I guess I can’t ignore this article by Greta Christina in Salon any more. Even though it is a cheap parody of religion, it seems to be getting some play around the ‘net. The initial thrust of the article is that the religious folk want the Atheist folk to lie about their Atheism. And to some small degree, and according to the anecdotes given, there could be some truth to that.
But the article goes on from there, with the fantasy that because religion cannot stand on its own, it relies on the consent of the religious victim; “social consent” it is called. For evidence of this the internet is given as a tool for increasing Atheism, and the evidence for that is the MIT study which says that religious unaffiliation is increasing as “mirrored by internet use”. The correlation as causation fallacy is implemented full on by denying any other correlative possibility, such as increased drug use and increased maleducation in government schools, for example.
Regardless, the need to have Atheists lie about their Atheism is attributed to the “Emperor’s New Clothes” syndrome, because no one wants to hear that their false belief is false.
Yet religiosity persists in the midst of a completely pagan media-driven social construction which now dominates TV, movies, advertisements, and print media, not to mention the entire Leftist political accumulation. The rise in Atheism is merely in single digit percentages of the population as a whole, despite the stealth advertising Atheism gets from its media.
If Atheism were robustly based in logic and evidence as claimed, then there would be no need for them to claim only to “have no theist belief”, which is so obviously a lie (they do have a belief: they believe it is false), and which is so obviously a dodge to get them relief from having to actually analyze theist propositions, using their self-vaunted logic and evidence. (It is blatantly obvious that Atheists have no compunction about lying; their underlying complaint is that they don't want to have to show any respect for theists or theism. As with Greta Christina, only contempt is to be proffered).
But Atheism is not robust; it is merely a VOID which is entered either in the childhood span of pre-development of the frontal cortex, or it is an excuse for justification of libertinism or the Nietzschean Will To Power. There is nothing more to Atheism than that.
If there were more to Atheism as a robust, unifying theory of existence, then surely Greta Christina could cough it up. But her thrust, as always, is to create false images to attack as if her straw men were actually representative of reasoned theism. Her religious position, Atheism, and her personal lifestyle depend on these attacks to be considered “true”, to be accepted, and not to be too closely examined. In other words, social consent: exactly what she claims about theism. Projection is a symptom of intellectual and emotional instability.
1 comment:
I read this article and remembered reading the advice of Screwtape (a senior devil) to his nephew (a junior tempter named Wormwood) on the best methods of corrupting a human. It fits atheists in general and attacks like Greta's in particular.
To wit:
"Flippancy is the best of all. In the first place it is very economical. Only a clever human can make a real Joke about virtue, or indeed about anything else; any of them can be trained to talk *as if* virtue were funny.
Among flippant people the Joke is always assumed to have been made. No one actually makes it; but every serious subject is discussed in a manner which implies that they have already found a ridiculous side to it.
If prolonged, the habit of Flippancy builds up around a man the finest armour plating against the Enemy that I know, and it is quite free from the dangers inherent in the other sources of laughter. It is a thousand miles away from joy; it deadens, instead of sharpening, the intellect; and it excites no affection between those who practise it."
That last, in particular, is true. When the strongest tie you share with the man or woman standing next to you is, essentiall, a belief in Nothing that you both secretly know to be false, there can be very little mutual respect. You already know they are a liar - they lie to themselves and everyone else all the time. No wonder the chief emotion of atheists seems to be contempt for others. Even their own kind.
I view atheists who are good as working against an enormous burden. They forget their philosophy and do what they were made to do - that is, good. Who knows how much more good they would be if they became Christians?
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