PZ Watch 05.25.11 From the Advocates of Humanist Tolerance and Compassion…

Seizing the low hanging fruit, PZ moves to condemn, basing his self-righteous moral anger on a billboard which read "That was awkward. 'No one knows the day of the hour...'":

I was sent that image by someone who clearly thought it was a joke, but I am not laughing. I'm angry, instead. I don't fucking care what fucking Jesus fucking said. The problem is NOT that some kook in California plucked numbers out of the Bible and conjured up a numerological justification for a date: the idiocy runs much deeper than that.

PZ uses the occasion to vent his venom on religion in general, and then goes on to preach using the common strawman vision of Christianity which indicates no theological comprehension whatsoever.

PZ preaches:

”A few will be spared; their reward is an eternity of servility, but at least they get to know they're better than everyone else. And that's the real lesson here: it's all about elitism and the most extreme threats imaginable to anyone who does not support these self-appointed masters of dogma.”

This has to be the most strained, apoplectic perversion of Christianity possible. Is this an objective analysis or a rant overflowing with hatred? The Atheist counter-attack claim of elitism as a characteristic of the Christian is begging to be compared to the elitist stances of such evangelists as Meyer, he who knows the best morality for all mankind because he is, you know, smart because he rejects non-physical reality. Self-appointed masters of dogma? Pot meet kettle.

No, Christ via the Bible does not teach the superiority of Christians, he teaches the imperfection of all mankind, including Christians. He taught specifically against the religious elites of the day, the Pharisees and Saducees. When Atheists attack, it is wise to check the validity of the strawman they have made for the occasion. Meyer seems to become more simplistically strawman-oriented as time goes on. But rationality claimed need not be rationality demonstrated, especially if one is to keep a herd of simplistic Atheist readers entertained.

”Sure, everyone is laughing at Harold Camping now, except his followers, who are undeterred. But you're missing the real joke. Look at every Abrahamic religion, with their myths of prophets and favored peoples and fate. Look at the crazy conservative church in your town, that preaches homophobia and anti-science and supports Israel because of the Armageddon prophecy. Look at the liberal Christian church down the street from you that has the nice Vacation Bible School and puts on happy plays for the older kids, and also teaches that one day you will stand before a great god and be judged. Look at your family members who blithely believe in death as a mini-apocalypse, in which they will be magically translated into another realm, again to be judged.

“It's the very same rot, the poison of religion that twists minds away from reality and fastens them on hellish bogeymen. They're demented fuckwits, every one, and the big lie rests right on the fundamental beliefs of supernaturalism and deities, not on the ephemera of one crank's bizarre interpretations
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“And to the next person who quotes Matthew 24:36 at me: you're part of the problem, too.”

Homophobia and Anti-science being preached as doctrine? Fear of homosexuals? Science as evil? These blanket accusations are the mark of dogmatic hatred being preached from the altar of Atheism. Homosexuality is now a practice, once universally regarded as deviant, which is being guarded religiously by these evangelical Atheists; its usefulness is as a demonstration of omni-tolerance of the Atheo-Left, a tolerance of everything deviant but not of anything theological. In fact, the Atheo-Left can declare itself the savior-protectors of this class of "victims", a moral highpoint in their self-created moral system. So Homosexuality is valuable to Atheism.

And anti-science is Atheo-dogma-speak for holding the religious cant of evolution in abeyance, not for any antipathy for real science which is not at issue. When a dogmatist such as Meyer spews such falseness and attributes moral meaning to it, it is a sure sign that rationality is not involved in any meaningful fashion in his belief system / worldview.

The “reality” espoused by Meyer has no rational defense, and therefore it cannot be Truth, much less religious Truth as required by the absolutes of Atheism. Why is it that evangelical Atheists should have such painful twists in their shorts? After all, they merely “have no deity belief”, to hear them tell it.

So why is it that whatever they think goes on inside churches makes them so bilious? Is it fear of punishment in a lake of fire? Is it the existence of a moral code that they did not make up themselves? Is it the threat to their own presumed superiority and eliteness? Is it actual non-rational reality and worldviews that irritate them? Or is it their own non-rational “reality” which must be defended?

A non-existent deity cannot punish them: it’s just worms after death according to M.M.O’Hair. So it can’t be punishment which doesn’t even exist that bothers them.

Is it the fear of the actual existence of an objective moral code, one which they did not personally make up? Possibly, but that also couples with their own personal eliteness – the conclusion that they know best, and the rest of humanity is composed of fools (“demented fuckwits” according to Meyer). This type of eliteness is discriminatory classism at its most transparent. It is the potential loss of eliteness, not the problem of morality, which seems to be more precious to the Atheist, and in need of constant defense.

Are they irritated by actual non-rational arguments, or are their own arguments devoid of rational content? Since the arguments made by Meyer and such do not even make logical claims but rather depend on direct claims of mere possession of rationality without even attempting to demonstrate that any claim is logically valid, then no, it is not rational content which is the issue. To the contrary, Meyer depends on Ad Hominens almost entirely when referring to antithetical authors and their texts.

Is it the threat to their own anti-rational worldviews which is the problem? I think that at bottom, this might be key. Losing the claim of “rationality” for their own worldviews would dash their belief systems to dust, not to mention their self-esteem. And along with this loss would be the accompanying loss of all the other perceived perqs of Atheism: loss of the supposed eliteness of their intellects; loss of the validity of their personal morality, and the necessity of either an absolute morality beyond their control or no morality at all, an admission they are loath to make.

The constant bleating of the supposed rationality of the Atheist position in the presence of no evidence to that effect is perhaps the most obvious characteristic of modern Atheism. Yet, there is seemingly no interest in discerning any internal non-coherences in Atheist positions, or in Humanist positions for that matter. The example of Humanist condemnations of non-Humanists on the one hand, and declaring themselves to be tolerant and compassionate on the other hand, is demonstrative of the lack of self-analysis which the Atheo-Humanists ever engage themselves. Self-unawareness of both personal positions and intellectual positons, their content and consequences, seems to define Atheists in general. And when one does finally become self-aware of the content and consequence of personal beliefs, analyzes them and changes them in view of their rational errors, he is excommunicated from the band and declared heretical by virtue of insanity ( a la Antony Flew).

Atheism is a religion in every sense of the word; it preaches dogmatic cant under the cover of such mantras as fighting “anti-science” and “homophobia”. It disciplines its heretics with excommunication and personal defilement. It ignores rational arguments against it, but launches campaigns of unscientific sloganeering in order to make converts to its posed scientific false-front. Atheism comes with no morality attached, but Atheists make moral pronouncements constantly. Their moral condemnations are emitted from their presumption of their eliteness. And their eliteness is dependent upon a presumption of a rational base for their Atheism, a base which does not exist.

Atheism is a rational fail. Accordingly, it is a moral fail.