Can we drown the atheist "movement", please?
I’ve been an “out” atheist since I was a teenager when I was put on the spot about the truthfulness of the Bible. Having grown up in the backwater areas of the United States the only other atheists I knew were my brothers and my dad. I was in my early twenties and half way around the world before I met another atheist.
I’ve met other atheists (real life, not online) since then, but the pendulum remained squarely on the theistic side for the most part. Then September 11, 2001 rolled around and Muslim extremists finally succeeded in their attempts to bring the World Trade Center down. Since then atheists have been coming out of the wood work, especially here in America.
Sam Harris’s The End of Faith, published in August of 2005, became a rallying point and a best seller. Before long he was joined by others and in what seems like a blink of an eye, the atheist movement had arrived and has been growing ever since.
I, for one, am sick of the movement. It seems to me that it is populated by assholes. No, I am not talking about Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins or the other horsemen. I’m talking about the people who’ve decided that there are two kinds of atheists. The “good” kind of atheist they just happen to be and everybody else.
The ‘everybody else’ group is populated by atheists the “good” atheists have deemed unacceptable for a variety of reasons. They’re described as hostile, irrational, unreasonable, dogmatic, ignorant, “just like the [favorite disliked group of theists]” and so on and so forth.
In the real world, such shit is, at the very least, extremely rude, but in the “movement” this good vs. bad atheist mentality is the golden rule. Why? Because I’ve gotten several comments/emails about how “atheist whoever” and/or “atheistic whatever” is an affront to the “movement”.
I expect this from theists as it’s the old ‘divide & conquer’ tactic and dismiss it on the spot. With other atheists though, I’ve decided to see where this comes from and it’s my firm opinion that the problem is the “movement”.
The truth of the matter is the atheist “movement” is corrupt to the core. It depends upon definitions of atheism that are simply not true. Atheism is nothing but the absence of theism, which is the belief in supernatural beings called gods.
The personality traits of individual atheists are irrelevant to them being atheists. Atheists do not have to be friendly in order to be atheists. Atheists do not have to describe their disbelief in a manner that theists find acceptable in order to be atheists. Sanity, rationalism, reasonableness, skepticism and the rest of such things are not requirements to be an atheist.
The only requirement to be an atheist is a lack of belief in gods and it doesn’t matter how individual atheists came to be atheists.
Of course, a large part of the movement is alleged to be about putting a good face on atheism. I consider this to be a fool’s errand. We need only ask ourselves why there’s an alleged “need” to make atheism acceptable. This alleged need extends from the stereotypes of atheists.
Theists paint atheists, past and present, as a variety of things. Who reading this hasn’t heard about Psalms 14:1 in some form? “The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good.”
These two sentences were written no later than 530 years before Christianity’s god-man was allegedly born and may date back as far as 1000 years prior. That’s three thousand years of atheists being called amoral for not being theists.
Thus, the problem with atheists and atheism is not atheistic people saying or doing things that individual theists find offensive. The problem is not being a theist to begin with. The slander, the insults, the attacks and so forth extend from being an atheist, not a particular kind of atheist.
The excuse for attacking atheists as a whole may be “bad” atheists, but the reason is atheism. Atheism itself is offensive.
It’s impossible to overcome that. The only thing one can really do is choose sides. From all appearances, that’s what a lot of atheists are doing - choosing sides. This is not good. I’m all for atheist “pride”, but I want no part of the atheist “movement”. It’s corrupt and it’s going to do more damage than anything else.
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Comments
If you support Sam Harris then you recognize that he does not like the term ‘atheist’ at all. In my mind, everyone in the world is ‘normal’ but those who believe in supernatural gods are ‘theists’. Instead of being called an a-theist, I prefer to label theists as being ‘a-normal’. In other words, they are making a conscious choice to be a theist, I don’t consciously choose to be atheist.
Could we instead call the cause ’secularism’? I heard the president of the ACLU use the term ‘reasonists’ (or was it ‘rationalists’?) but I feel that implies that theists are not reasonable or rational. Most of them are. They just don’t put much effort into applying it to their theism.
As a relatively new atheist, I’m pleased that several openly atheistic books have been best-sellers in recent years. I’m also pleased at the wealth of Internet resources available to those who are questioning their long-held beliefs. Books and web sites played a huge role in providing the information I needed to discard my theistic beliefs.
Nevertheless, I have mixed feelings about the “out campaign” and the “good” vs. “bad” or “militant” atheist word games. Atheism is based on one item of non-belief, as you noted. It’s absurd to build a “movement” around something people don’t believe. You said, correctly, that “atheism itself is offensive.” Theists will never be able to tolerate, let alone accept, atheists on atheists’ terms. Their belief system prohibits it. We just need to accept that and deal with it.
So, the only thing that we can do is take sides, and we shouldn’t. That sounds like a Catch-22 to me.
Like every other atheist I’ve met, I don’t consider myself to be part of the atheist movement. I stick up for other atheists, but then I try to stick up for people being unfairly criticised in general. What should I do?
However much you rage, there are atheists and atheists. those who think theism is false and dangerous and should be actively countered, and those who think that ‘not believing’ is enough and the religions should be left alone to get on with teaching prejudice & causing prejudice, abuse, suffering and distress all over the world.
For want of better words, ‘weak’ and ’strong’ atheists. (atheism does not have the language we need because of its centuries of ruthless suppression by suppression & censorship,punishment & death)Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water.
It is inevitable that they will conflict, but that is the nature of human interactions. Progress only comes through working these things through, one way or another over time. Ranting may make you feel better but it can be destructive when taken to such lengths. Just ally yourself with the side you are on and address the religious enemy. Don’t let the weak atheist ’steal your time’ by arguing with them.(though I know how tempting it is)
As far as I am concerned the latter group can think what they like, you cannot stop them, unfortunately they insist on trying to prevent strong atheist and are constantly sniping at them for their criticism and opposition to religions, so we cannot entirely ignore them.
But this is nothing to do with corruption, it is the natural state of any large group of people with one basic defining principle, in this case non-belief. Most people have inconsistencies in their thinking in the societies in which they have been conditioned.
These conflicts also affect many other progressive movements and if they let it, if they pander to the conservative elements withing their ranks they lose sight of the basic need for robust and courageous activism. Often it is the desire to gain ‘members’ at the expense of principle that is at the root, and gets worse when paid organisers are employed to promote the ’cause’.
I think KCs post is illogical and thoughtless, and damaging to the very concept of atheism and attacking superstition, sectarianism, sexism etc. and undermines the many strong atheists who already have as many enemies as they can cope with.
Defending the Atheist Movemement…
Driving down the freeway, I observe two men, both riding Harley-Davidson motorcycles, pass each other while heading in opposite directions……
I for one can assure you that these people don’t represent the black… er atheist “movement”. The fact of the matter is it is technically an anti-theist movement, which is an ideology and hence a movement.
Technically the movement can be corrupt as it lacks any power to misuse- the correct accusation would be dishonest.
When ever you have a cause you will have assholes. Please excuse them- they have realized that they know something that almost everyone on Earth doesn’t and the feeling of power and disgust at those who cling to their illusions makes them rather snappy.