Greetings

[SometimesFactsAreUnpopular]

Welcome. Are you claiming that theists are more moral because they are likely to behave as though God (or a god) is watching them?

That's one reason, yes. Because they will behave as if they're being watched even when they're not. Many humans are capable of abusing more vulnerable people in private if they don't see any consequences to their actions ... but believers in God who would otherwise be just as willing to abuse others may avoid doing so simply because they falsely and deludedly believe that they will be punished for it by a supernatural being that somehow knows the awful things they are doing. This is not the case with atheists who know that when they're alone with somebody more vulnerable than them they really are alone with somebody more vulnerable than them.

It's true, of course, that not everybody is sadistic or abusive ... but the point is that if somebody is capable of such sadism or abuse then the false belief that God is watching may prevent them from engaging in such a behavior even when such a belief God is nonsense.

So, that's one reason. Another reason is that people in general tend to be selfish and have a "What's in it for me?" attitude with regards to generosity. True, thankfully plenty of people genuinely enjoy helping others and kindness is part of their personality trait, even if that's still ultimately down to selfishness and not truly moral in any deep sense, but some people are less kind but even an unkind person is capable of acting kind for nonsensical reasons if they falsely believe that there will be some big reward at the end of it all (heaven). Even when for us atheists the answer to "What's in it for me?" is "nothing" ... the theists will still have a "Heaven" answer to motivate them to do good, however bullshit the reason. As a consequentialist it makes sense to me that their motivation for their behavior is irrelevant and theists are simply better human beings (generally speaking, their are exceptions like the few fundamentalists who actually kill people for their religion) because they avoid doing more cruel things and pursue doing more kind things in cases where us atheists wouldn't bother (as not everybody enjoys being or kind, both theists and atheists alike) because they think that they will (a) be punished for doing bad things and (b) be rewarded for doing good things ... even in cases where nobody human is there to know about their actions because they think a supernatural being is monitoring their every behavior and evaluating it all in terms of its goodness and badness.

At the very least, there are psychopaths out there in the world and not all of them actually get caught or arrested, there are bound to be more of them than the news would let on ... and some of them must get away with awful things.

But an atheistic psychopath is more dangerous because a theistic psychopath could avoid preying on vulnerable people due to their false belief that they will be punished for it even if nobody human ever found out (because God will know) and they will be rewarded for pro-social behavior even if they're very bored and lacking in stimulation from the world itself (psychopaths tend to have a very high boredom proneness) because supposedly something supremely amazing called Heaven will be waiting for them in the long-run if they behave themselves enough. It also suits a lot of psychopaths because psychopaths tend to be very goal-orientated which is why the are often so good at crafty scheming.

"Because empathy" may work as an answer for atheistic non-psychopaths but it won't cut it for an atheistic psychopath. Psychopaths that could be convinced that they'd be eternally punished for good or bad behavior that nobody human even knew about ... that, however, could work. Religion is bad because it sometimes creates irational killers but if it weren't for its subduing of rational killers (and, of course, killing is only one problem with psychopathy and the majority of psychopaths are dangerous in lots of other awful ways).

And I think it's no surprise that psychopathy is on the rise and so is atheism. I'm not saying that atheists are psychopaths, by the way. I'm saying that humans are ... and that religion works as a sort of moral placebo ... a bullshit morality that works because people believe in it. It often misfires and leads to immorality too ... but without it we'd all be fucked.

---

"I am an atheist but I am also of the rather odd opinion that atheists are less moral than theists ... even though I am also an atheist."
How long have you worked for the Department of Redundancy Department?

Do you really want to know, fathom, comprehend, understand, come to realize and apprehend the answer to such a question that you are asking?

Well, to be honest and frank and candid I have gotten used to and familiar with being accustomed to previously having been employed and working at the tautologically redundantly re-empathized and re-re-overstated redundantly redundant redundancy department for almost just about neigh-on around and plus also about aprox 10 years (a decade), just about and around over 9 years, less than half of slash fifty percent of a couple of decades and not quite or anything even close to a century, etc, etc et cetera for not presently longer or less short than currently now, right now, and I very much mean and am talking about when it comes to shortness in a sense that I speak and talk of temporally and time-wise my very own dear beloved kind generous curiously quizzical Sir and/or perhaps maybe madam or both or, or and/or, neither or not either or not (or not), thank you and thanks for asking and TY for inquiring/enquiring my lovely non-hately darling dearest sweetheart dream-boat consciousexperiencewhilesleeping-raft friend buddy pal old ol' ancient oldy olde, olde worlde, world planet chum matey mate