re: #3 thedopefishlives

I was just talking to a friend of mine, a fellow moderate/liberal Christian like myself. I mentioned a few days ago that being a closeted liberal in the midst of a wingnut family is not entirely unlike being a closeted homosexual. Aside from the threat of death - I mean, physical violence, emotional abuse and rejection, attempts at conversion or intervention… It’s all on the table depending on the severity of the wingnut. Not to say that coming out as a liberal would be as significant as coming out as homosexual, but the social stigma would be similar.

Atheists have the same problem.There’s an outside chance me admitting to being one may have contributed to me losing a client.

A tangent to that story is that I worked with a National Guardsman who would always say shit like “If there’s such a thing as God”. When I admitted to not playing for the God Squad anymore, he jumped all over me and claimed people like me where what’s wrong with America. I would imagine it filtered back to the higher ups at some point.

As an aside, this guy was a real eye opener for destroying the myth of “We must blindly worship our men in uniform”. Guy was not a team player and would not hesitate to throw you under the bus if it meant saving his ass.

Other than that, a real nice guy.

But yeah, as an atheist, people tend to look at you funny. Not that I will, but I pretty much can’t hold public office in this country (the inevitable death threats wouldn’t be worth it anyway). Even the supposedly open-minded people you know think you’re acting like a child when you say you don’t believe.