Angry Atheists

[poliphilo]

A happy atheist- by which I mean an atheist confident in their unbelief- wouldn't continually be banging on about God the way Dawkins and Hitchens and Pullman do, they'd just let the matter rest and get on with their cheerfully Godless life, wouldn't they?

I read a piece by Dawkins the other day. (Thanks to chiller  for the link. ) It's very ecrasez l'infame- very shrill. Dawkins thinks he's got the Pope on the run and is giving chase with loud cries.

Philip Pullman is just about to publish a book about Jesus with a provocative title. I doubt that it'll be any good. Fictions about Jesus- for or against- never are. I enjoyed the Dark Materials trilogy, but the anti-God stuff was clumsy. As Eliot said of Matthew Arnold, Pullman is dealing with a subject "in (which) reasoning power matters, and it fails him."
 
I've been an atheist. I've dreamed that dream. The one where the bastille is tottering and you put just a little more weight on the crowbar and something gives and the masses come staggering out into the light of pure Reason. It's not going to happen.

Comments

[kutsuwamushi.livejournal.com]

A happy atheist- by which I mean an atheist confident in their unbelief- wouldn't continually be banging on about God the way Dawkins and Hitchens and Pullman do, they'd just let the matter rest and get on with their cheerfully Godless life, wouldn't they?

I don't think that's fair.

I spent a lot of time arguing religion a few years ago, but it wasn't because I was unsure in my unbelief. It was because I enjoyed arguing about the subject. That eventually got boring, but I hadn't made a career out of it; I was just being opinionated online.

This reminds me too much of the old argument that the loudest homophobes are secretly homosexual. While it's an attractive idea, it's probably not true of many of them.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I'm reflecting on my own past. I've argued on both sides of the divide- and when I was shoutiest it was because I was standing on shifting ground.

One gets into arguments, I think, partly in order to convince oneself.

And why would one debate an idea or a stance if one didn't find it attractive in some way? Speaking for myself, I'm not going to waste time arguing against a position I find boring, irrelevant or just plain silly.

[kutsuwamushi.livejournal.com]

But I don't think that religion is boring or irrelevant. I'll give you silly--but then, only sometimes.

Not only am I personally interested in learning about religions, other people's religious beliefs do have an impact on my world. Policy makers in my country cite religion when trying to restrict my rights to reproductive health care, for example. And the fallout after I didn't take part in an unconstitutional school prayer demonstrated quite clearly to me that religion was anything but irrelevant to my classmates or teachers.

when I was shoutiest it was because I was standing on shifting ground.

Would you say the same is true of other things, or is it just atheism? Is the flamingest queen in the room suppressing his heterosexual leanings? Is the man shouting loudest about how white women should stay at home and raise babies so the Muslim immigrants don't outbreed them secret egalitarian?

When I was the shoutiest, it was when I was a teenager, when I was shouty about everything.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Remember, I'm speaking from a British perspective. This is a deeply secular society. I'll grant that it's a lot harder to ignore religion in the States.

I'm talking about belief and unbelief. I think in that context people who shout a lot are trying to drown out opposing voices- some of which may be in their own heads. I don't think a flaming queen is quite the same thing as a person roaring from a soapbox or a pulpit, but a racial bigot probably is. I'm not saying the bigot is a secret egalitarian but that they are probably aware, at some level, that their arguments aren't as compelling as they'd like to think.