Don't want to be labelled Atheist?

Many people who consider themselves non-believers are hesitant to use the term atheist to describe themselves. That is the case with Ian Jack,the man who wrote the article I linked to below. He was in the hospital and when asked his religion he chose to say none rather than call himself an atheist. I usually tend to get two explanations when I question people why they think this way. The first reason is that it carries what many would consider a bad stigma with it.  I believe that to overcome this stigma we must be more open about calling ourselves atheists. When people begin to realize that people they know and like are atheists, they may start to think differently about atheists in general.
The other reason, which Jack touches on in his article, is that people don't want to be defined by by just one term. Particularly a term that describes a negative about themselves. By negative I don't mean a trait that is bad but by something they don't do or believe. However, I think that there are other terms that identify us by our negatives that we use. Nobody is offended by being called a non-smoker for example.
Also, we often identify ourselves by only one term at a time, perhaps as a runner or a teacher. So those that say they don't want to be labeled by just one term should realize that we do this already. It usually is just a matter of context, obviously if someone asks you what you do, you wouldn't say atheist just as you wouldn't answer runner to that question. We have many labels which we use to describe ourselves and we just pick the appropriate one for the situation.
Christians label themselves with a single term and our term which is actually much broader should be suitable for us. Labeling yourself a christian comes with assumptions also, both positive and negative. So be proud of being an atheist and when asked about your religion, use that as a proper time to label yourself and be honest. "I am an atheist."


http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/dec/23/ian-jack-not-an-atheist?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+theguardian%2Fcommentisfree%2Frss+%28Comment+is+free%29