When, Where, How and Why did you become Atheist?

[Gawdzilla]

Speaking of which, what are the reasons why someone who is programmed want someone want to program someone?  

Shared beliefs are comforting. And you get Heaven Points™ for "spreading the Holy Word". Doesn't matter if you drive the other person to distraction or make them really, really hate religion, because you're a step closer to the Golden Gates. It's self-serving and factious, but guys who babble on about their favorite footy club aren't much better. 

[robvalue]

Indeed, atheism isn't supposed to be a replacement for religion.

Critical thinking and scepticism are a vaccination against any forms of irrational thinking. There's no need to preach anti-anything propaganda, just give people the best tools and they will figure it out themselves.

Most people use scepticism at least vaguely well, they just jettison it completely in regard to their own pet religion/woo. Of course, getting someone to admit that is nearly impossible.

Anyone who actually has little or no scepticism is incredibly vulnerable.

[houseofcantor]

I agree rocks are not atheists, because "ist" implies a person. But they do present better arguments than some theists Rock solid ones!

Can always make a good argument with a rock. I'll have to remember to carry one.

[Qwest]

I almost feel like I have found my home reading this thread. I don't feel like an outcast for being where I am now.

I am a preachers kid and, although I haven't seen my bio father since 18, anyone raised in a strict church will understand what the "Christian guilt" does to you. I began to doubt and have distain for everything as a teen and would leave but the fear of " going to hell" would eventually send me back to church. By the end I was a full fledge, falling on the floor, speaking in tongues, waiting on the rapture Christian who read the bible and tried to ignore the things that didn't make sense or that I hated. I was in an accident and was home bound for over 6 months and really STUDIED the bible. I never went back. I knew what I had become and spoke to a friend that was an atheist to see how he managed to overcome the guilt.Although I knew I couldn't say I didn't believe because the "Christian guilt" was too strong.

It just takes time. Now I can say I am not a Christian. I can say I am agnostic. I can say I am not a theist. There is still, at 47 years old, enough of that brainwashing there to make it hard for me to say that I am an Atheist.

Lost story long but shorter than it could have been I hope it made some sense

[houseofcantor]

I almost feel like I have found my home reading this thread. I don't feel like an outcast for being where I am now.

Lost story long but shorter than it could have been I hope it made some sense

Feeling like home is enough, eh?

[bambi_swag]

I'm going to be a contrarian (and pedant) and disagree with the general consensus that rocks and babies are atheists. They are non-theists, certainly, but also non-atheists. The term atheist was coined before the word 'theist'. We often assume it comes from 'a-theist', or 'not a theist'. However it was originally constructed as 'athe-ist'. 'Without God' plus the suffix 'ist', which indicates a person concerned with or interested in whatever precedes it.

An atheist is a person capable of considering the proposition that deities exist, who does not accept that proposition.

Maybe the word "atheomatic" or "atheoical" (sounds like cheese in wood though) would suit babies and rocks better.

[downbeatplumb]

The closest I've been to being an atheist was just a big bout of agnosticism that lasted for around a year when I was younger. So I don't know how you guys see things. How did the whole atheist revelation come to you?

Born an atheist, continued being an atheist, still an atheist.

[robvalue]

Qwest: that's wonderful to hear, welcome home

I know, there is so much stigma attached to the word "atheist", I can understand the reluctance to go the full mile.

Most people (I'm not saying you) misunderstand the term quite violently and think it is saying more than it is. I hope that in the future, people will all be better educated and won't mentally substitute atheist with Nazi or satanist.

Maybe you'll find my article about the word useful, click here. Also, screaming at "God" has been theraptic for some people. Call him all the names you can think of, and dare him to strike you down. It's worked for some people, when you come to realize that if there's anyone listening, they aren't interested. If it would be helpful, or even just amusing, I'd be happy to do a video of myself doing this first!

(Fucking angry atheists!)

[bambi_swag]

Qwest: that's wonderful to hear, welcome home

I know, there is so much stigma attached to the word "atheist", I can understand the reluctance to go the full mile.

Most people (I'm not saying you) misunderstand the term quite violently and think it is saying more than it is. I hope that in the future, people will all be better educated and won't mentally substitute atheist with Nazi or satanist.

Maybe you'll find my article about the word useful, click here. Also, screaming at "God" has been theraptic for some people. Call him all the names you can think of, and dare him to strike you down. It's worked for some people, when you come to realize that if there's anyone listening, they aren't interested. If it would be helpful, or even just amusing, I'd be happy to do a video of myself doing this first!

(Fucking angry atheists!)

Especially in my conservative circles, you guys appear as devils who are "immoral and unpredictable and a detriment to human society". And what's sad is that a lot of us fall for it and when we meet an atheist we have a preconceived distrust about what they say or do.

I think it's about time that the FFRF and the Christian representatives of the country got together to discuss and deal out the differences.

[TheRocketSurgeon]

Equally important to realize that many, if not most, atheists aren't angry at all, but are far more at peace than they were when they were religious and having to deal with issues of cognitive dissonance between their own sense of post-Enlightenment, Western morality and the Bronze Age tribal sheepherder-warrior-priest nonsense that makes up the "objective morality" claimed by the Bible.

When we become angry is when people come at us with demonstrably stupid, wrongheaded ideas about atheism and/or science, and then expect us to just swallow their wooist ideas without questioning them, calling us "angry" or "arrogant" simply because we won't just lie back and let our world be run by the people who talk to their imaginary friend who tells them how to run things, and won't let them make assertions about atheists/atheism that are blatantly false and demonizing.