No prophets or preachers controlling the state...
No religious rule...
No denial of science...
No artificial alternative reality...
No faith based hate...
No religious indoctrinaton...

One of the Scandinavian countries?

ETA: oops... just noticed "faith based hate" as something you wanted to avoid. I hear many Scandinavians are learning to hate a faith, or at least it's more ardent believers. Is that a deal breaker?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/11/2017 11:44PM by elderolddog.

If you call that "hate" then yes, you probably find "hate" even in Sweden.

No where.

Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people living for today
Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people living life in peace

I think Dave's quote of this beautiful Lennon song illustrates his deeper subtext, which is that we are all free within ourselves, and we are as free from outside influences as we wish to be.

Imagine! within yourself, you are free. External activities do not have to burden us, as we can choose to ignore them and hold fast to our own inner freedom.

Spot on, Dave...

My house

Try France...

Soft Machine Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Try France...

:D :D :D

You are here

Antartica.

I hear lots of land and a mild climate will be available there soon. God is clearing out an entire continent! The New New World!!

Oh wait: Quakers!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/12/2017 08:00PM by lurking in.

"Moonquaker" sounds like an Orson Scott Card novel.

I feel the same. Especially here in the U.S. with all the Christians crying discrimination as they discriminate.

The world is overpopulated. There is no where to run. No where to hide. All you can do is pick the place where the religion is the least invasive, least pernicious. France sounds nice. New Zealand is one of the best bets. I read a study that said 45% were Christian but only 15% go to church. And its beautiful and underpopulated. I loved it when I was there. Still felt like what the Planet Earth is supposed to be.

According to this article, the least religious cities in the U.S. are 1) Portland, OR, 2) San Francisco, and 3) Seattle. But of course, these cities and dominant cultures have their own dogma.

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/most-religiously-unaffiliated-us-cities_us_55c52ac3e4b0f1cbf1e526b0

My next door neighbor is a semi over-the-top Evangelical, but she knows that we are more moderate. She is also a d@mned good vet, so we've had a great deal going for years. She doesn't push her religion on us, we house-sit or whatever, and she takes care of our cats when needed.

I enjoy Portland one of my considerations for moving out of Utah:)

Nowhere is free of them, unfortunately, but the Northeast and West Coast are better for sure. I have a friend that moved to Denmark and absolutely loves it.

I really wish some of the southern states would secede. Let them elect their Roy Moores and Donald Trumps and let them implode without taking the rest of us down.

Of course they have nukes down there.

On this planet? Surely you jest.

Yep, I'm thinking outer space :p

You know, if you ask certain TBMs this question, they might be moved to answer, "Utah!"

Weird, huh?

I realize that you are venting, but there are large parts of this country where religion is largely off of the radar. I grew up in New England, and in my youth there, it was considered quite rude to discuss religion (unless you knew someone really well, and knew that it would be an acceptable topic,) or to actively proselytize for your church. Religion was considered to be a private matter.

It's largely the same in the mid-Atlantic, the PNW, most of Colorado, and many other parts of this country. Notable exceptions include the Moridor and the deep South.

You really can live somewhere without people harassing you about your religion or lack thereof.

Try Cali.... some people here do have a working brain and some critical thinking skills and they're not afraid to think for themselves.

saucie Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Try Cali.... some people here do have a working
> brain and some critical thinking skills and
> they're not afraid to think for themselves.

Just avoid Simi Valley! From the "outside," Simi looks like a particularly idealized form of normal, everyday, Southern California suburbia, but "inside," the pervasive religiosity (with all of pervasive religiosity's associated social attitudes), can be more than a bit hard to take on a regular basis.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/14/2017 07:32PM by Tevai.

I retreat inside of myself, into my peaceful, insulated shell, and the Mormons can't reach me there. This was not easy to do. First, I had to make sure I did everything possible to free my children and grandchildren from the influence of pushy religious fanatics. I could not retreat, until the fight was over.

I can venture out of my little world, whenever I have to. I have to go out and work at my career. Still--even in my job, I'm at liberty to choose who I work with, and I will not do business with Mormons. Here in Utah, too many people I know have been robbed by Mormon scammers. I don't want to pay any wages or any other money, to have 10% of it end up in the coffers of LDS, Inc. (I don't voice this out loud, but I quietly practice this.)

Away from work, at home, and with my family, I don't like to talk about religion at all (except to vent here on RFM), because I don't want to waste one more second of family time. My children have all resigned from the cult, and whatever else they believe is up to each individual, as is their right as Americans.

I can choose to play non Mormon-written music at home. I can read books NOT published by Deseret Publishing, I don't have to watch conference, we don't read the Ensign or Church News. The fact that none of my friends are Mormons was not originally my choice, but, thanks to being shunned by the Mormons, I am now happy to not have any of them in my life.

If I encounter any Mormons, and they try to push their way into my private life or business, I but up firm boundaries, and keep everything impersonal and brief.

YOU can make your own boundaries, and enforce them! You can add new boundaries, change them for individuals, and keep your personal rules as flexible or as strict as you want. But guard them!

Behind those boundaries, you are free from the rule of religious fanatics, wherever you go.

Definitely don't go to hell.
The place is packed with those bastards!

I dunno, as soon as I think I've gotten away from it, people start making climate change and "science" into a religion (among many other examples)-- if it boils down to one part of the population controlling another part to follow their particular list of "goods" or "morality" through violent state activity, I count it a religion. Pretty hard to get away from.

You can look up the data and do the research yourself.

If you don't accept the data and think there is some type of conspiracy to fake it, then go to Alaska and see the effects in person for yourself:

http://climatechange.alaska.gov/cc-ak.htm

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/barrow-alaska-ground-zero-for-climate-change-7553696/

Common sense tells you if there is more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere since the dinosaurs were alive the Earth is going to heat up.

Unless you think that Satan is making you "believe" in science.