Ron Ruggieri thinks that atheists are snobs that think they are superior. Odd, considering religious people think they are the only ones gaining salvation and their values are the set values. Of course the religious are inclusive as long as you join. This Catch-22 of religion is exactly why atheists try to provide antidotes as well as support to atheists who are afraid to come out simply because the religious have a hegemony on knowledge, morality, and politics–especially now. As the end of the world types want the world to end to meet their religious fantasies of a rapture and redemption. Most who do come out are glad of it but not because it meets a snobbishness but have finally resolved their dissonance in their new-found integrity.
I don't have any quarrel with atheistic humanism. But I smell the New Atheism in these obnoxious Rhode Island Public Transit Authority bus ads: "Godless? So are we!"
Of course he has an issue with atheistic humanism or he wouldn't be writing the article complaining about bus slogans that say being godless is okay. I guess all the slogans that say be saved through Christ or some such are okay because godless people saying other godless exist, and that's okay, is harmful to maintaining the hegemonic religions of today. It's okay to advertise religion but not irreligion. It's okay to advertise buy this product but not to say don't, which makes vegetarians equally odious as well as those that advertise don't smoke, overeat, or pollute.
The new atheism is characterized by rude, snobby and mean-spirited effrontery.
And all of the slogans that say be saved are not rude and an affront to those who choose not to be religious? At its softest this is like a car dealer saying to buy my car is an affront to the other car dealers. Cosmic salesmen are limited to the right product only. If the religious hadn't been forcing their religion on everyone for millennia there would be no need or desire for push back. There have been a few times when the religious were more in line with the nonreligious in deism, pantheism and some such, but for the last few decades it's become my religion or the highway, and that religion must be aligned with the most isolating, non real, version.
As a socialist, I can only wonder at its political agenda.
As if religion didn't have a political agenda? As if socialism had anything to do with it? As if his version of socialism wasn't theological?
Individuals who feel a need to join exclusive " intellectual " cliques are rarely friends of the oppressed and exploited masses.
Right and the religious are friendly to the exploited masses? And the religious are inclusive to the non religious–as long as you join? As if religions haven't been fighting over their exclusiveness for all known written history? As if religions haven't been a convenient excuse for the most horrible exclusionary practices possible? As if the religious GOP today weren't anti-intellectual because it corrupts their children, at home, in public, in school. Don't thunk too hard, trust your heart.
Do they apply reason and logic to the highly irrational capitalist system? Or am I correct in suspecting that many of these naturally "superior" individuals are devoted to the cult of Ayn Rand cult, the crackpot queen of pro-capitalist atheism?
Most atheists don't think they're superior. Many atheists aren't trying to convert others but just want to be allowed to practice in peace without being told their only hope of salvation is through Christ or some such. Many libertarians have sought atheism simply because they are tired of being told what to believe and are tired of a government that supports religious practice but not secular practice. Indeed many atheists are quite pissed at the leave-social-justice-out-of-it attitude in libertarian atheists because you can't leave morality out of it. Logically or morally, atheism implies many things and is not an isolated position in a jungle of interconnected life. Nor should we forget that the most popular libertarians are the moronic religious conservatives in a political world where we don't even see atheists but maybe uh, two or three.
image source
Jim Newman, www.frontiersofreason.com
