it's been claimed that atheists and others without religion cannot be moral or ethical. to them, I say, "total BS!" (see, I could've written that out, but I didn't! immoral, am I?)
many theories of ethics and morality have been developed that do not require a deity or an external standard. the Wikipedia article on secular ethics will serve as a good introduction to these theories.
personally, I would place myself in consequentialism. a broad term, it states that actions should be judged by their consequences, not by their mere nature (that's deontology).
anyway, not to get bogged down in technical terms, atheists can be moral, since morality doesn't necessarily have to come from an outside standard. this should be at least one defense against the claim that atheists are evil, etc.
