Considering we live in this country, I assume the majority of us are locally In the closet.

When I first considered myself an atheist, I had this overwhelming urgent need to tell people. I thought to myself, if I don't get to share this, nobody knows me and I have to pretend to be a part of the flock. The thought of this made me sad. So, I reverted to coming out online and having vague debates with my brother about slavery and Islam, magic and whatnot. I even reached the point where I would consciously avoid saying the word Allah because, hey, I didn't believe in him. That ended one day as I was on this site, I was messaging a fellow atheist who lived in Jordan complaining about this unpleasant feeling and dogmaty I was experiencing for myself. He said " i dont mind using thr word,the word Allah is in every other word of our vocabulary, why be religious about it". I was a bit relieved yet still feeling uncomfortable as though I would be misleading people if I joined in the mantra. I also made a point of refraining from saying alhamdullilah after a meal despite my dads pleas to go for it.

I realize now this is not the most important issue, although , somehow naturally I have lessened my use iif the word because god is naturally not on my mind anymore.

I've come to peace with the fact that I might never be able to tell the men in my family that I am an atheist. The ladies in my family have been told though. And for the majority, it seems like it doesn't play a major difference.

Sometimes at work I am approached with a religion related personal question :- " are you fasting?". Depending on the person asking I might answer honestly. And I'll tell you, so far it got me into this email based debate and email based preaching. I am now had zakir nail recommended to me. Oh how I dislike this person. He is full of himself and grows on how uninformed his audience are. I've been advised to keep quiet about it, however, for people at such close proximity, I tend to feel safe.

So my approach now, I'm an atheist and I'll tell you if you ask me.

It is still surprising though how often I am mistaken for a Muslim simply because of my last name. I know this shouldn't surprise me because years ago I had the same misconception about Saudis. And I think, if I wasn't exposed to the diversity in though, I would have continued on this way. This is one of the reasons why I prefer to be open about it as much as possible and give someone else a taste of the diversity that I love.

How about you? Have you told anyone?