Bah Humbug! Or have yourself an atheist holiday season

Hey, at least Halloween is a fun excuse to dress up and have a good time.

Yeah, I was pretty disappointed.

edited 16th Dec '11 4:15:47 PM by DrunkGirlfriend

"I don't know how I do it. I'm like the Mr. Bean of sex." -Drunkscriblerian

Crap, I lost the bet before it even began! D:

Halloween is a day for me to celebrate and respect all that there is to love about costuming, make up, stage craft, special effects, ghost stories, horror films, and monsters. Mostly the first four things.

If someone wants to accuse us of eating coconut shells, then that's their business. We know what we're doing. - Achaan Chah

@Aon: I definitely get more into Halloween than Christmas. It's a lot more fun, for one. And for two, there's less family guilt that I have to deal with.

I hate how Christmas presents from my parents come with this overload of "We know what you wanted to get, but instead have a book urging you to come back to church so we can love you again."

"I don't know how I do it. I'm like the Mr. Bean of sex." -Drunkscriblerian

I just get gift cards and money because no one knows how to shop for me. That or they don't want to buy me the things I want because they're weird.

If someone wants to accuse us of eating coconut shells, then that's their business. We know what we're doing. - Achaan Chah

I have seen this. What bugs me more is the for-no-reason Christmas displays put up in September along with the back-to-school stuff.

IMO, the most "pointlessly" commercial holiday is a toss-up between Easter and Valentine's Day. Christmas does sort of provide for a good reason to get together with the people you love, exchange gifts, and just in general spread love and good cheer during a season that naturally pulls people towards depression. I still don't get what a guy being burned at the stake has to do with love.

That’s the epitome of privilege right there, not considering armed nazis a threat to your life. - Silasw

Have you considered writing "Return to Sender" without opening it?

That’s the epitome of privilege right there, not considering armed nazis a threat to your life. - Silasw

DG: Holy shit, that's fucking terrible! Whatever happened to unconditional love and parental support?

"You fail to grasp the basic principles of mad science. Common sense would be cheating." - Narbonic

@Ninja: Sometimes. I don't really have the heart to do that though. D:

@Kat: I dunno. It's the same reason why I can't tell them anything about my life, because it'd only get worse if they knew what I'm into.

"I don't know how I do it. I'm like the Mr. Bean of sex." -Drunkscriblerian

Well, I can see why you're bitter toward Christianity. But I hope you don't judge me based off of the kind of people you grew up around. It really pisses me off when I hear about stuff like what you went through.

"You fail to grasp the basic principles of mad science. Common sense would be cheating." - Narbonic

The more Atheist use public property to advance their beliefs... the faster we will get rid of religious displays in public property.

So I saY GOOD!!!!

And yea I dont really like christmass. People dont do shit, eat far more than they should, and trick their kids into believeing in Santa. But they can do whatever they want. There is enough Holiday regalia without it being displayed in public property.

edited 16th Dec '11 4:48:02 PM by Baff

I will always cherish the chance of a new beggining.

It's funny, there is absolutely no need for atheists to go radical, or protesting, or whatever, here... Because nobody gives a fuck about religion here.

I can sort of understand the need for "resistance" if you're living in a place where religion is everywhere, though. Still sad.

Murrl LustFatM

Kind of boring.

If they want to make a counterpoint to Christmas, why not celebrate the birth of Isaac Newton instead of just being "Stop Having Fun" Guys?

And while I do not care about Santa, skeletal crucified Santa looks like something that PETA might do. I dunno if this is the image that this association meant to project.

But they seem to know where they are going, the ones who walk away from Omelas.

Wasn't that Santa in a park?

"You fail to grasp the basic principles of mad science. Common sense would be cheating." - Narbonic

Used to be true here too, even though the Christians always had a strong political influence. But now, in recent years there's been... let's call them fringe groups, that have been doing stuff like mailing little plastic fetuses around as an abortion protest. They've prepared flyers decrying evolution (your typical teach the controversy nonsense) etcetera. Stuff that came blowing over from across the Atlantic. (like so much stuff before it, mind)

There's probably just as much to blame on the anti-islamic sentiment post-2001, that has made the fundamentalist Christian elements feel the heat. (Not So Different, after all)

(this is in response to something from page 1)

Except of course that in the mind of some Christian groups "no display" equates to "Atheist display"\* and anything atheist is automatically an assault on their way of life... Which is where the DODT comparison comes into play, because if "no endorsement" is to equate to "endorsement of a-religion" and the religious get it in their head that a-religion equals anti-religion you're right back where you started: discrimination. I don't think that's what the good people who wrote the no endorsement clause had in mind either.

You would turn the public space into no-mans-land and what good would that do?

\*)what the fuck is an atheist christmas display anyway?

This is absurd from all sides.

Will people never realize that deliberately causing a ruckus is a terrible way to do anything but preach to the choir? Gee, you put up a display of a skeletonized Santa Claus on a cross in public, I wonder why people got upset.

You cannot do something specifically designed to piss people off, and then when they get pissed off, claim persecution. That's not how that works, and that's not how that should work.

I'm pretty apathetically irreligious and I do find the prevalence of Christian imagery around the holidays to be mildly annoying. But honestly, this is so much more annoying simply because they've made atheists as a group look bad yet again, and given more fodder to the far right who gabber about the "war on Christmas" every December.

I'd like to see them try to pull this bullshit with a Jewish holiday, by the way. See how long that goes on before you get people calling you Nazis.

edited 16th Dec '11 7:16:15 PM by BlixtySlycat

go ahead and do every stupid thing you can imagine

On the subject of halloween, Actually its supposed to be a Christian thing. Originally called "all hallow's eve" its was basically the day before all saints day, the feast day for saints that don't have their own days. People just kept tacking on traditions and changing the name until few people knew this anymore.

I'm sure the Saints appriciate so many people celebrating them though.

You win the thread.

Nothing us Christians put up can even compare to this.Every single atheist display i've ever seen is some sort of attack on Christianity in some way or another. But have you ever seen a Christmas display of, say, Charles Darwin burning in hell? No, because its a positive time, and we don't go out of our way to attack people. (well, most of us don't, there are some crazies, but they don't over take display areas with negative signs). Why can't they just follow the golden rule- If you ain't got nothing nice to say, don't say anything at all.

edited 16th Dec '11 10:30:11 PM by Joesolo

I'm baaaaaaack

This is rather silly and should be considered such. I have no idea why people get so freakin' upset about the holidays. It's about love and peace not pettiness and intolerance. No matter what value you give the holidays, they are special to someone. Unless you don't want it to be special in which case resume taking a short break while everyone else celebrates the holidays. It's just so silly and a waste of time.

"If there is a hole then it's a man's job to thrust into it" - Ryoma from New Getter Robo

It is important to keep in mind that these are "the crazies" too.

This is hardly the norm.

go ahead and do every stupid thing you can imagine

Indeed. American Atheists is kind of like the atheists' equivalent of WBC in the US, except, by virtue of there being less atheists—thus making the group less susceptible to the law of averages—that their shitheads are slightly less shitty. Basically everything I've seen them do is deliberately done to be mean-spirited/piss people off.

All else being equal, I think that if there were as many atheists as there are Christians, you'd see comparable numbers of equally-stupid/horrifyingly immoral things coming from both sides, as the general stupidity and selfishness of humanity would adversely affect each core ideological position in the same way and with the same gravity.

I am now known as Flyboy.

Mmmquite.

*spot of tea*

go ahead and do every stupid thing you can imagine

A dead guy on a cross? Err, you've got that one up all year round.

Christian rhetoric defines every display of secularism or atheism as an attack on Christianity. Nothing gets that Christian zeal going like a bit of good old persecution after all. Seen that campaign ad by Rick Perry, perchance? Well, no true scotsman would. But, that's not the golden rule. It's "Love your neighbor as you love yourself". (or "do unto other as you would unto yourself" or one of a myriad other forms of it) Holy shit, how does a Christian even get that one wrong?

edited 16th Dec '11 11:34:38 PM by GreatLich

Do try to remember that the crucifix has more meaning to Christianity than "lolz dead guy on a cross." People get upset over a crucified skeleton of Santa because it's an intentional perversion of that symbol, regardless of the point they were trying to make by doing so.

Blixty observed a similar thing about Atheists: "You cannot do something specifically designed to piss people off, and then when they get pissed off, claim persecution. That's not how that works, and that's not how that should work."

He never said "no true Christian" or "no real Christian" would do such a thing, just that most wouldn't—and he labeled those who would as "crazies," which is little different than noting someone as an extremist. Therefore, your implication that he committed a No True Scotsman fallacy falls flat. Whether or not he gives Atheists the same benefit, though, that's another story.

(I personally think "No God? No problem! Just be good for goodness sake!" is one of the few benign Atheist holiday messages I've seen.)

On that note, I agree with Blixty and USAF on the point that American Atheists (and the Freedom From Religion Foundation, who I have seen do some extremely insulting things toward all religion) are the Atheist equivalent of the Westboro Baptist Church. I set them (and anyone who would support what they do) apart from more level-headed and religiously tolerant Atheists.

edited 17th Dec '11 7:50:07 AM by TrevMUN

>Christians celebrate religious aspects of a holiday that is traditionally religious >non-religious people get mad

Only in America.

There's no justice in the world and there never was~

I dunno, man. I may be an atheist, but I like to subscribe to the "don't be a dick" mantra. A handful of my best friends come from a variety of religious backgrounds. We've got this mutual understanding that no one's out to piss anyone else off, and that if me or a couple of my friends utter "god dammit" in frustration we're not aiming to get anyone tail in a twist.

That kinda ties into this whole atheist Christmas thing because they're just being dicks. I mean, that's cool if you get your rocks off to that sort of thing, but it's even more poisonous to atheists than WBC are to christians. Mostly because it's so much easier to villainize atheism in this country than christianity.

Greentexting outside of an image board? Only on TV Tropes.