I do not react with a sad emoji or respond with angry or dismissive comments when you post stuff on your timeline pushing your religious beliefs. I hope I have never done so, even though I have legitimate reasons to feel both sad and angry about those toxic memes.

So when you respond with a crying face or an angry comment at one of my posts celebrating my life without a god, you might want to ask yourself what it is, you think, that makes it any less crass and disrespectful for you do to so on my timeline than it would be for me to do the reverse.

Yeah, this pops up from time to time on my Facebook timeline. Now, mostly from former friends with whom I have basically cut off contact. Back in the day, it became a signal that I was probably going to cut off contact—at least on Facebook. Absolutely inappropriate.

I believe the purpose behind those responses is primarily to manipulate, to attempt to guilt-trip me into shutting down so as not to offend. I say this because it was a common meme within Evangelical circles (and also semi-Evangelical ones) that we should not offend the dogma in order not to cause dissension.

On the other hand, bottling up is my go-to reaction, and it served me well for many years in the Evangelical world. So I might be overreacting. But that sort of “sad because you’re going to hell, you heathen” response is still terribly crass and inappropriate, no matter how entitled and exceptional you think you are because of your beliefs.