We need a better word for "atheist." Here's an idea.

One way to measure conscious bias is to ask Americans if they'd support a Presidential candidate of a given ethnicity, religion, gender or sexuality. By that measure, atheists are the most discriminated against group in America. Somewhere around 43% of Americans openly admit they believe atheists are unfit to be President. And seven state constitutions explicitly ban atheists from elected office.

I'm a word guy. A copywriter, author, blogger, poet and lyricist. So it probably makes sense that I've been wondering if the word "atheist" is part of the problem. Broken down to its roots, atheist quite literally means "no god." It defines a belief system by the absence of a competing belief system. No wonder people won't vote for an atheist. It sounds like we believe in nothing.

And that's wrong. Most atheists are positive, moral people. We believe we have a personal responsibility to save the planet and lift up our fellow humans. And we feel an urgency to do it ethically and immediately, because after we die it'll be too late.

Why wouldn't you want a President like that?

Perhaps we need a new word for atheist. One that sounds like it could be a positive belief system. "Humanist" and "secularist" are both unacceptable, because neither means "death is the end." They only define our current relationships with each other and our government. In fact, as far as I know, there is no noun for someone who says, "This life is all we got. Make it great."

So let's create one.

I'm going to suggest Vitaist. (With a capital V. Pronounced, in my head, vy-TAY-ist.) It's derived from the Latin word for life. I did a quick Google search and couldn't find it in use anywhere.

Go on, try it out. Would you vote for a Vitaist Presidential candidate? I sure would. But if you have another idea, let me hear it.