CrimsonBlack said:
You'll find that Atheists - at least the more vocal and/or militant about it - are united not only in disbelief, but also in the belief that religion, as a whole, is not beneficial to society. Religions actively foster unfairness, bigotry and homophobia, and yet society tolerates them and allows them to use state schools to teach their insidious BS to the next generation. Governments give religious charities tax breaks, build faith schools, and in London especially it encourages segregation. Plenty of better minds than mine have already put the case for the evils of religion (including "moderate" religion, which, as Sam Harris points out in "The End of Faith", means that person isn't religious at all really).
An atheist doesn't "need" anything - he derives his morals from evolution (see Marc Hauser's "Moral Minds"), from reading and education, but not from a book about an imaginary friend. What I think you are confusing "atheist" with is perhaps "secularist" or "humanist" - simply put, someone who believes that church and state should be as separate as separate can get.
Re "God isn't provable": We all live our lives as though many things' existence isn't provable. Fairies. Unicorns. Tooth Fairies. Santa Claus. Bertrand Russell's famous teapot orbiting Mars. A Christian is an atheist to Zeus, Thor, Poseidon, Wodin, Ibis, Ra, etc etc. If asked why, they'd probably say "well it's laughable to believe in them, nobody's proved they exist!" Well, atheists believe it's laughable to believe in the Abrahamic God (or any other unprovable supernatural being). See Flying Spaghetti Monster. You may or may not be aware of strong and weak atheism, in that the former is agnosticism verging on atheism, and the latter is where you live your life as though there is no supernatural being.
Atheists believe based on evidence (the antithesis to faith - see 2 Corinthians 4:18), and in that matter if the Abrahamic God were to prove his existence beyond a doubt tomorrow, atheists would change their minds; it is not dogmatic. Many religions don't allow you to change your mind - the sentence for apostasy from Islam is death, for example. THAT is why atheists fight religion so vehemently, amongst other things. THAT is why it's so important to tick "no religion" - and as someone quite rightly said, the government doesn't care if you, Joe Bloggs, is a Jedi or not. It uses the data to distribute money, assess constituency borders, adjust immigration, and a whole other useful ways. Screwing it up (FOR LULZ!) marks you out as immature, quite frankly.
What I've seen is that almost any movement can be used to unify people under the banners of hate just as equally as any other. A person in power of a belief system (and non-believing is a belief system) steps up, barks out his or her ideology under the guise of speaking the tenants of their beliefs, and if he or she is charismatic enough, the sheep go along skipping. Political bodies (tories, Republicans, etc) do it all the time. But that doesn't mean in and of itself being a Tory or being a Republican is wrong or breeds contempt; It simply means those who label themselves as such are just as accountable for their own actions, but choose to be led because they can not resist the lure of that particular Pied Piper.
To lump all with a vocal portion of any population is folly and does not promote understanding. Not every Atheist gets as vehement as those in this very thread. In fact, not every Atheist in this very thread got as vehement as others. Would it be wrong for me to say all Atheist vehemently oppose and commend religion? Absolutely. As I know a few Atheist who completely support religious people, as I know those same religious people support their views.
There are bad churches. Those who look at archaic text and sprout off at the mouth with guile and charm and just point out the evil. To borrow at an outdated Meme, they are doing it wrong. It's easy to believe that's what happens because it's plastered on the news or media or whatever. But like everything, you don't get it all at the first glance. In fact you might lose more because of that first glance, as if it's an unfavorable glance, one would tend to lump all experiences to be just like that then look over anything that differs.
In First World Societies, putting someone to death for their religious misgivings or slights is unspeakable and unthinkable. In third world, probably more common place. But there are people who are put to death for economic reasons that has nothing to do with religion, for moral standpoints and the like. Both are unspeakable. Both happen because of ignorance. Crushing religion will not crave enlightenment, because those who are atheist do commit horrors, but just not in the name of God.
Enlightenment, intelligence does not come in religious or atheist flavor. It's one type. If both sides gain that, there would be no problems.
