What Would the World Look Like if Run by New Atheists?
Posted: Sat Jan 14, 2012 1:00 pm
Found an interesting article on Evolution News and Views.
I'll post a couple snippets and if you're interested check out the entire piece on ENV here:
What Would the World Look Like if the New Atheists Won the Day?
On Christmas I had to run into the office briefly and discovered two new atheist books I'd ordered had arrived: Sean Faircloth's Attack of the Theocrats and Penn Jillette's God, No!. Nice Christmas present to myself! I've since read enough to report that they provide quite a contrast: The former suggests that religious people everywhere are trying to create "theocracy" and encourages atheists to hide their anti-religious goals, while the latter unashamedly shows that the real threat to religious freedom comes from new atheists themselves.
The foreword to Fairchild's book was written by, of course, Richard Dawkins. Dawkins take the occasion to argue that the real intent of the Founders was that "the United States was to be kept free of religion's suffocating foot" and to say he hopes to "return America to its secular roots." (p. 13) Fairchild follows Dawkins by claiming he wants to establish a "Secular Decade" as they implement the "Secular Decade strategic plan." (p. 131)
Part of that plan is that atheists should hide the more radical aspects of their agenda, the ones that don't win them any goodwill from the public, and instead focus on "marketing" concerns that get them good PR. Don't believe me? It's right here in his book.
Fairchild thus maintains the pretense of caring deeply about religious liberties for everyone, as he writes, "We must protect the religious liberties guaranteed in the Constitution, including the rights of the so-called Moral Majority and their allies to express their ideas with absolute freedom." (p. 139) But what would really happen if the Secular Decade took place? Would religious persons really have "absolute freedom"? To find out, let's look at what rank and file atheists think. For example, consider Penn Jillette's new book God, No!
Penn Jillette, for those who don't know, is one half of the famous "Penn & Teller" magic team. Jillette lays out in plain terms what a Secular Decade might truly look like. Consider the closing argument from his book:
I'll post a couple snippets and if you're interested check out the entire piece on ENV here:
What Would the World Look Like if the New Atheists Won the Day?
On Christmas I had to run into the office briefly and discovered two new atheist books I'd ordered had arrived: Sean Faircloth's Attack of the Theocrats and Penn Jillette's God, No!. Nice Christmas present to myself! I've since read enough to report that they provide quite a contrast: The former suggests that religious people everywhere are trying to create "theocracy" and encourages atheists to hide their anti-religious goals, while the latter unashamedly shows that the real threat to religious freedom comes from new atheists themselves.
The foreword to Fairchild's book was written by, of course, Richard Dawkins. Dawkins take the occasion to argue that the real intent of the Founders was that "the United States was to be kept free of religion's suffocating foot" and to say he hopes to "return America to its secular roots." (p. 13) Fairchild follows Dawkins by claiming he wants to establish a "Secular Decade" as they implement the "Secular Decade strategic plan." (p. 131)
Part of that plan is that atheists should hide the more radical aspects of their agenda, the ones that don't win them any goodwill from the public, and instead focus on "marketing" concerns that get them good PR. Don't believe me? It's right here in his book.
Fairchild thus maintains the pretense of caring deeply about religious liberties for everyone, as he writes, "We must protect the religious liberties guaranteed in the Constitution, including the rights of the so-called Moral Majority and their allies to express their ideas with absolute freedom." (p. 139) But what would really happen if the Secular Decade took place? Would religious persons really have "absolute freedom"? To find out, let's look at what rank and file atheists think. For example, consider Penn Jillette's new book God, No!
Penn Jillette, for those who don't know, is one half of the famous "Penn & Teller" magic team. Jillette lays out in plain terms what a Secular Decade might truly look like. Consider the closing argument from his book:
Amazingly, in this same paragraph, Jillette says about atheists, "We have love."The respect for faith, the celebration of faith, is dangerous. It's faith itself that's wrong. I deny terrorists the moral right to have faith in a god that will reward them for killing people with airplanes. That means I have to deny Christians the moral right to a faith that Jesus Christ died for their sins. That means I have to deny the warm, fuzzy faith that there's some positive conscious energy guiding the universe. That means I have to get pissed off when Luke Skywalker trusts "the force." ...
F*** faith.
(Penn Jillette, God, No!: Signs You May Already Be an Atheist and Other Magical Tales, p. 229 (Simon & Schuster, 2011).)
