I want to point out this is not about religion. Religion doesn't make me angry. It is the idea that you will exist after you die that makes me angry.

The reason is that it becomes an excuse for humans to put up with suffering and lower states of being. You would think that it would inspire people to act more ethically or do great works, but I feel the opposite happens instead.

This is of course anecdotal, meant to be a discussion, and with different view points. I am not preaching nor claiming truth here. When I listen to those who have accomplished great things in life, be it financial, ethical, or personal goal oriented, I rarely here, "I did it because I know there's life after death." I hear, "I love people, I love myself, I wanted to be remembered. I wanted to accomplish great things, I couldn't bear to watch others suffer, etc. It is the here and now that motivates people to action, not the great beyond.

Yet when I have spoken with people who believe in life after death, and as someone who once believed in it, I have found it is a convenient excuse for why you don't do more. The mind can imagine that it is worth suffering today because eventually your later life will not suffer. Almost everyone who believes in life after death believes they are worthy of it, and it will be pleasant and not torturous.

Further, it is easy to implicitly deny the immediacy of other's suffering. When my Aunt died of cancer, my mother thought it was sad that my Aunt didn't believe in life after death. My mother than proudly claimed that she wouldn't be afraid of death when it came because she knew it wasn't the end. I had to tell her that she would be afraid regardless, and that was ok. It is not wrong to feel afraid, or to admit we and others suffer. Facing that head on means we are there to comfort, assist, and not judge. When we realize the reality of pain, loss, and things we will never get back, it can inspire us to be there for others instead of removing ourselves from it.

Further, I find the idea of life after death the ultimate in arrogance and hubris. All scientific evidence and even anecdotal evidence shows that when you die, you are dead. And yet many people insist that there is something out there because...you're more intelligent than other animals? Because you've thought all of your life, so why wouldn't you continue to think? Because what you strongly believe is more important than the facts in front of you? It is a denial of the world around you. And I feel denial of reality is a habit. When you do it in small things, it tends to bleed out in larger things.

And I suppose this is the ultimate source of my anger. It is not the belief in life after death per say, it is the belief in something that is not real, that I, in my viewpoint, see as self-evidently wrong after these years. And I suppose the anger I feel is not at the people who choose to believe in life after death, but the suffering, procrastination, and hubris it can cause a person to feel. It is the negative hear and now that I feel it causes other people, and that is what I wanted to examine, not in the afterlife, but today.