Atheism as Glamourous

Here is a slightly different take on the appeal of Atheism:

"A new type of character has emerged in popular television.[1] Not only is this character a hardened naturalist, this character is a principled cynic when it comes to human motive, an inveterate pessimist on all matters of progress, and an outright fatalist where man’s destiny is concerned. This character sees through everything and everyone, and is not afraid to issue shrill reports on his or her unseemly findings. It goes without saying that “said character” is usually some kind of investigator, preferably a medical doctor or a detective, and that said character usually dispenses with all social formalities in the name of blunt honesty that often borders on misanthropy. After all, said character cannot be bothered with the usual conventions that govern civil society. Said character’s only allegiance is to the truth, and truth rarely agrees with our sense of decorum.

Have you met this character? He goes by the name of Gregory House in the television series House, M.D. We see him in the current BBC adaptation of Sherlock Holmes, and his latest incarnation is detective Rustin (aptly shortened to Rust) Cohle in HBO’s True Detective.

The following is a brief sampling of detective Rust’s worldview: The world is a “giant gutter in outer space.” Rust says that human consciousness is a tragic misstep in evolution. We became too self-aware. Nature created an aspect of nature separate from itself; we are creatures that should not exist by natural law. Rather, we are things that labor under the illusion of having a self—this accretion of sensory experience and feeling, programed with total assurance that we are each somebody when in fact everybody’s nobody. Hence, argues Rust, “The honorable thing for our species to do is to deny our programming. Stop reproducing. Walk hand-in-hand into extinction, one last midnight, brothers and sisters opting out of a raw deal.”

When Rust’s partner poses the very reasonable question of how he manages to get out of bed in the morning, Rust replies, “I tell myself I bear witness. But the real answer is that it’s obviously my programming, and I lack the constitution for suicide.”

As is often the case with this kind of character, a direct correlation is drawn between Rust’s unflinching outlook and his misery. He is a functional alcoholic throughout most of the show and occasionally abuses drugs in order to subtract sleep from his obsessive work routine. We catch brief glimpses of him working through the details of his case in his spartanly furnished home, the walls decorated with crime-scene photos. He has no friends. His marriage crumbled beneath the weight of a tragedy that took his daughter’s life—a tragedy he describes in positive terms when he is under the influence of his nihilistic worldview. His partner repeatedly describes him as “unstable,” and it is visibly evident that he walks a thin line between genius and madness.

So, what in any of the foregoing could possibly be construed as appealing? As articulate as Rust is on the subject of human nature (or the lack thereof), few will find much inspiration in his conclusion that “everybody’s nobody,” and fewer still will feel compelled to “deny our programming” and waltz headlong into extinction. And yet, I think there is a powerful appeal to Rust’s bleak philosophy, and even a kind of austere beauty to it."

The article goes on to refer to nihilism and death as appealing to Atheists. I think that it is more associated with the appearance of intelligence and intellect. These are volatile, of course, but the lack of a soul in the Atheist universe renders death complete annihilation anyway. So the temporary emergence from sludge is quickly terminated by the return to sludge, and the brief life in between sludges is all the time they have to accomplish their personal differentiation from the "herd".

The idea of a superior intellect is appealing to those who need that association for their own ego. For Atheists, intellect is their only real differentiator so even if they must pretend (and they must) they must have at least that distinction if only in their own minds. And that is the reason that they are irrational: no amount of reasoning or logic can shake them from their pose of intellectual superiority, because that pose is all they have, other than brute force, that is. So when Atheists such as Dawkins and PZ Meyers urge ridicule upon their nemeses, remember that ridicule is a form of brutish force, not of rational processing. It is intellectual weakness and moral vacuum rolled into one ideology, and that ideology is just a void.

Addendum: There also is this: Where Atheism Leads.