Why I am an atheist – Natasha K

I suppose my journey to atheism started with spirituality. When I was a kid, I attended a Unitarian Universalist church in Seattle. We had both a Solstice and a Christmas pageant, celebrated Easter and the Equinox. My parents sought not to force an ideology upon me, but to expose me to many traditions so that I could piece together my own collage of beliefs. I remember one day, standing in my living room, when someone inquired as to my religion. Bewildered, I said “I don’t know…” and turned to my mother, who replied “Good.” When my sisters were born, though, our house and traditions were suddenly too small.

We moved to a cohousing community about half an hour away when I was nine or ten, and my father moved back to Seattle soon afterward. He was and is a very scientifically minded person, fascinated with the acquisition of any kind of knowledge he can get his hands on, and I believe his transition to atheism came soon after my parents split. I began attending a New Thought church with my mother (and later my stepfather). In this place, I was taught that god is just a word for some spiritual thingy that makes up everything, a person’s natural state is perfection, that our thoughts affect what happens to us, and that heaven and hell are merely states of mind. After a while, though, I became disenchanted with that fat box of joy. They started asking people to tithe after every service. They acquired a new TV spot, associated themselves with Deepak Chopra, and built a new “celebration hall” with the money they constantly milked their audience for…. The average wealth of the people attending rose visibly, and not because the church was making anyone richer. Our old holding-hands-during songs tradition was abolished without a word. Not to mention the fact that we were building ugly new buildings instead of, say, helping people through devastating world crises. Attached to my previous participation in the music program and to the friends I’d made there, I dangled on for a little while before I gave up.

As I began my college career last year, I discovered my fascination with anthropology and psychology; the reasons people are how we are, and how we perceive the world around us. And in the light of my recent split from the New Thought movement, and the insight I was being given into humanity, I turned my questioning nature upon my own beliefs. I’d read Pharyngula before, and was already better versed in biology and the scientific method than most people my age, but had held tightly to my vague, earthy spirituality. Under closer scrutiny, I was shocked at my conclusion:

None of the important values I was holding onto and associated with spirituality- self-fulfilling prophecy (a well-known psychological phenomenon), respect for life, empathy, getting to know oneself- needed to be assigned to any sort of supernatural being or force. There was just no reason I had to believe something quite frankly silly to be a whole, happy person living on a fascinating speck in a vast and astounding universe.

So I did. And now I’m an atheist.

Natasha K
United States

The scandalous video that could not be shown on TV! Here! Now! Uncensored!

When will they ever learn? Tim Minchin did a new song for a television show, and when the director, Peter Fincham, saw it, he presumably freaked out and demanded it be cut. This wasn’t The Pope Song — it was a very friendly and cheerful song about Jesus. But he had it cut anyway, and now everyone is featuring it on their blogs.

I have decided that Peter Fincham has to be the most cunning Jesus-hating atheist ever, because it was an absolutely brilliant move guaranteed to get the song promoted all over the place.

Thank you Tim Minchin for another lovely song, and here’s to you, Peter Fincham, you magnificent devious blaspheming bastard.

Why I am an atheist – Rodriguez

My path to atheism was paved with history books.

I was interested in my native Catholicism, so I read Elaine Pagels on the origins of Christianity. Starting from her books, I was led to the similarities between Catholicism and ancient Egyptian beliefs. It could not have been chance that those people, who were not Catholic, believed in the same things as me. It couldn’t be unless those beliefs and mine were the same in some way: they are the legacy of that time and people to me. That was the biggest and most crucial step.

Then, I read up on Santeria. It’s part of my native culture too, but I didn’t consider it an option to believe in. Given the way Santeria was presented to me in my childhood, it was the opposite. Santeria was never a live option, in exactly the same way that dog-headed and falcon-headed gods were not. Yet the parallels to Catholicism were too obvious. I noticed another obvious thing. In some Catholic circles, Santeria is viewed with extreme contempt. I noticed that contempt, and I noticed how much racism was tied up in that contempt. It bothered me.

Santeria is a New World religion and it may be a syncretic religion; it may be the combination of Catholicism and certain Yoruba and other African religious practices. In that view, the saints and orishas represent the same underlying principles. Or maybe, it’s not syncretic at all. On this view, the saints that are associated with the orishas are a dodge and a defense mechanism. That dodge enables an older, persecuted religion to survive in secret in a new environment, even if in a changed form, and even if some believers eventually forget the dodge. Funny about that, how that process is similar to what happened to those Egyptian ideas from so long ago.

Either syncretic or not, Santeria’s history has played out in the last 500 years, and there are clear historical records to be read. Sorry Osiris, Horus and Isis; sorry Chango, Yemaya and Cachita; sorry Santa Barbara, Regla, and Caridad del Cobre, but I just can’t believe in you.

It didn’t take much imagination to extend that same logic to Jesus and Mary and Genesis and Yaweh and all that.

Rodriguez
United States

Predatory and reptilian

Thomas Nast, the 19th century political cartoonist who gave us our standard image of both Santa Claus and Uncle Sam, is going to be enrolled in the New Jersey Hall of Fame. This isn’t really controversial: he was extremely influential. He was not entirely a nice guy, though, being a bit of a nativist and also responsible for promoting the stereotype of the Irish as violent drunks…so I would hope that his exhibit in the Hall of Fame would also highlight his bigotry. That’s not acceptable to Bill Donohue, though — Nast is the subject of his latest fit of apoplexy, because, unfortunately, while having a biased attitude towards the Irish people, he also portrayed Catholicism accurately.

I confess. I laughed.

Ark Park? What Ark Park?

Ken Ham has been planning to build this colossal boondoogle in Kentucky, a life-sized replica of Noah’s Ark. Except they’ve hit one little snag.

Their groundbreaking was pushed back from spring, to summer, to fall, and the most recent media report was to next spring. Meanwhile, their fundraising goal of $24.5 million appears to have ground to a halt at just over $4 million, where it has been for quite a while. They had reached the $3 million mark all the way back in May.

I don’t know what the problem is. $4 million is more than enough to hire one old man with a wooden mallet and a bronze axe for a year.

$4 million is also a lot of moolah for Answers in Genesis to walk away with if their Ark project flops.

(Also on Sb)

Why I am an atheist – Holly

I am an atheist because, if I am to be an honest person, it is the only way I am able to be.

When I was struggling with trying to be Christian in my early 20’s, other Christians who knew I was struggling would tell me to “have faith” and “it will come with time” if I just believe. I was subtly told that I was over-thinking the whole question. (What does it mean to “over-think”?) I tried to be open to God, but I couldn’t stop “over-thinking”. I pleaded with God to reveal himself to me and wondered what was wrong with me that he never did. I wasn’t even asking for much of a sign–I didn’t want a burning bush or a miracle, I just wanted a feeling like so many Christians I knew claimed they had–a feeling of knowing the “truth” and knowing that God was there with me.

I never got such a feeling and I slowly came around to the idea that maybe there was nothing wrong with me. Maybe the reason I wasn’t picking up God’s signal was not because I was a poor receptor but because he wasn’t actually there. The moment I let myself think that, I was on a very quick path to atheism. My “eureka” moment was not “God does not exist” but rather, “I don’t have to believe in God.” It seems obvious to me now, but at the time it was a real revelation (so to speak). I started to see faith for what it is: not the noble, humble position as it is touted, but a lie to oneself–deliberate deceit self-imposed in order to believe in something that’s not true.

I’ve recently become not only an atheist, but an “out” atheist. I talk about it with the religious members of my family. I say it outright if someone asks me if I belong to a church. I updated my facebook “philosophy” to read “atheist” (this was surprisingly difficult for me for whatever reason). I’ve even told a handful of my students when they’ve asked. This newfound zeal came about this year when my husband and I started looking for resources on raising our 3-year-old daughter without religion. We want to raise her to not be afraid–of being different, of being creative, of being smart, of being rational. And so I had to stop and examine how I was living my life and I saw that I had been hiding. I didn’t believe, but I sometimes pretended I did to avoid conflict. I was noncommittal or weakly compromising at best and untruthful at worst, and I don’t want to raise my daughter to think that’s OK.

I became an atheist to be honest with myself and so I had to come out as an atheist to be honest with others.

We teach by example, so I’m working to be an example worth learning from.

Holly
United States

Michael Ellenburg is a quack!

Alaska is one of those states afflicted with licensed naturopaths, which basically means they’ve got a bunch of people with no qualifications and a skull full of stupid who get to call themselves doctors and make sick people worse. The premiere Alaskan quack is Michael Ellenburg, one of those guys who peddles everything from homeopathy to traditional Chinese medicine to ozone therapy to acupuncture — the usual cocktail of New Age sewage. Steeped as I currently am in cancer texts in preparation for the next term, I perked right up when I read about Bryomixol.

Bryomixol is an herbal therapy that targets the patient’s immune system function. In patients who have cancer they need to get their immune system to start working properly. Anyone who has cancer does not have a proper functioning immune system, otherwise they would not have cancer. Chemotherapy and Radiation are directed against the tumor(s), they do nothing to support the immune system. Bryomixol can be used in cancer to treat the patient’s immune system; it is not a targeted cancer treatment. Bryomixol specifically effects Natural Killer cell function. NK cells are involved in seeking out and destroying tumor cells, bacteria, and viruses.

Try listening to any of these quacks on the radio (sadly, turn to any of the more liberal networks in your area, and you’ll find them infested with magic medicine shows), and this is the refrain you hear most frequently: “enhance your immune system naturally”. I don’t even know what that means, and I’m a biologist…but it sounds good, doesn’t it?

Unfortunately for all those cancer patients who are going to hand over their money to Ellenburg, bryomixol is also homeopathic: it’s distilled water, nothing more. Ellenburg is a guy who skims profit off the pain and suffering of others, offering nothing in return but a glass of water.

21 April is a busy day

If you aren’t attending the Northeast Conference on Science and Skepticism on that day, like I am, there’s another big skeptical conference going on on the other side of the country: SkeptiCal will be held in Berkeley. You’re in luck if you’re in New York or Northern California, but the rest of us will have to travel.

Next time, they ought to split the difference and hold both in some exotic place halfway in between, like, say, Morris…it’s the only way we’ll get a heroic Eugenie Scott vs. Steven Novella face-off.

Why I am an atheist – Fester60613

I am an atheist because the gods presented to me in my youth are:

  • All loving – while providing the perfect vehicle of hatred and bigotry for their followers.

  • Omniscient – except when the intervention of a God is desperately needed.

  • Benevolent – while children suffer and die, while women are humiliated and tortured and slain in barbarous fashions simply because they are women.

  • Conflicted – “Heal the sick, clothe the naked, feed the hungry” but also “kill them all – men, women, children, animals and trees.”

  • Afflicted by Munchausen by proxy syndrome – “I’ll kill my son so you will love me more.”

  • Misogynistic

  • Used by the international criminal Pope Benedict XVI to assist in the cover up of an international conspiracy to sexually abuse children.

  • Unworthy of my praise, my devotion, and my worship.

And other reasons too numerous to mention.

Fester60613
United States

The ghouls’ new game

Hitch is barely cold and already the ghouls are coming for the corpse. It’s the strangest approach, too — they’re all sounding like Mormons, trying to retroactively baptize him in their faith.

Case #1: Ross Douthat. But then you knew that Christian hack would do his best to turn an atheist’s death into a moral fable for his faith. He compares his literary gifts to G.K. Chesterton and C.S. Lewis and thereby, by some strange rambling logic, claims him as a kindred spirit, actually cites Hitchens denying that he was going to abandon his lifelong and strongly held principles and convert on his deathbed, only to then concludes that Hitchens wouldn’t have given in to atheistic despair. It’s appalling, sleazy, and contemptible, and exposes Douche-hat as someone completely incapable of comprehending any other perspective than his god-bothering own.

Do go read Charles Pierces’s takedown. If the NY Times had any sense, they’d fire Douthat on the spot (because he’s a fucking dimwitted ghoul), and put Pierce in his place (because he actually has talent and perspicacity).

Case #2: Scott Stephens. Stephens is the religion editor at ABC Online, and he actually makes Douthat look good. Douthat at least is constrained by the Times in his length; Stephens has a kind of spirit-infused theological diarrhea that he pours onto the page. I swear, I blacked out several times trying to read the whole thing — I think he was trying a novel argument for the soul by doing his best to make mine sick to the point of pining for mortality.

His obit is a weird one that simultaneously tries to be generous in its praise while sinking to new depths. One of the running themes seems to be ‘Hitchens got fat’, with comments like “his increasingly corpulent body”, “overindulged jowls”, “bloated, hirsute complexion” (that last one is strange) — aha, I thought, so that’s what Conservapædia looks like dressed up with a clerical collar and a thesaurus.

But then, he tries to “distill the essence” of Hitchens, and concludes that he was, at heart, a Christian. He quotes Hitchens saying that the Pope was one of his three most deeply hated people in the world (the others being bin Laden and Kissinger), and then declares that Hitchens’ anti-totalitarianism was exactly like the Pope’s.

Yet, on the other hand, it was precisely the form of rigorously Christocentric humanism advocated by Pope Benedict and his predecessor, Pope John Paul II, that constituted the most powerful and persuasive critique of the totalitarian regimes of Eastern Europe. Moreover, it was from Christianity itself that Hitchens derived his keen sense of the illegitimacy, the idolatry of totalitarian power.

And then he quotes Hitchens acknowledging the contribution of Christianity.

The greatest contribution of Christianity in my life is the reminder of the complete ephemerality of human power, and indeed human existence – the transience of all states, empires, heroes, grandiose claims, and so forth. That’s always with me, and I daresay I could have got that from Einstein … and from Darwin. But the way I got it and the way it is implanted in me is certainly by Christianity.

That’s from a public conversation he had with his brother. But Stephens doesn’t bother to mention what Hitchens said further down:

If anything could prove what I so much believe, which is that we are not made by God and never were and could not have been, but that many, many gods have been made by men and women and it is precisely the other way around, the basic claim of materialism — if nothing else could persuade me of that obvious truth, the behavior of religion itself would be enough.

Hitchens was always blunt and plain-spoken about his opinion of religion. He would not ever deny that he was a product of a Western and English culture that had religion wrapped around its roots (like a parasitic fungus, I would say), he was also explicit in his denial of the validity of god-belief, and was frank in his accusations of the folly of faith. For a Christian to now try and put the mantle of Christianity on him is repulsive and disrespectful — it’s like witnessing the desecration of a corpse. The corpse may not mind anymore, but it’s still a distasteful spectacle and gives the lie to any pretense of appreciation of the person who once resided in that body.

But then, that’s what ghouls do.

It’s also such peculiar behavior. When popes die, you don’t find atheists lining up to write encomiums in which they claim that he was really an atheist, deep down, and that he lived as a humanist rather than a Catholic. When William Lane Craig dies, no one will speculate that he denied the gods on his deathbed; when Scott Stephens croaks, no one will winnow through his columns, straining occasional words and phrases out of context to suggest that maybe he really was sympathetic to atheism after all. They are who they are, deluded dunces who invoke no sense of envy in us at all.

And maybe that’s the explanation. Hitchens was a man of palpable talent and immense rhetorical skill, and maybe we should recognize it as flattery that these Christians desperately wish to appropriate him.

But there is one thing anyone who read his works could know: Hitchens was an atheist, without qualification.