Thread by @answersinreason

"What's the Objective of Atheism" asked in a group.

There is no objective of #atheism.

In philosophy of religion its usually understood as the proposition gods do not exist. The #atheist believes this proposition true.

Colloquially it is understood as a lack of belief in gods.

There is, however, #atheist activism which seeks #secular society. This can be referred to as anti-theism rather than #atheism though.

Anti-theism, in the strongest sense, is the belief no one should be theist (believe in gods).

There are some today who conflate philosophical atheism (belief gods do not exist) with anti-theism.

If that were true & the anti- prefix doesn't mean against/opposing and means belief not:

Antivaxxers believe vaccines don't exist
Antiabortionists believe abortions don't exist

I think this anti-theism conflation comes because of the commonly used philosopy of religion definition being "the belief gods do not exist" and because the colloquial definition has shoehorned anything that "lacks a belief" as an atheist, they've also had to rebrand anti-theism.

The funny thing is, this use of anti-theism isn't even how the often celebrated Christopher Hitchens used it.

Quoted below, this isn't just a belief gods do not exist, he maintained the belief that religion is harmful, and thus is an anti-theist...

Now, folks can identify how they like, but it does bother me when folks say "atheism is only" or tell me I am an "anti-theist" due to some weird redefining of the word.

I also prefer concise and precise language.

I don't find broad terminology that useful.

You're free to conflate all non-theists with atheists

And you can apply that to other things too... Consider though, do you regard

All non-brits, American?
All non-dogs, cats?
All non-humans, pigs?
All non-fords, Ferrari's?
All non-cars, boats?

Or are there more precise terms?

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