I know I've posted on here about what things helped me not be religious anymore. And I'm sure many of us have seen this video. I first watched it when I was still religious and had a good laugh but disagreed with him of course. Then I watched it again 1 or 2 years after originally seeing it when I was questioning God, and it was what he said in here (even though he's doing a comedic act) that really put the icing on the cake. I'm grateful for the media we have available today because without it I wouldn't have been able to pull myself out of religion.
Part of what made him so wonderful, was his dead-on, tell it like it is approach. With that license to speak uncomfortable truths , that comedians have in the name of laughter - Carlin spoke volumes about religion and it's inherent BS. He made people squirm. He sometimes silenced them with his outrageous words. And yet, he saw things as they are - as they really are.
Hail, King George !
That says it all! Watching a Carlin HBO special gave me the courage to publicly declare my Atheism. The indoctrination process that children are put through and the parental/peer pressure is very strong in upper middle class environments. You run the risk of complete alienation from everyone near and dear.
Carlin was the first stand up I was familiar with many years ago. Now it seems that I discover new ones all the time. Ricky Gervais, Eddie Izzard, Jim Jefferies, Seth MacFarlane, Bill Maher and Julia Sweeney have all been popular. I’ll always owe a debt to Carlin as he was the first to get right in my face with it, make me think and make me damn proud to be atheist.