A Lone Thought

When you're interested in things, you want to talk about them. I'm interested in a number of things - unfortunately the things I love the most are the things most of the people around me couldn't really care less about. Namely technology, science and counter apologetics.

Unfortunately, for each of these interests I had to find out the hard way. With religion though it was 10x worse. Religion is sacred - taboo - you never ever talk about in any sort of negative fashion. To criticize says everything about you and nothing about the people claiming to be a part of the religion. I wish I had known that earlier.

It was a Thursday: sport. As per usual, I just sat around waiting for sport to finish, as did some of my other friends who either didn't really want to play, or just don't care for sport. One way or another, I got into a discussion on either science or religion with two friends of mine who we shall call Susie and Amy. Regardless of whichever it was, one invariably led to the other.

Being quite preliminary in my rational skillset, while I had "a lot" of arguments, compared to what I know now I probably didn't know all that much. The gist of The God Delusion as well as everything I had learned on YouTube. At one stage I asserted Amy had been indoctrinated as a child, and it's more than likely her religion was the same as her parents religion. To this she objected. Oh? Really?

One of my parents is Muslim, the other Catholic. They gave me the choice as to which religion I wanted to be. I chose Catholic.

Really... This was interesting. I thought I was stuck, but luckily came up with an objection: sure, they let her choose between Islam and Christianity...but why only those two! Why not present all the options so that she could've been any religion. Why not Buddhism or Judaism - or no religion at all!

As the conversation lengthened on, a teacher got in on it too. I was the centre of the discussion, as I was obviously the one that had opposing views to the rest of them. One person in our group, Joe, an atheist who doesn't care; doesn't want to know - the objections with religion are just irrelevant to him. He thinks that God is bullshit, you never talk about religion, and that's the end of it. So naturally during our conversation he popped in multiple times accusing me of trying to convert people saying I'm a bastard, asshole, etc. I was copping it from all sides! Luckily I had enough knowledge to defend my position, but I don't think anyone really wanted to listen.

Another friend, Mary, butted in at one point with the remark "do you agree that everyone is entitled to their own opinions?" I replied, "yes", to which she screamed in anger "well how about you shut the hell up and stop disrespecting peoples opinions then!" Unfortunately I wasn't quick enough to come up with a witty reply, so just said "no" and returned to my conversation. As soon as she walked away from me she went up to her girl friends and I could tell she had just started bitching about me. Then confirmed by the glance they all gave me moments after she spoke. Mary looked saddened...depressed. Why! I would soon find out when minutes later one of her friends came over and said I had made her cry, she was sad, and wanted me to apologize and stop this conversation or something. I refused, defended my position, and was then attacked by the friend herself.

At one stage I started having a one-on-one conversation with the teacher who had joined in earlier. What surprised me, or at least I found interesting, was that she agreed with every single point that I made. Religion has done this, this is flawed, this makes no sense, that's ridiculous. I didn't understand how this lady could agree with everything I was saying, and still be a Christian! This is the stuff that makes so much sense and makes you think "hey, maybe religion isn't all its cracked up to be. I'd better investigate!"

At the end of sport, when we finally sat down on the bus to go back to school, Mary posed a question at me. I didn't understand why she would ask the question at first - it sounded so silly to me. "Are we still friends?" I replied, "why wouldn't we be? There's nothing wrong with a little bit of conversation!" She laughed. That was the end of that. Later on I came to the realization she felt our friendship had been destroyed as a result of that argument. Conversation, argument, debate, call it whatever you want. She thought it was a negative experience that resulted in a negative outcome and sought to clarify the casualties of it. Such is the religious mind that to have such a disagreement of such epic proportions is the stuff that breaks relationships. And so, we remained friends, and still have to this day.

Mary on the other hand, was pissed. Angry, upset, full of hate, anger, and all the other nasty stuff you get from religious offensiveness. Despite the fact none of what I said was even directed at her, and no-one even stooped to ad hominem or similar tactics to offend the other - it was purely a discussion about facts, she was grossly grossly offended. Luckily she got over it - until the next time I offended her by having an opinion on a natural phenomenon. Perhaps it's because I'm faintly suggesting it is in fact a natural phenomenon - in contrast with supernatural, as perhaps she might think.

While I had enjoyed the debate, and wished for it to happen again next week, I inevitably got more than I bargained for. My friends now thought of I as a fundamentalist atheist nutjob who was trying to take over the world, convert everyone, didn't care what others thought, anti-religious, anti-god, evil heretic heathen. That's my take on their opinions towards me based on their reactions to my occasional mentions of religion anyway, and some of it has even been verified in their blind assertions that I'm just trying to convert everyone and I'm trying to "disprove god" and "disprove religion".

While it would be easy enough to just never bring up religion again, unfortunately in a Catholic school, that feat is impossible. (Not impossible, but if a teacher starts giving us a powerpoint presentation on how everything in the universe was created, you expect me to sit by and say nothing?) And even if it were possible, it would be irrelevant, for one of my other great loves is science. But not just any science. The science that shatters the core of Christianity, the science that makes Ray Comfort The World's Stupidest Christian™, you guessed it evolution!

I presume my friends will always dislike me in some way shape or form due to my interests in religion. I'm evil, religions boring, they don't wanna know about it. Which is partially the reason why I'm starting this blog. They might not, but the internet might. And might is good enough for me.

In the conclusion to my conversion, my condescending family will go to all odds to yank me up, slap me around, and throw me to the ground, all so I can wait for another beating again. The question is though, will I stand for such intolerable behavior? Or make a stand! That's not over exaggerating at all!