Case in point, I am ethnically jewish and yet my entire family is atheist. XD

Judaism is both an ethnicity and a religion. Anyone born from a Jewish mother is considered jewish, even if they don't practice the religion or don't believe in any God at all. It confused me as a kid, but it's how it is. We practice Passover and Channukah in the same way a lot of athiests practice  Christmas and Easter. We pay lip service to the traditions and symbols, but we don't actively believe in it.

The question why someone is atheist, is similar with asking someone why he doesn't believe in Santa Claus or Dracula. :P

Or perhaps they simply arrive at the realisation for themselves at an age where they start being capable of doing do. 7 year olds generally aren't capable of conceptualising a view of existence that runs contrary to what their parents believe. 

Regardless your comment smacks of an attempt to diminish atheism to a knee jerk response to parental oppression. If we are going to speak in such superficial terms then I could argue that believers are simply those who were too lazy to rebel, and have maintained their status quo because it is the path of least resistance.

I doubt either would be true in most cases.

I am an atheist for the simple reason that there is no evidence to support the existence of any deities. Additionally, all such claims that I have encountered lack verisimilitude and are easily dismissed as either wishful thinking or a means of controlling the masses. I do not believe in deities because there is nothing that convinces me otherwise.

Belief in deities, regardless of religion, ultimately boils down to faith. People believe because they want to and they choose to.

This becomes more apparent in monotheistic religions that attribute all of existence and its governance to a single, knowable entity as defined by a collection of stories passed on through generations.

I was born an atheist, as we all are, and no one converted me. The only religious person in my family is my grandmother, so...

I tried to believe in a deity, but another one tried to kill me.

Here is all the proof you need.

I believe in reality,that's why I'm an atheist. You supposedly have all these different relgions and gods,what do all these gods do have a round table discussion in the sky? lol Religion is just something used to control the masses and keep them in line. that's all it is to me. the bible is nothing more then a big moral book. I just don't believe in that magic man in the sky mumbo jumbo. that's just not logical to me.

Did he... ban himself? Nevermind though.

I don't know what I was expecting, but I just wanted more :) Wanting to know why certain people are the way they are can surely be interesting in itself, I was just thinking that maybe he was trying to take it in and change something about himself. If this was somehow a stepping stone to reach new heights. It's interesting to me because I've never done something similar. Maybe I was looking a bit too deep though :P It's very nice that a thread about, hmm, "religious interests" has been kept civil for so long. Vgchartz can be a surprisingly good forum for most topics.