You’ve heard it before. “They hate us for our freedoms”. It’s a catch-all excuse, where we can simultaneously pat ourselves on the back for being so “free”, whatever that means, and condemn others for not being as “free”. I’ve developed a bad reaction to that: I want to know what you mean by “freedom”. Freedom to exploit people? Freedom to harass? Freedom to eat bacon? Freedom to pray to your gods? There are a lot of freedoms that are worth exercising, and many of those that I’m happy to say can be exercised in my country. There are also things people call freedoms that are truly awful, and those get exercised, too — like the freedom to take advantage of underprivileged people. There’s also a tendency for my fellow Americans to assume that America is the land of the free, and that everyone is equally and completely free, which is not true. They also tend to get angry if you point out the shortcomings of America, in particular that different people have different degrees of liberty.

So my usual reaction is to wonder how the ‘freedom’ cheerleaders define freedom, and whether they seriously think the ideal is to be free of all responsibilities and obligations. It’s usually used vacuously, as a dogma that is not to be questioned.

Which means that I had to facepalm at this complaint about new atheism. That’s fair; there are good reasons to criticize, and an important part of intellectual growth is to address good faith criticisms. I read this, for instance, and didn’t reject it out of hand.

Many new atheists, including Dennett or Dawkins, have been criticised for being too radical. The phrase “militant atheist” is often thrown about. The general worry is that they have little patience or compassion for religious people and the reasons why they choose religion.

I’ve heard that complaint frequently enough that we should pay attention to it and try to deal with it. I wasn’t particularly impressed that this critic then goes on to babble approvingly of Alain de Botton, one of the shallowest, least interesting, wanna-be replacements for Richard Dawkins ever.

But don’t worry! He’s got a suggestion for what the next generation of atheists need to do.

What should we do then? Is there a genuine, not merely superficial alternative to both religion and the “something bigger” new atheists talk about? I suggest that there is a very simple alternative: we should try to avoid forcing a straight-jacket on our ever-changing self – by religious doctrines or by one of these “projects” the new atheists talk about. We should accept and cherish our freedom to change.

For the new atheists, freedom plays a very limited role. You are free to choose what you devote your life to, but once you’ve done that, your life is on a fixed track – no more free decisions. The new atheists’ “projects”, just as religious doctrines, put unreasonably severe constraints on our inner freedom.

The opposite of religion is not the slavish following of “something bigger” as the new atheists suggest. The opposite of religion is freedom.

Baffling. What “projects”? Is this a thing among the new atheists? (I think I’d know.) What “straight jacket” [sic]? Where is this assertion that new atheists aren’t allowed to change and grow, that they’re on a fixed track? This is news to me.

And what is his alternative? Fucking “freedom”. What does that mean? It’s stunning that this platitude comes from a professor of philosophy. Define your terms. What do you mean by the “opposite of religion is freedom”? Religion is slavery? All a slave must do is accept atheism and they are free?

We need good criticisms because we do need to improve our image and our approach. This is not a useful argument. We don’t need hackneyed bromides. Explain what “freedom” means in a social movement.

I told you that the University of Minnesota Morris has an opening for a tenure track position in quantitative biology — really, we do, and we urge qualified individuals to apply.

Only now it turns out that we have some competition in the market. Liberty University is also trying to fill an assistant professor in biology position.

Disclaimer: Liberty University’s hiring practices and EEO Statement are fully in compliance with both federal and state law. Federal law creates an exception to the “religion” component of the employment discrimination laws for religious organizations (including educational institutions), and permits them to give employment preference to members of their own religion. Liberty University is in that category.

Minimum Qualifications
Ph.D. in a biological field, or an M.D. minimum qualifications or 18 graduate hours in biology related coursework. Candidates must be committed to the evangelical standards and mission of Liberty University.

Preferred Qualifications

Ph.D. in a biological field, or an M.D. minimum qualifications or 18 graduate hours in biology related coursework. Candidates must be committed to the evangelical standards and mission of Liberty University.

I might be wrong, but I think there might be some religious requirement for the job at Liberty. You might want to read it carefully, I could have missed it.

In the spirit of true academic collegiality, though, if you meet the requirements for the Liberty position, I urge you to apply there. Not to UMM. We’re secular, super gay, and satanic. We might be drawing on a different pool of applicants.

Any Catholics out there want to field this one? Despite my reputation, I’m not specifically anti-Catholic, just generally anti-religion, and these weirdly reactionary old school Catholics with their exceeding narrow interpretations of dogma just creep me out. This one comes from some guy who is absolutely convinced that the only true Christian is a Catholic, but at the same time, he argues that the current Pope is the anti-Christ, etc. I’m guessing he’s going to be lonely in heaven as the only True Catholic ever.

Hello

Pope Eugenius IV in His infallible Bull ‘Cantate Domino’ at the Council of Florence (1441) declared the Dogma: “The Holy Roman Church firmly believes, professes, and teaches that none of those who are not within the Catholic Church can ever be partakers of eternal life, but are to go into the eternal fire “prepared for the devil and his angels” unless before the close of their lives they shall have entered into that Church.”

See the following:

https://www.youtube.com/user/mhfm1

Unless a person becomes a Catholic before they die: they will never save their soul.

Right now you are in rebellion against the Truth. According to Theological writings Americans (generally speaking) are hyper-allergic to Christianity, spirituality, and to spiritual truth; but if you managed to overcome that initial hurdle you could discover the beauty of Truth. You will need to say many Hail Marys though. “American identity” is just not compatible with Christianity. Followers of the USA think themselves an exception to the Law of Water Baptism and indeed to all the moral Laws of God for which there are no exceptions. Well you are not “exceptional” and this is what makes you angry at Christianity.

Sadly the USA flag like the Confederacy flag is an anti-Christian symbol whose tricolore (red, white, and blue) represents the slogan “liberty, equality, fraternity” according to the World Atlas website. That revolutionary masonic slogan has been repeatedly condemned as heresy by Christianity because it represents man against God and the overthrow of Christian order and Monarchy which uphold inequality. Millions of Christians were murdered under that slogan (which you venerate via the flag). To learn true compassion and fairness for everyone please see www.mhfm1.com which has many fantastic videos and articles. Many have converted from the American religion to the Christian Faith.

Sincerely
Alexander Emerick

I’ve never said a “hail mary” in my life, and couldn’t if I tried. There’s some words? Do I need to make any mystical gestures?

The bizarre claims about flags at the end is just the ludicrous icing on a fusty old cake made of cobwebs and rotting parchment. No thanks.

Leo Igwe writes about the contribution of Christianity and Islam to modernizing Africa. Against the background of African superstitions, does adding European and Middle Eastern superstitions help?

You will be shocked to learn that no, it does not.

These two religions do not, in any way, constitute ‘modernising forces’ in Africa. They render it increasing difficult to question and challenge supernatural and paranormal claims. Christianity and Islam only add to the existing superstitions, substituting or rebranding magical narratives that already apply in African societies. The skeptics’ movement should make it part of its program to subject Christian and Islamic faith claims to critical evaluation, even at the risk of being accused of racism or islamophobia.

I don’t think bringing in Scientology or Buddhism would counter irrationality either. Let’s criticize all religions.

Yeah, I’m trying to reach YouTube atheists, so I guess that means I need to use their preferred medium, as unsuited as I am to it. So here I am, expressing my views about the awful people in my movement by staring uncomfortably into a camera.

Sargon of Akkad “won” his interview with Thomas Smith. I’ve only seen a few short clips (the con organizers are going to be selling the videos, so they were limiting recording), and it was deplorable. Carl Benjamin aka Sargon sat there with a smirk; Smith would try to confront him with something, like the time Benjamin dismissed a victim of sexual assault by declaring “I wouldn’t even rape you”; then Benjamin would say “Yeah!”, turn to the audience and wave his hand, and the place would erupt with cheers and laughter. He didn’t need to reply, he had a claque on hand to howl approval no matter what vileness was brought up, who would howl the louder the more vile the Sargon quote was.

The speakers/attendees who backed out before they got on stage were wise. This was a theater packed with giggling misogynists.

I also saw a small bit of the “Armoured Skeptic”. He stood on the stage reading from a handful of papers, and made absurd declarations, such as that adding social justice to atheism made it a religion, that there was a god of SJWs, etc., etc., etc. It was unprofessional and ridiculous.

I pity the well-meaning people who stuck it out. Sargon won by being more disgusting than reasonable people could tolerate. Remember that next time Mythicist Milwaukee puts on a conference — it will be only for the dregs of atheism.

Robin Ince has a few words about political correctness.

Political correctness means different things to different racists homophobes misogynists concerned citizens. For some, it is a mindless removal of offensive words based purely on doctrine, they are cancelling the racist jokes for no other reason than statue 8 paragraph C. Some people cannot believe you may not make homophobic jokes and quips about rapes because you’re playing it safe rather than because you’ve thought it through and, via a combination of empathy and reason, you’ve decided it may be a better night without those jokes. You haven’t banned those jokes, you’ve just come up with other ones.

This is why I think PC can be good for comedy. It makes you think about what you are saying and why you are saying it. You still have the freedom to say it, you just might have spent a little more time thinking why you are. The cost of free speech when well-used is to think about its value and what you want to use it for.

So true, not just for comedy, but for any kind of communication. If you aren’t thinking about your audience, you aren’t being effective. You can spit on a Bible in front of an audience of atheists, but if you’re trying to talk to a group of creationists, you’ll lose them immediately and they won’t bother listening to you. “Political correctness” is a bullshit term used to disparage something important: thoughtfulness and honest discussion. Complaining about political correctness just means you’re admitting that you have zero interest in listening to the other side.