Even before I declared my Atheism last year, the Christian Evangelicals were giving me the boot. Simple things like the Christian me questioning the inerrancy of scripture, or eternal punishment, were enough to hit the eject button. Professional clergy were the primary ones giving me the heave-ho even before I left the faith.
The declaration of Atheism brought a huge drop off; I lost an easy tithe. People who had been friends with me my whole life found this move to be too much.
I still have a lot of religious friends on Facebook, in fact, I would have to say the majority of them are religious. I find it interesting that through all of these years of theological and philosophical shiftings, my Mormon friends have been the most solid. This is curious, because in many respects I think they are similar to Evangelicals ... but on this issue they are extreme opposites.
Do you get defriended much? If so, who are your primaries and what are the issues?
6 comments:
I don't get de-friended much, and usually by people I don't really interact with on any level, so it doesn't really matter. I did have someone who I thought was a very good friend de-friend me on Facebook after I started posting politically liberal things and soon after that started snubbing me when we would get together, or rather when our husbands would get together and I would just sit there. Her husband snubbed me too. Oh, if you really do want to be notified when someone has defriended, download the free SocialFixer extension (app?). It will put a box in the sidebar that tells you when someone has removed you as a friend from Facebook, among other things.
*de-friended you.
My experience has been very similar - I've had regular de-friendings throughout my deconversion.
By far the biggest issue was homosexuality. Just about anything I said made christians go crazy.
In second place, Rob Bell or anything he questioned (ie Hell!)
Good times! Haha.. I'd really like to test out some evolution posts to cull the crowd a little, but still learning about it myself
Thanks DP! That Social fixer is awesome on many levels.
Jonni... lol, yeah I got tons of push back years ago when I would post stuff by Rob... mention no Hell and many Christians lose their minds. I do not get that much anymore since most of those folks have finally given up on me. :)
I'd find it distressing if long-term friends defriended me for a change of faith or outlook - you would wonder what value the friendship had. About half my "friends" are my in-laws and extended family so they don't get a choice and they're pretty diverse already - everything from militant atheists to militant fundamentalists. There are some fierce discussions which sometimes get a little out of hand but mostly people tolerate each other.
I don't pay close attention to who defriends me, but I think it's mostly people trying to declutter their online lives. I only defriend people if I don't know them very well and they post lots of cat pictures or stupid videos.
i have so many friends that i don't think it matters if i get de-friended. i practically wouldn't even notice... too many to count. lols. sometimes i even beg people to de-friend themselves from my list.lols http://www.unn.edu.ng/
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