Being an Atheist I will speak for myself here. I am straight. My parents are Methodists, let that be known. My father used to teach history (is now a supportive living specialist,) and as a boy he taught me about history and why many of the wars in history were fought. Mom and Pop never once told me to believe anything, never made me go to church, never told me to pray, they let me think for myself. My parents taught me how to be a good person, how to care for other people, not to tell lies, etc. This ability to make my own decisions is partly why I'm an Atheist. Without someone telling you what to believe, there is no reason to believe in God. Now, the older I became and the more intelligent I became I started to see the hypocrisy, the lies, the betrayal, and the sheer inhumanity that organized religion has wrought across the world. I could not allow myself to buy into something that does not practice what it preaches.
A large issue I had, was the immoral behavior of my "religious" peers. I decided I was an atheist when I was in middle school. At the time, people would ask how could I not believe in God? And I would reply, "Even if I believed in God, I probably would follow another religion than you and thus would still not be good enough." This would cause them to be angry; this proved my one of my beliefs that religion does not unite, but separates. As I grew up and came into high-school I saw even more behavior which shows why I don't believe in organized religion or a God/Gods. I'm sure many of us as freshman saw our female friends prayed upon by juniors and seniors. As a three sport athlete, and varsity track from day one, I became friends with these older guys. These older guys would make bets on how fast they could have sex with my female friends, what they could get them to do, and proceed to tell every important and personal detail about these girls to their buddies. This is standard behavior for a teenage male, but what really makes it sting is how they would go to church on Sunday morning after taking the virginity from a drunken freshman. Simultaneous to the de-virginizing of 15 year old girls, other people began to find out that they were homosexual. The leaders of the "I hate you faggot" talk were the most religious individuals. This is so fucking wrong to me, how could any decent human treat their fellow man like this. Adding all of this behavior, all of the current lies, the 9/11 attack *happened freshman year* and was motivated by religion, and the uprising of my own CHRISTIAN against any dark skinned individual was simply disgusting.
Throughout the years, I began to feel better and better about my disbelief of what I think are lies. Also, I continued to study history. One thing that always made me /boggle was the negative usage of the word "pagan." I found it funny seeing someone who followed a monotheistic religion developed thousands of years later than the polytheistic "pagan" religions claiming the others were infidels/sinners/etc. This idiotic behavior once again sickens me. Another practice I hated was missionaries. I find few things more disrespectful than the systematic destruction other people's beliefs. It is simply one of the most foolish behaviors I can imagine, going into a foreign land, and telling the people there that what they think is wrong, and they should believe what you believe. As some incentive, why not build them a church and "civilize" them. This idea is also what has motivated so many wars in our shared human history. Ever since Akhenaten's dabble in monotheism *long before Jesus* religion has been used as an even stronger tool of war. Furthermore, If any Christian Individual believes that their religion even exists today without the aide of Constantine adopting your "God" to help him rally his soldiers to win a war, is simply a fool. The power of religion is control, which is probably the strongest reason I am Atheist. More acts of inhumanity have taken place under the grace of God than under any other banner.
I am speaking my own beliefs from my own experiences, take what you want from it and I'm sure the flames will come.
EDIT: another thing, if your Christian, at least get the name right and called him Jesuah..not Jesus.
Last edited by liquix (2006-12-07 17:34:59)