Here we go again, another session of Christians complaining about atheists…specifically, these danged “New Atheists” who don’t show the proper respect that the old atheists did. And of course they start with an annoying definition.
I have a couple of friends who are New Atheists and have had conversations with several more. If you haven’t run across them, New Atheism is a sort of grassroots movement among atheists that has gone beyond holding the position that no god exists to the position that theism is actively bad for the world and that atheism should “evangelize” actively to move people away from theism and religion. The movement is spearheaded by the writings and stylings of Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Daniel Dennett, and Sam Harris.
There is no “New” Atheism. It’s the same as the Old Atheism. And the Old Atheism was just as strident and just as annoying to the believers as anything we do today — this is just the usual attempt to silence people by shaming them with the imagined good behavior of their predecessors, where that good behavior is simply the imagined ancestral silence. It’s not true. Bertrand Russel was assertive about his beliefs, and so was d’Holbach and Diderot. We ‘evangelize’ by plainly stating our views, nothing more; you don’t see us legislating to ban Christian churches or trying to infiltrate theology into classrooms.
All that has happened is that the ongoing secularization of society has removed some of the stigma from atheism, and more people are speaking out (which has its downsides, since it also means more ignorant people are hopping on the bandwagon). It’s a sign of poor comprehension of modern atheism that the author tritely names Dawkins, Hitchens, Dennett, and Harris, as if they are at all representative. They aren’t. Clearly, he has picked up a label from the Christian literature and is happy to stuff it with the same old cliches.
This is the same phenomenon we see in American race issues, where the past is given a rosy glow, everyone is told to be nice like that uncontroversial gentleman, Martin Luther King Jr., and the message is supposed to be to sit down and shut up and be deferential like King was…and all we learn from that is that the hectoring person is totally ignorant about what was actually going on.
It gets worse.
Recently, my good friend, Christian brother and ad hoc accountability partner, and business partner Travis told me about a book: The Atheist Who Didn’t Exist. While there are a few bits and bobs that I’m not sure work out, I heartily recommend the book as a whole. It was obvious to me that the author had actually had numerous atheist friends that he took seriously (many of which disavowed the excesses of New Atheism) and was well acquainted with the talking the points of the new movement and why they tend to be pretty weak.
I’ve actually read that book! It’s awful. Let me give you two examples of the author’s cluelessness.
The first chapter is about those atheist buses in London — you know, the ones with the signs that said “There’s probably no god. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.” He first recounts a supposedly amusing anecdote about his friends calling him up in a state of shock at this remarkable development. Atheists! Promoting themselves!
The author objects, because the slogan, despite its friendly pink letters, is an example of a really bad argument
. Wait a minute, you might say, what argument? It’s not making an argument. It’s stating a conclusion, and explaining that this causes us no trauma. It’s undercutting a common Christian claim, which the author then demonstrates on the very next page.
What’s new about the “New Atheism”? As many have pointed out, not so much its arguments, which tend to be old ones, as its tone — which is one of apoplectic anger.
Right. Because you see that bus sign, and the first thing that comes to mind is apoplectic anger. The author then goes on to compare the makers of the bus sign to big-haired televangelists and calls them preachy and hectoring. It’s dishonest. When even a light-hearted message is given, Christians will whine about it’s tone — you can’t win with someone who’s that determined to distort everything.
The second example of the many I could give if I were doing a substantial review of this piss-poor book, is a complaint about a common argument that shows that he really doesn’t get it.
Indeed, claims such s “You’re only a Christian because your parents were!” have always smacked to me of desperation, on a par with “You’re only pessimistic because you’re English!” It’s also an ill-tempered Rottweiler of an argument, for it can quickly turn around and bite your own hand; after all, if it were true, it would apply to atheists, too.
Jesus. Exactly! That’s the whole fucking point! We are all products of our environment. One is Christian, not because there is some objective empirical evidence for its truth, but because it is a subjective experience which is shaped by your family, your friends, your culture as a whole. One is an atheist because of a constellation of experiences shape our beliefs — I, for instance, am steeped in science and naturalism, and that impels me towards atheism. I don’t pretend that the nonexistence of gods was something that jumped out at me in a revelation, without precedent and without a whole truckload of baggage.
The whole book goes on and on in this vein. Each chapter begins with a jokey anecdote, usually involving a humorous conversation with an imaginary friend (a Christian specialty), followed by a complaint about something an atheist said, which then leads to a “refutation” that only reveals that the author completely fails to comprehend the atheist point of view at all. Really, it’s a total waste of time unless you really want to have a lot of examples of how stupid Christian philosophy can be.
But back to the original link, where our clueless Christian resumes whingeing about those New Atheists, after revealing the rotten state of his sources of information on New Atheism.
This has been my experience as well – that the New Arguments of the New Atheists tend to be Pretty Bad. It actually makes me long for the days of Old Atheism when atheists were self-critical and pragmatic about their atheism. But why is this? Why is this particular brand of atheism so much more strident in its claims and so much worse about being able to substantiate them?
This should be obvious and predictable: none of these Pretty Bad arguments are going to actually be stated, let alone argued against. This is not to claim that there are no bad atheist arguments — there are some awful ones — but if you’re going to rail against the failure of atheists to back up their claims, you ought to cite at least a few rather than simply taking it as given. But at least he tells you the name of a lazy anti-atheist book that he claims has the refutations, even when it doesn’t!
Instead, he’s going to cut straight to his primary contention. Think you can guess what it is? Hint: think slack. Think tired old cliche. Think projection.
Yep. He’s going to complain that atheism is just another religion! Yay! Let’s all go take a nap.
But my contention is primarily this: New Atheism is the New Secular Fundamentalism.
Nope, sorry. This is just sloppy thinking. It’s just the old playground rebuttal, “No, you are!” All he’s going to do is list a bunch of things he doesn’t like about fundamentalism, and declare that atheists are just the same.
But I’m not going to play that game. It’s a standard Christian avoidance tactic.
Look, here’s the thing. Most of us aren’t atheists because we just translated our old church experience into godlessness, for arbitrary reasons. We didn’t invent atheism because we wanted a new religion. Some of us are atheists because religion really was poisonous to us: we saw hatred and pettiness and sanctimonious authoritarianism, and we wanted nothing to do with it. Those things do crop up all too often within atheism, because they are human failings, but it’s not because we are intentionally trying to recreate them.
Some of us, like me, are atheists because religion provides nothing we want, is unsatisfactory at addressing what we do care about, and is really, really bad at answering a very human question, “Why?” Instead, they prefer to make tirades against the other, ignoring their own failings, and pretending that the questions they ignore have been answered.
You want to know what those New Atheists, who are the same as the Old Atheists, are all about? We actually have important questions.
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Why should I believe in any god? We don’t need an intelligent authority to explain the universe, and in fact, assuming that the world is a product of natural, undirected processes has a far better track record of generating useful answers. Related: Why can’t you explain why you believe without resorting to hand-waving, fuzzy, unconvincing nonsense?
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Why should I believe in all the other hokum you attach to your religion? There is no evidence of an afterlife — it seems to be entirely a product of wishful thinking. The details of that afterlife, heaven, hell, angels, demons, whatever, all seem to be unsupportable exercises in pure imagination as well.
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Why should I believe in your particular flavor of religion over any other? Catholics and Muslims all seem to have some very smart, very scholarly, very serious people working on their theology, but they come up with completely different answers, almost as if they’re making it all up as they go along. And worse, there’s no method within their theology for checking the accuracy of their answers, and there’s no way to reconcile, for instance, Catholicism with Islam.
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Why should I believe some of the archaic bullshit that is central to your beliefs? At the heart of Christianity is the bizarre idea that we can have our sins (weird idea right there, too) redeemed (whatever that means) by the blood sacrifice (barbarous) of your god (who didn’t really die) 2000 years ago. I’ve read the apologetics. They are wacky, twisted, illogical crap.
These question will not and cannot be answered by religious apologists. The process of exploring them honestly is exactly what leads to atheism, so they have to avoid them. Far easier to complain that atheist bus signs have a bad tone, or that gosh, isn’t it rude of those atheists not to want to be forced to pray, or that there are bad arguments in atheism. You don’t get to complain about the latter until you address the fact that all of the arguments at the core of every religion’s beliefs are total flaming bullshit.
Oh, was that rude of me? So it was. I will not bestow upon lies an unearned respect.
One more thing I have to point out: religious people are oblivious to what we find rude. Take a look at this survey that assess what Christians think atheists will find uncomfortable, vs. what actually makes atheists uncomfortable.
Do you detect a pattern? We’re generally fine with you doing whatever you like within your religion. Where we get annoyed is when you insist on dragging us into it. You want to pray? Go for it. Oh, you want to turn a family meal into a communal thank you to an imaginary being? No thanks. You want to pray with me? Fuck off now, please.
And if you’re going to demand perfection in every atheist argument, I think the least you can do is provide a little of the same consistency and rationality to your faith-based babble, but one thing I can trust you to reliably do is to avoid the problem. But then, Matthew 7:3-5 is one of those verses Christians always conveniently forget.
For all my fellow sinners who also have to look that up:
It seems ironic that a religion with a built in imperative to proselytize (“evangelize”) gets all upset when they think someone of a different persuasion is supposedly doing the same thing they are so proud of doing.
I’ve never met a less charitable individual than an Evangelical Christian.
Literally. I know one who said that she’s fine with the idea of homeless people dying in the streets as long as the government isn’t spending any of her money to help them.
She also loves to pat herself on the back for the way she prays for everyone and everything and acts like it’s so amazing that someone got over a migraine or a severe case of hay fever several hours and multiple over-the-counter drugs after she prayed for them.
PZ:
People like this remind me of people who think they are perfectly qualified to discourse on Indians, without knowing even one actual Indian, without knowing one thing about one specific culture and traditions. These are people who are the most comfortable in a habitat of assumptions. Getting to know people who are atheists would be a direct threat to those who are accustomed to thinking in assumptive stereotypes.
It’s a willful blindness, preserved and passed on in order to keep their perceptions unshakable, and to avoid scary questions, and the worst of the worst – doubts.
Who are these old atheists, the ones who are “self-critical and pragmatic.” Ingersoll? Mencken? Has he actually read anything those old doubters wrote?
Matthew 6:5-7 is good, too.
Really, aren’t people like this right to worry? It’s not exactly death throes, but the opposition to religion is much further along than even these people think.
I can only speak for myself, but every one of the public faith displays in that survey makes me uncomfortable in equal measure. I do want religion destroyed. I do want it ridiculed and marginalized and relegated to a Thursday daytime spot on the History channel alongside how the alien lizard nazis built stonehenge. I do choose to give or withhold respect not for whether people have beliefs, but on the basis of those beliefs. I do consider parenting a child within a religious system a form of abuse. And the crazy thing is, I don’t think I’m alone in my generation.
The only error here is that they’re putting the blame on a select few authors from the Bush era. Never mind that the “four horsemen’s” books, at least the ones that pertain to atheism, are 10-15 years old already and that they rarely agree on anything, but that simply isn’t generating swarms of unbelievers; they were simply part of a market for people who were already atheists.
What’s causing a rise in atheism is greater transparency, especially from online reporting, of church sexual abuse, the buying up of hospitals to offset loss of income, papal shenanigans, sectarian violence, terrorism, funny hats, etc. Once again the Jeezits are looking for a scapegoat because they can’t see it’s their own damn fault.
Jean Meslier was an old school atheist and he wasn’t tone-trollable because he published after he was dead! Hardcore last word!
When atheists start demanding tax free status and showing up to proselytize the virtues of tequila, sex, and pizza – then I’ll take their complaints seriously.
That pain you’re feeling is just privilege-levels dropping slightly. Awwwww, poor boo boo
tomh@#5:
Who are these old atheists, the ones who are “self-critical and pragmatic.” Ingersoll? Mencken? Has he actually read anything those old doubters wrote?
They’re still smarting from Nietzsche. The current generation of atheists are super gentle compared Epicurus, Nietzsche, Hume, Voltaire and Meslier. And Voltaire wasn’t even an atheist. “Crush the infamy!” he used to write, referring to the catholic church.
Have the christians hawked up a good attack on atheism that isn’t a self-pitying tone-trolling whine? Will someone rid me of these tedious believers?
@tomh, 5
You really need to ask that?
I think the real difference between old and new atheists are far as they’re concerned is proximity. They’re much less likely to get accidental, unmoderated exposure to the old atheists.
I’m curious about that figure of 8% of atheists & agnostics who are uncomfortable with public displays of religious clothing. Surely it depends on context?
Some of it doesn’t bother me too much, such as Sikh turbans or Jewish yarmulkes. If men are fool enough to take the superstitious nonsense so seriously, at least they’re the ones wearing the outfits, (although I do wonder what might go on, behind closed doors, with their wives & kids). But I don’t like to see Muslim women wearing hijabs or burkas, especially on hot days. That must amount to torture. Okay, maybe some of them choose to wear that clothing, but I suspect that many, if not most, don’t.
I had some fun yesterday. Two Jehovah’s Witnesses came to my door.
Keeping one hand on the head of my very large German Shepherd, I told them “Ladies, I’m everything you DON’T want in your church. I’m a pro-choice feminist, a liberal Democrat and an Atheist. Have a nice day.” and I slammed my door shut.
It’s fun to shock smug xtians, especially here in Texas.
And what would fundamentalist atheism be? Fundamentalism is the dogmatic acceptance of beliefs or texts. As applied to atheism, what such texts are they? Atlas Shrugged? Das Kapital? A Treatise on Human Nature? Why I Am not a Christian? Or the beliefs of their authors?
If they really want to shame atheists they just need to get a few YouTube links, if yah know who I mean…
Dick:
It’s not about what you like to see. You’re expressing a double standard here, where yeah, it’s okay if men dress in whatever way they like, but not the women. This type of attitude really needs to stop, because adult women are adults, with brains and everything, and they can decide for themselves how to dress. It’s not up to anyone else to have attitude about their choices. No matter what, women are always and forever subject to attitude and judgment over how they dress. This is one of those things where you need to tell yourself, firmly: none of my business.
Also, a burka can be very lightweight, or heavy and warming, depending on the fabric, so there’s another reason to stop being judgmental about it.
Eh, is he under the impression that most atheists got their irreligion from their parents? I was raised Christian, like most atheists I know. So I’m not seeing how that one can “turn around”, really.
“Secular Fundamentalism” reminds me of this:
https://www.amazon.com/New-Atheist-Threat-Dangerous-Extremists/dp/1908675349
the alt right have overused the term “regressive left” to the point of meaninglessness but if it has any legitimate meaning then this book is the best example of it
Caine, I’m not expressing a double standard. If the women freely choose that kind of clothing as their own choice, then they have as much right as men do. But do they have a free choice?
I believe that a lot of these women don’t get to make their own choices. I returned to Canada four years ago, after living 27 years in England. There are some really nasty misogynistic husbands & fathers there, with occasional, so called “honour killings”. It may not be so bad here; I admit that I don’t hear about the same level of misogyny here, but that could be because I’m not exposed to the news items in the way that I was in England. I’ve not seen survey results of Canadian Muslim attitudes, so I don’t know. But I don’t see why it should be so very different, unless the extremists are generally unable to score enough points to immigrate here.
I concede that I might be unfairly biased by my time living in England. For the record, I do have Muslim relatives (by marriage) here who are perfectly normal in their treatment of women, & very nice people indeed.
I am a product of my experiences, so I don’t like to see women in hijabs & burkas. That clothing appears to me to be misogynistic.
I would date the start of aggressive “New” atheism to the late Mikhail Bakunin, the anarchist, who wrote in the later 19th century “If God existed it would be necessary to abolish it” (In God and the state)
Compare to the start of aggressive “New” theism, which was … who knows? Several thousand years before that, in any case.
It’s an old, time-honoured tactic of argumentation:
“What you say presents a problem for my position. Here is why I don’t have to deal with it.”
dick @19,
I get what you’re saying, and I have a similar instinctive reaction, but you need to really listen to what Caine is saying: What you (or I) like or dislike isn’t the issue. It’s not about us.
Nope, on the other hand I’ve seen atheists* attempting to legislate to ban Muslim identity markers from French streets (sure, everyone has heard of the Burkini, but the dipshits have also been trying to ban waterpipes and Shawarma)
Because that’s another consequence of the secularization of society: authoritarians who happen to be Atheists don’t need to hide anymore and many are taking advantage to wear on their sleeve their desire to browbeat everyone else into conforming to what they deem appropriate.
Now that doesn’t mean that authoritarianism increased (I heavily suspect that past would-be despots who happened to be atheists just pretended to believe in whatever religion was the dominant one where they lived), but atheistic authoritarians adopting the very same behaviors as their religious counterpart is something that’s happening.
*White Atheists, who unsurprisingly have no problem joining hand with white Christians when it comes to treating people of african & arabic descent like shit.
***
Once again I’ll take the french exemple: french fundie Catholics claim that “Since we’re forbidden by secular laws from proselytizing, everyone must be forbidden from proselytizing” which is bullshit for two reasons:
1. They’re not forbidden from proselytizing, what they are forbidden from is harassing people, preaching to a captive audience (say, a sick person in a hospital bed: one is not allowed to go to their room and demand that they renounce Satan), or linking proselytizing to material gifts (for instance, if a religious group offers free vacations to children from poor families and uses it as an excuse to try to convert them, expect a lawyer to come and tear apart the proselytes limb by limb in a court of law).
2. The people who say that belong to the religious wing of the dipshit collective whose members claim that waterpipes and Shawarma are attempts at turning people into radical Muslims and must be banned less France becomes just like Saudi Arabia.
***
Actually, the correct translation is “Crush the Wicked“: Voltaire was deliberately trying to emulate the tone of sanctimonious zealots. Remember that Mr Arouet was rather notorious (dare I say “infamous“?) for being a showboat who loved nothing less than displaying his own wit.
I think I know the difference between “old” and “new” atheism.
“Old” atheists are elderly, scholarly gentlemen who write large, difficult books. The kind of people theologists can relate to, even if they disagree with them.
“New” atheists are ordinary people who refuse to take the theology seriously and simply say religion is bullshit. We’ve totally unarmed the theologists and they can’t stand that.
@Dick, my wife owns several abayas from when we lived in the Persian Gulf region. She wasn’t required to wear them, she chose to do so out of respect for the local traditions.
That respect was reciprocated by the locals when buying items at the souqs, expressed via significant discounts. Inevitably, I was offered tea and “biscuits” (typically, saltine crackers) from the elder shopkeepers.
She told me that it wasn’t actually all that hot to wear, as it blocked the sun from her and she didn’t wear the veil or head covering, only the abaya.
As for Evangelical atheists, well, at least they don’t pass the collection plate around repeatedly. ;)
Unlike one church that my wife convinced me to attend with her sister, which held a 30 pieces of silver collection. I walked out.
I think that was the last thing that minister expected.
Gondwanarama@23
If someone believes (reasonably) that the hijab is a symbol of male oppression over women, why should he or she not experience a feeling of dislike of that symbol?
@23
Yes it is not about us. It is about women who get tortured and or killed if they do not where a certain piece of clothing.
Because most muslim women do not live in western states where many of them (but not all!) are free to choose their clothing.
Most muslim women life in Islamic theocracies, where not wearing these pieces of clothing can result in a wide range of punishments, from social exile to death. And that should concern us, don’t you think?
The hijabs or burkas are inherently misogynistic because women have to wear them to hide their appearance so men can freely move around without having “sinful” thoughts. That is the underlying argumentation Islam uses to justify the need of these kinds of clothing.
And just because some women choose to wear them does not make them less misogynistic, the same way the GOP does not become less homophobic just because of log cabin republicans.
That does not mean that these women should not have a right to choose to wear what ever they want. I am strikt against any ban on any piece of clothing. But i will not stop criticizing the tradition that stands behind and is symbolized by hijabs or burkas.
thecalmone @27,
That’s not what I said, nor what I understood Caine to be saying: I didn’t say “don’t dislike it”, I said that your personal dislike isn’t really all that important. It’s not about you.
Turi1337 @28,
“Most muslim women life in Islamic theocracies” – that’s not even remotely true. The largest muslim country is Indonesia, where Islam is certainly dominant, just as Christianity is in the US, but is by no means a theocracy. Look at the list:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_by_country
The first country where you could really argue for a theocracy would be Bangladesh at #4, and you’d really have to make a *good* argument. The first undisputable theocracy is Iran at #7.
@30 Yes, your are entirely right. I did catch it only after i send it. The term society instead of theocracy would be much better, and even than is “most” the wrong choice of words.
I still stand behind the entire rest of my argument.
Suggestion: Put this on a t-shirt in case someone challenges your lack of belief.
1. God splits into three parts while somehaow remaining one (quantum?).
2 God sacrifices a third of himself to himself.
3.God resurrects the dead part.
4. Part of God is present in communion wafers and wine, but does not become urine or excrement.
5. in the sixth or seventh centuries, Satan is promoted to a bona fide rival of God, instead of a mere irritant.
6. The jooos are evil.
by the way, God has a hand and a foot (not Xians, but fun): “Sunni Islam riven anew by ancient dispute” http://www.timesofisrael.com/sunni-islam-riven-anew-by-ancient-dispute/
Search for old new atheism on Google Images and see what comes up first.
@#17 Nemo
Eh, it depends on your surroundings, I would think. I live in Europe and many people – including myself – have irreligious parents of some sort (not sure if they are outright atheists, but who cares). Go to Scandinavia in particular and you’ll probably meet a ton of people who happen to be atheists because they were never taught to believe Christianity, not because of a specific, personal journey away from religion. And a lot of young atheists even in the USA are having children now, who are presumably not going to be raised in a Christian setting, either. But like PZ said, I don’t see why that would be a strike against atheists born to atheist parents, as long as those parents instill ideas of empiricism and critical thinking in their children.
This sounds like something I want.
OTOH… wtf is it?
One point I like to make about the “obnoxious atheist” line of argument.
Atheist: “I think you are wrong about there being a God.”
Christian: “I think you are going to be tortured for eternity and I worship the guy who is going to do it.”
Now tell me again, which one is the obnoxious asshole?
Gondwanarama @ 23, are you saying that I shouldn’t have a visceral reaction to perceived instances of, or a culture of misogyny, or even to the sight of overt religious belief, when I view such beliefs very negatively? I’m entitled to my reactions, as long as I’m still alive. If I discover that they are inappropriate, then of course, I should work on changing them. In this instance, I don’t think that my reactions are inappropriate.
Jaybee @ 37 – that’s very good.
@wzrd1
“she chose to do so out of respect for the local traditions.”
isn’t it one directional?!i hardly believe that a muslim woman would do the same out of “respect”.
but the more important question is, why using similar clothing is a form of respect to them?!
Turkey’s Islamic Fashion Revolution:
And as usual, the xian blog doesn’t allow comments…..
Brave, brave Sir Robin….
@Arash Jka
You should turn that question on yourself and the others in this thread–why, exactly, do they need to conform to our fashion standards to have our respect? Either you oppose fashion conformity as a prerequisite for respect, and therefore respect Muslims even as they dress differently; or you embrace it, and allow Muslims to disrespect you for not conforming to their fashion and vice versa.
If one wants to criticize the misogyny inherent in gendered clothing codes, one should be careful to direct their ire at the institutions and structures that penalize women for disregarding them. Which, incidentally, also includes patriarchal white saviourism–see the French cop forcing that poor woman on the beach to strip at gunpoint. It really is counterproductive to set your sights for anyone but the clerics and mouthpieces.
@Arash Jka #39:
For the same reason that I wouldn’t wear a hat in church or nothing but Speedos in a Michelin-starred restaurant.
The latter would really put people off their grub…
Deriving a divine world from our concrete one requires a salto mortale.
Ferdinand Domela Neuwenhuis, Dutch theologian, apostate and socialist, somewhere at the end of the 19th Century. Got a statue in Amsterdam.
@Siobhan
what i object is ideology behind it but i don’t demand any fashion conformity and respecting irreligious people via clothing is stupid too.
people clothing could make me mad or uncomfortable but standards for respect should not be as superficial as how people dress.
@Rich Woods
if a place is privately owned i don’t have much objection or if there is a singular restricted event.
but when you live in a community/society, earning respect by clothing is not a really good sign, it shows conformity is appreciated and diversity is shunned.
Old Atheists or New Atheists. You take Mary, I’ll take Sue, Ain’t no difference ‘twixt the two.
Crimson Clupeidae, why allow comments when you’ve already written a perfect truth? ~snark
It’s easy to see why people fall under religion’s spell. The religious are now rallying behind a man who, if not an atheist, is a hedonist and charlatan who now proclaims his belief, something he had never done in his 70 years before running for president. If you think Donald Trump is a True Believer, I have a bridge in New Jersey you can shut down.
Eh? Who said anything about “earning respect”?
I call goalpost moving.
Either I am exceptionally tolerant of religious expression or there’s more to each question being asked than the information presents because I don’t find any of those irksome inherently.
Even things like “saying “I’ll pray for you” ” don’t inherently bother me. Sure it can be condescending passive-aggressive nonsense but yeah I have encountered it used nicely.
It also strikes me as unreasonable to be bothered if religious members of your family wish to say grace before a meal,; especially if you are over their house.
Mike Smith:
It sounds like you agree that it would make you uncomfortable in certain situations. People responding to the questions may not be thinking it’s a black or white thing which is “inherently” this or that. Instead, they could think their reaction would usually be one of discomfort, because they think such an encounter would probably not be a “nice” one. Perhaps the past experiences they’re drawing upon are different from yours, but in any case, knowing of a few atypical cases when it was “nice” won’t change much.
There’s a strong expectation that you have to participate in the prayer, as someone jumps in with their standard/memorized prayer, before you know it, without consent/discussion and without any acknowledgement that some may have a different perspective — whether they’re atheists, members of a different denomination or an altogether different religion. I don’t want to pray (while I’d be happy to thank farmers and cooks and so forth), and the fact that I happen to be at their house is irrelevant. So I’ll just sit there quietly as they do their thing, but I will feel a little uncomfortable about it. This seems unreasonable to you?
@blf
those people respected her more than before because she dressed like them.
isn’t it earning respect?
Arash Jka@51, And now you are JAQing off.
sorry that was a rhetorical question
i thought the answer is pretty obvious
Just a precision: while Riviera municipalities did use “White Savioresque” rhetoric to try to justify the ban, their intent had nothing to do with playing White Saviors: it was all about right-wing and fascist mayors pandering to local racists by telling them “Look at us: We are treating Arabs like shit! Vote for us in the next elections!!!“
The only thing “new” about the New Atheists is that they have better book deals and thus made it into the standard Rolodex of cable news shows so they can “present the atheist point of view.” It’s why you see the same people over and over again. Need an atheist? It’s Harris. Need an evangelical? It’s Perkins. Need a gay man? It’s Savage. Need a trans? It’s Cox. The media is incapable of considering the possibility that there is more to a group than a single viewpoint and thus they would need to talk to more than one person.
the only difference or the primary difference between old atheists and new atheists is that many of the old atheists are dead and gone while new atheists tend to be alive.
While acknowledging there may be differences in various social and political issues I do not think the differences fall on new or old lines.
it is interesting being now on the unbelief side of the issue how different things appear.
uncle frogy
Mencken wrote some terribly racist stuff in a 1910 book, Men Versus the Man. See page 162 for instance.
Ichthyic wrote:
A friend who is supposed to keep you
from having any funsinning and tattle to your pastor if you stop believing the One True Christian sect you both currently belong to.dick @38,
Again, your feelings on the matter are *not the issue*. Islamic dress codes for women have a long history of oppression, and men policing women’s bodies. I would hope it’s fairly obvious that the solution isn’t for a couple of white men to point out that they are *deeply offended* by a particular woman’s appearance.
Do you have a “visceral reaction” to seeing women wearing high heels at work? Do you recognise that many women may feel socially obliged to dress in a boner-pleasing fashion, even if impractical and with long-term health consequences, thanks to centuries of men policing women’s bodies? Do you accept that many women (and men, for that matter) nevertheless *enjoy* wearing high heels, and that nobody has the right to pass judgement on them for doing so? Do you recognise that your opinion, and mine, are both *completely fucking irrelevant*? If you can answer yes to any of these questions, why would the answer be any different if we’re discussing a hijab?
Fixed
***
It’s not obvious to a great many white men & women who invested their sense of self-worth in the postulate that they are the paragons of enlightenment.
laurentweppe,
Yeah, that was kind of the point of my second paragraph. I’d *hope* it was obvious, even though it clearly isn’t.
@gondwanarama
I know: the thing is, you did what Paul Krugman calls “throat-clearing” which tends to mute your argument.
Krugman’s example was that if an economists built her argument as such:
[Throat-cleaning] Of course excessive public debt is a problem
…
[Actual Argument] Three pages explaining that the policies advocated by the austerity fetichists won’t work as advertised, make ordinary people miserable, won’t reduce public debt and eventually increase the clout of demagogues
Then the austerity fetichists would focus on the introductory attempt at being nice to one’s opponent (“*Ahem*, it’s not that I completely disagree with you“) via one non-controversial statement (“excessive public debt is bad“) and claim in bad faith that she conceded their point.
One should avoid that rhetorical trap: instead of beginning by stating something so bloody obvious that no one in the audience denies it (“Islamic dress code have often been used as a tool and excuse to oppress women“), the core of one’s argument should be made clear from the earliest lines (“Assuming that any adult woman who adhere to a given dress code is being either oppressed or manipulated is false and wrong.“)
@Arash Jka #39, their country, their culture, a good guest respects his or her hosts traditions. Just as they do when they come to be educated in our country.
And yes, many do come here for an education and live within our culture quite well. I’ve even taken a Saudi gentleman around shopping when he was helping to settle his daughter at U of P. They both immediately adopted western attire and were quite glad of a local showing them around. I also helped him fix his sheesha, which was damaged in transit, but a touch of epoxy made right as rain.
I was careful to not admire it too much, his culture would’ve forced him to part with it and honestly, my own less elaborate models more than suffice for my modest requirements. :)
Learning and respecting another’s culture is a good thing, it shows respect for the individuals of that culture, their culture in general and even if one disagrees, one has common ground in many areas to build upon, rather than judge upon and build a wall between one another.
Evolutionists are bluffing when they say their beliefs are scientific. Take a look at http://originalitythroughouttheuniverse.com/life-science-trial/
Did. YAWN.
Where the fuck is their citations to the peer reviewed scientific literature? Dismissed as religious fuckwittery.
A million or so scientific papers back evolution, both directly and indirectly. Any other idea, low numbers, if at all. Deities/designers are MIA.
@64
By that “””””logic”””””, didn’t the failure of anyone ever to successfully claim the Randi prize disprove the existence of supernatural forces?
Insectman, I looked at your site there. It’s just a muddled mess of allegations about scientists making mistakes – some are identical. If all were true, it still would not affect the truth – science accounts for mistakes.
The first claim the site makes about the physical world -every animal is unique – actually supports evolution. A typical situation for creationists.
All I need to refute your comment is to say, “No, you are bluffing.” Get some evidence.
@59 gondwanarama
That over-simplistic bullshit belongs in the “a feminist would support Sarah Palin!” camp.
Sexism isn’t a battle between men and women, where feminism calls us to support the female side. Sexism is a pervasive attitude shared by men and women alike. Women are the primary victims, but that doesn’t mean their oppressors are never other women. Who teaches little girls that they shouldn’t go outside without covering their face with hoods or makeup? And for far too many little girls, who’s the one that cuts off their clitoris? Not the dad, but the mother.
The fact that many women often choose to make themselves a part of sexist culture doesn’t make that culture not sexist. If I see a Trump supporter with a “Hillary is a c*nt” T-shirt, there’s good reason to be made uncomfortable by the overt misogyny inherent in their outfit, even if the wearer is a woman. Or maybe I’m just not very sympathetic to your high-heels analogy when I see, on a regular basis, the heels at my job being vicious shits to the women here who aren’t as gender conforming.
I also want to address the asinine thing of “it’s not feminist to tell women what they have to wear!” It’s not feminist to tell women what they have to wear… because they’re women. Societal dress codes exist irrespective of the burqa, and while I’d like to see a lot of those relaxed, we’ve never lived in a society where you can wear literally anything you want anywhere, and I don’t think we should (eg, people aren’t allowed to walk naked onto a kids’ playground, and for good reason). There are always going to be dress standards, they should just be the same for men and women.
I know that probably sounds a lot like “the law forbids the rich and poor alike from sleeping under bridges” since the burqa is a very gendered article of clothing, but consider this; how socially acceptable is it for men to go out in public in a visible chastity belt or gimp suit? That would obviously make people uncomfortable, but what is the difference between a visible sex-control bondage fetish outfit and the burqa, except that you can be relatively certain that the guy in the gimp suit consented?
@zibble, males in Islam have clothing modesty requirements, just as women do. The local culture/sectarian environment adds or subtracts upon those requirements and that you fixated upon a burqa in favor of an abaya is rather telling.
While my knowledge of Islam is rather extensive, due to previous military duties, my knowledge of various other cultures on this planet is also extensive.
To be honest, any clothing code is a control of a society upon its membership, not trusting said membership to actually be decent people.
I’ve lived in areas where niqab and burqa were mandatory, I’ve lived in areas with my wife where even an abaya was optional, I’ve lived in areas where people tended to go with minimal to no clothing.
Somehow, all of those societies manage to keep things working.
Interestingly, every one of those cultures did restrict sexual activity to private or at least near private conditions, depending upon the culture in question, but the average norm was, things sexual went on in private on a visual basis.
Feeding babies ranged from in public to our norm of asking mothers to feed baby in the shithouse.
To be honest, I’m a male in his mid-50’s, I’ve been happily married for 35+ years and frankly, don’t give a tinkerer’s damn what anyone wears at work. I’m at work, I’m there to work, then go home. When out shopping, the same.
When my wife enjoyed some sun this afternoon without a top, I supported her decision, despite somewhat restrictive clothing codes here in the US state that we live in.
Fortunately, our neighbors value property rights and one’s activities within one’s own property’s rights over some prudism, thereby saving them from the firing of the howitzer beneath my nose.
As I’m normally quite soft spoken, most find it surprising when I initiate conversation at volumes previously utilized to address multiple companies of armed forces members and the content, addressed in such a withering volume and detail in character flaws present in the one objected to has resulted in the one addressed in said military environment being placed on suicide watch.
Fortunately, I’m not so easily aroused to such ire. But, minding my wife’s and my business on the privacy of our own property would cross that major line, as we have enough border foliage and barriers in place that one has to go far out of one’s way to find objection.
As for at work, anyone sitting in shorts or no shirt would simply be thought of as either a human version of a polar bear or an idiot. The A/C in the building is set to *damned cold*.
That said, as far as I’m concerned, everyone’s welcome to wear what they want to. I’ll keep my hoodie about for when I start to feel cold (apparently, some cold spells on my part were due to my hyperthyroid condition responding to medication a bit too well, resulting in today’s lowering of the dosage by 50%).
That said, the company has a casual business attire policy. Pity, I’d love to wear a tee shirt to work, with that hoodie for when I feel cold.
But, when I work from home, it’s in shorts and no shirt.
It’s comfortable to me and my wife has been cold intolerant of late.
But, just to give you nightmares, when we’re of mutually acceptable temperature acceptance, we both tend to do without the extra baggage of clothing within our home. Just a cloth to sit upon.
Gotta protect the furniture for guests and future usage.
If anyone wishes to disrespect our property lines and play peeking tom, they’re welcome to turn into stone or worse, experience either the super bright flashlight under my home defense rifle that oddly lacks a firing pin or the twice as bright, recently acquired handheld flashlights. All, well, I’d strongly suggest wearing sunscreen before being exposed to them, as the rifle’s light is 1000 lumens (we do occasionally have alligators in yards here and a firing pin is easy enough to install, if I actually *had* to harm the creature, rather than wait for it to leave), the others are 2000 lumens. Leave ’em seeing spots for the next 45 minutes, as they stumble toward the property line, likely thinking that I’m giving chase, rather than simply laughing.
I’ve done the blinding precisely once, to a prospective burglar, who dropped his pry bar and left a nice blood trail over the fence he gouged his shins upon departing.
Oh, if that attempted burglar is reading, thanks for that fine pry bar. I used it to replace the motor mounts on my car. That abortive effort saved me some money, which is badly needed for other medical issues here at home! You’re welcome back to it, once you’ve mowed the lawn a few dozen times as penance for frightening my wife.
Hey, even Will realized the corollary to Wheaton’s Law, “Some times, one just has to be a dick”.
IRL, I’m actually pretty good at figuring out the difference and apologizing properly when I’ve made an error in judgement well enough to actually make a new friend. :)
Online, not so well. You can’t see my winks, nods of head, crossed eyes, funny faces or tongue sticking out.
But, the flashlight bit and the rest, all within our life experiences and our home experiences as well.
We dress up for visitors.
Having a couple of statues would be OK, having a house full of people ossified in horror, totally not cool. ;) *
*We had a good friend who had a wonderful tee shirt that I’m still seeking a copy of. “I have the body of a god. Unfortunately, it’s Buddha”. Interestingly enough, we knew the culturalism of what Buddha would have looked like (scrawny, due to fasting), however, despite his Iranian roots and my US roots, we also both appreciated the Western humor of the shirt and so did every Buddhist we knew.
He and his visiting parents, having just arrived from Iran, were astonished to see this “American” (I loathe that term, I’m a US citizen, Mexicans and Canadians are North Americans along with my countrymen, Americans are also Central and South Americans) enjoy a fine appetizer of raw garlic and onions in olive oil and spices. To our horror, without time for family to catch up, traveling parents to relax, but different cultures and all (we ran into that a lot, friends wanting to introduce us immediately to family).
Hey, when in Rome, go to the best orgies! Just be warned, most involved food.
With which I’ll close with one warning, should you ever be in the Middle East. Beware the Lebanese table, for you’ll be at grave risk of leaving it twice the person that you arrived at it – literally. Loving every tidbit of food.
I’m serious, the Lebanese tend toward generous offerings of a banquet for guests and it’s damned near impossible to turn it down, it’s that damned good.
A regional joke not often used of late, Syrians are only so miserable because they can’t be Lebanese. Alas, a quite westernized (to the point of scandalizing Fredericks of Hollywood) nation (yeah, their intimate apparel was that good), has fallen into a condition that greatly depresses me.
Honestly, no people deserve what’s going on there.
Might I ask for a moment of silence for the people of Syria?
I’ll try to dry my eyes, allergies and weeping combining make for poor viewing.
Such erudition!
Of course. Ask away at your leisure.
(!)
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How did we end up here, on a post about the vacuity of Christians’ complaints about atheists?
(Not even 100 comments in!)
Slow nght?
[meta]
I don’t usually indulge, chigau. Someone had so say something, but.
Just a bit of wandering OT and some distress over a news story that was recently viewed.