Ask an atheist

[ciphergoth]

In a discussion about religion in wildeabandon's journal, meihua writes: "this seems to have turned into me interrogating you. [...] Is there anything you'd like to challenge me on, instead?"

I think it's only fair enough to open up my own beliefs to the challenges of others, since I'm always keen to respond when theists invite me to give my perspective on some aspect of their beliefs as wildeabandon has in a series of recent posts. So, is there anything you'd like me to respond to?

Rules:

• You don't have to read this thread. This post is an invitation, not a challenge; if you don't like to read me talking about this then feel free to skip this.
• Be honest. Please don't advance arguments you don't personally buy, unless you're also an atheist and you want to discuss how best to counter it.
• If you come to change your mind about the validity of an argument, think about how you can generalise the lesson learned so as not to misassess similar arguments in future.
• Don't just match the politeness of what you reply to, but try to exceed it - see Postel's Law. Otherwise it is very easy to end up with a thread where each contributor thinks they are merely matching the snark level of the other, and yet the thread starts with the very slightest suggestion of rudeness and finishes with "please choke on a bucket of cocks".

Comments

[mskala.livejournal.com]

I have friends who are Catholic and who believe with all possible seriousness that I and all non-Catholics are headed for Hell, for sure, just for not being Catholic. They believe that I and all non-Catholics could be saved from that if we converted, and that that would be a good thing and worth promoting. Nonetheless, I don't hear much about it from them, and I've never heard snideness or insult from them on the subject. I've never had a Catholic call me an idiot to my face for not converting to Catholicism.

I have friends who are Evangelical Protestant and it's the same story. I have at least witnessed some Evangelical Protestants engaging in snideness and insults towards Catholics and others who aren't Evangelical Protestants, but never any of the ones who are my friends, and my friends don't seem to condone that kind of behaviour.

But when it comes to atheism, snideness, insults, and venom seem to be the order of the day. Many people I otherwise like a whole lot, stop behaving in a way I could call admirable when they start talking about their anti-religious beliefs. Calling all non-atheists idiots is routine. Calling me an idiot to my face if I mention that I'm not an atheist, is routine. The standard of what's acceptable discourse is completely different from what I expect from people who have other strong opinions and beliefs. It is also different from the standard of discourse between professional scientists. Religion is, by what looks like common agreement among very many of the atheists I've seen, so vile that there is no reason to have any respect whatsoever for anyone who follows any of it, there is no need to learn anything about religion before rejecting it, and it's perfectly okay and acceptable to be an asshole.

Even atheists who do not engage in those behaviours themselves openly associate with the ones who do and don't seem to feel any need to disclaim or distance themselves from anything. The assholes are treated as valued assets to the cause. I don't think you've ever called me an idiot directly, Paul, but you've certainly posted with approval and no disclaimer links to people who did. My Catholic and Evangelical Protestant friends have never done that, despite having at least as strong disagreement with my eclectic neo-pagan beliefs.

If that's what atheists are like, then I sure wouldn't want to be one. It is fortunate, since I'm employed as a scientist myself, that I know not all scientists are like that - but I'm certainly annoyed and disappointed by those of my colleagues who think that the only true scientists have to be atheists and the only true atheists have to be assholes.

So my question is, and I'm sorry if this is less polite than you were hoping for but I think it's pretty important: why do atheists seem to be such assholes, and especially, why are they different in this respect from adherents of theistic religions? It'd be easy to say - not convincing, but easy to say - that atheists are different from adherents of theistic religions in the way of being right, but how and why would it lead to also being different in the way of often being assholes? It'd also be easy to say that I don't know enough atheists and non-atheists, or enough about how good atheism is and how bad theism is, to judge, but that's unfalsifiable; no matter how many people I meet and how much I know one could always claim that if I met a few more or learned a little more I'd feel differently. Even if it were possible to somehow measure the proportion of theists and atheists and find out how many of each are assholes, and even if it turned out that actually a far larger proportion of theists are assholes about their beliefs, there remains the question of what led me to form the impression of atheists being unique in this way.

(over the comment length limit - continued below)