Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
This forum is in permanent archive mode. Our new active community can be found here.
"Okay then! How DO atheists act!?"
I was in the car the other night coming back from volunteering. My aunt turned to me and said "You sure you're an atheist?"
"Huh? What do you mean?" I said.
"Your demeanor, your "spirit" is not like someone who doesn't believe in God." "What!" I exclaimed. "Is it because I went to the shelter to help! People of all beliefs help other people and-"
"That's not what I mean. I mean you just don't" she interrupted.
"Is it because I care about things and people? What are you trying to say?" "I'll talk to you about it later."
"It sounds like you don't even have a clear answer or question. What do you think people who aren't Christians are?"
"I'll talk to you about it later."
"You are strawmaning."
Anyway, based on my observations what really makes atheists different. I mostly see cool, intelligent or just regular people. I see the same with my Christian friends or Muslim relatives or whatever they are. If you run into an asshole hypocritical Christian or an douche bag atheist that doesn't mean everyone in that group is like that.
Anyway, have anyone had this type of confrontation or argument. I'm kinda curious.
"Huh? What do you mean?" I said.
"Your demeanor, your "spirit" is not like someone who doesn't believe in God." "What!" I exclaimed. "Is it because I went to the shelter to help! People of all beliefs help other people and-"
"That's not what I mean. I mean you just don't" she interrupted.
"Is it because I care about things and people? What are you trying to say?" "I'll talk to you about it later."
"It sounds like you don't even have a clear answer or question. What do you think people who aren't Christians are?"
"I'll talk to you about it later."
"You are strawmaning."
Anyway, based on my observations what really makes atheists different. I mostly see cool, intelligent or just regular people. I see the same with my Christian friends or Muslim relatives or whatever they are. If you run into an asshole hypocritical Christian or an douche bag atheist that doesn't mean everyone in that group is like that.
Anyway, have anyone had this type of confrontation or argument. I'm kinda curious.
Comments
PeopleBelievers expect us to: constantly shout profanities, give everyone the finger, shove old ladies in front of buses, have sex all day long in the middle of Central Park in every position that is not the missionary position (don't forget to tell the cops to fuck off, while flipping them the bird and resisting arrest), vote for Obama, smoke drugs, kill and eat babies, overthrow the government, plant bombs, hijack planes, etc.Generally, we're expected to be moral-less. They think that denouncing god includes losing your heart.
Thankfully I haven't had the pleasure to speak to such people.
Oh yeah, and please take care of the spelling mistake in the title. It's really annoying to constantly see erroneous thread titles in a forum that supposedly prides itself in the attention it pays to not be a kiddie forum where people are unable or unwilling to use the spell-check of Firefox or the forum itself provides.
It's funny how people whose beliefs ostensibly say that you should be altruistic can't conceive of somebody doing so in the absence of any sort of reward. They've been taught that godless people are wicked and evil, so they just can't figure out how an atheist could actually do something nice for someone.
The problem with being a member of any group is that you'll always be held accountable for the actions, behaviors, and opinions of any vocal minorities inside your group. It's like how if you're an anime fan you're going to have to answer for the sweaty hentai fanboy types, even if you never watch the stuff and can actually talk to people without embarrassing yourself.
{snip}
"Well, I don't believe in God."
"But you seem so nice!"
So that's that. The atheists I know are inherently kinder than some (not all) of the Christians I know, one in particular who seems to believe that her ivory tower is impenetrable because of her beliefs. Combine this with some other stuff I've been through, and I'm almost completely done with my faith.
Zen Buddhism has always seemed more sane, anyway. No strict commandments, just a philosophy for living compassionately. Even without God.
I really like the Jesuit point of view (Liberation theology? Priests in common dress with AKs? Liberation in general? Fuck yeah!), but it's never been extensively taught to me. I'm finding Buddhism far less restrictive and objectionable than the church, which to me feels corrupted by human influence. I dunno. It's a tricky subject.
Religion as a culture, guide, way-of-life, philosophy, or what-have-you is fine and interesting and perfectly dandy. The "short shrift" only comes if someone wants to pretend that there actually, truly is a sky mage behind it all.
So here is a question, which came first? Society or Religion. I always though it was kind of convenient that religious values for the most part reflect the values of a society.
beliefcult that demands the same things.I'd be curious to see how these theists who freak out over immoral atheists react to someone who identifies themselves as, say, a secular humanist rather than as an atheist.
While I don't like rebranding in principle, it's so effective that I might just start doing it.
If a person is not thinking, and is merely acting reflexively and instinctively, why should you bother to change your terminology to get them to act negatively or positively any more than you would care about getting the IM chat bot to agree with you? The first step, as is the first step with the chat bot, is to make them think. Once they are actually thinking, then you can go on to actually have meaningful intellectual interaction.
The problem isn't that they aren't thinking per se, it's that they're conditioned. See, after I get someone to agree with my secular humanist ideas, I drop the bomb: that's what it means to be an atheist. Sometimes it doesn't work, but many times, I've gotten people to go, "Huh. I never actually thought about it like that before." Whether or not they actually change behavior is another story, but making any amount of progress like that is good.
Basically, I get people to agree with me, and then backtrack and show them that I was just being an atheist all along. It's tough to break somebody's mental conditioning, but that's the way to do it. You have to be polite, open-minded, and not preachy, and then show them that you can be all that, a good person, and an atheist. The people who are "savable" will really think about that, mull it over, and maybe change a little bit. Only the most irrational people will react negatively, and those people can then be marginalized.
Basically, I try to bring out the atheist in everyone, and show them that it's not all bad. At the very least, I get most people to admit to a more open-minded deistic approach, rather than a fervent one.
If someone is simply reacting to the input (atheist) by doing a prescribed action (becoming enraged), is this any different than the Chinese Room problem? In other words, is it possible to retrain an unthinking person to start thinking, or are they lost once they get to a certain age / mental resolve?
I wouldn't be surprised if the backlash against atheism grew greater in the coming years, as more and more of the world is either philosophically or practically atheist. I mean, look at Asia and most of Europe. Many Britons, even though they may still consider themselves part of the Church of England, live their lives as atheists.
Most of what we see is the result of people being taught to suppress critical thought. Remember that every major religion has to tell you specifically not to question it, as their beliefs cannot be confirmed by rational inquiry. The fact that you have to be told not to think indicates that thinking is the default setting for people. If the majority of people weren't innately thinking creatures, we wouldn't be here today.
Part of the problem we have today is information overload. We've been shoving information down people's throats ever since we've had the ability to do so, and now we have more information than can be retained at any one time. So, we teach people to be "open-minded," but we don't teach people how to separate good information from bad information. As a result, information of all sorts just gets jumbled around, and, well, people wind up believing anything that sounds convincing.
We need to re-teach people how to filter information. There was a time when we had so little information to learn, that we could afford to be as discriminating as possible with it, and to go to great lengths to acquire new knowledge. Now that we have too much information, we need to re-gear the process of teaching.
So, in other words, there's hope for most. We need to break people of the "open floodgate" mentality when it comes to information, and instead start instilling a sense of information discrimination into people. Everybody is capable of it, it's just that nobody is being made to do it. We're not conditioning people to use their critical thinking abilities, and that's what we need to be doing.