Please Read and Respond

[XavierMalloy]

We're going to do this a little differently...


1) Please state your age
2) Were your parents religious, if so which religion?
3) Did your parents raise you this religion?
3b) Do you feel that the religion you had growing up affected you today? If so, in what ways?
4) Have you ever felt close to a higher power? If so, when?
5) Is there anything specific to your childhood that affected your views towards religion?
6) How do you feel about religious views other than your own?
7) How would you react if your child/loved ones had religious views differing from your own?
8) To what extent, if any, should religion be used to help raise and discipline children?
9) Where did you grow up (city, state/province, country)
10) Did your geographic location have any affect on your turn to atheism?
11) Any other comments!

Thanks you for answering!

Also, thank you to all who have suggested better questions!

Lastly, if my grammar is poor, suck it up, grammar isn't that big of a deal. And if it is...let me know and I will change it happily!

[Tank]

Sometimes it's very difficult to be civil. 

[Whitney]

how do you intend to write a paper on the affect of environment on religious views if you didn't ask:

What religion are your parents?
What political affiliation are your parents?
Did you attend religious services as a child; if so, which?
Do you currently attend religious services; if so, which?
Where did you grown up (city, state, country)?
Where did you live now (city, state, country)?
Are you male or female?

And if you don't want people to spam your email why did you spam forums?  (note that I can't do anything about bots reading your email off this forum and spamming you with Viagra emails)

[Tank]

Hello, my name is Xavier Malloy. I am a high school student in Laredo, Texas and I am writing my second semester English paper on the impact of one's environment on religious views. I would love it if you all would answer all the questions to help me write my paper. Feel free to answer any or all of the questions and remember that no answer is too short or too long. Thank you for your time. If you would like to add any further experiences or anything that would help me with my paper that you do not want in a public forum please feel free to email me at XavierMalloy@gmail.com. But please do not spam me! Thanks again for your time and consideration!!!

Please keep in mind that I've sent the same questions to other forums of different religions so some of the questions you may have to omit. Also, if you were a religion before you became atheist please let me know what you were and why you lost your faith. Lastly, please remember that this is a completely un-biased paper and that I am using all of your responses in a strictly education way. Thanks again!

1) Please state your age range (0-18, 19-29, 30-39, 40-49, 50-59, 60+)
50-59
2) How long have you been atheist?
Since conception
3) Were your parents atheist?
Dad yes, Mum no
3.5) Did your parents help you grow closer or farther from God?
Both managed to show me in their own way that the God Hypothesis is a load of superstitious manure.
4) Why are you this faith?
I have no faith in any institutionalised superstition
5) When have you felt closest to God?
Never felt close to a superstition.
6) When have you felt furthest from God?
Never felt distant from a superstition.
7) How have hardships affected your faith?
What bloody faith I'm an atheist and always have been.
As a child, how has your environment affect your religion?
It guaranteed I didn't have one
9) What is your view on other monotheistic religions (such as Christianity and Judaism)?
Institutionalised Superstitions born out of greed for power and the expression of the Alpha Male syndrome.
10) What is your view on atheism?
The only view worth a damn
11) Have you received any prejudice because of your religion?
No. Only from rude theists. And they are not all rude.
12) How would you react if your child/loved one changed religions?
I'd be amazed as they are all atheists.
13) How would you react if your child/loved one became atheist
THEY ARE ATHEISTS FFS
14) What are your views on extremist religious groups such as the Westboro Baptist Church, or Hamas?
Indoctrinated morons
15) What are your feelings on (How do you react to) the molestation of children by trusted church officials?
The same way any normal person would, revulsion.
16) To what extent should religion be used to help raise and discipline children?
None whatsoever. It should play no part in bullying a child with mythology.

Thanks for answering!!!

What a singularly poorly formed and ill thought out questionnaire. Talk about presumption of your audiences demography.

[Whitney]

What a singularly poorly formed and ill thought out questionnaire. Talk about presumption of your audiences demography.

ya, it's obviously written by a biased theist.

I'm not even going to bother replying with my responses (which would be pretty similar to yours minus how I was raised) till OP posts back.

[XavierMalloy]

Okay, I see all of your points, just a few things:

1) I used the same questions for each religion that I interviewed because I thought, from an education point of view it would make my thesis stronger. But I am no Harvard scholar, so I can tweak the questions so they are more relevant

2) Thank you for the added suggestions of questions I'll add them in, except the one about political affiliation

3) I don't really see this as spamming...but i need answers and its better than walking around the street interviewing people

4) I would just like to say that it is sort of funny that all the Christians who responded assumed I was an atheist who lost faith, and all the atheists think I'm a Christian trying to write a biased essay. Truth is I just want a well-written paper.

5) I know some of the questions are rough...but the original prompt I was given was "should religion be used to help raise and discipline children?" I though this was a silly question to ask because so many more factors go in to religion than just "yes it should", or "no it shouldn't". So i'm simply trying to learn more about peoples experiences with religion now, and as they were growing up. What I'm getting at with this rant is that I mainly need to know about your childhood and your experience with religion and how it affected you. Whether its the fact that you lived in a strict Catholic family that made you atheist or whether there wasn't enough proof, it doesn't matter, i just want to use insights on peoples lives to help prove my point. And, i also want to show that my teacher is incompetent and can not write good prompts.

[XavierMalloy]

Also to Tank, specifically

After reading your responses and my questions I do realize that it is moronic too have the same questions from two polar ends.
Unfortunately my prior laziness prevented me from changing small items such as the word "faith" which would please the Christians to "atheism" which would please the atheists.

[Whitney]

1) Please state your age
2) Are your religious? If so, for how long?
3) Were your parents religious?
4) Why are you or aren't you religious?
5) Have you ever felt close to a higher power? If so, when?
6) Was there ever a time you felt separated from a higher power?  If so, when?
7) Is there anything specific to your childhood that affected your views towards religion?
How do you feel about religious views other than your own?
9) Have you received any prejudice because of your religion or lack thereof?
10) How would you react if your child/loved ones had religious views differing from your own?
11) What are your views on extremist religious groups such as the Westboro Baptist Church, or Hamas?
12) What are your feelings on (How do you react to) the molestation of children by trusted church officials?
13) To what extent, if any, should religion be used to help raise and discipline children?
14) What religion, if any, did you have as a child?
15) Where did you grow up (city, state/province, country)
16) Any other comments!

^fixed it for you...now works no matter who you ask.

[Tank]

Also to Tank, specifically

After reading your responses and my questions I do realize that it is moronic too have the same questions from two polar ends.
Unfortunately my prior laziness prevented me from changing small items such as the word "faith" which would please the Christians to "atheism" which would please the atheists.

Please excuse my shooting from the hip. But we do get 'drive by' posters who feel, for whatever reason, that people on forums are just an easy target to do work for them.

However my feelings about "should religion be used to help raise and discipline children?" are as follows. Humans have evolved so that their offspring believe them without question and automatically look to authority figures for guidance. A hypothetical example of this would be twoo children and two mothers. One mother tells here child "Don't eat that!", but the child ignores her and eats whatever it is. The other mother does says the same to her child and the child obeys. Which child is more likely to survive and go onto reproduce, thus passing on their particular behavioural proclivities? In this case the child that obeys without question is more likely to pass on their genes.

If one did not believe what ones parents told one how would one learn anything? The fact is we wouldn't. When we are young we have neither the skills, time or resources to challenge what we are told by authority figures e.g. teachers, parents and adults in general. So it is critical that children are told the truth. However now comes the problem, what is the truth? If one is brought up in a community with ingrained institutionalised superstitions then one is bound to be taught that these myths are true. And the myths are tailor made to fit the evolved human mind. They explain everything from a position of authority. They create and instil belief in a great all knowing father figure.

So now we are faced with parents discipling children based on their own inherited mythology. The morals instilled are reinforced by the dogma of the institutionalised superstition. And thus the meme is reinforced and passed on from generation to generation.

In my case my father was an atheist, although I don't recall him ever using the term, and my mother was mild church of England protestant. My mum used to take my to church but my dad never came. Over the years the answers my father gave me to questions of note generally rang more true than those of my mother. Thus I was never really infected with the meme of Christianity more inoculated to it.

So in my opinion institutionalised superstition (aka religion) should have no place in the lives of children at all as it is all really just mythology. The appropriate methods are to instil the golden rule balanced with a firm understanding of the impact one's actions have on oneself and those around one. This is how my wife (also a life long atheist who went to a Christian school) and I brought up our three very different children and they all cae out better than us with no superstitious mythology involved at all.

I hope that helps a little.

As to my opinion of your OP, it's interesting how different groups inferred different things about you and your intent. That is a serious problem on line when one loses face-to-face communication and why it is critical to produce a questionnaire that is very carefully phrased. You have heard the expression "Garbage in = Garbage out." Well if your input is Garbage try as hard as you like any output can only be worse as it's interpreted Garbage.

[Stevil]

1) Please state your age range (0-18, 19-29, 30-39, 40-49, 50-59, 60+)
30-39
2) How long have you been atheist?
All my life
3) Were your parents atheist?
Dad - yes, Mum - no
4) Why are you this faith?
I don't belong to or have a faith, probably because I struggle to see religion as anything other than imaginary concepts
6) When did you feel furthest from "God"?
I have never had a belief in gods, I don't feel close nor far from imaginary concepts ever.
As a child, how has your environment affect your atheism?
My lack of belief in gods has largely been unaffected by my environment. Maybe if some evidence of a god concept came along then it would be affected but throughout my entire life there has been no evidence presented.
9) What is your view on other monotheistic religions (such as Christianity and Judaism)?
Other? I am pretty tolerant, people can believe what they want. I am hugely opposed to religions imposing their rules on me or my society though.
11) Have you received any prejudice because of your religion?
Not that i know of
12) How would you react if your child/loved one became a theist?
I would be supportive, its her life and she needs to make her own decisions, I expect that I will always love and support her and her choices.
14) What are your views on extremist religious groups such as the Westboro Baptist Church, or Hamas?
WestBro are a sad bunch of misguided people they are best ignored. I feel the Arab-Israeli conflict  is complicated and I don't know enough to have an opinion on this.
15) What are your feelings on (How do you react to) the molestation of children by trusted church officials?
Molestation of children is never good, regardless who does it.
16) To what extent should religion be used to help raise and discipline children?
I try to avoid stating what other people should or shouldn't do, I will not use religion to raise or discipline my own children.

[Gawen]

My goodness...

1) Please state your age range (0-18, 19-29, 30-39, 40-49, 50-59, 60+)

2) How long have you been atheist?
I was born an atheist, just like you. It's the default position.

3) Were your parents atheist?
When they were born, yes. After that they learned their religion.

4) Why are you this faith?
Atheism is not a faith.

6) When did you feel furthest from "God"?
Show me this God and I'll try to show you how far away we are.

As a child, how has your environment affect your atheism?
I was brought up Presbyterian. By the time I was in middle school, I had already figured out superstitions and belief in them were basically hogwash. Otherwise, there has been little or no impact that I can remember.

9) What is your view on other monotheistic religions (such as Christianity and Judaism)?
See answer to #8.

11) Have you received any prejudice because of your religion?
Atheism is not a religion...otherwise, I can think of little prejudice.

12) How would you react if your child/loved one became a theist?
Whatever floats their boat. However, my kids were brought up to question everything and use of critical thinking skills.  My kids becoming believers in superstition are just about null.

14) What are your views on extremist religious groups such as the Westboro Baptist Church, or Hamas?
They are ultra militant fundamentalists.  

15) What are your feelings on (How do you react to) the molestation of children by trusted church officials?
My feelings are any person who molests a child forfeits their life. Extreme view to hold? Perhaps. However, Christianity and Islam both hold the views that God and Muhammad both had sex with underage girls. And what of the view that Lot's two daughters got him drunk and had sex with him? Be sure to add these in your report.

16) To what extent should religion be used to help raise and discipline children?
No extent whatsoever.

[Ihateyoumike]

1) Please state your age range (0-18, 19-29, 30-39, 40-49, 50-59, 60+)
60+
2) How long have you been atheist?
For 3 score and 19 minutes
3) Were your parents atheist?
No. Satan worshipers.
4) Why are you this faith?
Why aren't you?
6) When did you feel furthest from "God"?
When I wrote "god" on a postcard and sent it to Moscow.
As a child, how has your environment affect your atheism?
That's just bad grammar. Which tense are you going for? It seems you're calling me a child? But the answer to your question is... Beatings.
9) What is your view on other monotheistic religions (such as Christianity and Judaism)?
They're fun to chuck rocks at. And jewish babies taste better than christian babies.
11) Have you received any prejudice because of your religion?
Yeah, people assume I'm a terrorist just cause I'm a scientologist.
12) How would you react if your child/loved one became a theist?
I'd eat it. But only if it was jewish.
14) What are your views on extremist religious groups such as the Westboro Baptist Church, or Hamas?
I love them. I want to fornicate with the whole lot.
15) What are your feelings on (How do you react to) the molestation of children by trusted church officials?
Feelings? What is this odd word?
16) To what extent should religion be used to help raise and discipline children?
Again... Beatings. Lots and lots of beatings. Put the fucking fear of god in the little bastards.


There. Answered them all as honestly as possible. You're welcome.

[Ihateyoumike]

One more thing... Where are questions 5, 7, 10, and 13? Do you not know how to count or is there something special about those questions thAt you had to keep from us?

[Davin]

@Ihateyoumike: Look at Tanks post, looks like those were removed after Whitney provided a correction. Also Whitney has much more universally accurate versions that remove the obvious misunderstanding of atheists while keeping what appeared to be the intention of the questions (assuming the OP had no intention of misrepresenting atheism with loaded questions).

[Gawen]

Here's Whitney's modified questions answered:

1) Please state your age
50-60

2) Are your religious? If so, for how long?
No

3) Were your parents religious?
Yes and still are.

4) Why are you or aren't you religious?
Critical thinking.

5) Have you ever felt close to a higher power? If so, when?
No.

6) Was there ever a time you felt separated from a higher power?  If so, when?
No.

7) Is there anything specific to your childhood that affected your views towards religion?
No

How do you feel about religious views [strike]other than your own[/strike]?
As empty as all the others.

9) Have you received any prejudice because of your religion or lack thereof?
No

10) How would you react if your child/loved ones had religious views differing from your own?
N/A

11) What are your views on extremist religious groups such as the Westboro Baptist Church, or Hamas?
Same as my answer in #8

12) What are your feelings on (How do you react to) the molestation of children by trusted church officials?
Same as my answers in my first post

13) To what extent, if any, should religion be used to help raise and discipline children?
None

14) What religion, if any, did you have as a child?
Presbyterian

15) Where did you grow up (city, state/province, country)
Michigan, U.S.A.

16) Any other comments!
Nope