Are atheists moral? Do they have ethics? Who are more moral? Theists or atheists?

No. Not all atheists are not immoral or unethical. Those people you're talking about are just very misguided and don't understand that humans wrote the Bible. That means morals existed before the Bible. Look at what religious people did to others back in history. Those things were truly immoral and they were religious.

Nowadays, one can learn morality from our culture—we don't have to learn morality only from churches. It's true that an atheist is not going to learn morality from a church (except of course he/she might have gone to church as a child) but we have morality built into our laws and our stories and pretty much everyone knows what our morality is from learning it in school, from friends, etc.

However, although I've read atheists disagreeing with this, I have a feeling that religion was the group that taught men morality when we first started evolving beyond simpler primates and had started to think. That is when we stopped just following our inborn instincts to guide our behavior, as animals do—when "free will" was born, and we had to learn "right and wrong," in other words, morality. I'm quite sure that morality has to be taught and reinforced. These days there is a lot of non-morality going on, that's for sure. I don't think there's any agreement on why that is. And because of the media (we all know so much more about what's going on everywhere,) we can't really tell if it's worse than it used to be or not. I do know that in the 1970s I lived in a house that didn't lock and I was never robbed.

If you notice about what the bible says is moral, like: stoning unruly children, rape, slavery, murder, etc. Hopefully most Christians see this as wrong, the reason they see these as wrong now but not in the bible days, is that we have evolved to work towards the bettering of our species. Meaning things like murder, are seen as counter productive to the survival of the human race. As time goes by we learn what social behaviors disturb the cooperation of the main group and so we basically call those things that best keep peace, moral. All humans naturally have become more moral than are ancestors. That is why slavery didn't bother us back a few centuries, but now it does. Most Christians will just ignore the "moral laws" that are counter productive and follow the ones that are productive. God has nothing to do with this, so morality is god independent. I don't know if this helps or not, but here it is.

There is no such thing as morality, but there are ethics.

Atheists are just like everyone else. Some behave ethically, others do not. Believing in a deity or in a religion does not make someone any different. It boils down to who they want to be. If someone wants to be kind, they will be kind regardless of their beliefs. If someone wants to be a scumbag, they will do so regardless of their beliefs.

Why there is no such thing as morality is because it is defined by religion, and has not remained constant throughout the years. Things deemed immoral are now seen as moral, and vice versa. Even today, depending on what country you are in the views on moral behaviour will be different. Ethics are based off of laws, morality is based off of belief.

The demographics of the prison population should tell you that exceedingly few convicted felons are atheists. That should tell you about atheists and morals.

I'm an atheist, and I live an honest, moral life and have the same set of emotions everyone else does. Atheists are not some subspecies of humanity. We simply do not believe in a god. We treat others well because it's the right thing to do not because a holy book says to.

You look like you're UU so you should know the answer to this. Basic moral similarities pop up in every religion and higher mammals because they're beneficial and they work. Most people will have some level of empathy fostered by whatever environment they grow up in.

Atheists don't think it's "moral" to rape underaged altar boys. We dont believe its moral to demand blood sacrifices, to "dash children with rocks," to forcibly require little girls to serve as sexual slaves for god worshipers (numbers 31).

Unlike religionists, atheists are ethical because they legitimately care about This world and this life, and the people who inhabit the earth. Religionists in this forum have frequently claimed that their fear of god is the only thing that keeps them from killing people or committing other crimes. Thankfully, I don't need a deity to tell me that harming other people is wrong.

The proposal is that morality is exclusively based on an adherence to religion. If you assert that, and you believe the bible is the way you get moral directives: Luke 19:27 Jesus says, "But those mine enemies, who would not that I should reign over them, bring them hither and slay them before me."

What kind of morality is that?

Of course (most) atheists are moral. You have been 'sold' the total BS that morals come from religion, that is a total load of nonsense.

That is a bit ignorant.

Atheists have their own conscience, whereas Christians should have (sadly, many go by the Law or Commandments and not by the Spirit) - instead - Yeshua, for He IS the Truth, and you need not a "conscience" if you have the Truth, the Way and the Love (God IS Love, too).