#anti proselytizing

[fandom-hoarder]

Somehow my YouTube autoplay got turned on, and I ended up in a sequence of ex-Jehovah's Witness videos...

But y'all, I'm sitting here like... how do you realize the lies and hypocrisy of the cult and get out, but stay Christian? How is it that these videos still talk about the truth of the bible or the truth of jesus. 👀👀👀👀

cannot relate

When I got out, I got OUT.

But maybe it's harder to deprogram when you leave as an adult, who has been fully entrenched so as to have gone to JW version of seminary and been PART of the organizing body in their congregation.

Maybe I just don't remember how long it took to stop praying automatically, to stop saying "in Jesus' name, Amen" in my head as a compulsion, to stop having nightmares about Armageddon and not being allowed into Paradise, about how my body would never be "perfect" and healthy in everlasting life because I didn't have faith anymore, or to stop basing my perspective on things I'd learned as "The Truth," because I was still a child and had the grace period of growing up to analyze all that shit.

But I still have a hard time understanding people who left the cult but still talk about Jehovah and giving glory to God. Like how can you open your eyes a little bit but not question the fucking bible??? Not learn about other religions; or think about how religions evolved around cultural creation stories, and christianity isn't any more "real" or "true" than Hinduism or Buddhism or the Greek pantheon, etc?

[dougielombax]

I am afraid of being alone.

Yes!

I’ll admit it.

Not that I ever doubted it.

But I’ve seen FAR too many people using someone’s loneliness as an excuse to badger them with proselytising.

Specifically with regards to Christianity.

(I can’t say the same for other religions due to demographics in my area, plus some other religions don’t proselytise (Judaism, Druze, Mandaeism, and Yazidism spring to mind))

ESPECIALLY with Christianity!

“Well, have ye thought about God? Jesus?”

“Oh dear. Well ye’ll be sorry when ye’s older.”

Fuck off with that shite!

Belittling condescension!

Talking as if we were lost, frightened, helpless children!

I grew up with it and found it lacking and offering nothing but unrequited obedience, shame at simply existing as I am, along with perpetual misery and an eternal fear of judgment and damnation.

And some people call THAT a new counterculture?! Be RID of it!

Fucking bullshit!

Keep your proselytising to yourself! That shit needs to end fucking yesterday.

The world doesn’t need any more missionaries!

(And no, cold, nihilistic, bullying, judgmental atheism isn’t the answer either. I tried it and was found wanting!)

Get in the fucking BIN with that shite!

That’s why I lost patience with (western) Catholicism.

To say nothing of Protestantism, most of it is dull, austere and demanding, and has stupid ideas about work ethic and the like. (Fuck Calvinism btw! A ghastly miserable thing!)

I want NONE of that!

Bunch of nasty, bitter, judgmental, miserable, godbothering old women!

Don’t try selling me any of that shite!

No I’m not bitter, shut up!

And don’t even get me started on school reunions.

[lila-rae]

[howtostandinsilence]

cross-tags something hateful with arms spread wide, waiting for my Unpopular Opinion to be recognized so that I may be attacked for speaking the Truth! Let them come! I say! Let them come. It is their own hubris that drives them, their own depravity for liking this *checks notes* fandom ship. 

God’s be good! But if I am crucified today, it is an injustice most grand, for they took me down for speaking to them what NO others have spoken before! They may come for me, but I am driven by glorious purpose. So come at me. Yes. Come at me. Within this fandom I am martyred and persecuted for my unique beliefs and my bravery to speak them where no other has done so - for purging the barbaric lands. Oh, woe is me that this must be my brave and heroic fate. Woe is me and all who believe such as I. May god save the souls of those who disagree with me, and their proclivities most foul.

[supercantaloupe]

im not gonna link it cause im not interested in getting into shit tonight but i really hate that post thats like “as a jew i dont think jesus was divine or the messiah or anything but i think he was still a cool guy” bc i dont. i think he sucked actually

[some-times-a-writer]

Christians stop coming up to random people in public and trying to convert them Challenge. I was just waiting for a friend and these two girls walk up and try to get me to join the campus Christian club. Like leave me alone I don't want to join.

And then they had the audacity to ask me why I didn't want to join. I grew up Christian and have left the faith now leave me alone!

[greensaplinggrace]

antis really be like: the enemies? in this lovers-to-enemies relationship? is full of the characters hurting each other while they’re enemies? 🤔 abuse

Can we really blame antis when in most cases it’s the writers and/or cast members who cannot tell the damn difference between animosity and abuse? That’s the reason why antis repeat the same rhetoric in every fandom where there is an enemies-to-lovers ship. If there was one piece of English-language media where someone in an official capacity understood and defended what enemies-to-lovers actually meant, we wouldn’t be in this predicament.

What a grand and intoxicating innocence! How could you be so naïve? There is no escape. No recall or intervention can work in this place. Come, lay down your weapons; it is not too late for my mercy.

[protectcosette]

absolutely hate leftists who think it's woke to be anti-judaism

[administer-distractions]

.

[fiercestpurpose]

i eat banana nom nom nom

[slayer-of-titans]

There is one thing I really wish I could have told my child self, and that if people are proselytizing, it is perfectly fine to tell them "No thank you" and if they persist just say "I respect your beliefs but I do not share them and ask that you please do not force them onto me." My parents were hardly religious at all but I had peers all around me who liked to preach to me that I had to be good with God and Jesus.

[dougielombax]

Tumblr please stop putting Christian proselytising on my dashboard.

It’s freaking me out.

[jdsquared]

I have a theory why people have such a hard time seeing the campus protests’ anti-Zionism as anti-Semitic.

Even if we understand their attacks on bombing Gaza, why aren’t they calling for a peaceful two-state solution? Why are they anti-Zionist? This will take some explanation and I explain some things for non-Jews so you understand how your Jewish friends are feeling right now.

Someone recently put it this way, and it all clicked for me:

“We aren’t Jews because we practice Judaism. We practice Judaism because we are Jews.”

Think of it this way. The Cherokee have certain traditional rituals and spiritual beliefs. But it’s not those rituals or beliefs that define them as Cherokee. The Cherokee are a tribe – a people. Not a religion.

That’s why, like the Cherokee, Jews don’t proselytize. We’re not a belief system that’s looking to convince others to believe. Sure, there are ways to become part of the people, but simply deciding to believe what we believe and practice our rituals isn’t it. You can believe in the absolute truth of 100% of the Torah and the rest of the Jewish Bible, and that doesn’t in any way make you part of the Jewish people. That’s just believing that God gave certain ritual and moral instructions to the Jewish people. Just like putting on Cherokee garb and rituals wouldn’t make you Cherokee.

The category error comes from the fact that it’s easy to try to put Judaism into the same category as Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, etc. But it doesn’t really belong there. It’s like how Christians slip into categorizing Hanuakah as “Jewish Christmas” and think that their Christmas messages (e.g., Peace on Earth) fits with our Hanukah message (fight a war to resist assimilation). The easy – and seemingly good ecumenical thing to do is to look for our similarities. But it���s a mistake in this context.

Jews are a distinct people like the Cherokee, not a bunch of people with shared beliefs like Christians or Muslims.

The Left would surely be on the side of the Cherokee's sovereign aspirations, so why not the Jews?

[racefortheironthrone]

Maybe this is too broad, but wondering if there's a better term than "conspiracy theorist" to describe some large figures in the ongoing national discourse? Not that "fluoride in the drinking crowd" were serious thinkers or total harmless, but am I alone is finding "conspiracy theory" too quaint and mild to describe how mainstream rather fringe these things are and also how totally evidence-free and something just plain dumb they can also be?

I don’t think conspiracy theories have ever been quaint and mild.

Think about the history of antisemitism from medieval blood libels to 19th century theories of Jewish financial cabals to the “Protocols of the Elders of Zion” dreamed up by Tsarist agents-provocateur that took the theory global and spawned untold numbers of imitators, to Hitler’s invention of “Judeo-Bolshevism” that married traditional antisemitism to anti-Communism and nationalist populism. Conspiracy theories one and all, but fully capable of spawning pogroms and fascist dictatorships.

Likewise, we think of Anti-Masonic or Illuminati conspiracy theories as self-evidently ridiculous and harmless, but we forget that they were used by cultural conservatives in church and state to wage culture wars on the Enlightenment, liberalism, secularism, democracy, every revolution from America to France to 1848 and beyond, feminism and almost every social movement of the 18th and 19th century. People died or were surveilled or were sent to prison, political parties were formed or banned, and conservatism itself was founded in the name of “poisoning the minds of the lower orders” to inoculate them from the influence of secret societies.

As Dan Olsen has shown, even seemingly benign conspiracy theories like the JFK assassination cover-up or the Moon landing was faked or the earth is flat can hide much more malign motivations, just waiting for the opportunity to radicalize and proselytize:

[jewelleria]

friendly reminder that the term “islamophobia” was popularized by iranian fundamentalists who intended it to be used as a tool of manipulation. those who flippantly throw around the term as an accusation of racism against muslims forget that there is no such thing as a muslim race—just like there is no such thing as a christian race. christianity and islam are both belief systems, and those belief systems are practiced by people across every ethnicity.

unlike judaism, christianity and islam are religions that rely on proselytism (the practice of converting others) to survive. criticism of christianity, and of its ideas that have the potential to be dangerous to free and democratic societies, is never labeled as racism. the idea that critiquing a system of beliefs is somehow racist or xenophobic is preposterous.

so why is it deemed okay to slap an accusation of “islamophobia” onto anyone who dares question the morality of concepts like jihad (‘holy war’ against non-believers)?

criticizing islam is not criticizing the entire arab race—it’s questioning a system of ideas. it’s asking whether free and open societies can afford to accept and promote religious ideals that allow for violent, oppressive, and imperialist interpretations.

and, in case it wasn’t clear, if you read this post and immediately jump to accuse me of being anti-muslim or islamophobic, you’re part of the problem.

“for muslims,” says sam harris, “muhammad is the greatest person who has ever lived. unfortunately, he did not behave like jesus or buddha—at all. it sort of matters that he tortured people and cut their heads off and took sex slaves, because his example is meant to inspire his followers for all time.”

just some food for thought.

[jewish-vents]

I’m really sad because in the past few weeks some of the big goyische “allies” have started to fail us in startling ways - Daniel Spaulding has been viciously misogynistic about Jewish women (so weird bc he was on the forefront standing for the rape victims, but now he’s making nasty comments about Jewish girls?), Elica demonized Ashkenazi Jews as white Europeans and when she got called out she doubled down by saying she’s only heard from white anti-Zionists who don’t want her to speak for them, this one woman who claims to have been doing activist work for the Jewish community for over a decade (Virag) is mad because she claims that there’s no antisemitism in Hungary anymore (??? WHAT) and she said if she abandons the movement it’s going to be “Jews’ fault,” more have leaned harder and harder into only defending us from a Christian point of view in a proselytizing way, and I’m just at my limit…why are we so easy to betray and abandon? why do we have to accept crumbs? why can’t anyone support us simply for being human?

.