Freethinker, Secularist, Nontheist, Humanist.......

In the January/February 2008 issue of The Humanist magazine (pg 17) I read a short article titled The Post-Theological Umbrella by David Niose. It talks about humans in the "pre-theological" stage moving to the theological stage as a "natural development of extremely advanced animals."

The article explains that we came to a point in our development when we were smart enough to ask deep questions, but not smart enough to answer them. The proof that it is normal for any advanced animal comes from the Neanderthals, who "buried their dead and had religious relics that suggest that they also asked deep questions that required theological answers."

This all makes sense to me until I'm asked to describe myself as "post-theological" instead of atheist. I'm seeing articles in magazines and blog entries all over the place telling me to call myself something different in order to avoid the icky feelings theists get when they hear "atheist". This article, like the others I've read, mentions the 2001 ARIS survey. This study revealed 13% identified as non-religious, but only 1% call themselves atheist. Post-theological doesn't sound bad to me, and that's where I get confused. I've been extremely happy with being just an atheist all this time.

The point of this article is for all of us to come together and pick one name to fight under, other than atheist, or changes in culture regarding theism vs. atheism will take much longer. I'm having a hard time thinking this through, because I've only been an atheist for three years. I'm still super pissed about being brainwashed as a child. I can't tell if it's anger or reason that tells me I should just stick with atheist and fight the fight. I don't want it to take longer than it needs to and theists are having huge success with renaming creationism. Should we do what they are doing and rename in order to try to gain a warm-fuzzies face?

Nineteen

Oh nineteen, how I love thee. I decided that the best thing I could do was find some happy people and study them. When I really started paying attention, I noticed a pattern. Happy people who didn't wear a big fake smile usually didn't go to church. Most people are happy to identify with a religion without understanding it's dogma. Wow. Try talking to these people as a Christian and they shrug their shoulders at you. Try talking to these people as an atheist and it's the same. They have no idea what they believe, or what they're supposed to believe, they just follow the herd.

It immediately became important for me to see atheists at play. I was told I was in for extreme amounts of evil, but I wasn't convinced. Christians were wrong about a lot of things. People seemed willfully ignorant in general.

I met this girl at work who invited me to her birthday party. She had purple hair and swore a lot. She smoked and drank. Perfect. I decided, once again, if I'm going to do this, I'm going to do it right. So I went to her party and I was shocked. I was in a new world I had never been around. These people were friendly. I wasn't dressed like them and they still accepted me and were extremely nice to me. The birthday girl's best friend was my boss, TD. I started hanging out with those two every day.

We roller skated, we played with fluffy kittens, we sang songs, we bought toys at target and played in the back yard. We drank and smoked and hugged. We never did anything evil. In fact, it was a common interest of ours to make other people happy. TD and I shared that trait. I fell head over heals for TD. She loved me for who I was. She never judged me or told me how to live my life. She never talked about religion. I had so much fun with her that I forgot that the original plan was to learn about atheists. One day I remembered to ask, and found out she was an atheist. She believed that when we die that's it.

The most wonderful, loving, caring, selfless person I had ever befriended... The first person to lift me up from the floor and dust me off and encourage me to do what I dreamed... The first peer that ever believed in me, was an atheist.

Whether it was true that she was the only atheist like this didn't matter. (FYI there are LOTS more like her) What mattered was that Christianity had kept me from feeling happy, and made me feel guilty for wanting me to feel happy. Christianity not only took away from my life, it forbid me to talk to those who could change my mind. It's not because atheists are evil, it's because atheists make sense and are nicer than Christians. They have more compassion for humanity. They do their best to be awesome humans, because there is nothing else. They aren't evil at all. Christianity lied to me. It scared me in order to keep me from learning the truth.

I haven't been tricked, either. I've been happy. All this time I've been happy. I do what I want to do now, without fear that god will hear my thoughts and be ashamed of me. What do I want to do? I want to self-actualize. This is my greatest goal. I want to make other people happy. Not by changing them, but by being there for them and listening to them. I declared myself agnostic at this point. The creation is more important than the creator. To live like it's not is foolish.

Proove It

It feels really good to be proud of who I am, even as a minority. It's hard, guys, because you religious people are bullies. A lot of us don't come out because it will affect our jobs. I'm lucky enough to work with kids, who love me and are happy in my class. They are happy to be in my class. All of them. They are happy because I am consistent, and I am consistent because I just do what my mother did. I let them learn from their mistakes, and I explain to them what just happened and why. Every time I throw in a quick lesson on empathy and why it is an important thing to have. I'm half way through my year with this class and they all behave for me like they will behave for no one else. I'm calm with them, I never tell them to stop crying, I actually tell them that when they are done crying I would like to speak to them, but for now I will just sit next to them. I sit by them and I let them cry and I never tell them to stop and I never leave them. Unless one decides to grab the broom and play pokemon, then I run from the crying child without warning. Sometimes you just gotta stop them. All I ever say is, "Nice try."

I don't understand why people can't calm down and stop yelling at their children. It's so rare that a parent doesn't immediately start with the threats. Kids don't need to be threatened. They don't. This is either denying that small humans learn by watching large humans, or you just don't care about giving your child the opportunity to be happy. Just make the kid shut up, am I rite?

It is not acceptable to have children with a selfish purpose. While a kid would be swell and all, I don't have the money or the time to have a child and still do the things I want to do. I feel that my plan to step in to the lives of 15 kids a year and make sure they learn about what happiness is, is far more important than me having my own child. I wouldn't be able to do what I do if I had that much responsibility. Mothers look at me like I am evil when I say I don't have plans to have any children. They asked. It's not like I'm just walking up to them shouting, "I don't want to have children!" Thought they look at me like that's exactly what happened.

The thing is, atheists aren't awful people. Here I am, I devote my time to figuring out happiness and I'm honestly doing my best. I'm not just one unique atheist, we are all like this. We find our happiness and peace of mind in our brains instead of by faith. And I'm not saying that those with faith are not using their brains, but I am saying that we use our brains, plus that part that you explain with faith, we like to take it one step further and explain it by using only logic, no magic. We aren't terrorists. We aren't without morals, we simply replace faith with proof.

Furthermore, no proof of nothing does not make something. It only means that we have no proof of nothing. That is not proof that there is something. something is proof that there is something. The end.

Edit: I also often let them know if I feel like they are fake crying to try to get their way, but I only say it once and very calmly. If they can tell me why they are crying I will believe them. One time one went on to explain something I didn't know happened where his feelings got hurt. I hugged him and apologized for accusing him of crying for gain. He said, "I love you, Kamina" and I held him until he felt better. You don't have to control children, they are emotionally very smart. If you explain how things make you feel they will be considerate of your feelings. My class asks me if it's after ten o'clock yet so they can start hammering with tools. They don't want me to get a headache. They did that on their own, I didn't make it a rule. I just mentioned to one kid that it hurts my head until I finish my coffee. He asked me what time I finish my coffee and he went around to all the kids and told them about what I said. They all agreed they don't want me to get a headache. Amazing. I certainly didn't expect it, but I just wanted to let people know that kids don't need a lot of rules, they only need to understand that other people feel like they do for the same reasons.