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Yeah, I see your point, Tricky. So do I just call you "The Firestarter"?
Just call me G.I. Jesus if you feel the need to. I guess I have a Cyber messiah-complex (or just a really huge ego).
[ or carrying the G.I. Jesus handle is just a clever prevention measure to discourage overzealous Christians from trying to convert me to Christianity]
Certainly I'd like to meet like-minded people. There's no doubt about that. But when I say like-minded I mean people who would rather discuss a variety of things such as science, literature, etc... etc... rather than how annoyed they are by religion or by religious people.
You are basically what I would call a Rationalist. The place for a person like yourself is hanging out in a university setting. IMO. Meet other educated, rationalist people and attend events, along with others, that develop your interests.
I have to admit that after going I was more or less turned off by it. The main reason for me going was because I just wanted to meet people that didn't ask me within the first minute of conversation what church I went to. I think there is a lot of confusion on both sides as to what secular means, or at least how I interpret it. Secular, to me, implies no acknowledgement of these matters. In other words, we live in a secular society as regards the Tooth Fairy, the Easter Bunny, Zeus, Thor, etc... We do not make it an active part of our lives to ask one another whether we believe in these things; and we do not ask whether or not someone believes in them. We just live our lives and we do not discuss the existence or non-existence of such things.
Boy, do I wish you were closer to Huntsville. :I A normal conversation - EXACTLY what I'd like to have.
It sounds more like a club, where the members are all their because they have a common interest.
The groups I go to are social, related to a common interest, and the start of a political or lobbing movement. I think both are fun, and filled with amazing free thinkers.
They both expose me to like minded people and wider views of the non religious culture than I can get on the web.
I am thinking of joining one which debates issues related to religion and political issues. It seems like the natural next step.
I joined an atheist group near where I live, but I only attended a few of their meetings. My experience was similar to what GCSTroop described earlier in this thread. The people I met, while well-meaning, had an elitist air about them in terms of how they viewed religious folks. I also wasn't expecting there to be an agenda as far as what the group talked about. I thought it was just going to be a bunch of people getting together to have a friendly dinner and talk about whatever they felt like talking about. But there was a moderator who wanted to discuss religion, the problems it's created throughout history, and specifically address some recent decisions by the local government that he felt violated the separation between church and state. But I kept an open mind and attended 2 more meetings hoping things would be a little less structured. Unfortunately, it was more of the same. While it's great to be surrounded by other atheists, my idea of a fun evening isn't sitting around with a bunch of them badmouthing religion.
What I learned from the experience is that if you're going to join a group, join one based on a common interest, not a common non-interest. I guess if I were going to join an atheist group again, it would be one where my being an atheist was almost incidental. I'd want a group with fun and interesting people around my age where I didn't have to worry about being judged for being an atheist and where we could talk about subjects other than our shared atheism.
How about just trying a group, or club related to your interests or hobbies? Works for me...I collect and restore older air cooled cars (VWs and Porsche) and belong to the local aircooled club....No religion or non religion discussed.
This is an old thread; when I started this thread I had joined one group in my area. I was impressed with the people in the group, and discussions which did not cover non religious issues were better than I have found in any social or country clubs settings. I have now joined several national groups who are working to mainstream the Atheist movement. My view of the Atheist and Agnostic position has changed as I interacted with the members of these groups, and I feel much better about myself and my views as a result. It has been a positive move for me, and I would say keep looking if you did not find a group you liked.
Yeah, I know, I got into this conversation kinda late, but... Troop? you listenin'? Secular-1. worldly rather than spiritual. 2. not specifically pertaining to any religion or religious body OK, going fishing with a friend is a secular activity, singing in the church choir is religious (personally I find most hymns boring, but, then again, I have long suspected that any church related literature, including hymnals (no, they are not really urinals for him's) the tracts, their bible, that little table of contents thingy they hand out as you enter (it may not really be a table of contents, it may just be the recipe for a church meetin'), in my youth during the time I was forced to participate in church stuff, I would find out how many different words I could make out of some of the larger words in the program, Thessalonians, Corinthians, or I would take the longest word pertaining to christerism I knew "antidisestablishmentarianism" and start making other words out of it. You probably already figured out that I had a painfully boring one hour every week. OK, the word is a descriptive for the believes of some that did not want (anti) the (disestablishment) or the getting rid of, the Church of England, The (arianism) meant that there were more than one of these groups and they treated this as a cause celebre. It musta worked, the church of england still exists. This just goes to prove what great lengths I will go to alleve my boredom, it was better than trying to count the number of boards in the ceiling.
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or carrying the G.I. Jesus handle is just a clever prevention measure to discourage overzealous Christians from trying to convert me to Christianity]
oops, oh never mind 
