Attitude to Religion and its believers.
What is your general attitude towards those who believe in religion whether they are jewish, Muslim, Christian etc etc.
Do you get on well with any religious friends and neighbours?
Have you ever thought of believing in a religion at some point?
If you do not like the faiths, why?
If you DO, also why? Does this come from your family? Maybe something went bad during your life?
I get that Lemmy might have the same stereotype in Reddit that there are loads of atheists, but there's a good reason why despite criticism of religion, it is still here.
P.S. I am not religious or anti religious in any fashion, I am agnostic.
Imagine if that person did all the same things they do, but without the label of "religion" being attached.
Charity? Awesome! Habitat for Humanity is an explicitly Christian organization and does great work. In my neighborhood, the local Lutheran and Quaker churches give out free food to the poor, and they don't sneak any Lutheran or Quaker cooties into it. If you're good to others because you think God wants you to be good to others, that still really does count as being good to others.
Prayer? Okay, take "religion" off of it and they're meditating, thinking, or talking to themselves. That's good. Unless they're thinking and talking about torturing their neighbors eternally, or something creepy like that. (But even then, better to keep those fantasies to yourself than to act them out in public.) Die Gedanken sind frei — thoughts are free.
Going to worship services? Okay, they've got a weekly social event where they sing songs and listen to speeches. Sounds great, unless the songs are about "everyone outside this room is a terrible person and deserves to suffer forever" and the speeches are about hate politics. If they're about how wonderful it is to be nice to each other, or being brave and standing up against oppression, or something else that would be positive even without the label of "religion" on it, great!
Dietary rules? It's okay to have preferences, distinct cultures, cuisines, and so forth. For that matter: my family isn't Jewish, but when I was little, we ate kosher beef hot dogs, because my mom expected the rabbis would care about the meat being sanitary. (Unfortunately in retrospect, kosher slaughter is, shall we say, not clearly better than secular slaughter.)
What you said is all true, but you are ignoring the negative aspects of religion.
Religious influence, both on their followers and on government, is anti-science, misogynistic, and anti-LGBT.
Religions are funded like pyramid schemes, with the most desperate and vulnerable as their victims.
Religious indoctrination is child abuse.
Anti-science, misogyny, etc. are bad independently of whether they are done in the name of religion, or pseudoscience, or political ideology. Doing bad things in the name of religion is exactly as bad as doing them in the name of communism, or capitalism, or racial ideology, etc.
Anti-science, misogyny, etc may be bad independently of religion, but they aren't independent of religion. Religion is a source of these problems.
You can imagine a hypothetical religion that is simply a "social club" or whatever, but here in the real world religion comes with baggage.
Religion is why my cousin's children have never seen a doctor in their life. Religion is why my gay friend in high school tried to kill himself. Religious indoctrination has led to lifelong shame and trauma in many of my friends.
And this was just from a "moderate" sect of Christianity- the millions living under fundamentalist religion have it even worse.
Every terrible thing done under religion has been done without religion. None of them have happened without people (except for killing the different). Maybe people are the problem and religion is just one of many tools that can be used to harm other people. Tribalism exists in many forms, religion in its many flavors being just one of them.
Saying "maybe people are the problem" is reductive and unhelpful. But I agree with you broadly, religion is just a system or a tool, it can be used for good or evil.
To judge if religion is a good system or a bad one, we can use a cost benefit analysis. This is what we have been attempting to do in this thread.
But when it comes to sensitive subjects like religion, many people have a tendency to avoid, overlook, and deny the associated costs.
Saying "religion is the problem" when the problem crops up in many different areas regardless of which religions are present in an area or if religion isn't present at all makes it seem like you might be focusing on the wrong thing. Nationalism, religion, strong ideologies, groups with deep emotional bonds and a sense of insularity are all susceptible to the same things - charismatic leaders can easily direct their attention and they have a tendency towards directing their hostility towards groups that don't fit into their group.
So, tribalism. And if one tool won't work, or is removed completely from access, those who wish to use tribalism to mobilize a large group to help them achieve their goals will just use the next one that is available to them. The tools are rarely what are important to them, but the results. So I don't see how focusing on one tool, even a particularly well-suited tool, will solve the problem.
With or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil - that takes religion. -Steven Weinberg
Maoism did a lot of evil without any religion. Were all of its perpetrators bad people?
Yepperoni, thanks for putting this so succinctly.
I like this interpretation but last I checked the vegans aren't going to vote for a despot who will kill all non-vegans, and that they don't view the death of all non-vegans as a positive thing. (Most vegans I know are keenly aware they can only participate in veganism because of modern agricultural, distribution, and economic systems. They know veganism is an elitist choice that a lot of the world cannot make.)
I think that's the major difference here.
Sure. Voting for religious genocide is just as bad as voting for non-religious genocide: e.g. on the basis of nationalism, pseudoscience, or the like.
Agreed.
Wow, you sure did manage to slip in a bunch of self-serving misinformation about veganism for no fucking reason. Who are you actually trying to convince, I wonder. (I'm being sarcastic, I know perfectly well.)
I like this. You're good people.
I treat religion like my penis.
It's ok not to have one.
It's ok to have one.
It's ok to be proud of it.
But don't display it in public, and don't shove it down people's throats.
And NEVER whip it out in congress.
You aren't born religious. You are indoctrinated. I grew up in a cult. It wasn't nearly as bad as cults get, but it has its own insane
ramblings"teachings"I escaped my indoctrination because I took it too seriously. I wanted to adhere perfectly, which resulted in finding out how convoluted and hypocritical it is. It is impossible.
So in my confusion, I started to look more critically at the hows and whys. The result, religions all use the same dirty tactics to get people to believe. False promises, comforting lies and empty threats that will seem real to those who were taught magical thinking.
I reject religion.
But I cannot hate people who are religious for just being religious. They were a child when taught, or an adult so downtrodden they needed a fairy tale to continue life. Or perhaps just are a bit naive. It's a slippery slope. So... I can't blame people. I get it. I know what it's like and it saddens me the older people get, the less likely they'll ever escape the mental constriction religion brings.
I sure as fuck hate a religious person for commiting hate crimes. They can go to hell.
You are born with spiritual needs. It is clear that you still have unmet spiritual needs despite your religious trauma.
My spiritual need was liberation from this projective bullshit.
[x] doubt
Don't project your needs onto others.
I don't care unless they force me to believe the way they do.
What would you say to a person that wont use preferred pronouns of a trans person?
If you're trying to make an analogy here, that's incredibly short sighted.
Forcing religious values down other ppls throats is trying to dictate their life.
"forcing" aka asking to be referred to with certain pronouns is asking to have your own life respected.
One is about having your beliefs respected, the other is demanding others to act as if they were part of your faith no matter if they believe or care.
Some religions believe that they should proselytize as many people as possible, so really not letting them convert you is disrespectful to their beliefs.
I agree that there’s a difference, but I’m not sure a simple argument like this really works since it is difficult to say one belief is ‘better.’
Proselytizing: You can say no without repercussions.
"Forcing Their Beliefs:" You have to follow the religion or you will face legal/societal consequences.
Not really the same thing at all though is it?
Also bit of a weird constructed example. A faith like that can only lead to it's followers taking offense or religious totalitarianism.
Which is not something I'd engage with so idk why i would tolerate something so intolerant.
The comparison is also kinda failing since one is a belief and the other isn't.
A more fitting comparison would be ostracising someone for their faith vs insisting to misgender someone despite better knowledge.
So then what would you say to a person that wont use preferred pronouns of a trans person?
I'd say if you can at all help it please be less of a cunt
I’d tell that person they’re being intolerant and offensive, and to fuck off.
And I’ll tell you that that is an unrelated question to the topic, and that you are being offensive by injecting that question in such a manner. You can pick your religion. You cannot pick whether or not you have gender dysphoria.
It's not analogous nor related to the topic, but since you asked, this scenario requires a lot of assumptions.
Is said person intentionally misgendering? I'll make it quick. "Please respect [trans person]'s preferences." It's not my business to force them to comply or not.
Taking a WAG at the number, I would say that 90% of people in your belief group would use soft power against someone that wouldnt go along with using their new pronouns. This includes things like banning them from social media, kicking them off youtube, debanking them, ect. Do you think that using influence like this is approapraite to get people to not offend the trans people?
No.
Okay then it sounds like you are like what normal christians are. The problem is that most of the people in your group will start yelling and use their soft force to get people to comply, which most christians dont do. So in the end your group is the one that is trying to use force to get people to follow their ideology.
What would you say to a person who refuses to acknowledge or take into consideration the belief of a religious individual?
It's very different. Misgendering is illegal where I live, but you can't be forced to care about someone else's dumb beliefs
I wouldnt say anything. Modern christians in america are much much more accepting than those of the "woke" philosophy.
I am agnostic, and if a god exists, I hate them.
I hate the belief not the believer
preach (pun intended)
All religions are made up. No one has ever proven that a "god" or supernatural entity exists, no one, ever. It's all mythology, fiction and "supernatural" nonsense. Ghosts, angels, demons, gods, spirits, pick a name, pick a flavor, none of it is real. It's like insisting that Harry Potter, James Bond, Tinkerbell, Captain Kirk or Superman are actually real living people / spirits / entities, and they have the ability to control you now and after you die. Just because you, or someone claims it's real does not make it factual. You are allowed to believe in whatever you want to, but you are NOT allowed to force others to believe that same thing. If you truly believe in your "religion", you would research it in every way possible, reading pro and con information to get a balanced understanding of what you decided to believe in. You will learn where all the stories of your religion originate from, and that will actually decide what you choose to believe in. Religion is a lifestyle choice.
I consider myself an anti-theist. Religion is used to control unintelligent/mentally challenged people and shouldn't exist in any form.
I don't hate the people unless they are forcing it down my throat.
Congratulations, this is the vision philosophers shared during the Lumières
Ramen
I don't mind them doing their thing at home, but I could do without them shoving their lifestyle in everybody's face in public.
I don't tell non-straight people they can't have their pride parade, I don't tell people they shouldn't kiss or hold hands in public, I don't tell religious people they can't have public displays, either. What I object to is if any of those groups insist I join them, or insist I don't.
I hope my sarcasm was clear
Growing up in religious circles I kinda learned that there's no good in religion. Surely there's good religious people, but they spread the evil word the same as those who want to bring the oppressive shit onto others.
Religion has never been good for anything but for controlling masses
Mostly I find them annoying. I mildly understand the need for human meaning as it kind of, tends to come up later at night, or for the elderly, or when life really sucks or you tend to even just be really really bored right.
I also understand some of the benefits, right, like. As much as people will despise to admit it, you don't get, say, the number zero without the Muslim science guys, and you don't get science without the enlightenment which stemmed out of some weirdass Catholic Christian theory guys. and then everyone's all like, oh no well you can't attribute that to the Catholics and if anything they hampered progress, and I'd say, well, maybe, maybe, but also maybe science sucks as we commonly understand it and maybe also you can't really divorce any part of things from their cultural context, or else things get fucky.
On the other hand I find them annoying and I find that all to be totally null and void because the vast majority of people are just using it as an opiate to placate literally all of their anxieties about the world with a bunch of meaningless thought terminating cliche style statements, and even actively reinforce their own participation in some of the worst aspects of their own culture and society even at points in which they really don't want to or know that it's horrible and is causing them pain.
So I dunno, mostly it sucks.
I'm atheist. My mom is a devout catholic (and raised me that way) and my dad is an atheist Jew. I never truly believed and mostly think religion is dumb, but I'm fine with everyone believing or not as they see fit. I'm not fine when others' religion is forced on anyone else - e.g., abortion restrictions, the 10 commandments being displayed in Louisiana classrooms.
I just don't support dogmatic thinking and indoctrination, especially when it creeps into politics, which is inevitable at the scale of the most popular religions.
In theory I have no problem with other people's faith, but in practice it degrades the critical thinking capacity of our population and, paradoxically, the moral capacity as well. That's a net negative in my opinion.
Charities exist without religion. I think religions often teach good moral frameworks, though very traditional. But those come with a huge caveat that you cut out a big hole in your brain for the belief that God exists and cares about how you behave. That one idea leads to so much trouble, from false prophets to normalized misogyny and hatred of gay people.
personally, i don't get, like, at all. i don't care what nonsense folk put their faith in, so long as they don't use it to justify being a dick, or try to justify others being a dick. maybe they get some pity/sympathy from me, to a point, cause they probably got brainwashed when they were a child, or otherwise in a vulnerable state, and maybe some amusement depending on how 'out there' their counterfactual beliefs are.
i generally get on well enough with my religious friends, but it's not a topic that comes up much in real life.
i don't usually care for organized religion, but that has more to do with my anarchism than my atheism.
this all goes equally whether we're talking about conventional religions, modern conspiracy theories, new-age mumbo jumbo, or what-have-you.
I’m an ex-Christian, the more I read the Bible, the more it doesn’t make sense. But I respect others choices to believe in their higher power, whatever that may be that makes their life work. Double points if they respect back. They all can’t be right.
I don't really care if they believe in something.
I would never try to convince them to stop or anything like that.
I think the type of people that frequent Reddit and Lemmy and constantly complain and mock religious people are the worst.
I used to be fence sitter agnostic but Qanon has made me deep on the athiest side. I don't care what ones religion is but I don't want to hear about it. Its fine to mention it but if someone is always talking about it then I will avoid them.
For the don't-anger-the-sky-daddy religions, roughly the same as having a crazy aunt who gives 10% of her shit to a psychic or Trump. I haven't experienced the be-one-with-the-universe religions being as exploitative, but I guess those wack Theravadan Wats don't pay for themselves.
https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/10/india/dalai-lama-apology-kissing-boy-video-intl-hnk/index.html
Buddhism has its own set of worthless freaks, you know.
Those who believe in an invisible sky wizard (or any other delusion) belong in psychotherapy.
It's ok, I'll pray for you /j
I have a spiritual need and that's liberation from this discrimitory bullshit /srs
As someone who is mostly agnostic, those who belive that absence of evidence equals evidence of absence belong in psychotherapy.
There is zero evidence either way, the best we can say is that we don't know.
Yeah man something about Russell's tea pot
We have no evidence for gods, that's it. There's no need to provide evidence for absence of god, the burden of proof belongs to the person who makes the claim (that there's a god/gods).
Unknowns just exists, religion assigns the unknown form. Why is that justified and even more incredible important to those who believe that it be true and to make choices due to the assignment of that form?
Because science tries to understand the unknown using reason, religion throws the reason away and says it was gods.
I get what you're saying, but saying people who choose to believe something that can't be proven and hasn't been disproven need psychotherapy is like saying the same for color preferences. Sometimes there is no right answer and people should be able to choose.
Opinions are opinions. Opinions don't change the fact that earth is orbiting the sun or that religions are a hoax
First, religions and the existence of God are two different things, just like the existence of the earth and the earth being flat are two different things. Likewise, the existence of religions is no guarantor of God's existence, nor is there many flaws proof of his non-existence. And unknowns are facts we haven't discovered or proven yet, much like germ theory, or fanciful ideas which haven't been debunked, such as the idea that an imbalance of humors was the cause of disease.
The problem with this theory is that we dont have a complete explanation for existence without the existence of a higher power.
Yep, but we have tool for trying to understand it. It's called scientific method, and it has so far been able to help us understand the mechanics of the universe without resorting to crazy claims such as "yeah must have been super powered aliens", which is the only offer from religion.
I do get that there's a chance that it's all bogus, and that there really is or was a god that created everything in a way we have been able to measure it, but why exactly should I believe it? Which story should I believe? 'In this world of a million religions everyone prays the same way', the same human made stories written over centuries trying to explain the world around us. In this context religion seems nothing more than a predecessor to scientific method turned into crowd control tool.
My main point is any philosophy about where humans came from is a matter of faith. I was just pointing out the issue where evolution doesnt sufficiently explain things, but most atheists are aware of this or just handwave away the problem.
I suppose on picking a religion you would need to look at what makes the most logical sense, and is most consistent. Also I would look at what has the best track record with the best outcome.
Yeah that religion is called science. To suggest that gaps exist on evolution so we need to go examine religion is an a joke of an argument. The difference in successful capturing of the reality of the process of life by the theory of evolution to any religion is galactic in scale. Your justification is ridiculous and only exists because you cannot let go of the lies someone taught you as a child in order to control you.
The joke is that you think you follow science and then outright discount things when they are not what you want.
I mean we can talk about how god is a non sense idea.
So with what certainty do you think there is no God?
Around the same certainly that I think balloons exist inside giraffes on the moon of TRAPPIST-1b.
So this points out how you dont care about science because you are completely close minded. What you will find is that with your group this is common, they will not even begin to admit the possibility of a deity.
Evolution theory DOES explain where we came from, and the theory is proven billion times over and over. It's insanity to believe anything else. As Dawkins neatly put it, we have more evidence for evolution theory than we have for Holocaust.
No, 'atheists' do not handwave problems found in scientific theories away but study it until it's no longer a problem. What religion does is just says "it must be gods" and throws any reason to thrash bin
The issue is you guys do handwaving about how the basic building blocks started and then go on to look at fossil progression. You guys need to stop and look at how it seems to be impossible for DNA to develop and how evolution doesnt have a good explaination for it.
No one is handwaving away problems we are yet to solve, except the people just claiming "must have been gods"
There has always been and probably always will be new problems to solve. Scientists have been working on trying to understand and resolve those problems, and we know so much more today than we did 100 years ago. We take evolution theory as a fact, because it's the theory that has been proven billions of times again and again, and we keep finding more proof for it. Just because we might not know everything yet, is not an argument against the only working theory we have.
Your Christ illusion has been proven zero times
You can say its not handwaving, but as evolution currently stands it is an impossible theory. Until there is an actual explanation you can say its been "proven billions of times".
All the evidence we have supports evolution theory
Except for the very start of it, and unless you can answer that question it voids all of evolution.
isn't a 'higher power' just kicking the can down the road?
It could be, I guess it would all depend on the theory of what a higher power is. If its God, then thats the endpoint, if its aliens or simulation theory, then it definitely is a kick.
i am not sure what's the difference there. why is one an endpoint, and the others aren't?
God would be an endpoint in that its the full explaination, where as if aliens put the basic building blocks of life on earth then the question is where did the aliens come from.
Literally anything that anyone can ever imagine, is not all equally probable.
This position is a straw man. Atheists generally do not argue that God categorically does not exist. Instead, we usually say that we don't believe in God because there is insufficient evidence. Much like the proverbial invisible unicorn in your backyard - since there is no evidence that it exists, there is no reason for it to affect how we go about our daily lives.
When it comes to whether you're agnostic or atheist, I think it helps to answer the following question on a scale of 0 - 10: How confident are you that God exists? If you say around 5, then you're agnostic. If you say around 1 or 2, then you're an atheist.
The one thing that still remains unclear with regards to science and god is the big bang.
The way I have heard it explained is that before the big bang there was nothing.
Which to my mind becomes:
This does not make sense to me, how can nothing explode?
So there are three categories of answer to this question:
A. There was something before the big bang which exploded, though this offeres not explanation of how the thing that exploded came into existance, I have heard theories about how the universe is cyclical and how it will eventually collapse into a new big bang, but that doesn't answer the queation about the first big bang.
B. God exists and triggered the big bang, that means that the god entity exists outside of our universe.
C. We are just a highly advanced simulator, the big bang was the the program starting our simulation.
There is no rule that says the universe must make sense to human beings. In fact the more we learn about it - subatomic particles, quantum mechanics, the multiverse, etc. the stranger it becomes and the less it appears to operate in ways that are intuitive to our primitive primate brains.
Hell, even space and time might not be fundamental properties, and could themselves be abstractions which emerge from an even deeper underlying reality...
All of which is to say your list should have an extra option:
D. Who The Fuck Knows?
That's fair.
I was about to add that option, but forgot about it.
I guess what makes me annoyed about it is that we know that the big bang happened, but we don't know what triggered it or what was before.
It's more like what happened before big bang has no consequences to what happened after. Because this, we have little idea what happened before because there's no direct evidence.
That is a new way of putting it that I have not heard before, I like it, it doesn't answer my questions as much as defecting them. It forces me to realize thsybit doesn't matter.
I believe in that which we can prove, because we have evidence of those things.
Not invisible sky wizards. Lol
I respect the fact that people believe. They even can form their own clubs as far as I'm concerned. Forcing those beliefs onto other people is something I do have an issue with.
I myself am Christian and have never had trouble getting along with others no matter their religious beliefs. The only conflict is when someone thinks their religion or religious precepts should be made law; I have no tolerance for that.
Despite the claimed ostensible "good" Religion can supposedly bring...
We're literally in the middle of a mass extinction event and facing our own extinction and belief in this religious horseshit precludes people from caring or believing in man-made disaster.
We're literally facing our own extinction because these people can't be fucked to face up to reality instead of playing cult games of "but I'll have everlasting life after death so who cares what happens to the planet!"
I don't give one flying fuck what "good" it can do for an individual, it's going to be the downfall of human fucking civilization.
Whatever "good" it brings is destroyed and overshadowed by the cult like behavior that would worship corrupt figures like Donald Trump and who choose to live in a false reality simply because it is more comforting.
Don't ask don't tell
Same way I get on wih other people who have imaginary friends, I just ignore them and worry about the inevitable indoctrination (aka abuse) of their children.
Keep it to yourself and don't hurt others. So long as that's the case, what someone else believes is generally not my business.
I was raised in various evangelical protestant denominations of Christianity, went through a Neopagan period, and landed in atheist-leaning agnostic.
I don't hold belief against people so long as they act appropriately toward others.
I have some positive and negative opinions toward particular religions based on their foundations and practices.
I kinda long for a sense of spiritual community, but I can't make myself have faith in something I don't believe, no matter how nice it seems. So that kinda sucks
I'm a Pluralistic individual. I believe everyone has a reason to believe. But I think the way someone believes is very telling about that person's personal values.
Ergo, I don't care what a person's religious beliefs are, I care what that person's values are. I believe that is a much more honest approach that doesn't needlessly alienate anyone or stoke petty, tribalistic behavior.
It's totally okay, just like when my nephew talks about dinosaurs.
When my siblings and I were kids, our parents considered themselves christian and we went to church. But as we grew up, we all stopped believing, and we convinced our parents to stop too. I don't generally want to convince most religious people to stop, but we were kids at the time and didn't really know the ramifications of disillusioning our parents. If religious people can believe in "heaven"(or equivalent) and think they are going there, it's a really nice thought that I don't want to take away from them. But people that use religion to hurt people, yeah I kind of want to take it away from them. I guess like anything else in life, if you are using it to be nice and constructive, cool. If you are using it to hurt people, take it away.
The real version of death kind of sucks. It honestly kind of physically hurts/feels bad to even think about ceasing to exist permanently. I feel like that has always been the true purpose and main point of religion. Pretending death is absolutely anything else other than what it really is. I don't want to take that aspect away from anyone.
I do, because choosing to believe in a comforting lie is what leads us to despots killing anyone who is different. There's a direct line between the two.
Donald Trump is a comforting lie that a strong man (like God, the ultimate strongman) can come in and just "fix things" because it's easier to believe that than do the hard work of understanding how complex and confusing our world is. That's where we're at, the comforting lies appeal to humanity more than cold truth and it's going to fucking kill us all.
Sorry, humans need to get the fuck over themselves with this not being able to handle death shit or wake up to our own extinction. Eternal life, reincarnation, it's every flavor of stupid.
Religious or not, I don't care. What matters is their personality. (except for jehova's witnesses, every time I've interacted with them it made me think they're some sort of cult rather than a religion, so not sure if this counts.)
I do have religious friends that I get well with.
In New Zealand we're currently waiting on the release of a report from a parliamentary commission on the state of the Jehovah's Witnesses following decades of abuse claims. We don't expect it to be light reading.
As someone married to a JW and who is friends with several others, I will say this: like any group of people, they can be a mixed bag. Some are more closeted and "in the truth" whereas others are more outgoing and "worldly".
One the things that I actually admire about them (the individuals, mind you, not the Watchtower organization) is that they really seem to try and live by the teachings of the Bible and study it frequently. Much more so than, say, your average evangelical Protestant.
If a person is smart an has personal opinions about everything or if they are a person of power I won't trust them. Because how can I prove they are a true believer and not a liar or sociopath?
If a person is average human who thinks what the crowd thinks then I won't care.
Attitude: I generally don't care unless they try to tell me what to do based on their religion. This is generally never a problem, I've had more vegans and environmentalists bother me.
Getting along: we have some high faith denomination of Christianity here. I've worked with a few and generally don't notice unless they drop something heavy on their foot and don't swear.
Thought of believing: not since I was 12 or something.
Do not like faiths: I acknowledge they can create a sense of community and belonging. I have a dim view of the dogma that tends to come with them.
I'm greek orthodox, my family, is greek, and the religion comes with it
I get along with all amd you should too, religious or non-religious shouldn't be a question, a party is a party. Get messed up and regret it in the morning
The only one's I don't really like is protestants but thats because
of my racism against british peopleI think quite a few of the protestant demoninations strangle the meaning of what it means to be a christian.Although surprisingly, I've known anti/atheistic people who gave me meat on several occasions during fasting (where we go basically go vegan) even though i reminded them about it before they even started cooking. We also have some of them in the board with us aswell, the "the religious belong in psychotherapy" types.
One of the biggest mistakes faith has done is try and influence things outside of the church espically in modern day schenanigans like politics. The church should be the peaceful escape from the outside world, not the opposite
From how I see it, my religion is beautiful, provides me an undescribable sense of peace, and I know the people who are at my parish are people i can depend on if i ever need help
I am Anti-theist, If anyone brings up religion around me I will not hesitate to tear it down. These people are playing make belief and if affects my life, I have to live in a world where people make decisions based on some imaginary sky friend.
I will not play nice for the sake of someone feeling good about their bullshit.
So you're an asshole, using religion as an excuse to berate and bully people, got it.
Flat-earther comes up to you and tells you the earth is flat. What do you do tell them to each there own? Or do you tell them no the earth is not flat and they should educate themselves?
That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying you don't need to be an asshole to disagree. You don't need to "tear down" beliefs and "not play nice". Being rude to people for being wrong just makes them dig deeper into being wrong out of defensiveness. It isn't about edification, it's about finding an excuse to be mean.
That said, other people's education is not my responsibility. Taking the time and energy required to correct a random stranger about what shape the earth is isn't going to change the world but it will take a toll on me. Being wrong doesn't make them a bad person. Being a jerk to them for believing so does. Believing in a flat earth a symptom of fundamentally flawed reasoning skills that I don't have the time or energy to deal with. If someone believes the earth is flat, I'll politely disagree and state my opinion, but ultimately I'll let them do them. Who cares. I choose my friends, they won't make the cut.
I actually care a lot about people. I don't care much for ideas though.
How's it go? Love the person hate the imaginary "friends"?
One thing that's nice about being visibly queer is that luckily people don't try to con me into their religions.
Unfortunately, "these people" have to live in a world where you exist too and your conflicting attitude affect their lives.
Learn to live and let live, my friend. You cannot expect the world to accept you if you are not ready to accept them.
I accept people, I will never accept irrational/harmful beliefs. Luckily it looks like access to the internet's vast wealth of knowledge is killing religion in the next generations.
Don't say, don't ask.
As long as they’re not an intolerant dick about believing or not believing, whatever they go with is fine. It’s none of my business.
I hate the ignorance that edgy kids have about religion, having exposure only to a very very very narrow sample and extrapolating to infinity. Not every religious practice opposes truth, or oppresses and exploits its practitioners. No more than every political practice does. Religious practice is an expression of our innate humanity. You cannot just get rid of it, any more than you can get rid of any fundamental human need. What is important is finding safe, healthy, ethical and helpful means of expressing it.
My uncle is a pastor. So when his kid came out as trans, he and his wife did the ‘good moral Christian’ thing and shamed her and harassed her until she committed suicide.
Then deadnamed her at the funeral, and wrote and published a book about how ‘his betrayal’ and ‘his unfortunate death’ were just tests from God to test their faith.
This is not a rare or unique story; many people all over the world have stories like this. Is it any wonder those who pay attention find religion distasteful? It may be a part of humanity, but many unpleasant things are, and there is nothing ‘edgy’ about rejecting them.
Yes, there are ‘good’ churches in my town that feed and clothe the poor; a far cry from my uncle’s church. But they are part of the same religion, and the fact that religion accepts both, morals be damned, means I have no interest in it.
Their point is that there's more than 1 widely-practiced religion, and there are plenty of sects that are tolerant to different forms of self-expression. Saying food is bad because you don't like bananas isn't sound logic, and applying that same logic to religion doesn't work either.
I can't speak for any Christians, but many of the religious people I know are some of the most tolerant people I know because their religious schools focused on doing things with good intent.
Could you name them for me? Not beliefs, just religions
Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism are some, but Asia has many more religions/ideologies.
All of these are philosophy not monotheism
All the examples I provided are religions.
Philosophy is not religion, your answer speaks volumes
Your ignorance is genuinely louder. All of those are religions, and any credible source you find will agree with me.
Tell me, who is god/deity in Buddhism? https://www.history.com/topics/religion/buddhism Oh look no deity https://www.britannica.com/topic/Sikhism No deity there either https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hinduism Also No deity
Coming next, But those aren’t real sources
Philosophy versus Religion
Now I’m done wasting time on you.
"...scholars consider Buddhism one of the major world religions."
"Sikhism, [a] religion and philosophy..."
"Hinduism (/ˈhɪnduˌɪzəm/)[1][2] is an Indian religion or dharma..."
Your own sources say that all 3 are religions.
They say they are philosophies, answer the question. Who is their deity ? A spiritual god? Or a physical person?
Sikhism is a staunchly monotheistic religion.
(Wiki says otherwise, though they do conflate religion with philosophy)[Sikhism (/ˈsɪkɪzəm/ SIK-iz-əm), also known as Sikhi (Punjabi: ਸਿੱਖੀ Sikkhī, [ˈsɪk.kʰiː] ⓘ, from Punjabi: ਸਿੱਖ, romanized: Sikh, lit. 'disciple'), is a monotheistic Indian religion and philosophy]
Bruh... That quoted text says that it is a monotheistic religion. Please just learn the thing and don't die on the hill. They have a holy book (the guru granth sahib ji), together with a wider collection of religious and philosophical works (the bani). They have rituals and the like. Things like the 5 Ks. They believe in a singular deity (Ik Onkar) who is, according to Sikhism, the same deity that the Muslims call Allah. Onkar is the Punjabi symbol for Aum (A very important Hindu concept). The gurus (their leaders), are supposed to be god. The idea is that they are a reflection of God, likening God to the ocean and the gurus to a bucket that is filled by the ocean. Their holy book is the last and final guru and simultaneously god and leader/teacher.
Point of the above is I know what I am talking about. All of those are definitely religions with a belief in deities and afterlifes and holy books and miracles, etc...
At what age does one stop being an "edgy kid" in your eyes?
50% grow out of it by mid thirties.
The Internet atheism movement of the late 90s was extremely liberating and enlightening to many people. But, it has gradually become hateful and I think it has long since run out its useful lifetime. We can't just stop there, we need to collectively develop a more informed, nuanced and compassionate view. Today's threat isn't baptist fundamentalism, it's fucking fascism. You can't hate yourself out of that, you only sink deeper.
Like supporting
trans, gay or poc rights or free food for childrengun rightsIs it your poorly stated, smug, so-ironic-no-one-knows-what-you-are-talking-about point that all religions promote oppression based on sexuality and gender, of the poor, and of children? Because that sounds an awful lot like American conservatism, not religion. But since you won't come right out and state your points clearly in a way that can be directly refuted, how about you just fuck off.
Shit in one hand and pray in the other stupid motherfucker
You are being hateful towards religion. That is very different than rationally opposing religious oppression and persecution, which obviously is a thing that does exist and needs to be opposed, but which does not define religion. You can't make things better with hate. Figure your shit out.
Shove your religion up your ass
WHAT religion? I was one of those edgy young mid 90s atheists.
Look, I'm sorry. I can see that you have trauma. But please don't take it out on other people.
Serious question, do you still believe in the Easter bunny and Santa Claus?
Edit: these examples are heavily promoted as Christian
"Serious question," asks ridiculous question. You don't need me here for the rest of this conversation, say what you are going to say. As long as you are not about to extrapolate from some abusive sect of Christianity that you are familiar with to the entire concept of religion generally. You know, like I just said.
How do you know that science is not a believe like the other ? My answer is in challenge it with other believe systems to explain reality. Of course some things make a lot more sense with science methodology, but to be faire, te main point of religions is not to explain gravity.
I consider other believes as opportunities, no to explain to others, or to be taught by others, but making both and strengthen us all.
However, we shall to care do not confuse religions and believes. A lot of people took part in religions and do not believes, and others believes and do not took part in a dedicated community. This is a different topic. Communities are generally a good thing, but hierarchy lead to abuses. This true in every organization, religions include
Not sure if I'm taking the bait but here goes.
Science is a set of processes where you take belief out of the equation. You can start with something akin, which when you have informed belief you have an hypothesis which you set out to prove. You don't hold that as truth and anything not falsifiable is not a valid hypothesis.
Science is not a religion, it's just a thing. Plenty of people need to belief to function and end up having (even a blind) faith in science, using it as a religion.
On your second point I'm with you on the last part though I think you are calling religions and believes things that are organized religion and religion.
In any demonstration, you have to make some unproven statement, taken as true. It could be "1+1 = 2" or "God exists". So sciences are methodologies based on believes. Lot of religions use logic and reasons, based on science and philosophy, to deduce things from their core believes. This is theology.
So if both science and religions are based on believes, and could have the same methods, how to distinguish one of the other ? We could argue that science try to reduce believes as possible. Personally I'm not good enough in sciences to argue with religious people, and demonstrate that point. In trying to challenge my believes in scientific models, I have to stay tolerant with religious people (I'm not sure I would otherwise); which is a most productive approach. Furthermore, it helps to have a critical point on view on science (as you've said, and to taking it as a blind faith)
If you need unproven statements to prove something, then it isn't science.
You do have start somewhere. Complex numbers have an impossible assumption at its core. But it needs to be falsifiable. You need to be able to prove it isn't true and fail at it.
God exists and God is all powerful are a blanket check to solve everything, because it just does whatever you want it to and you don't even try to prove it. 1+1 = 2 is a semantic axiom, not really equivalent to wilder assumptions you can do where those wouldn't be comparable to there's an all powerful something in existent in our reality that affects it at will.
It's like believing there's a multiverse, it's not a useful axiom as it's not measurable and specially not falsifiable.
It's useful to keep an open mind and not discard people based on irrational beliefs, but God is something you can only accept in the scientific method if you bend or break the method.
Imo, That's not even looking at the fact that any type of religious organization ends up being someone taking advantage of the faithful. It irks me to no end, and it's rare to find faithful in a vacuum.
Contemporary philosophy and sciences are different from religion in some aspects. One important aspect is that these academic fields rely on rational arguments, while religion today mostly relies on traditional beliefs and faith.
Let's say a philosopher is pondering the idea that direct experience is not necessary for knowledge. The only way to go and declare this publicly is to elaborate why, how, in a rational and rigorous manner. Most scientists work with objects that admit replicated experimentation, so they must do that, let's say in their case, to demonstrate that a rain frog only comes out with heavy rain, but not with light rain. In contrast to these two, a religious or spiritual person might give "arguments", but this argumentation is never to see if their belief resists examination, it is only to convince others of this belief that has been established as truth before everything else. In other words, philosophy and sciences examine their thesis (hypothesis, theory, etc.) and never assume they have the ultimate truth; on the contrary, they keep searching and exploring possibilities. Talking here about the disciplines and not the individuals who can be different from this from time to time (e.g., a dogmatic professor). Meanwhile, religion and spirituality do not have thesis or any beliefs that are susceptible to drastic change. They establish core beliefs or dogmas, and only later might try to prove them or not, depending if they find this exercise important.
Are they all ultimately unprovable statements? I guess so, but we should care how these statements come to be and how we justify them. To me, it makes an enormous difference.
I rather believe in climate change in which human action is definitely affecting the Earth (source: sciences) and the importance of stopping it as we seem to have a responsibility to others and to ourselves (source: ethics, a branch of philosophy), than to believe that there is a conspiracy to make us believe about climate change (source: perhaps imagination) and that we shouldn't do anything anyway because there is no reason to (source: ignorance or dogmatism, honestly).
I try to remain critical of rational disciplines too, but that's ironically done with more rationality. And here I do not mean "cold" and rigid pseudo logical analysis, but something that admits different approaches as long as they are solidly justified.
I guess it comes down to who we are. I simply cannot be convinced without this I explained. I cannot believe in religion or spiritual beliefs. I sometimes get short videos about people telling many different stories, about ghosts, ayahuasca trips where they talked to superior entities, gods and the way they know they're real, etc. How can I believe what they perceive is real? Mere "leap of faith"? And why choose one over the other? Just because I like a particular system or because it benefits me in some way? Sorry, too arbitrary even for me that I sometimes act impulsively and capriciously. As I said, I guess the way we are allows us to accept or to deny different ways to approach existence. This is me.
Thank you for reading my stupidly long comment.