Posted: Jun 15, 2010 7:33 pm
Warning, this may also not work for everyone, I am just saying how I came out.
Unlike CJ, I don`t have any experience in communications and negotiations, etc. unless you would consider having taken a course in communication applications i.e. speech class as an exception. This was my procedure at the time and it may appear synonymous with the above. I wrote my final composition about religious intolerance within my background and how I had dealt the grossing torment thereof, so I suppose this is a summary. I don`t believe that being straightforward is a copacetic consideration in most hostile and religious environments such as my case, e.g. Texas, but if you have an apathetic family, if not fortunately an understanding one then don`t hesitate to reveal your beliefs and or lack thereof. I managed to sway my parent`s view appreciably to the point that with the awareness of my non-religious nature, they would politely ask me if I would want to attend Church instead of intolerably refusing the idea of me oversleeping or something else. I changed, however, from straightforward to discursive almost immediately with regards to the coming out session. My experience, as mentioned, showed that my straightforwardness did not help my parents to understand.
As typical as it sounds, they sadly held deep collective prejudices that influenced their unreasonable responses. The refusal of participating in religious activities, ceremonies, etc. had struck a nerve, because for them their undying indoctrination led them to believe that without this your reputation and your accepted morality would go rock-bottom and disappear respectively. What`s worse is the rejection of subscribing to the cornucopia of traditional religious beliefs that have been spoon-fed to them as ignorant innocent children. Once they knew that I did not buy into the jargon, they immediately approached and treated me as some lost cause, rebellious in nature, etc. and without the time to explain or justify it, they endlessly questioned me one creationist canard after another.
[1] If this happens, what I did was raise my stentorian voice to stop them from interrupting one another and most importantly to keep tranquility and steadiness among the discussion. I could not care any less whether they thought I was being disrespectful for hushing them, they were too overstimulated by the rarity of having an atheist, doubting child.
[2] I told them respectfully to please take turns asking questions and to wait for my explanation or justification for having those supposedly out of the ordinary doubts and thoughts.*
*Since it was Sunday, they were interminably determined to make me attend Church. This is when the situation with respect to [1] happened. My initiative maneuver was to be straightforward, in which I immediately refused. They didn`t stop bickering and quibbling on and on until I raised my voice and told them to take turns, which was quite awhile. My mother finally calmly asked why I did not want to dress up and go and the first thing that came across my mind was Bill Gate`s response, "Just in terms of allocation of time resources, religion is not very efficient. There`s a lot more I could be doing on a Sunday morning." and I quoted it verbatim. Be prepared, needless to say, CJ`s considerations.
[3] It was always important that you don`t leave them the impression that this atheistic thing is just a common phase among teenagers, otherwise I don`t think you have succeeded in allowing them to accept you as you are. I read this out of my father`s cousin`s son`s book in his bookshelf for good parenting and I was dumbfounded how they treated doubts or skepticism with regards to religion as some sort of phase teenagers experience from time to time, so instead of outright scolding them, they should flippantly neglect it and expect them to be religious in a few days.*
*One of the alternatives were to press them on into really vivacious activities that teenagers enjoy, but revolved entirely upon theistic concepts and Jesus Christ. Apparently this is what happened to the more gullible and frivolous children in my neighborhood, including my sister. I can only faintly remember the time where everyone enjoyed celebrating for the sake of brightening everyone`s day with contagious smiles and whatnot. Now they`re being sent off into religious conferences for evangelism and practise thereof. It`s ridiculous.
[4] Well, this is my confession, I never directly told them that I was an atheist. I was ambiguous enough to lead them on that I would never subscribe to any faiths whatsoever, not even if there was available evidence. My point being was that if there was empirical substantive evidence, I would go beyond the more often than not equivocated term faith and resort with critical acceptance as distinguished by the rigorous help of Calilasseia. Their facial expressions did lead me on that they were holding my position in contempt, however. I tried and refrained from being aggressive with any of my viewpoints, so they could easily understand why I was not susceptible to their dis-positional beliefs. I think it was more or less a bit of failure here and there, because they kept asking me what I believed and what religion I adhered to.
[5] They finally brought me into a state of mind that led to me realize that they would not fully accept my atheistic skepticism. And so, I unfortunately told them how it is with references to available statistics about correlations and causation(s) about religion and intelligence, prison populations with respect to believers and nonbelievers, etc. just so they could stop viewing me as some sort of outcast psychopath. Sometime later, I revealed significant similar dislikes that led them to realize I was ethical and moral, whereas I inevitably showed their biblical references condoned the contrary. I began to think that they were finally catching on to something about said jargon, but in the end, they only felt guilty for having prejudices and thankfully accepted me as an intelligible and moral human being. We tolerated one another since then, never bothered them to affiliate or participate in any activity and I received less demands, but just more invitations to religious activities on occasion.
Again, this is just a summary, I left many things out, some relevant.
Unlike CJ, I don`t have any experience in communications and negotiations, etc. unless you would consider having taken a course in communication applications i.e. speech class as an exception. This was my procedure at the time and it may appear synonymous with the above. I wrote my final composition about religious intolerance within my background and how I had dealt the grossing torment thereof, so I suppose this is a summary. I don`t believe that being straightforward is a copacetic consideration in most hostile and religious environments such as my case, e.g. Texas, but if you have an apathetic family, if not fortunately an understanding one then don`t hesitate to reveal your beliefs and or lack thereof. I managed to sway my parent`s view appreciably to the point that with the awareness of my non-religious nature, they would politely ask me if I would want to attend Church instead of intolerably refusing the idea of me oversleeping or something else. I changed, however, from straightforward to discursive almost immediately with regards to the coming out session. My experience, as mentioned, showed that my straightforwardness did not help my parents to understand.
As typical as it sounds, they sadly held deep collective prejudices that influenced their unreasonable responses. The refusal of participating in religious activities, ceremonies, etc. had struck a nerve, because for them their undying indoctrination led them to believe that without this your reputation and your accepted morality would go rock-bottom and disappear respectively. What`s worse is the rejection of subscribing to the cornucopia of traditional religious beliefs that have been spoon-fed to them as ignorant innocent children. Once they knew that I did not buy into the jargon, they immediately approached and treated me as some lost cause, rebellious in nature, etc. and without the time to explain or justify it, they endlessly questioned me one creationist canard after another.
[1] If this happens, what I did was raise my stentorian voice to stop them from interrupting one another and most importantly to keep tranquility and steadiness among the discussion. I could not care any less whether they thought I was being disrespectful for hushing them, they were too overstimulated by the rarity of having an atheist, doubting child.
[2] I told them respectfully to please take turns asking questions and to wait for my explanation or justification for having those supposedly out of the ordinary doubts and thoughts.*
*Since it was Sunday, they were interminably determined to make me attend Church. This is when the situation with respect to [1] happened. My initiative maneuver was to be straightforward, in which I immediately refused. They didn`t stop bickering and quibbling on and on until I raised my voice and told them to take turns, which was quite awhile. My mother finally calmly asked why I did not want to dress up and go and the first thing that came across my mind was Bill Gate`s response, "Just in terms of allocation of time resources, religion is not very efficient. There`s a lot more I could be doing on a Sunday morning." and I quoted it verbatim. Be prepared, needless to say, CJ`s considerations.
[3] It was always important that you don`t leave them the impression that this atheistic thing is just a common phase among teenagers, otherwise I don`t think you have succeeded in allowing them to accept you as you are. I read this out of my father`s cousin`s son`s book in his bookshelf for good parenting and I was dumbfounded how they treated doubts or skepticism with regards to religion as some sort of phase teenagers experience from time to time, so instead of outright scolding them, they should flippantly neglect it and expect them to be religious in a few days.*
*One of the alternatives were to press them on into really vivacious activities that teenagers enjoy, but revolved entirely upon theistic concepts and Jesus Christ. Apparently this is what happened to the more gullible and frivolous children in my neighborhood, including my sister. I can only faintly remember the time where everyone enjoyed celebrating for the sake of brightening everyone`s day with contagious smiles and whatnot. Now they`re being sent off into religious conferences for evangelism and practise thereof. It`s ridiculous.
[4] Well, this is my confession, I never directly told them that I was an atheist. I was ambiguous enough to lead them on that I would never subscribe to any faiths whatsoever, not even if there was available evidence. My point being was that if there was empirical substantive evidence, I would go beyond the more often than not equivocated term faith and resort with critical acceptance as distinguished by the rigorous help of Calilasseia. Their facial expressions did lead me on that they were holding my position in contempt, however. I tried and refrained from being aggressive with any of my viewpoints, so they could easily understand why I was not susceptible to their dis-positional beliefs. I think it was more or less a bit of failure here and there, because they kept asking me what I believed and what religion I adhered to.
[5] They finally brought me into a state of mind that led to me realize that they would not fully accept my atheistic skepticism. And so, I unfortunately told them how it is with references to available statistics about correlations and causation(s) about religion and intelligence, prison populations with respect to believers and nonbelievers, etc. just so they could stop viewing me as some sort of outcast psychopath. Sometime later, I revealed significant similar dislikes that led them to realize I was ethical and moral, whereas I inevitably showed their biblical references condoned the contrary. I began to think that they were finally catching on to something about said jargon, but in the end, they only felt guilty for having prejudices and thankfully accepted me as an intelligible and moral human being. We tolerated one another since then, never bothered them to affiliate or participate in any activity and I received less demands, but just more invitations to religious activities on occasion.
Again, this is just a summary, I left many things out, some relevant.