Quote:
Originally Posted by transplant99
Whether one is fanatical about there being no god, or one is fanatical about there being a god...both are still fanatics.
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I've seen this argument quite a bit (from numerous different posters in this thread and in others), but I've yet to meet anyone I would call "fanatical" about there being no god. There are certainly passionate atheists, but I can't possibly imagine an atheist being so fanatical that they would be a suicide bomber for their beliefs.
The overwhelming majority of atheists tend to have a live and let live view towards believers. So long as their religious views are kept private among the practitioners of a given faith, atheists don't really have a problem with people believing in "fairy tales" (to borrow a term from earlier in this thread). The reason atheists push back is because religion
isn't being kept private. Whether it's teaching creationism in public schools, erecting monuments of the 10 commandments in public courtrooms, or discrimination against same-sex couples because of religious beliefs, the examples of religion entering the public sphere are numerous, and many atheists are very vocal in their opposition to this. It's a huge stretch to call them "fanatics" though.