[ShizukaMikudou]

Originally Posted by Zairak

I'm not sure why you're trying to redefine a word. Atheism is not a belief. It is the lack of belief. That's the word. Killshot summed it up best in the second post of this thread.

As he said. Trying to classify atheism as a religion is like trying to classify abstinence as a form of sexual activity. It is not. It is the lack of sexual activity.

Alright, seeing as that's the exact argument that I have been refuting this entire time, I see no good reason to repeat myself once more. xD

Instead, I'll try to just put what I've said in even simpler terms.

• 1. A religion is something you believe in. If you are an atheist, you believe in atheism. Being an atheist, you don't believe in Christianity, Buddhism, ect.
• 2. Atheism, also known as Secular Humanism, is all based on the individual.
  This means that you and only you are the one who decides what is right or wrong.
  Your ideals are your truths.
  You have the right to do whatever you think is right.
  Nobody else can tell you what is right or wrong.
  Your instincts tell you what is right or wrong.
  That other guy's instincts tell him what is right or wrong for him.
  Truth is relative.
  Your moral comes from your and only your instincts.
  If someone has a bad moral, it is because he or she has been badly influenced by his or her environment, and any wrong acts are not the individual's fault. "A person raised to be a thief will steal. A person raised to fight may kill."
  In atheism, you are the only being in the world that you answer to. By bettering your self, you become greater in mind and social status in the world.
• 3. In Christian or New Age terms, this is the equivalent to regarding oneself as ones only "god" figure. This doesn't mean you go around "praying" to yourself, or saying that you're God. That, in action, would be more New Age than Secular Humanism.
• 4. But because you choose to reject anything that society calls "god", you are accepting no other being as higher in importance than yourself.
• 5. Anyway, atheism has already been declared a religion by the Supreme Court and by several major atheistic leaders.
  
  

  Originally Posted by Zairak

  As an aside, it is incredibly offensive for you to imply that atheists think of themselves as gods. It is not a belief. It is an organized movement in the same way that religious zealots have an organized movement: That is, people trying to use a concept to force their view on the world. It is not appropriate to generalize the way you are.

  I did not realize that you were reading "god" as something completely different than I was. For that, I apologize. See 3., and 2. as well.
  
• 6. "atheism is to religion as abstinence is to sex." makes hardly an iota of logical sense. Atheism is to religion as a giraffe is to animal. This quote is trying very hard to make it seem like atheism is the lack of a belief. That is more like agnosticism. I have already said this before: Everyone has a religion, whether that religion is based on the belief in a super natural, powerful being called "God", or based on the rejection of any thing called "god", or based on the refusal to acknowledge any known religion due to lack of proof of a god, the Force, or the lack of an Intelligent Designer of the world.
• 7. Although they are given different definitions, the terms "Religion" and "Worldview" are nearly the same thing. Your worldview is the foundation of your beliefs about the world, and not just the world, philosophy and ethics as well. Religion is basically putting a label on a commonly shared worldview. Atheists call their worldview "Atheism" or "Secular Humanism". Christians call their worldview, which is based upon Christ's Salvation for a fallen world and society, "Christianity".
• 8. Every religion, worldview, belief, or whatever you wish to call it, has an opinion on the origin of the world, and the purpose for mankind. Atheism is not excluded from this fact.
• 9. Lastly, the number analogy actually supports my theory xD Zero is not the lack of a number; it is a digit and another integer just like all the others on a number line or graph. But what it represents is the lack of whatever the numbers are counting! c: