You can't decide to believe something. You can, however, decide to be willfully ignorant of anything that could possibly challenge your beliefs.
How do you not decide to believe something? That's pretty much what the word means. I think the agnostic scientist put it best: Faith and religion do not contradict science. I don't think I understand some peoples absolute hate for any kind of religious belief system.
One reason for the hate - until very recently, in a lot of the world, being an outspoken atheist was very likely to get you killed, or at least ostracized. This is STILL true, in a lot of places. Of course, being of the wrong religion is usually just as bad - but it's not the atheists doing the hating here.
Just making the point, that the perceived intolerance, of atheists to the religious, does not hold a candle to the very real intolerance of the religious to the atheist. Not even in the same league.
Are you asking about me personally? Or in general? Because if the latter, here ya go : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inquisition
And if you live in America, surely you know that it is very difficult to be elected to public office if you are an outspoken atheist. Correct me if I'm wrong about that, I have been away from the USA for some time.
Really? Because I don't believe things are like that, even in a blue state. This link has a lot of info - see the USA section, where it says this : "Few politicians have been willing to identify as non-theists, since until recently such revelations would have been considered "political suicide", until Democratic California Representative Pete Stark's 2007 decision to come out as the first openly nontheistic member of Congress." That's 2007 - the very first openly atheist member of Congress.
Not that I hate religion but I'll try to rationalize this hate. - People hate the things people have done in the name of religion such as gay hate, non equal rights for women, etc.
- People hate justifying acts of hate with the bible, or with or other holy texts Well I've ran out of reasons because I made that first on really broad...