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Atheism
Community Guide
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Statement of Purpose
- This is a support and conversation community for people who don't believe in gods.
- Superstition hucksters have no reason to subscribe or post here at all.
- If you are looking to debate or proselytize, options will be linked lower in the sidebar.
Acceptable
- Honest questions or conversations.
- Discussions on parenting or advice.
- Struggles, frustrations, coming out.
- Atheist memes. We can have fun!
- News headlines relevant to atheism.
Unacceptable
Depending on severity, you might be warned before adverse action is taken.
- Anything against site rules.
- Illegal and/or NSFW material.
- Troll posts and comments. There will be no attempt to explain what that means.
- Leading questions, agenda pushing, or disingenuous attempts to bait members.
- Personal attacks or flaming.
Inadvisable
- Self promotion or upvote farming.
- Excessive shitposting or off-topic discussion.
Application of warnings or bans will be subject to moderator discretion. Feel free to appeal. If changes to the guidelines are necessary, they will be adjusted.
If you vocally harass or discriminate against any individual member, you will be removed.
Likewise, if you are a member, sympathizer or a resemblant of a group that is known to largely hate, mock, discriminate against, and/or want to take lives of any other group of people, and you were provably vocal about your hate, then you you will be banned on sight.
Provable means able to provide proof to the moderation, and, if necessary, to the community.
~ /c/nostupidquestions
If you want your space listed in this sidebar and it is especially relevant to the atheist or skeptic communities, PM DancingPickle and we'll have a look!
Connect with Atheists
- Matrix: #atheism:envs.net
Help and Support Links
- Freedom From Religion Foundation
- The Secular Therapy Project
- Secular Students Alliance
- Black Nonbelievers
- The Clergy Project
- Atheist Alliance International
- Sunday Assembly
- Atheist Ireland
- Atheism UK
- Atheists United
Streaming Media
This is mostly YouTube at the moment. Podcasts and similar media - especially on federated platforms - may also feature here.
- Atheist Debates - Matt Dillahunty
- Rationality Rules
- Friendly Atheist
- Making Sense with Sam Harris
- Cosmic Skeptic
- Genetically Modified Skeptic
- Street Epistemology
- Armored Skeptic
- NonStampCollector
Orgs, Blogs, Zines
- Center for Inquiry
- American Atheists
- Humanists International
- Atheist Republic
- The Brights
- The Angry Atheist
- History for Atheists
- Rationalist International
- Atheist Revolution
- Debunking Christianity
- Godless Mom
- Atheist Freethinkers
Mainstream
Bibliography
Start here...
...proceed here.
- God is Not Great (Hitchens)
- The God Delusion (Dawkins)
- The End of Faith (Harris)
- Why I Am Not a Christian (Russell)
- Letter to a Christian Nation (Harris)
Proselytize Religion
From Reddit
As a community with an interest in providing the best resources to its members, the following wiki links are provided as historical reference until we can establish our own.
Are you telling me you're stupid enough to defend a bible you don't believe in? Did you... read it? Yahweh is a death god. Check my original comment. I made very specific arguments you still have not responded to.
It is a relief to hear you say so.
It's mostly deadly bullshit and outright lies. For example, the Exodus basically didn't happen. No global flood. No 6-day creation. No resurrection. Jesus did not invent the golden rule, nor did he live by it.
I was raised on it, I know much about it. Hence my criticisms. Meanwhile, all you have offered is "you bible bad" with no explanation for how my interpretation is wrong or what you think would be better.
Cute. People are dying for this shit.
You need to be smart about it to deconvert people. Like, you need to understand the real stupid reasons people accept this religion, but you forgot or were never into most of it.
Shut the fuck up. I was violently indoctrinated by my abusive christian parents. I know too much about it. I lived with a god in my head for decades. I know no one has good reason to pretend any god exists. It's deadly, selfish delusion every time. It's fear, an inability to say "I don't know". They submit because they are afraid of their violent abuser, and they call it "love". It's stupid. It's point-blank stupid.
I know why people lie. They're scared. But that's not good enough. Their choices are killing us all. It is intolerable. There is no excuse for it.
The hard part is getting them to admit it. They've trapped themselves in circular logic. They're smug about it, proud of their wrong choices. They refuse to apply critical thought because they're selfish, lazy, scared, incapable of facing reality. They need constant pushback from all directions to counter the constant reinforcement of their baseless ideas they give themselves and each other.
I can't deconvert anybody. They have to be confronted with sufficient evidence to trigger a change. Barring that, the least we can do is tell them how wrong they are with hopes it will sink in later.
It should be this simple: all life depends on the truth that defines it. There is only one truth. Falsehoods divide us, threaten all life. There is no evidence, argument, or reason to believe in god's existence. Therefore, it is in everybody's best interests not to pretend there is a god. The alternative is needless suffering and death.
I can't understand why that isn't enough for people. Their shortsighted idiocy is killing us now. We need to do more, faster.
We need to attack the emotional basis first I think. First of all, quite a lot of people just take for granted what those higher up in the hierarchy tell them. They use it as a compass of right, and wrong. And for many, doing wrong is mentally "impossible". This is before you take into account what religion does to people.
Then there's the existential terror. Religion outright explains away everything as some divine being's plan. Do this to be in the right, and you will literally live forever. Do that, and you hurn in hell. They are terrified of a world with no justice, where they will just cease to exist, and everything they did was for nothing. They will cling to even the most miserable of hope.
I suppose you need to offer some hope, catch them in a good mood. "How could god kill an army of 200000 when there were only like 20000 max" rarely works. They will always pull out another excuse, like "there were more people before the flood" or "God is just punishing us for our sins/this is for our own good in the end" type of crap.
You need to figure out if possible WHY they believe in a God in the first place, disarm them emotionaly, let them explain the theology in such a way, that they see the inconsistencies themselves. Ask them "so what is it you really even believe in? What are you betting your whole existance, and other's on?".
Ask them if a reasonable person would think like this, do they really want to follow a God who does the things he does [point out specific examples]. Ask them to summon a fire tornado to consume you, why God does not fulfill his promises, if they can really trust a God that does all that, based on only his word alone?
That of an Anectodal book?
I don't think I'd enjoy having a serious discussion with you
We'll never know, you never tried. I'm not doing this because I enjoy it. I want to spare anyone from suffering the fate that befell me. There are more victims every day, but you don't give a shit.
Fuck you.
You've been telling me a lot about myself! Are you psychic?