Posted by Mike O on: 05.17.2007 /
On Monday, Siamang posted Note to Evangelists: Learn our Stories first (Or: How NOT to Witness to Atheists). Great post!
On Tuesday, Jerry Fallwell died.
While all this was happening, on Wednesday, my wife forwarded me an article titled Christians and atheists start a calmer dialogue on Yahoo! News (It speaks positively of Off the map, Jim, Matt and Hemant).
Also, this month Outreach Magazine has a “Mystery Visitor” church survey, much like what we’re doing on churchrater. They’ve also got articles this month titled “Church Cancelled, Service begins” and “Breaking out of the Christian bubble.”
While I still can’t bring myself to revel in the death of Jerry Falwell (and I hope I never do), could it be that Rachel was right when she said, I see this as one more welcome sign that we are looking at the beginning of the end of the Religious Right? I do see the tide turning.
With the growing acceptance of books like “Jim and Casper go to Church” and “I Sold my Soul on eBay” (and others), and the increase in “otherliness”-type articles in major Christian rags, there seems to be a growing willingness in Christendom to re-evaluate what we’re doing to see where we miss the mark Jesus set for us. There is a shift happening in the Christian church.
Oh, it will take a long, long time for it to really take hold and become mainstream. But it’s happening more and more.
Leave a Reply
Comment by: Ir (Helen)
1 05/17/07 6:52 AM | Comment Link |Mike, I’m encouraged by these signs too.
BTW Jim is on the radio twice tomorrow - once with Hemant and once with Casper. Both programs are live streamed over the Internet. I posted details on CatE
Comment by: Siamang
2 05/17/07 9:49 AM | Comment Link |I heard David Kuo speak on All things Considered yesterday.
He said a fascinating thing.
Please read the whole thing, but that beginning grabbed me. I found it easy to imagine that yes, Falwell and his ilk DO make it hard for Christians to come out of the closet in certain circles.
Anyway, I saw a lot of common ground with Christians in that moment.
Comment by: Mike O
3 05/17/07 10:21 AM | Comment Link |This is a serious question, I’m not trying to start anything. But do atheists do the same distancing when it comes to people like Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris? It seems that they are to atheism what Jerry Falwell was to Christianity, yet their voices don’t seem to be shunned by the atheistic community as “extreme.”
Are Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris the “Jerry Falwell” of atheism?
Comment by: Ir (Helen)
4 05/17/07 11:29 AM | Comment Link |Siamang when you saw the common ground, is there a particular atheist who makes it hard for you to come out in some circles? Or were you simply finding common ground in the fact that it’s hard to come out wherever people have a very negative stereotype of what you’re about to come out as?
Comment by: Siamang
5 05/17/07 11:59 AM | Comment Link |I think Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris have never advocated infinite torture for finite sin.
They’ve never damned anyone to hell, as far as I know. They’ve never taken millions and millions of dollars from little old ladies for their private jets and said that was God’s work.
They’ve never said gays deserved AIDS. In fact, they’ve never said anyone deserves anything nasty, disease, death, torture, damnation etc just for holding a philosophical view differing from theirs.
They’ve never said that the antichrist is alive and a Jew.
They’ve never said that black people do better among their “own kind”.
If you want a “Jerry Falwell” of atheism, you’ll have to go way past academics like Dawkins and Harris.
Sadly, I think eventually there will be a public atheist to match Falwell in his invective and forceful bile. I just can’t think of one at this moment. The RRS members, in all their invective, don’t go nearly as far as Falwell did.
Falwell pushed the boundries of “acceptable” discourse way, way out. Remember, he gave the invocation for Reagan’s nomination. This wasn’t a “fringe” “outsider” “shunned wacko” like Phelps. He was the ultimate insider. He makes Imus look milquetoast in comparison.
Harris and Dawkins have moved the tone of atheist discourse in the harsher direction, to be sure. They took it from “completely silent except for a couple of dudes on the internet” to “provocative and a little peevish”.
Dawkins has said quite plainly that he thinks it’s the subject matter that makes people think he’s more strident than he is.
He says that if he used the exact same language to talk about politics or sports or economics that nobody would bat an eye… in fact, he’d be one of the more polite voices comparitively in those fields.
But we’ve got such a taboo in society that we don’t criticize religion that saying so much as “boo” is taken upon as being strident hateful shrieking.
I hope, I really, really hope we never ever get to see anyone of Falwell’s stripe again, Christian, atheist or any other belief system.
Comment by: Siamang
6 05/17/07 12:02 PM | Comment Link |Helen,
I meant that people like Falwell have so poisoned the well that you’d say “why come out at all?”
Why should I set myself up to go out into the world honest with other people about my beliefs when the discourse has become so incredibly nasty.
I didn’t know that Christians felt that way too until I heard David Kuo say it.
Comment by: Karen
7 05/17/07 12:19 PM | Comment Link |Not even close. Dawkins and Harris are academics who hold no official leadership roles in the atheist community (though Dawkins has established a foundation recently). They haven’t founded political movements, universities or lobbying groups.
Aside from the raw power of their words, which engage many people in debate for and against them, they have absolutely no insitutionalized power over anyone.
Contrast that with what Kuo says about Falwell:
Falwell had enormous power. He had the ear of presidents and would-be presidents. I’d be surprised if even the most liberal of the current candidates has even heard anything substantial about Dawkins or Harris, by contrast.
Comment by: Karen
8 05/17/07 12:24 PM | Comment Link |Sorry, I meant to add this:
Many atheists DO repudiate the style of Dawkins, Harris, et al. While they may agree with what they say, they dislike the way they say it.
I’ve found that opinions range far and wide on them in the atheist communities I’m familiar with. Some applaud them, some deplore them. In atheist circles there tends not to be blanket approval for anyone. Atheists tend to be iconoclasts more often than not.
Siamang- thanks for the link. Excellent!
Comment by: Ir (Helen)
9 05/17/07 12:24 PM | Comment Link |Siamang, thanks for explaining.
I think Dawkins has blamed 9/11 on all religious people by lumping them together.
“To fill a world with religion, or religions of the Abrahamic kind, is like littering the streets with loaded guns. Do not be surprised if they are used.”
Religion’s Misguided Missiles
I don’t think that’s fair but it doesn’t upset me as much as the self-righteousness inherent in the position “God likes me and I’m going to heaven - but God is mad at you for your evil deeds and he’s showing it by bringing calamity on America”.
Comment by: Siamang
10 05/17/07 1:04 PM | Comment Link |I think he blames 9/11 partly on the human artifact called religion, that’s different than blaming it on religious people.
Dawkins didn’t say in your quote:
“To fill a world with religious people, or followers of the Abrahamic faiths, is like filling the streets with viscious lions. Do not be surprised if they attack.”
This goes right to what PZ myers said yesterday on Pharyngula:
Shorter PZ:
What we say: religion is X.
What they hear: you are X.
Maybe it’s because these people spend so much time telling other people they’re bad and sinful and whatever that they just hear a negative adjective and assume it was a personal attack.
I mean, how many times here has an atheist remarked that someone was making an “argument from ignorance” and the christian got all in a huff saying “You’re calling me ignorant!”?
No, dude, I’m attacking the structure of your argument!
Comment by: Siamang
11 05/17/07 1:28 PM | Comment Link |By the way, this isn’t to dismiss people who don’t like Dawkins and Harris. I don’t mean in any way to not hear you.
You don’t like them, or their tone or their style, I want to say that I hear you on that one, and I don’t dismiss that.
Comment by: Mike O
12 05/17/07 1:43 PM | Comment Link |I was one that got bent about the “argument from ignorance” phrase, but only because I’d never heard it before and when you tell a person they are arguing from ignorance, it’s easy to see why I misunderstood. But I did misunderstand at the time.
Face it, when Dawkins speaks he uses both barrels. He’s not interested in narrowing the gap between us.
And please don’t misunderstand … I am not defending Falwell. I was just asking if atheists distance themselves from your more antagonistic spokespersons. I mean, don’t you ever say, “Geez, I wish he wouldn’t say/do that … it makes us look bad.”
Comment by: Siamang
13 05/17/07 1:44 PM | Comment Link |I think the entire “Friendly Atheist” mindset is exactly that.
Comment by: Ir (Helen)
14 05/17/07 3:03 PM | Comment Link |Siamang, I take your point that saying religion is stupid is different from saying religious people are stupid.
I’m fairly sure Dawkins has implied that liberal Christians are thoughtless, by saying if they thought about their position they’d abandon it and become atheists.
But, yes, I see the difference between criticizing a belief and the people who hold it.
Comment by: Siamang
15 05/17/07 6:03 PM | Comment Link |Again, I don’t want to discount anyone who says they dislike Dawkins’ approach or tone. I just think the phenomenon of saying one thing but a different thing being heard is a relevant warning, even to politer atheists like me.
Comment by: Julie Marie
16 05/17/07 8:13 PM | Comment Link |I think change can happen much faster now than previously, because of the internet. I found OTM blogs via the internet - and that was way before all the recent exposure with Hemants and Jim and Caspers book. Sites like this - where you can have your beliefs and assumptions questioned without feeling like you’ve been laid bare facilitate evaluation. Where-ever people wind up after examining their intellectual/spiritual frameworks, its better than where they were before they started. Looking back, I realize it was inevitable that I would leave conservative evangelistic faith. I think the support - from both sides - of people on the OTM blogs helped me transition with a minimum of hand-wringing. So many helpful suggestions of books to read from both sides, and so much dialog…Mike, I’d guess the tide will turn pretty quickly now that its rising. I think its an exciing time to be a christ follower.
Comment by: Stephan
17 05/18/07 6:13 AM | Comment Link |Siamang, if I were to say, “Atheism is stupid,” would you not take that as a personal insult?
To say that a belief system is lacking intellectually is really the same as saying those who adhere to it are intellectually lacking, despite what some atheists would like to believe. They would like to insult people without being thought of as insulting.
And if you were to take the things that strident atheists say about believers and substitute a minority group (race, gender, etc.), they would be thought of as racist, sexist and bigoted. The fact that they are saying it about a majority group rather than a minority somehow makes it socially acceptable.
Comment by: Ir (Helen)
18 05/18/07 7:11 AM | Comment Link |Statements like ‘Atheism is stupid’ or ‘Christianity is stupid’ are inflammatory and unhelpfully vague.
People who say things like that probably are angry or don’t care about the distinction between a person and their belief/nonbelief.
But some atheists are careful to talk about the belief not the people and to avoid unnecessarily inflammatory language.
Comment by: Siamang
19 05/18/07 10:42 AM | Comment Link |Yes, but Stephan, it’s not just “Christianity is stupid” that you can’t say. I’m not likely to ever say such a thing because I do know that it’s just going to make me enemies.
But you know… there are ANY NUMBER of things that fall under what some christians would call their deeply-held beliefs… are they all protected?
Some stupid idea is going to wind up to be held by SOMEONE. Can we not call those beliefs like we see them?
Can I say it’s a stupid idea that dinosaurs and humans lived side-by-side like the Flintstones?
Can I say it’s a stupid idea that Jews are going to hell for not accepting Jesus? Can I at least call that belief hateful?
Is that the same as saying that christians who believe that are hateful people?
At some point, do we soft-pedal the language until it means nothing?
Should I call people like Falwell who said that Ghandi’s in hell “lovingly, charitably and honestly mistaken (I hope) in promulgating misunderstanding, but not willfully, through his sincerely-held and honestly mistaken beliefs. In my humble opinion, of course”?
Or do I call Falwell a bigot?
I think it’s rather nicer just to say that his remark that Ghandi’s in hell smacks of bigotry.
Why can’t we criticize ideas?
Can’t we call ideas stupid?
If you said “I read an idea that dancing can cause it to rain.” I’d say “That’s a stupid idea.”
If you said “I have a BELIEF that dancing can cause it to rain.”… well now I better watch what I say.
Comment by: Siamang
20 05/18/07 10:45 AM | Comment Link |Ahhh…. from a religion who’s official policy is that I’m gonna burn in hell forever, “atheism is stupid” is probably the nicest attack I’ve ever gotten!
If all the ring-and-run evangelizers on Friendly Atheist were to change their posts to “atheism is stupid”, I’d consider that a major victory for civility!
;-)
Comment by: Stephan
21 05/18/07 11:37 AM | Comment Link |Siamang, of course we can criticize ideas, but we should be careful about how broad a brush we use. In the example you used above, PZMeyers said, “Religion is stupid”. That’s pretty broad, and covers a lot of people with the “stupid” label. Obviously saying religion is stupid is the same as saying religious people are stupid. To think otherwise is to try to have your cake and eat it too.
Your second post was quite an artful dodge. Rather than address the question you use it as a springboard to attack a straw man. I expect better of you.
Comment by: Siamang
22 05/18/07 11:49 AM | Comment Link |I think we’re making two different points here.
My point is that using language like that will get you into trouble, whether you attack the person or not, you’ll be percieved as attacking the person.
My other point is that it has a halo effect, and even when talking about some aspect of religious belief will also be heard as if it’s an attack on the person.
I think your point is that an attack on religion IS an attack on a person, at least as far as inflammatory language like “stupid” is concerned.
But the problem with adjectives is that the same word that attacks an idea is the same word that can be used against a person.
We don’t have different tenses for adjectives applied to people and adjectives applied to ideas in english.
I wish we did. Like say we could call a person stupid, but we could call the flat earth hypothesis a stupidical idea — an idea that is void of intellectuallical heft.
Comment by: Stephan
23 05/18/07 12:08 PM | Comment Link |I see what you mean, but it is still a fine line.
To say the flat earth hypothesis is a “stupidical idea” could still be perceived as meaning that anyone who believes the flat earth hypothesis is stupid. I don’t believe it is possible to attack a belief without attack the person who holds that belief.
That’s why I think the broad brush is to be avoided, and I think you would agree with me on that.
Feel free to question certain specific aspects of my belief, but if you say the whole thing is a load of crap you have made a very clear statement about your opinion of me as a person.
Comment by: Ir (Helen)
24 05/19/07 2:20 PM | Comment Link |Stephan wrote:
I think that’s a good reason not to ‘attack’ beliefs but rather, to civilly disagree with them.
Comment by: Mike O
25 05/20/07 6:31 AM | Comment Link |A Christian friend of mine asked me the other day how to respond to a non-Christian friend. This non-Christian friend of a friend had sent an email that showed a series of pictures, starting with earth and the smaller planets, then the larger planets and the sun, and then larger stars and larger galaxies. The pictures were all strikingly beautiful and did a great job of showing the imenseness of the universe (my friend and would call it “creation”) and ended with the tagline “So, how big are your problems agian?”
My friend wanted to use that email as a way to get them to consider God, and they were wondering what to say.
I thought about it, and I thought about everything I’ve experienced here in the past several months, and here’s what I said.
By definition, people believe what they think is smart and reasonable. And if someone else doesn’t see it that way, there’s at least an element of “they just don’t get it,” or “that’s stupid.”
Wouldn’t it be better to just say, “Here’s what I don’t get … blah blah blah.” and leave it at that? Leave them with the question, not the answer to a question they aren’t even asking - that question being, “Am I an idiot for believing this?”