alt.atheism

{{short description|Usenet newsgroup that discusses atheism}}

{{lowercase|title=alt.atheism}}

alt.atheism is a Usenet newsgroup within the alt.* hierarchy that discusses atheism.{{citation|title=Atheism Online|first=N.|last=Holbrook|journal=The Lantern|date=October 25, 1998|url=http://media.www.thelantern.com/media/storage/paper333/news/1998/11/25/Column/Atheism.Online-45855.shtml|access-date=2009-05-22|archive-url=https://archive.today/20070616132912/http://media.www.thelantern.com/media/storage/paper333/news/1998/11/25/Column/Atheism.Online-45855.shtml|archive-date=2007-06-16|url-status=dead}}. The group was originally created on February 6, 1990,[https://groups.google.com/d/msg/alt.pagan/TIAlrwQ3JSw/vLOWNyCI_1cJ Brian R. Holt's alt.pagan post announcing his creation of alt.atheism] as sourced from Google Groups on January 15, 2016. by a member of the alt.pagan newsgroup, to provide an alternative forum for the numerous discussions on atheism that were overwhelming the pagan group. A survey of Usenet groups in 1994–1995 found that, among 70 groups discussing "consciousness, spirituality, and religion (broadly defined)", it was the group with the highest traffic volume.{{citation|first=Jay|last=Kinney|authorlink=Jay Kinney|title=Net worth? : Religion, cyberspace and the future|journal=Futures|volume=27|issue=7|pages=763–776|year=1995|doi=10.1016/0016-3287(95)80007-V}}. Nash writes that "atheist and freethought newsgroups" including alt.atheism have "done much to remove the sense of isolation felt by many with antireligious opinions".{{citation|first=David|last=Nash|contribution=Religious sensibilities in the age of the internet: freethought culture and the historical context of communication media|editor1-first=Stewart M.|editor1-last=Hoover|editor2-first=Lynn Schofield|editor2-last=Clark|editor2-link=Lynn Schofield Clark|title=Practicing religion in the age of the media: explorations in media, religion, and culture|publisher=Columbia University Press|year=2002|page=281|isbn=978-0-231-12089-0}}.