"I disagree with you, but i don't think you're Hitler"

[Angrboda]

I disagree with the idea that, as atheists, we are not part of a group. We share this lack of belief and that is enough to make us a group, we do not need any other common factors to be a group. This board is a good example of that.

You're welcome to accept him into your group, but he is under no obligation to consider you a part of his. Unless allegiances are bilateral, they are chimera. The atheist dicks of this world might just as likely want to reject you for coddling the theists. Your ideas about what is proper for your group in no way obligate anybody else.

Any action made by any member of a group reflects on how public opinion considers the other members of that group. This goes for any ideology or, in our case, lack of ideology. This is why we need to be civil, and have a reasonable discourse: the public opinion's eyes, how people see atheists, is a vital element: as long as that condescending douchebag stereotype stays, people are less likely to listen to our views.

ibid. You are manufacturing -- or attempting to manufacture -- unity in the service of a political goal. What purpose does this hypothetical group serve aside from providing the scaffoloding upon which you can mount your argument for "tactical efficiencies"? I don't see that there is one, and to quote Groucho, I wouldn't want to belong to any club that would have me as a member. That, and I'm rather fond of, and confident in the truism of, Dawkins statement that, “Successful revolutionaries ignore the admonitions about which fork to use for their salad because they care only to grab the steak knife as they launch themselves over the table.”

If anyone cares about my REAL opinion, I don't think eliminating the douchebags will change the stereotype. I think all of the reasonable, cordial, ethical and wonderful atheists there are in the world "coming out" would do way more to open people's eyes to how 'normal' they really are. After all...it's the sheer number of Christians that allows us to see the mix of good and bad, yeah?

I think this view is somewhat naive and optimistic. The stereotype of the atheist (rude, depressed, malcontent, etc.) is perpetuated more because it is politically and psychologically useful to those in-groups who are threatened by atheism and free-thought. It isn't going to go away, no matter how well we behave. Before the rancorous splash of the four horsemen of the new atheism, theists were regularly painting Madalyn Murray O'Hair as a devil in a dress. Demonizing out-groups and other threats is at the core of many religions' blueprint for survival. God didn't waste a second after liberating his chosen from Egypt to turn them loose upon a mass of Canaanites whose only real crime was that they were in the way. (Not that any of the conquest of Canaan actually happened, but regardless it was important enough to set a precedent for the attitude, even if it was not based on real events.)