Pretty sure they do. They still own Clearwater, Florida (including the police department) and have a significant presence in East Grinstead, England, plus at least one mega-yacht in international waters. All they need to do is relocate you there then ‘handle’ the investigation when you come up missing.

Shelly is still missing to this day.

e: they may have toned down the crazy publicly because they were attracting too much attention, but I don’t think their power has diminished.

On the age scale, they’re barely a blip. On the size scale, they’re massive enough to disappear people with zero accountability.

They’re a full-blown religion.

You’re right, and that’s fair. I guess I was talking about general atheists in one breath, then the specific vocal atheists OP seemed to be talking about in another.

I shouldn’t generalise like that. Atheism is simply the lack of belief in a god – any god. And there are many gods. You can be atheistic about any of them.

Scientology is pretty new, and pretty big.

I think you’ll find vanishingly few even fervent atheists who wouldn’t be persuaded by actual evidence. I know some percentage of fervent atheists would say if real evidence of a god were presented, they wouldn’t follow it because it’s a monster (I’m in this camp), but I don’t believe any real percentage would stick their fingers in their ears and say lalalala. That’s kind of the opposite of what atheism is about. It’s literally about evidence.

You can’t really blame people who were raised in religious environments and have newly discovered intellectual freedom, though, right? Sure, they can be obnoxious sometimes, just like we all are when we learn a new thing that’s blown our minds. They’ll grow out of it, and we should have patience, like in all things.

Some, sure. Most, no.

Atheism is simply the state of nonbelief in a deity. It requires no declaration nor even conscious thought. I don’t believe in leprechauns, but I don’t belong to an anti-leprechaun cult.

e: you’re likely atheist about Ra, Thor, Sheba, and Quetzalcoatl, right? Most atheists feel the same about Yahweh, and aren’t likely to bring it up unless you do. Most will even hold out for dozens or hundreds of times. Many Christians seem oblivious to how often they reference their religion in casual conversation. Often, Atheists only have to say it once.

The only difference between religions and cults is the size.

Oh good lord no.

Those are almost universally built on religion, and most are very cult-like. If that’s your take on them, I suspect you haven’t had more than a superficial interaction with them.

The Lost City with Sandra Bullock, Channing Tatum, and Daniel Radcliffe. It seems like a tropey romance-action flick, but is more a parody of genre clichés. The writing, acting, and humour are pretty good.

Wait, your right or my right?

There’s already a codebase for bursting from the ground in an explosion of lava. Everyone wants that.

You’re the first person asking for a scarf, and our system doesn’t even know what a neck is.

Or never let Windows touch anything. There are alternatives. Treat Windows like the virus it is.

They look like they’re drowning. I feel I need to throw them life preservers. This is stressful, because I’m not sure they can catch them, what with the hooves.

I hope so too.

This whole administration is hitting them in the wallet, and coupled with the insurance hassles of their second or third home being threatened by insurance companies pulling out due to climate change, they’re starting to feel it.

Fascism won’t help most of them, and it’s already starting to hurt. Florida relies on their money, and it’s already on life support.

Boo fucking hoo.

Especially Florida.

Never underestimate the power of snowbirds.

Yes, more of this, please.

If Texas can do this, anyone can.

Yep. And this bug exists in both scenarios.

Wait, really?

That’s terrible design. I know I’m a mod and can take action. That’s the point of being a mod. Flagging all comments is superfluous and misleading.

I thought something was wrong with my community.

e: Instead of a shield (which to me means ‘fellow mod’) I’d colour the edit ellipsis green or something. This makes me think the commenter is a mod.

It helps to know it’s only on my end, thanks! I was worried anyone could mod my community. Thanks for your input! I’ll put it in as a UI bug. Cheers!