4 Things the Atheist Movement Has Done Badly (and How to Do Them Better)

[rug]

The atheist community has a lamentable tendency to make the same mistakes over and over.

By Adam Lee / AlterNet
February 6, 2016

Born in the shadow of September 11, the New Atheist movement took up the mission of pushing back against religious dogma and warning the world about the danger of unchecked fundamentalism. In the years since, this community of modern nonbelievers has made some surprising inroads and can claim some major victories to its credit. Atheists have fought tirelessly for a truly secular state, where no religion receives preference in the law and no one is disadvantaged because of their beliefs or lack thereof. Atheists have supported science and stood against dangerously irrational ideologies like climate-change denial. Atheists have called attention to the evils of totalitarian theocratic regimes around the world. Atheists have stood for people's absolute right to leave cruel, oppressive, patriarchal religions, to live and think freely, and to choose for themselves what makes their lives worthwhile and meaningful.

However, no movement is without its flaws, and the atheist community in particular has shown a lamentable tendency to make some of the same mistakes over and over. Too often, we atheists have failed to notice our own blind spots, needlessly chased away potential allies or otherwise blundered in ways that's kept our cause from being as influential as it could be.

Here are four of the biggest mistakes the atheist movement has made, and what we can do better to fix them.

1. Take diversity and inclusion seriously. The atheist movement's roots in mostly white, mostly male, mostly upper-class people show all too clearly in its tendency to parade the same faces over and over, on the boards of influential secular organizations, on the speaker lineups of major atheist conferences and in the news stories that get written about the movement. Too often, an all-white or all-male slate is seen as the unremarkable norm.

http://www.alternet.org/belief/4-things-atheist-movement-has-done-badly-and-how-do-them-better

[ret5hd]

1. Get back to me when religionists do these 4 things any better.

And seeing as how we are lumping atheists into a homogeneous group, we must likewise do so with religionists. No fair bringing up Quakers or some other small group that actually does these things...all or nothing! That's the standard that has been set!

[rug]

2. That's a pretty lame rebuttal.

For some reason, likely deliberate, you don't realize the author, an atheist himself, is critiquing specific aspects, specific organizations, and specific individuals within the modern atheist movement.

Does that criticism offend you?

[ret5hd]

3. It wasn't a rebuttal of any kind...it was a reply to you, the OP,

not the author.

In much the same way that Democrats argue amongst themselves about the virtues of single-payer health care vs ACA, atheists argue amongst themselves about issues.

But when outsiders (Republicans in my example above) then step in and express disdain for the entire group because of those arguments it is IMO legitimate to ask "So what have you got that's better?"

So, in that vein, what have you (as an all-inclusive group and in the context of the OP) done better?

[rug]

5. "outsiders"? You make it sound like a cult.

It's a public board, bub.

The tribalism you espouse is better left in the Bronze Age. It's not a very enlightened position.

And it's still a damn stupid answer. Tu quoque always is.

[ret5hd]

7. So, in other words...

you got nothin'.

[rug]

8. Actually, that is your position.

Not to intrude on your insularity.

[Lordquinton]

9. You are absolutely right here

I'm glad others see it. It doesn't matter who wrote this article, it was by an atheist, for atheists, not for an anti-atheist to bring out and scold us with when the group he is a proud dues paying member of keeps getting busted with their staff raping children. (I'm talking about the RCC, and the child abuse scandals hat are popping up more frequently in the past weeks, see a couple on the front page)

I mean, the big defense last week was Richard Dawkins deleted a tweet.

[rug]

10. Since when is alternet a site for atheists?

It doesn't matter who wrote this article, it was by an atheist, for atheists

You have a peculiar view of what free thought is. Maybe you should have some form of Swiss Guard protecting your portals.

BTW, I'm not anti-atheist at all, which you do not represent. I'm anti anti-theists. As well as other forms of bigotry. Oh, and assholes too. I'm anti-assholes.

[MisterP]

4. isn't AGW denialism RIFE in the New Atheist movement?

[rug]

6. Anthropogenic global warming?

Not that I've heard.

[edhopper]

11. No

the leading atheist and humanist-secularist organizations are quite vocal about the dangers of GCC.

Sounds like some Christian Fundy slander to me.