We’re in the 21st century, and the vast majority of us still believe in an utterly and obviously fictional creator deity. Plenty of people, even in developed countries with decent educational systems, still believe in ghosts or magic (e.g. voodoo). And I–an atheist and a skeptic–am told I need to respect these patently false beliefs as cultural traditions.
Fuck that. They’re bad cultural traditions, undeserving of respect. Child-proofing society for these intellectually stunted people doesn’t help them; it is in fact a disservice to them to pretend it’s okay to go through life believing these things. We should demand that people contend with reality on a factual basis by the time they reach adulthood (even earlier, if I’m being completely honest). We shouldn’t be coddling people who profess beliefs that are demonstrably false, simply because their feelings might get hurt.
I 100 percent agree. Unfortunately you’re going to realise that a huge percentage of your non-religious beliefs are also unfounded nonsense. Think about how much paranoia and out-right fabrications occur in interpersonal relationships (e.g gossip), think about how many people appeal to “science” without actually knowing anything about it. As a pretty strong atheist, I find the actual atheist community to be intolerable due to the irrelevant obsession on a mere subset of irrational behavior, while ignoring the arguably more harmful irrational behaviors (because let’s face it they also engage in it).