this post was submitted on 21 Jun 2024
779 points (97.7% liked)
Atheist Memes
5577 readers
13 users here now
About
A community for the most based memes from atheists, agnostics, antitheists, and skeptics.
Rules
-
No Pro-Religious or Anti-Atheist Content.
-
No Unrelated Content. All posts must be memes related to the topic of atheism and/or religion.
-
No bigotry.
-
Attack ideas not people.
-
Spammers and trolls will be instantly banned no exceptions.
-
No False Reporting
-
NSFW posts must be marked as such.
Resources
International Suicide Hotlines
Non Religious Organizations
Freedom From Religion Foundation
Ex-theist Communities
Other Similar Communities
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Thanks, I appreciate that. But I hope you do understand that this is not the average experience for the vast majority of people who become atheist, right?
Would you care to share what you may have done differently?
Just to be clear, I am by no means advocating for anyone to return to their parents' church if they found it to be full of assholes and hypocrites. Rather, what I am saying is that unless you manage to live a more moral life than those you left behind, you aren't likely to end up anywhere good in life, and to the extent you use atheism as an excuse for being a shitty person, you'll be just as much of a hypocrite as those you condemn.
So just stick to your own values?
If you won't find ethics in religion, you'll find some by exploring philosophy. If you won't find truth in religion, you'll find some by learning science. If you won't find a purpose without religion, reach out to people who are worthy of sharing a life with, enjoy art, try to make the world a better place. You will find a purpose far truer to you than any preacher could offer.
Not a good idea if your own values suck – and a lot of people end up using atheism as a an excuse to have shitty values because there is no God who will judge them for it.
The values Jesus espouses are fundamentally solid and worth imitating. The fact that many of his fan clubs do a terrible job at living them is not a testament to their futility, but rather, to the sheer difficulty of actually practicing them.
My point is basically that if you throw out your morals along with God, there is no hope for ever making it anywhere good in life. It's true that you don't HAVE to go to church to have morals, but unless you find them somewhere else, you'll be no better than those fake Christians.
Citation needed. This is a total straw man argument.
"Morals" are a completely man made concept. With or without religion, it is immaterial. They did not and do not have to come from somewhere else. They come from us.
And what is and isn't "moral" changes over time as society evolves. As I am positive you know, quite a few things in Judeo-Christian scripture were considered "moral" in their time but are now viewed as unquestionably heinous. Have you ever stopped to think why that is?
Believe it or not, but it turns out studies on this actually exist.
Very interesting also that you're showing the exact same behavior (i.e. consequentialist moral reasoning) in the remainder of your comment. This poses the question, if society were to evolve to consider rape, murder, and theft as excusable or even desirable behavior, would you go along with it?
What exactly are you referring to here? Slavery? Persecution of homosexuality and witchcraft? I'm sure I don't need to tell you that the abolitionist movement was largely driven by Christians, while the other two causes were championed by atheists or non-Christians. I'll leave my moral judgment of the latter aside so as not to unnecessarily inflame the discussion with reactionary rhetoric, but I will pose the question of whether in light of the rapidly declining birth rates in the west, homosexuality is a net good for society as a whole.