5th April 2007

An unhappy, cynical person

posted in Philosophy, Religion |

That’s me.  Yup.  Because I’m an atheist.  (Well, okay, agnostic, but in many people’s minds, it’s all the same.)

Tsk, tsk.

Ah, well, at least this person didn’t pull out the usual chestnut about atheists being immoral, and how all morals are the result of religion.

I know I run the risk of running off bunches of my readers with this, but statements like the above just bother the heck out of me, and they got trotted out on a regular basis.  A writer on a group blog wrote about his lack of religion, and how he is teaching his kids that religion isn’t needed to live a moral, just life, and the very first comment that pops up says that all the atheists this person has met are “unhappy, cynical people”, and that religion is all about luuuuuuve.

And when some other atheist, agnostic, or (gasp!) liberalized Christian types said that, to them, religion reeks of justifying hatred, this same person comes on and tut-tuts, saying that this just exemplifies the ignorance about religion in the U.S. these days.

Let me just say to that:

  • The Crusades
  • Northern versus Southern Ireland
  • Palestinians versus Jews in Israel
  • Jihadists whose dream is to fly an airplane into a tower filled with unknowing businesspeople who are just living their daily lives.
  • Fred Phelps and his ilk
  • Kicking a city manager of 17 years out of his job because he’s going to have a sex-change operation
  • Hitler (what?  You think Hitler was an atheist?  No, he was a Christian.)

Need I go on?  Ah, sure, there are plenty of atheists who have tolerated or promoted or inflicted hideous miseries upon their fellow man en masse, and I know it will be brought up to justify how good religious people are and how narsty atheists are.

My point is:  we’re all human beings.  And human beings are a wild and wooly bunch, subject to the same passions and inclinations towards unpleasantness, regardless of religious belief or lack thereof.

I personally feel that a great deal of the inequities and injustices that man has inflicted upon his fellow human being are historically justified on religious grounds.  Don’t talk to me about being “ignorant” of religion; I am merely looking at the evidence.

And when someone trots out the “Jesus says he is the way, truth, and light” as a counter-argument to someone talking about how all religions seem the same to him, what on earth can one say?  How about, “Well, Mohammed said the same thing.  So, I am sure, did Zoroaster.”  Why should I believe the one over the others?  They all seem equally improbable to me, and equally worthy, or unworthy of my respect and belief.

As I have said before, I am an agnostic, not an atheist.  I don’t know.  I don’t claim to know.  I have my own woo-wooistic set of feelings and beliefs about an inherent harmony in the universe…but I’m not going to go out and kill my fellow human beings if they don’t believe in the same Kozmik All.  And I sure as heck know that my beliefs are just that–beliefs, totally unbacked by any evidence, totally unscientific, and I have absolutely no right to tell anyone else that My Way Is The Right Way.

Grumble, grumble, grumble…

(And, to add to my grumblishness, the “B” on my keyboard is being recalcitrant and causing me no end of misery.)

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There are currently 7 responses to “An unhappy, cynical person”

  1. 1 On April 5th, 2007, Julie Pippert said:

    If one is Christian then one believes in Jesus and if one believes in Jesus then one must believe in good for goodness’ sake.

    It stuns me how many people miss that point and still live solely in the Old Testament: good out of fear of retribution.

    I mean, how effed up is THAT?

    P.S. I try to raise my kids to decide morally on their own, too. Not because of: WWJD?

  2. 2 On April 5th, 2007, Lizard said:

    I’m totally with you, Omega. I was raised by agnostics (though I do believe that my father is really an athiest, one of the few— but hardly anyone even understands the distinction, so I rarely say it). Still, in favor of a good education, they chose a religious school for me, because the local publics were crap. I heard it, listened, participated as needed, and still think it’s not for me.

    It isn’t that I haven’t heard the word, it is rather that I do not find the word comforting or necessary in my likfe, and like you, I can’t see why I would choose any one over the others.

    I have such a hard time with the ‘need to be right’ among religious proselytizers– which is not to say anything about most religious believers, who generally keep to themselves about it and are lovely friends without trying to tell me I need their religion. Still, I think it can be said that anyone who aregues with you in the comments of your blog about whether or not you need religion, well, that person is a proselytizer.

    Keep it to yourself, let it be a personal sourceof whatever it is, and we will be fine. Start telling me how wonderful it is, and how much I need it, well, we have a problem because I am not interested.

  3. 3 On April 6th, 2007, Journeywoman said:

    Couldn’t agree with you more.

    On the days when I believe in Gd,
    I am NEVER so concieted as to think that he plans his day around what I’m doing.

    On the days that I don’t…well I won’t go into that here.

    To quote my husband when a friend asked “Don’t you love Jesus?”
    He responded “Jesus is great it’s his fan club that gets me crazy.”

  4. 4 On April 6th, 2007, Mrs Figby said:

    Hear freakin’ hear. And what really chaps my hide is the agenda of the religious right, which pushes a world view that JC would most definitely NOT agree with. Hello people, take another pass through the teachings of your messiah and then look again at what you stand for. Hmph.

  5. 5 On April 6th, 2007, Dirk said:

    Amen sister.
    Oops - bad choice of words…

    But seriously - I just commented on Figlet’s blog about the intensity and intolerance with which many people are trying to push their religious believes on other people. What about that tolerance thingy? Aren’t you supposed to love everyone, regardless of who they are? Even if - gasp - they aren’t as religious as you are?

    And don’t get me started about that odd combination of ‘religion’ and ‘far right wing conservatives’. Scary.

  6. 6 On April 6th, 2007, Dirk said:

    Hey Mrs. Figby, no fair, you were just a few seconds faster to click submit… :-)

  7. 7 On April 6th, 2007, SBird said:

    Funny, I’ve encountered that sentiment a lot recently too on the internets, that if you question authority, if you’re cynical, skeptical, etc., then you can’t be a Christian….WTF? Jesus was a radical, people. He FOUGHT the system. He was CYNICAL about the system. He lived a completely ALTERNATIVE lifestyle. He was NOT a yes man. Hello????

    Other commenters here covered the hypocracy of religious ideology pretty well, so I thought I’d just address the title of your post…

    by the way, I’m a deacon at church, a lifelong agnostic, and a “woo-wooistic” type too. All at once.

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