I have compassion for religious people who finds comfort in faith; especially if it’s born out of personal trauma.

As an atheist, I’ve been advised not the challenge people’s religious faith. The atheist, by pointing out reality to the faithful, is seen as mean, or unethical for stealing a security blanket away from people. People often find themselves in a fragile states, and religion is said to offer great comfort. I fully understand that perception, I sympathize with it, and there is a partially reasonable, and ethical argument to be made in favor of allowing the faithful to maintain their faith unchallenged.

The larger problem is, the faithful do not realize the true costs of their faith. Most people accept, as a matter of faith, that having faith in God is a net good. If that is one’s default assumption, then anything that chips away at faith is a net bad.

If someone could maintain faith in private, and not bring their private thoughts on faith into the public sphere, then in theory their would be no issue with faith. But faith, by definition, forces one to warp reality to believe things that aren’t real. It trains one’s mind to reject uncomfortable realities. So in a very real sense, faith steals your sense of reality, and that is extremely dangerous. There are high societal costs associated with people training themselves to reject reality.

If faith and reality are at odds, and they are, consider weighing these two alternatives . . . What is more unfair: For someone of faith to insist I and all others reject reality, or for those of us who do not shy away from reality to insist the faithful accept what is real?

Facts are real regardless if you believe them. When a powerful group within society refuses to face facts, it puts society as a whole at risk. The high costs for maintaining faith are born on those forced to subsidize the them. Having to play along and pretend people of faith have equally valid claims on facts or reality in general is not only unfair, but harmful to social trust and human progress. The “faith subsidy” paid by society has real world effects, and the net effects are largely negative.

Faith is inherently unethical; it’s harmful and unfair to others. The scales of justice favor the atheist.