About.

I am fascinated by religion and what makes people believe in a spiritual realm. As a biologist I tend to read the world through my biology - I am the least spiritual organism I have ever come across. I seem genetically incapable of belief, and I come from a long line of Apathetics, although no one in my family has ever declared themselves an atheist before me, as far as I know.


my own deconversion from token Christianity is not an interesting story, but I am fascinated by the stories of those who have left a religion, any religion, after devotional belief and involvement. It took me years to make the intellectual leaps required of atheism, and I had no involvement in religion as an adult, and no pressure to be involved whatsoever. There was no challenge, and I am in admiration of those for whom atheism was a rigorous leap into a whole new world.

I do LOVE to read about religions and the crazy things people do. I am intensely fond of Mormonism, Fundamentalist Christians scare me a bit, and the Scientologists, well, they confound me.

I spend a lot of time defending Muslims because I grew up in a country (South Africa) where I was exposed to only moderate Muslims and am always shocked to see that many Christians and others believe them all to be fundamentalist and extreme. I know many who do not cover their heads and even (ahem) drink.

However, I admit I would also be too scared to make any comment about their beliefs. Some (just some) can be a little touchy about those things.

If anyone has an interesting deconversion story, I would love to hear it.

I used to think of myself as a benign, benevolent atheist, who was tolerant of religion as long as it was not harmful and not imposed upon me. But the more I read, the angrier I get. I find it harder and harder to see religion doing any good at all. Some days I am a very angry atheist. Then I calm down and forget and try not to think about these things until the next time.

**NOTE: I created this blog as Hug and Atheist, then after one day of writing it realised that there is already a blog, documentary and entire brand labelled Hug an Atheist. I honestly did not know, and so changed the name of my blog. I am not sure if I can change the URL, but will see if I can.