Appreciate the info! Thank you.

I don’t want to put you out, but if you’ve got actual links to him saying dodgy stuff, then please could you show me?

I’m about ten minutes into reading through his Reddit comments and he’s not even said anything political. One of the most recent comments was him replying to an accusation of creating the federated wiki alternative for right-wing purposes, which is confusing me even more.

He’s specifically telling people which instances they can join that block lemmygrad.

He doesn’t seem that extreme. If you can provide something, it’d really be appreciated, because from looking at his posts so far, he seems a nice enough guy.

Edit - never mind, I think I’ve found what you’re referring to. I’ll look through them properly in a little bit.

Is possible, just maybe, that you’ve been talking to trolls posing as communists, rather than actual communists? Because that’s what it sounds like.

I’m getting lots of downvotes. The Principal Skinner meme comes to mind.

Is the Democratic Party at fault?

No, the millions of people who didn’t want to vote for the Democratic Party are to blame.

Ah, ok. Thanks for that.

I’ve got even more questions now, but I won’t press on!

I’m also getting the impression that I accidentally caused you to dredge up unpleasant stuff from your past - I promise it wasn’t my intention. Sorry if I did.

Hope I’ve at least shown a side to the thing that isn’t the insane/angry side that you know.

Or, and please hear me out, because you’re not going to like it.

The Republican party are directly responsible for putting Trump as the nominee.

The people who voted Republican are directly responsible.

The Democrat party are indirectly responsible by presenting such a poor-looking alternative. “We’re not Trump” is not enough.

The people who chose not to vote are the least responsible of all.

You’re directing your anger in the wrong direction. It’s the corruption within the system you need to be tearing down, not some poor sod on the internet.

What’s the plan - to scare them into voting the way you want in the next election? To argue with and win over the millions of extra voters the Democrats needed?

The problem isn’t with the people who saw that both sides were bad options - it’s with the Democrat party for being a bad option.

Absolutely.

For the avoidance of doubt, atheism is not a religion.

The whole issue is about definitions.

But, before we finish up, I do have a question for you, if it’s ok?

You probably noticed that several people have jumped on the same thing. Where do you guys get these identical discussion points? In particular the whole “atheism is so different from any religious belief, world view, or philosophical position that I’ll have online arguments insisting on specific word usage”. Is it just from other online commentators?

It just seems strange - even when there’s no ambiguity, any topic that mentions atheism will have someone pop up arguing that you can’t use certain common words because atheism is different. You need to use special words like “deprogramming” instead.

I mean, this behaviour has to come from somewhere. I’m just genuinely curious from where.

No, it’s fine.

I’ve grabbed your Collins as an example - I promise it’s not been cherry-picked, it was the first I clicked on!

“If someone converts you, they persuade you to change your religious or political beliefs. You can also say that someone converts to a different religion.”

Would it qualify as changing my religious beliefs? I think so. It’s you that’s inferring that it needs to be to another religion.

Ok, second part.

“I get that a large part of Abrahamic religions in particular is to obey and not question, as well as theism being necessary to be adopted into the religion”

No you don’t, because you’re wrong. I don’t mean that in a harsh way - it’s easy to look at listen to all of the hard-line religious folk and think that’s the norm. The truth is that they’re weirdos.

A big part of most Abrahamic religions is questioning the dogma, theology, even the scripture. It’s been this way forever too.

And yes historically, bad people have used religions (and still do) as a pretext for horrific atrocities, but unfortunately that’s a problem with any organisation that places too much power on an unhinged leader.

Look, an example might help. A little while back, the Church of England put out a statement about how they didn’t intend to change their stance on not allowing gay marriage in churches. It was, to my eyes, an utterly unnecessary statement to make, and moreover, completely at odds with the “unconditional love” message.

I asked my vicar if we could talk about it and explained that I don’t feel comfortable being associated with a religion that publicly makes statements like that.

I found out that she herself has performed several same-sex marriages, just not in a church. As have many of the other vicars around here. Some haven’t. Her mentor in the church is transexual, not secret - she’s written a book about it.

The truth is that the upper ranks of the Anglican church are trying to prevent a schism with the more hard-line Anglican churches in Africa. The statement was just one of many that have been put out, it’s just that this one got attention from the press.

The rank-and-file vicars don’t even share exactly the same theology as each other. Like I said, many officiate same-sex marriages, some will not. Some believe that when people die, their souls go straight to heaven or watch over us, some do not (why wouldn’t they? Well, it isn’t actually in the Bible).

There’s a wide, wide range of interpretations and you are encouraged to keep asking questions.

Like I said, it’s easy to look at the loud people and think they’re the norm - but it’s not the case. They’re the very, very vocal minority.

Yikes I’ve written way more than intended. I hope that helps!

Sorry, but it’s true. I’m afraid you’re going to have to take it up with a higher authority than me (i.e. the dictionary people) if you want to change how the word is used.

It’s the word for changing someone’s belief system not, as you seem to think, giving someone a new belief system.

Sorry, but I’m correct here.

Also, here’s additional lesson for you - you started your reply admitting that the question was asked in bad faith, that I did spot what you were talking about, and that you do know that I’m talking about atheism. Then you finish with “so my question stands”.

No it doesn’t. You understood fully what I was talking about in both the post you replied to and my response. So it doesn’t stand - you already knew the answer.

Look, I don’t mind you having a crack at being Mr I’m-Very-Clever-Catch-You-Out-On-Word-Meanings, but at least do it well.

Hmm. I’m going to go ahead and assume this is a bad-faith comment. Despite that, I’ll try to help.

I’m guessing from the phrasing that you’re not aware, but if you’re trying to change someone’s belief system, it’s called conversion.

I appreciate that you were probably trying to do the “atheism isn’t a belief, it’s a lack of a belief” thing, but unfortunately that’s how the language works in this case.

It always starts from the assumption that I’m an atheist too. They’re all friends, by the way, so don’t picture some kind of weird high-pressure pitches on the street.

Also I want to make it clear that I’m not trying to conflate being atheist and being anti-religious - my friend in this story however is in the “religion is ultimately the cause of every war in history” camp.

Anyway, very basically, I’d done something nice. Another work friend was talking about it, and my anti-religion friend responded with “see, he’s an objectively nice person, no religion needed or anything”. And it was at this point I revealed my secret identity, and the discussion began.

Just for balance, over my 44 years, I’ve also had a Scientology pitch, a Jehovah’s Witnesses pitch (old-school knocking on the door style), and an uncomfortably high-pressure pitch from what I’m sure was one of those churches set up to scam immigrants.

But outside of those, the main people who have tried to change me have been friends with strong anti-religious views.

My experience has been the exact opposite!

I suspect it’s a cultural thing, though. I’m British, but I know America has a very aggressive evangelical base. There are mega-churches and politicians and sports people are always talking about God and Jesus and we just don’t have that over here.

On the other hand, a few atheists I know have tried to “convert” me before.

I’m guessing it’s a certainty thing. From what I’ve seen of the American churches, some of them are absolutely borderline cults. So of course the folk are certain that they’re right.

And there’s certainly enough ammunition in religion as a whole for anyone who hates religion to think that they’re right.