So you think your an Atheist?

[Italian]

Let me start by giving you some of my own personal history. I was raised in a fairly zealous protestant home went to a christian school for most of my life. Ive gone to churches of most denominations including baptist, pentacostal, independent, roman catholic... et cetera. I strongly believed everything i was taught in my religious org. and tried to live accordingly applying the lessons i learned in church to my life when i could. I thought i was the only christian trying to live the life the way God wanted me too even though i was in a christian school. I hated the kids I was around at that school. They were all hypocrits that lived their lives of depravity but were christians when convenient. These cultural christians (which is prob 90% of those who call themselves christians) ****** me off. I was better than them, I was trying to live how the Bible said. I wanted out of the christian school and easily persuaded my parents with my arguement and the next year I was enrolled in the public school. Finally I was getting what I wanted. I was going to be with real people instead of the fake christians I had known all my life. The first semester was very long for me and friends were slow and coming, but as i started to learn some social skills (something you dont get at small private schools) friends began coming in quickly and as is common I found myself in a clique. The quickest way I found to make friends was to find a common bond or an interest that fueled the friendship and since I didnt go out for soccer I wasnt involved in any sports clubs, but I'm a survivor and I would just find something else. One of the easiest people to get along with in high school are nerds and pot heads. I chose the latter. Even before I had ever smoked weed in my life I was telling kids that I smoked. Not only was I just telling kids I smoked I was looking forward to smoking and telling friends we should get together to smoke sometime. I no longer had christian influences in my life telling me what to do and I quickly became disenchanted with christianity and claimed to my parents that I would no longer go to church with them because I was agnostic. At the time my theory was that God may exist and if he does exist he hates man. I didn't hate christianity at the time, i just didnt care about it. I didnt care about any religion they were all equally false in my eyes and I saw the world in a new light by accepting the theory of evolution. I became a party guy. I got trashed whenever possible and by the 2nd semester of my senior year my day usually started with chugging a bottle of alcohol or smoking a bowl going to morning classes going out during lunch to drink/smoke more, finish afternoon classes and then hang out with friends after school doing the same things. Not to mention snorting any speed i could get my hands on. Finally I saw the light, there is no God. God is dead. There is no evidence to proove otherwise. I have not seen God therefore he does not exist. I continued living my hedonistic way as was natural for me and i was good at it. I was the guy who was known to always be down to do anything. And i kept it secret from my parents pretty well, although they did find several drugs and bottles of alcohol in my room over periods of time, but i always convinced them it was a one time thing or that it wasnt mine. I was an expert at deception. I convinced my mom that i wasn't drunk when i was sloshed. It was all a matter of what to say and when to say it and some preplanning to cover up any signs or smells. I was glad to be free from christianity and grew to hate it. Being the king hedonist loses its luster though once all your friends are off to college and you dont know what your doing because you fooled around a little to much in high school. For some people the fear of not being accepted in college is enough to make them reject what they want to do, for me it wasnt. However I realized I had to mature sometime thanks to a good friend of mine. I started to make plans to clean up my life the most drastic change being to go completely straight edge. I realized that drinking and smoking and drugs everyday is something i no longer do because i enjoy but because its my lifestyle and it helps me pass the time. It was simply so I wouldnt be bored all day. Stealing alcohol was a grand way to spend my day stealing up to 300+ $ in alcohol in one day. I began to see that I just may have a drinking problem. I couldn't be living my life like this for too much longer I have to do well for myself and I have to be successful. I wouldn't be content otherwise. It was that realization that made me feel the need to go straight edge. It was during this time that I became disillusioned with my atheism. It doesnt make sense to me. I'm a thinker, a modern philosopher baseing my arguements off of logic. Atheism thinks it's based off of logic... God doesnt manifest himself to man therefore he doesnt exist. So what am i basing my arguement off of if not logic... that isnt logic, it's ignorance. When broken down to its core im saying I dont know therefore God doesn't exist. That is just moronic of me! My ignorance is my arguement agaisnt God. Maybe if there is a God he is too great for me to know him. Of all the things in the universe I only know a thousandth (if that) of a percent of and I'm saying "there is no God" is a fact. A fact based on ignorance. In the US that arguement wouldnt hold up in a court of law. This realization turned my world upside down for the second time. I wouldnt claim atheism, agnostic or religous. Although I was more of an agnostic now I wouldn't tell people I was agnostic. Agnostic now ment i was a cop out and that basically I was clueless which no one readily admits. With the change in my lifestyle however I realized mans true nature. Naturally we are hedonistic and it's only societies morals and standards that keeps us in line and those who go beyond that line end up in prison or dead. I could no longer steal liquor from the store because there are real consequences to every action. That much at least is scientific. So thats where I stand today. I seek truth because that is the only thing worth seeking. Plato, Aristotle, Socrates. These are my hero's because they sought truth in everything. Today I read parts of the Bible again and there is something in christianity that has made it last... something in judaism.... All religions possess some sort of truth in it but you have to find it. It's shocking for me to find myself looking at the bible for truth after hating it so much. When all was said and done it was revealed that I was the biggest hypocrit at my christian school. I went into hedonism head first with no fear of consequences. My life and my beleifs require reevaluation.

to be continued...

[Ahiga]

Please put some spaces between your post.


I'm about to head out the door so I can offer a small quip. 'something in christianity that has made it last'.

Christianity has existed for roughly 2,000 years. Shamanism existed for more than 6,000 years. Polytheism may have a similiar length of time. Beliefs of God's creating the sun or moon in fantastic ways (like driving a chariot leading the sun across the sky) existed for long periods of time. Length of belief is not truly a measure of accuracy, because we find ourselves realizing that things we once believed as true albeit on a shakey basis end up proving false or different (The 4 humors of the body believed by greek doctors is an example)

[I Have a Clever Name]

I'm sincerely incapable of reading that, please put some spaces in!

[PacSubCom]

I'm not entirely clear what point you try to make here, but I honestly believe....




...you made it all up!

Stealing alcohol for 300$? Coming down with the wrong crowd, the pot-heads? That is a little too stereotypical for my measure. My bet is you are from one of those missionary people who try to convince others the wrongs of their hedonistic atheist ways. Only that you are probably a beginner in that regard. "I became disillusioned with my atheism." Holy cow!

Better luck next time.

[vegetarian]

I'm not entirely clear what point you try to make here, but I honestly believe....




...you made it all up!

I would be more inclined to believe that somebody else made it up and that he used the copy and paste function.

Also please try not to post walls of text

[mongoose]

Did I ever tell you guys about the time I was a Christian?

Well, China and Russia and the US just started randomly nuking each other. The entire world was destroyed, and I had to fight off the zombie hordes with a shot gun. I was doing OK until the aliens arrived and started destroying what was left of the world. It was looking pretty bad for awhile. In the end I was saved by a plot device, but I was out of ammo and the zombies were attacking me more than ever. That's when I realized that atheism was probably the way to go.

[I Have a Clever Name]

...you made it all up!

Agreed.

Besides, not all atheists make your stupid life choices. You speak of a truth in religion, yet it is not a truth you can convey, so I'm going to assume its a readily explainable sensation.

[Miraj]

I don't see how Atheism and lifestyle choices are linked. I used to be a pretty devout Muslim and I became an atheist during University. However, I still maintain a lot of good habits that practicing Muslims have - like no drinking, smoking, structured daily activities. I still don't even eat pork, just out of habit. I don't do any of these things because I believe in any magical being who will sodomize me if I don't, I do it simply because I like a clean and straightforward lifestyle. This whole idea of a person become atheism and turning to a hippie, druggie and sodomistic lifestyle is just far too cliched and above all totally inaccurate.

[wolveraptor]

It certainly does sound like a caricature of atheists by your average evangelist, but I'm willing to give you the benefit of a doubt. Either way, you clearly aren't accustomed to the principle of parsimony. If we know of absolutely no evidence that something exists, we may, via Occam's Razor, conclude that is does not exist until real evidence is brought forth. After all, we conclude that invisible, ethereal unicorns don't exist for the same reason.

[Lusted]

That was difficult to read......and does sound made up as it portrayed the stereotypical evangelical view of an atheist, which is:

"We don't believe in God or heaven/hell so nothing matters, lets gets smashed/wasted and not care about anyone as we are selfish".

Unfortuantely most atheists are not like that, i would say a miniscule minority of us are like that. I am a non-smoker, do not take drugs, only drink very rarely, and volunteer/donate money to several charities.

I'd hardly call that hedonistic or selfish would you?

[Shaun]

Very difficult to read, so I gave up after a few lines, sorry.

[removeduser_487563287433]

If it had paragraphs, I would have read it.

[mongoose]

"Aunicornism thinks it's based off of logic... Magical Unicorns don't manifest themselves to man therefore they don't exist. So what am i basing my arguement off of if not logic... that isnt logic, it's ignorance. When broken down to its core im saying I dont know therefore magical Unicorns don't exist. That is just moronic of me! My ignorance is my arguement agaisnt magical Unicorns!

My ignorance is my arguement agaisnt magical Unicorns. Maybe if there are magical Unicorns they are too great for me to know. Of all the things in the universe I only know a thousandth (if that) of a percent of and I'm saying "there are no magical Unicorns" is a fact. A fact based on ignorance. In the US that arguement wouldnt hold up in a court of law."

[vizi]

If it had paragraphs, I would have read it.

I was at work and couldn't say this first.

SOOOOO

QFT

[IamthePope]

If it had paragraphs, I would have read it.

Same here. Sorry, thanks for the thought though.

[Italian]

double post

[Italian]

Im sorry, Ill admit I'm not a good writer. For the record I'm not evangelical and I'm not christian I just ment to share my disallusionment with atheism. If you had the fortitude to continue reading my very sloppy post you'd see that the last thing I said was that I'm closer to an agnostic now, but I'm careful to even profess that because my version of agnosticism is that I dont know what to believe. Those that profess atheism have nothing on the existance of God and those who profess a God have nothing on atheism. Thats how I see it. I HATED christianity when i claimed that I was an Atheist. I still have a bad taste in my mouth whenever christianity is brought up, i hate the Bible, but I also find that most spiritual texts and teachings have nuggets of truth in them. "a soft word turneth away wrath." is one of them.

I brought this up to see if you guys had any insights and i apologize that you took it down another path that had little to do with my post. Its ok though its an honest mistake and probably had a lot to do with my sloppy writing techniques.

This post is more of an attack on my hedonistic ways which are wrong. They leave you without any structure or organization in your life, I mean how can you have any if your constantly fked up. I was the most juvenile and as I stated also the most hypocritical christian when I thought I was better than those at my christian school. pretty messed up, eh?

Correlation does not imply causation. Furthermore, even if Atheism is the cause of amorality or hedonism, it isn't necessary for it to cause such things. One does not become an amoral hedonist when one becomes an atheist. Atheism is only a lack of belief in deities (or a belief in the lack of, if you want to be that way), it does not have any position within it in regards to morals.

MOST people don't become amoral hedonists when they become atheists, I did. I'm in no way implying that atheism causes people to not have morals, contrary, I have more respect for atheists than I do for most christians. It's natural for humans to do what pleases them. It's instant gratification and it's great for a while. But success from working hard is a better high and takes more discipline becuase it goes against what we want to do. But what makes people moral isn't necessarily religion, it's what is accepted according to societies norms. Those who don't accept society are in prison or dead. I can't continue stealing alcohol because I become an outcast to society. There are consequences to those actions and it took my friend getting a felony for doing the same sht I was for me to figure that out.

[LoZz]

im athesit, i am doing a national diplomia in college, in a years time maybe a year and a half i will be in the fire service. I dont drink, I dont smoke, I dont do drugs and i am not into "lose" women that kinda of relationship.


just because we are godless does not mean we have no morals or standards.

[Shaun]

just because we are godless does not mean we have no morals or standards.

Yes exactly. Most thiests often forget this. If someone is convicted, one of the first things said is the lack of god in thier life.

[ThiudareiksGunthigg]

*Large, eye-watering block of text mercifully deleted*

It was during this time that I became disillusioned with my atheism. It doesnt make sense to me. I'm a thinker, a modern philosopher baseing my arguements off of logic. Atheism thinks it's based off of logic... God doesnt manifest himself to man therefore he doesnt exist. So what am i basing my arguement off of if not logic... that isnt logic, it's ignorance. When broken down to its core im saying I dont know therefore God doesn't exist. That is just moronic of me! My ignorance is my arguement agaisnt God. Maybe if there is a God he is too great for me to know him. Of all the things in the universe I only know a thousandth (if that) of a percent of and I'm saying "there is no God" is a fact. A fact based on ignorance.

I think the problem lies with your rather juvenile understanding of atheism, not with atheism itself. If you are 'a thinker, a modern philosopher' I'd suggest you do some reading about atheism rather than working from a teenager's misapprehension of what it is. If you can find a copy of an article called 'A Defence of Atheism' by the philosopher Ernst Nagel, that would be a good place to start.

And learning how to use that 'Enter' key on the right of your keyboard would be useful as well. especially if you want anyone to actually bother reading your posts. :wink: