You're Soaking In It...

There is an old joke about fish.

Two fish are swimming along talking about whatever it is fish talk about. 

A third fish swims by and says, "Hey, how's the water?"

The first fish turns to the second fish and says, "What's water?"

Then there is the old Palmolive commercial where the woman is getting a manicure and talking to her manicurist about how harsh her dish soap is. The manicurist tells her all about how wonderful and soothing this other dish soap is and then says, "You're soaking in it!" Much delight and laughter follows. 

Fish don't notice the water. It's all around them, it's just the way it is. 

You don't notice what you are soaking in at the manicurist, it is just what's offered up and you assume it's good for you.

A few months ago a friend of mine posted something about religion and in the post talked about how he worried that his non-religious friends would be mean and asked that we not be. 

He ended up taking the post down because people were really mean. 

Not the non-religious ones. The religious ones. Which if he asked me, I could have told him would probably be the way it went. 

Because if you are an atheist or agnostic that has decided the religious people in your life are good friends you are generally pretty careful, in their spaces, to not be a dick about it. If you are having discussions about why you aren't religious you tend to choose your words carefully. Now if you are with just your friends who are also not religious you might be a little more free with your language, or a little less careful about your phrasing. But for the most part you aren't a dick to your friends. 

But religious people often don't follow that same guide. And they will tell you they aren't being a dick, but telling someone that they have no morals, they cannot possibly be a good person or that they will bow their knee and confess that god is king before burning in hell is pretty much being a dick.

But I sort of got why he was worried about those of us who aren't religious. He and I were raised in the same church and we were taught that atheists were basically evil pawns of Satan. Madalyn Murray O'Hare who was the most famous atheist of the day and was leading the battle to remove mandatory prayer from public schools was called all sorts of horrible names. She was pretty much the walking embodiment of evil. Not only was she trying to kill god she was a WOMAN. How dare she?

Someday god would get her...

When she disappeared, and then later her body was found there were people in religious circles who were practically gleeful about it. She sure got hers!

Right now we are in the midst of a big pushback from the Religious Right. They are pretty sure they are being oppressed and the world is trying to take away their religion. 

And it feels really true to them. 

Because more and more people are noticing the water. 

Quite a few years ago a friend and I went to one of those all day positive motivation seminars that used to tour in the before times. Where you get like a dozen motivational speakers and a sprinkling of pretty famous people who give little lectures about being the best you possible. After it was over and I wrote about the day I mentioned that it was all a little too religious for me, but there was some good stuff in there as well. My friend who went with me said he hadn't noticed it was religious at all. There were multiple mentions of thanking god for gifts. There was a sermon in the middle of the day with an altar call to come forward and accept the blessing. It was all water to him. He hadn't even noticed it. 

In God We Trust on the money. 
One Nation Under God added to the pledge. 
God bless the United States at the end of every political speech. 

It's all water. 

Until you notice it. 

Then it's not even Palmolive that you're soaking in because it's a lot more abrasive than that. 

Another friend of mine, one who happens to not be religious, posted a quote meme the other day that the basic gist of it was that the biggest reason there are atheist is because of Christians who are hypocrites. 

Well...no.

That's a very water/Palmolive view of atheism. 

I'm not an atheistic leaning agnostic because of hypocrites in the Church.  I am what I am because I couldn't reconcile the teachings of the church with my own findings. With what I could see to be actually true. There were things I would have to believe that I didn't. I left because I learned something else and that new information meant that the church was wrong. And if the church was wrong in that area then...well it was a house of cards.

I raised Christopher without any religion at all. There was nothing for him to leave. He can recognize hypocrisy in those that claim to be religious and don't follow what is supposed to be their own teachings, but that's not why he isn't religious. He isn't religious because he isn't. It's just that simple.

But Christians cannot fathom a world where someone is just not religious. 

It's not a thing they can see. 

And it's always shocking to them. I've had more than one person in a discussion about why our laws should not be based on religion tell me I will burn in hell. My response is that I don't believe in hell so that's not a persuasive argument to use on me. They then insist that it doesn't matter that I don't believe in it, it's going to happen, so there! Okay. Well, if it makes your sleep better at night imagining my eternal suffering and torture, I guess....good for you? 

I also almost always use the lower case g when I am discussing god. I've had people tell me how disrespectful that is. But to who? To Christians who have decide there is only one god so they just took the description and capitalized it? I mean, that's not even the name of the deity you worship. It's Yahweh right? Isn't that what Moses taught? And if I were to use Yahweh I'd capitalize it. That's a name. Capitalizing the word god is just a dick move to the other religions, you are saying your god is THE god and their gods are all lowercase wanna bes. Which fine. That's your belief, but I don't think your god is any more real than theirs are. 

Which makes me the dick. 

Because you are soaking in it. 

But I know it's water and I decided not to drown in it a long time ago.

Freedom of religion. 
Freedom from religion.

I'm in favor of both. 

I do not want the laws determined by your religious beliefs if you cannot give me other reasons as well. 

I do not want to see people discriminated against because somehow the book you read that tells you god is love has an asterisk that relates down to but not for these groups of people. 

I do not want to see laws made that are used to cause harm to people who are born perfect but told by the religion that teaches god does not make mistakes that they are mistakes. 

You don't have to believe what I do, or don't as the case may be. But I'm so tired of everything around us being your water. And I'm tired of you thinking moving to the fish bowl so you can keep swimming in it while the rest of us dry out is oppression. 

You keep swimming in your water. 
You keep soaking in your Palmolive.
You keep believing whatever you want to.

But I'm not going to.
I don't.
I won't. 
I can't. 

If believing in your god, in your religion, in your church, means that you think you need to make laws that are discriminatory, that are exclusionist, that only benefit those that are swimming with you? Well...no thank you.

And if you are tired of people telling you that you must then...I say, come on out...the lack of water's fine.