"This perspective" as in the idea that the word "atheist" is only about belief in gods?I have never encountered this perspective before.
Who is "they?"Seems to me they need to categorize the subjective experience of consciousness (for example) as either an illusion or an emergent property (whatever that is) or some such.
Atheists (and theists) also have to make choices about what to have for breakfast, but these decisions don't have a bearing on whether they're atheists.