annoyatron: tumbleweed and crickets

I see we are having a religious debate on Tumblr

To me it sounds more like you fit in with LaVeyan Satanism, which has nothing to do with Satan or God or any other religion. Or maybe you want to be cute and cuddly and be all Wiccan, who knows?

Being anti-religion is not the same thing as Atheism, though. Atheism exclusively deal with the non-belief in deities. If you are willing to say that no deities exist, no matter what, then you are Atheist. If you translate any of these into the belief in friendship, love, and family, it’s not Atheism. It’s something else.

secretcara:

The wonderful thing about atheism is that it doesn’t have to mean the same thing to every person. My atheism is this belief system: I believe that this is the only life I have, that there is no magical man that made the world or controls what goes in it, and that arguments about ethics, right/wrong & morality that rely in any way on on the idea of a “creator” are invalid to me.  This is just my atheism.

But, I do admit that as an “evangelical atheist” (as my dad dubbed me) I can be anti-religion. Not on an individual or personal level, but on a wider scale.  The only way atheists will pull themselves out of the “most distrusted minority in the country” spot is by (1) showing we’re capable of being “good people” without a god and (2) showing that religion doesn’t automatically mean someone is “good people”. And we have to work on revealing and reinforcing that 2nd part, and for whatever reason I get a kick out of being atheist in public & in private. Others are content to not even worry or care about religion.  But I like to be more in your face.

*disclaimer* I do NOT want to debate this on Tumblr. I don’t debate b/c I don’t cite sources and follow all the textbook logical processes. I prefer discussions. But I don’t really want a one-on-one discussion on Tumblr either. I’d rather save that for email, chat or in person. But reading other folks interpretation of their atheism would be pretty cool.

annoyatron:

I’m already bored and will continue to hand out beer and benzos until you guys settle the fuck down and play some Brutal Legend with me instead of perpetuating this inane nonsense. We can discuss religion and politics ad nauseum.

For the reference, here’s an excerpt from the Wikipedia entry on Atheism:

Atheism, defined most narrowly, is the position that there are no deities.^[1] More broadly defined, it is the rejection of belief in the existence of any deities, with or without an assertion that no deities exist.^[2] The broadest definition classifies atheism as the absence of belief that any deities exist.^[3]

As such, I would consider it a dogmatic belief system. You basically say that “Whatever deity somebody else believes in, I don’t believe in.” That’s a silly — not to mention narrow-minded — approach. Maybe some of you mean to say that you are Agnostic?

Agnosticism is the view that the truth value of certain claims—especially claims about the existence of any deity, but also other religious and metaphysical claims—is unknown or unknowable.^[1] Agnosticism can be defined in various ways, and is sometimes used to indicate doubt or a skeptical approach to questions. In some senses, agnosticism is a stance about the differences between belief and knowledge, rather than about any specific claim or belief.

Or maybe you are more along my lines: I don’t give a fuck about religion!