WildernessPunk- Drinking Games

I’ve made a few drinking games in my time, but for WildernessPunk, I’m going for the extra six-pack and designing three drinking games for the price of none. But hey, perhaps you can buy me a pint the next time you see me walking in the sun.

Why three? Well, it’s a simple answer, I don’t know where you’ll be drinking and as far as I’m concerned there are only three real drinking zones on this Earth.

This Planet’s Drinking Zones:

  • Inside a building
  • Outside in a populated area
  • Outside in the Wilderness

If you can think of a different zone let me know.

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Also keep in mind different areas and regions have odd things you can quickly add to these lists, which I certainly think you should print up and bring with you wherever you go. For instance, when I was recently in Aspen there were a few electric blue shorts here and there and they go added to the list for our, Aspen Brewing Drinking Game, Genocide and I made up on the spot.

Some people think drinking games are only for bored knuckleheads trying to drink fast before they return to dull lives and abusive relationships, but no, such is not the case. Couples and groups of friends can have a lot of fun and more than a few laughs, while playing these games. Just make sure you bring enough cash and don’t plan to drive afterwards.

A final note:

Each list has 17 triggers for drinking but also the space for you to add three of your own. Many different places have more unique occurrences you may wish to add. Such things as skies in a tavern or moose out the window are very fun to add in some places but would seem silly in others. So, feel free to fill them in or add even more.

Also are there any huge things I forgot, please comment below so I can add them to my own games.

Thanks

Alex Bone

Indoor Drinking Game

  1. Someone brings in an animal. Two drinks if they are not allowed.
  2. Something breaks or spills
  3. A person comes in, looks around, and leaves
  4. Someone you know arrives
  5. An individual is hitting on another, two drinks if it fails
  6. You get a free drink
  7. Someone tells you how they have figured it all out
  8. Someone brings a bike inside the building
  9. Anyone talking or texting on a cell phone while their date watches
  10. Two drinks if both are on their cell phone
  11. Any super drunk move witnessed
  12. Lover’s spat
  13. Anyone sneezes, pukes, or falls
  14. Public Display of Affection
  15. You make an employee laugh
  16. Someone tries to order a domestic swag lager at a brewery
  17. Ball comes off a pool table, dart hits the floor, etc

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Urban Outside Drinking Game (Patio)

  1. Any vehicle tire hits a curb
  2. You get to pet a dog (Everyone Drinks)
  3. Anyone talking on a blue tooth
  4. People walk by in matching clothing
  5. Anyone dressed for work
  6. When you can feel the bass of a car driving by
  7. Anyone asks you for money
  8. Someone you know walks by
  9. Anyone talks about river rafting, mountain biking, or climbing
  10. White pants
  11. Someone gets another’s cell number
  12. Someone takes a selfie or a picture of their food
  13. The first time you see any species of animal
  14. Anyone says, “I love you man. (bro)”
  15. Anyone helps another person
  16. Any weather change
  17. You talk to a child who was not with your group

 Wilderness Drinking Game

  1. Get stung
  2. Someone comes back on a wood run
  3. Dog fight
  4. New vehicle arrives
  5. The first time someone plays frisbee golf, horseshoes, or cornhole
  6. Anything breaks
  7. Anyone falls or knocks something over
  8. Food is burnt or dropped into the fire
  9. See another human go by
  10. A camper is threatened by an animal
  11. Sunburned
  12. Lose something (Group Drink)
  13. Someone is doing yoga, knitting, artwork, photography, or filming a video
  14. A person gets wet
  15. Someone runs out of beer, everyone else drinks
  16. You see human blood
  17. Each time a person goes to bed

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You can check out some of my fiction here, where Detective Dak is placed in charge of the anti-clone task force. His main problem…. He’s dating one.

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WildernessPunk- Communication Breakdown

It’s always the same. You try to organize a project, gathering, or event and sometimes it’s like pulling teeth to get certain people to just reply to a simple text. Should I be buying four corn on the cobs or a dozen? Damn it, how much ice am I going to need…

The lack of efficient communication during our current times remains mystifying. Three hundred years ago, you would have to write a letter and sometimes wait months for a reply. Morse code sped things up and you could have the potential to get a reply within a day or so if you had the funds. About a century ago phones began to appear on the walls of the wealthy but a few decades later most families had one in their kitchen.

It was the time of the potential for instant communication, even with people who lived hundreds of miles away. Then things got easier. Soon we had phones in our pockets. Not long after that, phones become computers, cameras, video games, and bankers. Add to this social sites and I can connect with most of my friends in multiple ways.

However, as the ease evolved, it often seems like our motivation declined. Where once I would have to hear my friend’s voice if I wanted to let him know I’d be visiting his town soon, now I could call him, text him, or message him on Facebook. But maybe I can just let him know he’s in my thoughts by clicking like on that almost funny meme he posted.

This gets to the strange part. If I left a message on a friend’s machine 30 years ago, I could see how it might take him a while to find the time to call me back, because, if nothing else, it would probably be a fifteen-minute commitment. This is why it remains bizarre when I can’t get a fifteen second text from someone confirming they’re in on some event. I know I’m not the only one experiencing this because I’m part of some of my friend’s group texts too.

Now I’m not throwing people under the bus. I don’t approve of being linked to your cell and checking it every two minutes. Yuck. I often take hours to text people back. It just seems weird when people go black and just ghost a buddy.

So let me ask you this, is it just me, or do you also experience a decline in human interaction in a ratio to how easy communication is?

Allow me to the review the timeline:

  • Letters, months long wait.
  • Morse code, Day long wait
  • Phone, instant communication between homes
  • Cell, instant communication from anywhere
  • Texts/Messaging, the ability to communicate sound bites at quick speeds
  • The ability to communicate in multiple ways but lacking the motivation for that fifteen second commitment

This also brings up another interesting point/observation. What happens when some friends get right back to you with the data you need but others don’t? At least for me this creates a new type of tier system within the individuals I know. When some people throw down right away and others don’t reply, the latter in some ways become ghosts or half people.

I don’t want to sound like a dick or assume it’s cell phones or the highway, but when you can reply but you don’t where am I supposed to go from here? Products are more expensive than ever and knowing whether I need two pizzas or three could mean the difference of 40 bucks these days and my kids won’t eat cold pizza because they are aliens.

Again, I don’t want to call individuals ghosts or say they are half people, but if two people have cells and one takes a big fifteen seconds to text me back and another doesn’t, they seem less real to me. This doesn’t even reflect how it could be considered an insult that I’m not worth the effort of giving me the thumbs up sign if I ask you if you’re making the BBQ.

I recently passive aggressively let someone slack out of a three-year-old RPG I’m running. He never replied to texts. I had to text his wife to remind him to come and it just became too much effort. I just texted him, got no reply, no show and I gave up. The funny thing was, he never even brought it up when I saw him. Two of his best friends are still in the game with me about once a month and he is oblivious.

My intention isn’t to dish on people, set up some standard of behavior, or say I’m better than the next guy. My main goal is to maximize my chaos by using law. I know this sounds odd but hear me out.

When we were younger, maybe single, most of us were without children etc. Back in those days (or if you are in them now) being chaotic is easier and you could just wing it. If you missed a get-together there would probably be another next week.

As we grow older, we have less chances to throw down. People spread further apart and many of us up our game. For example, at 25 a few sixers of lager and two bags of potato chips was a good Friday night with my pals. At 55 if I’m having the same guys over, it’ll be more like BBQ, iced down craft beers, and some soft cheese. So obviously it is more important to know if people are coming if each person is going to use over 15$ in supplies.

If I’m hosting something and shelling out over a hundred bucks for it, I need to know who’s coming and not at the last minute either. I also know if things fall through, I won’t be doing it again for another couple of months. So yeah, I’m going to use law to organize the Hell out of it. If I just leave it to chance and hope is flows correctly, I’m going to be a pissed off guy hanging with one friend and having so many leftovers I might have to toss out some food. So yeah, I may be a priest of chaos, but if I want everyone there so my chaos can rock, I’m going to come in strong to see it through…kinda, gasp, like an adult.

So hey, if you can join in the fun and want to make sure you are included, take those 10 seconds to communicate in the easiest manner ever invented because we don’t have telepathy yet, but I’m sure it’ll be placed in our brains soon by our AI overlords. Until then… ride the apocalypse my friends.

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If you liked this, then I’m sure your want to check out the deals available with Cactus Phone!

WildernessPunk- In the Lap

It’s always the same. You try to organize a project, gathering, or event and sometimes it’s like pulling teeth to get certain people to just reply to a simple text. Should I be buying four corn on the cobs or a dozen? Damn it, how much ice am I going to need…

The lack of efficient communication during our current times remains mystifying. Three hundred years ago, you would have to write a letter and sometimes wait months for a reply. Morse code sped things up and you could have the potential to get a reply within a day or so if you had the funds. About a century ago phones began to appear on the walls of the wealthy but a few decades later most families had one in their kitchen.

It was the time of the potential for instant communication, even with people who lived hundreds of miles away. Then things got easier. Soon we had phones in our pockets. Not long after that, phones become computers, cameras, video games, and bankers. Add to this social sites and I can connect with most of my friends in multiple ways.

However, as the ease evolved, it often seems like our motivation declined. Where once I would have to hear my friend’s voice if I wanted to let him know I’d be visiting his town soon, now I could call him, text him, or message him on Facebook. But maybe I can just let him know he’s in my thoughts by clicking like on that almost funny meme he posted.

This gets to the strange part. If I left a message on a friend’s machine 30 years ago, I could see how it might take him a while to find the time to call me back, because, if nothing else, it would probably be a fifteen-minute commitment. This is why it remains bizarre when I can’t get a fifteen second text from someone confirming they’re in on some event. I know I’m not the only one experiencing this because I’m part of some of my friend’s group texts too.

Now I’m not throwing people under the bus. I don’t approve of being linked to your cell and checking it every two minutes. Yuck. I often take hours to text people back. It just seems weird when people go black and just ghost a buddy.

So let me ask you this, is it just me, or do you also experience a decline in human interaction in a ratio to how easy communication is?

Allow me to the review the timeline:

  • Letters, months long wait.
  • Morse code, Day long wait
  • Phone, instant communication between homes
  • Cell, instant communication from anywhere
  • Texts/Messaging, the ability to communicate sound bites at quick speeds
  • The ability to communicate in multiple ways but lacking the motivation for that fifteen second commitment

This also brings up another interesting point/observation. What happens when some friends get right back to you with the data you need but others don’t? At least for me this creates a new type of tier system within the individuals I know. When some people throw down right away and others don’t reply, the latter in some ways become ghosts or half people.

I don’t want to sound like a dick or assume it’s cell phones or the highway, but when you can reply but you don’t where am I supposed to go from here? Products are more expensive than ever and knowing whether I need two pizzas or three could mean the difference of 40 bucks these days and my kids won’t eat cold pizza because they are aliens.

Again, I don’t want to call individuals ghosts or say they are half people, but if two people have cells and one takes a big fifteen seconds to text me back and another doesn’t, they seem less real to me. This doesn’t even reflect how it could be considered an insult that I’m not worth the effort of giving me the thumbs up sign if I ask you if you’re making the BBQ.

I recently passive aggressively let someone slack out of a three-year-old RPG I’m running. He never replied to texts. I had to text his wife to remind him to come and it just became too much effort. I just texted him, got no reply, no show and I gave up. The funny thing was, he never even brought it up when I saw him. Two of his best friends are still in the game with me about once a month and he is oblivious.

My intention isn’t to dish on people, set up some standard of behavior, or say I’m better than the next guy. My main goal is to maximize my chaos by using law. I know this sounds odd but hear me out.

When we were younger, maybe single, most of us were without children etc. Back in those days (or if you are in them now) being chaotic is easier and you could just wing it. If you missed a get-together there would probably be another next week.

As we grow older, we have less chances to throw down. People spread further apart and many of us up our game. For example, at 25 a few sixers of lager and two bags of potato chips was a good Friday night with my pals. At 55 if I’m having the same guys over, it’ll be more like BBQ, iced down craft beers, and some soft cheese. So obviously it is more important to know if people are coming if each person is going to use over 15$ in supplies.

If I’m hosting something and shelling out over a hundred bucks for it, I need to know who’s coming and not at the last minute either. I also know if things fall through, I won’t be doing it again for another couple of months. So yeah, I’m going to use law to organize the Hell out of it. If I just leave it to chance and hope is flows correctly, I’m going to be a pissed off guy hanging with one friend and having so many leftovers I might have to toss out some food. So yeah, I may be a priest of chaos, but if I want everyone there so my chaos can rock, I’m going to come in strong to see it through…kinda, gasp, like an adult.

So hey, if you can join in the fun and want to make sure you are included, take those 10 seconds to communicate in the easiest manner ever invented because we don’t have telepathy yet, but I’m sure it’ll be placed in our brains soon by our AI overlords. Until then… ride the apocalypse my friends.

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If you liked this, then I’m sure your want to check out the deals available with Cactus Phone!

WildernessPunk- In the Lap

As I stand with my little family at the side of the Roaring Fork River in Aspen Colorado, I can’t help but be overwhelmed by the power of the beauty which flows over the landscapes surrounding me. I feel calm and at peace. Joy fills my heart while I remain happy and proud, I can help my children experience such things and bring a smile onto my wife’s pretty face.

Yet, as is my gift, or perhaps curse, other realities tug at the edge of my consciousness. Do I deserve such privileges, and if I somehow do, what have I done to make this so? I’m not sure about you but I don’t think what each of us deserve in life is as simple as a math calculation based on your net income/wealth.

In the past I have been of a mind that no one ‘deserves’ anything. Life is random chaos and humans are animals which aren’t entitled to anything other than air, and if you’re being generous, water and food. However, over the years some of my attitude on this topic may have changed, but I certainly don’t believe in some mystic karma which brings justice to the world. We need to look no further than our last president, the evil criminal who flourished, while thousands of caring families starved to death every hour.

Yet to get back to the subject at hand, let’s drill down to what each of us might deserve in this life and how we could ever measure how someone might be entitled to more than another. As mentioned above, for many, if you can afford it, you deserve to have it, but does this really make sense. What if you can do something only by accident of birth? “Well, my mother bought this house, so now I get to live in this house I had no hand in earning or purchasing.” Do I have more of a right to live in such a nice place, while a person with the same date of birth born into a poor family would never be allowed such an opportunity?

Currently, I don’t even have a real job, but I’m experiencing this ultra beautiful place which some other guy who works 80 hours a week wouldn’t be able to afford. How is this fair? Why would I deserve this more than him?

I suppose someone might claim you get out of life what you put into it. This, of course, helps. Motivation, kindness, understanding, and hard work usually will elevate your quality of life, but when we start with a loaded dice fueled by chaos, I think only a fool would claim we’re all receiving what we deserve or have even worked for.

This doesn’t consider what some people would call luxury, others might consider boring. For some individuals staying in Aspen during the summer might be the height of opulence, while others might prefer camping at the base of a mountain north of Gunnison. The first might think sleeping in a tent on the dirt is low class, while the latter might feel like a king having this billion-dollar view all to themselves.

But I’m getting tangented again.

How should I feel bringing my children here? I’m happy they are getting to experience this beauty and some of this culture. Expanding their minds and giving them variety is almost always a great thing. Can I enjoy it too or does the back of my mind always nag at me that maybe I don’t really deserve this. Or why do I have it when others who struggle more than me don’t.

But how do you measure struggle? Has the workaholic struggled more than I when I didn’t see my kids for 18 months while I escaped the horror of a bad marriage? Should I not be able to enjoy what I have because others won’t? Should I spend months organizing some half-assed communist retreat, where I allow underprivileged kids to come up here instead of my family?

Obviously, I have been asking more questions than I’m providing answers for, and I haven’t even touched on such things as environmental concerns or the impact of travel. But before I wrap this up, let’s try to discover a few answers, or perhaps some balance.

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How much luxury does one deserve?

Earning privileges through economic gain has too many variables to be considered a fair unit of measurement in my eyes, so I will be looking deeper than job to pleasure ratios here and try to find measurements which can be considered more universal.

Strong indicators you deserve what you have:

  • You are enjoying something you built yourself
  • You are enjoying the kindness of people you have been good to
  • You have harvested something you have grown or raised yourself
  • You are basking in the companionship of animals you have cared for
  • You have made the effort to travel far to reach your destination
  • You have sacrificed other luxuries to reach your goal
  • You will make sacrifices after you obtain your goal
  • You can share your experience/trip/luxury with others and enrich their lives by doing so
  • You have created something out of nothing which improves people’s lives

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These are just a few items which are strong indicators we’re being paid for our efforts in a just manner. What do you think? Are there items we could add to this list? Do you think we deserve whatever we can purchase? Do you believe in Capitalism Karma? Please consider sharing what you might think on the subject for I would be very interested in getting other people’s take on this.

Thanks for your time and now I think I deserve a break and will breathe in the fresh air of the Rockies before I crack open a crafted ale.

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Grab some of my ‘Does Dak dream of electric cars’ fiction here

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WildernessPunk- Friends

Despite our friendships being some of the most enjoyable parts of our lives, what a friend is might be hard to define. How do you know you have a great friend? When does someone who was once a tight buddy get demoted into the acquaintance level? Can someone be a friend with someone who doesn’t return the favor?

If I was going to try to define what being a friend means, it would go something like this:

  • A person you like spending time with, which you share some similar interests with, and you also have each other’s backs during both the high and low points in life.

How about acquaintance?

  • A person who you share at least one interest and usually see while partaking in that interest. Also, a person you are on good terms with but do not run into often. Lastly, they could be a former close friend who one no longer spends much or any time with.

Friendship and Time

I have held a personal theory about friendship for a few decades now. My theory is to stay a tight friend with someone you need to see them at least once every two years. This would be weirder with someone living in the same town as you, but can still apply, but my theory really addressed when a great friend of yours moves to a different town, which happens so frequently in our lives.

I think if you don’t see someone you used to be friends with for over two years, it starts to get awkward because you are forced to spend so much time catching up and rediscovering the people you have both grown into. You also might not realize the person they have become. Maybe you have drifted apart culturally. I find two years works well, you have some new, funny stories to share, perhaps some drama, but then, with luck you can fall back into your older friendship without much issue. Have you ever hung out with an old friend who you haven’t seen for five years or ten? I’m sure I’m not the only one who can find this becoming strained.

I have a buddy who moved to Vegas. Sure, it is five hundred miles away, but I’ve made sure to visit him as much as I can and over the past twenty-three years, I’ve probably seen him in Nevada a dozen times, and he’s probably visited me almost as much. Yeah, we live in different states, but we keep in touch and know enough about each other’s lives when we meet, we can just pick up where we left off. Hell, there are people who are supposed to be my friends in the same town, I see less than him.

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Friendship Length

One of the stranger things about friendship for me is understanding how the length of the original tight friendship can affect its durability. How many times in life, especially when we are younger, do we end up having fast and fun friendships where we grow close to an individual and they become an important part of our lives. We will often look back with fond memories in regard to these people, but then when we remember how long we really spent with them it seems surprising.

I have several friends I met as soon as I moved out of my parent’s house and whom I have been friends with for decades. We always help each other out and spend as much time together as possible. It is obvious they are true buddies. But how about those intense eighteen-month friends I had in my twenties? They seemed super important then, and I was tight with these people, but how good of a friendship do I really have with someone I only hung out with a year or so, twenty-five years ago?

This is the hard part. Sure, I was tight for a year, but now after two decades have passed, how good of friends are we? Are we still tight or was this person just a fun blip on my radar? Of course, Facebook and such things can change all this to some degree but I’ll get into that later.

Still, isn’t it strange to think of someone who meant so much to you but hasn’t been a part of your life for a long time. Are you still friends? I would think so. How close? I guess that would be up to both of you, but I think it is easy to understand my Two-Year rule when we dig down into subjects like this.

Facebook Friendship

I hate to say it, but discussion of friendship can’t happen these days without including Facebook. However, it often brings up more questions than answers. What happens with the Two-Year rule, I reviewed above? Do I need to see my more removed friends every two years when I know what their kids look like, and how they went to Mexico for their vacation? Does Facebook bridge the gap in our current world when at any given time 80% of our once tight friends are no longer in our direct lives?

I also noticed a strange phenomenon with Facebook. Before Facebook started, I used to think about some of my older friends. Maybe people I hadn’t seen or hung out with at all for a decade or two. What would I say to these people if we could speak again?

Then it suddenly happened. I could talk to the girl I dated my sophomore year in College. Or contact that weird guy I used to buy shrumes from. I’m not sure about the people reading this, but I mostly found these interactions unfulfilling. Either the conversation was awkward and underwhelming, or I felt a tinge of guilt, here is this person I always wanted to sit down and have a three-hour conversation with, but now I barely said hi when we were ‘friended.’

Another downside to Facebook, at least for me, is it seems to cheapen my probably unrealistic and romanticized memories. Sometimes you just want to remember things like how the girl you first kissed looked when you were both teenagers. At the risk of pissing someone off, I’m not as into seeing her as some overweight fifty something, with her bald husband and three kids, one of which is older than we were when we kissed.

Maybe some memories were meant to stay idealized and, yes, a bit fake, but those young years of our lives were intense. Often looking back on those wild times helps you when you are listening to cartoons while making dinner for your kids, or just staying home on a Saturday night. Maybe I don’t want to know that crazy guy I took acid with on Mount Lemmon is now celebrating his ninth year of sobriety. I really don’t want to know what that girl I was crushing on when I was twenty-five looks like now.

My personal, and incriminating, gripes aside is Facebook a positive or negative to friendship.

Positives:

  • You can get in touch with forgotten friends
  • Reunions and such happen with greater ease
  • If your kid deletes all the numbers in your cell, you can still get them back
  • It does add an aspect of life sharing which helps people stay in touch

Negatives:

  • It cheapens memories
  • You are forced to watch exciting people slowly become ever more boring
  • Fun memories become watered down by mundania
  • People change and you might be subjected to the current nonsense of someone you used to respect

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For most people, after family, friends are your next important treasure. Many might put friends first. Personally, last weekend, I finished a huge chapter in a 24-year-old Dungeons and Dragons campaign with friends I have known for 38 years. My friends helped me beyond all belief when I was down and started WildernessPunk. Frankly, without the assistance of Jeremy, Zano, Geff, Dave, Greg, Chris, and Tony I don’t know where I would be. And golly those are some white boy names, but what the hell, we deal with the cards we are dealt.

One last word of warning. If there was ever a red flag in a romantic, or any other type of relationship, it would be a lack of friends. Whether it is a would-be platonic buddy or a potential mate, if they don’t have a gaggle of friends, don’t just run, run fast, and make sure you use a fake name.

This is

Alex

Bone

Signing Out

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If you feel like it, consider looking up my Cyberpunk novel. Detective Dak is asked to hunt down all the clones in New Cluster but is in love with one of them.

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WildernessPunk- The Last Fable

What’s the number one thing which many people find supremely important, while others don’t even believe it exists? I’m not talking about global warming deniers, flat earthers, or evil morons talking about how they want to promote racism, oops, I mean yapping about critical race theory. These are all valid points of contention, but I’m talking about the number one thing which bell curves from controlling lives, human rights, and in some cases whole countries, but on the other side of the spectrum the majority of humans think it’s just a silly fable.

Of course, I’m discussing religion.

Step back from however you feel about such things for a moment. Is there anything else you can think of which is so important to so many but other people think is a myth? If you are religious and reading this (weird) you aren’t off the hook, because even if you truly believe in your version of god and creations there are billions of people who YOU think are doing it wrong and praying into the emptiness. As Christopher Hitchens said, everyone is at least 99% atheist, because they are rejecting hundreds of other faiths, real atheists just take it one step further.

As a lifelong atheist I can kinda groc the concept that maybe something created some parts of existence. It isn’t impossible, but certainly the popular religions on this planet have nothing to do with it. What I really can’t wrap my head around is things like a person thinking Satan exists or that they might be going to Hell or Heaven. Such ideas are fine for Dungeons and Dragons, but how an adult could really believe these things are real remains difficult for me understand.

It must be so strange to believe supernatural and magical things are happening to the billions of people roaming this globe. I can understand why religion evolved. Like all myths it was used to explain the unknown and perhaps more importantly, was designed to control and often grift people.

In antiquity when humans discovered the uses of grain (beer) and put their hunter and gather modality behind them and began to live in larger settlements, crime became a problem. This is because for the first time in human existence, some people had a lot more than others. They made laws, but laws don’t work as well if you can break them without getting caught. So the elites needed something else. Some way people could get in trouble for stealing even if no one was watching.

The myriads of religions fit this bill with style. If you steal from me and get caught you could lose a hand, but if you don’t get caught you could still lose because now you will burn in Hell, fade into nothingness in the glooms of Hades, or be tortured in Gehenna. And boom, bang, bingo, the masses are double controlled and your brother with a big mouth can fleece the population while convincing everyone they are the special chosen people. In fact, hey, since we are all so important let’s steal stuff from those other guys, cause, you know, they aren’t the special people who follow the same guy in the sky as we do.

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Sort of a ‘we’re special and you suck,’ paradigm. And we are still dealing with this mentality and yeah, it’s ruined the world more than anything else.

Of course, the history of most religions includes genocide, rape, slavery, subjugation, imprisonment, torture, execution, and grifting the poor of their money. In the past, as well as today, we can find multiple countries run by religion. These countries use their religion with an iron fist and citizens who proclaim their atheism are imprisoned or sometimes killed. Most modern religions punch down on women. In some circumstances doing something as basic as dressing as you wish, or driving is forbidden.

Also included in most religions is the hatred of the outsider. The Abrahamic religions all include passages where the unbeliever must be destroyed. In the Bible and the Torah, genocide, rape, and slavery are encouraged. Fear of different people is one of our species’ most primitive emotions. It doesn’t speak highly of these faiths when they seek to make use of such primordial impulses.

What really amazes me is when these people, who worship a god which by any definition is evil, somehow claim to be the vanguard of morality. If you don’t follow their god of murder, rape, and slavery, somehow, you are the one who is evil and has strayed from the light. If, when playing Dungeons and Dragons, I came across a xenophobic god who preached the destruction of everything which was different, but had followers who claimed to be peaceful, I would tip my hat to the Game Master for providing a complex set of villains and then go about taking them out.

This brings up my final point. I have heard religious people say, “What if you are wrong? What if you find out (my) god is real?” Well, I can answer that. If it was the Abrahamic god, somehow, I would call it the monster it is and probably try to fight against it if I could. Hell’s Bells, where did I leave my Hammer of Thunderbolts?

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Grab my Cyberpunk novel here. Dak has been hired to chase down the Skinjumper clones, he biggest problem, he’s dating one.

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