view the rest of the comments
Atheism
Community Guide
Archive Today will help you look at paywalled content the way search engines see it.
Statement of Purpose
- This is a support and conversation community for people who don't believe in gods.
- Superstition hucksters have no reason to subscribe or post here at all.
- If you are looking to debate or proselytize, options will be linked lower in the sidebar.
Acceptable
- Honest questions or conversations.
- Discussions on parenting or advice.
- Struggles, frustrations, coming out.
- Atheist memes. We can have fun!
- News headlines relevant to atheism.
Unacceptable
Depending on severity, you might be warned before adverse action is taken.
- Anything against site rules.
- Illegal and/or NSFW material.
- Troll posts and comments. There will be no attempt to explain what that means.
- Leading questions, agenda pushing, or disingenuous attempts to bait members.
- Personal attacks or flaming.
Inadvisable
- Self promotion or upvote farming.
- Excessive shitposting or off-topic discussion.
Application of warnings or bans will be subject to moderator discretion. Feel free to appeal. If changes to the guidelines are necessary, they will be adjusted.
If you vocally harass or discriminate against any individual member, you will be removed.
Likewise, if you are a member, sympathizer or a resemblant of a group that is known to largely hate, mock, discriminate against, and/or want to take lives of any other group of people, and you were provably vocal about your hate, then you you will be banned on sight.
Provable means able to provide proof to the moderation, and, if necessary, to the community.
~ /c/nostupidquestions
If you want your space listed in this sidebar and it is especially relevant to the atheist or skeptic communities, PM DancingPickle and we'll have a look!
Connect with Atheists
- Matrix: #atheism:envs.net
Help and Support Links
- Freedom From Religion Foundation
- The Secular Therapy Project
- Secular Students Alliance
- Black Nonbelievers
- The Clergy Project
- Atheist Alliance International
- Sunday Assembly
- Atheist Ireland
- Atheism UK
- Atheists United
Streaming Media
This is mostly YouTube at the moment. Podcasts and similar media - especially on federated platforms - may also feature here.
- Atheist Debates - Matt Dillahunty
- Rationality Rules
- Friendly Atheist
- Making Sense with Sam Harris
- Cosmic Skeptic
- Genetically Modified Skeptic
- Street Epistemology
- Armored Skeptic
- NonStampCollector
Orgs, Blogs, Zines
- Center for Inquiry
- American Atheists
- Humanists International
- Atheist Republic
- The Brights
- The Angry Atheist
- History for Atheists
- Rationalist International
- Atheist Revolution
- Debunking Christianity
- Godless Mom
- Atheist Freethinkers
Mainstream
Bibliography
Start here...
...proceed here.
- God is Not Great (Hitchens)
- The God Delusion (Dawkins)
- The End of Faith (Harris)
- Why I Am Not a Christian (Russell)
- Letter to a Christian Nation (Harris)
Proselytize Religion
From Reddit
As a community with an interest in providing the best resources to its members, the following wiki links are provided as historical reference until we can establish our own.
Yes, Everything about "Jesus" was made up by monks many centuries later...
FTFY
Well that's may be your belief but the consensus among historians is that there was a man called Jesus of Nazareth that existed.
But many religions create their own alternate versions of history, so I wouldn't expect atheism to be any different. But it's important to recognize it as a belief and understand your belief is inconsistent with the consensus of experts in the relevant field.
Atheism is as much a religion as not playing any sports is a sport.
Eh, based on how many people put so much effort into treating their lack of interest in sports as a personality trait, and in demonstrating how they don't care about sports even more than other people who don't care about sports...the analogy seems...at least amusing if not entirely accurate.
In my experience "atheism is a religion" is only an argument religious ppl make when they have no real argument otherwise. It's semantics and frankly, who cares? Call it a religion if you like. Idgaf.
"I hate the NY Yankees, but I'm not a sports fan" said no one ever.
I hate all teams equally.
How about "I used to be a fan but the Yankee's fucking ruined the entire sport for me?"
Also, I bet “I hate the NY Yankees, but I’m not a sports fan." is said multiple times per day across America in various contexts. For example the guy that has to park next to the stadium or the non enthusiast spouse of an over the top fan.
"I hate God" said no atheist ever.
You say it like it matters if the experts said otherwise. Like if the consensus was there never was a Jesus of Nazareth, would you no longer have that oh so important 'faith'?
What makes you think SpaceCowboy has a religious faith? Nothing they've said in this comment gave me that signal. Fwiw I am not religious, but I know religious people who I respect, and who are intelligent, rational people, knowledgeable about and interested in science and history etc. I don't think having 'faith' automatically makes a person stupid or contemptible, and I don't think being an atheist automatically means you're more rational or intelligent than someone else
Their reference to atheism as a religion (it isn't) which 'creates its own history' tipped me off.
And their lack of reply to my simple question really says it all. A non-religious could simply reply 'no, obviously I would not believe in him if the experts consensus was they did not exist'. SpaceCowboy however cannot state this, as my suspicion is the expert consensus has no impact on their beliefs whatsoever. Which is why I asked ... why even talk about the expert consensus at all?
Also this comment chain further reinforces my view. Referring to atheists as 'they' implies SpaceCowboy is not an atheist.
And I'd argue that you actually don't know any truly 'rational' people who are also religious as those concepts are fundamentally at odds with each other. There is no rational basis for the supernatural. I'm sure they are generally nice, well-meaning, intelligent and knowledgeable people though, most religious people I know are too. And yes I also know asshole atheists too, lots of them. But I don't see what that has to do with what I stated/asked. I made no assessment on religious or non-religious people being good or bad, smart or stupid. I made no claim that atheists are magically more rational or intelligent than someone else, although on average they may be but I would have to review the data before jumping to any conclusions. I didn't attack SpaceCowboy in any way, I just asked a simple question.
There were hundreds of men named Jesus, it was a popular name during that time. Also, prophets were everywhere. So it stands to reason there was probably a prophet named Jesus during that time period. The "Jesus" talked about in the Bible? Lol nah.
What do you think is more likely: disciples telling taller and taller tales after their master died that spun out into the Bible after a while, or a mythological preacher being invented a few decades after his death?
From what I understand, the consensus view of historians is that Moses and the exodus is probably wholly legendary - there's no archeological evidence of the exodus and the Torah was written 500+ years after the events supposedly happened.
By contrast, the earliest sources for Jesus are from within a century of his death. It's way more likely that we have a mythologized story of a real preacher named Jesus than that we have a wholly legendary story.
First, there is no consensus, a fairly small group of mostly religious historians believe that.
Second I gave you, by far, the most likely answer.