r/humanism

I was wondering if there are many on this subreddit who think of themselves as pagan humanists or who incorporate elements of modern pagan beliefs and practices into a humanist worldview?

I think of myself as primarily being a Humanist, so I have a view of the world that is largely based in science and rationality. I’m skeptical of most metaphysical claims such as the existence of an afterlife, of supernatural beings/deities or the soul and I try to base my ethical decisions on empathy.

But, I also Increasingly find a lot of meaning in ideas that come from the modern paganist movement. Things like marking the wheel of the year and paying attention to the rhythms of nature. Seeing that as a metaphor that mirrors the phases of human life. I’m also very interested in folklore and the ways it can help us to feel connected to our ancestors and our environment.

I’m aware that a lot of neopagan beliefs in Britain are a bit of a confection that blend together various new age beliefs with bits of folklore and that a lot of its historical roots are only about a century old as most pre-Christian beliefs have been either completely lost to time or subsumed into mainstream Christianity, but nevertheless it still speaks to me and scratches an itch when I am looking for more ritual or to look to something transcendent.

I’m getting married next month and we’ve opted to incorporate quite a few pagan elements into the ceremony we’ve designed, like having a hand fasting and choosing to have it in the wood, using a lot of imagery from nature in the words. We’ve had to tweak a few elements from more standard pagan ceremonies though to more explicitly frame things as metaphors rather than actual beliefs in spirits/gods etc and I’m still a bit worried some of my family will think it’s a bit out there and woo-woo.

This might seem a bit of a rambling post but really I’m just wondering if anyone else similarly mixes bits of other religions and beliefs into their Humanism and if anyone else ever feels a bit of a tension between them?

There is substantial scientific evidence that shared autism in close friendships is not “just a label.”

Research increasingly shows that autistic-autistic friendships can involve genuinely different communication dynamics, emotional safety, reciprocity, and mutual understanding.

One of the biggest modern theories explaining this is the Double Empathy Problem developed by Damian Milton. The theory argues that communication difficulties between autistic and non-autistic people are mutual mismatches, not simply deficits in autistic people. (Sage Journals)

A major theme across studies is that autistic people often report:

• feeling more understood by other autistic people,
• needing to “mask” less,
• experiencing less social exhaustion,
• and communicating more naturally and directly with autistic peers. (Sage Journals)

One especially striking paper was literally titled:

>

That study found autistic adults consistently described autistic-autistic relationships as:

• calmer,
• safer,
• more authentic,
• less judgmental,
• and emotionally easier to navigate than mixed neurotype relationships. (Sage Journals)

Another 2026 study found autistic adults reported:

• better communication with other autistic people,
• less need to camouflage,
• and lower interpersonal strain. (ScienceDirect)

This matters because traditional stereotypes often claimed autistic people lacked empathy or social desire. Modern research increasingly rejects that simplistic framing. Instead, many researchers now argue:

• autistic people frequently do connect deeply,
• but often connect differently,
• and especially well with people sharing similar neurocognitive styles. (Sage Journals)

The scoping review on autistic friendship experiences also found autistic friendships are often characterized by:

• strong loyalty,
• intense emotional investment,
• shared interests,
• deep protective instincts,
• and comfort in reduced social performance demands. (Springer)

If anything, current literature would interpret much of that as potentially consistent with autistic relational styles:

• intense attachment,
• caregiving through action,
• protective devotion,
• emotional sincerity,
• and what some researchers call monotropic focus — deep, highly invested bonds with specific people. (Springer)

There is also evidence autistic people are often misread by non-autistic observers as lacking emotion even when they are feeling things intensely. (ResearchGate)

Importantly, the research does not say:
“all autistic people automatically connect with each other.”

But it does strongly support the idea that shared neurotype can fundamentally alter:

• ease of communication,
• felt safety,
• emotional reciprocity,
• and depth of understanding.

So scientifically, shared autism in a friendship is not merely a diagnostic coincidence or “label.” Research increasingly suggests it can shape the entire interpersonal environment of the friendship itself.

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Do you guys think it’s normal to bond with your best friend over things like shared personality, neurotype, interests, and so on?

Hello all! As the title suggests, I’m looking for good humanist resources for kids. I’ve left my former evangelical faith but still married to a deeply religious person. We are trying to raise our 3 kids (12f, 8m, 6f) kids responsibly with critical thinking. But in reality I need some other resources to counter the indoctrination they get from church and other religious activities. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Cheers to the future!

We didn't just adopt technology, we outsourced parts of being human.

And I don't think people realize how far that's gone.

Technology isn't neutral anymore. It's not just changing what we do, it's changing how we think, feel, desire and relate to the world. We've optimized so much of our lives that we've started optimizing ourselves. Nobody asked for that part.

A few examples that genuinely bother me:

Love & relationships: No more magic, no more "a friend introduced me to a friend". Algorithms judge us on surface signals and create infinite choice illusion. You no longer build tolerance for imperfection, you just keep swiping for better. Externalized desire, weaker bonds, more loneliness. We are less human.

Democracy & opinion: Social platforms didn't create "free speech", they created privatized attention markets. Outrage and emotion get amplified, nuance gets buried. Elections are no longer about ideas, but about vibes. We don't debate anymore. We react. Algorithms don't vote, but they shape the emotional conditions where votes are made. That should scare people more than it does. We are less human.

Identity & taste: Instagram, TikTok, etc. don't show you content, they shape you. Every micro-interaction trains an algo to build an aesthetic + ideological bubble around you. You think you have a personal taste. You have a feed and the algorithm chose how you chose . More content than ever, less originality than ever. Everybody is the same. We are less human.

Silence & introspection: This steals your soul. We've made silence unbearable. Every moment of boredom gets filled. But boredom, daydreaming, mental wandering, that's literally where deep thinking, creativity and emotional processing happen. We've turned off our default mode network, the engine of our mind. Shallower thinking, higher anxiety, less clarity. And we call it being productive. Always chasing the next shining object. We are less human

AI & thinking: last but not least AI. We a f*cking less human

Technology steals people's souls, and people let their souls be stolen.

Like in Oh Canada you have the line “God keep our land glorious and free”, and in America the Beautiful you have lines such as “God shred his grace on thee” and “God mend thine every flaw”.

Personally, it doesn’t bother me as it’s so generic it doesn’t mean anything. The songs don’t define what they mean by “God”, “God” could easily be understood in this context as a poetic personification of fate or destiny or something along those lines. It doesn’t negatively impact my enjoyment of a poem about the ocean if personifies the sea as Neptune for example.

And I can find value in historical documents like the US Declaration of Independence or the Hippocratic Oath without subscribing to “Nature’s god” or to Apollo.

Despite the supernatural elements central to the plot, The Good Place is a very humanist show.

The characters discover that they were actually sent to the Bad Place in the afterlife after thinking that they were in the Good Place, and spent most of the show trying to morally improve enough to earn a spot in the actual Good Place.

The show explores ethics from varying perspectives; utilitarianism, deontology, virtue ethics, etc, and what it means to be a good person.

In the end they find that the whole afterlife system is broken at every level, with basically everyone doomed to the Bad Place and even the few in the Good Place not being happy. They then reform the afterlife so that instead of people being tortured forever they are given the opportunity to improve themselves until they can earn their way into the Good Place, and once you get tired of paradise (which you inevitably will), you can choose to go through a door where your identity as an individual will end and you will be “at peace”.

If there was an afterlife, though I don’t think there is, I’d want it to be something like that.

How are women and people of other gender identities marginalized in patriarchal societies? How do gender roles shape the worth of people in society? How does patriarchy dehumanize people of all genders? 

What are your thoughts on manned space flight? I think that it could be one of the only ways to continuously raise a humanist consciousness for people on earth. Every significant manned space expedition to some new frontier forced people to take a look at themselves in the mirror and realize our collective humanity. Every time an astronaut experiences the “overview effect” we can’t help but raise our global consciousness. If manned space travel becomes routine, I think the level of consciousness raising that would happen would be dramatic. I think space does not really feel like a real place for the average person. Once it does, some wild stuff is going to happen to our collective consciousness.

AI hatred is displaced anger from capitalism and imperialism. Rather than pointing at the root of the problem and saying, we must do something about this -- we point at the newest technology or social trend and attribute fault to it. This is an easy target and gets people to invest in the zeitgeist, to form a mob without a specific goal in mind or even a common purpose. It's like trying to slay a mythical hydra -- cut off three of the heads, and five more grow in their place.

So as we move from technology to technology, capitalism and imperialism grow stronger. This has been the case since the advent of the Silk Road 2100 years ago or before that the proliferation of irrigation 5000 years ago. The pace of development is beyond us. We rely on systems to care for us at scale, and we rely on process to navigate complexity; as things move faster we increasingly rely on these systems and their weak points become more apparent.

I'm not advocating for or against AI, it is a nuanced subject; but I am advocating for identifying the shared enemy. We must know where to start to make a difference here. And AI, it might be new and shiny, but it's not significantly more evil than these other technologies. It exasperates issues that have existed for thousands of years and of which are a direct result from the systems we rely on, the power hierarchy, and our way of life.

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Hey so I'm an Ex-Muslim and agnostic. I want to meet fellow secular people, humanists, free thinkers, apostates, non-religious people, etc.

I live in Canada, specifically in Ontario, and am aware of two organizations that look promising like the Centre for Inquiry Canada (CFIC) and Humanist Canada (HC). Both require yearly memberships to join and I am interested but both organizations seem kind of......dead? Like I joined the zoom link for one of the "Living without Religion" sessions by CFIC and there was literally no one there. The CFIC discord also has very few people in it and no one talks to each other.

I haven't tried out any of HC's events or sessions yet but I'm worried I'm gonna face a similar problem there since idk I just get the same dead feeling vibe from HC.

Can anyone vouch for either organization and tell me what it's like to be a member? If not these two then what other more active organizations are there?