I sense a lot of misplaced anger here...
Anger? well, annoyance, at least.
Misplaced? Not a bit.
I HATE hypocrites
It is often said that Buddhism is not a religion but a philosophy, a way of life. And people who say that are often Buddhist and often have far more sense than some,
'philosophy?'
I know of no philosophies that have monasteries, ceremonies, holidays, etc. Buddhists do.
So do the atheists that look and act as if they were members of the most 'evangelical' of religions.
Here's the disclaimer again: I am NOT saying that 'atheism is a religion." It's not, any more than theism is.
I am NOT saying that all atheists actually belong to a religion. They don't. The VAST majority of them do not, and wouldn't know what to do with an 'atheist' religion if one were presented to them.
I AM saying that some atheists belong to groups or philosophies that look and act exactly like the sort of religion they are out to rid the world of, and that simply being 'atheist' does not absolve them of that behavior, nor does being 'atheist' mean that in spite of the way they behave, they aren't actually engaging in that behavior.
American Atheists, for instance.....if you go to their website, and whenever you see 'religion,' you substituted any specific religion, and whenever you see 'atheism' you substituted any other specific religion, you would see absolutely NO DIFFERENCE between that website and any church based website, except for some of the base doctrine.
It talks about supportive communities for those who leave religion....which rhetoric, frankly, could be taken word for word from any number of 'counter-cult' churches that say the same thing about THEIR groups, aiding people who are either 'coming to Christ," or "getting out of (insert whatever group they don't like here, JW, Catholicism, Mormonism, Seventh Day Adventists...whatever...)...
Looks exactly the same to me. Same rhetoric, same invitations, same attempts to get laws changed....I see no difference except that the THEISTS are up front about it, and the atheists are pretending that they aren't really doing this stuff.
Just....own it, OK? Atheists who are doing this, stop pretending that your poop smells better than the guy next to you in the latrine.
The point is that atheism is defined, people are not. Just because some will seek agreement does not make them religious.
.....if it walks like a duck....
If anyone ascribes bad behaviour to another then proceeds to mimic the same behaviour themselves does not make them religious but a hypocrite.
Agreed. Absolutely agreed.
However, I'm not wrong in pointing out that a big part of that hypocrisy is that even as they get on their 'less holy than thou' soap boxes and consider being called 'religious' a serious insult, they continue to act exactly like the religions they claim to utterly despise and be opposed to.