On the Subtleties of Attacking and Being Attacked

Let me start by saying that I don't really have time to write this, yet I feel compelled to do it. I'm a little resentful of that. As such (the lack of time, not the resentment), this may be a little sketchy at times. I don't know; I haven't written it yet. I'm just expressing my annoyance.

So... I have been accused of "attacking" "christians," recently. More than once.
On the one hand, I have no issue with the idea of attacking "christians;" however, I don't believe it's an accurate description of what happened. Or the relationship of what happened. No more than I would say it's ever accurate to say that someone being abused "attacked his/her abuser."

But let me step to the side of that for the moment and give a different example:
As I have mentioned before, though not in a while, I have a butt-ton of collectibles, and I have been working on selling them off for a while via eBay. Not a great place to do that, but the best option available (sort of like U-haul (and I may have a post about them coming up, too)). It just so happens that this week I listed a quite expensive card to the site. Not terribly long after listing it, someone messaged me and began haranguing me about my chosen price point, long rambling incohesive messages. Three of them, in fact. I, of course, responded, but I did it in a very cohesive manner, responding to each "point" he made by number. Then he accused me of attacking him.

Basically, because I used actual sentences, addressed each of his issues separately, and, honestly, because I made sense, he felt threatened. Because I had a smarter, better worded argument. In short, I used facts when what he had come at me with was an emotional response to the fact that he wants my card and can't afford it.

For some reason, facts seem to threaten people and make them feel attacked.

But the dude came into my space and went after me. He initiated the conflict.
But I "attacked him."

And this is what dealing with "christians" is often like.
You say a thing that is a fact, like:
The United States was not founded as a "christian" nation nor were most of the founding fathers "christians." In fact, the biggest movers among them, the ones everyone thinks of when you start talking "founding fathers," none of them were "christians." They were deists. By definition, they did not believe in the divinity of Jesus. He was just some dude with delusions of grandeur, which is true. In fact, many of the founding fathers frequently criticized "christianity." As Thomas Paine did with the following quote:

The study of theology, as it stands in Christian churches, is the study of nothing.; it is founded on nothing; it rests on no principles; it proceeds by no authorities; it has no data; it can demonstrate nothing; and admits of no conclusion.

For posting that, I was accused of "attacking 'christians.'"

Was I making a point? Yes.
Did I go into anyone else's space to make that point? No. 
I made the point in -my- space, on my "wall."
So did I "attack" anyone? Or any peoples? No.
Did I clearly state an actual fact? Group of facts, actually. Yes.
If someone else reads that fact and feels threatened by a fact, is that my fault? No, not really.

There's really two things going on here:
The first is that if someone is coming into your space and initiating something, you're not the one doing the attacking. 
Wait! Here's how to think of it:
You ever get punched on the playground as a kid and hit the other kid back and have them go tell on you for hitting them? Yeah, it's that. 
Don't come in my space and accuse me of attacking you because of something I am doing in my space. 

But here is the bigger issue, at least for me:
"christians" don't get to complain, ever, about being attacked. Not in this day and age, anyway. You can follow the Republican, i.e. "christian," shenanigans all the way back to Newt Gingrich, who is really the one who started all of the current shit we have going on in our politics, and how he, for lack of a better way of putting it, weaponized "christians" and turned them into nothing more than a political bat for the republicans. So for the last 30-40 years, "christians" have been on the attack against the rest of society. When someone fights back (confronts them with their lies and delusions), they don't get to suddenly cry out, "oh! oh! You're attacking me!"

And you also don't get to use the "good people" argument about how it's not all "christians." Republicans have revealed themselves to be evil and fascist, and the vast VAST majority of "christians" are republicans and support republicans. That makes them complicit and responsible. If you don't want to be judged by those standards, don't be a part of that group. Don't vote for republicans, and don't fucking be a "christian." Because not one of them is a Christian. [And just shut the fuck up with your "judge not lest you be judged" bullshit -- I'm just applying the objective criteria for what the term means; it's not my fault if you don't meet it.]

So am I "attacking" "christians"? Well, I don't think so. Maybe counterattacking, but it's more like a defensive maneuver. But, yeah, sure, I am gonna keep calling out the bullshit and lies and delusions that "christians" cling to. Someone needs to do it.
And, honestly, at this point, someone does need to wage a little war back against "christians." The organized church is evil. Pure and simple. I don't know that organized religion can resist without becoming evil. What else can you expect from something founded on the belief of lies and fairy tales.
Anyway...
I've gotten off topic.

I think liberals have been too fast to apologize and try to make nice when they have been accused of "attacking" others. Which is what we do because, mostly, we believe people should be allowed to live their lives as they see fit, and liberals have empathy whereas conservatives tend to... well, just not have any. Empathy. So we try to make it better. 
But I encourage you to look at the bigger picture any time this accusation gets tossed around. Whose space did it happen in? Was anyone targeted? Where did the aggression begin?

I guess that's all I have to say about this at the moment. Normally, I would take a week or so on a piece like this so that I could go back over it and make sure I had everything in order and didn't ramble too much. But I wrote this yesterday. You're getting it pretty raw.

And by the way, the Thomas Paine quote is from his "The Age of Reason." Because it was also implied that I just made it up so that I could support my thesis about the founding fathers. Nope, didn't make it up. I do think I need to read the whole pamphlet, though. Who knows what other quotable quotes are in  there?

Also
#fuckrepublicans

"Nothing You Can't Handle": Why "christians" Think They're Better

I don't know if this will come as a surprise to any of you, but the Bible is full of things it doesn't actually say. Things like
there were three wisemen
cleanliness is next to godliness
god helps those who help themselves
abortion is a sin

Also, god will never give you a burden you can't bear.

"What?" you say, "That's not in the Bible? How can that be? People ("christians") say that all the time!"
Because of course they do.

Some of the examples I gave above have no Biblical basis whatsoever (actually, none of those things have any Biblical basis whatsoever), but this one does -- sort of; at least, it has a root cause for the thought -- so let's take a look at the actual verse the thought comes from.

I Corinthians 10:13 NIV
"No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it."

This verse is specifically dealing with sin and temptation. So, like, you're walking through a room and there's a fat piece of chocolate cake on a table, and you're tempted to eat it. This verse is saying that "god" won't allow you to be tempted in any way that goes beyond you're ability to resist it. Or, if it is a temptation beyond your ability to resist it, he'll offer some kind of escape hatch so that you can get away without sinning.

Which begs the question: why is the chocolate cake a sin? And, of course, it's not, but try convincing a "christian" of that. [Look, the cake is a metaphor (or, if you prefer, the cake is a lie).] At any rate, whether the cake is a sin is a topic for another conversation (and one I may have had on here? I can't remember, but I'm not going to go digging around looking for it, right now). The point, right now, is whether seeing the cake on  the table is a temptation beyond which you can bear and how, exactly, you can get away from it if it is. I don't remember ever seeing a special cake trap door appear in anyone's floor so that a tempted person could escape, and I'm pretty sure that would have made the news.

However, a "temptation," which happens in the moment, is quite a different thing from a "burden," which is ongoing. So the saying goes that any burden you have in your life, you only have because "god" knows you're strong enough to carry it. But let's take a closer look at that, too.

I think (and this is entirely my thought) that the verse cited above from I Corinthians may be being conflated with the verse from Matthew about taking up your cross to follow Jesus. You take up this burden, and "god" will give you the strength to carry it.
BUT
Not even Jesus was strong enough to carry his cross (his burden). Someone else had to step in and carry it for him.

And a lot of "christians" will say, "See, he couldn't carry it, so "god" provided someone to help him out because it was a burden beyond what he could bear." And that's all well and good except that it means that everyone who is burdened beyond their ability to carry the load should have someone there to take it from them. Right away. As soon as it's too heavy.

But that doesn't really ever happen, now, does it.
[In fact, the general response in modern evangelicalism is to decide that any person who becomes "burdened" in some way is, in fact, being punished by "god" and, therefore, no one should help that person. They need to fucking learn their lesson! Goddammit!]
There's definitely a failing somewhere in this whole concept, the most likely being that "god" doesn't hand out burdens or have anything to do with them or keeping them from getting too... burdenful. "He" couldn't give a shit about any burdens you may or may not have, either because "He" doesn't give a fuck about individual humans (anymore than we give a fuck about individual ants or bees) or because "He" doesn't actually exist (something I know I've talked about, but I'm also not going to go dig up that link).

The other main option is that "god" does monitor all of these burdens and has "provided" people ("christians"?) who will come along, as Simon did for Jesus, and take up your burdens for you so that you can make it BUT these "people" have free will and, so, are doing shit about helping other people, which is entirely true. Being someone who spent decades working in churches, I know exactly how "christians" feel about helping people in need. If it's someone white and in their congregation who suffers some kind of catastrophe, they are more than happy to step in and help but, if it's someone poor, especially if they are of some shade other than Caucasian, "god" suddenly only helps those who help themselves and they can all go fuck themselves. It's their own fault anyway and, if they didn't want to be poor or hungry or addicted or whatever, they would and could certainly do something about it.

Because, see, it's all about choice and, because "god" always provides a way out, that means that at some point that person made the cognitive choice to ignore that option and do something to put themselves into the situation they're in. You know, they chose the temptation. Or the burden is punishment. Or whatever. But whatever it is, it puts the "christian" into a position of superiority because, you know what? The "christian" doesn't have some undue punishment or temptation that they're giving into (other than the pride and arrogance they will never see) so that means, must mean, that the "christian" is favored by "god" while the suffering person is not. It gives them carte blanche to shrug their shoulders and go about their business.

Personally, I don't know how they get around the verse in Philippians that says, "...in humility value others above yourselves," but I guess I'm not the only one who has a "fuck Paul" attitude because, as much as "christians" hold Paul up as their idol, they never seem to get beyond his judginess in their dealings with other people. Paul also said to make the rich sit at the back of the church in the bad seats, but when's the last time you saw that happen? Oh, yeah, never.

So... If you ever wonder how or why it is all these "christians" in the United States don't seem to care at all about helping the poor and the destitute and the burdened, well, this why. They aren't compelled to because, obviously, "god" would take care of it if they deserved it. It's their burden to bear and, if they aren't able to handle it, it's their own choice.

Is that a great way to get out of helping people?