misotheism from a roleplaying perspective

[Cold Soul]

Edit: Post has been edited to replace the word Atheist with misotheist in order to avoid confusion.

I know threads about the misotheism description pop up often here, but I didn't want to revive old threads, and I do feel this is a valid criticism.
First I want to post the description, so you all know how misotheism (which the game mistakenly calls atheism) is described in the game. I will bold the part I'm concerned about:

Despite the obvious presence of Gods and
Goddesses throughout Yliakum, some deny that these beings are worthy of worship.
Most people consider atheists foolish at best and a condemned object of pity at worst.
atheists will bear the worst effects of the penalty for dying since no god will grant succour from it.
The atheist does not look outside itself for thruth. People attracted to this faith:
People who have had a bad experience with religion, anti-social people, staunch individualists, and the irrational.

I understand that Yliakum is a society that looks down on misotheism, because of the immense presence of Gods in the world, but what bothers me is that the game itself tries to segregate misotheist role-players into inherently irrational, anti-social, ignorant and arrogant characters, instead of characters with a valid (but controversial) point of view.

Take the two major deities for example, Laanx and Talad. Laanx is an incredibly petty and merciless God:

Seeing that the creature refused to follow his orders, Laanx became enraged and destroyed the creature by whispering a single word. During the following days, many other Klyros passed through the portal. Each time, Laanx tried to impose his will. Many of them were corrupted, tempted in many ways, or were destroyed or tortured, but none of them yielded to the god's will. It seemed their pride did not allow them to bend to any god. Laanx saw inside them a splinter of the delirium that had taken possession of him and, even though he hated them for their indifference, he did not utterly destroy their race. Before leaving them to their destiny, he taught them the way to Yliakum, sure that they would create some troubles to Talad, whom he now considered an enemy.

Talad is jealous and short-sighted:

When Talad discovered Laanx's creation, he was surprised and astonished, but he was also saddened because Laanx had her people and he did not, even though she insisted she had created the Lemurs for both of them. He harnessed power from the crystal too, going even farther than Laanx has dared. She thought that Vodùl had taught Talad the secret of the energy and let him work, because she trusted him and she did not want him to be sad. But she was wrong. When Talad, imbued with the crystal's power, came close to her to create the first creature of his people, a tempest of chaos burst forth from the god's hands and hit Laanx on her face, penetrating deeply into her body, and she became forever disfigured.

Isn't it understandable that some characters would reject Gods like this without that making them 'bad'? AGAIN, I don't have anything against misotheism being taboo in the world of Yliakum, but the insinuation that characters subscribing to misotheism philosophy are inherently inferior to others in some way.

[Aiwendil]

Pretty simple reason to not play an Atheist:

And I quote - 'Three. We gods shall no longer spare the faithless; you who do not revere a deity or follow a sacred path, you shall have no succor, and you will be folded into Me as your spirit shrivels. All who die the true death are Yliakum's gifts to Me.'

The books also details the nature of Dakkru's curse - that a small part of you is taken away in order to power the black crystal.

I had previously assumed that Revelation 3. meant that when an atheist dies, they are taken entirely into Dakkru / the black crystal and are thus denied resurrection or probably not even capable of it when the entirety of their 'life essence' has been taken away.

Edit: Ok. I think I see your point now. It is valid to infer that true death awaits those with no faith who should they enter Dakkru's realm since no god will bail them out. It remains, imo, possible that the punishment it speaks of be something else as the book is written now but it might be edited in the future as the game develops. When or if that happens, I'll be (once more) completely wrong.

Even if mechanics support permadeath for atheists one can still roleplay an atheist . . . Just not for long.

If you play an atheist you should delete your char as soon as you find yourself in the Death realm the first time as he/she/kra will never get out again.

[novacadian]

Isn't it understandable that some characters would reject Gods like this without that making them 'bad'?

@Cold Soul: It is not a matter of rejecting a god which makes one an atheist; it is the disbelief in their existence. If I am Hindu and do not believe in Christ as the son of god yet believe in Ganesh, Shiva, Vishnu, Brahma, etc.; then I would not be an atheist yet would be rejecting Christ as the son of god.
   
There are many characters which reject the gods yet few can refute their existence.

- Nova

[Cold Soul]

Isn't it understandable that some characters would reject Gods like this without that making them 'bad'?

@Cold Soul: It is not a matter of rejecting a god which makes one an atheist; it is the disbelief in their existence. If I am Hindu and do not believe in Christ as the son of god yet believe in Ganesh, Shiva, Vishnu, Brahma, etc.; then I would not be an atheist yet would be rejecting Christ as the son of god.
   
There are many characters which reject the gods yet few can refute their existence.

- Nova

Atheism is defined differntly in the game than in real life. From the description I posted:

Despite the obvious presence of Gods and
Goddesses throughout Yliakum, some deny that these beings are worthy of worship.

In other words, they don't deny the existence of Gods, they just believe that they don't deserve to be worshiped.

[provisionist1]

I suppose that yes, in PlaneShift, it's not really possible to believe that the gods do not exist at all, or at least, once you come back from the Death Realm, you can no longer be an atheist.

However, you could easily role-play an anti-clericalist- someone who is entirely against all the religious institutions and the power they have in Yliakum society. You would believe that yes, the gods exist, but that they should not be worshipped or revered in any way.

Xirius

[Catlemur]

Once the atheist faction gets implented it will be totally cool to be an atheist in Yliakum.

[Earowo]

The simplest way i can make the athiest description true I have.
Personally, Im an athiest IRL, the reason why? there is absolutely no proof whatsover that gods have ever existed.
Now, athiesm In PS, There is undeniable proof, of all of the gods, the deathrealm being the first proof, of dakkru.

Now think about those two things, Athiesm In RL, is often supported, since there is no proof.
Athiesm in ps, cant be supported, it is critisized, and often time holy people, crusaders mabey, idk, might geta little blood thirty for athiests, becuase of the undeniable proof of gods.

Religion in real life, is a thing of faith, or hope.
Religion in PS is just which gods morals, you agree with most, so you decide to like that one best.

There are different ways to 'play' athiesm as well, you can play it to description and be called a fool or killed, or you could play it at a much simpler level, being, I know hte gods are out there, i just choose not to warship any of them.
 Anyway you go about it, your IRL points and views should not affect your character in any way, the game is supposed to be immersive, of which if you are an athiest, and you should not be forced to choose athiesm by your own thoughts, choose a god and play it out, instead of critizising the roles they all play, you'll have more fun that way.

[novacadian]

Atheism is defined differntly in the game than in real life. From the description I posted:

Despite the obvious presence of Gods and
Goddesses throughout Yliakum, some deny that these beings are worthy of worship.

In other words, they don't deny the existence of Gods, they just believe that they don't deserve to be worshiped.

That is, indeed, a bad choice of words. If taken literally it is not even using the term Atheism correctly.  My feeling is that it is more as explained in my previous post and subsequent others.

- Nova

[Cold Soul]

Fine. I was talking about misotheism, and so was the game. The devs acknowledge that it was a bad choice of words, but because the word atheism is more recognizable, they've decided to stick with it. So just to be clear, what this thread is really about is misotheism.

I've edited the OP to reflect this.

Anyway you go about it, your IRL points and views

I wasn't making IRL points though, I was making in game points.

[bilbous]

There is at least one NPC, seemingly ordinary, that appears to be an atheist as provided for by the game. ah yes here is the quote:

Don't deal in that sort of religious stuff, myself; the gods don't seem to care about me, so why should I care about them?

Perfectly upstanding citizen though he is.

[tslates92]

And what about agnosticism? There really should be a choice for people who believe in higher power, but think that we're not supposed to know it or that it is impossible to understand, or whatever agnostic view. Agnosticism for those who don't know, is the belief there is a higher power/being, but it is unknown for sure what that is.

[provisionist1]

Agnosticism ... is the belief there is a higher power/being, but it is unknown for sure what that is.

Only a very Deist position of Agnosticism could be kept in Yliakum. Traditionally Agnostics don't believe there is definitely a higher power, but believe it is impossible to know. In Yliakum, we do know that 'gods' exist, however, we can be unsure as to the extent of their actual power, and believe we cannot understand them at all.

Of course, Xirius has never actually seen any of the four gods, nor witnessed their work that could not have been done by mortals...

[MishkaL1138]

Woot, a religion debate on the Internet! but this time is about fictional gods.

My explanation to atheists dying and then going back to the land of the living would be some sort of kind God ([insert god/goddess here] for example) who doesn't want that character to die... yet. That would be an effort to make them realize they're wrong with their lack of faith and maybe make them start worshipping a god, but they still fail.

Believing in, yet despising the gods, would be what we know as an 'atheist'. Or the lack of knowledge (even though you have to be very short-sighted or live under a rock if you don't know about gods. There are plenty of temples and sacred places throughout Yliakum) may create atheists/agnostics. Or those atheists are actually disguised Black Flames. You never know!

[novacadian]

My agnostic view in rl might mimic the buddist's don't know. Something seems afoot; just not sure what. 

- Nova

[miomo]

It is possible to be an atheist in this game. If my sources for the definition of atheism are correct, an atheist is one who rejects the existence of God or gods. A character in game can say that they believe in the existence of Laanx, Talad, Xiosai, Dakkru, and whoever else is considered a god, but deny that they are gods. Instead he or she can insist that they are just really powerful beings.

I think misotheism is too narrowly defined to be the appropriate word. Characters do not need to specifically hate the gods, even as they believe in their existence. They can simply be dispassionate about religion in general. It's a fair character choice, as religion in real life is always able to cause heated debates, and is a very personal experience. Not wanting to bring that baggage into a game is reasonable.

But I'm splitting hairs here. Whether someone chooses to role play an atheist, misotheist, agnostic, or simply just secular, the original quote is just a guideline. I look at those as simply assistance to get the new player thinking about their character. For me, the initial choices I can make when creating a new character are way too limiting, so I hardly bother acknowledging them, except to make sure they're not completely off the wall.

The wording might be adjusted slightly, but it would be hard to capture all of what one should be thinking about when choosing that religious option. As it stands, I don't see people who have had a bad experience with religion, or staunch individualists as necessarily bad people. I know one of the former, who is a very good fenki.

Edit:

I knew there was something else I wanted to write. Regarding Dakkru's revelation number three, I never thought that it meant that when a faithless character died, that was permanent. But I do think that Dakkruists would, in particular, have strong opinions regarding those people. The question is, when does one's spirit shrivel? I would say that death in Yliakum is only a corporeal death. I thought the 'all' in that last sentence, "All who die the true death are Yliakum's gifts to Me," was, in fact, all people who die the true death, but now I'm thinking it means all the faithless.

It is completely appropriate for this to be vague and left up to interpretation, that makes the differing opinions of the characters that much more interesting. If all we had was established dogma, well, you'd still have inter-faith debates, but not so much intra-faith debating.