The Problem With Atheist Activism

[One guy's speck of view. Whatever thing to sharp taste around, perchance.]Earlier this engagement, a friend sent me a statement on Facebook that whispered, simply: "You strong suit imagine to stare yesterday's occasion of The Article Reveal itself."In the occasion, crowd Jon Stewart did a surface on a court case by American Atheists, the utmost noticeable freethinker tidiness in the Joined States, to a award of trash in the physical type of a cross that was to be located in the Innovation Metier Fixation testament museum. All over the surface, he quoted this make available by Dave Silverman, the regulate of American Atheists: "The WTC cross has become a Christian icon. It has been blessed by supposed holy men and existing as a tinge that their god, who couldn't be displeased to limit the Muslim terrorists or theme 3,000 people from center killed in his name, cared purely stacks to luxuriant upon us some trash that resembles a cross."Once upon a time branch that make available, Stewart -- verbal communication as if he were Silverman -- added: "As Lead of the American Atheists tidiness, I declaration to make emphatically that one and all, even inhabit that are blas to our pull, inner self f-cking detest us."For a branch second, I wondered if Silverman had actually whispered that himself.Doubter ViciousnessThe concern of how freethinker activists must vocalizations religion is a inveterate hot concern as well as atheists. Yesterday, it was brought to light by illustrious freethinker quirky Greta Christina, who wrote an important blog post righteous "In the same way as Are The Goals of the Doubter Movement?""I don't imagine all atheists -- even all freethinker activists -- clutch the self-same goals," wrote Christina. "And I imagine this may be the writer of some of this harass and negotiations that we're having."So some atheists positive to relish and even take care of it, this private danger is, for many of us, exhausting. As someone who is in a pattern targeted with spurious critiques by man freethinker activists -- utmost over and over again that I diagram that earnest beliefs must be immune from trouble, a disagree I countered in this post, or that I am an apologist for religion, for which no testimony has ever been provided -- I can attest firsthand that the negotiations condescending how atheists must front entrance religion is perhaps the utmost belligerent natter in the freethinker movement. It is a time-honored pull of quarrel, and the disagreements it inspires are very on a regular basis biting and secret.In short: Christina hit the nail on the fizz. The writer of the infighting in the freethinker movement is, in fact, what Christina established in her post -- put forward are differing and on a regular basis mismatched goals as well as self-identified "freethinker activists."In an apply to get at the heart of these conflicts, Christina named two goals of freethinker activists. The initially is "to see atheists be perfectly celebrated clothed in cooperation, and to clutch our non-belief notorious as official." The second: the trouncing of religion."Most freethinker activists would love to see anti-atheist bigotry put down, and are working towards that," she writes. "But many of us -- I'm one of them -- see that as purely one of our goals. Visit of us don't just imagine a world where believers and atheists get knock back and let each other practice their religion or lack ther in friendship. Visit of us imagine a world where there's no religion."The evocation of Christina's disagree is that criticizing earnest beliefs is a top precedence for many freethinker activists, and that inhabit who do not prioritize it must allow that it is an important element of freethinker activism as a movement. But I clutch concerns with the gadget that the freethinker movement is at this time con this well -- or that it is truly "freethinker activism."Informative Deep ReactionAs someone who has busy task with the strategy of many freethinker activists, I'd devotion to make whatever thing release dutiful off the bat: I pungently diagram that criticizing rigidity -- in all its forms -- is a good thing. This must take up rigidity in religion, but it must by no outlet end put forward.However: effective trouble of earnest rigidity accounts for the various spectrum of earnest call. It is in accord, it is rooted in sensitivity, and it responds to what people actually diagram and practice, not just the utmost extreme forms of earnest thought.But some of the utmost spoken freethinker activists understand earnest trouble differently. Handle, for check out, this sampling of notes from illustrious atheists about Islam and Muslims:American Atheists No God Blog: "One thing we basic to conserve in fear is that Muslims are massively barbaric and very old, even completed so than their aggressive mythologies."PZ Myers: "Float on, Islam... It's bad stacks to be the religion of detest, but to be the religion of cowardice should to depart from you parody corrupt."JT Eberhard: "Islam is a shitty religion (completed shitty than utmost, and try me if you don't imagine we can include that make available) and Muhammad was a pedophile, which has resulted in not the same Muslims chronic the practice."Al Stefanelli: "[Islam] is a virus of the fear, a form of hang-up and so interpreted comparatively it produces a member that can be very weighty. At the same time as you add ideologies that authenticate brutality and the look for world grasp, the purely logical end is a physical illustration of total field to a twisted, barbaric philosophy that we know as terrorism."None of these are rectify critiques of any convey Islamic beliefs. They are far-reaching generalizations and they do go fast to get stronger the inform on ideals -- atheistic or Islamic. Criticizing inflexible conscience and practices is very important in the desire to make convivial stem -- be it in the have a fight for LGBTQ similitude, in combating sexism, or in defending the health and steadfastness of children -- but these statements are just distasteful (not to citation erroneous).And while we're on the concern of earnest criticism: it is important to unplanned that it is not the detail split of the profane, and acting devotion it is by adopting a "earnest people in opposition to atheists" intellect while painting all earnest believers with a far-reaching skin alienates allies in the important have a fight opposed to rigidity and cruelty. Reaction of earnest beliefs isn't a new thing; its gift is as hanker as the life form of religion itself, and it rests of the backs of manage earnest leaders devotion Martin Luther, Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther Emperor, Jr. and even the biblical Jesus Christ. But they -- devotion many earnest critics today who work within their own communities -- were reformers, not abolitionists.Blanket attacks on "religion," as if it were a highest achievement view to be demolished on the other hand of a complex spectrum to be improved, are a very real bother the same as they intricate what are, in my fear, far afield completed important aims -- making the world a supervisor, completed open-minded place -- with a unruly, spiteful and alienating plan that doesn't demand for differences in belief and practice.To be emphatically, effective earnest trouble has an important place; but is it "freethinker activism"?Doubter Activism, or Anti-Religious Activism?As hanker as "freethinker activism" is established initially and in the beginning with anti-religious trouble -- and surveying the arena of illustrious freethinker activists, this is with conviction so -- the infighting as well as inhabit working in the freethinker movement inner self postpone. So I'll come dutiful out and say it: I in fact do not restrict the wisdom of not easy to destroy religion -- I oppose cruelty and rigidity in all their forms -- and I clutch thought-provoking concerns about the ways many spoken atheists go about not easy to execute this wisdom undeviating superficial, belligerent criticisms of religion. I do not imagine the kill of religion is an potential wisdom, and I clutch no goal to diagram it would destroy rigidity and cruelty, which I diagram are the essence causes of earnest (and profane) harass. But I overly imagine that if the freethinker movement is going to prioritize earnest trouble, we should to be harmonious about how we net in it.With, I fall out with Christina's disagree that "confrontationalism" is "the best outline for achieving our other goals." Focusing one's activism on criticizing a floor show of religion does go fast to salvage atheism's image; in fact, it earnestly hampers attempts to salvage the credentials of life for profane people. As Jon Stewart's boom on Dave Silverman's notes about the Innovation Metier Fixation testament demonstrated, naive criticisms of religion separate from rectify people -- both man atheists, and viewpoint earnest allies.Christina blocked her post by saying:But if you're arguing that confrontationalism -- arguing with believers about religion, or making fun of it, or impolite it -- is sadness our pull, then beforehand you depress that indictment, I imagine it's peculiarity asking: Which pull, in a straight line, are you words about?Because we may not be words about the self-same one.I imagine she's dutiful. Our goals may not be the self-same.If center an freethinker quirky outlet "persuading completed people out of religion and clothed in non-belief," as Christina wrote, then I am not one. I am an freethinker who requirements to make crucial thoughtful, sensitivity, and pluralism, which is particular by the Interfaith Youth Substratum as "neither pond coexistence nor forced equality, but the presume that people who diagram in obstinate creeds can learn to breathing together with, in the words of Wilfred Cantwell Smith, shared prospect and shared good manners.'" Visit earnest people are allies to me and other atheists in these efforts--and a good play a part of them repeat their earnest convictions as the major issue sad their pains. I am far completed attracted about whether someone is pluralistic in their worldview--if they oppose cruelty and diagram people of obstinate earnest and profane identities must be free to breathing as they procure and compete around communal values--than I am about whether someone believes in God or not.To be emphatically, seeing an end to anti-atheist attitudes is a precedence of find. But it is a wisdom that is facilitated by relationship-building in the company of atheists and the earnest and by underlying big communities for the profane. For these reasons, I look for myself an freethinker and Humanist quirky. But I overly imagine to see an end to notion opposed to Muslims, Sikhs, and many other communities, and an expansion in understanding and meet halfway in the company of people of all beliefs, which is why I overly look for myself interfaith quirky.So let's look it devotion it is. If your "top precedence" is working to destroy religion, you are not starkly an freethinker quirky -- you are an anti-religious quirky.I shape dreadful quarrel with many earnest beliefs, but I do not wish to be ally with intolerant, dehumanizing generalizations about earnest people. I am depressed that such positions involve freethinker activism not purely to the largest part of our cooperation, but to many of my man freethinker activists as well."Doubter" and "anti-religious" are not synonyms. I inner self -- and do -- work with other atheists on our communal goals of not easy to make the world a safer place for atheists, but we bough at anti-religious activism.http://www.huffingtonpost.com/chris-stedman/atheist-activism-problems b 1164399.html posted in Crossroads of Religious studies - 16 replies