Iruka Naminori, lol. No time to write now , but in a world such as ours now, you and all caring folks can and do feel as you. Behind our happiness, there is always sad, angry, and we all get tired, and many of us are aging, and physically sick at any age. You know these things. All I can always say is be extra nice to yourself, and hey we all dig ya here, who know your words and art.

Thanks really, for being you and sharing. Keep in mind the good things, as that is to know, why we feel as we do,  and Jesus wept, me too, god as you.  mark 

Then all you can do is laugh.

Try it.

It will make you feel better and it will hopefully make them think.

Even healthy we don't need to be angry or hateful. Remember, we're (if I might be so bold) about self, about making our way, believing in ourselves and our abilities, thinking clearly and rationally and being stellar representatives of our community . None of that needs to involve anything labeled as hate. That being said,  forget your mom's irritating and stupid religion and the way she tortured you. You don't need to ever talk about it with her again. But, make sure you set the ground rules for maintaining a relationship with her and be prepared to give it up. Hey, she's the mom, you're not. It's her responsibility to make sure she loves her children for anything they might be or anything they might do or any thoughts or opinions they may have. It sounds like she controls you a little too much, or, phrased better, she tries. But you let her. End it. No hate, not anger, rational behavior. 

You write that you've given up the anger, but it's pretty clear that you haven't.  However, it probably comes from something within you, some other problem or focus in your life. That being said, we don't have to fight all the time. We have to fight when we have to fight, but what makes you think it's an all the time kind of thing? Do what you feel good about doing, fight the fights you feel good about fighting and not a drop more.  No one should ask you for more and no one should expect more. 

On a physical note, you need to clean things up. You need to get healthy and exercise. Don't say you can't unless you REALLY REALLY can't. Be honest with yourself about it though. We both have our medical issues which we work hard to get past.  I'm no MD, but most of your "conditions" sound reversible with little attention and, at the risk of irritating you, a little weight loss. Can I ask, are you overweight? I can (and will) help you if you need that kind of support. Losing a couple of pounds really really helps to maintain and gain both mental and physical power. 

Good luck. Please contact me if you'd like. I'll be happy to correspond with you and share our successes and failures, get pissed off at craziness in the world and to rag on each other for not writing or calling enough. Hehehe. I hope you feel better with my little dose of tough love.  Oh, one more thing... don't "blame" your mom, she did what she thought was right. It wasn't but she didn't do it intentionally with maliciousness in her mind. She tried and for that you owe her respect. 

Scott

It's interesting that when you share something personal on an Internet forum (which I probably shouldn't have done), you always get a smattering of careful, thoughtful replies and the usual subset of people who have no clue who you are and judge you based on a few paragraphs.

For those who were thoughtful (I am God as You, anniet), thank you. 

I'm taking care of myself as best I can.  I'm getting better after a bad medication adjustment that really fucked me up.  And yes, aiia, I can and do laugh a lot.

anniet, I did gain a lot of weight recently...and also lost a lot of it by going on a diet and swimming.  Swimming is the only thing that doesn't aggravate my fibromyalgia and it's excellent exercise.  I'm not so enormously overweight that gastric bypass is a viable option.  I have a friend who did it and he hasn't been himself since the procedure.  I don't know what happened, but he never returns my calls anymore.  I considered him my best friend.

I've also taken some interest in my young step-nephew.  He loves sharks and recently went ga-ga over a shark-tooth necklace I bought him.  I just bought four small fossilized megalodon teeth to make necklaces for family members (yes, even for those with whom I disagree).

DoomedSoul, lay off the brown acid.

scole, either you didn't read what I wrote or you didn't understand it.  I actually wrote a couple of paragraphs to explain, then decided it wasn't worth explaining.  Suffice it to say you reached some illogical conclusions because you did not have all the data and disregarded some of the data you did have.

Mostly, this was a reminder not to post anything personal on the Internet.  It invites attacks and derision from people who don't really matter.  As a matter of fact, I'm seriously considering staying away from Internet forums altogether because people are so ill-behaved.  (I certainly haven't always been very nice.) People do and say things anonymously, hiding behind the keyboard, that they would never do or say in person.  I'm sure there's a really interesting psychological reason why this is so and would love to see a paper.  In the meantime, I am considering saying goodbye forever to all the forums I've posted to.

Iruka Naminori

Please don't leave us if you can hang, with we who are as you. When you must go , that's okay too. Your honest sharing of your words is a blessing. I tell you truthfully, I am almost dead. The way it is, the way it was, the way it will always be. Ask the old ones, what is truth.

I've probably missed the point as much as everyone else, but I get the feeling your dilemma is as follows:
On the one hand you see this abuse and indoctrination and see that as an evil that you ought to fight.
At the same time, you feel that the anger and arguments just wear you down and the people around you.
I think that this dilemma has always been present in our community, that on the one hand argument and battle and attacking people's beliefs causes a headache all around but the problems need to be addressed and surely it's only honest to be straight with what you really believe.
And isn't kind of patronising to be so protective over your friend's bubble?

I think that error thing we rationalists make it to place too much emphasis on abstract rational argument.
That is, the battle needs fighting but constant arguing isn't necessarily the best way to fight it.
One example you mentioned it how atheists can be see as angry and argumentative with an axe to grind.
To present the most perfect logical argument in a debate would reinforce that opinion while relaxing and "live and let live" would do a lot to refute it.
We like rational argument as it's generally our favourite way to distinguish truth and falsity but unless they too have the same skills in rational analysis then such debate will be over their head.

I think we also forget how important the psychology is in debate.
I notice that when I get defensive, and lock myself into debate/battle mode I find myself fighting to win, my "rightness" at stake and find myself looking for an answer no matter what.
It takes a lot of self discipline to even notice your errors and fully appreciate your opponent's argument when in such a state of mind.
The best, most rational of us will struggle and even then it was be a difficult painful experience.
On the other hand, if I come across similar points in a different state of mind, where it's not "Me Vs" and it's not my sense of "being right", i.e. I'm not in a defensive mindset, I can find opposing beliefs quite easy to take on board - I consider myself to be "learning" rather than being "defeated".

Another observation is from when I was at University - I spent a lot of time with the Christian Union.
This is a group of fundamentalist Christians operating in secular England where their views go against common thought and political correctness.
Not to mention that pascal's wager is incredibly offensive to those who haven't been brainwashed.
I used to have friends who'd attend a Christian Union event looking for the goodwill and "love thy neighbour" of the Christianity they'd been brought up with and admired, only to come back fuming about this cult that bullied and threatened people.
Yet not only was I drawn to them, I witnessed people convert.
People with no religious background and no childhood brainwashing would become extremely zealous converts.
When you attended their baptism events and heard their story there was a familiar theme.
They'd usually have been apathetic about religion, considered it to be old hat superstition.
Then they'd get to know a Christian person, or perhaps someone they already knew converted.
At first they'd think their friend was mad, but would gradually get bowled over by their changes in personality.
These Christian groups were very attractive because they were extremely nice people to be around (apart from their scary theology and religious views) and their beliefs develloped them into happy contented people that other people like to be around, and these other people would be attracted and wanted to feel this "holy spirit" for themselves.

It would never have been possible for me to convert.
I already held strong moral philosophy and beliefs that clashed and my rationalist nature means that I couldn't accept their arguments either.
But the fact that I struggled with it all the same just shows how strong my attraction to their believers kept me interested and hanging around with them despite my absolute revulsion with what they believed.
And given that not everybody had the kind of strong philosophy, beliefs and rational skills that I had you can quite easily see how otherwise intelligent people would fall right in line.
They'd join the group, admit they don't fully understand the arguments and agreed that some articles of faith (e.g. loving God with eternal damnation) was difficult to comprehend, but all they knew is that through their beliefs they "experienced" a relationship with Jesus that transformed their lives and made so much sense to them, so were happy to accept these difficulties on faith.
(The point of this long self-indulgent reminisce of my student days being that many people base their beliefs on other things rather than rational analysis and you can see how it's rational from a practical perspective for them to work this way)

So to conclude:
I don't see letting go of the anger and "getting along" as giving up the fight.
Seeing as the "language" many of these people speak is by judging your character and judge your beliefs by your character, getting along will do more to refute their prejudices against atheism than any rational argument could ever.
I also think you're right to say that "people, religious or otherwise, all try their best" and we don't need to drill rational perfection into them.
I think that we strive to change beliefs because we want to improve our society for people around us, so to treat them like "enemies" kind of goes against the point in a way.
There will be times when you get into debate, and those debates will get heated from time to time, but if we are able to then let go, agree to disagree and then go back to getting along, we can get our debate points in without damaging our relationships.

Anyone here watch the TV series Kung Fu?
I love how Caine just "takes" all the prejudice and injustice that came his way, seeming not to fight back, but at the same time he'll take the necessary actions to calmly do what was necessary to change things for the better.
So all this relaxing and going soft on theist people isn't going soft in the fight against theism the belief/meme.
I'd go as far to say that you just took the gloves off and have come after it harder than ever.
Go get 'em girl!

I obviously don't know exactly how this plays out for Iruka, but she is talking about a combo of conditions that is really debilitating here.  You don't just cure any of these conditions.  Some of the comments I've seen here would be like telling Shelley to just get up and start walking.  Even with fairly mild symptoms from each of the problems she has listed, Iruka is going to need others to get through the day.  Period. 

Iruka, I would recommend that you also search out some fibro, chronic fatigue, and diabetes boards.  I know I wasn't very sympathetic until I saw what fibro does to mom.  You will find people who understand your physical needs better on some of those boards. 

Feel free to PM me anytime if you would like.  Even if I can't really help in any given situation, I can certainly listen.

Though we drown, still must we hold back the waters of chaos. - Me

Depression is simply anger with no passion.  When you give up your passion...well that's when you give up everything isn't it?  I'm not ready to die.

Finally got round to posting..

I find myself in much the same boat as you Iruka. Some people will around here know that I'm not stoked about life at the moment, and when I'm like that my 'activism' seems to be the first thing to suffer.  The last thing I want when I'm unhappy is to confront the waves of ignorance that prevail when discussing theism. My activity on this site has dwindled from checking it non stop to barely posting. It is true what you say, it takes too much sometimes. My friends often say I am so defensive and aggressive when religion gets brought up. No doubt because I was brainwashed the way I was and find it so dangerous and repulsive now.

Just..look after yourself I guess. Maybe sometimes you have to walk away from debates,much as I hate to. Is it worth it to get worked up and spend time arguing with someone whose blind belief needs no evidence,and therefore can never really be reasoned with? Probably not.

Isn't much point to all this, but hope you'll find some relief.