Perspective on the Attacks on Atheists from a UU Minister/Zen Master

[YankeyMCC]

James Ford is the founding Teacher for the school of Zen I practice within so I'm biased but I thought you all would find it interesting too.

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/monkeymind/2013/12/the-war-on-atheists.html

"Along with the baseline anti-intellectualism here, there’s something else in the accompanying line, that only the privileged can “afford” unbelief. Meaning what, precisely? That if you’re poor, all you have is a promise of a better afterlife? And shame on those who will take that small cold comfort?"

[JNelson6563]

1. Buck up Johnny!

Sure you may but a lowly slave to the system for the rest of your miserable life but your after-life will be awesome!1!

Something about that doesn't really sit well with me. And this is certainly "wisdom" from the supposedly "enlightened" new testament, so no dismissing it as allegory or whatever from the infamously blood-n-guts old testament for the believer.

Could there be a more control the masses teaching? James Ford is right on the money.

Julie

[Brainstormy]

2. Good article from Ford!

He's referring to Chris Arnaud's recent essay, I think. Here if you want to read it.
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/24/atheism-richard-dawkins-challenge-beliefs-homeless

[skepticscott]

3. It continues to be an interesting phenomenon

that the pseudo-intellectual hacks dredged up by sites like Salon and Huff Post to write about atheism no longer even bother trying to discuss whether the atheist worldview is actually correct or rational, whether there are strong and sensible reasons to believe in the literal existence of the god of the Bible (or any other). They know implicitly that they'll look intellectually foolish and medieval if they try to make those arguments on the side of religion in this day and age. So for the sake of getting as many pages clicks as possible, they resort to various shades of what is basically tone trolling on atheists...they're too extreme, too arrogant, too rude, too "strident" or (in this case) too rich, educated and privileged...while paying lip service to criticism of religion, and often tossing in the obligatory "I'm an atheist, but... (insert various reasons why other atheists are inferior)". They basically skip the necessary intellectual foundation of who's right and who's wrong (and the profound implications of that), hoping that no one will notice the bait and switch.

[NeoGreen]

4. First they ignore you...

Then they laugh at you...
Then they fight you...
Then you win.

Is this a manifestation of the "they fight you" phase?

A sad intellectual attempt to fight back against the New Atheist movement, and the implicate refusal to "sit down and shut up".

[AtheistCrusader]

6. I think they're scared.

The percentages haven't moved that much, but after years of being unable to answer our challenge, they are scared. Boxed in.

The things the church was portrayed as being willing to do in the movie Dogma, in jest, may yet come to pass as serious business real-world attempts to 'bring back' the faithful. I expect in my lifetime, the RCC, as an example, is going to re-invent itself, and its core dogma to 'fit the times'.

Because you can only slap so many coats of paint on the same stinking outhouse and pretend it's relevant in the age of indoor plumbing.

[AtheistCrusader]

5. Exactly.

"I understand, of course, what an upheaval of the universe it will be, when everything in heaven and earth blends in one hymn of praise and everything that lives and has lived cries aloud: ‘Thou art just, O Lord, for Thy ways are revealed.’ When the mother embraces the fiend who threw her child to the dogs, and all three cry aloud with tears, ‘Thou art just, O Lord!’ then, of course, the crown of knowledge will be reached and all will be made clear. But what pulls me up here is that I can't accept that harmony. And while I am on earth, I make haste to take my own measures. You see, Alyosha, perhaps it really may happen that if I live to that moment, or rise again to see it, I, too, perhaps, may cry aloud with the rest, looking at the mother embracing the child's torturer, ‘Thou art just, O Lord!’ but I don't want to cry aloud then. While there is still time, I hasten to protect myself, and so I renounce the higher harmony altogether. It's not worth the tears of that one tortured child who beat itself on the breast with its little fist and prayed in its stinking outhouse, with its unexpiated tears to ‘dear, kind God’! It's not worth it, because those tears are unatoned for. They must be atoned for, or there can be no harmony. But how? How are you going to atone for them? Is it possible? By their being avenged? But what do I care for avenging them? What do I care for a hell for oppressors? What good can hell do, since those children have already been tortured? And what becomes of harmony, if there is hell? I want to forgive. I want to embrace. I don't want more suffering. And if the sufferings of children go to swell the sum of sufferings which was necessary to pay for truth, then I protest that the truth is not worth such a price. I don't want the mother to embrace the oppressor who threw her son to the dogs! She dare not forgive him! Let her forgive him for herself, if she will, let her forgive the torturer for the immeasurable suffering of her mother's heart. But the sufferings of her tortured child she has no right to forgive; she dare not forgive the torturer, even if the child were to forgive him! And if that is so, if they dare not forgive, what becomes of harmony? Is there in the whole world a being who would have the right to forgive and could forgive? I don't want harmony. From love for humanity I don't want it. I would rather be left with the unavenged suffering. I would rather remain with my unavenged suffering and unsatisfied indignation, even if I were wrong. Besides, too high a price is asked for harmony; it's beyond our means to pay so much to enter on it. And so I hasten to give back my entrance ticket, and if I am an honest man I am bound to give it back as soon as possible. And that I am doing. It's not God that I don't accept, Alyosha, only I most respectfully return Him the ticket.”"

[trotsky]

7. That's a damn fine article.

This paragraph is spot on:

The principal argument presented in the essay was essentially that atheists are educated. And the privilege of being educated invalidates their position. It is interesting in that anti-intellectualism is now being dressed up as a class issue. This is aimed at, I assume, or at least justified mainly because of the New Atheists; people particularly reviled for their take no prisoners pointing to what they see as the emperor’s lack of clothing. This takedown isn’t an argument it is a rhetorical device, playing into our deep-seated cultural antipathies. And it ain’t pretty.

Anti-intellectualism infects across party lines. And given that people who don't like atheistic arguments have absolutely no way to intellectually counter them, they are increasingly resorting to the next best weapon: silencing them by labeling them bigots, or "privileged," or whatever nonsense one wants. They (Democrats, at least) wouldn't do this with any other minority group, but that hatred of atheists is still so pervasive, they're perfectly willing to do it.

[awoke_in_2003]

8. "labeling them bigots, or "privileged," "...

I am an atheist in Texas- I do not feel very privileged at all.