Doug Stanhope - Would You Believe If You Hadn't Been Indoctrinated As A Child?

January 8, 2010

I wasn't ever going to post this video/thread, but I'm in a foul mood today. I am fucking sick and tired of Christians boasting about how they've "thought" about their religion. And that, even as an adult, it makes "perfect sense."

BULLSHIT! You ONLY accept this drivel because it was spoon fed you as a soft-skulled child! Christians [theists] KNOW this to be true, which is why they insist that they be allowed to brainwash children as soon as they exit the womb. They KNOW that if they wait until children grow up and develop critical thinking skills, then no amount of bullshit/fear-mongering will get convince them. [unless, of course, they become stupid and gullible adults. It happens. Esp. in America.]

Anyway. Watch the video. Stanhope is funny and accurate as hell.

January 8, 2010

I think there's about a snowball's chance in hell that I'd be religious right now if I hadn't been indoctrinated by my mom's Ass-of-God-nutball side of the family. My parents have always encouraged me to think for myself, and of course there's the love-for-science thing...

January 8, 2010

I feel bad. I used to think Stanhope was a douche, but he is the truth. Thanks for the post!

January 8, 2010

I think some people that have converted later in life may have used religion as the crutch to get out of bad situations. Of course they thank god for this miraculous transformation in their lives when it was really all their own doing to begin with. And how do you explain say a non-believer becoming Buddhist or wiccan? Both are equally bullshit religions no better than Christianity as far as believability. So, yes stupid and gullible adults are affected but others also fall into the trap when they are desperate for something missing. A shame they cling to the fairytales of religion.

January 8, 2010

There is a podcast posted here about Childhood indoctrination (as of now its the most recent post, episode 638) that talks about this. I was especially struck by their explanation of children's hymns and how when you look at the lyrics of even the most beloved ones the message of being a worthless sinner who deserves hell and the blood sacrifice is all too present. The hymns will stick with you forever too, even years later people will remember "Jesus loves me".

Though there are people who convert as adults, its pretty rare I think. One religion I have a particularly hard time understanding adult conversion is Mormonism.

January 9, 2010

I have a half-baked theory about adult converts to any religion.

These conversions don't occur in any atheist vacuum. Even people who haven't been specifically targeted by religion, can't help but be surrounded by it's influences. Like it or not, we "know" all about the religion of our society. We soak in it's garbage by osmosis inadvertently. It's very much like planting the seed that Christians love to boast about. So when the adult is somehow triggered to consider religion they "miraculously" turn to the "reasonable" choice of the religion that they're most familiar. Having also been conditioned to reject and despise those "weird, foreign" religions. Thus, in a way, even these adult conversions aren't bereft of influence and indoctrination.

And I should know, because this is EXACTLY what happened to me.

January 9, 2010

Nah ah! Gawd would have revealed himself to be truuee.

January 9, 2010

They also convert later in life because when they were soft-skulled children someone fed them a line of bullshit that set up their paradigm for them. No one is going to accept the premise of some zombie that died for your sins unless they feed you that premise when you are too young to balk. The concept of sin itself and people that rise from the dead, etc... would be foreign to you and unacceptable. This is why people raised in the US don't convert to Hinduism later in life (unless they take acid and hang out with dead heads of course).

January 9, 2010

Stanhope FTW. He said something similar to this when he played here in Louisville last year. Always good.

That was always my favorite line: "If you really believe death leads to eternal bliss, then why are you wearing a seatbelt?" Classic!

January 9, 2010

But then the Christians could just as easily argue that we're only ex-Christians because we don't want to follow the rules or because we were hurt by false Christians or maybe we just haven't heard the gospel preached correctly. That's the problem I have with making judgment on the thought process that goes through somebody else's head. Unless they let you know what's going on in their head, we can't know what's going on in their head or how much they really thought about an issue and we ignore our own blind spots in thinking we think only we who came to the "right" conclusion did so because of purely rational thinking and not because of our own personal emotional investments. You see the same thing happen in political debates where each political party accuses each other of only believing their political values because of emotional irrational reasons but their own reasons are purely rational and unbiased. I'm not saying anyone here left Christianity just because of emotional and irrational reasons, but I'm just saying when it comes to judging other people's thought processes in general, it's better to be careful that we don't fall into the trap of thinking we have superior thought processes because we came to the right conclusion.

January 13, 2010

Wow, he's so right "You believe all the parts that don't affect your life at all."

If I had been raised in the brand of Christianity that he's talking about, I probably would never have been provoked to leave it. Don't know how many of you have heard of John Macarthur, but I was raised in his church. He's the kind of guy that agrees 100% with Stanhope, and will tell you that the vast majority of Christians in the world are not really "saved." He advocates the "word of God" style, and says over and over again that we must live our lives based on exactly what the Bible says.

So for 20 years, I did my best to resist urges, stifle 'instincts,' etc. I didn't allow myself to be a fake christian because I hate fake people. I literally ruined several relationships with girls just to be faithful to God. Finally, I knew enough was enough. I spent my 19th and 20th year of life (I'm 21 now) thinking about almost nothing else but the numerous reasons I had to suspect the falsity of Christianity.

January 13, 2010

I know MacArthur's works. He was among my short list of favorite Christian authors back when I was a sheep. It was partly due to the influence of such Christian critics that encouraged me to question and think for myself. I never could comprehend how these authors could simultaneously see all the faults and failures of Christians and never make the connection that Christianity failed to deliver simply because IT is faulty and a failure. People were never "new creatures created in Christ Jesus" because there is NO Holy Spook to make it so. Any changes you make are self-imposed and therefore doomed to fail. You can't change human nature.

Which, of course, plays directly into the evangelists hands. "You've got to TOTALLY give yourself over to HIS hands and let HIM remake you!" And thus continues the never ending cycle of failure, shame, recriminations, re-dedications, "success" and failure. Rinse, lather, repeat.

January 27, 2010

Love the video.

This is a question I have been rolling around in my mind. When I was 9 I had a massive conversion experience. At the time I was in a church home after the breakup of my family. I'd had no other religious instruction of any kind other then I knew who baby Jesus was. My family was extremely abusive and violent and I was a very traumatised child even at that stage.

I felt that Jesus had died just for me. That it was my sin that put him there, just mine. I devoured the bible and Jesus became my hero. God knows I'd had very few of them up till then. I read Jesus as a person who believed everyone was equal, who was kind to everyone, didnt hold back when addressing bullshit, took no prisoners when it came to the truth being outed. He was so different from everyone I had experienced in the world so far, even different from the minister who introduced me to god, then set about sexually assaulting me for the next three months. THe bible said that people choose the darkness over the light, but I knew I never would.

I developed my prime directive, never become my abuser. Attached to that was always tell the truth, always, 100% and NEVER deviate from that, as well as always put others before myself. Don't treat people as any better or worse than I was, be extra kind to poor and disenfranchised people, look after the weak. In some strange childlike way I was building a character for myself that would make it up to Jesus for all the pain and suffering I had put him through. I wanted to be just like him, but I had not figured into the equation what happened to him and why.

Long story short, after years and years of this I had developed a lovely little obsession with being perfect that brought me to the brink of suicide. Coupled with that was cult involvement, and my disgust at christians who didnt want to be like Jesus the way I did.

It all came to a head when I fell in love after nine years of celibacy, which is what good christian women do when their husbands leave. A choice had to be made, either I was going to accept my feelings for this person or commit suicide over the shame of them. I chose to live. Took about six months of sheer hell for the paradigm shift to occur. I was tired of being miserable and I was going to have sex with the person I loved.

Of course I got kicked out of the church and berated for dragging another, younger person into sin. The guilt and shame they tried to pour on me was massive, but it had the opposite effect. I had rediscovered real life, discovered comfort which I dont think I'd actually ever had. The massive load of guilt and shame I had carried for over 30 years just fell away, and I still couldn't tell you how that happened or why. Maybe I'd just had enough of beating myself to death over nothing.

I faced the possibility of going to hell, but then I considered the places in life I had already been. Like the breakdown I had when the cult kicked me out and told me I was separated from god, and I believed them. I was in hell at that point and it lasted a good six months. Really I cannot imagine anything worse, in this life or the next.

Now I am questioning everything. The jury is out on what I believe and why.

January 27, 2010

I would like to think I would have never set foot in a church a day in my life had I not been raised in a xtian home. Unfortunately, I never had that opportunity to find out.

January 27, 2010

I didn't become religious until adulthood, and I didn't go to church most of my life. I wasn't gullible or stupid as an adult either. So, wouldn't that mean that you DONT know exactly why people are Christians?

January 27, 2010

Me too Checkmate....you are batting "0 for"

January 27, 2010

You guys were raised in a culture where xianity is considered the norm. If you had been raised in Russia you would be orthodox, in India probably Hindu, in Vietnam, Buddhist.

January 27, 2010

BINGO! Though it is course possible they could end up christian, I'd say the chances are much, much more remote.

January 28, 2010

How did you become a Christian? Most people I know who say they became a Christian later in life actually were raised in a Christian religion. Later on, they were told by members of another Church they weren't raised in a real Christian religion so now they "became" Christian. The other people I know who were never Christians before are some Chinese people who became Christian because they felt Christians were luckier than others, added Jesus to their other beliefs & hedged their bets.

Those are the basic scenarios I've heard of adult conversions. What's your story? Just friendly curiousity.

'Tastic

January 28, 2010

Well, your guillible and stupid now to belive in imaginary beings.

January 28, 2010

I can't reconstruct your early life any more than I can walk into the empty tomb for myself, but... I think you are being misleading. I'm not sure you could prove me wrong because if you're being misleading, then you have incentive to continue doing so.

I could ask questions, but that basically gets too personal, and you might twist words and meanings to suit your purposes.

I see your statement, however, as discriminating between being "religious" and "believing." Being disinterested in religion is not the same as not being a Christian.

Ultimately, you were raised in a Christian culture, environment, and country, and you eventually took it seriously. I gather....

Now, if you were born in Tehran, forced to go to a madrasa, studied the Koran because you had to, but then came to the US and began to learn about and then believe Christianity and then became "religious" that would be different, but then it would only mean changing one set of beliefs for another.

God and Santa Claus are both taught to children, and some children are born in more religious families than others. Ultimately, to believe, you only had to be exposed (even peripherally) and not have those beliefs soundly refuted before you became "religious."

So, to get back to the question: "You ONLY accept this drivel because it was spoon fed you as a soft-skulled child" This would suggest that you were exposed to Christianity as a child. Were you not? Were you so ignorant that you never heard of it before you became an adult? Of course not. And when you "heard" of it, was it presented as ridiculous fantasy, delusion, and absurd? I doubt that. So you were exposed as a child.

Your answer: "I didn't become religious until adulthood, and I didn't go to church most of my life."

I think most Christians would like to think that they arrived at their beliefs solely through rational consideration of those beliefs (and maybe sort of even examination of other beliefs), but there is so much more than that in the US today.

Now, if your parents were baby-eating Satanists (other people's babies, of course) who recoiled at the sight of a cross that wasn't upside down and tried to inculcate an antiChristian attitude along with other things that parents do, like "Don't ever smoke, don't do drugs, and for Satan's sake don't become a Christian!", then ...

Keep in mind that a person that curses god must first believe in god.

January 28, 2010

I was normal Normal guy. I never thought about God, and if I did, it was for just a thought, then vanished. I had no interest in going to church, and if I did go to church, it was only because my wife or girlfriend went and wanted me to go with them. Other than that, I had no use for church. I believed in God and all. I didn't know the Bible, anmes of books, where they were, etc. If you would told me to turn to Corinthians in the Bible, I was one of those that took 10 minutes to find it in the index, (of course, after flipping through it for a few minutes). So, my Bible my mom gave me had dust on it.

I did do the whole church, God, Bible thing for almost a year once, but it was just because I dated a religious girl. But, all I cared about then really was having sex with her, and didn't ever get it, so I stopped caring about all that churchy stuff.

The only way I know how to communicate my transformation into the person I am today may sound a little cheesy, but in my mind, it's the truth.

Have you ever bought a car, liked it and all, thought it was different, cool, didn't remember seeing that many around? Then when you buy it, drive it, clean it, you start to see your car EVERYWHERE and it seems like everyone has one The thing is though is that the car was around the whole time, you just weren't looking for it.

Religion came to me in this light. For me, one day I saw nothing, then I was introduced to the idea of being a Christian (follower of Christ) by my own mind, and I bought it, attended the idea, started trying to pray, believe, talk to God, etc. (No Bible as of yet, didn't like to read much). And, it was like all of a sudden, I saw everything different, churches, crosses, people, life, the world; to me, it was like that car, when I bought it, I saw it everywhere.

This changed me forever and I have endlessly searched high and low through the history of Christianity, along with other religions beliefs, read the Bible a number of times, analyzed different translations and the evolution of the Bible and am at a point where the isn't much content of the Bible that I am unfamiliar with.

For me, just typing that statement is a miracle, and if you knew me like I do, you would see it as a miracle as well. I hated reading, I had no use for anything educational, except maybe math; and now, I love to read, study, research, discuss, think of different ideas, theories.

In summary, though church and religion had been there the whole time, it didn't pertain to my mind, it was far from my mind. So, yes, I was Catholic as a child, alter boy, up until about junior high. Then I quit alter boy because it was embarrassing as people at school went to the church. Then, I didn't go to church at all for some years (which made me happy because I really hated going to church)

I got in trouble at school and was sent to a Baptist private school. There I was forced to keep a Bible in my cubby (which I ruined and drew on) and forced to learn Bible verses to pass my grades (which I resented). We couldn't wear shorts, couldn't speak at school, had to write thousands of sentences if we talked, disturbed the class, or any other offense. I went to this school until my senior year(where I dated the girl that was religious).

My junior year, I quit trying to be good churchy, Bible guy for my girlfriend, and went back to, "normal". See, even though I was surrounded by church, god, scripture, it ALL felt cultish, abnormal, not me. That is because I was not religious.

Summer of my senior year, I had a bad car accident and my mom couldn't afford to keep me on her insurance anymore, so I had to go live with my dad. Senior year, I got into trouble my first day, had to write 2000 sentences as punishment. My dad pulled me out of the school and put back into public school. I had alot of friends from public school still, as the private school was always like a prison or something. I went there for 2 quarters until my friends and I were considered gang activity by the school board, and one of my friends mom's put him in a private school. I also went to this more liberla private school for the remainder of the year.

Now, the scene was this. Religion was for geeks, and great material for my friend and I to crack on some folks. Happen to be, there was about a 10:1 ratio of cool to geek, which worked out good.

Graduated, was working, no church life going on, and all my gang activities led to me not being able to even go to the gas station without someone trying to jump me.(from the other side, you know East/West thing) My stepbrother went to a Christian college. He came home and talked me into coming up there with him to school. He is gay (though at the time he was still in the closet). I knew he was gay then, and figured that if he liked it there, and looked, acted, talked like a gay man, then it must not be to bad.

So, I went. Met my first wife there who is religious. Same deal as the girlfriend, Me + church = female happy. That's it. Her whole family was religious, and thought I was Satan I resented most of any church, or church people my whole life. Judging, telling me I am hellbound, etc. I really made me mad that people would seriously think I was a bad person because I didn't talk about church 24/7. It baffled me and I thought they were loonies.

We had a child together, and then I went from Satan to just a sinner That's how I felt anyhow. Life basically went on for about 6 years after that. We both dropped out of school, me year one, her year two; and we became a family. I moved up in my work, became a very successful manager in my market, and was considered for supervision before my changes happened. At this point in my life, work was my life, and made me go from sinner to really, really, good guy that needs to accept Jesus and come to church (Oh yeah, and tithe from my good earnings).

I tithed because of my wife, went to church, dealt with religion in general. When my wife would go into 'I need Jesus' speeches, I would contend with her, argue a good bit. I, then, felt that providing for my family, becoming responsible, caring for my wife and child, these things were essential to me, not church stuff. I would mess with her and ask her if my grandma, my sweet grandma was going to hell since she is Catholic and they don't do all that crazy stuff you guys do. She said Yes !!

I resented religion even more at that point, especially hers. So, life was normal for me, probably comparable to any other ExCer. Dealing with religion and the religious. The only difference is that I had no clue what the Bible said about what and just went with what seemed rational most of the time. To me, it was rational to believe in a God, one God over all stuff, Holyman from God, a Book about God, and also, that nobody knew the correct answers because my mind told me just from observations that one place does it this way and the other another way.

Going back to where religion came to me, and apologize for the long response, but, nobody here has ever expressed curiosity about my transformation as an adult. That in itself is a long story and I will summarize. Crazy stuff started happening to me. First, a lady who worked for me knew I was going to do something I considered bad, which was trying to cheat on my wife. The day I decided to go forward with it, out of the blue, the lady said she needed to speak to me, and told me she knew I was going to do something bad, and it would jeopardize my career. She specifically said that I wouldn't get fired, but it would end my career.

I followed out my plans anyhow, and sure enough it caused a big problem. She declined the offer basically, then couple months later clamied sexual harassment, which started a snowball effect. I was very successful at work, so they ended up transferring her to another location. But, it didn't end. I felt like my supervisor (female) looked at this not so good, and she already resented me because she felt like I was handed my successful location without any work needed (which wasn't true, far from it)

That summer I started praying to myself in the car, shower, alone. Asked God to help me, that's about it. The store started falling apart. Had bad Mothers day in our numbers, took longest in company to do inventory, then they got robbed at gunpoint, then I got wrote up for being down in a quarter. So, everything went downhill. My old supervisor told me to keep a notice on me just in case she stopped in to fire me. For the first time that I can remember, I spoke about my faith. I told my old supervisor that it was in God's hands.

After this it gets a little sticky. I really hope you read this, and anyonbe else reads this whole thing and doesn't just read this part because I have had to many people tell me that I need to get my brain examined, or go see a psychologist.

Life sucked, and my wife also was distant from me intimately and emotionally. She was mad at me because for years she was overweight and I was overworked and never felt up to extra activities. She lost about 90 pds, and resented me because later because I got my sexual urge back, I lost weight to because of changing my diet for my health. So, all this is happening at the same time. I came home one day, I was upset about my job, my wife and I were arguing, and I felt like it was all my fault, I felt worthless.

So the life of me didn't work anymore because I was screwing it up, and I didn't understand why God would be letting these things happen when I was praying to Him???

I prayed one last prayer. "God, I have my eyes open, my heart open, my ears open, please tell me what to do"

Andddd, ...He did. I quit my job, and decided to devote my life to God instead of the world. I honestly thought everything would be different, happy since my wife wanted me to know Jesus, get saved. It was very different, in all kinds of ways.

That car example, the day I quit, that day it was like my eyes opened to everything. I saw crosses, churches I never noticed, people everywhere! All in a different light, I saw the light. I bought it, owned it, claimed it, and now saw it everywhere. It was and still is quite amazing in my mind. My wife hated me and said that God didn't tell me to quit my job, He wouldn't do that. So the best day of my life was also the worst day of my life because now my wife was ready to walk out, and I now was unemployed.

Amazing things happened since then, and horrific things have happened since then. I have felt like God is right beside me, to feeling like I am in the pits of the most horrible of hells. I have been stable, going broke, broke, almost homeless, homeless. I have been alone, had friends, people use me, people take advantage of my kindness, people love me, hate me, care about me, disown me.

But, I don't take back any of it because I know now, even though much the same as before, I know what is in that Book, what walking with faith is, what God's strength is, what evil can be available in the world, how blindness and deaf ears are real within religion, and out of religion.

I started talking here about 5 years ago and have researched, learned, read, analyzed, discussed, debated, felt good in God, felt God did not exist and I was crazy at times.

It has been quite a journey. I have lost alot, and I have gained alot.

So there it is, the how I became a religious nut in my adult life. After all that happened with my job, I began to read the Bible and read it in four months. I read everyday. I have since reread it, done commentaries on my own, research the church's history, just dove full force into Christianity, religion, life, hope, faith, all that.

I has not been perfect, but it wasn't perfect when I left my life either, and now, I at least know what I know and can make sense of it in my mind.

January 28, 2010

Wow. I wrote a big response to this just a minute ago, I hope you read it.

I do have a question and a response to what you have said.

Do you really think that me claiming what I claim is misleading?

I never cared about God or church. You, in your without God state, probably are more religious than I ever used to be. Church was not in my thoughts, my mind, or my actions, words, writing. It was nowhere to be found. And yes, it came just as that car example I gave in my response above. That's that.

Anything you say to try to convince me that I have this wrong with me, had to much pressure, needed psychological help, ..it's all been said to me before, by more important people in my life, people that I loved. So, you can say as you please, but I would appreciate it if you didn't because anytime my light, my Mona Lisa, my great symphony, my emotional awakening is smeared; it is hard to handle. Hopefully, thanks in advance.

January 28, 2010

Abiyoyo I enjoyed reading that. It was like reading the story of a guy who dropped some acid and never stopped tripping.

January 28, 2010

I think we are playing post tag. Tag! Your it!

I thought in the new thread I started, you were taking about another thread from awhile back that I had posted with some of my past stuff in it.

Doug Stanhope - Would You Believe If You Hadn't Been Indoctrinated As A Child?

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