@@JoeBManco The only example of actual discrimination against Christians that I know of in modern society is Marvel. Thor's an Avenger. Hercules is an Avenger. WTF is Jesus not an Avenger? Anti-Christian bias is the only reason I can come up with.
@@NoWay1969 I'm hardly an expert at all things Marvel, but there seems to be an absence of any Middle-East deities, kings, prophets, or priests as an Avenger. It is a shame because many of the legends from the area would make a good foundation for a story if modernized. The closest we get for Marvel that I am aware of is X-Men Apocalypse where the ancient Egyptian mutant is the antagonist.
@@dommidavros2211 Nope, then they'd be honest. People who aren't something generally don't try and convince people that they're not that thing. But people who are something will generally try to convince people that they're not that thing. For example psychopaths will spend a great deal of time trying to convince you that they're actually good people and not manipulative and uncaring. Whereas say a humanist doesn't need to try and convince people that they're a good person. They'll show it through their actions.
No, that's not what they said, I think they are saying it's an instant red flag, to say we're not a cult, this doesn't mean they are saying if they said we are a cult that means they aren't, I think you are exhibiting flawed thinking there, my thinking on it is if a group like this says either way they are a cult, mentioning cults in this context seem to me to be an instant red flag
@ARoll925 - That makes no sense! It's like in peep show when Jeremy says "Firstly this is NOT a pyramid scheme...." and Mark replies with "You joined a pyramid scheme?" And you think because it's funny in a comedy, the joke works in real life! It doesn't!
@@dommidavros2211 okay, why does it not make sense?, what you attempted to try to explain is irrelevant, what I said was the inverse logic does not necessarily mean the person believes the opposite of what they said too, in the example just cause they said that sounds like something a cult would say, does not mean the that if a cult says they are a cult, that person believes they are not a cult, that does not follow, if you are the original responder your logic is fuzzy, is all I'm saying, no the OP likely does not believe the reverse statement is true, but the reverse statement does not follow
Hilarious. This is comedy. Thank you for posting this entertaining video Matt. You are awesome. Thank you for all that you do for the atheist position.
My question to Christian family and friends is, "What can you show, as a Christian, what you have that someone couldn't get from another religion or no religion at all?" The honest answer is nothing. You can have subjective experiences, but you can't prove that it's anything but self talk and feelings, since god chooses to remain hidden. You can have community and some moral guidelines, but you can get that from humanism or your own personal ethics and morality. I found that I don't need to go through the motions of some replacement ritualistic structure to find meaning to my life. Sounds like it's a group for those who still do need that.
One of the things that keeps people in religion is community. It's also what people miss when they leave. I don't see why religion gets to own the idea of fellowship, charity, communal outreach, & an ethical framework for moral behavior.
Not wanting to just write 'atheist' on a survey? YOU SHOULD WRITE IT. Politicians use surveys and censuses as an excuse to push policies. We NEED people to write 'atheist' to prove how many there are of us out there. Putting ANYTHING else will just get seen as some form of religion and be used to claim that virtually everyone is religious.
100% agree! We don't need a religious way of saying "we aren't religious". Why would we allude to being something we never were..? That's like calling 'OFF' a tv channel, just so the stats can show that everyone watches tv
I know you cleared it up at the beginning but I was kind of secretly hoping the entire time that it was going to spring into a Marvel Cinematic Universe type discussion at some point.
Welp, Matt you finally learned from the Atheism+ days. I mean this in all sincerity, it's good to grow and learn. We don't need any dogma or atheist religion, it's herding cats. We just don't believe in Gods.
First thing Matt says is thank you for clicking, Oh Matt every time I see a notification for your videos I click! And this didn`t disappoint, thank you for finally addressing this topic Matt, very important!
Matt Dillahunty might not believe in any gods, but with that beard, he’s definitely trying to convince us he’s the one-eyed wonder, Odin! Maybe he’s just hedging his bets in case Valhalla has better Wi-Fi.” 😄
I cant believe i may meet someone that actually says they are a mystrick- undeclared politically- semi socialist - left leaning- agnostic- humanisticish- atheist…. 😂
On a good definition of religion I think: “A system of beliefs that informs either doctrines and/or practices and is centered around something which is viewed as sacred.” I think this definition is good because it includes then religions that are not belief oriented but practice oriented (such as Buddhism) but also excludes things which would be viewed more as a philosophy or life style (like Secular Humanism or being a Vegetarian/Vegan).
I'm with you Matt, I'm not looking for a religion, a group, feel the need to self identify and nail down a percentage of my personality or be defined by others. I've been defined by others and in many ways all throughout my life involving many expletives which were probably correct. Having to study a scripted word salad, admittedly shorter than a bible, still appears to have the effect of sucking out what time I have left on this planet. Well-done for doing it for us.
"...I'm not looking for a...group...or be defined by others." I hear a lot of atheists say that, yet they seem to congregate in these sorts for forums anyway. If what you're saying is true, what's the motivation, if not the very human sense of belonging?
@@JustifiedNonetheless we all live or take part in communities, often many. Having or taking part in a dialogue isn't searching for something is it? What has being an Atheist got to do with anything? I haven't claimed to be one have I? All I did was offer some feedback from a personal perspective which Matt probably won't read, or for that matter will many but that's the weird thing of social media.
I had a giggle when you said Third Baptist Church because one of my uncles has four (now married adult) offspring who ended up in four different versions of the original church where they all began in the local region. None of those aligns with my uncles religion of birth either so that's five. Amazing how people will almost literally windowshop through life looking for their ideal version of one branch of one of the three main Abrahamic religions. Some people also crave pseudo mystical input in life the way some kids crave minerals and suck on pebbles.
I didn't have to go through the (very understandable) "deconversion nightmares" I've seen with many people in YT, but as you briefly point out at the beginning of the video, humans are very tribal, and tribe membership is a huge part of someone's identity. I can imagine it being a substantial part of the struggle for leaving a religion. I don't see atheism as the alternative to being part of a religion, but the doorway you cross to get to the other side of religion. People struggling to deconvert may be asking themselves "what will my identity be if I go the whole way?", and I would argue that from that perspective atheism has a marketing problem. We lack an elevator pitch to help people cross that doorway (and if we have an elevator pitch, we are doing a bad job at advertising & sales because I haven't seen it). I'm blabbering all this because my knee-jerk reaction from looking at the MCU site is that appears to be an attempt to become that elevator pitch. It's the completely wrong way to go about it, though. Adding another label to the mix won't help. But this may highlight the need for having a better elevator pitch nonetheless
I think meditation tend to be quite overrated. While the idea of relaxing and getting away from your life problems for a moment and to reflect are useful, they don't need the meditation process and to some people it actually may make it harder. For example, I have been diagnosed with anxiety, my brain is often always going at full speed in some though rabbit hole. My attempts at meditation resulted in me just on a loop thinking about how I shouldn't be thinking about anything. For me the best way to relax, is to put headphones on with some fast paced music, move my body randomly while thinking about some not important thing, like think about a story I like and imagining possible ways it would go that I like. This actually makes me disconnect about my current situation and to lose stress, but it is quite an opposite way of doing it than the meditation one. On another topic, to add another thing religions convince people they need but that I don't think it is true is that one needs to have one overarching community. Maybe in the past where we lived in smaller groups that was the way, but nowadays with the internet and other forms of communication, one can easily be part of various communities to strike the itch of their different hobbies, various sides of their self.I find this an overall better format than the overarching community one, as if you end up stranded from one of those communities for whatever reason, it means you're only losing a small part of your social circles. But when you have a big community, it can means losing almost all of your social links, so people may often do things like conform to ideas they're not really for just to not lose the community.
I've sometimes thought about an alternative (to?) religion that focuses on science-as-a-process or similar ... I always come around to the conclusion that it can't work. Either it gets twisted and abused, or it becomes its own worst enemy.
On the point of not needing an alternative to religion, and religions co-opting the things that we do need, at 8:28 .. I picked this up somewhere else and cant remember where, so if that person sees this, im sorry i couldnt give you the credit. Its a bit of a lengthy anecdote (so, heads up), but it makes the point: Man 1 and Man 2 are both walking through the woods. Before they left, Man 1 pulled out a telescope, looked over the treetops and saw the tower he was headed to in the distance. He surveyed the woods surrounding him, took out some paper, and sketched the area around him and marked the location of the tower as well as his current location. He knows there are bear traps in the woods and he doesn't want to step on them, so he takes out a metal detector that he can use to mark when he comes across metal on his crude map. It's not perfect, but it's better than nothing, and this way any future travellers down this path will know. Then he checks the sun, and uses his watch to determine how much daylight is left, and plots points on his map of how far should travel and roughly where to camp each night. He considers his task and realises he has no instruments to test the weather, so he can't be sure if it will rain or not during the journey. Unfortunately the instrument doesn't exist for him, even though he realises the usefulness it would have. After all his preparation, he sets off into the woods. Man 2 also prepared for the journey, by bringing with him a 3000 year old map of the woods, made by settlers. He's confident that it's all he needs because of the surprising detail in some parts of the map, and heads out into the woods to reach the same tower as Man 1. Inside the woods, the trees are thick for both men, and make it hard to see what's up ahead and severely reduce visibility. Man 1 pulls out a compass and a pedometer, and uses them to keep track of how many steps he travels in which direction, so that he can corroborate it with his crudely drawn map and not lose his approximate location, even though visibility is low. Man 2 just tries his best to follow the vague lines marked in his 3000 year old map, but the path is overgrown and its easy to get confused. He regularly has to stop to double check his surroundings just to keep his bearings. In fact, he often heads in the wrong direction, sometimes heading backwards in the direction he came from. He also knows there are bear traps out here, but has no idea where and no way to check, and the fear of stepping in one makes him paranoid, so his progress is very slow. Eventually the two cross paths, and Man 1 greets Man 2, who looks weary. Man 2 responds and asks if he is also heading to the tower. Man 1 says Yes I am, and Man 2 invites him to follow his 3000 year old map, since it's certain to take them to their destination. Man 1 considers it, but decides its not wise after noticing that Man 2's map will take them off the path that Man 1 intends to follow. He points this out to Man 2, who scoffs and asks who drew Man 1's map. He explains how he drew it himself, and Man 2 just chuckles smugly. He boasts that his map was made by the people who founded this land 3000 years ago, and Man 1 couldn't possibly know the land better than them. Man 1 is bewildered by this, but decides to continue on his way regardless, and suggests Man 2 come along with him if he wants. Man 2 stops him. "No, you should follow me!" he says. "Otherwise you're definitely going to step in a bear trap." Man 1 politely disagrees on account of his equipment, but Man 2 persists and begins to follow Man 1, begging him to reconsider. "Your devices won't always be right, so how can you be sure?" he asks Man 1. "And besides, who could possibly know the land better than the ones who founded it??" Man 1 considers it, but points out that the woods have changed a lot in 3000 years, and his map is no longer accurate. Man 2 grows furious at this, and declares that the path is still there, even if it is overgrown. "My map is accurate and trustworthy!" he insists. Man 1 asks how accurately one could follow a path that's overgrown and looks just like the rest of the overgrown woods. Man 2 gets a bit angrier at the idea that he might be blindly following a path he is unsure of, and demands Man 1 prove the usefulness of his equipment. "If you can detect where bear traps are, can you predict the weather??" he asks. "No," says Man 1, "unfortunately I haven't figured out how to predict the weather yet." Man 2 scoffs at how unreliable he is, and pulls out a weather calendar from 3000 years ago to boast of his knowledge on the topic. Man 1 points out that if his ancient calendar did coincide with current weather it would just be random chance. Man 2 grows even more bitter towards Man 1. He demands that Man 1 explain how his machines work, if he believes they are so accurate. Man 1 says it's hard to explain, but provides Man 2 with his blueprints. Man 2 laughs and claims that the blueprints could be fake, and since Man 1 can't easily explain it to him, he must be lying. Man 1 shrugs and goes on his way. All the while, Man 2 follows behind, belittling Man 1 and his foolishness as he goes. After some time they come to a clearing in the woods, with the tower a stone's throw away. Without realising it, Man 2 had piggy-backed the entire way through the woods, benefiting from Man 1's method of navigation. Now they stand before the tower, only 2 hours past Man 1's original estimated arrival time. Man 2 makes sure to point out he was off by 2 hours.
I always hated that my dog tags said "NO PREF". That made it sound like Baptist, Catholic, Mormon, were all fine with me, whereas my actual preference was to keep that religious bullexcrement away from me.
Matt, have you ever read: The Expulsion of Adam and Eve from Heaven According to the Devil Just thought you’d find it interesting if you haven’t already read it
Are we 100% sure this whole thing isnt some real deep-cut prank? A lot of this feels too intentionally tongue-in-cheek, like the founders are sitting around, laughing at the idea of a bunch of gullible, pro-vaxxer atheists going around saying "Im Aweistic! The MCU is my religion!!"
Matt I wish you would make this argument to Alex O'Connor I love him but he seems to think that humanity needs some replacement for religion and I would love to hear you tell him this
Well they did ask for your opinion. And it sounded like a fair assessment IMO. Seems they'd be better off writing creative fiction of some sort with all their fanciful ideas.
Kinda disappointing only because the title very well could have been about Marvel movies and still resulted in a similar discussion. The gospels are Jesus fanfiction. Acts comes along late enough that the apostles are getting their own fanfiction. All of the stories about personified deities are ultimately fanfiction. Like, Hades didn't exist for a time. Zeus was thought to be in charge of the heavens and the underworld. But through people wanting to get more out of these characters, eventually there was a separation and suddenly a whole new character pops into being, complete with its own domain and powers and interesting stories.
allow me to put on a beard and pretend to be an old man for a moment... one thing we seem to have decided as a society is that bigger communities are better. if you want a big community, the hellscape that is the internet is right here. if you want a loyal community of friends that can have deep conversations around a campfire? I'd say you can stop recruiting at a dozen or so. I have no intention of becoming a mystrikist, but if they have six people attending these meetings, I would suggest to them to focus less on recruiting and more on enjoying it while it lasts
Making a name that is MCU strikes me as someone desperately trying to be cool and failing. Also, a union requires multiple groups. What are the other groups in this union? That's before even realising that union is completely superfluous when it's already a community.
As someone who is on the autistic spectrum Aweism/ awetistic are horrible sounding words. I know the person isn’t intending to mock those with the disability- but that's the first thing i thought when i heard aweism and awetistic was autism and autistic. Like come on.... you are telling me that in your attempts to be clever so that you could be taken seriously that not once did you take a step back and think how any of this comes off?
I don't think that that's fair. Religion combines supernatural beliefs with tribalism. There's also a hierarchical, usually patriarchal, aspect that's inherent in religions. There are no priests of the Dallas Cowboys. I think the attempts at "secular religion" are trying to downplay the harmfulness of tribalism. They understand that the supernaturalism in religion, but discount that religion's tribalism and hierarchies are also equally harmful. I don't see a priest, pastor, or cleric at least once a week on social media who molested a child because of supernaturalism. The supernaturalism doesn't cause church leaders to (routinely) abuse children. It's the power that they have. It's the hierarchy that's inherent in religion. One could also argue that the warm sense of community that people feel is part of what causes parents to let their guard down with regard to religious leaders. This is what secular religionists are arguing for.
Sounds like another reason parts of the world are nots fans of organized religion, like japan. Most of the religious people have been saying for decades that they just want to sample specific parts anyway, maybe the best way to practice any of that is to look into a bit of everything.
I suspect that people who leave religion are uncomfortable with the possibility that they have no community to support them when in dire need. Having a place to go and feel welcome is nice and helpful to self-actualization of social needs, but if the religious alternative is unable to provide the more basic needs (food, shelter and safety), it will always feel incomplete and unsatisfactory. Traditional religion, for all its flaws, usually have a dedicated building and money reserve to be able to care for the congregation’s basic needs. If they want to do good in a secular way, establish a nonprofit to care for the needy without tethering it to a God belief.
Here's an inconvenient reality. Beliefs have natural consequences in the form of implications. One characteristic of beliefs is that they tend to attract one another. Just as theism implies (but doesn’t necessarily entail) certain additional beliefs, so does atheism. Atheism implies (but does not necessarily entail) empiricism, humanism, materialism, naturalism, and secularism. While neither theism nor atheism as perspectives themselves include any ideologies, institutions, etc., there are atheist organizations. Just as religion provides televangelists for theists, there are atheist television programs and podcasts, such as The Atheist Experience, Rationality Rules, and Talk Heathen, for example. Just as religion provides religious folk with apologetics, there are atheist apologetics. Just as religion provides certain ideologies, there are certain ideologies that are closely associated with atheism. Just as religion provides theists with church services, there are atheist “Sunday Assemblies” and conventions. There is symbology associated with atheism. There are various atheistic “creeds.” There is, of course, atheistic activism. While decidedly not a religion itself (just as theism is not a religion unto itself), there are certainly nonreligious equivalents for all of religion’s trappings. I don’t know what to call the atheist analog for religion-the source from whence these equivalents are derived-but it is clear that whatever it is called, _it exists, too._ Changing the *label* doesn't change that reality.
Rather they know it nor not these attempts at secular religions only serves to validate and legitimize that there's something wrong with a secular worldview. That there's something shameful, at the very least, distasteful about being an "atheist"
Born, raised and living in a (relatively) secular country I must say this whole dialogue is so f'd up. Not because people "rebel" against religion - all I've heard sounds sane - but because how intolerant certain zealots are. So I understand why Matt and others need to talk. But holy hell, USA was supposedly land of the freedom??? And that's where most of this insanity happens in the enlightened world? We recently and finally allied with you and now it feels like I have to watch over my shoulder... But hey. Fup the whole world, if you want, USA. But please, just vote. If everything goes down, I'd hope it's because majority of huge economy voted for it. It probably won't, but just in case.
I have watched about 5 years worth of Jimmy now. And now I have to wait another few months to make my point of why I disagree. 🤯 What I hate is listening to Matt etc and agreeing with most of their arguments, except I did not write down the time they agreed with my own point, so now, I think so have to destroy an entire continent to prevent my mild embarrassment. That was a joke. Matt, call it out if I mischaracterized an older statement. Not all people are terms of equal in terms of competence or ability.
It's a fallacy for somebody to assert that their religion is of ultimate importance to them, therefore anything that is of ultimate importance to anybody is a religion.
18:55 “aweism” or whatever … experiencing “awe” when viewing nature … I do not believe anyone has or could ever prove that this experience is natural or intrinsic to humans or any other animal species. This feeling of “awe” (whatever that means or feels like-there must be a million subjective opinions on this) is a learned belief, an idea that has (likely) been touted for millennia, romanticized, idealized, and misconstrued as being natural or innate. It’s not. It’s a learned behavior. Even if it is natural, it of course has nothing to do with anything supernatural, and of course, the “supernatural” is pure fiction and imaginary. If the feeling/emotion of “awe” is natural, then it (necessarily), at some point in the course of our evolution, resulted in a behavioral or cognitive response that was beneficial to our survival (or procreation). How so? I do not know. I wonder though.
*Mystrikism : **_pretending to be like a religion_** ;* How could a _non supernatural "religion",_ ever replace a supernatural one ? Everybody knows MCU is make believe, but religion, has followers that are completely convinced it's real. To us Dungeons & Dragons, Star Wars, ect, is no different than Christianity, (make believe), but not to it's believers.
@@htpkeyUse the tax exemption test to differentiate “religions” from being “spiritual”. Don’t use the Monty Python witch test logic (“What also floats in water?”)
I totally came here for Captain America. I've been baited, and I clicked.
LOOOT of 30 second watch times! Too bad for anyone who leaves tho!
"Flame On!" Wait, what?
Don’t demand and you are an honest arbiter 😁
That matt, always chasing the algorithm for the latest trends
I saw 'MCU' in the title, so I came for Spider-Man. It made me wonder-has Matt finally conceded that the comics prove New York actually exists?
New York does exist, but the comics do not prove it. Its existence is demonstrated by other, actual, evidence.
I'd like to hear Matt talk about the marvel cinematic universe
Yeah, I thought he was going to use the MCU (the actual one) to explain how stories develop. Jesus is 1st and 2nd century Spider-Man.
Jesus seems to me to be a late first/ early second century attempt at making Dr. Strange.
@@JoeBManco The only example of actual discrimination against Christians that I know of in modern society is Marvel. Thor's an Avenger. Hercules is an Avenger. WTF is Jesus not an Avenger? Anti-Christian bias is the only reason I can come up with.
@@NoWay1969 I'm hardly an expert at all things Marvel, but there seems to be an absence of any Middle-East deities, kings, prophets, or priests as an Avenger. It is a shame because many of the legends from the area would make a good foundation for a story if modernized. The closest we get for Marvel that I am aware of is X-Men Apocalypse where the ancient Egyptian mutant is the antagonist.
@@JoeBManco And now guess why a big commercial myth-making business tries to avoid big current religions. You get one guess.
We're not a cult sounds exactly like something a cult would say.
So if they said "we are a cult" by your logic they're .....errr.....not???
Come on!! STOP with this fuzzy thinking and use your brain ffs!!
@@dommidavros2211 Nope, then they'd be honest. People who aren't something generally don't try and convince people that they're not that thing. But people who are something will generally try to convince people that they're not that thing.
For example psychopaths will spend a great deal of time trying to convince you that they're actually good people and not manipulative and uncaring. Whereas say a humanist doesn't need to try and convince people that they're a good person. They'll show it through their actions.
No, that's not what they said, I think they are saying it's an instant red flag, to say we're not a cult, this doesn't mean they are saying if they said we are a cult that means they aren't, I think you are exhibiting flawed thinking there, my thinking on it is if a group like this says either way they are a cult, mentioning cults in this context seem to me to be an instant red flag
@ARoll925 - That makes no sense! It's like in peep show when Jeremy says "Firstly this is NOT a pyramid scheme...." and Mark replies with "You joined a pyramid scheme?"
And you think because it's funny in a comedy, the joke works in real life!
It doesn't!
@@dommidavros2211 okay, why does it not make sense?, what you attempted to try to explain is irrelevant, what I said was the inverse logic does not necessarily mean the person believes the opposite of what they said too, in the example just cause they said that sounds like something a cult would say, does not mean the that if a cult says they are a cult, that person believes they are not a cult, that does not follow, if you are the original responder your logic is fuzzy, is all I'm saying, no the OP likely does not believe the reverse statement is true, but the reverse statement does not follow
Hilarious. This is comedy. Thank you for posting this entertaining video Matt. You are awesome. Thank you for all that you do for the atheist position.
My question to Christian family and friends is, "What can you show, as a Christian, what you have that someone couldn't get from another religion or no religion at all?"
The honest answer is nothing. You can have subjective experiences, but you can't prove that it's anything but self talk and feelings, since god chooses to remain hidden. You can have community and some moral guidelines, but you can get that from humanism or your own personal ethics and morality. I found that I don't need to go through the motions of some replacement ritualistic structure to find meaning to my life. Sounds like it's a group for those who still do need that.
If an organisation stresses that they are not a cult, it's time to put on your skeptics hat.
I like al Bundy's idea of a religion based on beer - that would make my beer tax deductible ;-)
One of the things that keeps people in religion is community. It's also what people miss when they leave. I don't see why religion gets to own the idea of fellowship, charity, communal outreach, & an ethical framework for moral behavior.
A solution in search of a problem.
Not wanting to just write 'atheist' on a survey?
YOU SHOULD WRITE IT.
Politicians use surveys and censuses as an excuse to push policies. We NEED people to write 'atheist' to prove how many there are of us out there. Putting ANYTHING else will just get seen as some form of religion and be used to claim that virtually everyone is religious.
100% agree! We don't need a religious way of saying "we aren't religious". Why would we allude to being something we never were..? That's like calling 'OFF' a tv channel, just so the stats can show that everyone watches tv
If anything happens to that beard, ill send my jinns to you Matt.
This is basically socially organized naturalistic pantheism
I know you cleared it up at the beginning but I was kind of secretly hoping the entire time that it was going to spring into a Marvel Cinematic Universe type discussion at some point.
I came here for Captain Puerto Rico. (and NO He isn't really Captain America, he only has one star people) lol :p
Once you see that his torso is the PR flag you can't unsee it :)
Cap PR looks way better
A brilliant criticism. Thanks Matt!
The best the automatic captions could do when you said it was mist thing 😂
Having no sense of community and never felt a need to congregate, at all, this has zero appeal to me.
Welp, Matt you finally learned from the Atheism+ days. I mean this in all sincerity, it's good to grow and learn. We don't need any dogma or atheist religion, it's herding cats. We just don't believe in Gods.
Always click when you post on your channel. Good stuff ‼️
The text may be AI, but the art on that website is absolutely, positively, 100% AI.
congrats on nearly 200k
took a while
The MCU isn't a cult, it's a worse C-word.
Cringe.
First thing Matt says is thank you for clicking, Oh Matt every time I see a notification for your videos I click! And this didn`t disappoint, thank you for finally addressing this topic Matt, very important!
Don’t need religion, don’t need anything of the sort to replace it. I’m in awe that I exist. I’m thankful for Matt’s channel.
In the end it seems religions work best with lethal authority backing them that eliminates competition of divergent ideas.
Matt Dillahunty might not believe in any gods, but with that beard, he’s definitely trying to convince us he’s the one-eyed wonder, Odin! Maybe he’s just hedging his bets in case Valhalla has better Wi-Fi.” 😄
I cant believe i may meet someone that actually says they are a mystrick- undeclared politically- semi socialist - left leaning- agnostic- humanisticish- atheist…. 😂
Reply: thats great sir but this is Wendy’s- can i take your order please
really we need to forget about you and this frustrate no community....
On a good definition of religion I think: “A system of beliefs that informs either doctrines and/or practices and is centered around something which is viewed as sacred.”
I think this definition is good because it includes then religions that are not belief oriented but practice oriented (such as Buddhism) but also excludes things which would be viewed more as a philosophy or life style (like Secular Humanism or being a Vegetarian/Vegan).
Thought you were gonna spit some knowledge on the Vedic text in Doctor Strange or something lol
I'm with you Matt, I'm not looking for a religion, a group, feel the need to self identify and nail down a percentage of my personality or be defined by others. I've been defined by others and in many ways all throughout my life involving many expletives which were probably correct. Having to study a scripted word salad, admittedly shorter than a bible, still appears to have the effect of sucking out what time I have left on this planet. Well-done for doing it for us.
"...I'm not looking for a...group...or be defined by others."
I hear a lot of atheists say that, yet they seem to congregate in these sorts for forums anyway. If what you're saying is true, what's the motivation, if not the very human sense of belonging?
@@JustifiedNonetheless we all live or take part in communities, often many. Having or taking part in a dialogue isn't searching for something is it? What has being an Atheist got to do with anything? I haven't claimed to be one have I? All I did was offer some feedback from a personal perspective which Matt probably won't read, or for that matter will many but that's the weird thing of social media.
I like that Matt ended on a quote from an IP with an overall better message.
“I’m not referring to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, this isn’t merely click bait” I beg to differ Matt, I beg to differ 😭
I was hoping for a discussion about infinity war versus endgame.
The old testament vs the new testament fits that bill
Anyone catch the Northern Lights last night? I was like "aww" - I mean "ooh!"
Heh heh, George of Jungle
I had a giggle when you said Third Baptist Church because one of my uncles has four (now married adult) offspring who ended up in four different versions of the original church where they all began in the local region. None of those aligns with my uncles religion of birth either so that's five. Amazing how people will almost literally windowshop through life looking for their ideal version of one branch of one of the three main Abrahamic religions. Some people also crave pseudo mystical input in life the way some kids crave minerals and suck on pebbles.
"We're not a cult! We just place our main focus on trying to cultivate the feeling that addicts people to religions/cults!"
i cant stop laughing at the imperfect mariners part😂😂
I didn't have to go through the (very understandable) "deconversion nightmares" I've seen with many people in YT, but as you briefly point out at the beginning of the video, humans are very tribal, and tribe membership is a huge part of someone's identity. I can imagine it being a substantial part of the struggle for leaving a religion. I don't see atheism as the alternative to being part of a religion, but the doorway you cross to get to the other side of religion. People struggling to deconvert may be asking themselves "what will my identity be if I go the whole way?", and I would argue that from that perspective atheism has a marketing problem. We lack an elevator pitch to help people cross that doorway (and if we have an elevator pitch, we are doing a bad job at advertising & sales because I haven't seen it). I'm blabbering all this because my knee-jerk reaction from looking at the MCU site is that appears to be an attempt to become that elevator pitch. It's the completely wrong way to go about it, though. Adding another label to the mix won't help. But this may highlight the need for having a better elevator pitch nonetheless
MCU shows how unimpressive biblical miracles and Gods are. Doctor strange has far greater feats than Jesus.
And yet Catholics like Daredevil and Muslims like Ms. Marvel are in the MCU
lol 2024 geo cities 😂😂😂 omg not yellow text on black background! My eyes!! 😂😂
The font is 8 points omg wtf 😂😂😂 I’m CRYIN’!!!
Absolutely we do not need religion! I believe we need to leave it behind us and move on as a species.
The world needs more clubs for hobbies. If my only options was this MCU or church, I'd be in the pews every Sunday. Thankfully I have other options.
Party on, dude!
Damn. I was hoping to hear about the Marvel Cinematic Universe
Don't we all worship Deadpool? He is, after all, Marvel Jesus
I think meditation tend to be quite overrated. While the idea of relaxing and getting away from your life problems for a moment and to reflect are useful, they don't need the meditation process and to some people it actually may make it harder. For example, I have been diagnosed with anxiety, my brain is often always going at full speed in some though rabbit hole. My attempts at meditation resulted in me just on a loop thinking about how I shouldn't be thinking about anything. For me the best way to relax, is to put headphones on with some fast paced music, move my body randomly while thinking about some not important thing, like think about a story I like and imagining possible ways it would go that I like. This actually makes me disconnect about my current situation and to lose stress, but it is quite an opposite way of doing it than the meditation one.
On another topic, to add another thing religions convince people they need but that I don't think it is true is that one needs to have one overarching community. Maybe in the past where we lived in smaller groups that was the way, but nowadays with the internet and other forms of communication, one can easily be part of various communities to strike the itch of their different hobbies, various sides of their self.I find this an overall better format than the overarching community one, as if you end up stranded from one of those communities for whatever reason, it means you're only losing a small part of your social circles. But when you have a big community, it can means losing almost all of your social links, so people may often do things like conform to ideas they're not really for just to not lose the community.
I've sometimes thought about an alternative (to?) religion that focuses on science-as-a-process or similar ... I always come around to the conclusion that it can't work. Either it gets twisted and abused, or it becomes its own worst enemy.
I love Universal Unitarian. It's basically the "believe whatever you want to believe" religion
It’s the silliest thing possible, and I love them for it
It’s the silliest thing ever, and I love them for it
On the point of not needing an alternative to religion, and religions co-opting the things that we do need, at 8:28 ..
I picked this up somewhere else and cant remember where, so if that person sees this, im sorry i couldnt give you the credit.
Its a bit of a lengthy anecdote (so, heads up), but it makes the point:
Man 1 and Man 2 are both walking through the woods.
Before they left, Man 1 pulled out a telescope, looked over the treetops and saw the tower he was headed to in the distance. He surveyed the woods surrounding him, took out some paper, and sketched the area around him and marked the location of the tower as well as his current location.
He knows there are bear traps in the woods and he doesn't want to step on them, so he takes out a metal detector that he can use to mark when he comes across metal on his crude map. It's not perfect, but it's better than nothing, and this way any future travellers down this path will know.
Then he checks the sun, and uses his watch to determine how much daylight is left, and plots points on his map of how far should travel and roughly where to camp each night.
He considers his task and realises he has no instruments to test the weather, so he can't be sure if it will rain or not during the journey. Unfortunately the instrument doesn't exist for him, even though he realises the usefulness it would have.
After all his preparation, he sets off into the woods.
Man 2 also prepared for the journey, by bringing with him a 3000 year old map of the woods, made by settlers. He's confident that it's all he needs because of the surprising detail in some parts of the map, and heads out into the woods to reach the same tower as Man 1.
Inside the woods, the trees are thick for both men, and make it hard to see what's up ahead and severely reduce visibility.
Man 1 pulls out a compass and a pedometer, and uses them to keep track of how many steps he travels in which direction, so that he can corroborate it with his crudely drawn map and not lose his approximate location, even though visibility is low.
Man 2 just tries his best to follow the vague lines marked in his 3000 year old map, but the path is overgrown and its easy to get confused. He regularly has to stop to double check his surroundings just to keep his bearings. In fact, he often heads in the wrong direction, sometimes heading backwards in the direction he came from. He also knows there are bear traps out here, but has no idea where and no way to check, and the fear of stepping in one makes him paranoid, so his progress is very slow.
Eventually the two cross paths, and Man 1 greets Man 2, who looks weary. Man 2 responds and asks if he is also heading to the tower. Man 1 says Yes I am, and Man 2 invites him to follow his 3000 year old map, since it's certain to take them to their destination.
Man 1 considers it, but decides its not wise after noticing that Man 2's map will take them off the path that Man 1 intends to follow.
He points this out to Man 2, who scoffs and asks who drew Man 1's map. He explains how he drew it himself, and Man 2 just chuckles smugly. He boasts that his map was made by the people who founded this land 3000 years ago, and Man 1 couldn't possibly know the land better than them.
Man 1 is bewildered by this, but decides to continue on his way regardless, and suggests Man 2 come along with him if he wants.
Man 2 stops him. "No, you should follow me!" he says. "Otherwise you're definitely going to step in a bear trap."
Man 1 politely disagrees on account of his equipment, but Man 2 persists and begins to follow Man 1, begging him to reconsider.
"Your devices won't always be right, so how can you be sure?" he asks Man 1. "And besides, who could possibly know the land better than the ones who founded it??"
Man 1 considers it, but points out that the woods have changed a lot in 3000 years, and his map is no longer accurate.
Man 2 grows furious at this, and declares that the path is still there, even if it is overgrown. "My map is accurate and trustworthy!" he insists.
Man 1 asks how accurately one could follow a path that's overgrown and looks just like the rest of the overgrown woods. Man 2 gets a bit angrier at the idea that he might be blindly following a path he is unsure of, and demands Man 1 prove the usefulness of his equipment. "If you can detect where bear traps are, can you predict the weather??" he asks.
"No," says Man 1, "unfortunately I haven't figured out how to predict the weather yet."
Man 2 scoffs at how unreliable he is, and pulls out a weather calendar from 3000 years ago to boast of his knowledge on the topic. Man 1 points out that if his ancient calendar did coincide with current weather it would just be random chance.
Man 2 grows even more bitter towards Man 1.
He demands that Man 1 explain how his machines work, if he believes they are so accurate. Man 1 says it's hard to explain, but provides Man 2 with his blueprints.
Man 2 laughs and claims that the blueprints could be fake, and since Man 1 can't easily explain it to him, he must be lying.
Man 1 shrugs and goes on his way. All the while, Man 2 follows behind, belittling Man 1 and his foolishness as he goes. After some time they come to a clearing in the woods, with the tower a stone's throw away.
Without realising it, Man 2 had piggy-backed the entire way through the woods, benefiting from Man 1's method of navigation. Now they stand before the tower, only 2 hours past Man 1's original estimated arrival time.
Man 2 makes sure to point out he was off by 2 hours.
This is like if A.I. and a word salad generated had a baby.
i actually just made up a new form of religion today specifically for Matt called Transcedental Atheism so its interesting i see the video today.
No you didn’t, you thought you did.
I always hated that my dog tags said "NO PREF". That made it sound like Baptist, Catholic, Mormon, were all fine with me, whereas my actual preference was to keep that religious bullexcrement away from me.
Thank you
Matt, have you ever read:
The Expulsion of Adam and Eve from Heaven According to the Devil
Just thought you’d find it interesting if you haven’t already read it
Are we 100% sure this whole thing isnt some real deep-cut prank? A lot of this feels too intentionally tongue-in-cheek, like the founders are sitting around, laughing at the idea of a bunch of gullible, pro-vaxxer atheists going around saying "Im Aweistic! The MCU is my religion!!"
The snails make me wonder.
Literally this was my thought the entire time. It’s a Poe.
I was expecting the book of Eric with Spider-Man.
@keithbielen8304 the book of Eric is a shitty as its author
Matt I wish you would make this argument to Alex O'Connor
I love him but he seems to think that humanity needs some replacement for religion and I would love to hear you tell him this
Well, they've already removed the MCU reference on their first page.
I came here for the Massively Cankled Unicorn…
if the 1970s is any gauge, this 'movement' is most likely gonna end messy.
Matt, do you believe that life has always existed?
Psychoticismy … hey, I just invented an alternative to religion !!!
I absolutely cannot believe just how often ads are now popping up on UA-cam. Ads every two minutes it seems … absurd. Absurd.
That is absurd, you witnessed the resurrection of the ad God.
I only got 2 ads during this video.
I'm hearing echoes of "Effective Altruism"/Less Wrong, but for Super Unique and Special Boys And Girls here (and also for poor people, presumably)
Completely uninteresting fact: that hatching pattern behind Matt is one that is typically used to denote soil on Architectural drawings
Its like someone asked AI to make an Atheist agnostic religion without a god.
It's bad enough that I'm forced to be anything at all, but that someone gets to slap a label on me because of it.
WHAT?! WAIT, THIS ISN'T ABOUT PROVING THAT THE HULK IS REAL? I MUST BE IN SOME SORT OF DYSTOPIAN MULTIVERSE.
I wonder which MCU character would join the MCU
I definitely came here for Marvel... god dammit.
Well since u teased us u gotta make a video about the MCU 😂
Well they did ask for your opinion. And it sounded like a fair assessment IMO.
Seems they'd be better off writing creative fiction of some sort with all their fanciful ideas.
do you know that when this empty sick toxic religious cult will disappear not even you will miss it?
I was about to ask if anyone else thought this was AI generated when Matt said it looked like it.
someone's trying to make a religion out of matt's atheist experience youtube clips XD
I ❤ CROSSOVER EPISODES!!
This presentation is so inept that I'm really surprised you spent any time on this.
Meet the new boss, same as the old boss...
Kinda disappointing only because the title very well could have been about Marvel movies and still resulted in a similar discussion.
The gospels are Jesus fanfiction. Acts comes along late enough that the apostles are getting their own fanfiction. All of the stories about personified deities are ultimately fanfiction. Like, Hades didn't exist for a time. Zeus was thought to be in charge of the heavens and the underworld. But through people wanting to get more out of these characters, eventually there was a separation and suddenly a whole new character pops into being, complete with its own domain and powers and interesting stories.
allow me to put on a beard and pretend to be an old man for a moment... one thing we seem to have decided as a society is that bigger communities are better. if you want a big community, the hellscape that is the internet is right here. if you want a loyal community of friends that can have deep conversations around a campfire? I'd say you can stop recruiting at a dozen or so. I have no intention of becoming a mystrikist, but if they have six people attending these meetings, I would suggest to them to focus less on recruiting and more on enjoying it while it lasts
Making a name that is MCU strikes me as someone desperately trying to be cool and failing.
Also, a union requires multiple groups. What are the other groups in this union? That's before even realising that union is completely superfluous when it's already a community.
"augment the principles of mystrikism" ... sounds like they are asking you to ankh your frequency ... martymer viewers know what that means :D
As someone who is on the autistic spectrum Aweism/ awetistic are horrible sounding words. I know the person isn’t intending to mock those with the disability- but that's the first thing i thought when i heard aweism and awetistic was autism and autistic. Like come on.... you are telling me that in your attempts to be clever so that you could be taken seriously that not once did you take a step back and think how any of this comes off?
I don't think that that's fair. Religion combines supernatural beliefs with tribalism. There's also a hierarchical, usually patriarchal, aspect that's inherent in religions. There are no priests of the Dallas Cowboys.
I think the attempts at "secular religion" are trying to downplay the harmfulness of tribalism. They understand that the supernaturalism in religion, but discount that religion's tribalism and hierarchies are also equally harmful. I don't see a priest, pastor, or cleric at least once a week on social media who molested a child because of supernaturalism. The supernaturalism doesn't cause church leaders to (routinely) abuse children. It's the power that they have. It's the hierarchy that's inherent in religion. One could also argue that the warm sense of community that people feel is part of what causes parents to let their guard down with regard to religious leaders. This is what secular religionists are arguing for.
Sounds like another reason parts of the world are nots fans of organized religion, like japan. Most of the religious people have been saying for decades that they just want to sample specific parts anyway, maybe the best way to practice any of that is to look into a bit of everything.
I suspect that people who leave religion are uncomfortable with the possibility that they have no community to support them when in dire need. Having a place to go and feel welcome is nice and helpful to self-actualization of social needs, but if the religious alternative is unable to provide the more basic needs (food, shelter and safety), it will always feel incomplete and unsatisfactory. Traditional religion, for all its flaws, usually have a dedicated building and money reserve to be able to care for the congregation’s basic needs. If they want to do good in a secular way, establish a nonprofit to care for the needy without tethering it to a God belief.
you have problem. You left a religion to entered into a toxic empty sick religious cult that give you only obsession and frustration.
Here's an inconvenient reality. Beliefs have natural consequences in the form of implications. One characteristic of beliefs is that they tend to attract one another. Just as theism implies (but doesn’t necessarily entail) certain additional beliefs, so does atheism. Atheism implies (but does not necessarily entail) empiricism, humanism, materialism, naturalism, and secularism. While neither theism nor atheism as perspectives themselves include any ideologies, institutions, etc., there are atheist organizations. Just as religion provides televangelists for theists, there are atheist television programs and podcasts, such as The Atheist Experience, Rationality Rules, and Talk Heathen, for example. Just as religion provides religious folk with apologetics, there are atheist apologetics. Just as religion provides certain ideologies, there are certain ideologies that are closely associated with atheism. Just as religion provides theists with church services, there are atheist “Sunday Assemblies” and conventions. There is symbology associated with atheism. There are various atheistic “creeds.” There is, of course, atheistic activism. While decidedly not a religion itself (just as theism is not a religion unto itself), there are certainly nonreligious equivalents for all of religion’s trappings. I don’t know what to call the atheist analog for religion-the source from whence these equivalents are derived-but it is clear that whatever it is called, _it exists, too._ Changing the *label* doesn't change that reality.
so also the believe in atheism?
The person who made it was prolly like 16
This was a reverse click bait for me 😂
I avoided watching it because I thought it was Marvel related.
Rather they know it nor not these attempts at secular religions only serves to validate and legitimize that there's something wrong with a secular worldview. That there's something shameful, at the very least, distasteful about being an "atheist"
Born, raised and living in a (relatively) secular country I must say this whole dialogue is so f'd up. Not because people "rebel" against religion - all I've heard sounds sane - but because how intolerant certain zealots are. So I understand why Matt and others need to talk. But holy hell, USA was supposedly land of the freedom??? And that's where most of this insanity happens in the enlightened world? We recently and finally allied with you and now it feels like I have to watch over my shoulder... But hey. Fup the whole world, if you want, USA. But please, just vote. If everything goes down, I'd hope it's because majority of huge economy voted for it. It probably won't, but just in case.
If you don’t want real feedback Matt is just about the last person I can imagine you would want to share your idea with
Evolution is defeated. 1043 scientists dissent from evolution
Evolution does not even make sense.... it can not even explain from what the microcells evolve from.
🤘🎸Twiddleywiddleydiddley Whaahh!
I have watched about 5 years worth of Jimmy now. And now I have to wait another few months to make my point of why I disagree. 🤯
What I hate is listening to Matt etc and agreeing with most of their arguments, except I did not write down the time they agreed with my own point, so now, I think so have to destroy an entire continent to prevent my mild embarrassment.
That was a joke.
Matt, call it out if I mischaracterized an older statement. Not all people are terms of equal in terms of competence or ability.
It's a fallacy for somebody to assert that their religion is of ultimate importance to them, therefore anything that is of ultimate importance to anybody is a religion.
Tax exempt status typifies “real” religion. 😊
Atheism is a religion, buty a toxic obsessed one. the worst of all.
18:55 “aweism” or whatever … experiencing “awe” when viewing nature … I do not believe anyone has or could ever prove that this experience is natural or intrinsic to humans or any other animal species. This feeling of “awe” (whatever that means or feels like-there must be a million subjective opinions on this) is a learned belief, an idea that has (likely) been touted for millennia, romanticized, idealized, and misconstrued as being natural or innate. It’s not. It’s a learned behavior. Even if it is natural, it of course has nothing to do with anything supernatural, and of course, the “supernatural” is pure fiction and imaginary.
If the feeling/emotion of “awe” is natural, then it (necessarily), at some point in the course of our evolution, resulted in a behavioral or cognitive response that was beneficial to our survival (or procreation). How so? I do not know. I wonder though.
Bright Atheism Plus, still not a cartoon universe. Yawn.
*Mystrikism : **_pretending to be like a religion_** ;*
How could a _non supernatural "religion",_ ever replace a supernatural one ?
Everybody knows MCU is make believe, but religion, has followers that are completely convinced it's real.
To us Dungeons & Dragons, Star Wars, ect, is no different than Christianity, (make believe), but not to it's believers.
Damn their site has crashed
Isn't a primary component of being a religion "something you do, not just believe"? Being "spiritual" or philosophical is not a religion.
It’s the tax exempt status that defines “religion”….😊
@@mr.c2485 Sure, but charities also don't pay taxes. Are they religions too?
@@htpkey you pay taxes. Are you a business then? Learn to differentiate differences
@@reysolo3672 I never said that. I was questioning whether being tax exempt is enough for something to be considered a religion.
@@htpkeyUse the tax exemption test to differentiate “religions” from being “spiritual”. Don’t use the Monty Python witch test logic (“What also floats in water?”)