Did Leaving Xianity Change Your Political Views?

[jackbauer]

I think it did for me. Despite being in a Liberal Church, I held Republican/Conservative views. Looking back, I was pretty intolerant and my views could have easily (and deservingly) ended up on some site like FSTDT. I blame FOX news, my love for the show "24", and being an ignorant teenager with not much exposure to the world. Then once I started questioning Christianity, I started questioning my political views (it also didn't help that this was during Bush's second term). While I can't say the Liberal/Democrats are perfect, their stances on things seem more in line with helping the common man (though I don't know if it works in application). The "small government" Republicans are the ones who want to invade and bomb other countries, waste billions in unnecessary wars, and screw over the common man (restrictions on welfare, anti union, ect).

 

I also noticed that Conservative Republicans, especially the religious varient, blow shit way out of proportion. They'll have you thinking planned parenthood is run by a bunch of abortionists, that gays are trying to recruit your kids, that a mosque near ground zero is an attack on America, and that Obama is the next Hitler. I can't even take any of them seriously. It's as if the Republican party has been taken over by a bunch of paranoid conspiracy nuts.

 

With that said, I do think my deconversion played a part in it. Once you start to question one thing, you start to question others. Of course, I don't think the Republican party has helped matters these past several years either.

[traveller2]

Oh yes,very much so.It was suprising too.I was very right wing,against homosexuality,pretty racist and also very hateful towards liberal christians,no interest in the social gospel considering it weakness.

I just gotto a point in my deconversion where I noticed without any effort on my part that i no longer held those views.Apart from the social gospel( i would call it social justice now) I am quite the opposite of how i once was.Iam actualy very interested in inequalities be it social ,gender,racial etc.And its very genuine.Ibecame a much kinder person from the ....animal...basically that i was as a christian.Ah yes and needless to say my view on abortion changed too.I'm not pro abortion but having never faced that situation nor being a womanwhat would I really know about the complexities or not of making that legally protected choice. I would hold my peace now but I was idioticaly opinionated as a christian;I was a fool.

[★ Citsonga ★]

I am socially more liberal, that's for sure.

 

As far as the economics side of things, I'm uncertain. Both sides seem to have pros and cons.

 

I've gone from being a Republican to being registered No Affiliation.

[Positivist]

Yes indeed. I went from the most conservative party to the party that helps people and the environment the most. I always wanted to vote for the latter, but felt it was my fundy responsibility to vote conservative. No more!

[Guest Valk0010]

No actually, at least not directly. I ultimately become more unconventional in my political thinking to help satisfy a need left unmet by religion. But directly influencing things like that, not really.

[★ Citsonga ★]

By the way, even though the vast majority of religious people I know who express their political views are Republicans, my father-in-law is a minister and a Democrat.

 

Also, just today I saw a vehicle with a bunch of liberal and Christian bumper stickers. One in particular said, "Jesus helped the poor; Republicans help themselves."

 

So, not all religious people are uber-conservative.

[JoeCoastie]

I considered myself a libertarian republican. I was conservative fiscal issues, and liberal on most social issues (still like my guns). I haven't really changed my views, but I can't vote for the Republicans anymore as they think I'm scum for not being a Christian.

[Zaphod]

My big political shift from right to left had more to do with coming out of the closet as gay than with my atheism. I find that as someone who now embraces critical thinking, I try very hard to make sure my political beliefs are evidence-based. I try to be sure that if I adopt a liberal stance on an issue, it's because that's where the evidence points and I'm not doing or saying this just because it's the stance of the party that's friendly to gays.

[Suzy]

The political leanings of fundy Christians, and particularly the church I was in, are quite different to what you see in the US - and probably surprising to you. The church I belonged to was always quite actively political and for the most part of the last 20 years (since the iron wall came down and we have democratic elections) this church has supported either the liberals or the socialists in opposition to the conservatives. How come that a fundy Christian church would support liberals and socialists? Well, the explanation is that here for the conservative parties Christianity means either Catholicism, Lutheranism or Calvinism. So the more traditional churches, while fundies, Pentecostals etc. were sidelined and considered sects. There's a strong Catholic lobby in the leading (now governing) conservative party and the leading pastor of my ex-church is VERY anti-Catholic. The dislike for each other is mutual between Catholics and this Pente church. At the beginning there was even some kind of campaign lead against my ex-church from the conservative side. So that made my church side with the liberals.

 

However as time went on they grew increasingly dissatisfied with liberal politics - of course, it's hard to reconcile gay rights with fundy Christianity, for example. Then they turned to the socialists, just because they were the biggest opposition to the leading conservative party.

 

However since the last election (2010) something has changed in the relationship between my church and the leading conservative party. There was a controversial bill passed last year about the financing of churches according to which 14 and only 14 selected churches will get state financing. Of course, this strongly violates principles such as the seperation of state and church. But the point now is, that surprisingly my ex-church, which has a history of very strongly criticizing the governing conservative party and also being criticized by them was one of the selected churches. So there was probably some opportunistic peace made in the background. I expect that at the next elections they will suddenly turn conservative and call their faithful to support the government...

Also the government opposes gay rights, made a new constitution with references to God in it and with marriage being between one man and one woman etc. - so actually if the Catholics and my ex-church can rise above their differences then I think they are more natural allies for them than liberals. Eventually that which belongs together, grows together.

 

As for me I have became socially liberal since my deconversion. The sad thing is however that here in Hungary all the parties are corrupt and I have a strong disdain for all of them so I don't know if I will vote at all. I definitely will NOT vote for this current conservative government which attempts to lead us back to the Middle Ages regarding religion and the power and support they give to churches, as well as shoving "God" down our throats in the new constitution.

 

As for US politics, at the last elections I was rooting for McCain and before that, I'm ashamed to admit, Bush. Of course, because they were the "good" Christian nominees. Now I hope no fundy will ever get near to be president again and dictate world politics. We have seen where that leads to with Bush.

[Guest wester]

I do hate to break this to you, my friend, but by any objective standard, today's USA Democrats can, in no way, shape or form be considered "liberal". That is unless you hope, as Peggy Noonan has been trying to do since 1980, to change the definition to:

 

LIBERAL

adjective: pejorative describing someone who disagrees with me, or

noun: said disagreeable person in the flesh

 

Please desist from this practice, apply your critical thinking skills, or actually crack an Oxford English Dictionary instead of freebasing what you are told to believe.

 

Thank you for your time and consideration, sir, and best of luck in all things.

[norton65ca]

wester, compared to the fascists in the repuglicunt party, the dems are liberal. Maybe a ways to the right of any other liberal party in world politics but definitely liberal "In comparison".

Here in BC we have a provincial "Liberal" party which is that only in name, being, in reality, a pro business, union crushing trickle down privatize everything bunch of corrupt tossers who thankfully will be gone very soon.

[FeelHappy]

One in particular said, "Jesus helped the poor; Republicans help themselves."

 

 

This one always puzzled me the most, Jesus is very clear in his passages about the commandment to help the poor and needy, no stipulations are given, yet its the liberal left which cares about the poor and the christian right get up in arms and vehemently oppose helping the poor.....which was one of Jesus's most direct commandments. Another issue of Christians picking and choosing how the follow Jesus and being oblivious to the actual teachings of him.

 

 

As for my political views, I've moved from the right to the left. Issues like gay marriage and abortion, I can now freely support, before I never had any issue with gay marriage, but there was always this underlying fear that allowing gay marriage could bring about a sodom type of destruction (although I seriously doubt it). Abortion, I was more against believing that if god creates a child we should allow him/her to live, now days, I think the bigger issue is protecting our earth and somehow decrease our exponential population growth before we doom other species and perhaps ourselves.

[Vigile]

wester, compared to the fascists in the repuglicunt party, the dems are liberal.

 

In rhetoric only. Pay attention to the policies not the rhetoric. The differences between parties here is virtually indistinguishable.

 

If you get a chance, watch the documentary "Lifting the Veil".

[Vigile]

This one always puzzled me the most, Jesus is very clear in his passages about the commandment to help the poor and needy, no stipulations are given, yet its the liberal left which cares about the poor and the christian right get up in arms and vehemently oppose helping the poor.....which was one of Jesus's most direct commandments.

 

This is due to the fact that the bible doesn't outline their belief system, it is merely data mined to support beliefs that have evolved over the past 2,000 years. I've contended for a long time that an unwashed mind given a bible would never deduce what is known today as christianity if you gave them a bible and let them decide for themselves its message.

 

As I was deconverting I started to notice the fact I couldn't read the bible without reading into it what I had been told in a sermon. This really frustrated me as I was trying to look at it objectively.

[Akheia]

Once I realized that Christianity is a lie, I had to re-examine every one of my other preconceptions about social issues and politics. I've done a 180 since leaving the church. Some of my positions changed over many years, while some changed immediately, but change they almost all did.

[Zephie]

I think it has to a point. Once I started thinking about political issues, I found myself more and more on the middle road just voting what I thought was best and not for a party. I've never been registered as either Dem or Repub. I think they are ripping my country to shreds and it pisses me off. On issues like abortion, I've always been pro-choice even though I didn't realize it. I always said that I hoped I wouldn't be in that position and couldn't imagine what women went through who had to make that choice. As far as gays/lesbians/etc are concerned, once I got to know people I saw they were just that people like me. If they want to marry and be in a life-long relationship who am I to stop them? It doesn't invalidate any commitments. Rights are rights and people have a right to marry so long as it's consensual.

[jblueep]

I think that political labels are almost meaningless these days. All sides demonize the others, when the fact is that most of them are just acting for self preservation and not the common good. I don't think my views have changed all that much, but perhaps my deconversion gave me permission to fully embrace those views.

 

For example, I never hated gay people or discriminated against them as a believer. But now, I fully accept that gays are born that way and should have every right that I have. Now, I actively defend them when I hear or see discrimination.

 

I was and still am financially conservative. I think that people should take responsibility for themselves unless they are truly physically or mentally unable to do so. I believe in living generously, and that generosity is best person to person and not person to government to person.

[ConureDelSol]

I've always been pro-LGBT, pro-choice, pro-gun control, pro-environment, pro-universal healthcare, etc. It didn't matter what the church told me, I just couldn't shake any of these views and it was one of the major things that drew me away from Christianity in general. It's probably partially due to the fact that I wasn't born in the faith, but was introduced at an age where I had already developed some degree of reasoning and critical thinking skills.

 

The only difference now is that I don't feel guilty or like something is wrong with me for thinking that way.

[Legion]

I think my political views changed less after leaving Christianity than they did while I was inside it.

 

I'll never forget going to West Virginia on a mission trip and learning about some of the coal mining towns of the past. I saw there that men will sometimes do terrible things to other men in their pursuit of profit. I saw there immediately there was a complex relation between profit, control, and community. It was an eye opener. And because of it, I see that it's not as simple as... "Hey, we're all in this together! Shish boom bah, rah rah rah!"

[Ro-bear]

I deconverted way before I cared about politics. Over the next 25 years I went from enthusiastic Republican to stubborn Libertarian to reluctant Democrat.

[★ Citsonga ★]

One in particular said, "Jesus helped the poor; Republicans help themselves."

 

This one always puzzled me the most, Jesus is very clear in his passages about the commandment to help the poor and needy, no stipulations are given, yet its the liberal left which cares about the poor and the christian right get up in arms and vehemently oppose helping the poor.....which was one of Jesus's most direct commandments.

 

I should clarify that we shouldn't broadbrush groups of people. When I was a Republican I strongly believed in helping the poor, and I know that there are plenty of Republicans who do not "vehemently oppose helping the poor."

[VacuumFlux]

Mine changed a lot. As a christian, I was conservative republican because that's what all christians are (yeah, living in a bubble, etc). A few things bothered me, like gay rights, but I mostly just felt kinda sad and avoided the fights. After deconverting, I was able to actually think things through and am now more socialist than I used to be.

 

One of the biggest reasons for that change is being able to look at my parents' views from the outside. Mom, in the financial areas, seems to believe "life is unfair, but that's not the government's problem and people should choose to help each other". My dad, however, has much more of a "wealth makes right"/just world view of economics that horrifies me. Socially, they both claim they want the government to leave them alone, but both believe that abortion should be completely illegal and that gays shouldn't be able to marry (and possibly that being openly gay should be illegal, I'm not sure; they certainly think that anyone openly gay in the military should get a dishonorable discharge). My dad is a little worse than my mom on some of that and leans towards christian dominionist. Mom gets angry about politics because she feels afraid and helpless; dad gets angry about politics because he seeks out reasons to get the rush that he gets from feeling better/smarter/more moral than other people (for example, bragging by parroting talking points from Fox and Limbaugh that he's got more "fair and balanced" information and more "common sense"). I heard lots of yelling the other night and was afraid that they were fighting again, but no, they were screaming with instead of at each other because they were that upset about something on the news in another state (and this went on for several minutes).

 

So I do admit that I've seen some of the darker side of conservative thought and have a strong negative reaction to that. I also get the impression that the current republican strategy is to feed the bad stuff instead of focusing on things I could agree are good things even if I disagree on a specific implementation (like fiscal responsibility). I see the libertarians as being what I thought thought the republicans were supposed to be.

 

When I agreed with my dad's views, one thing that stood out to me was the idea that it is the government's main role to stop people from hurting each other (thus the gov't provides punishment for murder, and enforces traffic laws, etc). To provide law and order and safety, the backdrop people need to have a working free market economy. That idea has morphed for me into the idea that the gov't's role is to mitigate the inherent unfairness of life (I do NOT mean protect you from the consequences of your own actions; I mean to protect you from the consequences of other people's actions and acts of god) so that people are more empowered to take responsible entrepreneurial risks and be informed consumers. That's why I like the FDA's safety testing and labeling requirements, I like the EPA preventing large scale environmental damage (and no, expecting all the poor people whose land you just ruined scrape together enough money to buy a lawyer to spend years suing after the fact is not an acceptable alternative nor a sufficient deterrent), I like that public education gives kids a chance in life even if their parents made bad choices, and I think that universal healthcare that isn't tied to your employment would make people better able to be responsible entrepreneurs or at least have the option to shop around for a better job without being limited by health concerns (thus making the job market more of a free market). I expect the gov't to discover and prosecute false advertising so that consumers can be informed enough to make a healthy free market possible. I see big corporations doing awful things with no consequences, and expect the government to provide those consequences. Unfortunately, I also see big corps buying off politicians and can kinda see why that would make someone distrust any sort of government actions, but it still seems to me that the government is the only entity powerful enough to push the economy in a healthier-in-the-long-term direction.

 

Anyway, that was a bit of a long rant to answer a simple question.

[OpheliaGinger]

As a Christian I was very right-wing Republican, but I don't think it was necessarily my disbelief that caused me to change my political views. My political views went hand-in-hand with my religious views, so as I was becoming progressively more and more liberal in my religion, I was becoming more and more liberal in my worldview.

[blackpudd1n]

I've been mulling over this question for the last couple of days.

 

I don't think leaving christianity changed my political views. I think my political views, being incompatible with christianity, were one of the many reasons I left christianity.

 

I could never support Fred Nile, the Christian Democrats, or Family First. And having studied Legal Studies and Economics in Year 11 and 12, I had a pretty good idea about how I felt politically, and I also knew how the political system worked. So, if anything, I resented deeply sitting through a sermon telling me who to vote for and how. I knew that that was not the point of an election nor our voting system, and, as such, made the decision to not be influenced by anyone when I voted- not the church, my ex-husband, no-one.

 

Eventually I had to make my choice between my personal convictions, to which my political leanings were tied, and christianity. And we all know how that turned out.

[♦ ficino ♦]

I usually voted Democratic because that was closer to my upbringing, but late in Carter's presidency I couldn't take it anymore and registered as Republican. One influence was stuff in Forbes Mag. about the economic views of F. Hayek (anti-Keynesian). I was basically a libertarian Republican. About ten years later, the Catholic Church's continued opposition to a gay rights/protection bill in NY State made me stop going to mass, and eventually I registered as Democratic because the Republicans increasingly used homophobia as a tool for gaining votes - and actively stirred up homophobia. The Republicans try hard to put a lock on the "God" vote. There are many other points on which I think the Republicans are worse than Democrats in the US, but the Republicans of today are not like the Republicans when I was young or when I was a Republican. Barry Goldwater said, social conservatives need a swift kick in the ass (referring to Jerry Falwell and others). He said, the govt should be out of the bedroom and out of the boardroom. I cannot imagine any Republican saying that today (well, they want the boardroom to control government, basically) except maybe for very libertarian types who will never gain national standing in their party.

 

Anyway, being a Christian was not really what led me to become Republican - it was despair over the US economy at the end of Carter's term. Most of my Christian friends were Republican basically for that reason. Deconverting was not the direct stimulus for leaving the Republican party. It was the increasing role of religious conservatives in that party, so the stimulus of deconverting was more indirect. If I were still a Christian, I have no idea whether I'd be a Republican, since they are now so different from what they were (e.g. party dogma of denying human causality in climate change, holding evolution as a liberal conspiracy, etc.).