# Atheism is now legally a religion. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 5, 2014, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811 "2014-11-05T22:45:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/161 "2014-11-07T00:36:27Z")
> [@simster](#): > > The whole point of the establishment clause was to prevent the Gov’t from enforcing/favoring a set of religious beliefs over others - and establishing a ‘state religion’. Keep in mind that in those days, they had just escaped the ‘Church of England’ and its trappings. > > I don’t think at the time they really considered that ‘atheism’ didn’t follow under that protection naturally - since if the Gov’t couldn’t establish a state religion, then it shouldn’t be able to ‘punish’ non-believers as well. Entirely possible. All the more reason to change it, really, if it didn’t take account of something that it should have done with retrospect. I tend to think that any attempt at doing so would mean a big push-back, though. ---
**Author:** ![Sitnam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Sitnam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sitnam)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/162 "2014-11-07T00:46:19Z")
> [@Peter\_Morris](#): > > What about someone that spends a lot of time attacking stamp collectors, declaring stamp collecting to be morraly and intellectually wrong, and trying to persuade people to stop their stamp collecting ways. > > Could \*that \*be a hobby, possibly? Project much? ---
**Author:** ![nani](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/58956e/32.png) [@nani](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nani)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/163 "2014-11-07T00:58:10Z")
> [@Lobohan](#): > > I’m not Jewish, but keeping the cultural identity is different from believing the supernatural claims about God. I have no problem in calling the Jewish non-believing person a Jew, at least culturally, but he’s certainly an atheist as well. If he follows the practices because he finds them meaningful even if he doesn’t believe in God, does he believe in the religion? > [@](#): > > At least football exists. Not in Los Angeles 😉 If in football the fan is the believer, the game is the uniting ritual and practice, like a Mass. What is being worshipped? Harder to say, but maybe fun… masculinity… sportsmanship… things that are hard to say exist independently of people imagining them. > [@](#): > > Sure. I have no trouble with that. Religion is more than cultural practices. At its heart it has a supernatural claim. You can reject the claim and follow the cultural practices. You can say you follow the religion, but you don’t believe in the core claim about the God at the center. What is the specific supernatural claim at the heart of Hinduism? Who defined it? Why should any Hindu agree with it to keep being Hindu? What is the difference between deriving larger meaning from a beautiful sunset or the elegance of mathematics and deriving larger meaning from engaging in a religious ritual? > [@](#): > > Every single religious person picks and chooses. By cafeteria, I mean those whose belief is weak. I’ve got relatives who go to church, but the moment they’re out the door the practice of that religion suspends for a week. > > They’re Christian, and would more likely vote for another Christian candidate, but in their daily lives religion is an afterthought. Unlike a passionate evangelical who makes every decision through a WWJD process. I don’t know your relatives but I suggest that you could think of it in this way instead: that your relatives’ inner value systems as a whole are strong enough to resist these weekly exhortations to change from a particular authority figure. These value systems incorporate some things that are specifically Christian, but also things that are not explicitly identified as Christian. So it’s not that their religion is an afterthought, it’s that the part of their moral imagination that they’ve marked as “Christian” and “Religion” has minor influence compared to parts that they don’t conceive in that way. But that doesn’t mean their belief is weak. On the contrary. ---
**Author:** ![Marlonius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/838e76/32.png) [@Marlonius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marlonius)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/164 "2014-11-07T01:06:56Z")
> [@DrFidelius](#): > > And “bald” is legally a hair color for identification purposes. And an empty bowl is a flavour of ice cream. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/165 "2014-11-07T03:03:16Z")
> [@simster](#): > > Thats incorrect - atheism is a ‘lack of belief in god(s)’ - it may follow that atheists are by and large not going to be believing/following religion - but its not required. Perhaps “irreligious” will serve, with “atheistic” being a mere subset thereof. I’m irreligious. Also, that “spiritual but not religious” crap… I’m not that, too. ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 3:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/166 "2014-11-07T03:27:41Z")
Just to ask, has anyone ever tried to argue that the government could encourage and make law through atheism and not fall afoul of the Establishment Clause because atheism isn’t a religion? ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/167 "2014-11-07T03:58:04Z")
> [@Marlonius](#): > > And an empty bowl is a flavour of ice cream. Again: are the overwhelming majority of bowls filled with ice cream, such that a normal question to ask about a bowl is, “what flavor of ice cream is in it”? If so, then “empty” is a flavor of ice cream, **within the context of that question**. Sure, it’s technically not, I’ll grant that. But I maintain that in this context, it’s appropriate to treat it as a flavor of ice cream, nudity as a sartorial approach, bald as a hair style, and atheist as a religion. > [@Lobohan](#): > > Do you believe in Thrackerwags? No? Then you’re athrackerwagist. I have no idea whether I believe in Thrackerwags. Is that another word for pizza? Because I believe in pizza. Is it some new particle hypothesized by theoretical physicists? Because if you show me some pop-science news stories about Thrackerwags, chances are I’ll believe in them. Until I learn more about what you mean, I can’t say yes to either of these questions: 1. Do I think Thrackerwags exist? 2. Do I think Thrackerwags don’t exist? I’m an an atheist about them in the same way that my coffee thermos is an atheist about God: I have no real belief about them, nor has my coffee thermos a belief about God. I don’t think that’s what most folks mean when they say “atheist.” ---
**Author:** ![marshmallow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@marshmallow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/marshmallow)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/168 "2014-11-07T04:09:50Z")
I agree with this comment left by Jonathan Dore in the OP’s article: > [@](#): > > The prisoner’s case should have been based on challenging the privilege extended to the religious being allowed to organize study groups simply because they were religious, not by seeking to get himself classed as a member of another privileged group. On the larger cultural issue, I can only shake my head at this new breed of special snowflake atheists who want “secular” chaplains, invocations and churches and a bunch of other hand me down religious ceremonial bullshit. What’s wrong with you people? Can the rest of us true non-believers launch an infitida against these blasphemers? Start an Unholy War, maybe? Part of the appeal of leaving the faith is jettisoning all this useless noise. St. Carlin wouldn’t have let this happen. Some people want to form a community of like minded individuals? Swell, start a club. Hey, that’s how the Illuminati started. ---
**Author:** ![Wallaby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/dc4da7/32.png) [@Wallaby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wallaby)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 4:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/169 "2014-11-07T04:42:40Z")
The only reason we have to specify a non-belief in god(s) is because culturally, a belief in God has been an important part of human society (or at least the written-and-passed-down part. I always wonder about some primitive tribes - whether they just thought - ‘that’s the way things happen’ without invoking some supernatural being. But we don’t get their stories. We get history and culture written by the people in charge - and for centuries, that was the priests). There is now no more reason to define atheists than there is Round-Earthers. Sure, there are some people who believe in a flat earth - but for all practical purposes (navigation, building, communications, travel) we use a round earth model. Similar with religion - OK, you can believe in a god or gods - but for practical purposes involving society, laws, how people interact, how things are done - no one expects religion to have any real value or input. The evidence of history is God doesn’t exist or it doesn’t care. Religion has no value except as a psychological crutch to some people’s thought processes. ---
**Author:** ![nani](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/58956e/32.png) [@nani](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nani)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/170 "2014-11-07T05:26:53Z")
> [@Wallaby](#): > > The only reason we have to specify a non-belief in god(s) is because culturally, a belief in God has been an important part of human society (or at least the written-and-passed-down part. I always wonder about some primitive tribes - whether they just thought - ‘that’s the way things happen’ without invoking some supernatural being. But we don’t get their stories. We get history and culture written by the people in charge - and for centuries, that was the priests). Religion has been present in every society, belief in a monotheistic god and priests have not. > [@](#): > > There is now no more reason to define atheists than there is Round-Earthers. Sure, there are some people who believe in a flat earth - but for all practical purposes (navigation, building, communications, travel) we use a round earth model. Just in terms of numbers, in many places people who identify as atheists are more comparable to flat earthers than round earthers. Also, for many practical purposes (like reading a map) the flat earth model is the more useful one. > [@](#): > > Similar with religion - OK, you can believe in a god or gods - but for practical purposes involving society, laws, how people interact, how things are done - no one expects religion to have any real value or input. The evidence of history is God doesn’t exist or it doesn’t care. Religion has no value except as a psychological crutch to some people’s thought processes. There’s a lot of people in the US right now who wish the first sentence was true. Whether or not God exists, that doesn’t have too much bearing on the important influence different religious traditions exert on all aspects of societies. ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 8:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/171 "2014-11-07T08:36:20Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Until I learn more about what you mean, I can’t say yes to either of these questions: > > 1. Do I think Thrackerwags exist? > 2. Do I think Thrackerwags don’t exist? But without any further explanation, definition or description you can answer the very simple question “do you have a belief in Thrackerwags” and that answer is “no” That is precisely the position I take in relation to god/gods etc. So I’m an atheist. When someone describes their god in such a way as it is possible to take a stronger position on the likelihood of their existence I might go further. I’m still an atheist of course, right up until the time I become a theist in general or a follower of a particular god/gods. ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 9:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/172 "2014-11-07T09:16:00Z")
> [@Peter\_Morris](#): > > What’s your objection, exactly? It was a self-professed argument from ignorance, you then back it up by asking others to do your work for you. like I said. Ballsy. ---
**Author:** ![nani](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/58956e/32.png) [@nani](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nani)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 10:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/173 "2014-11-07T10:08:52Z")
Well, to be fair, Richard Dawkins and the other New Atheists’ arguments are not respected among any religious studies scholars I have ever met. To the extent that their work is examined, it is more about how they are received and the influence they have, not about whether they actually make insightful arguments about religion. Of course, some of this must be at least partly due to a kind of pig-headed navel-gazing that is not uncommon in the field, but among the people who actually study this stuff for a living in top American academic institutions, I’ve found it to be a surprisingly strong consensus. FWIW. Personally I’ll love Dawkins forever for that look he gave Mehdi Hasan when he assumed that Mehdi, as a sophisticated journalist, didn’t believe Muhammad flew on a winged horse, and Mehdi said “can you prove he didn’t?” I’ve been there, man. ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 11:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/174 "2014-11-07T11:41:46Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Nonsense. > > First, atheism is the logical default position; it’s the job of people who claim gods exist to provide evidence, not for atheists to prove a negative. No. The default position is agnosticism: We don’t know. And we are likely not sable to know if there is a god, gods, or no gods. > [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Second, atheism fits the observable facts; that’s accepting the evidence, not “faith”. Atheism would only be based on faith if gods demonstrably existed. It depends on one’s starting point. If you start with the question of first cause, and accept the scientific tenet that all things have a cause, then there had to be, at some point, something not subject to such a rule. Something supra-natural. Something God-like. I don’t mean anything with flowing robes, or anything that even suggests a religion. Now, it is possible that this is wrong somehow. But for the universe to NOT have a first cause is a conclusion that requires faith, as well. > [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > And third; atheism doesn’t have principles, and it can’t take what it doesn’t have on faith. I’d say it depends if one is a strong atheist or a weak atheist. That’s what atheists have argued on these boards before anyway. ---
**Author:** ![SmartAlecCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/67e7ee/32.png) [@SmartAlecCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmartAlecCat)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 12:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/175 "2014-11-07T12:15:56Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > No. The default position is agnosticism: We don’t know. Gnosticism/Agnosticism is about knowledge. Though some theists argue they have knowledge, others might claim none of us know. Theism/Atheism is about belief. Some of us believe in god(s) and some of us don’t. ---
**Author:** ![Bozuit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/edb3f5/32.png) [@Bozuit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bozuit)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 12:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/176 "2014-11-07T12:33:06Z")
> [@bup](#): > > But \*dogmatism \*certainly exists among atheists, and it’s just as annoying in them as theists. Not in any meaningful way. You might describe a physicist as “dogmatic” if they insist the Earth’s gravity always pulls you towards the Earth, and get a bit red-faced and start raising their voice when you claim you saw an object accelerating at 4m/s² in a vacuum on Earth, or that objects fall up if you pray hard enough. But since we know all those claims are rubbish, it’s entirely correct to be dogmatic about it. I expect you’re dogmatic about vampires. You know they don’t exist. If someone tells you they saw one, you know they’re mistaken or lying. Some things, like “do vampires exist?”, just have one correct answer. We only think people who are dogmatic about atheism are arseholes because we’ve been trained to think there’s something different about belief in the Abrahamic god that makes it wrong to say unambiguously that he does not exist, when we’re perfectly welcome to say the same about Nephthys. What would a dogmatic anephthysist look like? ---
**Author:** ![Latro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a87d85/32.png) [@Latro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Latro)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 12:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/177 "2014-11-07T12:34:04Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > If you start with the question of first cause, and accept the scientific tenet that all things have a cause, then there had to be, at some point, something not subject to such a rule. Something supra-natural. Here is where you go wrong. Even if we accept that ‘all things have a cause’ is a scientific tenet, it doesn’t follow from this tenet that there has to be a point where this doesn’t apply. If you simply adhere to this tenet, it’s turtles all the way down. It’s only when you insert that there has to have been ‘a beginning’ that you run into a 'first cause’problem. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/178 "2014-11-07T12:38:43Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > No. The default position is agnosticism: We don’t know. And we are likely not sable to know if there is a god, gods, or no gods. I disagree. The default position is not certainty, but it’s reasonable that the default position is “without any evidence, there’s no reason to believe or act as if there’s a omniscient, omnipotent being in the sky”. That’s atheism (or at least it falls within the spectrum of atheism). > [@](#): > > It depends on one’s starting point. If you start with the question of first cause, and accept the scientific tenet that all things have a cause, then there had to be, at some point, something not subject to such a rule. Something supra-natural. Something God-like. I don’t mean anything with flowing robes, or anything that even suggests a religion. Now, it is possible that this is wrong somehow. But for the universe to NOT have a first cause is a conclusion that requires faith, as well. Why wouldn’t that first cause also have a first cause, if “all things have a cause”? Saying “there was a first cause and it’s God” doesn’t answer any questions – it just creates more… like what created/caused God. It’s just as reasonable to assume any first cause would be the destruction/collapse of a previous universe, for example, or just to say “we don’t know”. None of this implies a supernatural being in any way whatsoever. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 12:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/179 "2014-11-07T12:44:03Z")
> [@Leaper](#): > > Just to ask, has anyone ever tried to argue that the government could encourage and make law through atheism and not fall afoul of the Establishment Clause because atheism isn’t a religion? I’m sure some whackjob will now reason that if any law lacks a religious basis, it is an atheist law, and therefore in violation of the Establishment Clause, because atheism is a religion now. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2014, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811/180 "2014-11-07T13:11:42Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > No. The default position is agnosticism: We don’t know. And we are likely not able to know if there is a god, gods, or no gods. Nah. You’re almost there. The default position is we don’t know there are any of these things so we don’t believe in them. So we are atheists. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atheism-is-now-legally-a-religion/703811.md?page=10)