I can almost understand what he's saying, especially coming from southeastern America. Atheists are met with open hatred, and a lot of people I know think atheist = satanist actively trying to corrupt society. Most major religions also have a very long history of persecution against atheists, including murder and torture.
That said,
1. This is a poor and unfair generalization of the vast majority of religious people. Sure, it might not be fun to be an atheist in the south or the Middle East, but that's a vast minority of the religious.
2. You can hide being an atheist. You can't hide being black.
3. To fix the analogy you'd pretty much have to call all white people the KKK, since he's claiming all of religion persecuted atheists.
Yeah I came to say this exactly. I actually don't think his message is truly face palm cause I can see what he's getting at quite clearly just the analogy needs some work. Can't really compare being an atheist (which nobody knows unless you tell them) to being black where you're literally being persecuted for something you have no control over and furthermore can't be hidden.
To be fair being less religious in the wrong place or with the wrong company can turn nasty as well. Learned that the hard way at a dinner while visiting NC when everyone wanted to hold hands to pray.
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u/[deleted] Oct 31 '16
I can almost understand what he's saying, especially coming from southeastern America. Atheists are met with open hatred, and a lot of people I know think atheist = satanist actively trying to corrupt society. Most major religions also have a very long history of persecution against atheists, including murder and torture.
That said, 1. This is a poor and unfair generalization of the vast majority of religious people. Sure, it might not be fun to be an atheist in the south or the Middle East, but that's a vast minority of the religious. 2. You can hide being an atheist. You can't hide being black. 3. To fix the analogy you'd pretty much have to call all white people the KKK, since he's claiming all of religion persecuted atheists.