Atheist-Friendly Movies

[mlmooney89]

It's literally the same reason we come to this site to talk. We want to talk to like minded people about things we mostly have to shut up about in day to day life. It's not that we are going 'rah rah rah let's take down religion!' it's more of 'I'm so sick of seeing religious movies can we please see something that I agree with?' The movies that don't mention religion or the lack of it at all are not part of this category at all because they are neutral to both parties. Usually I try to side with you because I do get that some of the things other atheists say are mean but I can't agree that there isn't a crap ton of religion in Hollywood. They get made in a blink of an eye and we just kind of ignore it or shrug it off. The times movies go against religion you have to worry about being politically correct and almost none of them get to the fame of the religious ones. I mean shit look at The Passion of the Christ and God's Not Dead. According to God's Not Dead you'd think atheists were the worst monsters ever with no hearts and pushing Christians down when in reality the ten commandments stand on government property. When Christians make a movie it's them standing up for themselves but when atheists make a movie it's 'seriously? Stop trying to take our religious rights away'.

There are several things here I wanna point out. 

First and foremost, I'm not complaining about ya'll watching whatever you wanna watch or giving you shit for it or saying you're trying to take my religion away lol. So, I'm not sure if you got that impression or what, but none of my posts here have done any of that.

All I have done in this thread is merely pointed out that most movies in Hollywood are vastly non religious related. Lol I don't see how anyone can disagree with that. I've been told over and over again that "atheism" simply means "absence of religion" and not "opposition to religion." It has no principles or topics of its own, to be talked about. In that sense, I figure since most Hollywood movies are a-religious, they would qualify as "atheist friendly movies", per my understanding of the definition of atheism which I've learned here. And then I said the type of movies being described here would more accurately be described as "anti theist movies" rather than simply "atheist."

As far as your claim that movies mostly paint religion in a respectful light when it does get brought up, I don't know about that. I feel there are plenty of movies where they paint religion in a negative light mostly by making the one crazy character of the movie religious or something. And you feel there are plenty of movies which paint religious beliefs in a positive light. Perhaps there are plenty of both and we each only remember the ones that make us roll our eyes. But one thing is true, the vast majority don't mention religion one way or the other, and in that sense, seem to qualify as atheist friendly.      

Now, about God's Not Dead, trust me I agree that movie is shit. It's embarrassing, and I, as a Christian (though not the Evangelical type like in the movie) am embarrassed for it. On the flip side of the coin though, I also watched the movie "The Ledge" where the bad guy is a Christian man who tries to kill his wife while reading the bible to her. Same principle, opposite side. I hated it for the same reasons, though I hated the former more because it is supposed to be representing me as a Christian.

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In the USA, especially in certain states, we're surrounded by religion all day every day, and the list of movies that even mention that one of the characters is actually an atheist is pretty short. We're allowed to want to see ourselves in movies without people eager for a 'gotcha' re-imagining that as being anti-theist. But we can't have that, even on an atheist forum. We can't even talk about it without having that, apparently.

Why is everyone acting like I said they're not allowed? Lol.

I wasn't thinking that you were doing any of the stuff I had mentioned, it was more of a general information of why we wanted these things. I reckon it could be resaid with Barbies. Sure regular Barbie is child friendly because it doesn't do anything against any particular child but having a black Barbie is a big deal because little black girls feel like they can connect. Non religious movies that don't mention religion at all are indeed atheist friendly in that they don't do anything against us as atheists but having a movie that comes out and says 'hey religion isn't real' is something we feel like we can connect with so those are more of what we are discussing. It is just something where we can say this movie is made from our view point.

I do agree that maybe we are both remembering the movies more that go against our views so that is why we both say there are a lot on the opposite side we are. Statistically that makes the most sense. Thinking about this situation I recall the movie we watched the other night. It was a foreign film so it was based in Spain and only had subtitles but it was about a teenager that called a spirit from hell on accident and it was haunting them. It was actually a pretty decent film and is on Netflix if anyone is interested, it's called Veronica. Anywho point is they go to a Catholic school and there is one nun they call Sister Death or something because she seemed to be crazy. Even though they were all religious she was considered crazy because she took it 'too far' by saying there were shadows and demons. So in a way it is backing you and I both by showing religion as crazy but also showing that there is a hefty amount of religion in the first place that is normal.