I came on an invite from some people on the CT Valley Atheists forum, which may be on its last legs due to an increasing lack of interesting debate, it being too overrun by spammers who were posting hardcore porn, and having too little mod/admin control to keep all of it in check.


About the name: The title "Rev." is simultaneously ironic and factual, since I am an atheist who tends to look at religion (especially the Abramic religions) with a jaundiced eye, and also a minster in the ULC (I got ordained after learning that all four Beatles did). "Rye" comes from one of my favorite novels, "The Catcher in the Rye".

About me: I come from Chicago, and was raised as a Missourah (sic) Synod Lutheran, though I can never remember ever having truly believed any of it was true, and by now, both my parents have lapsed (partially due to one of the elders turning out to be a pedophile, and still being active in the church's affairs. After some years of school-sanctioned bullying at my Grade school (which ended up being like a Christian Wayside directed by David Lynch), I eventually managed to read several books, ranging from Why I am Not a Christian to the entire Bible and decided that, even if YHVH was in fact God, he deserved no more respect than Freddy Krueger, or some other fictional Serial killer/Spree Killer/Mass Murderer. I also attended a Catholic high school, which was surprisingly bearable, considering all the stereotypes of Catholic schools in the media, and the teachers essentially tolerated my atheism, due at least in part to my intelligence and the contempt for idiocy that I shared with the teachers. I consider myself a cynical Democratic Socialist, and I have Hyperlexia, an Autism Spectrum Disorder. I intend to make a career as a writer.

I hope to be getting into some good discussions, and I hope to repost some of my old stuff from that forum.

Welcome to the forums Rev. enjoy yourself and I will be looking forward to reading some of your posts in the near future.

You've come to the right place When we get too many theists we just have a cull

From one Reverend (WCA in my case) to another, welcome to AF.

Welcome Rev. Rye, to the atheist forums!!

Hyperlexia huh? So you are going to be able to read everything written here but it will be difficult to comprehend? Or does the disorder subside as you get older? The wiki page didn't tell me. Your posts so far seem coherent and interesting so...

Welcome to the forums!

I would welcome you even if your posts weren't interesting.

Rhizo

Looks like Minimalist should be awarded a special award for recruitment:

http://www.cvatheists.org/forum/viewtopi...org#p34975

Welcome to the forums! We allow any theist to join as long as they obey the rules. They are made fully aware that they aren't here to preach but to discuss their beliefs (or religion, atheism, god, etc).

So far we've had some great discussions with various theist members, and some of them number among our highest posters.

(January 11, 2010 at 1:10 pm)Rhizomorph13 Wrote: Hyperlexia huh? So you are going to be able to read everything written here but it will be difficult to comprehend? Or does the disorder subside as you get older? The wiki page didn't tell me. Your posts so far seem coherent and interesting so...

Welcome to the forums!

I would welcome you even if your posts weren't interesting.
Rhizo

Let me see if I can break it down for you. From the American Hyperlexia Association, the official symptoms list. [No, I can't post a link yet, because I haven't posted enough, but it should be #1 if you search Google.]

Hyperlexia is a syndrome observed in children who have the following characteristics:

* A precocious ability to read words, far above what would be expected at their chronological age or an intense fascination with letters or numbers. [I learned to read at eighteen months.]
* Significant difficulty in understanding verbal language. [This is still a problem with me to the extent that some people who have met me in the flesh world have assumed that I'm partially deaf.]
* Abnormal social skills, difficulty in socializing and interacting appropriately with people [Yes, although in my case, it's not so much difficulty anymore as a lack of desire.]

In addition, some children who are hyperlexic may exhibit the following characteristics:

* Learn expressive language in a peculiar way, echo ro memorize the sentence structure without understanding the meaning (echolalia), reverse pronouns [For the longest time, I could only speak in sentences I had read, like "Bert is Very Tired."]
* Rarely initiates conversations [I rarely start my own threads, although I will be transporting some of the threads I have started on CVA to here.]
* Auditory, olfactory and / or tactile sensitivity [I cannot wear sweats, and cannot have anything but a short-sleeved t-shirt over my bare chest (another shirt is fine), and must wear socks when feet are not in water.]
* strong auditory and visual memory [This often tends to be one of my bizarre quirks, especially when I compare things I've seen with movies I've seen or books I've read, but it's rare that many people will understand me]
* Listen selectively, appear to be deaf [Sometimes, I can hear a lot of what is going on around me, but often I cannot hear anything around me.]

Does this explain it?

Welcome Rev. "Too overrun by theists"? How is that _possible_ ?!?

Anyone would think you don't _like_ the subject!! Now get down and gimme some hail mary's

Thanks Rev. Rye,

Great information! I had never heard of it until you mentioned it and when I looked it up there were some matches with my own quirky relationship with reality. I have always had great comprehension of everything that I read (Tested 99th percentile in reading comprehension so there is objective repeatable evidence) and most of what I hear although I am easily sidtracked by interesting turns of speech or accents that are not relevent to the topic at hand. I sometimes combine topics from completely different conversations at a party with hilarious results but that trick also seperates me from those at the party who probably just think I am a loon. I have a chaotic brain and seem to line up with schizophrenia too well but have not gone for a diagnosis... yet.

What I find interesting about psychology is the fact that they seem to have a pidgeon hole for every one of us pidgeons. Back in the day I would have just been viewed as creative...

Ok, or maybe a madman.

Rhizo