#atheist discourse

[the-nerdy-autist]

Fuck You Tumblr

"Atheists are just as bigoted as religious people about women and LGBT rights!"

[captainjonnitkessler]

Sometimes people will say things like "minority and mainstream religions should be treated equally". But this is a trap and they will get VERY mad if you say that you do treat them as equally false or equally damaging, because what they actually meant was "it should be considered equally wrong to criticize or disrespect any religion in any manner".

[intimate-mirror]

routinely reminded of the fact that despite the fact that i think the existence of god is way more likely than most atheists do, in virtually every dispute in which "smug atheists" are complained about I consider them to be in the right

[edennill]

If Silm characters had Tumblr blogs (Years of the Trees):

Galadriel:

url: flowers-glade

pfp: probably a cat picture

blog title: have a voice and won't hesitate to use it

bio: 240s * mixed heritage (all three<3) * disrespect any and I am not liable for the consequences * anti-fëanorian * involved in politics to a reasonable extent

blog is a mix of aesthetic/poetry/literary analysis, strongly-voiced political views (no, she's not 'reasonably' involved), and personal posts that sound a lot like bragging tbh

Maedhros:

url: 12russandol

pfp: a picrew

blog title: Even scholars have their doubts, even painters have their missteps

bio: eldest brother of seven • yes, my father's Fëanor • probably won't reply to any asks about family matters • busy existing

posts like once a month on a very varied array of subjects. always polite

Caranthir:

url: you-are-the-blood-in-my-veins

pfp: something with a dark background

blog title: I just f**ing hate this world

bio: You're not going to like me, but maybe you'll stay to watch the trainwreck

very emo about it, song lyrics and edits, cultivates a deliberately edgy persona (is not really like this irl). steers clear of politics

Finrod:

url: manifestations-sevenfold-daffodil (bastardisation of some hyper-complex philosophical term + something random added on for good measure; if you ask him about the meaning he won't shut up)

pfp: cartoonish snake on a green background with yellow flowers (suspicious similarity to the arafinwean badge)

blog title: Edginess kills

bio: We could also just get on well with eachother :)

posts once a few days, reblogs anything that catches his eye. has contributed to various heritage posts though he isn't tumblr famous, has the epitome of a tumblr sense of humour. rarely makes original posts that aren't about complex philosophical questions.

Bonus - Fëanor:

has no consistent url because he gets banned every two months and has to make a new blog. is a troll. gets into a vicious fight with galadriel every week, neither knowing it's the other. very occasionally posts something more wholesome about his family or craft, but it's rare in comparison.

[chaos-in-one]

Atheistic Satanists who go SO FAR to separate themselves from (in a way that actively looks down on) theistic Satanists, especially ones who not only do that but also act like theistic Satanists are so rare or just don't exist at all are fucking weird. I promise you treating theistic Satanists worse will not ever make anti Satanist people like you more. It will not erase religious discrimination to stomp all over theistic Satanists. Theistic Satanists deserve to be treated well and have their religion understood and respected just as much as you do.

[hyperlexichypatia]

**Cracks knuckles and wades into The Discourse**

"Can atheists be culturally Christian?" is entirely the wrong question.

Of course they can! Plenty of people don't believe in the religious doctrines of Christianity, but still do things like celebrate Christmas or Easter, have church weddings, and other culturally Christian activities. Take for example, me -- I'm a Deist who is also culturally Christian. Christianity is the religious lens I understand best, even if I don't necessarily agree with it.

Plenty of atheists and broadly-secular people who live in majority-culturally-Christian places, like most of the U.S., also are often oblivious to the Christian basis of their cultural practices, and may think of culturally Christian practices are "universal" or "secular" or "for everyone." This comes up every time someone brings up the inappropriateness of public schools/places celebrating Christmas, when people come out of the woodwork to insist that of course Christmas isn't religious, they know plenty of secular people who celebrate it! (Note: This is often blamed on ex-Evangelicals, but I don't think that's fair. Ex-Evangelicals know what Christianity is. This is something I see more from people from secular families in mostly-secular areas who don't think about religious diversity because it's not relevant to their lives.) (Additional Note: Do not @ me with "WELL, ACTUALLY, Christmas is PAGAN--" No. Your history is oversimplified and bad. You are not celebrating Yule. You are not celebrating Saturnalia. You are celebrating Christmas, a heavily secularized Christian holiday with some cultural influences from European Pagan traditions.)

Additionally, many atheists/secularists/non-religious-people whose primary reference point for religion is Christianity (whether because they're ex-Christians themselves, or just because that's what they know from cultural osmosis) make broad, inaccurate assumptions about All Religion based on their projected understanding of Christianity, e.g. "I'm not religious because I don't believe that an omnipotent God controls everything in the universe and rewards or punishes people when they die." Okay, cool, but not all religions teach that, not all religious people believe that, not even all Christians believe that.

So, of course atheists can be culturally Christian, maybe without realizing it or thinking about it. Anyone who says they can't isn't paying attention! And that's why "Can atheists be culturally Christian?" is entirely the wrong question.

The right questions are "Is it reasonable to assume by default that anyone who lists their religion as 'atheist' or 'none' must actually be culturally Christian?" and "Is it reasonable to blame anything you don't like on 'cultural Christianity'?" and no! It's not!

Sometimes simply does not have a religious affiliation. And that's okay! There is a tendency to interpret "none of the above" as "Oh, so, the default thing, but a milder version of it," and that is... not accurate.

There's this vague sense that non-religious people aren't really a religious minority, that they're really just play-acting at being religiously marginalized, because after all, they're actually just non-devout Christians. Discrimination against non-religious people doesn't necessarily look the same as discrimination against religious people (like, there aren't atheist holidays that people are being denied time off work for), but it's still very real, and falls the hardest on non-religious people with the fewest cultural ties to Christianity, the very people erased by "Atheists are just cultural Christians" discourse.

Furthermore, the traits and beliefs and ideologies and biases that get called "culturally Christian" are often not actually unique to Christianity at all. Certain concepts, like an emphasis on redemption through death, are culturally Christian (although even that one is sometimes found in other religions), but to hear the people calling everything "culturally Christian" tell it, no other religion, culture, or philosophy on Earth has ever believed in virtue ethics, valued hard work and stigmatized "laziness", or been judgmental about petty infractions. Nor, I can't believe I have to say, is "Christians do it, so it's bad" a good argument against things like freedom of conscience or disability rights (neither of which are even especially popular among Christians).

The problem with way people are talking about "cultural Christians" isn't that atheists or other non-Christians can't be culturally Christian (of course they can) or that Christianity doesn't have pervasive influence in majority-Christian societies (of course it does). The problem is that people are using "culturally Christian" in inaccurate and nonsensical ways.

[starryeyedseeker]

"B-but Ex-Muslims make being exes their entire personality!!!"

Ok so

Are they really or did they just mention it? Are they allowed to indicate their existence as they are or is that 'their entire personality' to you? ISTS (I swear to the stars lolol) 99% of the time this accusation is thrown around when the ex does have other personality traits, but just isn't shameful about being an ex (which is what they really want OOP-)

2. OK, let's pretend you meet a rare ex who DOES talk about it more so than most, who can't let a conversation slide without letting you know they're an ex.

So fucking what? For one, the world doesn't stop at the word ex-Muslim lol

But also, exes have done a shit ton of mental and emotional work. They've worked through a fat book full of deplorable shit to read and in many cases, the Hadiths too. They didn't give up their faith at the whim of 'AlCoHOL sEx' (though these things are not inherently wrong), they spent more time questioning themselves and their readings, and even in an unsure field like faith and theology, do their best to be as sure as they can. They came to the realization that their families WILL choose Islam over them, that a lot of childhood bonds they have will be gone because the other person values a fucking child rapist over them, a living being in the current time who has the balls to question and condemn the general moral code of this shit.

If I keep going like this, I'd be here until next year. I've barely scratched the surface of it, so if other exes want to add on to this, please feel free to do so.

The point is, contrary to your beliefs, leaving Islam isn't a: "Teehee! I wanna fuck without boundaries because the West told me so!". It's years (at least months) of cracking your head at life-long notions, and dealing with the emotional pain of what going against these notions could mean for you, communally, mentally, and even physically (looks at apostasy laws)

That is no easy mental feat (and that's without counting the mental effort many exes make at recovery and unpacking old discriminatory beliefs they once had!!). That deserves credit, even if you don't personally like it.

Finally, if you can claim your identity as Muslim, so can they. This shit either goes both ways or is tyranny.

Let Ex-Muslims exist as they are. Let them claim their identity without constantly looking over their shoulder. Fucking let Ex-Muslims be, breathe and say who they are.

-A Lebanese Ex-Muslim grad student whose identity is central to their research

[tiny-huts]

Really fun how many time Matt tries to do anything with the gods or religion the fandom refuses to engage with the narrative and starts foaming at the mouth in barely concealed unprocessed Christian religious trauma.

[autistic-ben-tennyson]

I do find it ironic that the “culturally Christian” atheists Jumblr railed against like Richard Dawkins, Bill Maher and Sam Harris are all Zionists who fell for Israel’s pinkwashing BS. Meanwhile Stephen Jay Gould was an actual leftist who spoke out against scientific racism, something Prismatic-bell could learn from, and while his views on Israel were never made clear, would have never supported the chauvinistic garbage Jumblr preaches.

[feminist-slime-rancher]

The thing that’s really interesting to me about Christianity in America as an ex catholic atheist is that

My 7 year old brother also has an imaginary friend he very strongly believes is real. He also try’s to dictate how we do things based on his imaginary friend (“you can’t wear that shirt sissy it scares Jake”)

He has conversations with his imaginary friend and feels comforted by those conversations

But we all recognize that just because he believes these things strongly right now it doesn’t mean any of us are changing anything to placate the feelings of a non existent being we’re being told is always watching us and loves us

However, when adults do it, laws are passed that restrict my rights. My rights are being restricted and I am being expected to change my behavior for the sake of a different non existent being I’m being told is always watching and loves me, but this if different!!!!!!!!!! Somehow!!!!!!

[eyestrain-addict]

the line from God Help The Outcasts that goes "God help the outcasts, or nobody will" hits extra hard rn

[straightlightyagami]

people on this site are a little silly about atheism. tbh

[vampire-nyx]

By the way for anyone that it really bothers, I believe in and have fun with astrology, I don’t understand the aggressive hatred toward it but regardless I don’t support shitting on peoples beliefs or spirituality because you think it’s silly to believe in or because a couple people who believe the same thing were mean to you or made you uncomfortable

[opha]

has anyone noticed the religious side of tumblr getting increasingly weird and regressive since the porn ban? i know a lot of us had an eye on the evangelical xtian explosion here, but i now see a pretty uniform resurgence of the sentiment that you can't vocally hate/disrespect/even disbelieve a religion for any reason, sometimes extending to the point of thoughtcrime-ifying privately held convictions, even among leftists

[starryoak]

Making this into its own post rather than a reblog and expanding on it, not to be an edgy Reddit atheist, but I’m extremely biased against anything that purports to explain the inner workings of the universe but can’t explain it scientifically, because I don’t believe in anything that can’t be scientifically proved and I can’t respect anyone who claims to be able to predict things and then can’t explain how their pet belief actually works in reality.

I’m sort of ok with religion because generally it’s nowadays restricted itself to explaining things that science doesn’t have the answer to yet, or can’t have the answer to, like what happens after death, and even if I’d argue the fact that many religions used to claim that factually inaccurate information about our world was true says things about its accuracy in the rest of its claims, I also understand religion is and has been an important part of humanity’s history and development and isn’t going to go away soon nor should we try to force it to go away given how important it is to people’s lives (and more importantly, all the human rights abuses getting rid of it would have to entail to be even mildly successful). But any belief system that says that it can predict things about our world definitively and provably accurately, should be able to prove it scientifically, and if it can’t it should be ignored for decision making purposes, because if it isn’t provably true, it should be considered false. Making decisions about things based on your whims is fine, but you shouldn’t pretend it’s anything other than your own opinions that are guiding the choices you’re making.

The fact is, if something is true, it is also by necessity provable to exist. That is just what I believe, that if something is a factual truth, it can be proven to be one. And astrology just has not been proven to accurately predict anything whatsoever and more importantly has failed replication in every reputable and reliable scientific study ever attempted.

Astrology has no mechanism of action that could even possibly explain what it purports to be true about the universe, no logical consistency in anything it claims to be true, no reliable central body of information, no falsifiability, it is almost the textbook definition of a pseudoscience. It is exclusively able to make predictions that ‘feel’ true based on the Barnum effect, and then allows one to think they have a reliable method of telling the ‘good’ people from the ‘bad’ based on whatever reasoning feels right at the time.

And the thing is, it’s easy to say “oh, it’s just for harmless fun”, and I get it! Silly tests and sorting categories are fun, it’s why people love doing it. But I don’t think making judgments about people based on things they can’t control is ever a good thing to regularly be doing, even for yourself. It’s just opening yourself up to all sorts of nasty biases to be reading about how all people born in the month of may or whatever are demons sent from hell that ruin every life they touch, and it opens you up to other forms of pseudoscience to be willing to believe in things without evidence.

Because even if you don’t believe it, lots of people do! Like, for real believe in it enough to make major life decisions on! In China people get told not to apply to jobs if they’re a certain astrological sign! There’s a superstition in Japan about women born in the year of the fire horse being husband-killers that was so fiercely believed in that the last year of the fire horse, 1966, the birth rate dropped 25%! In India, they have services for arranging marriages that use astrology to decide who they should marry, and I don’t think it takes much to guess how that could go wrong.

There’s just no reason that in 2022 we should be endorsing judgement of other people based on immutable circumstances of their birth because it’s ‘fun’, honestly.

[randomnameless]

and of course the worse bit is that the leader of the religion is actually an Atheist cause God never answered his prayers.

If you played the game, that's not the worst Idore did lol

But bar the general implication that someone is using faith to push his own agenda that has totes none irl comparisons, there's the fact that Idore, in a way, manipulates his people and uses their trust to further his plans, getting rid of every Rozellian and ultimately seize control of Norzelia.

Then comes the game's "your religion is based on nothing!" very terrible take, and while the game doesn't spend a more seconds than necessary talking about post war Hyzante in the non Roland endings, how the fuck are we supposed to buy the "uh akshually they will be alright because Layla will develop medicine and they will continue on living!" nonsense?

To avoid dragging further irl events, I'd say this reminds me of the very emotional moment in FMA, when Bradley shits on Ishval's culture and beliefs, saying their God doesn't exist, since said God isn't striking him on the spot for leading an operation that basically consists or eradicating Ishvalians in Ishval.

Guess what happened after Bradley made Ishvalians realise their God "wasn't real" with the few survivors of this "war"?

That's why I love to think of future AUs in the Benedict ending, because it has all ingredients for darker gens - Gustadolf'n'Cornelia's kid notwithstanding, now you have Hyzantese who live in slums and are lower than trash being riled up by Idore out of all people, who also preaches to everyone left behind by Serenor/Benedict's joint rule, Roland is so going to be used as a rallying figure to gather all disatisfaction in the land by, maybe, Idore himself and give or less 15 years, the continent will be plunged in chaos, again.

a bit like eventual Jugdral 3rd gens AU