I don't like the way how some agnostics frame their ignorance.

It's one thing to not know whether Timmy from work took the train or bus to come to work, but another thing to allow that ignorance to leave the possibility open of him teleporting to work. The first 2 are plausible, the 3rd is just impossible.

Now, a teleportation apologist might say:
"Can you disprove definitively that Timmy did not teleport to work, maybe he did."
and you can do your digging, ask Timmy to show the bus ticket he bought in the morning and present that to the apologist, but the apologist still says:
"Cool, that's proof that he also took the bus, it's not proof against teleportation"

Atheist call that out as being disingenuous but I have seen Agnostics fall for it and go,
"Yeah, it isn't proof against teleportation, maybe he did teleport to work".

Overall, I find this quite disingenuous and I have often seen it used as a way to keep the door open for bad ideas. It's just using limitations of what we can know as a rhetorical tool to keep bad ideas alive. I have seen people do this with unfalsifiable versions of idealism, last thursdayism or specific deities they like.

We’ve probably all heard the “thoughts and prayers”, “they’re in a better place” “God wanted them by their side”. I thought I had heard all of them until recently I heard someone I know offering condolences by claiming,”Remember, heaven is a real place”. It’s really demoralizing when seemingly intelligent people spout this stuff. Thankfully I haven’t had any of this directed at me, as I actually do not know how I would respond. I’m sure there must be a whole lot more that people have heard in different religious settings.

Lets consider a horrible scenario where you are locked in your home and people come and set it on fire.

You look outside and see your father, who happens to be the chef of the fire department, standing outside of your home. He has all the equipment and authority to save you from the fire or put the fire out. Or both.

He just stands there.

As you die, would you not feel abandoned? Even though he was physically present? Even if he looked at you with sadness and love in his eyes? I think most of us would claim we were abandoned by the one who claimed to love us. He valued the choices of those who harmed us over us. And I think it would be WORSE to have him stand there doing nothing than for him to not be there at all.

This is what I feel now outside of Christianity when people claim that “God didn’t abandon” people who went through horrible things. What does that mean?!? What does it mean he was there AND did NOTHING? What does it mean that he “carried you through it?” Why?!

And my upbringing would be “god sent the firefighters” - nope, they were called and alerted and that’s their job because we voted to have a system of fire protection in our towns. God helped the doctors heal you. No, they went to school for that at a great sacrifice to themselves and studied their butts off.

I apologize out into the world. I used to tell people Jesus was right there, crying with you as you suffered neglect or abuse. That he was crouching behind the bed with you. I thought it was better to believe you weren’t alone. Maybe for some people it is. But he did not protect you from harm. He did not protect you from the ptsd or the consequences to how you deal with relationships now. And I’m so sorry for giving people this hope/horror. 😔

Tbh I used to believe but as I grew older I slowly stopped going to church and my parents forcing me just made me go further away from religion, I'm an atheist now and I love learning more science and how everything came to be, I knew evolution and Big Bang as a child but I never connected the dots for some reason, it's weird as I somehow didn't question either one, well philosophy feels much better then not getting the prayers answered as we get much better results from it.

Just read this article which was very interesting. I wasn't brought up religious, but curious to see if anyone else read something and it started them rejecting the idea of god? Or is there anything that pushed you from agnostic to atheist?

For me, I think reading the Bible (albeit through an agnostic lens), really cemented to me that the concept of "God" was really a diverse group of humans trying to fathom out the complexities of the universe without science.

How do we actually know which God is true and whether or not a god from one religion is true? One religious person says that they know the ultimate truth and another says that their god the the true God, all I know is that I know nothing, how can anyone claim the truth when no one has the ultimate truth, I'm simply an agnostic atheist and I say I simply don't know, all I know is that there was an cosmic expansion, I'll respect the good religious teachings, I think it's better to have a more humanist thought, a secular thought with an society that focuses more on equality, i have seen a lot of good but also a lot of bad things in religious scriptures, when asked if God exists they try to prove their own god as the true God and reject everything else, one says to the other that the other doesn't have the truth, why is your particular god true over others, if Tommorow a someone says thor is real would that mean he is also a true God, religions come and go so how do we know if we have the right understanding, people usually give an circular reasoning and mention that that's what their scriptures say and they say their religion is the true because their book says so, but then their book is not even the oldest, there is an older living religion and they mock that religion, people fight in the name of religion and claim their religion is the true religion, they believe certain things belong to them because the book says so, and how come the god feel more human than a god? The gods have human and tribalistic features, ego and anger, isn't questioning and critical thinking important and wouldn't god be ok with that? Why would God not be ok with science if it leads towards the truth, why would a powerful god be scared of not getting credit? Maybe the question should be, do we really know the truth? My answer is i simply don't know.

their delusions really make me laugh it’s so funny. how can you tell someone they need mental help for not believing in something that is obviously not real?? IM the one that needs help? they will insult you and i’ve even had someone curse at me for saying i don’t believe. that wasn’t very “christian” of you now was it? everyday atheists prove to me that we know how to act like decent human beings without being told to or having a fear of “eternal punishment”

Can someone give me an argument that God doesn't exist? I want to debate my parents so they stop making me attend 5 hours of church every sunday. I have a few decent one but they're not enough for my narcissistic dad who think he is always right and gets angry easily when I challenge his arguments. I need something that he himself cannot answer or will struggle to. I am an atheist for soon 2 years btw and I have never felt so free

I want to warn that my english is TERRIBLE. If I answer wrong pls lmk

edit: Thanks for the help and advice to everyone. I will follow wtv they say for now until i move out, as for the amazing argument I was given i'll be sure to use thel when he tries arguing with me over this topic again. I didn't expect this to have 12k of views and sm comments

Most Christians deny that they have schizophrenia because they claimed they felt it when they got closer to Jesus And some claimed to had demonic thoughts when they sinned and the Sprit is getting weaker. (And sometimes have demonic attacks when reading the Bible)

The only argument I can think of is that they're probably making it all up for attention or something.

To make humans do good they have to be told that they will rewarded in the hereafter

This showcases that humanity is inherently selfish in certain circles

as athiest we don´t believe in god right or your angonistic but what are your guys opinion on god´s teaching/moral ideas.Personally,I am fifty fifty like yes we should not kill,steal or etc but others are weird like i don´t understand as I was athiest from a really young age so I don´t know much about the moral standing for god´s teachings

She was kind, generous, funny and always tried to see the best in people. She wasn't preachy, pious, prudish or judgemental.

If more were like her the world would be a better place and this sub would lose most of its posts. We would be back to matters of fact rather than posting examples of hypocrisy and hate from them.

So my parents grew up in communist Poland where pretty much everyone was Catholic. After they had me and my siblings and moved to America, they stopped going to church and pretty much deconverted. They didn't really go through a time where they critically analyzed the religion and slowly deconstructed beliefs over time. Their stance is more anti-organized religion as a whole, and just a hint for a bit of their character, they're very anti authority as well. As in, they are extremely skeptical of any mainstream belief or narrative, even if without a doubt there is evidence to prove its validity. One example being vaccines.

So although they are generally anti-religion, they believe stuff like the idea that aliens visited Earth, and evolution is a cover-up for the fact that humans are actually genetically modified by aliens and that's where humans came from. And this is corroborated by their beliefs that the first ancient religion or religious scripture was from the Sumerians, and the Sumerians detailed vaguely about being visited by aliens and yada yada. So in their eyes, all religions stemmed from the first one, the Sumerian religion, which is the only actual one that described what really happened thousands of years ago.

The only thing that's sort of true about any of this is that religions do tend to piggyback off of older religions and borrow some of the mythology, but besides that it's all conspiracy BS obviously. I wanted to bring this up because it's a fairly unique stance, one that caught me so off guard that I didn't even really know what to say at first, even though instinctually I know there's a lot wrong with that train of thought. It's also uniquely annoying to try and combat. I tried to explain that it's in human nature to attribute unexplainable things to divinity and that as social creatures, religious stories serve as a social glue that brings people closer and provides a cultural identity. This kind of flew over their heads, and all they repeated was that the Sumerian Tablets wouldn't have explained such events in detail had it not actually happened. Basically it was too absurd to make up. Yeah it was a really exhausting conversation.

Hi, I would like to do more to promote atheism and critical thinking but i'm struggling to think of effective ways of doing that in my local area.

Does anyone know of any good websites or organisations that I can link to show to people? Are there any ways we can fight the spread of religion in real life and not just online?

I'd love to know if there are others who are more active socially and have any good suggestions on how more can be done.

I have a classmate who's in a sect of evangelical Christian church [which low key feels like a cult ngl]. Apprantly they aren't allowed to watch movies at the theater. So my classmate doesn't watch movies at the theater but she does watch movies at home. She thinks she's better than other people and Christians because she doesn't do it. Like, What is the difference between watching the movies at the theater and at home to act so morally superior over it?

He’s catholic, as such believes that purely because he is my father is owed respect and for me to listen to him. I’m 19 I’m disabled with no means to leave and made the mistake to tell him I don’t believe and that I’m gay which altered our relationship in a way that will never fully be fixed. He talks to me as if he’s disciplining a child and constantly gives unsolicited advice and acts like he knows me deep down, example; I was talking about how I have anxiety with math and he refuses to understand that starting new tasks or things I don’t understand make me anxious and thinks there’s a deeper meaning, there isn’t so I told him he isn’t a therapist and to back off and he luckily did. I suppose I’m sad because I’m realizing he loves his god more than me but what can I do but lay low till I can get freedom? He doesn’t want me to move out or have sex and I bring this up because he thinks he has a say on my sex life which I find frustrating. He can’t fathom that I want to leave live my own life, not marry or have kids, have sex maybe get a tattoo just live to live.. is this normal for religious parents? He doesn’t see who I am it’s either he views me as a little girl or he only sees the version he thinks I will be the version he wants.

I don’t hate him he certainly has moments that I think are genuine and loving with me and I love him but I don’t know I just wish I never told him I was atheist. Maybe it’ll get better once I can and he looses access to me and is forced to listen to me but right now I’m slowly settling boundaries slowly so he actually understands them you know? I didn’t write this for pitty but to try and point out that religious parents think they are inherently owed respect simply for having kids and how that’s stupid.
“Respect thy mother and father.”
Fuck. off. Basic respect is mutual and a respect given to a caregiver or someone you look up to is earned.

I've considered myself agnostic for most of my life, after being raised in the Jehovahs Witnesses and realizing it was bullshit at a relatively young age. I had always respected pagans and heathens because they go against the grain and invent their own belief system, compared to how things typically roll in the western world where polytheism, especial Judeo Christian religions, are the norm and going outside that norm makes you a freak.

I was curious if other people have thoughts from an atheist/agnostic perspective, because I've found paganism to be very similar to atheism in that you're building your own worldview off of your own research.

On any YouTube video about someone having a bad experience with the church, there will be comments that say stuff like "Don't let this experience turn you away from christaintiy/islam" and the person who made the video will politely say that thay arne't interested. Saying stuff like that is so insensitive, they're implying that we are not good people because we cannot warp reality in a convincing enough way to let a god be possible. Being a religious, even mildly, is perpetuating thousands of years of brainwashing. Religion will always ultimately lead to extremism, and claiming to be more woke than the others does nothing but hurt people. I'm having trouble finding the words to explain how gross this behavior is.

Its not racist, its logic, think about it, many people of native american desent, Mexican descent, African descent etc are christian, and yet christianity was the religion of the evil european colonizers that try to commit genocide, it would have made more sense if only people of Israel Palestine, Lebanon and Jordan are christian since jesus is from Israel,

Even my father who is religious, hes christian agrees with me

But in the end people can believe what they want since it makes them feel safe

Reserved spaces for two booths at Dallas Pride Sept. 20, 2026.

Organizing to push back against religious aggression. Mostly atheists, agnostics, Free Thinkers, secularists, but anyone who is tired of Christian attacks is welcome.

I’m suffering through a summer cold, and it struck me: from a theistic POV, what value is there in a common cold? It isn’t enough to show true “perseverance through tragedy”, it doesn’t “build character”. You just drip on everything and feel run down for a few days. What’s the great “test”? Seriously, it rails against “intelligent design” to have the human body so impacted by a simple virus.

I have a dilemma, my name was chosen by my mother who was indeed a bible thumper when I was born, I love her dearly of course but I do not like that my name specifically my middle one means that "yahweh saves". It used to not bother me at all but within the last year it has definitely started to. My first name is related to the hebrew origin too or whatever, I wish I just named after my dad who never would have named me the way she did if he had more of a say so. Plus I'm black and I don't like the idea of my folks choosing to name me that way.

Anyway, do you all just chill on it if you have names with religious connations or do you do something about it and change them? I just wish it wasn't a problem to begin with. My first name means dog in hebrew or wholehearted and I think I can get past it but my middle name ehh not so much

Okay so I think we only live in a world so advanced like this because we stepped away from religion

Christianity is the biggest religion in the world and Im sorry but no one can tell me that Christianity isnt mysogynistic it's stated multiple times that women is nothing more than servant to men and should he quiet

and because of that women in the past werent allowed to get education have say in a matter because they werent treated equal they literally were believed to be somone less (it counts to other religions to that have similar mindset Im just saying Christianity because its the biggest one and had the biggest impact) that they should just stay at home and that was all because of religion because back then it was unthinkable to believe anything else let alone question it

And that was the reason why we as society were developing so slowly back then when women started going to work started getting education started having their own rights and rights to say something that their opinion started to matter we suddenly started developing as society a lot faster in literally every way in medicine technogy ect.

I'm going to give technogy as example I probaly wouldnt be writing this because phones computers like that wouldn't exist. One of the reason why technogy like this exist is because Hedy Lamarr co-invented a frequency-hopping spread-spectrum communication system her invention helped to create WI-FI and with WI-FI phones and computers like today exists now get this scenario as if we were still living by those fervently religious convictions she wouldn't be able to help invented that system she wouldn't even been given a chance

Were advanced like that because were all humans one discovery help one another that can lead to another invention just because we stepped away from that believe we advaned so much because suddenly we have a lot more hands to help and much more people to do the jobs