I’d love to see a meaningful argument to the contrary. Near as I can tell atheism implies nihilism and the extent an atheist disagrees is decided entirely by how convincingly they can lie to themselves.
Atheism only implies nihilism if you subscribe to the concept that values are objective and morality is universal, which begs the question of who determines values and what is morally "good" and how.
So you assert that an atheist can find meaning by following their subjective values and morality, correct? This seems entirely circular and equivalent to saying that atheists can find meaning by valuing the things that they value.
How does an atheist hold subjective morals and values without those morals and values essentially being arbitrary?
You seem to have a really big chicken-and-egg problem here... you want morality to be universal. The problem is, "ethics", "morality", and "values" are all human constructs. We created them, we define them, we discuss them ad nauseum. They are as varied as we are. I don't think that makes them "meaningless".
I don’t have a chicken and egg problem. The chicken and egg problem arises from an attempt to pull meaning out of an arbitrary universe.
You say in different words that things are meaningful only because we believe they are. That’s fine if it helps you but it’s also circular and rather solipsistic. Your stance is also literally nihilistic: “a doctrine that denies any objective ground of truth and especially of moral truth”.
> There is no meaningful answer to your question
Didn't I say that? Didn't I point out that the ATTEMPT to answer was valuable?
>> Is this how I want things to be?
> because all of existence is without meaning
Atheists don't have be nihilists.