What's an Atheist?

[ThinkingSapien]

‘Atheist’ covers so many positions including positions that we would in common usage call religious, such as Buddhism arguably,

It can, when I took my religious studies class in college I remember a Buddhism being called “an Atheistic Religion.”

that it is should not be used.

I’ll leave that open for discussion. My personal take-away is that often times a single word description may not be sufficient for describing some one’s view of the word.

 

[ThinkingSapien]

Hmm. This was never my experience going to a Catholic high school. My group of friends at the time (including myself) was predominantly atheist, and I don’t recall anyone being treated as part of an out-group for their nonbelief.

I don’t know if this makes a difference but this isn’t a Catholic school. Her mom had some concerns about sending her to a religious school, but with the choice being either the school that can’t afford books where making good grades seems to be frowned upon by peers or one of the schools with books where her daughter might not fit in she didn’t have to debate the issue very long to arrive at a decision.

But such experiences are certainly not homogenous.

Certainly. Her experience at one of the other religious schools may have been better; I think her experience at this school may even have been better were it not for the teachers disclosing the absence of a religious disposition to the other students. Some how her declaration that she doesn’t know much about God was mutated to she believes there is no God while being passed around (two distinctly different statements).