Any atheist or agnostic fapstronauts,on here?

I don't really have a different story than the previous ones, but here ya go. i went to a private christian school all my life, and once i got to college i realized there was more to it than just the sheltered bio we learned there. I also learned that i LOVE science, and the more you love science, the less religion makes sense. I also met my now fiancee my first year of college. He was an Atheist too and helped me put the pieces together. We even went to the same high school and he had the same transition after he graduated (4 years before me). We go to different colleges and see each other on the weekends, but it is great because the time we spend together is always fun. We were each other's first, so sex means a lot to us because there's more trust.
I recently realized I was having trouble staying in the mood during sex and craving porn instead of intercourse with the love of my life! It was very depressing once realizing that because it's something I would never tell him about. He is so attractive, easily a 10, so why would i prefer internet strangers and a vibrator over his perfect body? So that brought me here.

 

Wow your PMO story is remarkably similar to mine! Nice to know I'm not alone in that. Thanks for sharing

 

I've been an atheist most of my life but I may be slipping into agnosticism, if you want to worry about labels. The reason for that is my growing interest in Buddhism, which generally takes the position of "There may or may not be a creator god. Who cares."

I remember being agnostic when I was about eleven. I thought maybe there's a god, maybe there isn't, maybe it's a man, maybe it's a woman etc. And then in school we were taught that you had to worship this particular male god or else you're a bad person and will be punished, basically. So for a while I was scared into believing in that god. After a while I noticed that many religious adults were arrogant, unhelpful, judgemental and so on. I also found many aspects of belief illogical, such as the idea that god listens to the prayers of millions of people.

I agree that certain Christian ethics are good. It's a shame they generally take the argument of "Be good because God wants you to be good." I'd prefer if they gave reasons to be good that don't require belief in God.

I respect peoples' beliefs and lack of beliefs as long as they don't use them to justify wrongdoing.

 

At some of these things, I'm just like... How? I wonder if such things happen in the Netherlands, too, as I certainly don't see them. Most people actually do not label themselves Christian, and the ones who do, are mostly actually acting it out. I can't recall these hypocritical Christians I see talked about on the internet so often.
I wonder... should I be happy I don't need to experience these people or not because I can't try to help them either?
Actually, come to think of it... I have seen lots of these "Christians" in YouTube comment sections, and that does really sadden me. I generally don't bother replying, as the atmosphere in the YouTube comment sections tends to be toxic, unfortunately.

 

I'm an atheist. Basically, I started doubting the existence of a god when I came to terms with the gender dysphoria in my life. I hated the idea of a god who decided to mess with how I see my gender, and I especially hated what establishment Christians had to say about transgender people. Eventually, my reasons for being one turned from emotional to logical when I started watching the channels The Amazing Atheist and DarkMatter2525 on YouTube. God just didn't make sense anymore, and he still doesn't now.

 

Well, I dont really have a story that's any different to ones above, I don't believe in God or the existence of any divine beings upstairs either. But I tend to not comment on this matter much; it's just better to let everyone be and do my own thing. I don't really mind, nor do I really care about what others want to believe.

But just because I don't believe in the existence of an omnipotent being doesn't mean I don't feel the guilt of being a chronic masturbstor and enthusiastic watcher of pornography that probably would've killed one's faith in God instantly. So yeah, no more freaky porn for me. But that didn't bring me here, my belies about the world just kind of made me look past the glowing computer monitor and decide that I probably should stop.

 

Even though we may doubt some World of Forms, some Perfection, some Omnipotent Being beyond this world we see - which would be the reward for virtue - I think most of us can recognize the harsh reality of vice..................... but then that would make the reward of virtue relevant to life here and now............

Perhaps we are not quite so beyond good and evil as we like to think. I think this why T. S. Eliot enjoyed the decadent and bleak poetry of Baudelaire so much; it disrupted the smug, sterilized and most respectable views of the middle classes.

 

I've probably been an atheist all of my adult life. My mother tells me that I was a doubter even as a youngster.

Here's my take on it. We can't be certain where we came from before, or where we're going after this life. We can't know for certain why we're here, aware of ourselves (sentient) and willful (able to cause things to happen). We can't know for certain why there is good and evil in the world, why some have good luck and others don't. And, there is no way to know if we are creatures of coincidence or by divine creation.

As human beings we need to have answers, we need to "know" the whys and wherefores. Yet, there are certain unanswerable questions that would drive us mad having to settle to not know. I feel fortunate that I've made my peace with that and do not feel the need to search for those answers. But, creating a supreme being to answer all the questions, gets us humans off the hook, ties up all the loose end and puts us as ease. We don't have to deal with the unpleasant uncertainties.

It's never been satisfying for me to think there is supreme power guiding our every move, putting our thoughts in our heads, omnipotent and all knowing, having to bend a knee to be ever in debt. Why then do I have awareness and will? Religion and belief in god is a way to control people, keep them under the thumb of a magical mythical being so other men can maintain power. It makes people weak and not responsible. They can look to an outside source for all their troubles and all their answers and never have to look in the mirror.

A god didn't make me look at porn and masturbate, I did that. Praying to a god is not the answer to my problems, the actions I take are. If I don't take action it's on me, not some entity on high or some devil from below.

I appreciate the question as there are very few places one can express their true feelings on this subject. I'm not going to convince others to change their ways, nor do I want to. To each their own. Believing in a supreme being is just not for me.

*B49*

 

Just stopping by to say that it's not about "knowing something for certain", but about faith. While some religious people act as if they knew an absolute, objective truth, some atheists do the same when they put science in the place of religion (instead of recognizing both for what they are - two different things). There are good and bad people in every group. There's nothing better than simply being content with who you are, or who you aim to be, so you can accept your subjectivity (and the responsibility for your actions as well) and don't have to force your views on anybody else. Peace!

 

Well we can't be certain of anything. The desire for certainty is like a quest for the Holy Grail; you're never going to find it. It is a strange obsession; forget God, it will make you doubt the existence of the external world, of others, even of yourself.

And so we leave it behind, we leave it to the Professors to ponder on within their dry academic little concrete cells. We wander outside, take in the air, look at this strange and beautiful world, laugh at times, cry at times, feel passion within us, and find it sensible to believe in the world, in others, and ourselves... and maybe, just maybe, some ground of being which would make sense of our feelings for the good, the beautiful, the unified, the true.

The default setting of doubt is the mass mind; having your beliefs [yes, we have beliefs after all!] manufactured for you. Homo Economicus replaces Homo Sapien; consumers replace thinkers. It seems a safe secure setting for us with all the outward display of prosperity, but it's cost is an inner poverty. As Ruskin said, 'There is no wealth but Life'.

 

I view always joke and call myself a possibilitist.

My mother was Catholic, but as she grew older studied all religions. I had no idea what my dad believed, but for a few years he practiced wiccan.

I have taken after my mom's view. There is something to learn from all belief systems, non being inherently wrong, I just took her view a bit further. I am hiw the fuck should I know what is real and what isn't. I can't say for sure there is no God, or gods for that matter. I admit to the possibility because I am honest with myself. There is no true way of knowing.

 

You sound pretty certain about that.......

I'm sorry I just couldn't resist.

I agree with you that it's essentially impossible to know for 100% certain about everything in the traditional sense. I would, however, like to say that it is possible to be certain of something well beyond a reasonable doubt. If we were to take that level of scepticism (that you can't be certain about anything) at face value, we're left with absolutely nothing! (not even the language I'm using to write!) Think what you will, but I am quite certain about lots of things in life.

Heffe

 

Well, there is a big difference between rational certainty and convictions that we otherwise arrive at. I mean we have other resources besides pure reason right. The problem is since the Reformation and Rationalism, we stripped ourselves down to individuated Reason [we must see something true, in our cogito, clear and distinct for ourselves], and we either found it sufficient or wanting; we either became rationalists or sceptics.

Now the older classical humanism, stretching from Socrates to Erasmus... perhaps as far as Kant, was quite comfortable with rational uncertainty [the Socratic 'I know that I don't know'], but it was more of an 'enlightened' scepticism, and perhaps more pragmatic; they looked to aesthetics, art, cultural, and historical precedents to guide them in their beliefs. It was a system founded on the ideal of education [educateo - to lead out], and cultivation. This humanism was about 'being and becoming', which seems so unfamiliar to us as in our modern world it is all about 'representation', a way of thinking to which our minds are habituated. It requires something of a 'paradigm shift', a 'Copernican revolution', a 'negative capability'... you get my drift, for us to truly engage with it. What all of these phrases have in common is they signify an ability of the mind to doubt, or suspend our belief in the commonly accepted way of seeing things, or of interpreting things, which means perhaps we need first to doubt [the common accepted belief] to Believe [in the ultimate sense]. The object of that doubt is now our own Reason.... or, in other words, our own Rational Doubt [which is today the common belief]. Here doubt self-destructs, and makes simple 'naive'/ native beliefs possible [I think this is something like Aristotle's poetic meaning]. The point of all of this is it turns out Will is prior to everything [not Reason]; it seems we either Will to doubt or Will to believe. There's free will for you.

Anyway, this cultivation of the mind was a civic ideal which was largely taken up into the early and medieval church, and in continuity with the classical Greek and Roman achievement [even C.S. Lewis, a scholar of the classics referred to the 'good pagans']. This 'Ciceronianism' was very much there in the writing of Augustine. But you always had that 'iconoclastic' tendency, against art in religion, even at the start; St Jerome, waking from a dream, thundered from the desert - 'Do you belong to Christ or Cicero!'. And then Luther also was stuck in the desert of academia. It was due to their obsession, or fanaticism, with 'unadorned' Truth, and an ignorance of the other three Transcendentals of Beauty, Goodness, and Unity, that the Puritans did away with monastic life.

 

I haven't done research into this and have no sources to cite for what I'm going to say, this is just some of my thinking.
I don't think those wars wouldn't have happened. I think religion is more often an excuse than a reason for war. At the base, war is mostly all just for power, even though people often claim it's for justice. I mean, Hitler tried to exterminate the Jews, for example. It's not like if Jews or Christians didn't exist, Hitler wouldn't have tried and killed people, he was doing it for power, and he would've found another excuse for it. Exterminate everyone with brown eyes? Who knows. This is just an example of why I think religion is an excuse for war, not a reason.

 

Any culture will fight for its life. Think about how the US will do anything to defend its 'way of life'. The wars over religion were essentially a series of civil wars, the breaking up of a millennium long culture/ way of life. I know what side I would have fought on.

 

iam an Agnostic here and I was raised by a muslim family

 

Hi there,

I'm atheist, I believe that there is no god.
When I was 10 yo, I remember thinking about the teacher during the catechism class "that guy cannot handle the thought that we're mortal" and I decided to believe to accept what sounded obvious to me on that time.
I realise that it's nothing more than an other believe. I have full respect for religions.

 

agnostic. for me it was the most logical desicion to become one, because we do not have a single proof for or against the existence of a god. before i was agnostic i was an atheist, but i wasnt quite sure if it is the right choice. and then i thought about it and came to the conclusion that being an agnostician is better, becaue we just dont know if there is a god or not. i was raised by a very liberal family but with a christian background. but as i said i am a very logical person and want proofs for everything, but the christian mythology doesnt proof anything so i stopped believing it.

 

Agnostic here. But I pray for other people on rare occasion, and sometimes when I am at the beach and it becomes real peaceful I have prayed for guidance/talked to whatever you want to call a higher power/energy. So more like a low key believer in God? But not necessary Catholic or Christian? And not necessary believing the usual photogenic depiction of God? Idk lol.

 

I was a believer turned atheist somewhat turning back to a believer. I think about going to church this Sunday.