Agnostic Group

Atheism, the idea believed by atheists, is essentially the belief that there are no deities or gods. It can also be defined, in much more broad terms, as the rejection of any belief of deities. While the exact definition of atheism is widely debated, there are several levels of atheism, giving alternate meanings to the word. By the broadest of standards, atheism refers to the absence of any belief in gods or deities. This modern definition of Atheism originated in the 18th century. The word “atheism” arose from the Greek word atheos, meaning “without gods”. This was originally a negative word applied to those individuals who did not believe or worship gods of any kind that the larger society as a whole believed in. The eventual rise of freethought, skepticism, and criticism of religions led to a more widespread belief in atheism by many individuals.

What Was the Atheist and Agnostic Group?
The Atheist and Agnostic Group was an atheist forum community that was created on the popular social networking website MySpace. The atheist forum was targeted to those who believed in atheist and agnostic ideals having rapidly gained popularity with approximately 35,000 members before it was finally deleted. The Atheist and Agnostic Group was one of the largest atheist forums on MySpace, having dedicated itself to the subject of non-theism and gained 10,000 members every year until it was finally disbanded.

Controversy Surrounding the Atheist Forum:
Due to several attacks from phish hackers in 2007, the creator’s account was accessed without permission and the atheist forum was vandalized. The group was renamed by the hackers, members of the atheist forum were banned, and the founder’s account was also vandalized. Due to the heated pressure caused by the sensitive subject matter, MySpace deleted the atheist forum. The founder of the atheist group believes that MySpace deleted because they gave in to pressure from powerful Christian groups. After the creator complained to MySpace, they eventually brought the group back a few months later. Once again, the atheist forum was attacked again by Christian fundamentalists, and once again, the group was deleted by MySpace during the creator’s continuing efforts to have users unbanned from the group. The atheist forum has been down ever since.

Attacks to One of the Largest Atheist Forums on the Internet:
There were many attacks experienced by the Atheist and Agnostic Group on MySpace. When the creator’s account was hacked by Christian fundamentalists, his profile was vandalized and the group was renamed “Jesus is Love”. In addition, many of the discussions in the forum were deleted, including threads talking about the hack and half the members were banned. Finally, on January 1, 2008, the group was scheduled to be removed from the website.

Subsequent Groups:
In honor of the original atheist forum and to exercise their freedom of speech, several other atheist forums on MySpace bearing the same name. They still have continual discussions.