Similarities Between the Christian God and Abusive Spouses

[Jesster]

This came up in another thread, but I thought it would make for an interesting topic on its own so it could start out fresh. As someone who has been in an abusive marriage, I've been able to look back on my life and recognize the similarities that had with my experiences with Christianity. I'm not sure which one was worse for me, personally, but I have no intentions of going back to either to find out. I also found an article that went over the finer details of that better than I could.

http://atheism.about.com/od/whatisgod/p/...busive.htm

I don't think I'm the only one here to notice this. Who else has any thoughts about the comparison?

[CapnAwesome]

Here is a big difference: abusive spouses are real.

[Jesster]

Here is a big difference: abusive spouses are real.

Haha, very true! Even so, there's still the same use of control in the doctrines and the church of the religion.

[dyresand]

Even if the possibility of a god(s) existing or not people use fear and violence to spread a message.
Then you have god the bible which doesn't exist people use the fear tactic of hell to scare the belief of god into people
ironically hell canon wise to the bible shouldn't exist as it was added. But it clearly shows if said being existed is clearly
a spiritual kim jong il and heaven is a trap for believers who seriously think that being is good. So is god like a abusive spouse..
well as a character in a book that millions of people believe in sure why the hell not i mean we humans have been killing one another
over stupid shit like the sun god.

[CapnAwesome]

Here is a big difference: abusive spouses are real.

Haha, very true! Even so, there's still the same use of control in the doctrines and the church of the religion.

Then I think it's fair to say that the church(es), or church leaders are like abusive spouses. They are real entities. You can't say the christian god is like an abusive spouse. It's like saying that the God Apollo is a like a serial killer, or the Joker from Batman is like a mental patient.  Why compare something imaginary with something real? It also distracts from the real people who are actually like abusive spouses to lay it on a fictional person. There are real clergy doing real abuses. That's not the fault of some imaginary character. It's the fault of actual people who actually exist.

[Jesster]

Haha, very true! Even so, there's still the same use of control in the doctrines and the church of the religion.

Then I think it's fair to say that the church(es), or church leaders are like abusive spouses. They are real entities. You can't say the christian god is like an abusive spouse. It's like saying that the God Apollo is a like a serial killer, or the Joker from Batman is like a mental patient.  Why compare something imaginary with something real? It also distracts from the real people who are actually like abusive spouses to lay it on a fictional person. There are real clergy doing real abuses. That's not the fault of some imaginary character. It's the fault of actual people who actually exist.

Oh sure. You can still say that the "character" God is like an abusive spouse. We label Darth Vader with negative traits as well, and he's just as fictional. The difference is that people are acting on behalf of the character whether he is real or not. Of course I am certainly blaming the people who created and still believe in this idea. I think this is getting a bit too far into semantics though.

[RobertE]

This came up in another thread, but I thought it would make for an interesting topic on its own so it could start out fresh. As someone who has been in an abusive marriage, I've been able to look back on my life and recognize the similarities that had with my experiences with Christianity. I'm not sure which one was worse for me, personally, but I have no intentions of going back to either to find out. I also found an article that went over the finer details of that better than I could.

http://atheism.about.com/od/whatisgod/p/...busive.htm

I don't think I'm the only one here to notice this. Who else has any thoughts about the comparison?

It is a human trait Jesster. We could call up paganism, hindouism, Sikhism, Islam, Christianity or Judaism and the same thing applies. I mean, if you take Islam for example and the way Islamic men treat their women during marriage, it is a great deal worse than Christianity. However, since all religions and Gods are fake, it is a moot point so, we have to look at human beings in general. I was in an abusive relationship with my ex-girlfriend and her family never went to church however, she came from a background where violence occcured on a regular basis because of alcohol (since her parents drank alcohol a great deal at home) and thus created an explosive atmosphere where her father would accuse or attack her mother on a regular basis. This was also evident when my ex beat her mother up outside where she lived. I am thankful that I got out of there in time after two knife wounds (the last attack on me was the final straw and I went back to England). Human beings will always have a nasty streak, whether male or female, we don't need to add any fantasy bollocks like religion.

[Jesster]

Yes, I know it's a fictional fantasy character. I think the point of this thread may have been missed. This was meant to compare the character portrayed within Christianity (or other similar beliefs if you wish) to a negative trait within humanity.

[RobertE]

Yes, I know it's a fictional fantasy character. I think the point of this thread may have been missed. This was meant to compare the character portrayed within Christianity (or other similar beliefs if you wish) to a negative trait within humanity.

Well, in short, the negative trait within humanity has always existed ever since Simiiformes existed, perhaps even before then.

[RobertE]

A rather old link but tells us something interesting about how other species go about dominating the females, pretty much in the same way as humans do:

http://discovermagazine.com/1995/aug/apesofwrath548/