Why is it that I don't hear atheists talking about the importance of love?

The only thing atheists have in common is a lack of belief in god/gods.

Perhaps for some, kindness is a religion. Bare naked kindness. By bare naked I mean lacking dogma. No reward or punishment except for the benefit of living in a world to which you have added your kindness.

I am an atheist, and I act morally partially because I'm an atheist -- if this is the only life we have, then it's important to not cause others to suffer. Are you moral only because you want a heavenly reward or fear hell?

Love in all its various forms is a biological and neurological mechanism, but it's a vital part of the human experience. To understand the origin and makeup of something like love does not reduce it, any more than knowing the ingredients in a meal reduces its value.

And even if atheism caused people to stop caring about morals, even if it caused people to not love, then that would not make it incorrect. There's inherent value in seeing the universe as it truly is, and not blinding yourself to reality just for the sake of feeling good.

My motivation is that I keep on living. Honor is an abstract concept that varies greatly between cultures: hence, Japanese soldiers in 1944 felt equally "honorable" in committing kamikaze attacks and raping and bayoneting Chinese peasants. In terms of love: how do you put it into the world? I help others where I can, love my daughter above anything else in my life, and am very family centered. I do this without the need to fall back on fairy tales for motivation: rather, I do it because I am a human and have compassion for other humans.

The basic mistake that you are making about us, is that you assume that our lack of a religious belief must mean that we are also lacking something else in our lives. Thats an error. Our lack of belief in fictional sky pixies merely means that we have to look elsewhere for what to do in our lives, and there are plenty of human based philosophies that suggest moral systems with which to live in ways that increase the good in society, and decrease the bad Thats called humanism, for one.

You are free to consider your "spiritual journeys" important in your life, and I am as free to consider them a gross waste of your lifetime. But, thats your choice to make, if you wish to waste so much of your time. I have no wish to waste any of mine, thank you all the same.

Good exists without fictional sky pixies. Thats what we believe and how we live our lives. Its that basic.

Because god isn't love. Love is a human emotion, not a deity.

Atheists don't generally try to preach their morals at other people as some religious folks do, that is most likely why you don't see them talking about how you should live your life because honestly, that's your own business.

We don't need to talk about love as if it's some sort of unusual foreign concept.

And I decide how I'm going to live my life simply by using my head. It's not that difficult to figure out that it's wrong to do things to other people that I wouldn't want done to me, and that we as a society benefit from having us all working together towards a positive common goal. I don't need to be threatened with eternal torture in a pit of fire in order to not do things that hurt other people.

Anyone can love without believing in a god or gods. One has nothing to do with the other. We're human, we were designed to feel emotions, whether or not we are religious.

we were raised in the same societies as you were, and learned about what is right and wrong the same way YOU did,we don't need threats from some imaginary creature to tell us whether we are doing right or wrong. We just know. Why should we talk about love, we know what it is, we were taught as children that love is unconditional, and that's part of why we don't believe in your Deity. its not love to threaten to torture people if they don't behave the way you want, its a sick kind of control

I don't need to make a great fuss over what is as natural as breathing to me.

Perhaps you do, because it is so unnatural to you.

Christians talk a lot about things they know little or nothing about.

Like following in the footsteps of Christ.

That'd be largely down to two things drowning out the atheists.

The sound of your own voice echoing in your head telling you that God says they're bad people, and the sound of your own voice informing the atheists that they're going to burn in hell for not believing that a beard in the sky (that used to approve of genocide, mass rape, torture and murder of children and a whole heaping else besides) sent his son (who is him) to be tortured to death to give a get out of hell free card to anyone (regardless of what they've done) as long as they beg and plead for it in just the right way and pledge their love to him in exchange for not killing them.

Yeah, cos it's atheists have the messed up ideas about love.