Comic Discussion > QUESTIONABLE CONTENT
What did my parents tell me......
pwhodges:
--- Quote from: ZorahG on 15 Dec 2008, 08:20 ---there's just so much we DON'T know, I don't see how anyone could say for sure "this is it".
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Look at it the other way: if no-one had told you about religion, would you be looking for any form of afterlife on the basis of the world you can see around you? I'm sure I wouldn't; and I don't.
As for my children, I really don't remember what I told them (it was 30-odd years ago, after all). Probably something along the lines of "when someone's body is too damaged [to cover accidents] or worn out [to cover old age] to keep itself repaired, it stops working."
ZorahG:
> if no-one had told you about religion, would you be looking for any form of afterlife on the basis of the world you can see around you? I'm sure I wouldn't; and I don't.
That's you though. And that's fantastic that works for you. :) My personal opinion, you'd have to live in a vacuum anymore to grow up NOT hearing something about religion and having some curiosity. I have always questioned and even as a kid was never satisfied with one answer. I guess that's why my life saying is "to each, their own". There are just too many options and possibilities, and that works for me.
I'm just thankful I live in a country where I can believe what I want as can everyone else. Might things have been different if I hadn't heard about religion? Mayhaps. But they aren't and knowing how I am, I doubt they would be too much different. Just because you research something doesn't mean you have to believe in it.
Susano:
Thing is, theres the possibility the child will discover the possibility of "real death" anyways, even if raised religiously. I was raised mdoeratly, laxly religious, and yet I still stumbled on the concept of my own, and damn, did it ever scare the shit out of me. It was really panic like for a while, until I learned to just stop thinking too deeply on it. Death still scares me if I do... but of course, just because Id wished it to be different doesnt mean it is. And as said, it doesnt take atheist parents telling you about it to discover the concept.
tuna ketchup x:
--- Quote from: Jeff7 on 14 Dec 2008, 21:46 ---And an eternity in Heaven - I'd think that after the first 200 trillion quadrillion millennia, it might start to get a bit dull.
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I don't think I'd get bored with eternity on Earth, as long as I got a new body/identity every 100 years or so. There's so much to explore.
Raised agnostic here. My parents told me all about the different things people believe, mostly Christian/Catholic stuff (since that's what they both were), but my mom also has some vague ideas about reincarnation, and I'd have philosophical conversations with my father at the dinner table (who later said he'd "failed" us religion-wise, w/e dad). I decided not to believe in an afterlife around the time I learned about solipsism and virtual reality and realized the Christian heaven would have to be solipsistic, and that idea scares me WAY more than oblivion. I wish I could believe in reincarnation, even a very vague variety, but I can't, and that was okay. Everything was okay as long as we didn't go overboard with it and my mom says she's happy that neither me or my sister turned out religious. I'm not having kids but if I were I'd have that same kind of openness: I couldn't shield my kids from religion or ideas of the afterlife, so the better thing is to present it myself, on my own terms, and let them decide. Emphasize the importance of actual experience over imagination. It's better than learning it on the playground. I'll be frank, I wouldn't be happy if my hypothetical kids turned out to be religious or have anything more than a set of vague beliefs, but at least they would have come to it honestly and not because they were bullied into it.
My fiancee was scared of sleep for years because his parents linked it to death. So yeah that's a really bad idea.
jtheory:
--- Quote from: tuna ketchup x on 15 Dec 2008, 10:03 ---My fiancee was scared of sleep for years because his parents linked it to death. So yeah that's a really bad idea.
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See now, that's why it's good to talk about these things. I hadn't thought of that at all... that once you link the two (trying to comfort a child that death won't be horribly painful) then every time they go to sleep they'll worry that they won't know if they're dying. Excellent -- bullet dodged.
Also -- that's interesting that your dad thinks he "failed" you religion-wise. My father says the same thing -- none of his 3 kids are practicing Catholics -- and thinks I must have no moral grounding without religion, etc., though I challenged him to point to the immorality he saw in my adult life, and he couldn't come up with a single thing. I lead a pretty peaceable life.
--- Quote from: ZorahG on 15 Dec 2008, 08:20 ---(...) I would NEVER tell my child death was "just like going to sleep". Only because that is what I was told as a child, with great nonchalance and it terrified me. (I was all of 5 yrs old) I was so afraid to go to sleep after that and it was VERY hard to get over. Most Psychologists agree the best thing for YOUNG YOUNG children is to have them think of death, especially the death of a pet or loved one as an end to their suffering and pain. NOT as "bedtime/going to sleep".
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Hopefully, also, your child can tell you about their terrors -- and you can help sort out misconceptions -- but I know this simply doesn't come naturally for some kids (my mother's a lovely nurturing person and in theory I could have talked to her -- I know my little sister did -- but I basically kept my inner life absolutely secret from the world for a very long time for reasons I still do not know).
--- Quote ---Personally, there's just so much we DON'T know, I don't see how anyone could say for sure "this is it". But that's the glass-half-full side of me I think.
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I hesitate to do that -- the sort of hand-waving that "there's so much we don't know... maybe one of these religions is correct". All of the major religions that I've studied at all are rife with internal contradictions plus contain some very questionable ideas. It's not surprising -- they are the product of their history -- but I wouldn't encourage a child to invest themselves in a religion and belief system that "feels right" without putting more thought into it than that.
I know, that's not quite what you're saying -- but while a scientific understanding of the world definitely leaves open the possibility of many things, the jump from "life and the universe contain many mysteries" to "maybe some of the religious people are correct... in their complex systems of belief which have morphed into their current state over thousands of years but carry along required rituals & worship, interrelated invisible forces, invisible places, and surprisingly human-like magical beings" is too huge.
'Course, a kid still needs to find a way to get along with religious folks, so teaching complete disrespect perhaps isn't wise.
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