Seth Andrews

Seth Andrews (born 12 April 1968) is an American video producer, author of the book Deconverted
Radio host career
Andrews became a big fan of contemporary Christian music, which later helped him to get his first job on a radio station. In 1990, he got a job with KXOJ-FM radio. After working for two years as a night radio host, Andrews was promoted to be the morning drive show host. He worked for KXOJ-FM until 2000. In 1997 the death of Rich Mullins shook Andrews's faith to the core. He struggled to reconcile this untimely death of a talented Christian songwriter with his understanding of the principles of Christianity. Andrews stated later: "As I spoke words of comfort to our listeners and callers , I struggled to reconcile the notion that the God of Matthew 10, the one who considered us worth “more than many sparrows,” would design or abide the taking of Mullins’ earthly life in such a pointless, gruesome manner. Why would God propel Rich Mullins into the spotlight merely to plunge millions of fans into mourning and leave his family and friends to grieve over a closed casket?" On that journey, the events of 11th of September 2001 played a crucial part in deepening Andrews's doubts about religion. By 2004 Andrews left a shrinking radio production business and started working in video production for a local media company.
The Thinking Atheist
In 2004, Andrews discovered a number of Christopher Hitchens's debates on YouTube, and that became a catalyst that helped him to leave faith behind, finally as an atheist to his family and friends in 2008.
Andrews set up The Thinking Atheist community where he could bring together people like himself: non-believers, skeptics, atheists, to share information that he gathered during the last few years to help people overcome their superstitious beliefs.
After creating The Thinking Atheist YouTube channel, Andrews started posting videos he produced covering a variety of skeptical contents, as well as his weekly podcast. In February 2014, The Thinking Atheist podcast became the number 1 podcast on BlogTalkRadio. By that time two million people followed his show monthly.
On The Thinking Atheist podcast, Seth Andrews has interviewed many guests from the world of science and secular activism, including Michael Shermer (science writer, founding publisher of Skeptic magazine and founder of The Skeptics Society), Lawrence M. Krauss (well-known theoretical physicist), and Richard Dawkins (ethologist, evolutionary biologist, and author of popular science books such as The God Delusion and The Greatest Show on Earth). Other guests on Andrews's podcast included people like Dan Barker, Nathan Phelps, Hemant Mehta, Peter Boghossian, David Smalley, Dale McGowan, Jamila Bey, Dr Carolyn Porco of NASA, and Greta Christina.
The book Deconverted
In December 2012, Andrews published his autobiographical book Deconverted: A Journey From Religion To Reason, in which he discusses his personal experience in leaving religion and becoming an atheist activist. He talks about what it was like to be brought up in the heart of a Bible Belt community, grow up to be a DJ on a Christian radio station, about how he started doubting his faith and the struggle he endured on the way to becoming an unbeliever and creating The Thinking Atheist community.
Donald Prothero commented about the book: "Andrews writes in a friendly, relaxed folksy style, just as you hear him on the air, and it suits his humble narrative well. He is a good storyteller and conversationalist not only in his radio work, but on the printed page as well. Andrews’ book is a short but very enjoyable read. It is especially of interest to anyone who has made a similar journey from faith to non-belief, or wishes to understand how this process works".
Public speaking engagements
Andrews is actively involved in the atheist and skeptical movement. He travels regularly throughout America and presents talks on various subjects related to atheism, religion and skepticism. Alongside fellow activists Aron Ra and Matt Dillahunty, he held the Unholy Trinity Tour in the United States, which they are planning to take to Australia in 2015. He has attended a wide variety of national conventions and gatherings. Conferences that Andrews has attended in the recent past include:
* Imagine No Religion 2 (2012) and 4 (2014) in Kamloops, BC, Canada
* Atheist Alliance of America International Convention in Boston, 2013
* Apostacon 2013 and 2014
* Reason in the Rock 2012
* FreeOK (Oklahoma Freethought Convention) 2011 and 2013
* American Atheist National Convention 2013 and 2014
* Florida Freethough Convention 2013 and 2014
In addition to regional and national conventions, Andrews also conducts annual speaking tour stops, he teams with local freethought groups for one-day events. Progressive Christian minister Michael Dowd, who opposes fundamentalism, recommended Andrews' lecture "Get Them While They're Young" at FreeOK 2013 as a 'richly illustrated talk' on 'the compelling tactics increasingly used by some large, fundamentalist churches and organizations to indoctrinate children'.
Position towards religion
In 2014 Andrews told the Arizona Daily Sun that he has been "a true believer" who after an accumulation of doubts, started examining his beliefs at an age of 37. On his recent activism he declared: “I’m not an enemy of religious people, but I’ll be honest and say I am an enemy of religion.”

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