First of all I have never visited the US, All I know is from TV/Movies and the internet.

Ok.

From the outside it seems as if the US is a mess when it comes to "live and let live", everybody wants their views to be forced onto everyone else, why is this? In the UK religion is barely mentioned, people go to their local church/mosque/synagogue or whatever and everyone respects that.

The U.S. like many places, has a problem with religious ideaology imposing it's dogma on the laws of man. These things harm a number of people that try to be civil and live their lives privately. Respecting lives needs to be a two way street. This in many ways is not the outcome.

I am atheist, but nobody would bat an eyelid at that here, I don't go around pretending I'm better than the people who do believe, I just let them do as they wish, it doesn't harm me and makes them happy.

Would you say the same if someone started to tell you that your kids are now going to start learning that the Genesis story is a fact of science?

How about if you were gay and people were telling you that you'll burn in hell and cannot marry your partner?

I've just read the thread about Warren being ordered to pay $100,000 for denying a "reason station", Wtf is a reason station? this is the stupidest thing I've heard in a while, go set up your own station if you want it, it's the same with all this FSM crap, it's just a way for you to feel like you're superior, why should it matter what others think?

No. To all of this.

If religion makes people happy then who the hell am I to try and tell them otherwise? It's not for me but I'm so such a self centred douchebag who thinks they should all think like me? Isn't that one of the reasons people here claim to hate religion so much?

Being happy pales in comparison when laws are being broken. Speaking up is not being self centered. It's being proactive.

By your logic then Malcolm X and Martin Luther King jr and our founding fathers would be self centered.