Something I discovered a while back is that as an atheist, I’m very much supported by others that I’ve either met online or in person. No one that I’ve come to be familiar with seems to have a problem that I’m a conservative, or even thinks that being a conservative, I cannot possibly be an atheist.  That’s been my experience overall. Sure, there are always naysayers but those people probably wouldn’t accept me no matter what.

I enjoy having honest dialogue with others. Even though there may be disagreement on a subject, I often gain insight into whatever is being discussed. It’s always been interesting to me to be able to attempt to see something from another’s point of view. Many times, as I’ve learned over the years, we tend to ignore those inconvenient facts concerning what we may have believed all of our lives to be true. I come to discussions with an open mind, or try to, because I may learn something that either I had ignored or never actually knew.

Unfortunately, none of us may count on someone else to accept those facts that would dramatically alter their view, were they to concede that what they were told is true. This happens with atheists, skeptics (two different sets of people), as well as those that are just hardened ideologues. I think that we’ve witnessed some of this in recent news stories. Even when the facts come out that dispel whatever was foisted upon us by the media,  there are those, no matter what, that refuse to acknowledge their error.

None of this is new, and for people to blame everything that has gone on over the last few years on social media or fake news, fail to understand that long before the advent of any social media platforms, there were still those that, for their own reasons, and sometimes for their own gain, manipulated the public based based on lies and innuendo.

We’ve all heard the saying, If it seems to good to be true, it probably is, and now, more than ever we should all take that to heart. We need to be open to ideas that are different than those we hold, but also be skeptical when appropriate to not just believe something based on the source.

When I  started this site, over 6 years ago, I named it Conservative Skeptic on purpose.It was meant to get attention; first that I was a conservative, but more that I am a skeptic, something I was long before I was an atheist. I meant to write about not only atheism and skepticism , but what it means to be a conservative in that world. I have some, but probably not enough over time. I want to get back to that initial idea. I want to write more as a skeptic from the point of view as a conservative. I want to have discussions with my readers, in the comments, on those posts.

All of us have an incredible opportunity, should we decide to take advantage, to have those honest conversations about those things that interest us the most and moreso, disabuse ourselves of those ideological tendencies we have as individuals.