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The Faith of the Fatherless: The Psychology of (strong) Atheism

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Stumbled upon this hypothesis by Dr. Paul Vitz while watching one of the Sedevacantist videos. This is an interesting hypothesis.

It goes: If you have/had a "defective" father, you were likely to become (strong) atheist.



Now, there is a distinction between strong/weak atheists. This is about strong atheists, and the correlation of dead/abusive/absent/weak fathers.

I, myself, had a strong father who was deployed for 6 months at a time throughout my childhood. Although, I have a father, he was not always there. When he came home, he was an effective father. As such, I developed a weak atheism/theism in young child/adulthood as he was both defective and effective at differing times. In my fathers presence, I was the prodigal son. In his absence, I became the fallen son. I took the same attitude with God.

Really interesting stuff for my theist friends on this forum, and if some of my atheist friends would like to self-reflect without a kneejerk rejection to this hypothesis, it may help you understand yourselves further. At the very least, expand your mind a little at a time. Theists, this understanding of strong atheists can help us in showing more compassion to our fatherless brethren. Enjoy:


Happy Thanksgiving!
 

deathwarmedup

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I have much less of a knee jerk reaction to the idea (which is old, simplistic and unwieldy) than I do to the manipulative passive aggression I see in your posts, disguised under a veneer of civilised cordiality.

The idea you quote is a pervasive but limited psychological paradigm within which a certain psychologcal type has always either submitted to or rebelled against a belief system which they can only appreciate on cerebral terms. It has nothing to do with faith or the lack of it or why many others outside that narrow paradigm believe or don't.

Richard Dawkins isn't an atheist because he has daddy issues, he's an atheist because he's a vaguely autistic narcissist - who has long since milked a wonderful niche for attention and the limelight.

The same was true of Christopher Hitchens (who also recognised the impossibility of making an intellectual case for faith and so made a sub-career out of intellectually challenging it and then got called a genius by legions of fanboys who followed him out of the same motivations as they might have followed a religious leader in another era).
 
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I have much less of a knee jerk reaction to the idea (which is old, simplistic and unwieldy) than I do to the manipulative passive aggression I see in your posts, disguised under a veneer of civilised cordiality.

One could say: "Fighting fire with fire"? Years of following the Left-Hand grants one insight into the Enemy's psychology.

<---See the Civilized Wolf in the avatar is not a Sheepdog. They fill different roles.


The idea you quote is a pervasive but limited psychological paradigm within which a certain psychologcal type has always either submitted to or rebelled against a belief system which they can only appreciate on cerebral terms. It has nothing to do with faith or the lack of it or why many others outside that narrow paradigm believe or don't.

Richard Dawkins isn't an atheist because he has daddy issues, he's an atheist because he's a vaguely autistic narcissist - who has long since milked a wonderful niche for attention and the limelight.

The same was true of Christopher Hitchens, who also recognised the impossibility of making an intellectual case for faith and so made a sub-career out of intellectually challenging it and then got called a genius by legions of fanboys who followed him out of the same motivations as they might have followed a religious leader in another era.

We agree on some atheists being autistic in their inability to differentiate the literal from metaphor, closely resembling creationists (which might be a different *psychological bag altogether). The opportunism of Hitch and Dawkins on the Atheism niche is a new one. Thank you for that idea.
 

deathwarmedup

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One could say: "Fighting fire with fire"? Years of following the Left-Hand grants one insight into the Enemy's psychology.

You'll probably never know the volumes you just spoke about religion within the context of America's culture wars. You'd be better just leaving the whole thing alone. For the sake of religion.


PS - and the term you're looking for is militant atheism.
 
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PS - and the term you're looking for is militant atheism.

Strong, anti-, militant, etc. all describing the same or similar thing.

You'll probably never know the volumes you just spoke about religion within the context of America's culture wars. You'd be better just leaving the whole thing alone. For the sake of religion.

This is a learning opportunity. What do you have to offer? (I've an idea what you mean to say)

To reference my earlier post:

Right-Hand Path

The Right-Hand Path is commonly thought to refer to magical or religious groups which adhere to a certain set of characteristics:

  • They divide the concepts of mind, body and spirit into three separate, albeit interrelated, entities.[2]

  • They adhere to a specific moral code and a belief in some form of judgement, such as karma or the Threefold Law.[2]


The occultists Dion Fortune[3] and William G. Gray[4] consider non-magical Abrahamic religions to be RHP.


Left-Hand Path

The historian Dave Evans studied self-professed followers of the Left-Hand Path in the early 21st century, making several observations about their practices:
  • They often reject societal convention and the status quo, which some suggest is in a search for spiritual freedom. As a part of this, LHP followers embrace magical techniques that would traditionally be viewed as taboo, for instance using sex magic or embracing Satanic imagery.[1]:197 As Mogg Morgan wrote, the "breaking of taboos makes magic more potent and can lead to reintegration and liberation, [for example] the eating of meat in a vegetarian community can have the same liberating effect as anal intercourse in a sexually inhibited straight society."[5]

  • They often question religious or moral dogma, instead adhering to forms of personal anarchism.[1]:198

  • They often embrace sexuality and incorporate it into magical ritual.[1]:205
 

deathwarmedup

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Thank you. Gnosticism was one of the earlier ideas considered shortly after deism. It's certainly interesting, isn't it?

It isn't gnosticism. It's the psycho-spiritual roots of what came to be the teachings of Gurdjieff, of which came to be the modern Enneagram, which provides us with hours of fun, typing our favourite celebrities.
 

Doctor Cringelord

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It’s well known Dawkins’ daddy used to put out cigars on little Ricky’s nutsack
 

Qlip

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I imagine also "Strong Atheists" would also be people who either really got screwed over by their particular church, or got screwed over while their church looked the other way while it was happening. I've seen plenty of that. It's pretty damaging when the thing that was supposed to protect you ends up messing you up. One of my goals when I left my religion was to not fixate too much on it, which was by far the healthiest move. People who jump from Christianity to reactive Satanism or militant-Atheism are still on the same shitty trip. Of course, zealots of any stripe are the worst, especially new converts to whatever belief they think will save them/make them special.
 

Doctor Cringelord

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I’m not an atheist/agnostic because daddy didn’t hug me enough, I am because I determined the whole thing was bullshit at a very early age.
 

Magic Poriferan

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So, what if both of your parents were simply atheist, and you were raised without religion, and you were never religious at any point in your life?
 

Warrior

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I had a defective father. Our relationship as of now has de facto been severed. I had many years of atheism, then weak faith followed by converting to another religion over and over again within a matter of weeks, followed by strong faith ONLY after suffering enormous hardship and turning to God for help when I had no one else to turn to. Now I'm in weak faith at times and strong faith at times, maintain a secularist world view, and suffer from the urge to look up astrology and date casually with classmates due to gender segregation with MOST family friends (but for those I'm not separated from, I hardly see them). I don't attend Friday prayer service, but will start attending religious readings ever friday (in english, though most in our group are in Turkish, since my turkish is bad, especially with ADHD). But i can see how this would work. But I would also say not to discredit the idea of turning to religion WHEN one doesn't have a father figure, but everyone's different. Though usually, i think atheists are the outliers from the norms of society, such as people from broken homes, as suggested. I even believe my experience led me away from religion due to anomie, as sociologists put it (normlessness) I'd also like to add that not having a father figure to explain sex from an Islamic perspective when i went through puberty at age 10 or 11, and only getting advised when i was deep into stalking, sexual perversion, and porn addiction led to my faithlessness.
 

Polaris

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I'm no longer an atheist because I know I'm God, but nonetheless I feel entitled to speak on this subject, having been a strong atheist for a number of years (yes, God can disbelieve in Himself). First of all, the topic title is ridiculous. Atheism is not a faith. Atheism and faith are unrelated to each other. Second of all, I disagree with the premise that a particular type of childhood leads to a particular type of adulthood. A bad father could just as easily lead to someone who rejects God as it could to someone who turns to God as a much-needed replacement--or it could lead to someone who is simply indifferent to God, as I was for many years and still am. Did I have a bad father? Yes. Did that make me an atheist? No. What made me an atheist was the lack of a realistic God being presented to me for consideration.
 

Amargith

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Funny. I was raised as an atheist, in a household where religion was mocked but everything was sacrificed at the Altar of Science instead.

I also went to Catholic school. Both organised religion and the worship of science shared one thing in my youth - disrespect for others and their free will.

I ultimately chose a form of spirituality that made respect for others and respect for free will in perfect balance, its core.
 

Mole

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I ask myself, who is the father of the universe which we have known since 1998 is accelerating away from itself at every point in every direction?

Did the God of the desert, Allah, create the universe, or did the three headed God, the Trinity, create the universe, or perhaps it was Ganesh, the God with the head of an elephant? All seem improbable to me.
 

Avocado

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Strong, anti-, militant, etc. all describing the same or similar thing.



This is a learning opportunity. What do you have to offer? (I've an idea what you mean to say)

To reference my earlier post:

Right-Hand Path

The Right-Hand Path is commonly thought to refer to magical or religious groups which adhere to a certain set of characteristics:

  • They divide the concepts of mind, body and spirit into three separate, albeit interrelated, entities.[2]

  • They adhere to a specific moral code and a belief in some form of judgement, such as karma or the Threefold Law.[2]


The occultists Dion Fortune[3] and William G. Gray[4] consider non-magical Abrahamic religions to be RHP.


Left-Hand Path

The historian Dave Evans studied self-professed followers of the Left-Hand Path in the early 21st century, making several observations about their practices:
  • They often reject societal convention and the status quo, which some suggest is in a search for spiritual freedom. As a part of this, LHP followers embrace magical techniques that would traditionally be viewed as taboo, for instance using sex magic or embracing Satanic imagery.[1]:197 As Mogg Morgan wrote, the "breaking of taboos makes magic more potent and can lead to reintegration and liberation, [for example] the eating of meat in a vegetarian community can have the same liberating effect as anal intercourse in a sexually inhibited straight society."[5]

  • They often question religious or moral dogma, instead adhering to forms of personal anarchism.[1]:198

  • They often embrace sexuality and incorporate it into magical ritual.[1]:205

Obviously, left-hand is superior.

I fit your fatherless model, sure, but I left the Jehovah's Witnesses and became an atheist not because of father issues, but because I respect science and science precludes the fundamentalism I was raised in. Its moreso that I'm a science enthusiast and truth seeker than anything that led to my lack of belief in diety(ies). The Abrahamic religions are arrogant, in a way, since they assume they are the ONLY religions. They act as if the East Asian and Ancient Pagan relgions didn't exist. I don't debate theist anymore since I will not change their mind, and it is very unlikely they will change mine at this point. I've heard and debunked their arguments enough times that seeing the same ones again and again is exhausting.
 

Avocado

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Funny. I was raised as an atheist, in a household where religion was mocked but everything was sacrificed at the Altar of Science instead.

I also went to Catholic school. Both organised religion and the worship of science shared one thing in my youth - disrespect for others and their free will.

I ultimately chose a form of spirituality that made respect for others and respect for free will in perfect balance, its core.

"Altar of Science"? What is that?
 

Mole

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"Altar of Science"? What is that?

Whatever we worship, we become. It is as though we have an instinct to become, and so we have an instinct to worship. In the marriage ceremony we say, "I thee worship", a judge is described as "your worship", and we worship our God.

So as we mature, it is important to become aware of what we worship, for that is what we are becoming. And to choose what we become, we must choose what we worship.

Our urge to become, our urge to worship, is very powerful and often not appreciated, so it is important not to underestimate our urge to worship.

And we can worship almost anything, no matter how silly, illogical, or inappropriate, like science. Science is somewhat self correcting.
 
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