Yeah, you do. And Skyrim allows for that.

The Thalmor know Talos is a god. They just hate him. Banning his worship was done mainly for two reasons:

1) It drives a wedge into the Empire that weakens it from the inside.

2) Humans believe that after the beginning of creation, the gods brought about the existence of mortals from the earth bones. This makes them revere Lorkhan for starting creation. Elves believe that they descended from the first beings to form and existed as spirits prior to creation. They hate Lorkhan for starting creation and forcing their spirits into a cycle of life and death as mortals.

Talos, having taken Lorkhan's mantle in the Wheel of Convention, is thus to be hated in their eyes. The Thalmor's ultimate goal is to finish destroying or disabling the remaining towers that hold together the Wheel, thus ripping apart creation and returning the universe to how it was before Lorkhan's betrayal tricked the gods into creation.

Talos is Lorkhan. He may not be considered aedric because I don't think Lorkhan is considered aedric. The deity that tricked the gods into creation didn't technically participate in it.

Yeah, it's a little difficult to make peace with people who think the right thing to do is to destroy the universe. That's the kind of ideology that simply doesn't play nice with others.

Well then you might as well worship Alduin and his dragon priests.

I don't know/not sure I care. I am against Thalmor forbidding people though.

At the same time, I understand why the Thalmor are angry about it. From what I can tell, not only was Talos a mortal, but he kinds of sounds like a piece of crap. Mind you, I think the same of my own character. That said, why am I not divine then? This is what goes through the average Thalmor's mind too, probably. "What makes this other piece of crap so special?"

Alduin is not a Deity. Dragon are by nature Immortal, and Alduin was the First Dragon created by Akatosh, but he never Ascended/Mantled Akatosh/achieved CHIM. The only reason Parthurnax couldn't defeat/stop Alduin is because of Alduins power, but Parthurnax reveres/worsips Akatosh, not Alduin. Alduin jealously guards the right to eat the Souls in Sovngarde because it is his right as First Created by Akatosh, and it is within his title as the World Eater, not because he is divine.

The Dragon Priests received power from the Dragons because the Dragons had such a mastery of Magic/Thu'um, not because they are Deific beings.

What judges whether something is Divine? The Psijic Order dislikes the term; everyone is a god to them. A "God" is a very Mannish term, the elves call them "ancestors." Auriel is a better ancestor than them, but a "god" isn't a proper term.

My character is a monotheist

Hail Sithis!

If I am a god, even in Palmyra, how do I heal gout? - Augustus Caesar

The Psijic Order dislikes the term; everyone is a god to them.

Oblivioin: Knights of the Nine I believe answers this, as Talos gives you a gift to defeat Umaril the Unfeathered.
Then there are the operational shrines and amulets.
If someone is not a god, you won't see any results from a shrine or a medal to them except placebo effects.

Eight. Long before the false god was forced onto Tamriel, there were the Eight. Now, with the fake teachings finally debunked... there are Eight again.

Oblivioin: Knights of the Nine I believe answers this, as Talos gives you a gift to defeat Umaril the Unfeathered.
Then there are the operational shrines and amulets.
If someone is not a god, you won't see any results from a shrine or a medal to them except placebo effects.

I say we compromise and go with, "Thank the 89" and include the daedric princes, arch mages, liches, and the top 10 most attractive people of Tamriel each year by forum poll.

The Thalmor wouldn't be so hung up on having him banned from worship if he were merely a well respected human mistakenly worshipped by fools. They have a problem with him because he IS a divine and that throws a spanner in their master plan to unmake Nirn as Talos IS Lorkhan in a sense, in the same way the Champion of Cyrodiil IS Sheogorath

Well a daedra can give you their blessing. Doesn't mean their worth worshipping. Also mages have spells that effect others as well as having the ability to create enchanted objects. What makes you think Talos and infact all divine shrines are blessed and not merely enchanted objects of the mages?

Exactly. A lot of people compare the Thalmor to the Nazis and I do believe that is a fair assessment. Their ideology and their megalomania leaves no room for rational thoughts.