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How do you respond when someone tells you "Have a blessed one"?

Kenpachii

Member
Obviously this is for the atheists, agnostics, and apatheists. I usually reply "Oh, I'm not a believer" in a friendly tone with a smile. What say you heathens of NeoGAF?

Toxic

I would just react back with, hell yea praise baby jesus.

But on a serious note, Would just say, same to you and move on.
 
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H4ze

Member
Woahhh hold on. I can't believe this thread exists. This is the most fedora tipping, m'lady saying, neckbearded looking like thread in a loooong while.

Just say "thanks, you too" for fuck sake. I don't believe too but this is all about being polite. How twisted you must be to think otherwise...
 

FunkMiller

Member
OP's response when he sneezes, and someone says 'bless you'.

Punch You Oh No GIF by GritTV
 

Jsisto

Member
I don't push my "atheism" on randos if I get told God bless I will politely say I'm not religious.I said it in my original post but most people were too triggered to notice I guess. I say it so that people realize we're not the baby eating monsters they think we are. We're ”normal” just like they are.

Dude, you practically have baby blood dripping from your mouth when you say something like that to a stranger who is simply wishing you well. I don’t think your effort to appear “normal“ is going the way you think. From one non believer to another, please do some reflection and think about how your words are perceived by others. You’re making this way too complicated.
 
Some of you must live in bizarro world. Seething with anger and insults because I said "Oh, I'm not beliver". If a Christian is greeted with "Hail Satan" I guess they should just say "Thanks" and keep it moving?

Because Christianity so fully permeates Western culture you're going to struggle to identify someone saying "have a blessed one" because it's just common parlance vs actually meaning it. For example, saying "bless you" and "hallelujah" are so ingrained in our vocabulary non-Christian say them without thinking.

So what you're doing is making the assumption each time that these people wishing you a blessed day are just saying it in religious sense rather than any general cultural one. It's almost impossible to do the same with "hail Satan", that one doesn't have much ambiguity.
 
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NinjaBoiX

Member
I was expecting these passive aggressive replies thanks for not disappointing. Funny thing that, I'm not either I just say it so that they see we're "normal" people just like them.
Sounds like just the kind of thing an insufferable twat would do.
“you too”
Yup, nice and easy. Just go about your day.

Don’t make strangers feel uncomfortable, you’re not going to spark up an intellectual debate with them.
 
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Days like these...

Have a Blessed Day
If someone could explain how "Oh, I'm not a believer" is tantamount to spitting in someones face I'm all ears. If it not then I guess keep the insults and outrage coming. 🤣
 

Days like these...

Have a Blessed Day
Sounds like just the kind of thing an insufferable twat would do.

Yup, nice and easy. Just go about your day.

Don’t make strangers feel uncomfortable, you’re not going to spark up an intellectual debate with them.
If politely saying "I'm not a believer" with a smile makes someone uncomfortable I don't know what to tell you.
 
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NinjaBoiX

Member
If politely saying "I'm not a believer" with a smile makes someone uncomfortable I don't know what to tell you.
It’s the passive aggressive response of a militant atheist, I can’t imagine any scenario where the recipient of such a reply would feel anything less than uncomfortable, as if they’d somehow challenged your beliefs or something.

They’re just being pleasant, they’re not trying to indoctrinate you.
 
never heard anyone say that before but it wouldn't bother me.

anyway, whatever someone says to me i don't get upset over it unless they are actually trying to be a cunt. someone saying "have a blessed one" isn't gonna upset me. people get angry because someone says "merry christmas". get over it fuck sake lol.

i have a friend who is very religious and will often say something like "I'll pray for you" or "bless you". i'm not religious in the slightest and people will get offended if someone says it to them. i personally don't give a fuck. she is religious so that's what she says and that's it. i just say thank you because it's nice to be nice.
 

NinjaBoiX

Member
OP's response when he sneezes, and someone says 'bless you'.

Punch You Oh No GIF by GritTV
I love that saying “bless you” after someone sneezes came from the days of The Black Death, where people were quite literally sending you godly blessings in the hope that you don’t die.

I always wondered why people say it, pretty cool little factoid.
Atheism is so edgelord.
I dunno, I guess it is if you go out of your way to tell people unprompted. I’m an atheist but I just keep it to myself unless it comes up in conversation.

Then, depending upon how drunk I am, I get really angry about how much pain, suffering and destruction has been caused by some story books written a long time ago that some folk took way too fucking seriously.

#notallbelievers, I totally get that, 99.9% of folk who practice religion are lovely people who use said teachings in a positive, life-affirming manner.

But the hardline nuts that seek harm on naysayers is one of the great tragedies of mankind.
 

Meicyn

Gold Member
If politely saying "I'm not a believer" with a smile makes someone uncomfortable I don't know what to tell you.
If someone could explain how "Oh, I'm not a believer" is tantamount to spitting in someones face I'm all ears. If it not then I guess keep the insults and outrage coming. 🤣
Some of you must live in bizarro world. Seething with anger and insults because I said "Oh, I'm not beliver". If a Christian is greeted with "Hail Satan" I guess they should just say "Thanks" and keep it moving?
ToPzlRU.jpg
 

NinjaBoiX

Member
people get angry because someone says "merry christmas". get over it fuck sake lol.
Some of my customers at work are Muslim, and I always felt a little uncomfortable with myself after I said “have a great Christmas” like I did on autopilot to all my customers when I dropped their last order before the break. Sometimes caught myself mid-sentence leaving a very awkward acknowledgment in my inflection, 😅

But I’d like to think non of them took it as anything other than a well meaning slip of the tongue. 🤷🏼‍♂️
 

E-Cat

Member
If politely saying "I'm not a believer" with a smile makes someone uncomfortable I don't know what to tell you.
You are probably a young man, slightly autistic and not well-versed in the subtle social cues you are giving off, so let me clue you in: The real world isn't an r/atheism battleground of wits. While you may think you are 'normalizing' non-believers, what you are in fact doing is giving off sociopathic vibes of a basement-dwelling adult virgin. Your passive-aggressive, combative behavior is indicative of an extremely low social value which women are bound to find extremely unattractive. Clearly your goal here isn't to attract women, but this is nonetheless a side-effect you might want to know about.

To them, you will not appear as a sympathetic stranger hitting them over the head with an epic epiphany about their innocuous use of words unbenknonst to them hurting and excluding a marginalized group, and them proceeding to want to blow you for this gift from the heavens. You will just read like a little weirdo, a fly they want to swat out pronto and be on their way. As a result, they will think less of you, and atheism.

No, what I think this is really about is sparring. Tell yourself all you want that this for some higher cause of exposing societal ills. But you just really like to get into logical arguments and defend your viewpoint; which is fine, there is a time and place for everything, but someone wishing you a good day (blessed, even) isn't it.
 
OP, you may think you are being nice, but you're not. You're disregarding the recipient's feelings because, as many people in this thread have stated, they would read a smiling reply like yours as a confrontation. Not in the same way as pulling a knife, sure, but more confrontational than wishing them well back.

You're not going to change the world one convenience store clerk at a time, so why not just be nice?

The irony of me trying to change the world one OP at a time lol. Guess none of us are perfect.
 

Days like these...

Have a Blessed Day
You are probably a young man, slightly autistic and not well-versed in the subtle social cues you are giving off, so let me clue you in: The real world isn't an r/atheism battleground of wits. While you may think you are 'normalizing' non-believers, what you are in fact doing is giving off sociopathic vibes of a basement-dwelling adult virgin. Your passive-aggressive, combative behavior is indicative of an extremely low social value which women are bound to find extremely unattractive. Clearly your goal here isn't to attract women, but this is nonetheless a side-effect you might want to know about.

To them, you will not appear as a sympathetic stranger hitting them over the head with an epic epiphany about their innocuous use of words unbenknonst to them hurting and excluding a marginalized group, and them proceeding to want to blow you for this gift from the heavens. You will just read like a little weirdo, a fly they want to swat out pronto and be on their way. As a result, they will think less of you, and atheism.

No, what I think this is really about is sparring. Tell yourself all you want that this for some higher cause of exposing societal ills. But you just really like to get into logical arguments and defend your viewpoint; which is fine, there is a time and place for everything, but someone wishing you a good day (blessed, even) isn't it.
I'll be 50 this year twice married with two very young children. Care to try again?
 

E-Cat

Member
I'll be 50 this year twice married with two very young children. Care to try again?
In that case I would say "congrats on the sex" first and foremost, and I guess you're highly likely to remain an unsufferable twat for the rest of your life? 🤷‍♂️

But if the response in this thread has any chance of making you reflect at all, maybe you should rethink your priorities in life? To me, you sound miserable.
 

Alx

Member
I remember on my first trip to Ireland I had a small chat with an older lady at a cashier and when we parted she gave me a "may God bless you". Thought it was very nice and one of my kindest/most unique memories of that trip. It doesn't matter if you believe yourself or not, it's just the fact that a person is sending you a positive message using something that is litterally sacred for her, showing how sincere it is. It's only polite to appreciate that gesture for what it is, whatever your own belief (I'm an atheist myself, for what it's worth)
 

TheMan

Member
That reminded me a couple of years ago when I was training new employees and said "I wanna thank you guys for..." and a young woman cut me off blurting out "I'M NOT A GUY!!"

I just replied "Go burn your bra somewhere else and let's go get some lunch."

Back to the original topic yeah there's no need to be confrontational or start a lengthy debate just because someone wished you well 😀
Yes Alex I’ll take “Things that definitely didn’t happen” for 300.
 

E-Cat

Member
I remember on my first trip to Ireland I had a small chat with an older lady at a cashier and when we parted she gave me a "may God bless you". Thought it was very nice and one of my kindest/most unique memories of that trip. It doesn't matter if you believe yourself or not, it's just the fact that a person is sending you a positive message using something that is litterally sacred for her, showing how sincere it is. It's only polite to appreciate that gesture for what it is, whatever your own belief (I'm an atheist myself, for what it's worth)
Yeah. Inserting your own belief system to interfere with such a kind remark is kind of like this: you are visiting your friend's flat in some urban area, and a stranger says "hi!" passing you by in the staircase -- the implicit understanding being that you probably also live in that same block, and therefore it's a polite custom to say greetings even though you may never have seen each other before. Rather than acknowledging this fact, you proceed to correct them by pointing out that you don't actually live there. Cringe ensues
 
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