Nah, this explains why the religious often want to proselytize. It doesn’t explain why religious people act rude, dismissive, or insulting towards atheists. Not to say all do, but certainly many do, especially of the evangelical bent.
I think the reasoning there comes more from resentment: atheists “get away” with being naughty people in a way religious folks rarely do, and don’t have to make some of the same sacrifices.
From wiki:
The original Hebrew seems to indicate murder rather than kill - usually based on the concept of bloodguilt.
I suppose the guy could have used the same logic to say there are no gays in foxholes because the number of openly gay winners of these medals is probably less than the number of atheists.
This may be of interest to you Czarcasm:
In Alabama, of all places. Seems to be a private group rather than a governmental monument, but still.
The general observation goes back at least as far as WWI.
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0609D&L=ADS-L&P=R7473
For many believers, it is a central feature of their beliefs that belief in a god is necessary to be happy and moral. Atheists who aren’t miserable psychopaths disprove their claim (thus the prevalence of atheists in popular entertainment who are miserable or warped), and that upsets them. Also, there’s quite a few who are convinced that the existence of God is self evident, and who refuse to believe in atheists. We’re just lying.
What was intended as an honest attempt to proselytize might well end up coming across as rude, dismissive, or insulting. Though of course, there are other, less altruistic, explanations as well.
This is really a topic for another thread, but the reason religious people can be more tolerant towards people of conflicting religions than atheists is essentially
“SANTA CLAUS IS REAL! I BELIEVE IN SANTA CLAUS!”
“No, Santa isn’t real, but the tooth fairy is!”
“You’re both fools, it’s leprechauns that run the world”
Atheist: “Guys… come on… seriously?”
“LET’S ALL AGREE THAT WE REALLY FUCKING HATE THAT GUY”
You’ve got it all mixed up. The walrus was St. Paul, Jesus was the eggman, Judas was the glass onion, which makes St. Peter the…uh…blue jay? I think.
I don’t see why atheists are so hated. We’re so easy to get along with.
Christians don’t believe in Islam. Muslims don’t believe in Hinduism. Hindus don’t believe in Buddhism. Buddhists don’t believe in Christianity.
And we agree with all of them.
I have met more atheists per person in Afghanistan than anywhere else. They pray in public but they don’t believe in god or Allah. That whole country is one big foxhole. Their choice not to see exile–and millions do–is proof of their bravery. Most of them were socialists that couldn’t stand the thought of the fundies winning after all that time. I remember their faces so well…
The saying is bullshit. Ever read “All Quiet on the Western Front”?
I don’t believe so, but one is based on death and the other is based on life, but it is willingness to accept the next level (even if it is believed to be non-existence) that is what is needed. As such it may be less likely to have a atheist in a foxhole, also because believers believe they are divinely protected, but then again atheists may see death as a better alternative to this live.
Yes, but not the way you mean it.
My personal opinion only, but I think that when things are going REALLY, REALLY badly, and you are REALLY ,REALLY scared of dying, you’d pray to the Easter Bunny if you thought it might help.
Except that an atheist isn’t going to think that a nonexistent god is going to help, any more than a Christian is going to try praying to Apollo or Marduk or Azathoth.
I think you could make a case, that in really out-of-your-mind-scared irrational moments, you will pray to a generic higher power of some sort, or at least the default higher power of your culture, rather than thinking about the specifics of it like that. More like a “anyone who can hear my prayer, save me!” desperation sort of thing. The line in a monotheistic, single religion dominant culture tends to blur these lines because saying “God help me!” can either be vague and generic in that way, or specifically referring to the Christian god. That makes it more ambiguous than saying “Apollo help me!”
Edit: Especially since our word “God” in English can refer to a generic higher power or specifically the Christian one.
For what it’s worth, that’s pretty much the point assorted believers have made when told about my grandfather: the guy went off to war convinced there was a God, and became an atheist precisely because he was surrounded by the horrors of WWII.
1 How do I mean it and 2 why is it not that way 
Speaking as a Catholic…
SUPPOSE it were true that, at moments of extreme stress, many (or even most) atheists nervously pray to a God they’re not sure is really there. What does that prove, exactly?
Years back, when I read the novel “Jaws,” Captain Quint offered an analogy that seems relevant here. He said (this isn’t a direct quote, I’m writing this from memory), "When a plumber is working on a particularly nasty problem, he may get angry at a pipe, he may curse at it, he may even bang on it with his wrench. But later on, when he’s finished the job and has calmed down, he KNOWS how silly it was to act that way. He doesn’t REALLY believe that the pipe is a living, sentient being, and may even laugh at himself for momentarily getting angry at an inanimate object.
Well, my sense is, even IF many atheists are sometimes momentarily tempted to embrace something they normally regard as a silly superstition, it doesn’t follow that they continue to embrace that superstition after the immediate crisis is over, nor does it prove that the superstition is true.
It does give insight into the core being of humanity. When all is stripped away a person is open to anything even beyond their beliefs.
As for the plumber, I do believe their are spiritual forces that sometimes frustrate our work, and also ones that can guide us so things go smoothly, so yelling at the pipe is not all that unusual IMHO.