Last week I had the pleasure of speaking at a roundtable debate hosted by the Cleveland Freethinkers. The theme of the debate revolved around how atheists should present themselves in public discourse: should atheists be "accommodating" of their religious colleagues and acquaintances, or should they actively confront such acquaintances and directly challenge their beliefs at any reasonable opportunity? I was on the "confrontationalist" side, and the following is an approximate dump of some of my statements during the debate.
A case against accommodation
The biggest problem with religion seems to be that, no matter how moderately religious a society is, it inevitably creates a slippery slope towards extremism for those few adherents who take it a bit too literally; and there will always be those few. The reason for this is that religious moderates are basically the same as religious extremists, except that the moderates have (thankfully) allowed themselves to be tempered by the secular social norms of our time. By default, religious moderates are tolerant of extremists, because after all, the extremists actually believe what they say they believe, unlike the moderates who water down their religion to make it more palatable in the modern world.
And it seems to me that, from the atheist perspective, being an “accommodationist” would only help perpetuate that same kind of slippery slope that's already made abundant by the religious moderate majority.
My rhetorical question to the accommodationists would be, "To what end?" Surely there must be some extreme forms of religion that you're not willing to accommodate? If you're willing to accommodate some forms of moderate Christianity, or moderate Islam, but not the more extreme forms of the two, then that would be just as hypocritical as the moderate Christians who cherry-pick which verses of the Bible to take literally, and which ones to take metaphorically. Religion should be an all-or-nothing deal. When it's not all-or-nothing, there's always some hypocrisy to be found.
Speaking of hypocrisy, it feels like we have a certain amount of intellectual integrity at stake here. We atheists are, to a reasonable extent, certain about the truth of our convictions. I don't mean to speak for everybody, but that's generally the case; we arrive at certain conclusions with some amount of certainty, and we consider these conclusions "true," or at least tentatively true, insofar as the scientific method allows us to define truth. We don't "believe" in things in the same sense that religious people believe in things, because our conclusions are backed up by evidence and observations, which makes the truth of our beliefs that much more meaningful and convincing.
So, taking all of that into consideration, why on earth should we be accommodating toward beliefs that are clearly false, or beliefs that are clearly lies, or beliefs that are demonstrably harmful to the well-being of their adherents? What does it say about our intellectual integrity when we allow falsehoods to be perpetuated, no matter how much false hope or false happiness they might bring to the people who believe them? I would think that we should be doing our best to expose such beliefs for what they are, and uproot them from the consciousness of our society using tools like education, debate, and scrutiny.
There’s a theory of why religious people get so offended when their faith is questioned. And the theory is that religious people are actually embarrassed by the things they believe, but they just don’t consciously realize it, which is why they get so defensive when their beliefs are put under the microscope. It's embarrassing to believe the Earth is 6000 years old; it's embarrassing to believe that a woman can give birth to a child without a man's contribution to the zygote.
If I put myself in the mindset of a religious person, I can see how it would be embarrassing when science explains yet another thing that used to be attributed to God, and having my God demoted again and again, to the point where the very definition of "God" becomes so nebulous that it loses all meaning. And all I'm left with is profundities like “god is the universe,” or “god is beyond human logic,” or “god exists outside of space and time” -- that’s my favorite.
The thing is, for truly religious people, that kind of embarrassment is buried deep down in their unconscious mind. Instinctively they're perfectly aware that it's all nonsense. But those instincts have been repressed by their conscious religious training, or indoctrination, or whatever. So when those beliefs are questioned, the conscious mind has no answer, so it turns to the unconscious mind, which says that it's all nonsense, which directly butts heads with the conscious indoctrination, and that's where the defensiveness and the anger comes from.
That’s only a theory, anyway. But my whole point here is that our goal as responsible atheists should be to bring that unconscious embarrassment to the foreground of consciousness. Not just the consciousness of religious individuals, but the foreground of our social consciousness. It should become outwardly embarrassing to keep believing in an all-powerful creator god. It should become embarrassing to keep believing in prayer, or believing in hell or heaven.
Believing in a god is on the same theoretical footing as believing any other figment of imagination for which you would otherwise be called crazy. It just so happened that this particular god was the one that got ingrained into the fabric of our society. But aside from that, there's absolutely no reason that we shouldn't attach the same kind of negative stigma to people who believe in the Abrahamic god, or the literal truth of ancient folk tales.
I'm not saying that people shouldn’t be allowed to believe whatever they like; of course they should. What I am saying is, we should work towards creating a society where the moment someone considers taking religion literally, it should be readily apparent to that person how embarrassing, counterproductive, and unwise that would be. So, in that kind of society, no one would have a reason anymore to turn to religion for any purpose, so therefore no one would have a reason to go down the slippery slope toward extremism.
That's the kind of state we should be striving for; a state where it's just as embarrassing to believe in the god of Abraham as it is to believe in Zeus or Poseidon or Xenu; because they are all on the same footing of pre-scientific wishful thinking. And I don't see how accommodation will help us get there. Theism in general belongs in the Bronze Age, because it’s based on Bronze-age thinking, and because the Bronze Age is already the resting place for all other gods ever invented by men. There’s just one more to go!
When people who promote the merits of religion run out of arguments, they usually retreat to the last-resort argument, which is something like, “Well, at least religion gives people comfort, or hope, or a sense of purpose...” Well, that might be true; but the problem is that all those good things are for the wrong reasons, and all those things only happen when religion is at its very best. That's more like an idealization of religion; that's the infomercial promise of religion. The reality is quite different. In reality, when religion is not at its best, the same religion that brings the hope and the comfort will also bring fear, shame, intolerance, and guilt. And we know all too well what happens when religion is at its worst... it makes otherwise decent people commit unspeakably evil acts, for those very same reasons!
The other problem with that argument is that it’s rather condescending towards religious people. It assumes that religious people are too weak-minded to cope with the real world without religion, and I don’t think that’s true at all. I’m fully confident that even the most devoutly religious people will be able to find their moral bearings without a god telling them what’s right and wrong. I think people might be afraid to let go of religion, because religion has been pretty much the only option for thousands of years. But the solution to all of that, as with anything else, is education; not just education, but actively combating ignorance.
A proper education should start at the very beginning. Religion’s biggest offense is the indoctrination of young children. Nobody should have any kind of opinion or dogma forced onto them from birth, and yet this happens every day, in many millions of households, in the form of religious upbringing. I wish more of us would recoil when we hear parents label their young children as “Protestant” or “Jewish” or anything else, before the children are capable of objectively evaluating the implications of such a label.
That’s why I’m not advocating forcing atheism onto anyone. What I’m talking about is subtracting the forcing of religion (which is pretty much the definition of atheism anyway)! Atheism isn’t a viewpoint that can be forced onto someone. Atheism is a natural, “clean slate” state of mind, and children should be raised with a “clean slate” until they’re ready (and educated enough) to decide which ancient Babylonian deity to worship.
To put it plainly, we simply cannot afford to accommodate irrational beliefs anymore. It would be great to accommodate them, in theory, if only people’s irrational beliefs didn’t influence their actions, and if only people with irrational beliefs didn’t get elected to public offices, and didn’t allow their irrational beliefs to influence their policies. If that were the kind of world we lived in, then, by all means, accommodation would be very fitting and reasonable.
But we live in a country where half of the population refuses to accept basic facts about biology, and half of the population can’t tell you how long it takes for the Earth to make an orbit around the Sun. And we live in a world where we have an explosive growth of a religion that has a doctrine of military conquest literally built into it, and a growing minority of that religion that’s plotting our destruction as we speak.
We cannot afford to accommodate religions that are inherently anti-human, which all three of the world's "great monotheisms" absolutely are. The moment when a religion places more value on things that are supposed to happen after we die, rather than focusing on doing good deeds in this life for its own sake, is a warning sign that such a religion needs to be eradicated, and fast.
Our battle is nearly vertically uphill, and the last thing we should be doing is pretending that there’s any good to be found in letting people cling on to their irrational beliefs just a bit longer. Religion’s function has been to divide people, divide communities, and stifle scientific and intellectual achievement. We should be doing our best to phase it out, instead of accommodating it. To put it as charitably as I can, religion has been the training wheels of our morality. And at some point, training wheels become more of a hindrance than a benefit. Our civilization is long overdue to take the training wheels off, and throw them away.
November 10th, 2010 at 9:10 pm
Wow, just wow. Very well said, thank you so much for posting this.
November 10th, 2010 at 10:13 pm
I think your assumption that moderate religious people are hypocritical is wrong. Even fundamentalists do not agree on the scripture with other fundamentalists of same general religion, and it is most certainly true that interpreting holy ...texts is a subjective affair. I don't think any sane religious people are claiming that religion itself is or should be logical and rational at its core. As such I don't believe ti is hypocritical for moderates to explicitly "white wash" certain parts of their scripture while taking other literally, since in the end it is all about subjective and personal interpretation.
On the same note, I don't think there is a "slippery slope" from secular moderate religiousness to theocratic fundamentalism. In fact most of the theory behind modern secular government was produced by thinkers who were religious, albeit certainly not fundamentalists.
Also it could be said that you are leaning on the more extreme (dare I say fundamentalist?) Atheist side by suggesting that Atheists as a group should combat all religious thought and eventually banish it from society. That is pretty similar to the goals of fundamentalist religious folks who want to see everybody follow their exact brand of truth.
Science and religion are not mutually exclusive (in the personal, human domain) and it is most definitely possible for rational and very smart people to exist who also have faith in supernatural. Thus, as Atheists I believe we should not try to "convert" religious people, but I would agree that engaging in healthy debates is always good for both parties.
The optimal way, as I see it, is not a homogeneous Atheist society but a secular government with freedom of religion wherein people are free to choose their religion and happily engage in debate and critique of whatever world view. I think that if everybody was brought up without having any religion imposed on them, then later in life allowed to study different religions as well as Atheist philosophy that not everybody would choose to be an Atheist and this would not correlate with level of intellect.
November 10th, 2010 at 10:49 pm
@Lev, you make some good points, and here is my response:
To me, that screams of intellectual dishonesty. All you're doing is taking the moral values you're born with, and projecting them onto an ancient text that's ambiguous enough to accommodate any random interpretation. Why not simply admit that you don't need the text anymore?
You might as well say that anything of value before the 19th century was created by religious people, but that's only because that was the only option! The thinkers behind modern "secular government" made it this way precisely because they saw the dangers that religion would pose to the success of a society! Thomas Jefferson had a particular distaste for Christianity. We have quotes from him such as, "Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined and imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity."
Just because I speak with the same passion as religious fundamentalists doesn't invalidate any of my arguments, and doesn't mean that my mindset is anything similar to theirs.
Yes, they are.
Of course it's possible for such people to exist! The 19 hijackers of September 11 were very smart and educated, and they believed in the supernatural. I don't know about you, but I don't want to perpetuate a society where such beliefs are possible. The problem with the hijackers wasn't that they were "extremists"; the problem was that they were actually honest about what they believed, and acted accordingly.
Like I wrote in the article, you can't "convert" someone to atheism. You can only deconvert from religion. Atheism is a ground state.
That's a naive point of view. How many religious people do you know who will "happily engage in debate"? I welcome you to travel to Afghanistan or Iran and critique their world view. The notion of "debate" implies a rational discussion, which is antithetical to religion. Religious people will never debate you, because they don't need to.
Like I said, you don't "choose" to be an atheist. There is no such thing as "atheist philosophy"! Even if you believe in a god, you're an atheist with respect to all other gods ever invented. When we're born, we're atheists with respect to all gods, period.
In the article, I'm not necessarily advocating eradicating "all religion," but I'm definitely advocating eradicating beliefs that are anti-human, such as the Muslim virtue of martyrdom, or the Christian belief of heaven and hell. It's only beliefs that devalue human life that don't deserve to exist. Wouldn't you agree with this?
November 11th, 2010 at 12:12 pm
These ancient texts can also be highly inspirational and contain a lot of food for thought, even if you may not agree with all of the book. They can be a good source of spiritual foundation on one's life because they were designed to be so, but at the same time you don't necessarily have to adhere to every letter of the scripture, unless you belong to a sect that says you must, in which case that is a problem.
Also they don't really accommodate any random interpretation, unless you go too far out on a limb. It is not like the Bible or Koran or any other religious texts are super vague (they may be in some parts, but not overall). If you wish to adopt the parts that you like and overlook the ones you don't, then why is it an intellectual dishonesty? What we are talking about here does not fall under domain of science, in which case it would be dishonest intellectually. What we are talking about here is subjective, spiritual worldviews that are deeply personal. If one is inspired by some things, why does he have to accept entire thing from where inspiration came from? Why does it have to be all or nothing in this case?
You could say that, but a lot of those people were also actively involved in religion, or while being critical of mainstream religion still believed in God (many founding fathers were Deists), and were most definitely not Atheist.
It is similar to theirs if you propose that the only good world view is Atheism and that everybody should prescribe to it.
Maybe you misunderstood me. My point was that one can be a scientist and religious person at the same time. Religion has no place in the field of science, just like science has no place in religion, however both can be part of somebody's overall world view. Thus they are not mutually exclusive in a personal domain.
Cmon, Dimitry, you are better than this sort of attack. That is like attacking evolution and Atheism because Nazis and Communists subscribed to one or another and murdered and oppressed millions of people based on such beliefs. See how this works?
Also the religion I am talking about is not extremist - my religious tribe vs rest of the world, but a much more moderate, tolerant form (which is far removed from extremism).
I disagree. Belief in supernatural and supernatural beings more powerful than us is ingrained in our psychology and instincts.
Also theism cannot be a ground state because Atheism is a conscious acceptance of purely scientific method world-view and involves making up your mind about universe, life and everything. Children can't be true Atheists, just because they didn't have exposure to religion.
Maybe you just had a great misfortune of never talking about theology with religious folks, but I have known quite a few who would happily debate and discuss their religion and worldview with Atheists or other people they don't agree with. Of course, to be fair, all of such people I knew were highly educated. In fact there is a reach tradition of Christian apologetics wherein Christian thinkers and philosophers attempt to justify their Christianity using more than just words from Bible.
I guess you are just messing with the definition of the word Atheist. In my understanding Atheist is someone who consciously adopts a certain world that is based on lack of faith in anything not personally seen or accepted by science community. A baby or a child cannot be Atheist because they haven't really taken time nor do even have facility to be cognizant of issues involved in Religion and Atheism.
Yes, I wholeheartedly agree with eradicating intolerant and anti-human beliefs and traditions. However that is not to say that all religions and their associated flavors are that way.
December 5th, 2010 at 4:29 pm
…
Do you consider atheism to be a religion? If so, then shouldn’t it be all-or-nothing, per your previous statement?
Agreed! Embarrassing is a great way of describing it. (Then again, what if Mary was an unusually-built, fertile hermaphrodite? Okay, won't go there...)
A few points to make here:
o You state that people should be allowed to believe whatever they like, but this doesn't mesh with your other arguments: 1) That all people of faith have this believer/nonbeliever duality and that 2) they should be confronted with the fallacies of religion and accept the facts that lead toward accepting only the atheistic rationale
o You previously stated that moderates are only accommodators with a decidedly negative view of the moderates. Fair enough, but here you argue that “extremism” is a “slippery slope”, which casts extremism in a negative light. It is clear you are an atheist extremist and it seems evident that you would prefer that everyone were an atheist extremist. Why, then, would you argue against extremism? Or would you argue that when everyone becomes atheist, there is no longer such thing as an extremist? Would people lose their vehemence, their passion, just because everyone believed alike? (I might argue that 'atheism' is the only religion in which 'religious' vehemence could erode since there would be no rituals to perform to keep the 'religion' as an active component of everyday life and because there would be no 'god' for which you would need to consciously address and show fervent loyalty to.) Curious…
I chewed on this one for a little bit because even as an atheist I have always argued in favor of letting religious moderates have their religious 'crutch' because there is nothing wrong with giving them hope.
I then considered the other argument that I’ve often held: Religion helps keep people from running amok! Some people need to feel that there is some superpower in the sky policing their acts because they would otherwise do terrible things and be harmful to society.
That train of thought led me to wonder that perhaps religion doesn’t prevent anything. If people have a thread of evil in them, won’t they be evil anyway? The only difference being that if they are religious, they will act it out and be remorseful later or they will act it out ‘in God’s name’. And yet, wouldn’t the shame or guilt at least be enough to prevent further malicious acts? I don’t have the answers, but it is an interesting road of thought to travel down. Challenge me with your thoughts on the matter. I’m curious what you think.
I have mixed feelings on this. More often than not, labeling a child is just an indirect way of labeling the family. I’d be curious to hear in what context you have heard a child being labeled by their religion and what was inferred by it. Yes, it’s a little like piercing a child’s ears as a baby (which I mostly disagree with), but at the same time, a parent chooses whether a child wears the latest GAP clothes or mismatched knock-around clothes all of the time. A parent chooses if the child will sit in front of the TV all day or will have Learn-to-Read toys to play with, instead. Everything about a child’s upbringing is at the parent’s discretion. Identity begins with the parents and it's a necessary 'evil' because children need some sort of foundation to start with. We can't just let children run around naked, withhold all toys, and never tell them anything for fear that we will misguide them. And the point at which a child becomes their own person is a very blurry line. I’m not sure that parents labeling their child as their family religion is that great of an offense. I think the greater offense would be if they prevent their child from learning about other religions or mentally cram religion down their child’s throat. (Determining how much is too much is extremely subjective, but there's really no way around that.)
Also, you argue a ‘clean slate’ approach, but that’s quite convenient for us atheists to argue since atheism IS a clean slate. A religious parent will find that hard to swallow, and I can’t say that I blame them. If they believe religion to be truth, they will want their children to know the truth. Atheists are no different. The ‘clean slate’ is just a slightly passive way of promoting atheism. (Think of it this way, if no one told you that objects were made up of atoms, would you come to that belief on your own? Not likely. People don’t have time to investigate every aspect of life, so they rely on other people whom they trust to fill in the answers to those things. Religion is like that in many ways. I disagree with all religions, but I can't argue that the methodology by which they learn/share their religions is completely wrong.)
Well said!
For most religions it is not the function, merely the end result, but in this case it’s the result that matters, not the initial reasoning. It has divided people, it has interfered with scientific pursuits, and it is a problem in many circumstances. You’re absolutely right.
I’ll simply conclude by saying that I’m not sure we should focus so heavily on snuffing out religion so much as we should work on snuffing out bad behavior. Is it all starting with religion? Or is it really the people behind the religion?
December 5th, 2010 at 5:33 pm
Lev,
You had some great statements that I wanted to comment on:
Completely agreed. Many scientific discoveries came about in pieces, too. If you take a piece of one study and add it to the piece of another study, you may find an solution that was better than either of the individual results from the first two. Religion doesn’t have to be all-or-nothing, even in religion where they claim that you must accept it as all-or-nothing. (Religion is organic, even the pertinacious Catholic church is finally acquiescing on certain doctrines and changing over time.)
I definitely agree with you…..but only until we discover the root of all existence through science. Then they are completely and undeniably mutually exclusive. The day that happens, there will be a lot of religious leaders out of work… *grin*
You made the argument so well that I’m just going to raise my hand and say “I second that”
I’m going to have to respectfully disagree with that. Although I can’t think of any circumstances in which we could test this theory offhand, I strongly believe that this is not ingrained in us. Or, as Dmitry might say, it is not the ‘ground state.’ I might be willing to concede that it could be the ground state (and/or inevitable conclusion) for certain individuals. This will provoke the nature vs. nurture debate, but if you fall on the ‘nature’ side of the argument then maybe the argument could be made that some people are natural followers and, perhaps, natural (strong) followers may begin with theism as a ‘ground state’ whereas people less inclined to be followers and people who are strong leaders may have a ‘ground state’ that begins with atheism, putting the locus of control within themselves rather than in a deity.
(Note that when I say ‘inevitable conclusion’, I am referring to the theoretical situation in which religion was never, in any form whatsoever, externally introduced to a person and relates to the conclusion that they would come up with on their own: theism or atheism.)
This is a good point. We need a concrete definition of what atheism is in general and/or for the sake of these debates. If atheism is a firm and conscious declaration that there is no god and theism is the firm and conscious belief in gods, what about the people who just don’t know and haven’t decided yet? If I’m not mistaken, the original Greek roots of atheism can be broken down to “without” “god” “state of”….or something like that. If someone doesn’t know what they believe in, could they technically be an atheist since they currently fit the “without god” definition? Or does there need to be a third category? Maybe just “anism” ('without a state').
December 5th, 2010 at 8:41 pm
Lev / Ducky,
Your counterarguments, as well as responses from other readers, have prompted me to start writing additional articles that will address more foundational issues surrounding the nature of atheism, and what our goals should be in these debates.
Allow me to briefly address some of the points you made, and then you'll have to wait for the next round of articles that will expound on these issues in much greater detail.
In general, it's somewhat annoying to see fellow atheists believing in the same misconceptions about atheism as our most religious opponents. Our own disagreements on the very definition of "atheism" should cause us to go back to the beginning and examine our case from the ground up. For the last time, atheism is not a religion or a system of beliefs. Regurgitating the tired old lines about "atheist dogma" or "atheist beliefs" does nothing to strengthen those accusations. To say that atheism is a religion is a bit like saying that black is a color. An atheist will never strap on an explosive vest and blow up himself and dozens of innocent bystanders in the name of atheism. An atheist will never bomb a church or mosque or abortion clinic. And all of this is precisely because atheism has no dogma that requires such ferocious defense.
It's also annoying to hear regurgitations of certain arguments that have long been put to rest. The Nazis did not eradicate the Jews in the name of evolution. They did so because of a half-baked eugenics theory, combined with what amounts to a charismatic cult leader. Similarly, Stalin did not send people to Siberia in the name of atheism. On the other hand, the Crusades and the Inquisition were carried out in the name of Christianity. The attacks of 9/11 were carried out in the name of Islam.
I fail to see what's so harsh about my example with the 19 hijackers. These were men of perfect faith, and they acted on it. To me, they are the perfect example of believers who actually believe what they say, and take actions that are required of them by their religious leaders and holy books. It's not the hijackers that believed in a "perversion" of Islam. It's the moderate Islamists who are too squeamish to fully embrace what their religion asks of them.
The bottom line is, evil people will commit evil acts whether they're religious or not. But only religion can cause good people to commit evil acts.
December 6th, 2010 at 8:47 am
Dmitry, I look forward to your other articles because these are good debates. Too many atheist debates are rife with petty comments and lack of thought. That is certainly not the case here.
This is entirely a chicken and the egg argument. I'm not convinced that good people will commit evil acts because of religion. It's an interesting argument and I'm not ready to take the opposite stance that it definitely doesn't make good people go bad, at least not yet, but I really think it's the people behind the religion. The same theory as "guns don't kill people, people kill people."
If a person is a 'good' person, I believe they will defy the incongruities of their religion. For example, a 'good' person will not kill in the name of their faith when their faith promotes peaceful coexistence. But then again, there is the aspect of brainwashing, too, in which case I don't believe it's the religion that causes people to do evil things, it's religious leaders warping the teachings of religion and brainwashing their constituents. Maybe that's the same thing to you? I'll have to think on whether or not I consider it the same thing.
To me, the basis of most religions is a good code of ethics and moral teachings meant to be instilled in future generations to guide people down a good path of existence. I see religion a lot like I see fables - fictitious stories generated by well-meaning humans to perpetuate a successful, ethical, and cohesive community.
And if you think about it, if we take away religion, will the harmful leaders simply find other avenues to perpetuate their evil doings? Or will they warp minds using other tools than religion? Perhaps paranoia and/or distortion of scientific facts. (For example: "There are aliens amongst us that want to kill us....we must root them out and kill them before they kill us!") And will those paranoid thoughts eventually become religion? Or there may even be events that occur that are true, not just paranoid teachings, that leaders turn into 'religion.' (Remember, for believers, religion is a true account of past events. To them, it isn't just a magical fairy tale, it's real events, real history.)
And let's ponder a different thought. Let's assume we eradicate all 'religion'... There will be people who lose their moral compass, either as a direct result, or just because. Crime will still happen and people will want to believe that there's something that can be done, they will want to believe that there's some punishment for these criminals in some sort of afterlife because they want to believe that life is fair. It's entirely possible that religion is an inevitable cycle. Take it away and people will create new religions with new characters in the role of "savior" and/or "God". There are too many humans out there that want to feel like they will be rescued, that there is some sort of fair balance in the cosmos. They don't want to hear that someone who commits unspeakable crimes might get away with it for life while someone whose innocent may have to deal with a lifetime of difficulties and never receive their 'fair shake' in the end (i.e. an eternal afterlife in Heaven). Does humanity have a strong enough means of creating fairness and equality in order to replace this? Not yet. We aren't sophisticated enough just yet to replace this 'safety net' of religion, so this may be the most difficult obstacle in overcoming religion.
As for arguing whether atheism is a religion or not, I agree with you. It's like someone saying their favorite color is black. It's not a perfect description, but it still gets the point across, so we're sort of arguing semantics. If someone asked you what your religion was, you would say "atheist", you would not say "I have no religion" even though that is, technically, the truth. I'm not offended by people who consider atheism a religion or lump it into that category for lack of a better way of saying it.
December 6th, 2010 at 9:38 am
[...] Today’s post is brief because I really just want to point in the direction of a really good blog that I’ve been participating in recently. If you’re an atheist interested in debating how to handle religion, visit Dmitry Brant’s “Accommodation vs. Confrontation” blog entry. [...]
January 2nd, 2011 at 5:25 pm
I welcome Dmitry's initiative to restart this dialog from a more fundamental level. I have to be honest and admit that I have not read much of Atheist philosophy, or philosophy in general, and perhaps I can learn from Dmitry and other contributing users such as Ducky in the course of our future discussion on this important topic.
As for my stance so far on the original topic of this interchange, I would like to restate what I feel about it now.
I believe that accommodation and confrontation can both be used by atheists to achieve our goal. Now we have to stop here and define what this goal is, or should be. In my opinion this goal should be facilitation of a secular society ruled by laws that have no theological derivation. This does not mean converting all people to be Atheist. We would just like religious people to agree on separation of church and state and have a similar jurisprudence perspective as us.
In achieving this goal we must use both accommodation and confrontation. We do not want to ostracise's ourselves as a group from all religious people via confrontation. This would be foolish and counterproductive to the goal I have stated above. This is because there is a large number of moderate and even humanist religious people that share same jurisprudence that is our goal. We must seek to unite with these people in our cause and give them due respect.
On the other hand there are also a large number of people who think that jurisprudence is inseperable from theology. These people we must fight, and use confrontation. The most effective way of fighting them would be to change their jurisprudence. We don't want to convince them that god does not exist. We want them to realize that a cosmopolitan society should be ruled by a completely secular set of laws.
January 10th, 2011 at 7:53 pm
Absolutely brilliant. You said it the way it's ment to be said. It has always irritated me how religeous people can scream from the roof tops about what they believe and yet if you open your mouth and say what you believe they act as if you just killed a member of thier family.
November 3rd, 2011 at 6:50 pm
Let's consider an "extreme" possibility - "people of faith" are, on the whole, just as honest, just as intelligent, just as educated, just as certain and just as unembarrassed as, on the whole, we atheists are.
Would that change your thinking about them?
It should.
Regards,
David.