OK, I hadn't planned on blogging anything special on Easter this year but a Christian friend of mine replied to a microblog post I put up earlier today and it got me thinking about a few things:
1) The majority of Americans are Christian.
2) A tiny fraction of Americans are atheists.
3) Atheists don't get holidays.
4) When we get snarky in the face of quite a few public displays of affection for God, Jesus, etc, why aren't we just ignored like we usually are?
It seems disingenuous, to me, that the majority feels the need to defend itself against the minority. As an average atheist, it seems like I should have the right to be exponentially louder than the average Christian since there are so many of them out there. I need to speak up in order to be heard over the voices of all those believers.
Yet, I feel like I get lectured when I do speak up for myself and my beliefs.
I don't need to be told about how there's a God, or how Jesus died for my sins or whatever else. I've heard it all before. None of it is enough for me--not that I'm saying anything against you.
My friend explained that he felt the need to defend the intelligence of believers despite me not saying anything about the intelligence of believers in the first place. Really, it's not about how smart or dumb you are--it's about what you choose to believe and what you choose to do with that belief.
If it helps you to believe that there is a benevolent being watching over us that can be appealed to for help, by all means, believe in Him. Personally, I'd rather assume that there is no God and behave according to my own morals.
What bothers me is when people who normally talk about politics, current events, or other non-God-related things start talking about how "He is Risen". Suddenly, I'm wondering why they felt the need to say such a thing to me. Yes, OK, you're Christian, Happy Easter, enjoy the chocolate.
Then I see it again and again and I'm suddenly feeling like a freak for not believing that Jesus even existed. But whatever, man--people believe what they want and I'm fine with that. But on days like today, it's hard to move on, so I joke about how I'm going to take a moment to marvel at how the seasons work at keeping us alive and then watch "The God That Wasn't There" again.
Of course, my snarkiness is taken as disrespectful, or, at the very least, in need of a reply/counter-argument/etc. It seems like the majority can't leave the minority to it's whinyness. And that's ultimately, fine, too--I mean, it's the Internet, right? The majority of the web is porn and what isn't porn is divided up between illegal file sharing and useless arguments (it would seem).
What bothers me is when a belief in something un-provable replaces the known facts of a situation.
I could die of an aneurysm before I finish typing up this post. However, some of you would suggest "well, say a prayer, make sure God is happy with you and He won't let that happen."
Right, or I could just understand that I could die and move forward with the idea that I should live my life to the fullest because I could die at any time.
See? It's up to personal choice.
No right or wrong answer. Both sides can't prove they are right.
So, if you're a "believer" please, the next time you see one of us "non-believers" commenting about how we don't believe or are annoyed by religious holidays or whatever, keep your opinion to yourself. You're the majority. Anything you say is going to sound just as pompous, self-righteous and insulting as what we said in the first place. The difference is, we've already heard what you have to say and that's why we're atheists.
It might serve you to listen to our opinions since you may not have heard them before--it's not like we atheist have dramatically influenced culture for centuries the way y'all have.
Posting Editorial Wars on a blog near you.
ReplyDeleteAs long as I am not banned off of it.
Nice post, Pete. While you are right that the number of atheists is small, it is nevertheless growing and I suspect will continue to do so in the coming generations.
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't know where to even start responding to Bob Edwards. He seems to believe that atheists do not believe in anything? Very strange idea.
Michael Nugent’s last blog post: Debate - Is God Fraud?
Wow, Bob--I really want to read your entire comment, but honestly, it's just too long. :( I do disagree with the suggestion that it's impossible to be an atheist since it depends on how you define it. I define atheism as being without a theology and as being of the belief that there is no supreme being.
ReplyDeleteI'm an atheist. I don't practice a belief in a god (theology) and I see no evidence that there is a god. I do lean towards not believing in much these days, but at this point in the argument the very definition of "belief" gets fuzzy.
Regardless, the size of your post does suggest I was right to criticize believers--it seems like even people who are generally supportive of my blogging (like you, Bob) are fine with lecturing me on why I am wrong about myself. I always find that weird--I've been me for quite a few years now and while I have changed as a person, I'm pretty tight with me and I tell myself everything. ;) So, I'm firm in my knowledge that there is no evidence for the existence of God, god, or any other deities, and have felt no soul-based connection with a higher power, either.
Of course, none of this is the reason I'm not reading your entire comment, Bob--I simply don't have the time :( You should get on the Twitter--after using it for a while I learned the beauty of brevity, though I'm not always good at it on my blog. But thanks for visiting the blog--I'm glad you still stop by. :)
Michael, thank you so much for your comment! It's nice to see a fellow atheist posting. :) I'm enjoying your posts on Twitter, too, btw.
I'm sure we are growing in number--despite the last eight years of the Bush War On Science, science is reaching more people and allowing more and more to take solace in facts and knowledge, as opposed to putting faith in things we can't prove. While I don't want to prohibit others from believing whatever they want, I don't understand the psychology of believing in something you can't prove.
I had a lot of time to just post away. I had not posted in a while here, so I thought I would make up for it, and I love to just ramble when I am in the mode as you well know form my past postings on your site.
ReplyDeleteYou do not have to read my Long-long post. I probably wouldn't read yours either if you wrote one to me like I posted to you for the very same reasons you cited.
The points within it that I was making>
>All people are atheist. People just differ on what belief system they are an atheist there of.
> I think, there are secular meanings and teachings within religious texts that non believers can use found within the some biblical writings that can be applied constructively to a non believing lifestyle.
> If you get to the root reasons why these religious writings were recorded to begin with you would find that they are more secular than anything supernatural.
BTW, I never said you were wrong. I was even a bit supportive of your viewpoint.
Most people I know are agnostic, less are believers, but few are true non believers in any higher power found within or beyond this universe. Most believers I know do not believe in any biblical deity described in religious texts, but one they have created for themselves based on their own interpretations of what they want a deity to be to fit their own modern value system. Agnostic, and non believers I find to be more honest than believers for the most part.
I find no reason to challenge your viewpoint. I believe challenging viewpoints is a pointless endeavor. On the other hand, expressing ideas is a wonderful thing we are able to do, and it makes the world a diverse garden of thought & choices.
Oh, Michael Nugent, I do believe that atheist have a belief system. That was one of my points. The only true non belief system, if there is one, would be the one agnostics use, or lack there of rather.
ReplyDeletePS I was in ramble mode early this morning, so I apologies for my extremely long post.