Flavors of atheism?

[More Than A Feeling]

What do you think: did the religion you deconverted from influence the kind of atheist you are? Examples: the kinds of arguments you use/think are convincing against religion/god(s)/etc, your willingness to get into debates, etc.

[baldguy]

1. Mint-flavored

[Mojambo]

2. Virgin atheist. Never had a religion. n/t

[More Than A Feeling]

5. Added an option for others like you (I assume you already voted)

[Mojambo]

6. I hadn't actually, but I will now. n/t

[Noirceuil]

3. Technically...

There are only two types of atheism: Agnostic and Gnostic. Personally, I think Secular Humanism offers the best hope of ending the problems created by religion while still maintaining the ethical foundation society needs in order to thrive.

[izquierdista]

4. I was born an atheist

However, starting at about age 6, I got shoveled bucketloads of Catholic dogma on Sunday mornings. This effects of this propaganda dissipated when I left for college and lived away from home and was not required to get a weekly load of bullshit.

Everyone is an atheist. Nobody believes in Zeus, Apollo, and Odin anymore. The list of Gods they don't believe in is much longer than the one remaining name that Catholics, Muslims, Jews and Protestants believe in. It's just getting them to quit bowing and scraping to that ONE last name that is the hard one.

[Beregond2]

9. Concepts

I'm not an atheist, but I think you bring up a valid point. Everyone rejects many different concepts of God, so in that sense, we are all atheists. I always find it interesting to determine what concept a particular atheist is rejecting. It is usually quite specific, and tells me something about their history. Of course, there are "universal" atheists who reject all god concepts, and I respect that decision. It is always the ones who are in rebellion against a particularly narrow vision of god that are the most belligerent toward theists. They have often been victimized by religion, or by authoritarian parents, and their anger is justified. But I don't want to imply that all atheism is the result of trauma. I think for many, it is just the way they perceive the world.

The bottom line is, this is an area that goes beyond the reach of language, and so it is pointless to argue about it. For me, the existence of an underlying field of consciousness is self-evident, but I can't prove it, and wouldn't try. And if it isn't evident to others, well, that's just the way it is.

[greyl]

10. I'll post my reply directly under yours because it's somewhat related.

I was in Catholic school 1st thru 8th grade, and around 6th grade I stopped believing in "God" because the Priests and Nuns couldn't provide sensible answers to most of my questions.
I had a great Christian friend in high school who I would have great conversations with, where I took the scientific rational role, and he defended his Christian faith, and our conversations only served to add security to my position that the Bible is crap.

Then, around 21, I got high.
I was watching the Imagine (John Lennon) video, and a thought came to me that seemed quite profound at the time, that in Heaven, we don't have hands. This was the beginning of my many year delve into Faith Salad, mysticism, and generally believing that God had spoken to different peoples in the language they could understand, thus resulting in the varieties of organized religion. At the time, I happily reasoned, it's not that I didn't believe in God, it's that I didn't believe in the God that Catholic school defined. Eureka!
So, I read a lot from people like Joseph Campbell, Shakti Gawain, Williamson, Chopra, Gary Zukav, Darshan Singh, etc... Campbell is the only one I still have respect for.

Anyway, I voted for the first choice in the poll, but I do think that having traveled through a fairly broad array of religious beliefs probably helps me understand where believers are coming from. However, it rarely causes me to refrain from using tough love when having discussions with them. I sometimes wish I could go back and challenge my younger self with some hard questions. ;)

[Chovexani]

11. Er.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hellenic_Neopaganism

Nope.

Be a little more careful with the sweeping generalizations.

Edit: So Odin doesn't feel left out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%81satr%C3%BA

[frogmarch]

7. I'll say Protestantism

I was brought up in a Protestant home - actually, my step-mother was a staunch Presbyterian, but I think my dad was probably an agnostic. At bedtime he read children's Bible stories to my sister and me, and after each story, he prompted discussion, telling us to never be afraid to question things that didn't appear to make sense. Because I was encouraged to think, I became an atheist (a "heathen," according to my mom) at around the age of five.

The only religious types I ever "get into it" with are fundies, and only when I'm provoked. They are so annoying, especially when they become theatrical or start speaking in tongues.

[TechBear_Seattle]

8. Neo-Pagan flavored

While I am an atheist (actually, more of an apatheist), I do generally celebrate the neo-Celtic holidays.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

12. Jalapeño. -nt

[Goblinmonger]

13. Spicey

:evilgrin:

[immoderate]

14. I picked "other"

I am ethnically Jewish, some would say "New York." I've always been an atheist, though I did some searching in my college days. None of it really took hold with me.

As I've often said, I will attend any religious observance where the food is good.

--IMM

[smoogatz]

15. I was raised in an agnostic/atheist household.

I guess that makes me an agnostic-flavored atheist. Or an atheist-flavored agnostic, on alternate Tuesdays.

[HamdenRice]

16. Progressive, civil rights, African American Church influence

Unlike many of the atheists on this board, I don't have any bad memories or bad feelings about my religious background or former church.

I'm very proud of the denomination I was part of, and remember Martin Luther King's father ("Daddy King") being a guest preacher at our church, and many civil rights related sermons in the 1960s and 70s.

I also attended a very, very liberal inter-racial Bible camp as a child, run by a predominantly white denomination that in the 1960s dedicated itself to inter-racial and urban ministry.

When I lived in South Africa during the late apartheid era, I was very impressed by the fearless, progressive, anti-apartheid Christian churches there -- Bishop Tutu's Anglican churches, the independent Zion Christian Churches or Z.C.C. (pronounced weirdly "zed-see-see") and the Sendingkerk of the Dutch Reformed Church (initially the "sending" or "mission" church of the ultra-conservative Afrikaner church to the Coloured community, but then the refuge for progressive Afrikaners).

I have nothing but fond memories of being a progressive Christian in an African American Baptist denomination, and so I don't have any of the anti-religious or anti-Christian zealotry that characterizes many atheists, and many of the ethical and political impulses of liberation theology are still important to me.