Saturday 30 June 2012

the dangers of atheism



The Dangers of Atheism


And by "dangers", I am not referring to religious types that would bully the atheist for having the gall to not only be a non-believer, but to also make that fact that they are indeed an atheist known to the world; instead I am referring to the inherent need for people to identify with a particular "genre" of what sort of people they think they are and "atheism" is very much in danger of becoming fractured in much the same way that religions tend to fracture.

Meaning to say that at some stage, all of this atheism banner-waving will end up seeing multiple people who supposedly fly that same atheist banner butting heads with each other over some issue, which in turn would make splinter groups, then we would have multiple groups of atheism when indeed "atheism" should not be a defining factor to what sort of person you are anyway.

For me, the way I see atheism is that there is no point in identifying as an atheist in the first place, because "atheism" is supposed to be the complete lack of religion and belief in supernatural - and that's it.

It's like taking the number zero and adding some stuff to it and then thinking that zero is now somehow larger than zero, but you still *call* it "zero"... no, any previous values of zero that are now larger, are now *not* zero... You just can NOT have a large value of zero, this does not make sense.

So I do not feel compelled to identify myself as a non-believer, not really, I tend to reveal my "non-believerism" at moments when it is relevant to where I am and what I am doing and what is going on around me - it is not something that I need to carry around as a banner before me, but if I do, it is merely to annoy the religious, which I know is childish, but enjoyable nonetheless, which in turn partly allows me to tolerate the religious and their bullshit...


the danger of flying your banner is that others who also fly that same banner will flock to your banner and vice-versa, which is the whole point of flying a banner in the first place, so people with the same line of thinking can group together. The danger here is that others will not share in all things that you believe in and this creates an environment where belligerent attitudes can flourish.

ie. just because someone is an atheist, it doesn't mean they understand science, it doesn't mean that they are vegan, or that they vote a particular way, etc etc -- point being is that just because two atheists may agree on being atheists, it doesn't mean that somewhere down the line, the two atheists will continue to get along once the common thread that brought them together is over.

As an example, I often tolerate atheist idiocy because the argument that they are in sees that the opposing side is even *more* ridiculous than the atheist argument and I also find it reprehensible to chastise atheists when the fact of the matter is that the christians do NOT chastise their extremists so I do not feel compelled to get into arguments with atheists because we have a common cause to fight against, ie. religion. But as time goes on, that battle is more than likely to die away as more and more people give away their religion, meaning there will be more atheists or at least, less religious people to butt heads with.

Meaning to say that if atheists rally around the banner of atheism, eventually there will be a philosophical split over some issue. For example, some atheists have tried to insult me for not being of the position that there is most definitely *no* god. That argument is just as arrogant as saying that there most definitely *is* a god. Neither position is verifiable, so I take no position on the matter of god other than to entertain myself with the possibilities of there being such a creature as god or not.

The point is that this person suggested rather strongly that I should make the affirmation that I was an atheist on *his* terms. As far as I am concerned, taking a position where no logical evidence is involved, is a religion, it requires faith. That rather angry person was a fanatical atheist. He has made his religion *atheism* because he is willing to summarily dismiss all the supporting evidence (or lack thereof) and that is exactly what religious fuckwits do. He emphatically denied the existence of god and in fact, went out of his way to do so as well. He clearly would not tolerate my presence unless I would make the same spurious affirmation as him. If that's what atheism is about, then atheism is not for me because I do not accept anything anybody says if they can not back it up, I don't even care if they are right and there really is no god, you can't prove it, so you most definitely don't get to be an arrogant cunt about it, no matter what side of the fence you sit upon.

This same thing has happened with christianity, it split into factions, which split into factions, which split etc etc and as documented throughout history, these christians that are supposed to be on the same page as their Jesus messiah dude, hate each other so much that they have been killing each other for centuries and yet they are supposedly all christians?? If christians can't even follow this message of love everyone from their precious Jesus, then christianity is not for me, either.

same thing happens today with Islam, a major component of the violence in middle east countries involves the dispute between the Sunni and Shi'ite factions of Islam, and they kill each other over that difference, and yet, they both, allegedly, follow a religion of peace?

If atheists start clutching to their atheist banners too tightly, the same thing is bound to happen, it is human nature to defend what you perceive as being yours.

Did you see that episode of South Park, where the atheists of the future split into factions that were at war with each other over some trivial aspect?

What I am saying is this: go to your atheism meetings and groups and atheism forums and make it known that there are atheists out there as often as you like, but just remember that atheism is about being an individual, to group yourselves into new convenient groupings after society has finally started to dump the convenient groupings of religion is just to start the whole "religion" process all over again.

"We are all individuals"--[Brian]


the religious should not read these blogs, they *will* be offended

these are my rantings about religion - i speak fluent sarcasm - know this when you are reading and it will save you some heartache.