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Atheism is simply non-belief

Christians and other religious people often repeat the same tired accusations when lashing out at Atheists. Among the most often heard claim is that Atheists are responsible for all the genocides and atrocities perpetrated by regimes in the modern era. This is completely untrue. In fact no nation has ever done anything evil in the name of atheism.

Russia and China have regimes that don't advocate religions and claim an atheistic attitude towards spiritualist dogma. However, as atheism has no ideology outside of the non-belief in supernatural deities, it can't be blamed for wars or hate crimes. That's like saying Hitler and Stalin were evil because they both had mustaches.

Both Hitler and Stalin were raised in devoutly religious households incidentally. Hitler was baptized a Roman Catholic. So using them to bolster such a claim is absurd.

There is no world view or idolatry associated with atheism. We don't worship Charles Darwin for example. Many of us respect him for his huge contribution to science which is responsible for advances in many fields including medicine but there are no Darwinists. Worshipping individuals is part of the religious mindset and shouldn't be projected onto the non-religious.

We don't hate God either. No more than religious people hate Odin, Zeus, Vishnu or a host of other deities outside of their particular religion. Why would we hate a fictional imaginary person? It's the religion many of us hate and only because it tried to indoctrinate many of us in school or we've met annoying street preachers etc.

Many atheists used to be religious but learned too much about their faith and came to the realization they had been brain washed. That no evidence existed for their faith and in fact their scripture was composed of ridiculous contradictory fairy tales. In the case of religious indoctrination too much knowledge can actually be a good thing which is why religions discourage questions.

One of the most annoying claims made by Theists is that non-believers have no morality. This assumes that only religious people have a sense of right and wrong. Yet religious dogma is more fundamentally flawed than secular law which governs modern western societies. We no longer stone adulterers or burn accused witches. In fact studies have shown atheists are more compassionate, less likely to support torture or the death penalty and far less likely to end up in prison.

Despite this there is a lot of hatred directed towards atheists in both the East and West. Americans don't trust them and in many Middle Eastern nations they are locked up for simply not believing in a magical sky fairy.

Because atheists don't have any unifying beliefs outside of thinking claims for the existence of any god should be backed up with compelling evidence they've been slow to find solidarity and work together as a movement. That seems to be changing now. Because nothing unites people like an outside threat and religious people have always been a threat to atheists.

Perhaps the last Catholic Inquisition ended long ago but religious people still hold many positions of power in politics and are using it to force their beliefs on everyone else including atheists and people of other faiths.

Oklahoma just banned atheists from marrying.

http://www.thefrisky.com/2015-03-19/oklahoma-bans-atheist-marriages-in-hopes-of-preventing-gay-ones/

Personally I don't see that as being such a bad thing as marriage is basically a religious invention principally concerned with making a woman the property of a man. It has lost much of its value nowadays anyway. Two out of three weddings end up in divorce and most people only marry for financial reasons.

Although atheists don't share a world view their individual beliefs aren't influenced by a pervading belief in mythology so certain ideas are more likely than not when compared to Theists. Beliefs such as global warming which is supported by the vast majority of world scientists. When there is a global consensus by leading scientists on a major issue like the ice caps melting you would expect politicians to agree with the experts. Instead, the religious politicians in America are arguing with them.

Atheist groups are now slowly forming to create their own communities and political parties and the non-believers now comprise about a third of the population in America, Western Europe and Australia which is around the same level of support as Catholicism but its still early days.

Like racial and sexual equality the rules of society are changing fast and each new generation is more tolerant than the last but religion has always been the principle obstacle to such change and as the last great perceived enemy of religion the atheists might have the toughest battle of them all. 

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