Beginnings of an Atheist and Misanthropist (part 1)

I’ve lived in the south my entire life and at an early age came to accept the fact that religion was a part of everyday life and should be included in every aspect of our lives from sports, to the arts, and praying for sunny days to play. All of this and I had two very non-religious parents, that were fairly liberal at times. My dad the son of an episcopalian and Jehovah’s Witness, my mom the daughter of two very devout southern baptists, I had plenty of options. However, they never took me to church service and I was fortunate to not been branded at birth as so many unknowing children are. Instead, when I was old enough to start understanding the roll of religion in the world, they encouraged me to seek out my own truths, and discover a belief and moral system that fell in line with my life.

Throughout my teens, I attended various services with my friends and there families, and studied the different teachings of different denominations from Jewish to Catholic and even Islamic. No religion I ever studied seemed to make sense and I gave the readings and teachings no more credit or value than I would give the writings of Kipling, as great as the stories may seem, they were just stories.

Finally, at the age of 18 and on the cusp of graduation and entering the “adult” world, I came to the realization that I was an Atheist and greatly enjoyed the pursuit of knowledge and scientific understanding of my surrounding world, instead of following dogma. Even though I felt as if a burden was lifted from my chest and I saw the world in a new light, I was once again faced with the fact that I was in the South and religion was deeply ingrained in every part of life; so I buried my non-belief and kept quite on religious matters.

As I began to open up more and more with the passing years, I began to notice many stereotypes that “believers” have of Atheist. From being morally, corrupt, to being mean savages, to being arrogant, and close-minded. I won’t lie growing up in a predominately white area and being a white male you really don’t face any kind of stereotypes, so this was all a new experience and somewhat unbelievable. As my coworkers began to find out my “heathenist” ways I experienced a disconnect from them in our daily interaction. I was slowly being labeled based on my lack of faith, and even though I had worked with some of them for a few years and they knew me and my values, it didn’t matter because I didn’t “know their god”.


In the upcoming weeks, I will continue my story and background and some more new stuff going forward…


"We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart." -- H. L. Mencken