The problem with your ‘our community’ is that you really are abusing the term ‘atheist’. Atheism really is dictionary atheism. All the people that can be atheists: Fascists, Communists, Democrats, Republicans, Budhists, … well, pretty much anyone that’s not a theists. Atehism already DOES contain lots of bad people. Your piece, and the one by Myers that referred to yours, continue to get this wrong.

New Atheists are mostly secular humanists. Their political persuasion covers various elements of liberalism and libertarianism. They acquire the label as a consequence of the accessibility of their material with the rise of the internet. They are not significantly different from many Old Atheists, Classical Atheists.

There are no atheist doctrines that demand bad behaviour. That comes from elsewhere.

More on your piece: https://ronmurp.net/2015/10/07/ashley-miller-invites-our-atheist-self-flagellation/

And for the record, Myers: https://ronmurp.net/2015/10/07/is-myers-morally-and-intellectually-bankrupt/

Her article and its conclusions are based on a patently unsupportable false premise. There is no evidence the shooter is atheist.

The article is also based on false logic. Even if the shooter were atheist (which there is no firm evidence to prove at this stage) , there is no evidence to connect him or compare him by analogy with religiously-motivated shooters.

The labels used by the author of that article – “atheist” or “religious” – are entirely irrelevant per se. And this resort to lazy labels indicates a lack of seriousness and intellectual robustness in the writer.

What matters is the *motivation* and *rationale* for a person’s actions. Many religious can be motivated by their religious texts, teachings and associated political beliefs – not all will be.

But the writer needs to offer evidence that atheist shooters are motivated by their atheistic leanings. It seems that the only kind of atheist that would be motivated to do what these shooters do would be an “anti-secular” atheist who wants to eradicate religious freedom entirely. Now, of course, this not “atheism” – this is anti-secularism. They are not the same thing. Anti-secularism is not a feature, belief or ideology of atheism at all.

Please stop using “atheism” as a lazy, un-reasoned, anti-intellectual shorthand.