For a lot of people who come here, this is one of the upper rungs on the ladder out of the religious cesspit, but they are not quite in the open air yet. We can therefore offer a helping hand and advice on how to mount the last few steps, if it is asked for. Which yes will involve turning back and looking down the pit again, but once you have found firm ground there is nothing to be scared of. Or you can curse them for being slow, give them a kick in the face and waltz off to sniff the roses alone.

I have been here quite a long time, and I am wondering the same these days.

What Jeni said, and what I have said before. God and religion play such a pervasive role in our daily lives in this country from laws to politics and more, how can you not talk about it? You get new folks on here all of the time who want to talk about it and some who need to talk about it. You don't have to get in on those discussions. I am sure there are other discussions you don't get in on because you have no interest in the subject as we all do.

I see it as being a bit like how a road safety discussion group could be expected to discuss bad driving, or how a vegan group might talk about the meat industry. In other words, since so many of us here use terms such as "atheist" and/or "agnostic" to define ourselves, it'd be quite odd if we didn't talk about the one thing we share and which brought us to this site.

My guess is many have just escaped religion, and have to work out some anger toward it. Others might just feel refreshed to have the freedom to complain about religion without counter attacks from the religious on this "safe" site.

I left religion years ago and feel I have worked through the anger issues about it. I now filter topics on here to exclude religion for just that reason. I'd really rather talk about other things.