Dear Atheism Subreddit: Today, I've unsubscribed your preachiness

I’m a liberal fellow.  I recently got in an argument with my wife over banning the game RapeLay, not because I’m a proponent of games where you molest women against their will– just because I’m that against censorship when dealing with adults.  Censorship is a personal decision, not be enforced upon others.  Instead, the control of what one considers “wrong” is one of persuasion.  Disagree with Fred Phelps?  Then protest him, don’t sue to legally silence him.

So today, I begin my self-censorship of the “atheism” subreddit, and state that I hope others will join me.

I appreciate reddit.  Beyond just a great “time sink” at work, it’s an involved community of interesting opinions.  I like that it’s socially left, but you’ll find a wide array of viewpoints at the top of the page.  Given the other default reddits (politics, funny, programming, worldnews, etc) do not take a position, I find it unusual the default position for the religion and humanism based articles to be either pro-”god” or pro “there is no god”.  This didn’t stop me from reading plenty of articles from the reddit.

More often than not the subreddit isn’t atheist per se.  It’s anti-organized religion (especially Christianity), pro science, and humanistic.  There’s a lot of good and interesting material that any open-minded person would find highly interesting.  That said, I think most of the general reddit-going crowd would agree that the subreddit is sometimes far too bent on it’s soapbox.  I see more and more “self” threads declaring “I don’t give a shit what your religion is or isn’t” and the like… and I very much agree.  I come to reddit to learn, expand, be touched, be amused… not to be preached at.  I would have thought an “atheism” crowd would understand that.

The straws that broke the poor camel’s back?  A self suggesting that atheists piss off the world by taking over “@” as some sort of symbol (stupid– can’t you do something better with your imagination?) and an argument over whether or not a man should use his two day old’s death as a soapbox (let him do whatever the hell he wants).  I, like many, am tired of this junk, and so I’m moving onwards.

However, I want to keep the benefits of a critical eye towards organized religion along with amazing advances in science when looking at the mystery (be it a “miracle” or otherwise) of the universe.  Which is why I’m asking, as nicely as I can, that those who agree with me might take a moment to not just unsubscribe the “atheism” subreddit (as I hear many say they are doing), but to add the “FREETHOUGHT” subreddit.  Again– I am a strong proponent of freedom of speech, and in no way want to silence… well, anyone.  I’d like to keep the benefits of having a reddit with a large group of people still invested in challenging the set ideas of society with new and engaging information that I can devour on a daily basis, while personally moving myself away from the occasional preaching and tearing down currently on display in an accurately titled ”atheist” subreddit. 

Thanks for listening, and I hope to see the “freethought” grow so I can continue to expand my mind.