In today’s society there’s a huge misconception about what atheism really is. There are many people out there who believe that any person who is an atheist is just a demon-loving killer. Atheism is not actually a religion; it is the belief in lack of religion. The difference between it and any organized religion is that religions are theistic, which means that they believe in a higher power — a God of some sort that they follow.
Atheism, on the other hand, is the exact opposite. Atheists do not believe in a higher power. They don’t worship the devil and dance around a campfire singing to bring the evil spirits to kill all theists. They just do not believe that there’s a God or Goddess above them. Atheism’s just a different type of belief, one which some even describe as a more philosophical way of thinking about religion.
Atheism, like many other systems of belief, doesn’t have one specific set of guidelines. There are actually two different types of atheistic belief. There’s implicit atheism (otherwise known as weak atheism) and explicit atheism (otherwise known as strong atheism).
In implicit atheism, there’s a lack of theistic belief without a complete rejection of all deities. This means implicit atheists don’t believe in theism, are unsure, or have never thought about it. Explicit atheism is a complete rejection of any theistic belief. This means that explicit atheists do not believe in theistic religion and argue that it isn’t a rational belief, and should therefore be rejected.
Atheism itself is much different than most people assume. One of the most common stereotypes of atheists is that they’re immoral, God-hating heathens that want to put an end to every religion. Actually, almost all atheists are civil people, like everyone else in this world — they have no intent on ending other religions.
Another common belief is that part of being an atheist is to not believe in God, and to disrespect those who believe in God. Atheists, as explained before, don’t believe that there’s a higher power, so they don’t hate what they don’t believe in, nor the people who do believe. Atheists coexist with people of all other religions; they have different ideas about where things such as morality come from. They’re very accepting, logical and tolerant of religion, and most atheists wish they could receive the same tolerance.
People often wonder about misconceptions and different types of atheism, but there’s also curiosity as to the reasons why one becomes an atheist. There are countless reasons for one to become an atheist; however, there are a few common things that a large majority of atheists base their reasoning off of.
Obviously, one of the most well-known reasons for becoming an atheist is a lack of evidence of any particular religion’s God ever existing. The argument’s that there’s no real physical evidence that any religions higher power ever actually existed.
Another reason many choose is a lack of faith or an absence of a good enough argument to prove that a God was ever present. One may have achieved that notion by being in a religion and losing faith in said religion, philosophizing about the possibility of any theistic religion and deciding there’s no evidence, or for any other reason that one may come across. Obviously personal choices play a deciding factor in any belief, but these are just a few of the many reasons people decide atheism is for them.
Atheism is a common belief among many different people in today’s society. Many believe it’s the only factual way to think about religion and many couldn’t even fathom an understanding of how or why anyone could think in that ways. Either way, it’s a very heated topic at times and can be misconceived in various way. It’s my hope that exposing the true facts about atheism will help people better understand it and be more accepting of this belief.