Interesting stuff, but way off point. Both of us can dig into the history and laws of other societies and come up with things we find that are good, and things that are repugnant. We can find good and bad people and laws within Christendom, and outside it. (But I'm certainly not saying that all cultures are equally good.) As good as we are now, we still have a load of idiotic and destructive laws right here in the US. But the original point, and the only one that brought me into this mini-thread, was whether the atheist could have a love of his own life, and the lives of others. I never claimed that all atheists are wonderful people; we are well aware of some ghastly examples to the contrary. I just think that what Piltdown_Woman said seems sensible to me -- and I don't think that atheism is automatically an anti-life system of thought. I think I made my point, and we probably agree on it. We also agree that our own society is superior to any other, so we can both be happy with our conclusions.
And I'm not disagreeing with you or Piltdown. My point is that culture has a huge influence on attitudes. Our culture is Christian -- although much regression has been occurred during the last 40 years to make it more Roman.
You have people in this country who might declare themselves atheist because of a particulary bad experience with a church -- which I don't think is infrequent. But they still accept the values of a Christian society.
On the other hand if we institutionalize atheism, or paganism or anything expressly anti-JudeoChristian -- which I think is the agenda for some in this country -- you will end up with a hell on earth.