General perception of atheists?

[robvalue]

The biggest problem I think is when a religious person is surrounded almost entirely by other religious people, and doesn't have much contact with atheists. Their perspective is then likely to be based on what all those people say atheists are like. And since they probably don't have much contact with them either... they can say whatever crap they like and it doesn't get challenged.

My advice is to just be a nice, reasonable person. Getting in someone's face who is minding their own business is no better for an atheist to do than a theist. But if harm is going on, then it's time to speak up.

The fact that atheists aren't just staying silent anymore is seen by some as "aggressive". But as Mathilda says, unless they speak out, nothing changes. And they can do so without being dicks about it. And again, in my country (England) it's no big deal anyway. People are generally unconcerned with it all whether they're religious or not. I see this as the mid-future of the US.

The biggest thing such theists need to learn is that atheists are just people, who happen to share a lack of belief on one single issue. Any further preconceptions they have, good or bad, are not justified.