Are Atheists the new Christians? A small persecuted minority in a world of aggressive believers?

Question

In both the Muslim and Christian world there are people prepared to kill non-believers, John Lennon died for his beliefs, is he the most prominent of many? and others yet to come?

Answer 1

Yes, that's pretty much the situation. Just a couple of days ago one of the local papers here printed an ignorant dishonest rant against atheist as a "community commentary". It read just like the ones we see here, yet this paper apparently didn't see anything at all wrong with printing it. Of course they'd NEVER print the same kind of attack on any religious group, even the Muslims.

We do have an advantage over the early Christians, though, in that we've got a lot of the scientists and academics.
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BTW, I agree with the others - Lennon wasn't really shot for being an atheist. However, the guy who shot him was a Christian and used to belong to a Christian group that encouraged thinking about killing Lennon. Furthermore, I had a friend at Bob Jones University at the time who told me that his classmates all were very vocal that Lennon had deserved to die. The Christians have a lot to be ashamed of with respect to that killing.

Answer 2

I think you may have stumbled upon something there. I'm more concerned about how Christians are behaving these days rather than Muslims and I was raised in Ireland as a Roman Catholic! I haven't practised any religion in years now and I never will but I still get people berating me for expressing my beliefs when they go about preaching the "good word" whether people want to hear it or not. Frankly, with the state the world is in today I find it hugely irrelevant whether people believe they'll be whisked away to Heaven or Hell when they perish or shed their "mortal coils". John Lennon was shot for believing a man could better himself WITHOUT religion to fall back on or to use as a tool. Well so far I can't see the benefit Christianity has had on the world after more than 2,000 years.

Answer 3

I don't feel persecuted =\

John Lennon didn't die because he was an atheist. John Lennon died because some sh--headed fan felt snubbed because he had better things to do then to spend five hours talking to the guy. The man that shot Lennon was mentally unstable. There was a religious component to it, but at that point in his life John was actually starting to be very open to Christian beliefs.

Answer 4

Not a chance. American atheists don't have the first clue what persecution is, except the sort that persecutes Christians, of course, which is most of them.

Atheists are a bit inconvenient for the vast majority of Americans, who are false Christians, and want everyone to be like them. The USA is a bit like medieval Europe in that respect. But 'Christians' and American atheists (who also believe in Christ, but hate him) are on the same side.

Atheists in the UK are very common and entirely neutral. Maybe in another 500 years the backward USA will catch up.
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Answer 5

I'm not sure John Lennon died because he was an atheist. A guy believing himself to be Holden Caulfield or possibly believing himself to be Lennon shot him. The main reason seemed to be because he felt Lennon was a phoney who blathered on about having no possessions whilst owning an enormous mansion, a swish apartment and a yacht.
Yes there are religious crackpots who are prepared to kill. But there are loads of non-violent religious people, and plenty of atheists...

Answer 6

"In God we trust" is on our money. The Boy Scouts of America rules specifically deny membership to atheists. The common figure for the percentage of atheists in America is 1.6%. Atheists age 18-25, 20%. Atheists actually are a minority and the law actually does ignore us. Now onto what Christians see as persecution. We took prayer out of our schools. No longer can the Christian kids set aside time during the school day for prayer, even under the seemingly harmless guise that all they are really asking for is 5 minutes of quiet time so that those who want to pray can. What they were really asking is that my kid bow down to their desires and set time aside out of his day specifically to meet a need for their children. What they are really asking is that my kid be forced to watch other kids pray for 5 minutes every day so that they will see this as normal behavior, no matter what I wish to teach them. What they are really saying is that their child's time is more important that my child's time; that it's somehow more fair for my kid to have to bow to their desires than for their kid to simply show up to school 5 minutes early, or pray at home before school. And let's not forget that there is PLENTY of time to pray during school. There are study halls and lunch times and times between classes. I'm pretty sure an omnipotent being can hear you praying to him even if it's noisy. There is no need whatsoever for my children to be exposed to their beliefs or inconvenienced by them. But they pretend there is. Another example, the Ten Commandments cannot be displayed at court houses and judges, who are supposed to know and follow the law, have a problem with this. Do you know how many of the Ten Commandments are actually law? Two! Don't kill, don't steal. There are two others which could break existing laws under specific circumstances, but are not always illegal. That leaves 6 commandments which we have no laws to match. Yet Christians, who are supposed to know these commandments, will ignorantly argue that our laws are based on the Ten Commandments and insist that they are being persecuted when asked to remove them from public places, especially court houses, where they have no real place. Most of Christian persecution is imagined and Christians certainly are not the minority in this country. Of course we atheists go off on them now and then, but at 1.6% of the population verses the 70% mentioned by someone else, I would hardly call that a noteworthy persecution.

Answer 7

My experience on this site is that non believers are far more aggressive than believers. I am an atheist by the way.

The idea that Lennon died for his beliefs is pure poppycock.
He died because a 'fan' with a personality disorder and a degree of psychosis shot him. Lennon's beliefs were apparently that we should imagine having no possessions!
This from a man who owned a separate apartment on 5th Avenue just for storing his clothes!

Answer 8

There's always persecution for religious (or non-religious) beliefs.

In some parts of the world Christians are being persecuted too.

Whatever religion is in the minority usuly gets picked on because everone elce doesn't understand. People fear the unknown.

Answer 9

What? John Lennon died because a homicidal maniac got hold of a gun - if US gun laws weren't so insane John Lennon would be alive today.

I love how humans claim to be the most intelligent species on earth, yet most of them believe that a space ghost with gas legs built everything out of nothing, and that this space ghost with gas legs can hear people's thoughts and act on them to effect a positive outcome in some future event in time.

Absolutely bonkers the lot of em.

Atheists like me may be a minority, but at least we don't fit the criteria for a mental illness and delusional disorder.

If animals knew this they'd be rolling on the floor laughing their arrses off.

Answer 10

I don't think so. I'm an atheist and can say with honesty that I haven't been pinned to a cross for not believing in God yet. Besides as an atheist I can truly say that believing in nothing wouldn't stop me from nodding my head and going 'OK you're right, there is a God'. If someone was holding a gun to my head.