We’ve all heard it a number of times, by now. “Atheism is a religion.” When we attempt to explain why this is not the case, the conversation goes something like this:

Atheism is a religion. You have a religious belief that God doesn’t exist. It’s a religious belief system. No it’s not. It’s a lack of belief in a god. There’s not even a “system” there, it’s a position on a single point. Yes but a lack of belief is a kind of belief. Therefore, it counts as a religion.

In the eyes of the law, atheism is not a religion. It’s a “religious preference”. There’s a difference.

Suppose you worked at an organization where your “lunch preferences” needed to be registered (maybe it’s required to be specifically ordered/delivered). One of the options is “no lunch.” The organization also has a rule that everyone who has lunch has to pay a delivery fee. You’d think that because you’re not having lunch that you don’t have pay up. Think again!

“Yes but not having lunch is basically another way of having lunch, where you’re just not eating anything. So therefore you fall under this rule, and have to pay the fee.“

According to these definitions, it’s literally impossible to not be a member of a religion, because even strictly not being one, is one. This isn’t just an error in thinking, it’s a violation of the basic logical absolutes.

(I pulled this list from one of Matt Dillahunty’s most holy holy holy videos)

Identity: A = A (A thing is whatever it is)

Non-Contradiction: A != !A (A thing isn’t what it isn’t)

Excluded Middle: Everything is A or !A

In order for this “lack of belief = belief” to be true, we’re essentially saying that: A = !A – it is what it isn’t. Once the absolutes are tossed out, our very capacity to process realities is flung out the same window. We suddenly have possible, perfectly “logical” equivocations.

The lack of potato salad is a kind of potato salad. A Corvette is a lack of potato salad. Therefore, a Corvette is a kind of potato salad.

Anything goes at that point. That’s how “not having lunch” magically equates to “having lunch”. Likewise, that’s how atheism’s lack of religiosity supposedly becomes religious. Secular law doesn’t approach it like that. What the law cannot do is discriminate for or against religious preference. That’s how atheism can be protected under the First Amendment, without itself being a religion.

Note, though, that I actually modified the argument. I changed “lack of belief = kind of belief” into “lack of belief = belief.” One needs to be careful, because there’s different ways of positioning this. One way they’ll phrase it is that there’s a spectrum of belief, from “no belief to 100% belief“, and what they’re saying is that, even though we have “zero belief”, we’re still on that number-line. That’s fine, but the problem there is the conflation between “being on the number line” and “having belief”. We’re still facing the same identity/contradiction problem, in a strange equivocation:

Religion requires belief. Atheism is a lack of belief. Lack of belief is a kind of belief. Therefore, atheism is a religion.

That’s essentially:

Religion requires a belief value of 4, on the number line. Atheism has a value of 0. But 0 and 4 are on the same number line… Therefore, atheism has a value of 4, and is a religion.

It’s silly. That’s why I don’t buy that “kind of belief” and “belief” are relevantly different. Both chocolate ice cream and demon-scowl ice cream are both kinds of ice cream, but non-existent ice cream… isn’t.

Such argumentative problems don’t seem to deter some people.

Years ago, the Atheist Experience had a guy (Stan), who repeatedly called the show, trying to argue that atheism is a religion. His arguments were vapid. Atheists have an opinion on the topic, so they’re religious. Atheists get together and form communities based on a common topic, so they’re religious. Each time these arguments were shot down with responses like “Then geology is a religion because they have groups that talk about this shared interest.” He’d then move to the next argument.

Each subsequent call recycled many of those arguments, as though he had amnesia. I don’t think he was a troll. I think it’s one of those situations where a person knows that his/her conclusion is right, and the fact that each attempt at arguing it fails is just a “bad example”, so the person will just keep trying until something sticks.

These people (if I paint with a somewhat wide brush) often seem have a double standard. When it comes to people doing bad things in the name of religion, they narrow the definition of religion or Christianity, to the point where almost no one qualifies anymore. They don’t want that baggage, so they modify it on the fly when convenient.

Accusing atheists of hypocrisy is often a favorite past time. “You’re bashing on religion while being religious! Hypocrites!”

They attempt to accomplish this by, again, modifying the definition of religion or Christianity on the fly, to suddenly be so broad, that anything (and I mean anything) qualifies. With an umbrella so large, finally atheism falls beneath it. Then again, so does sports events, engineering firms and family gatherings. The definition has been stretched and distorted to such a degree, that it’s virtually a meaningless word now, on par with “things” and “stuff”. It’s either that, or they build complete straw men caricatures of atheism to better qualify… or often a combination of both.

When I talk about definitions, I’ll speak of “distinguishing exclusive definitions”. If you’re defining a “giraffe”, the question is not “what attributes does it have?“, but rather “what distinguishes a giraffe from a non-giraffe?” The fact giraffes contain carbon, and have eyes, really does not narrow it down. Virtually the whole of the animal kingdom now falls under that definition. Instead, we’d talk about a yellow-furred tetrapod with brown spots; an herbivore that has a very long neck that can reach up to the leaves of trees, and can be 20 feet tall, in adult form. That’s perhaps not a perfect definition, but it’s in the ballpark.

Do you know what the distinguishing characteristics of recognized “religions”?

They tend to believe in one or more “higher” beings that created/established the world.

They tend to address the “supernatural” – either as realms or spirits.

They tend to worship these beings/spirits, in a collective common-doctrinal way.

Buddhism is an example where it’s apparently debatable as to whether it’s a religion or philosophy. So we often don’t have hard lines… but there are trends we can recognize.

Do you know what’s not distinguishing characteristics of recognized “religions”?

Community (if anything, religion plagiarized this from humanity)

Shared secular beliefs (like – what’s the best approach to building a sky-scraper?)

Talking about a common topic of interest

On the last point, even if the common topic of interest is about religion, that doesn’t mean the group is religious. That’d be like saying having an interest group that discusses NASA, are themselves NASA; or a interest group that discusses dolphins are themselves dolphins.

Either list could have more entries, but my point is, when atheists criticize the religion, we’re criticizing them for having beliefs that are not factually established, not because they’re forming communities. We’re criticizing them for hypocritically collecting money for personal wealth, while telling the group’s poorer members that God will give them more money back for giving to the church… not because they’re a group that has member dues. We criticize them for being anti-human and anti-science, not because they have a belief system or common philosophy.

If you were to listen to the our accusers, you’d swear us atheists were bashing on the religious for being humanoids, despite being humanoids themselves. They’re not listening, or they have their selective-listening filters engaged.