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Is your yard private?

Mines not! Walked out into my backyard with the calmness of songbirds everywhere only to be interrupted by music and WTH! a gospel hymn! Where's that coming from? All my neighbors are older with no teenagers to be playing loud music. Aaah, yes, a protestant church two blocks from my yard was using a PA system to hold an in-car church service. All the faithful followers/worshipers of their eternal god were huddled in their autos afraid to go into god's house for fear of becoming ill and dying! How ironic! The all-powerful being they were worshiping (with their tithes and offerings mostly) seemed to be unable or unwilling to protect his sheep from possible death. Then shortly, all the car horns began to sound! Such devotion! If heaven is all their god claims it to be, why would they all just not do as they did in Jonestown, drink the Koolaide, and go on to be with their heavenly father in paradise? Perhaps somewhere down deep within their "soul" they actually do not believe what their church leaders are teaching. Maybe they know, deep down, that there is NO paradise after death. Such delusion; and now it seems to have spread into my backyard. Oh well, I'm OK as long as they don't come by with their collection plate asking for my tithe! 🙂 Larry in western Kentucky

Justme43 7 May 17
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39 comments

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1

Is there no law against noise pollution where you live?

There may be a local ordinance, I don't know. It wasn't too disturbing, but I just thought how ironic it was the way the church members were attending the "house of their lord" and yet could not depend on him to keep them safe if they went into his house. 🙂

Most likely the local police would not enforce an ordinance on noise pollution against a local church (especially if they, or another on the force, were a member).

@AtheistInNC They have to.

@Justme43 It sounds like they are obeying the law and not assembling in person; which is more than I can say for some churches who make such orders out to be tantamount to religious persecution. And, about the noise, I think it depends on the time of day and the decibels involved. It might be annoying, but also perfectly legal.

It's rather ironic, I think. It seems these people want to make noise to show their devotion to the non-church goers and heathens; but it likely just pisses a bunch of people off.

@Joanne Actually the noise was not that annoying. Just the fact, like you said, ironic they assemble and then are afraid of the very superior being whom they are there to worship! That was the point of my post, not so much the noise. And yes, I would much perfer them to meet in their autos so when they leave they don't infect someone at the grocery Monday morning!

@Justme43 : I would be annoyed. Loud music, and honking horns, no thank you 🙂.

7

You have my sympathy. Call the police. If your city has a noise ordinance, they may shut it down.

Living on the top floor of a triplex, I have views of the Cascade Mountain foothills from every window. With rain and cooler temperatures, the foothills are green and covered with wildflowers. Looks like Switzerland.

But the Christian couple who live below me have been holding church services in their apartment, defying the state ban on gatherings of people.

This morning, they played loud church music and sang mournful hymns. Noise moves out and up.

Unwilling to listen to that crap, I played Elton John's "Diamond" CD. Turned it up. Elton John is a flamboyant, gay, married superstar, the type of person they hate. Hahaha!

Next Sunday have a plan to get out of the house. If they do it again, do the same thing but instead of Elton John (excellent choice, btw) put a porno on and head out the door.

Correct speaker placement can insure they hear it just fine

Bow Chicka wow wow.

Next week, find some good death metal to compliment their choice in music.

😜Good on You! That's so funny. It's a wonder that they didn't try to call the police for you interferring with their "god-given right" of religious freedom violations. They are all so "butt-hurt" about their beliefs and feelings.

@1of5

Hilarious!

@Justme43

Thank you. Love your turn of phrase, "butt-hurt." Apt.

John Phillips Sousa played really loud gets one's attention, it is also patriotic so if you can stand it loud it makes a point.

@1of5 in sure if you went online you could find some "alternative" video interpretations for "the passion of Christ" if you know what I mean. ,

@Justme43

Just put on Gabor Szabo's wonderful "Spellbinder" album.

They probably think jazz is music of the Devil.

snicker

6

I have a church a block away from my house whose parking lot is just across an alley from my backyard. I enjoy leaving my dogs outside extra long on Sundays to bark at them as they come and go, imagining the devout hearing them as hell hounds coming to drag them to the inferno.

5

There is considerable space between the homes out here. We're outside the
city limits, things are a little more spread out.
Sometimes, the neighborhood dogs can be heard. It rarely bothers me.
Sometimes, I can hear the neighbors behind us playing music when they're outside, and I'm outside.
It doesn't bother me, I generally like what they listen to.

I have also lived in places where I had extremely noisy neighbors, and it was a real
pain in the ass.

Privacy is a really relative and subjective concept.
It often depends on what each individual considers it to be for them.
It also depends on whether people have any respect for others.

5

Ah, it won't solve anything - but it is cathartic to do things like: play with laser pointers during service. Green ones are BRIGHT and you can be a couple of blocks away. Always just in the corner of peoples vision, never letting them see the source 🙂 Do you have a mic and amp? Or a bullhorn? There are phone apps that play ultra-sonic sounds that folks can't figure out the direction of, but are torturous and would get them just fine through car windows. Also, simply stickers and notes put in late the night before -- ads for Crucifix shaped dildo's. Pictures of kids starving to death with questions about God, and etc! Great fun! And they are forcing their audio on you . . . so they are fair game.

Here are a few of good graphics, just in the spirit! (I really do have hundreds of stickers printed from thousands of different graphics, I have been doing this for 20+ years now) I put them around towns, with a small email address on them too, because I WANT the pieces of shit to come after me about it. Glory!:

4

Yikes!!!! We moved out here in the boonies 10 years ago to escape the lack of privacy of the city. Hopefully, we get some privacy on our 17.5 acres. Few people actually come to our place. BUT, the JWs found us!!!!

The churches in our town hold online church services. Here, religion is private and few people talk about their religion in public. If you want to participate, you participate. If you don't want to participate, that's none of anyone else's business. Even the JWs were appeased with my just taking their pamphlet and they just went away.

@graceylou

I repel Jehovah's Witnesses by saying:

"I'm an atheist. We are ALL atheists here," grandly waving my arm to include the entire neighborhood.

That shuts them up. Good. I never take their pamphlets.

They haven't bothered me since.

@LiterateHiker I find it easier to just take the pamphlet and send them on their way. They show up may be once every 2-3 years. I know from experience in the city that if I say anything about not believing they would try to argue with me and push more.

Post this

@AtheistInNC Nah. It would take them longer to read that than for me to deal with them my way. Since I only get those visitors only once every few years it’s not worth doing anything about it. Besides, friends, family, and law enforcement aren’t welcome here.

4

Seems like a great opportunity to troll the congregation wondering through the parking lot with a big sign saying "Allahu Akbar" or "If you truly believe your God will protect you in church". Maybe hand out balloons with a message attached "Breath of Christ faith test. Pop me in your car and pray".

But nah, life is too short to waste on trolling auto worshippers. #MostlyHarmless

Oh, my! Those signs would be silly and fun, but the balloon idea is truly wicked (still funny, though.)

4

No one fights harder from taking an early trip to heaven than Christians. They will spend every last dime they have to stay right here.

4

Tell me about it! Where I live there are four churches within two blocks of my house. Three of them have electronic carillons and I am subject to at least five minutes of loud carillon hymns at least three times a day. I can guarantee you if there were a Mosque broadcasting a call to prayer five times daily there would be hell to pay from my pious Christian neighbors. Our freedom of religion is quite subjective!

4

Once in a school road trip to the North of Portugal, the local church would play the mass in loudspeakers, like at 7 in the morning, which isn't the nicest way to wake up to. They want to worship, fine, no problem. Now, make others listen to that, when they are on holidays and try to get some sleep? Bad form. Unfortunately, many people think it's acceptable as it's in the name of God... then they wouldn't tolerate a band practicing because they were too loud... the hypocrisy...

3

We live on 10 heavily wooded acres....everyone all around us has a considerable amount of property. Last night - about 7 pm. the "shooting" started. And it went on for about 30 minutes. Probably a bunch of the hillbilly neighbors who spent their corona money on new guns and lots of ammo just having a fine old time on a Saturday night shooting - at who knows what. There are (outside) cats that roam these properties - we have deer that come to the feeders we've put out....seen a fox or two not to mention the possums that come to clean up whatever the cat didn't eat. I hate to think about what innocent animals may have been caught up in their big Saturday night special. uggghhhhhhhhh

Ok . After I read this , new rules ma’am ! U better text me every Saturday night . Are u kidding ? And no gardening for u ! No near the end of your land . Jesus f christ ! These people will shoot u and think they got a baby deer . No . Just noooooo !!!! Ok I am freaking out now !!!

Not to worry......no wandering around the property for me in the evenings. Especially right now - I found two snakes while clearing out underbrush up in the "park" area. Don't freak out - they were very small ones and they scurried away as scared of me as I was of them. We have a pair of hawks that have been hanging around lately - hopefully finding the snakes. Circle of life, honey..... 😉 😉 🙂

3

Can you not complain about the noise to the police? Sure if it was something traditional like church bells but this seems OTT.
I certainly would be tempted to out amp them with "Sympathy for the Devil"

3

Don't get the wrong idea. The sounds coming from the parking lot were not that annoying except for the horn blowing. But it just struck me as really interesting to think about how the "believers" were acting towards their divine god during this season of disease. It seems their "trust" in him may not be as strong as we would have thought! 🤷‍ Larry in western Kentucky

All things considered, I'm glad that they're doing as they are, to curb the spread of disease. You're absolutely right, though, that this speaks volumes about what they actually believe (or don't).

2

It seems like it would be a whole lot more private, convenient and less invasive to do a virtual service on Zoom or something, but then , the whole Idea is invasiveness whenever possible, I suppose. I probably would have reported the noise and filed a disturbing the peace complaint. Can you imagine the ruckus if they were piping a Muslim prayer over an outdoor PA system?

Deb57 Level 8 May 19, 2020
2

I feel like you can make a funny comedy video for YouTube out of what's going on. Thanks for sharing!

2

sometimes I like hearing the old church songs they remind me of my granny she use to sing them in her sleep

2

I can feel your pain, but if you think about it, it could have been "It's a Small world" being played over and over again. 🤯 😁 Oh yes the answer would be no it's not.

@OldMetalHead summer of 1966, It still hurts. 😉

2

My city has a noise ordinance. "Noise" includes any electronically amplified sound (music). The sound cannot be audible more than 50 feet off the property line during the day, and not audible at all off the property line after 8pm. I use that law liberally.

2

You are fortunate not to live next door! We have a Catholic church nearby, but all we ever hear are bells (recorded) for mass. Not the worst thing in the world ... reminds me of when I lived in Europe.

2

Complete absence of caring, how jeebus-like!

2

I’d say my garden is private but not to sound. There is a public park all along our eastern border and occasionally there are events permitted where loud music overwhelms my space. But I’ve learned just to go with it. Sometimes someone will just bring a horn or other instrument out to the park to practice. I usually prefer whatever they do to my canned music.

2

Doesn't your city/town/county have noise ordinances? Blasting their services to be heard 2 blocks away sounds more than excessive to me - whether it's something I agree with or not.

They would claim they were being persecuted and start talking about religious freedom.
And we all know by that they mean is the "right" to do as they please. And deny that "right" to any non- christian

@HumanistJohn - No doubt, you are correct.

2

One hour a week of that wouldn't bother me at all. As long as they’re not trying to convert me, they can do whatever makes them happy and gives them peace.

The problem is that a lot of them vote.
They don't keep their beliefs private but want to force them on everybody else.

So long as they are cool with a meeting of satanic worshippers broadcasting their tunes at a similar volume then all's good.

@prometheus I agree! What’s fair for one group should be fair for the others. 😉

And you show them that love thy neighbor is not a religious requirement. It is the right thing to do.

2

I can hear you pain especially for the honking but I do appreciate the church trying to protect their members and the people those members also come in contact with.

Despite my distaste for religion, I still love the old fashioned spiritual music such as Amazing Grace. I love jazz and the blues and that's definitely part of that genre's history.

Oh yes, I can appreciate their attempts to protect their members and attempting not to spread the virus to outsiders. At least they are using a lot more common sense than those churches that are still holding indoor services. 👍 Larry in western Kentucky

I was raised in a British non religious school but we still did signing practice once a week. Somehow all the songs were hyms, carols, or otherwise religious, funny that. So I do have an instinctive affinity for "Jerusalem" and a few carols - even without the schoolboy alternative lyrics which most of us did sing compulsively much to our teacher's annoyance.

And there's things like classical religious music ("passions" ) which can be frankly "devine" in the right space. Plus the words are usually Latin or something so it isn't like you're listening to anything meaningfully religious, just meaningless words and sounds.

2

To answer your questions: HellifIno

twill Level 7 May 17, 2020
2

One characteristic church goers like this rely on to both believe in the mythology and function in life simultaneously is the ability to compartmentalize the religion from objective reality. They often do this with political figures too. No contradiction, just compartmentalization.

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