Greta Christina has been writing professionally since 1989, on topics including atheism, sexuality and sex-positivity, LGBT issues, politics, culture, and whatever crosses her mind. She is author of
The Way of the Heathen: Practicing Atheism in Everyday Life, of
Comforting Thoughts About Death That Have Nothing to Do with God, of
Coming Out Atheist: How to Do It, How to Help Each Other, and Why, of
Why Are You Atheists So Angry? 99 Things That Piss Off the Godless, and of
Bending: Dirty Kinky Stories About Pain, Power, Religion, Unicorns, & More, and is editor of
Paying For It: A Guide by Sex Workers for Their Clients. She has been a public speaker for many years, and many of her talks can be seen on YouTube. Her writing has appeared in multiple magazines and newspapers, including Ms., Penthouse, Chicago Sun-Times, On Our Backs, and Skeptical Inquirer, and numerous anthologies, including
Everything You Know About God Is Wrong and three volumes of
Best American Erotica. (Any views she expresses in this blog are solely hers, and do not necessarily represent this organizations.) She lives in San Francisco with her wife, Ingrid. You can email her at gretachristina (at) gmail (dot) com, or follow her on
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Despite the best efforts of certain vocal theists.
Thank You!
But you know what, I would rather be an angry atheist than an angry religious person, because the latter rage is more often than not dangerous. Angry atheists write books- angry religious people blow things up.
Sorry for generalizing, but I was very annoyed at Nick Kristoff’s piece on Ayaan hirsi Ali. Amazing that she is the angry atheist, yet the loving relious were the folk who issued death threats at her.
Yes. Compared to my co-workers at the small postoffice where I carry mail, I am the least stressed-out, most contented person there. Two of the four are fundies – Baptist and Pentacostal – one is moderate Baptist and the other is mainstream denomination of some kind. (All female). Previous co-workers – ranging from fundie to moderate – have all been “religious”. I can say I am the only “secular humanist” to have ever worked there. (You don’t out yourself as an atheist in a small town in Ky – you may lose your house or car to “accidents”) The fundies seem to be the most emotionally fragile, hysterical, unstable of the lot, all on drugs of various kinds, hypochondriacs, divorced at least once, dysfunctional families, etc. I couldn’t live with the constant drama that seems to permeate their lives. One of them is always looking forward to dying and going to heaven (how she knows I can’t tell), this at the age of 38 – my fundie mother-in-law was the same way. Yet they all have incomparably better lives than women in the third world or women in the early 1900’s in this country. Why am I so happy and they’re so miserable? I have an intellectual life, I’m in science and I’m happy in this world. I have made the most of this life and don’t have another to look forward to. (Would be nice, but get real.) Is it heredity? or environment?
I know what you mean, Jane. I was once in contact with a person online who had all sorts of problems. She fought depressions for which she took medications, she had panic attacks, anxiety, sleeping problems… things like that. She was also theist and when she eventually realized I was an atheist her first words were: “If you don’t believe in god, how do you even get out of bed in the mornings?” …
It’s not that my life is perfect in any way. I have had my share of problems. The things is not that atheism in itself guarantees a happy life (though I do think that accepting reality makes you better suited to handle problems). It’s that the theists claim that religion does… and it so clearly doesn’t!
Jane, there may be a correlation v. causation issue there. People sometimes turn to religion because they are having trouble coping for some reason.
Agreed, Joshua. Although the correlation may go the other way as well: having religion may make people more likely to think of their lives as not being in their hands, and therefore less likely to take effective action to change their lives. And they may not have as clear a sense of cause and effect… and therefore may not have as clear a sense of what kinds of actions in their lives might produce what kinds of results.
Frankly, I could easily see the causation of this as being one big vicious circle.
Assuming, of course, that it’s a common phenomenon, and not just a few anecdotes. Which it easily could be.