An Unabashed Accusation

Only a child abuser would lead an impressionable mind to belief through birthright indoctrination. “This is what mommy and daddy believe” does not define truth and does constitute force. And what a child affirms at and beyond the age of reason does not negate any of this. Perceived childhood truth does not suddenly morph into “real adult truth” after so many pages on the calendar flip. Confirmation only serves to rationalize a child’s lack of choices and control under the guise of “Well, mom and dad just happened to pick the right religion.” I’m sorry that you’re too stupid to recognize this or too much of a coward to admit it.

Rough Numbers

Casual observation of the world reveals over 7 billion people who follow one religion or another, or none at all.

About 2.1 billion Christians, 1.7 billion Muslims, about a billion Hindus, and another 2+ billion comprising everyone else: Jews, Buddhists, Baha’is, Sikhs, Shintos, Krishnas, Bole-Marus, godless bastards, and countless others.  (It’s generally accepted that about 10% of the world population has no particular belief in god – whether they be atheist, non-theist, or agnostic.)

For those who believe, one thing is clear: they can’t all be right. Moreover, at most, only one can be right.

Now some nutbags argue that they’re all connected or one and the same, and that’s pure New Age bullshit. No, they’re not the same, and their only connection is that they’re founded in delusion.

Disparate religions, such as Judaism and Hinduism, are mutually exclusive. For example, if Brahma created the universe as told in the Bhagavad Gita, then all of the Abrahamic religions (and many others) would necessarily be false.

Even directly-related religions are mutually exclusive. For example, if the Judeo-Christian god is real, two of the Abrahamic religions are still necessarily false in what they perceive to be biblical truth. It doesn’t matter that they all share the same father god. Commonalities don’t preclude them from being ultimately in direct conflict. If the doctrines conflict in a meaningful way, and they do, then they are mutually exclusive.

If the Jews are right, then Christians and Muslims are necessarily deluded beings who fell for the Jesus and Mohammed cons, respectively. Now follow the same logic for Christians being right, and then Muslims.

If the Christians are right and Jesus really is the son of god, then all Jews and Muslims are eternally fucked by their incomplete and therefore invalid doctrines. No savior Jesus, no salvation, game over, you lose. BUZZ! (Muslims do not believe that Jesus was the son of god. And while they accept that he was crucified, they neither believe that died on the cross nor that he rose from the dead.) This is just the tip of the iceberg as it pertains to Islamic doctrine that conflicts with the new testament.

These religions are clearly and necessarily mutally exclusive by doctrine alone.

Another case in point, Christianity and Mormonism. Adherents of both religions are followers of Christ and believe that he died on the cross and rose from the dead. But that’s where their shared truths end. I’ll defer the rest of my argument to evangelical Christians. Don’t take my word for it. Ask any of them if the two religions are compatible or exclusive. (I’m absolutely certain that they’ll do the job for me just fine.)

At the end of the day, when it comes to doctrinal truth, they are all mutually exclusive simply because they all have their own [differing] doctrines.

So where does this leave us?

There are 7 billion people on the planet, plus 100 billion who have lived and died before us, the vast majority of which believe(d) in a supreme being in one form or another. At the very most one is right, and the rest are necessarily wrong. Period.

Why You Believe What You Believe

First, I spit a hearty preemptive fuck you in your direction if you, as all insecure theists do, argue that any meaningful number of people find their way to religious “truth” as a result of independent soul searching, whether their starting point is another religion or no religion at all. The disingenuous implication here is that the majority of [insert religious group here] came to [insert god name here] irrespective of external circumstance and influence because [insert religion name here] is an obvous truth. Admittedly some do find their way on their own, but in the grand scheme of the history of humanity, this number is too triflingly small to consider them anything but anecdotal cases. But taking this stance (as you will invariably do) is a thoroughly disingenuous and preemptive attempt to prove that you would have found your way to your current delusion “anyway.”

You will also argue that as an adult (after breaking free of any parental hold, control, and influence), exercising your freewill, you confirmed your religious beliefs on your own accord. Yeah, it was your freedom of choice to find and believe in Jesus – just like it was freedom of choice that made the girl who was molested by uncle Lenny when she was 9 to now sell her body on the street or do porn.

Bullshit. You know EXACTLY why you believe what you believe.

But keep trying to convince yourself that you orchestrated your faith on your own accord without external force, duress, or seduction. You never know. You just might be able to will your own truth into existence.

Intellectual Honesty Time

The overwhelming majority of theists follow the religion in which they were raised. There may be some inconsequential change in practice between childhood and adulthood, but this is generally a shift in degree or sect. A child raised as an orthodox Jew may end up a reformed Jew as an adult, but they’re still a Jew. And a child raised in the Pentecostal church might end up a garden variety non-denominational Christian, but they’re still a Christian. The shift may be subtle or dramatic, but they remain where they started in the only way that matters: belief in the same god and acceptance of the fundamental tenets of the religion’s core doctrine.

The number of people who convert from one religion (or no religion) to another is trivial relative to the 6.3 billion people who believe in a supreme being, so don’t waste your time trying to establish a bolstering argument there. Besides, you’re not a convert anyway. Very few are.

Admit That You Were Brainwashed

Regardless of degree (which as previously demonstrated is utterly meaningless and irrelevant to the origin of your belief), you follow now the religion in which you were raised. Restated, and there’s no getting around this, you believe what you believe because that’s what mommy and daddy believed. I’m sorry that you’re too clueless to recognize this – or perhaps too much of a coward to admit it. But either way, you must rationalize and reconcile this little problem of how you came to your current flavor of delusion.

This leaves you with one undeniable concession:

You were indoctrinated by parents who (with financial, emotional, and legal control over you) gave you no choice but to do as they said. At their direction you went to Sunday (or Hebrew) school, you went to church (or synagogue), you obeyed the laws of the religion, followed its practices, and celebrated its holidays – again, to one degree or another. One only need look at your childhood to see this demonstrable and undeniable fact.

This is where your typical knee-jerking Christian chimes in with the predictable, “My parents forced nothing upon me, and I forced nothing upon my children. I was exposed to the religion of my parents as my children were exposed to mine. What else would you expect? I was free to believe what I chose as are my children – and I’d love them just the same.”

Awww. Isn’t that sweet? But the only part of that declaration that smacks of the truth is that you’d still love your children. And I would expect you too. You’d be an asshole of epic proportions if you didn’t. But the rest is pure bullshit, and you know it. You told  us nothing that we didn’t already know. Of course you were free to believe whatever you chose. You (like your children and everyone else) have free will. Thank you oh so much for your fairness in this concession. I never would have guessed.

Okay, are we done chewing on your jaw-dropping intellectual dishonesty?

First, I neither said nor implied that you or your children were forced into believing anything. That would be your word choice, not mine. [This is what we call an act of self-incrimination, but I'll let it slide. Ssshhh.] No, all I said is that you have/had full control of your children, and therein lies a HUGE fucking difference…but with the identical effect.

A parent with such all-encompassing control need not “force” anyone into anything. I love my dog and I force him to eat nothing – but he eats on his own accord whatever I put in his god damn bowl because I control the food supply. So spare us all the disingenuous obfuscations. Your children’s options are limited only to what you put in their bowl. Period. The day Christians teach their children about Islam, Hinduism, Mormonism, and all the others from a positive perspective (i.e. as acceptable worldview options from which they may choose with their parent’s support), is the day I’ll amend my commentary. Until then I’ll correctly label you for exactly what you are: a lying sack of shit.

Bad Sportsmanship

I know this one couple who are lifelong, frothing-at-the-mouth New York Knicks fans. They have countless photos of their two boys wearing Knicks jerseys while they were still in diapers. As babies they had no understanding or interest in basketball (or any sport for that matter) let alone an allegiance to a specific team. And wouldn’t you know it, both boys to this very day (in their early twenties) are die-hard Knicks fans. Jesus fucking Christ, I can’t imagine why.

If you are a theist, you believe what you do for the same reason this child (above) is a Nationals fan. Accept this undeniable fact.

Now of course even the most semi-lucid brain function can see the cause and effect in play here, yet their parents (when confronted with this observation) dismiss the undeniable parallel as static. Their only retort is, “It’s not the same.”

Uh huh. Clearly.

Yes, I know it stings a little, but being the coward that you are, you will (and must) cling to one of the only two mutually-exclusive rationalizing options.

Explain Yourself

Option 1: You must argue that while this may be true, you would have found your way to your current beliefs anyway (by some means other than parental influence).

If you go this route I can’t touch you. It’s a technically plausible claim. Problem is (aside from the fact that you and I both know that deep down inside you don’t really believe it), you can’t possibly know such a thing. It’s merely what you’d like to believe to convince yourself that you weren’t brainwashed and that you had some freedom of choice. Enjoy your one-way trip to Self-Deception is Blissville.

Option 2: You must argue that while this may be true, you were simply lucky enough to be born of parents who just happened to choose the right religion.

First, your parents likely “chose” nothing. They were impressionable, intellectually and emotionally defenseless, and financially dependent children who were indoctrinated by their parents as you were indoctrinated by yours. Regardless, you must now maintain your position in stunning and profound arrogance.

And if you’re now scrambling for an out you can always claim that (in spite of being indoctrinated) you were convinced by some personal experience. Well, of course you were. That’s what indoctrination does. It primes impressionable children to see and feel what they’ve been taught to see and feel. You could do this with fucking lab rats, some cheese, and a blinking red light. What part of this is lost on you? And proof of this is found by simply observing the result of indoctrination of the children of other religions. Pay close attention: they’re all claiming the exact same thing…because their religious experience is consistent with their religious indoctrination. They’re all claiming proof by personal experience, just like you. And you can’t all be right, which brings us back to this: mommy and daddy just happened to pick the right religion.

Yeah. Uh-huh.

Christian Chutzpah

How big your balls must be. Your faith necessarily renders ALL OTHER RELIGIONS as false, and you stand amongst the minority of the total theistic world population and the 100 billion who have ever lived and died – yet you have the unmitigated gall to justify and validate your beliefs by way of incident of birth, a total chance occurrence.

You can have your delusion and I hope it serves you well, but don’t think that it isn’t perfectly clear to anyone who invests a few minutes of simple skeptical inquiry that you have no meaningful or impressive cause to believe that the aforementioned has led you to the sole cosmic truth.

Your mommy and daddy’s issues are now yours.
 

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