Violet: “We’re PEOPLE, Zoe. Just people, trying to get through our day despite being ruled by an imperfect government. Just like everyone else on earth.”
Zoe: On the night I posted David Frum’s Twitter message, I had been texting my close friend who is American and lives in Michigan. She told me she was terribly depressed about the U.S. President, the postal service debacle, and told me “Don’t come here, it’s awful!” She forgot that we can’t go there as our border is not open. My point being, she was terribly upset and in the years I’ve known her I have not heard her admit to this kind of depression. I tried to lift her spirits and planned to talk to her the next day. And so I did for several hours. She kept asking why these people in the U.S. believed Trump. How can they not see he’s lying, his narcissism, his cruelty. We talked about David Frum’s Twitter message. I found it interesting, so I posted it. She hesitated to talk about the QAnon stuff because she knows it triggers me and I told her we both could talk about it since we both were upset about it. I don’t go on and on in writing anymore Violet. I’m tired. I’m no longer going to invest in the behind the scenes explanations. No one reads here because I write great instructive exposes on anything. This is like a personal diary that I sometimes write poorly in and for the most part anyone that reads here and sometimes comments here has done so with grace. I suspect many have moved on. And that’s not a problem with me. Every day I think about moving on too. Often I can’t even form sentences anymore. I might start something and not bother with commentary on it. I’m just putting it here for something to do.
Anything I write regarding the U.S. is because I’m fucking shitless scared of the world we are living in. Yes Violet, I’m a people too. And yes, the U.S. is a big part of my life from the time my ancestors landed on your eastern shores. The branch I was in stayed loyal to the throne and headed north. Others stayed south. In doing so, some of my ancestors died before they got here. They were considered traitors. Some of my ancestors came up the St. Lawrence and participated in establishing a Christian religion and nation by eliminating Indigenous peoples all in the name of Christ.
The U.S. Southern Baptists highly influenced the Independent Fundamentalist Baptist Church here in Canada and to tell you the truth, the U.S. was the bees knees and we were beneath them when it came to the one true religion. Our speakers on creationism, evolution, abortion and demonic activity travelled from the U.S. to tell us all about it. The gospel groups came from the U.S. to sing their praises. Our printed materials for Sunday School came from the U.S. to indoctrinate our children. Our youth programming came from the U.S. Seminars and mission events were held in the U.S. We were inundated with the U.S. conservative evangelical movement and when the church growth movement started, we did it too. During my short stint in Bible College some of our full-time profs were Americans.
We have friends and family in the U.S. By the way, the U.S. family are very conservative and think we Canadians aren’t the sharpest tools in the tool chest. Talk about vitriol.
When I came online in 2001 , to forums looking for help with spiritual abuse I knew not one Canadian. When I started blogging a few years later, I still did not know one Canadian blogger. When it came to Christian blogs they were American. I literally lived in the American Christian world day and night online. The books I read were written my American authors. The forums were run by Americans. It formed my world view both religiously and politically. And though when I deconstructed what I use to believe I slowly left that world with as much grace as I could knowing that once again I was disappointing people I had networked with for years.
When I started writing as an agnostic and then an agnostic atheist I found only one online atheist woman and she was American. She stopped blogging years ago. Later I found John Loftus’s blog and though it was way out of my league that’s where I started to learn of others who had left Christianity and were blogging about it. Then over the years, ex-Christian blogs blew up all over the place and guess what? All American. I was still fully engaged in the U.S. as we all wrote about, commented on and discussed leaving the faith. I think a few other Canadians were in the mix but I no longer know as I myself don’t read hardly any blogs. If you look at my list of blog sites, almost all of them are dormant as many people aren’t blogging anymore. I still leave some of their blogs listed just in case by chance someone pops in here looking for information and maybe then they can find stuff that will help them with their doubt and changing beliefs. Maybe they won’t feel so alone.
So I’ve just sat around in here, though less and less as the years pass by, toying a bit I suppose with what might have been or what should have been. Then Covid-19 startled not only me, but you and an entire universe with traumatic changes. I decided to try and develop a cohesive way of learning about QAnon and trying to understand mom so that every single time I am in touch with her I am not literally slain and knocked off my feet for days, weeks &/or months at a time. And I’m sorry but I can’t talk about QAnon without talking about the U.S. President, his government and the people who believe it. And yes, we have QAnon here in Canada but every bit of mom’s stuff comes from U.S. websites. So I am pissed beyond measure. I’ve been traumatized since Trump came down the escalator. I’m not the only one. And yes I know people are dying and starving and killing one another and despairing. I bloody well know that Violet. And though you aren’t reading this, I’m content to know you’ve moved on because this blog doesn’t meet your expectations anymore. Hell, it doesn’t meet mine, apart from the fact that I can come in here because it is my blog and prattle on about what ever it is that is making me sick to my stomach at the moment.
Violet: “I initially came to this blog because we both had similar experiences of being beaten down by religion. Religion was something I was born into and had no control over when I was a child. Now I’m leaving this blog because because I’m being beaten down for being American…something I was also born into and have no control over. You can say I’m taking things too personally, but when I read post after post of hatred toward the US, I feel unwelcome here.”
Zoe: You can take it personally. If there’s anything I’ve learned now by age 64 is that a woman has every right to take whatever it is that she finds offensive and hateful and leave. I don’t hate the U.S. Violet. That is over the top. It’s because I care that I’m angry, scared and traumatized by what’s going on. I am taking what is going on in the U.S. personally. You want to blame me for hating the U.S. go ahead. I only hate Trump and the goons who once ran against him and all said on tape that he was terrible in every way shape or form. Now they have bowed down to him and kissed his ass. Yes, I take that personally because as the U.S. goes often the world goes and it damn well affects/effects Canadians too. As well, right from the start, what is going on in the U.S. government reminds me hook, line and sinker of my days in church. Is this all stuff for a therapist? Yup.
Violet: “I wish you only the best on your journey. My journey leads me elsewhere now.”
Zoe: Okay. You may feel unwelcome here. I would never dispute what you feel. For the sake of people who may read here and wonder, people who have the password to my password protected posts are not unwelcome and Violet, that includes you. I don’t give my password out to just anybody. There are people who have asked and I’ve said, no. We are people and there’s so much more to both of us as human beings than what is shared on this one blog.
Addendum: For those reading this, I apologize for the discomfort. I’m feeling it too. I do not expect anyone to feel they have to respond &/or comment. We’re all entitled to come and go and to give voice.
“Say what you want to say and let the words fall out, honestly . . . ” (from the Brave song.)
Secular Wings 
Violet: “If I were asked which country in the world hates the US the most, I would have to say it’s Canada.”
Zoe: I would say if I was asked, the U.S. does a fine job of hating itself and one another. Then maybe China and North Korea might hate you more than Canadians. Of course, I don’t know which Canadians or Canadian bloggers you are referring too.
Violet: “I don’t know why, but it seems it’s a Canadian religion to bash Americans every chance they get. You know what’s odd? I almost never hear of Americans having vitriol for our neighbors North of the boarder.”
Zoe: Almost never but sometimes?
Violet: “I notice that you never talk about your own country on this blog, but persistently harp on every flaw Americans have. I’ve read many Canadian blogs but have had to bow out of all of them for this same reason.”
Zoe: I gave up talking about my own country when my adult children assumed positions in the community and province that would expose them if people knew who their mom was and what she was writing online. That’s also when I chose the option for search engines to ignore my blog. I also moved here to this new url (14 years ago according to my WordPress Anniversary notice last week) when I made those decisions. Up and until then I was followed by bloggers all over the world in the Christian community. During that time I spoke up politically about Canada frequently as it pertained to religion, not just Christianity but often involving Islam. I wrote frequently about honour killings and wrote a long article encouraging a former Premier to outlaw Sharia law. The next day he did. Did he see my article? I don’t know. The point being I was a prolific writer and at that time unafraid in regards to my government. I have been a political person my entire life, having written to my Canadian government during my college years as well as being outspoken in the community, medical and educational system. I’ve also had politicians in my family. It’s in me. As well I have been an advocate for the abused outside the church, for those with special needs, for those who are dying and in the mental health field. At one point, I became very concerned about exposure and people figuring out who Zoe was/is. I also developed a fear because I was outspoken regarding Islam and the honour killings happening here. I was brave then. I’m not now. And though I wrote about this in a previous blog and during my busier blogging days, I was scared to death of a former friend’s “lover” who at one time was involved with (removed as this info. can still trigger me). Shortly after being verbally and abusively in written form, attacked by her, my husband had to pick me up off the floor from being shattered in a million pieces as she told me I was an abomination to the Lord and responsible for raising and immoral and corrupt generation of children. Narcissists love to hit you where your strengths are. Meanwhile she’s carrying on an affair with a converted preacher (removed this info. as it is still triggering) guy. But I’m the abomination. And just sharing that there is too much information to put in a blog.
In my 30’s I fought for my life with severe illness, spending almost 2 years in bed, only later to be hospitalized and fighting for my life sick with intestinal disease as well as battling a body and mind that were deteriorating. If I’m not mistaken, you suffer as well. In my 40’s I began to deconstruct my religion and belief system understanding that I was falling apart emotionally and mentally due to Christian abuse and felt the extreme weight of guilt and shame for having taken part in it, raising my children in it, losing friends over it and being active in youth ministry. As well, I began to develop deep understanding of the roots of original trauma from my youth. I’ve never been the same since. This blog is read by maybe 6 people though all kinds of people *follow* it and commenting here is at a minimum. You have been privy I believe to some of my password protected posts and know some of the shit I’ve been through. You also know I’m not a human being who ignores the humanity of other people.