For those of my readers who are at Purdue, don’t miss out the Society of Non-Theists‘ Fiction for Fiction event next week. As I’ve blogged before, it’s an event where people can trade in religious texts for great fiction novels.

When: Thursday, April 15th, 9 am to 4:30 pm
Where: Outside of CL50 at Purdue University
How: Bring a religious text! (pocket versions accepted)
Why: To encourage people to question what they read (and to stir up a little controversy, like always)

I’ll do a full write-up of the event next week. Oh, and if you want the good fiction books, come early – pretty sure Hitchhiker’s Guide will be snatched up quickly!

Today I took part in a religious diversity panel for an agriculture class at Purdue, Communicating Across Cultures. I was on the same panel representing atheists last year, which was a giant debacle that left a bad taste in my mouth. I decided to try again this year and hope for the best.

I have to say, it went much better. This time I was actually told that I was supposed to have a presentation prepared, and I was told the accurate topic (yes, last year was bad). I had limited time for my presentation, but here’s a brief outline of what I talked about.

– Definition for atheism and agnosticism
– Demographics of atheists in US
– Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, I can be convinced
– Secular humanism and general ideals some atheist have (search for truth, reason, evidence, concern for this life, ethics)
– Why atheism is not a religion
– Not all atheists hate religion (though some do), and we don’t hate religious people. In fact, most atheists were at one point religious.
– Atheists are not depressed, angry, hopeless people

The Muslim speaker (a recently graduated student) did an excellent job at explaining exactly what Muslims believe and some of their traditions. The Christian speaker (a pastor for Alpha Chi, the group with the zombie event), while very nice, was one giant facepalm. I really shouldn’t be allowed to be on panels or do debates, because I make a very obvious “What you’re saying is stupid and annoys me but I have to look polite” grimace, like so:It wasn’t her description of her belief that annoyed me. I disagreed with her just as much about there being proof of Jesus rising from the dead (uh, care to share that with us atheists?) and Intelligent design being proof for God’s existence (No) as I did with the Muslim talking about Mohammed being a prophet. I’ve heard the arguments before and I don’t agree with them, but the whole point of the panel was diversity, so they were totally appropriate.

What annoyed me is that she felt the need to comment on people other than Christians. Namely, atheists. To summarize her argument:

You know how when you were a little kid, and your parents forced you to go to bed at a certain time and eat your vegetables? And at the time you hated them and whined and resisted, but now looking back you thank them for being good parents? That’s God. Atheists don’t like that God’s a meanie and makes them do things they don’t like, so they rebel and go to the extreme and say he doesn’t exist. Atheists need to realize that God is all loving, and he makes rules in our best interest.

…

First off, when I was a little kid I went to bed at my curfew and ate whatever my parents told me to ate and never threw tantrums.

*ahem*

Really? Did she even listen to the talk I gave? I had just got done saying how atheists usually come to that conclusion after many many years of thought and introspection. That we weighed the evidence, and it wasn’t even enough to jiggle the scale. That we live by many of the same moral rules as religious people. That if given sufficient evidence, we would totally not hesitate in believing in God.

But no, atheists are just rebellious, selfish people who don’t want to conform to God’s rules. It’s just so fucking condescending, which is highly ironic considering it’s always the atheists who get labeled as the pompous jerks. I don’t think she was saying this to be mean, or even consciously aware of how bad it sounded – she really seemed like a legitimately nice woman. I didn’t go up and say how only atheists use reason and logic, and that theists are dumbasses. Blaaarrgghh.

One of the questions during the Q&A for me was what sort of evidence it would take to convince me that God exists. I gave my standard quip, that “If God is all knowing, he’ll know what will convince me,” which the pastor actually liked and agreed with. Then I added “Or he could make a trout materialize in front of me right now.” I paused, but no trout. Sadness. That was your chance, God!

Most of the other questions for me were pretty standard – Do you believe in a soul? (No) Where do you think you’ll go when you die? (In the ground) What do you think the purpose of life is? (There isn’t a preordained purpose, but we chose to give our lives purpose). How do you get along with religious people? (Just like someone with different political beliefs, you try to put it aside and find other things you have in common). I wish we had more time in the Q&A, because there were good questions we ran out of time for (exactly where do you get your morals, and how can morality evolve?). But since the class seemed so interested, the professor is going to email me the questions and let me answer them, and then she’s going to give my answers to the students.

I also really would have liked to address all the arguments the pastor was making. When she feels down, she asks God for strength and it makes her feel better (feeling better doesn’t mean he exists). When she looks at nature, she knows it couldn’t have come about by chance (it’s evolution, not chance). She hears the voice of God speaking to her, therefore she exists (you might want to get that hearing voices thing checked out).

But more importantly, atheists aren’t just some rebellious cranky kids who want to be able to run around having promiscuous sex and drunken parties! The ironic part is that she agreed that we have similar morals and care about the well being of others and want to live happy lives…so what exactly are we rejecting? An all loving God? Heaven? Yeah, I would just hate to have those things.

All in all, I still think the panel was a success. At the beginning of the talk, one girl said she didn’t know what the word “atheism” meant – hopefully now she does. And while I probably didn’t make any converts, I think it helped for them to see that an atheist is just a normal, happy person. They might think I’m wrong, but hopefully they won’t hate me.

So for those of you who are slightly confused, my previous post was a little April Fool’s Day prank. No, I haven’t suddenly seen the light – I’m still the same skeptical atheist you all know and love. I got a kick out of how many of you I actually made worried – I even had people emailing me out of concern, haha.

While I’m still a godless heathen, I wasn’t joking when I said that I really enjoyed Jon’s talk. And before I talk about it, I have an important side note to make. Every time we’ve had an atheist speaker on campus, something has gone wrong. It was raining for Hemant, snowing for Greta, and PZ‘s flight got delayed. Jon? Arrived early on the first beautiful, sunny, 70 degree weather day of the year. I think this is a sign…

I first met John at the Secular Student Alliance conference where he talked about how Christian groups can cooperate with atheists. We’ve kept in touch, and he has the honor of having the one Christian blog I follow. And like at his blog, he does a wonderful job of talking about Christianity in a way that’s a lot more understandable to atheists, especially ones (like myself) who were never Christian. One point that Jon made in his talk is why I like him so much – that he’s all about dialogue, not debates. He’s someone who will actually listen to what you have to say, and conversations don’t devolve into stubborn debates.

The bulk of his talk was about stereotypes people may have about Christians – that they’re anti-science, hypocritical, the morality police, etc. His main point wasn’t exactly revolutionary – that yes, some Christians do these bad things, but it’s not all Christians. But I’m mostly glad that he’s willing to admit this. Far too many people that I’ve talked to seem to think that Christians are infallible, but not Jon.

Though I will have to disagree with him on one point. When talking about certain Christian extremists, he remarked that he didn’t want to start “bashing Christians.” But I disagree. Okay, maybe not quite “bashing” – but we need more moderate Christians like Jon to speak out against Christian extremists. We all complain about the loud, obnoxious groups that get disproportionate media coverage, but moderate Christians need to start actually doing something about it. Do they see it as being traitorous towards their fellow Christians?

I don’t have too many specific remarks to make about the talk, but I definitely left feeling a bit uplifted. Not because I had seen the light, but because I remembered that there are Christians out there that I can talk to and be friends with. They’re not all right wing anti-evolution homophobic teabaggers. Jon and I definitely disagree on theological issues – I don’t agree with the concept of everyone being bad/sinners, or the whole… well, God thing. But we don’t feel the need to push our beliefs on each other, so we can still enjoy having a beer together and geeking out about Lord of the Rings.

Thanks, Jon, for coming and visiting us at Purdue! I know I enjoyed it, and so did others. Sorry I didn’t get to talk to you much at dinner – I’m sure our other members kept you entertained. Or more likely, somewhat frightened.

If you were there for Jon’s talk, please feel free to add to the discussion in the comments! Mike already has a good review up, as well.

—————————-

And as an aside,

Me: *leading the group to the restaurant, decided to take an alley for a short cut*
Member: Why are we going this way?
Me: It’s quicker.
Other member: *points ahead, we’re headed straight for the back of University Church* OH GOD, IT’S A TRAP! SHE’S TAKING US TO CHURCH!
Me: *evil cackling*
Member: He got to her, noooooo!
Me: You should have known this was just a plan to convert you all!

So for those of you who are slightly confused, my previous post was a little April Fool’s Day prank. No, I haven’t suddenly seen the light – I’m still the same skeptical atheist you all know and love. I got a kick out of how many of you I actually made worried – I even had people emailing me out of concern, haha.

While I’m still a godless heathen, I wasn’t joking when I said that I really enjoyed Jon’s talk. And before I talk about it, I have an important side note to make. Every time we’ve had an atheist speaker on campus, something has gone wrong. It was raining for Hemant, snowing for Greta, and PZ‘s flight got delayed. Jon? Arrived early on the first beautiful, sunny, 70 degree weather day of the year. I think this is a sign…

I first met John at the Secular Student Alliance conference where he talked about how Christian groups can cooperate with atheists. We’ve kept in touch, and he has the honor of having the one Christian blog I follow. And like at his blog, he does a wonderful job of talking about Christianity in a way that’s a lot more understandable to atheists, especially ones (like myself) who were never Christian. One point that Jon made in his talk is why I like him so much – that he’s all about dialogue, not debates. He’s someone who will actually listen to what you have to say, and conversations don’t devolve into stubborn debates.

The bulk of his talk was about stereotypes people may have about Christians – that they’re anti-science, hypocritical, the morality police, etc. His main point wasn’t exactly revolutionary – that yes, some Christians do these bad things, but it’s not all Christians. But I’m mostly glad that he’s willing to admit this. Far too many people that I’ve talked to seem to think that Christians are infallible, but not Jon.

Though I will have to disagree with him on one point. When talking about certain Christian extremists, he remarked that he didn’t want to start “bashing Christians.” But I disagree. Okay, maybe not quite “bashing” – but we need more moderate Christians like Jon to speak out against Christian extremists. We all complain about the loud, obnoxious groups that get disproportionate media coverage, but moderate Christians need to start actually doing something about it. Do they see it as being traitorous towards their fellow Christians?

I don’t have too many specific remarks to make about the talk, but I definitely left feeling a bit uplifted. Not because I had seen the light, but because I remembered that there are Christians out there that I can talk to and be friends with. They’re not all right wing anti-evolution homophobic teabaggers. Jon and I definitely disagree on theological issues – I don’t agree with the concept of everyone being bad/sinners, or the whole… well, God thing. But we don’t feel the need to push our beliefs on each other, so we can still enjoy having a beer together and geeking out about Lord of the Rings.

Thanks, Jon, for coming and visiting us at Purdue! I know I enjoyed it, and so did others. Sorry I didn’t get to talk to you much at dinner – I’m sure our other members kept you entertained. Or more likely, somewhat frightened.

If you were there for Jon’s talk, please feel free to add to the discussion in the comments! Mike already has a good review up, as well.

—————————-

And as an aside,

Me: *leading the group to the restaurant, decided to take an alley for a short cut*
Member: Why are we going this way?
Me: It’s quicker.
Other member: *points ahead, we’re headed straight for the back of University Church* OH GOD, IT’S A TRAP! SHE’S TAKING US TO CHURCH!
Me: *evil cackling*
Member: He got to her, noooooo!
Me: You should have known this was just a plan to convert you all!