Atheism is on the rise in America and yet we are constantly discriminated against and marginalized because of our lack of belief in imaginary friends. For atheists who value reason, logic, and the scientific method, it sometimes seems like the inmates have taken over the asylum. But it shouldn’t have to be like this. Atheists make up a larger percentage of the American population than Jews, Muslims, and every other non-Christian religion in America combines. If we want to be less marginalized, there are things we can and should be doing.
Tag Religion
Picture this, you are walking on a beach and all you see for miles is sand. Then, out of nowhere you find a perfectly formed rock. How do you suppose it got there? How could a rock have formed naturally?
When we think about religious believers, we tend to think that they all actually believe in the belief system that they identify with, however that might not always be the case. Many religious believers are brought up in the traditions of religion but might not really believe in the actual beliefs – and really, who can blame them. Many of those beliefs are pretty ridiculous.
Often religious believers will claim that science can’t apply to religion. What they really mean to say is that they would rather not apply science to religion because if science were to apply to religion, it would be extremely obvious that religious claims are not actually true. So of course they will assert that science can’t apply to religion because if you are a religious person, you have to believe that or sacrifice your religion to the alter of science.
Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy claimed that prayer (even explicitly Christian prayer) is not really religious; it is just ceremonial. It is merely a tradition and has no real religious purpose.
This is why I love it that the number one online news program are filled with rational people who self-identify as “agnostics.” The on-air personalities of The Young Turks aren’t those mean atheists like me; they are open-minded progressives like me. They are also not “preaching” to the “choir” in that their audience isn’t just atheists. I don’t know if I can call them mainstream, but they are certainly more mainstream than the average atheist broadcaster.
The other night, I re-watched the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode, “Who Watches The Watchers.” This is probably the episode that most obviously deals with religion and has become a favorite among atheists.
A while ago, I created a Facebook page specifically for Dangerous Talk, but it really didn’t take off the way I was hoping it would for a variety of reasons. For starters, I mainly posted there at 2am and as a result fewer people saw those posts on their feeds. Also, I had one other content creator and he was busy with his own stuff and didn’t post there that often either. But mainly I think the problem was that most people don’t know what Dangerous Talk is. The name alone could mean anything. It just isn’t descriptive enough to people outside of my blog.
I work part-time in retail and the other day I had a woman ask me about how I viewed the Bible. She then handed me a Bible tract titled with that same question and told me that it would only take a few moments of my time, but it could change my life.
Last night, I attended my county’s Democratic Party nomination convention and unlike the last few years, there was no religious invocation and no one missed it.