In Aliens?
Or else, Aliens will get you?
Religions that impose compulsions not to interfere with an insect from an apiary … you must bee leave! … are actually going to get you stung. How ridiculous that ‘must believe’ statement is. When you hear something, it either makes sense and you believe it or it doesn’t and you don’t. If the latter, rationale to back it up might then or later convince you that it is true, and only then will you become a believer.
No amount of compulsion or threats will do the job, however. You may bleat, ‘OK, OK, I believe,’ or even, with assumed rapture, ‘I believe, I do, I do!’ but unless you have an inner conviction that it is the truth, any number of such utterances are not worth making sound waves for. Thus, ignore any preacher who rants that one must believe, without giving sound (or visual 🙂 ) reasons for such belief or explaining that when you receive the news he has to impart an inner conviction should grip you.
The worst and most criminal form of this is ‘You must believe or else!’ How can forced belief ever be anything but a sham? Belief and faith are synonymous. If you have faith then you believe. If you profess to a faith and you don’t believe, then your whole spiritual life is a travesty. It is literally beyond belief.
So, if anyone insists you must believe, invite them to believe, impolitely and leaving off the ‘be-’.
Colonialist's Blog 
I feel the same, but also wonder why the arrogant Holier than Thou’s who are so certain, irritate me more than other forms of stupidity and ignorance …
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If they want to believe in an almighty warty flying toad with spots, that’s OK with me. If they try to convince me that I should, too, I get a trifle annoyed.
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And not let the door hit ’em on the butt on their way out!
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Why ever not? I think it would be a good idea!
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Bwhahahahaha! Too true! 😀
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I think the pertinent question here to always ask, the one that little kids regularly iterate that is profoundly irritating, is Why? Followed by a lot more of the same.
Ultimately the one exhorting you to believe will in exasperation use the retort “Because I say so!” and then you’ve won!
Childish, I know, but as they say, Out of the mouths of babes…
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Trouble is that you get responses like, ‘Because the Word of God says so’, and these are considered clinchers by the utterers.
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It’s a circular argument. Always pointless.
Now, can I interest you in this tract about the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster? Enlightenment guaranteed! https://www.venganza.org/
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I am duly enlightened and have learnt the password, ‘Slur-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-rp!’ My colander is on order.
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Lesley for Pope! 👿
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Oh what fun that would be! The Papal Edicts I could issue!
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What on earth brought this on?
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A festering annoyance with that fatuous injunction, brought to a head by recent utterances on those lines from a professional Holier Than Thou.
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Well, that explains everything!
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Other sets of statements that get my ire level shooting up are those threatening Hell and Damnation.
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Well, I’ll be damned!
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What was the line in Back to the Future? “Act like a tree and leave” or something like that.
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Barking up the right tree, indeed!
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When inculcated into kids it becomes something else altogether.
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That is particularly reprehensible. The intelligent among them will think, ‘Why does this seem like a load of rubbish? Is there something seriously wrong with me?’
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And I believe in fairies.
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Great — but nobody is saying you simply have to!
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