Explicitly “Atheist” and “Agnostic” societies generally have axes to grind. They aren’t content to not believe, or to doubt, on their own. They think this attitude should be spread.
Trouble is, once they do, they have gone in the ring with evangelists who have just as much right to speak their minds. And in the long term, evangelism usually wins. I say it’s because there really is a God, but also we can see that to preach in favor of a something is more appealing than to preach in favor of a nothing.
“Explicitly “Atheist” and “Agnostic” societies generally have axes to grind.”
Atheists, yes absolutely; they believe they possess the perfect truth that overthrows all others, and lots of them will get out there & hector away.
But agnostics...? How do you militate on behalf of your belief in...nothing in particular? When an agnostic missionary knocks on your door and witnesses to you that “There may be a god, there may not be one, I personally don’t know for sure, I don’t have conclusive proof one way or another, I don’t reject out of hand the notion of a higher power, it’s just beyond my ability to conceptualize the unseeable and unknowable, but anyway...thank you for your time & have a nice day”, do you regard your most fundamental spiritual beliefs as under concerted & determined attack?