The Atheismism of Resentment

DJW makes a good observation on the issues about secularism we discussed yesterday:

Many commenters feel compelled to point out that atheists of all sorts are often not afforded the respect and tolerance that Linker wants atheists to extend to theists. This is factually correct, but as a defense of the likes of Hitchens and Dawkins, it's nothing but a tu quoque. Moreover, even if returning the disrespect in kind had some sort of strategic value, which I can't really see, Hitchens and Dawkins attack illiberal and intolerant believers and ecumenical, pluralist believers with the same broad brush.

Right. The level of intolerance that's directed at atheists in the United States is, in my view, disgusting. From Mitt Romney's speech to the polls showing that tens of millions of my fellow citizens wouldn't vote for a non-believer, our culture is full of horrible stuff. But directing equal and opposite illiberal bile at the direction of religious people in a way that draws no distinction between liberal and illiberal strains of religiosity isn't a solution to anything.

Comments

Moreover, even if returning the disrespect in kind had some sort of strategic value, which I can't really see, Hitchens and Dawkins attack illiberal and intolerant believers and ecumenical, pluralist believers with the same broad brush.

This is ridiculous. Belief in the supernatural is illogical, whether there's liberal or illiberal intent behind it. Of course Dawkins paints them with the same brush; sure they're nicer, but they still believe in something there's no evidence whatsoever to support.

Posted by Cain | December 17, 2007 4:52 PM

Re: Belief in the supernatural is illogical

So what? A good deal of what humans do and think is illogical-- and if it weren't nothing remotely like humankind could exist. Where's the logic behind loving someone? Behind works of creativity and art? Behind hope? Do you really want to exorcize every illogical facet of human behavior?
Besides which reality itself is not 100% logical either. Study quantum physics sometime for a humbling revelation just how far mundane human conceptions of logicality will take you. The is not just stranger than we do imagine, but stranger than we can imagine.

Posted by JonF | December 17, 2007 6:13 PM

This is a silly post, Matt.

What makes you think that "new atheists" don't distinguish between liberal and illiberal strains of religiosity? I don't know of any who don't. In fact I clicked the link you supplied, and the Dawkins quote in the first paragraph there is specifically aimed at the literal belief in hell, which is not a feature of many liberal churches.

What makes you think they are supplying equal and opposite illiberal bile at the direction of religious people? Atheists are perfectly willing to call religious believers good people. The reverse is very often not true.

Posted by raymond | December 17, 2007 6:14 PM

This is factually correct, but as a defense of the likes of Hitchens and Dawkins, it's nothing but a tu quoque.

saying a person is foolish for believing in [insert any of the crazy things religions claim] is a hell of a lot different that saying a person is foolish for not believing those things.

if they were equally silly, tu quoque would be a good name. since they're not, it's more like 'calling a spade a spade'

Posted by cleek | December 17, 2007 6:37 PM

Bullcrap.

First of all, split Hitchens off from the rest. We KNOW he's "illiberal" - he's a fucking neocon!

This statement: "But directing equal and opposite illiberal bile at the direction of religious people in a way that draws no distinction between liberal and illiberal strains of religiosity isn't a solution to anything." - is equal ruminant evacuation.

First of all, who says the "new atheists" attitudes are "equal and opposite illiberal bile"? Matt?

Got some quotes - from somebody OTHER than Hitchens - to support that statement?

Better yet, got some STATS on how many statements issued by people (again, other than Hitchens, who is a known asshole) justify that remark?

Second, who says we need to "draw a distinction" between "liberal and illiberal" religion? The POINT of atheism is to attack RELIGION as a concept. There is nothing in atheism in philosophical history to suggest that there is or should be any distinction between fanatics and moderates.

In terms of the POLITICAL expression of religion in society - such as the right wing Christian Zionists - clearly there is a good reason to draw that distinction. We're better off with religious moderates than we are with those bozos.

But that doesn't negate the fact that the presence of religion AT ALL undermines rational philosophy, in the philosophical sphere, in the social sphere, and in the political sphere.

There is absolutely no reason for atheists not to denounce so-called "liberal religion" any less than "fanatical religion."

I don't know why Matt is suddenly on this anti-atheist kick - unless he's trying to boost his Jewish bona fides with somebody off screen. It's hardly a significant issue on the national scene, even with all the discussion over the political candidates religious affiliations. The atheists aren't even being heard in that noise.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | December 17, 2007 9:14 PM

I think "illiberal" was on Matt's Word-of-the-Day calendar today.

Posted by Fargus | December 17, 2007 10:14 PM

There are some good comments above. I've seen many of these anti-atheist comments and it just seems to be the PC thing to write. Many of the comments indicate to me that the writers haven't even read the authors, especially Dennett, who walks on eggshells and is very careful not to insult anyone.

I view these books (other than Hitchens) as attempts to educate the public in a logical, unemotional way about why religious beliefs are irrational and possibly damaging. Can't anyone do just that without being criticized, especially by other secularists?

Posted by Ben | December 17, 2007 11:36 PM

Right. I think it's a grab for the supposed moral high ground. The "New Atheists" aren't intolerant zealots, but it's just so easy to say they are some sort of irreligious fundamentalists. Then they can be neatly stacked with all the other fundamentalists, and the disconcerting task of considering the arguments they make can be ignored. All the while, the pundit can pose in a kindly and tolerant manner and defend the nebulous idea that "liberalism" would be utterly destroyed if any set of deeply held beliefs were really subjected to serious criticism.

Posted by gerontion | December 18, 2007 1:32 AM

Belief in the supernatural is illogical, whether there's liberal or illiberal intent behind it.

Sorry, Spock, but your and my belief that the universe is 13 billion years old, and a fundamentalist's belief that it's 6,000 years old, have exactly the same basis: a trusted authority told us so.

Science as a whole is a rational enterprise (in general, with many exceptions) but that doesn't extend to teh rest of us who merely believe in it.

Posted by lemuel pitkin | December 18, 2007 1:43 AM

I don't know about you, but I don't "believe" the universe is 13 billion years old the same way a fundamentalist "believes" the world is 6,000 years old. I accept that this is the current estimate, but if the number changes tomorrow as a result of some new data, it won't break my heart or particularly surprise me. Not so of the fundamentalist, who makes much of the fact that his belief endures regardless of the evidence. In this regard an extremely important distinction exists between what I think and what my religious contemporary does.

Posted by gerontion | December 18, 2007 1:52 AM

My main problem with the Dawkins line is that it seems to be accompanied by a certain amount of philistinism, if you pardon the biblical reference. He gives lip-service to the aesthetic and social value of religious art and literature, but the overriding sense is that his heart's not in it.

Fans of the Dawkins-Harris approach essentially discount theology and bible scholarship and religious departments as academic squatters with no right to be there: it's all bullshit, and there's no faculty for astrology, so why a theology department? What's the point of grappling with the theological arguments in Paradise Lost, because it's all bullshit, isn't it? I'm not sure what place there is for James's The Varieties of Religious Experience in Dawkins' intellectual framework. And so on.

That's why I'm comfortable with the eighteenth-century model of 'ceremonial Deism' as a kind of social foundation, in spite of its philosophical flaws.

Posted by pseudonymous in nc | December 18, 2007 2:37 AM

There is a place: it's called the Literature Department. And that's the best place to read Paradise Lost and James's The Varieties of Religious Experience anyway. It's true that Milton's theological arguments probably wouldn't be as strenuously considered in a literature setting as they would in a theological one, but they'd still be there-I don't see how Milton's attempt to fuse predestination with free will is less interesting as a literary problem than as a religious one (I'm an atheist, but I can appreciate that struggle for what it is).

Posted by gerontion | December 18, 2007 2:50 AM

Good points, but "tens of millions" is a bit of an understatement. The vast majority of adult Americans say they would not vote for a qualified atheist for President. Tens of millions ? Sure, the same way that there are many tens of millions of people in the world.

Posted by Robert Waldmann | December 18, 2007 10:07 AM

"I don't know about you, but I don't "believe" the universe is 13 billion years old the same way a fundamentalist "believes" the world is 6,000 years old. I accept that this is the current estimate, but if the number changes tomorrow as a result of some new data, it won't break my heart or particularly surprise me."

And what if tomorrow science tells you that folks like Andrew Sullivan are right and black people really are less intelligent than white people?

Mike

Posted by MBunge | December 18, 2007 10:15 AM

"I view these books (other than Hitchens) as attempts to educate the public in a logical, unemotional way about why religious beliefs are irrational and possibly damaging."

And if they are, so what? What's the alternative? Why is there any reason to believe, given the history of human behavior, that if the public is educated to disregard religious beliefs, the result will be a world any better than what we've had?

Mike

Posted by MBunge | December 18, 2007 10:20 AM

And what if tomorrow science tells you that folks like Andrew Sullivan are right and black people really are less intelligent than white people?

If the scientific evidence is convincing, then of course rational people would believe it. The problem as yet is that it is difficult to tease apart the genetic and environmental causes of discrepancies in IQ scores. If you don't believe me, then read the dozens of blog posts and thousands of comments that have appeared in the last few weeks.

Posted by Jim W | December 18, 2007 10:21 AM

Sure, Matt.

Except that Dawkins, in particular, DOES draw just the distinction between liberal and illiberal strains of religiosity. For god's sake, if you and DJW are going to criticize Dawkins' positions, at least have the courtesy to RTFB.

But as is too common, you, like most other critical commentators, continue rely on (usually flawed) second-hand characterizations of the viewpoints expressed.

Posted by Soma | December 18, 2007 10:48 AM

My main problem with the Dawkins line is that it seems to be accompanied by a certain amount of philistinism, if you pardon the biblical reference. He gives lip-service to the aesthetic and social value of religious art and literature, but the overriding sense is that his heart's not in it.

Why in the hell would it be?!? He's an atheist, heh.

I'm guessing one's "heart" can't be in it without an appreciation for the divine or the "numinous" that it's supposed to represent. But I can still think Handel's "Messiah" is one hell of a composition, regardless...

Posted by Soma | December 18, 2007 11:06 AM

"If the scientific evidence is convincing, then of course rational people would believe it."

So what then would prevent a "rational" person from discriminating against black folks on the basis that they are not as smart as white folks?

Mike

Posted by MBunge | December 18, 2007 1:11 PM

I'm not sure what kind of discrimination you mean. I don't see how the relatively small differences in the means of IQ that people talk about would justify discrimination.

But, all this is beside the point. If your goal is to make the world a better place, then on balance religion, or more generally, intentional irrationality might be for the best.

That's not the way a lot of people, myself included, look at this issue. What I'm most interested in is a search for truth. I have no idea if convincing everyone to be "pro-rationality" would make the world a better place. That might be where I differ from Dawkins and the others.

Posted by Jim W | December 18, 2007 1:32 PM

PZ Meyers, nail on the head as usual:

Damon Linker doesn't like the New Atheism because it is "illiberal", and so he writes a screed in the New Republic — one that is poorly thought out and guilty of the crimes he accuses atheists of, while exercising his distaste for the godless, and nothing more.

The problems begin with his opening gambit: he's outraged that Richard Dawkins dares to regard religious indoctrination as a form of child abuse. As has been typical for complaints of this sort, Linker doesn't bother to address the substance of the argument, since that is apparently too difficult for him — is, for instance, telling a child that they will go to hell if they get a blood transfusion a damaging psychological act or is it not? — and instead makes the lazy and fallacious leap to the claim that Richard Dawkins wants Christian parents arrested.

Why Dawkins refuses to take this idea to its logical conclusion--to say that raising a child in a religious tradition, like other forms of child abuse, should be considered a crime punishable by the state--is a mystery, for it follows directly from the character of his atheism.

This is the premise upon which Linker builds his argument that the New Atheists are illiberal: because Richard Dawkins has not called for a fatwah against religious parents, but Linker thinks he should, all New Atheists belong to an intolerant tradition of bad atheists. It's a curious situation when someone can refuse to demand the imprisonment of his opponents and therefore be accused of authoritarian intolerance.

Here's a revelation for Mr Linker: perhaps Dr Dawkins, and others of us New Atheists, are refusing to take affairs to that conclusion because they are practicing members of a tradition that values personal liberty and is reluctant to impose personal beliefs on other individuals. That would break his thesis, however; far easier to imply that the New Atheists are illiberal villains whose actual actions are a charade to hide their ultimate aims. Perhaps I should rebut Mr Linker by claiming that the "logical conclusion" to his contempt for the New Atheists is that he must desire the most illiberal goal of silencing them; that's as reasonable as the inference he's making.

The New Atheists have pointed out a problem. We are members of a liberal democracy, a political institution that requires a well-informed and engaged citizenry to function well. Yet at the same time, we have people who propagate ignorance, who drill false ideas into the heads of their children, who do active, intentional harm to the intellectual development of young people. And further, these people are working hard to compromise the quality of education for all Americans, driven by their religious ideologies to make sure that no challenging ideas are ever discussed in the classroom. This is child abuse. That there are competing liberal values of parental autonomy is not something that we have denied or failed to recognize — but apparently, pointing out a real and genuine problem is "illiberal". I had no idea that denial and ignorance were liberal values.

The "logical conclusion" I draw from the continuing practice of child abuse by religious parents is not to make laws that punish those parents — it's to fight for better education, to refuse to allow sectarian nonsense to be promulgated in our public schools, to encourage more critical thinking by citizens of all ages, and to use my public soapbox and my right to free speech to openly berate the credulous morons who frighten their children with hellfire if they open their eyes to the beautiful reality of our world. I'll also use it to chew out narrow-minded apologists for inanity who invent false dichotomies, such as that the only two possibilities in a liberal democracy are to pretend that damaging conflicts don't exist, or to start shipping dissidents off to the gulag.

Speaking of facile dichotomies, Linker continues the practice in the rest of his diatribe. After smugly informing the New Atheists that they aren't "New" (something we have also complained about; this is an inappropriate term invented by the media, not something these atheists have chosen), he traces everything to two, and only two, philosophical traditions. There are the thoughtful atheists, the liberal atheists, who have their roots in pre-Socratic Greece, and are marked by a recognition that no one can absolutely disprove the existence of gods, and by tentativeness. Then there are the radical, political, ideological atheists who came into flower in the violence of the French Revolution, and in philosophers like Marx and Nietzsche — that is, not liberal. And of course, when there are only two choices, and when you've already made a commitment to ignore any intellectual diversity within either strand, and when you've plainly set up one as the good guys and the other as the bad guys, it's no problem to simply shoehorn anyone you don't like into the ranks of the bad guys and tar them with the sins of your favorite evil fanatic.

And most importantly, by turning it all into an argument about which of these two simplistic caricatures your opponent belongs to, you can avoid the actual arguments at the heart of the problem: is there a god? Does he give private instructions to individuals on how to act? Should we justify and promote claims that are so clearly in contradiction to empirical reality? Can we have a civil society that so readily confuses piety with morality? Let's just ignore these and other substantive questions and accuse atheists of wanting to imprison Christians.

Perhaps, instead of demonizing the New Atheists with his simple-minded and inflexible vision of a history infused with unchangeable philosophical traditions, Mr Linker ought to recognize that the New Atheists are obviously politically diverse, that atheism seems to cross political boundaries, and that the proponents have the ability to blend the ideas of our culture into new combinations. From my perspective, what I see is a number of people who have grown up in a Western liberal tradition and have combined that with an increasing recognition that science has made fundamental dogmas of the religious traditions untenable — we aren't members of a lineage that demands violence and bloodshed and enforcement of intellectual ideas at all, but we are members of an increasingly strong rationalist ideal that refuses to blithely accept patent nonsense because a man in antique robes says so.

If you want to define the heart of the New Atheism, it isn't illiberalism. It's simply that willingness to openly and boldly and with some smug confidence state that the old dogmas are bullshit. There is nothing in that that is antithetical to liberalism. If Linker wanted to make a case that it conflicts with conservatism, he'd have a case.

I have to bring up one more blatant example of the incoherence of Linker's essay, a single paragraph that exemplifies the nonsense he's promoting.

In describing their atheism as illiberal, I do not mean to imply that the new atheists are closet totalitarians. On the contrary, all of them understand themselves to be contributing to the defense of freedom against its most potent enemies, at home and abroad. Yet the fact remains that the atheism of Dawkins, Dennett, Harris, and Hitchens is a brutally intolerant, proselytizing faith, out to rack up conversions. Consider, for example, the sloppiness displayed by all of the authors in discussing their political aims. Do they seek to defend the secular politics favored by the American Constitutional framers? Or do they have the much more radical goal of producing a secular society--a society in which the American people, as a whole and individually, have abandoned religion? The former is a liberal goal, the latter an illiberal one; and it is inexcusable that each book leaves readers guessing which objective its author favors.

That first sentence is painfully disingenuous. His opening was all about implying that the "logical conclusion" of Dawkins' beliefs was criminalization of Christian parents; he describes the New Atheists as "brutally intolerant"; he's going to close his essay by calling the New Atheists a "cause for concern", as if they are a danger to the Republic, and suggests that they promise to be "destructive" in a "war of attrition" between absolutists; his whole frackin' essay is a tirade against those bad atheists following in the tradition of violent revolutionaries like the Hebertists and Marx. Tossing in a tepid disclaimer is not convincing.

Then there's that accusation of sloppiness in discussing politics, followed by the bizarre question about whether Richard Dawkins is going to defend the American Constitution. While I know that Dawkins greatly admires the secular ideals of the Constitution, he does happen to be British, and as far as I know, there are no plans afoot to lobby for major changes in the US Constitution that would allow a foreign national to be appointed Dictator of America. Shouldn't it be obvious that Dawkins cannot and does not have political aims in the US?

And once you've realized that, shouldn't your recognize that just perhaps the others may have goals other than political ones, too? I think the current aims of the New Atheists are social: we need to raise the profile of atheists as legitimate members of our culture, we need to provide rallying points for the many atheists in those liberal Western democracies worldwide, we need to encourage greater skepticism about the bogus claims and invalid pretenses to authority of religious leaders. The New Atheists with science backgrounds are also clearly pushing an agenda of promoting secular education and a deeper pursuit of scientific knowledge. Isn't that enough?

Working towards a secular society that has abandoned religion is most definitely not an illiberal goal if it is to be accomplished by education, persuasion, open discussion, public criticism, and for christ's sake, by publishing books. This is what the New Atheists have done and plan to continue doing, and Linker finds this objectionable. Now that is an illiberal attitude. The actions of the New Atheists have consisted of speaking and writing their minds, and in defense of liberality, Mr Linker is now in the position of condemning the publication of books.

And that is the ultimate irony of his complaint. Not only is he opposing the free dissemination of ideas he dislikes, but it is inexcusable that his essay leaves readers guessing what objective its author favors. I presume that means we're free to emulate him and assign the most reprehensible and illiberal aims to his sloppy arguments.

Posted by ggw | December 18, 2007 5:30 PM

"That's not the way a lot of people, myself included, look at this issue. What I'm most interested in is a search for truth."

So...you spend your time thinking and arguing about a proposition that is UTTERLY unprovable? Just because you decide the search for truth stops at a certain point, why is that perspective superior to someone who believes the search for Truth goes beyond that?

Mike

Posted by MBunge | December 18, 2007 5:47 PM

"If you want to define the heart of the New Atheism, it isn't illiberalism. It's simply that willingness to openly and boldly and with some smug confidence state that the old dogmas are bullshit."

And the new dogmas are NOT bullshit...why?

I do have to admit, there's nothing quite as entertaining as watching atheists portraying themselves as martyrs and preaching their "Word" with all the self-righteousness of a televangelist.

Mike

Posted by MBunge | December 18, 2007 5:53 PM

By all meeans, the new Athjeists should continue with their program of insulting people into agreeing with them.
" You religious people are idiots who should be put in zoos! You shouldn't be even allowed to raise children in your own faith, etc, etc"
I'm sure you will convince folks by the boat full.
Let me know how it turns out...

Posted by stonetools | December 18, 2007 6:12 PM

And it's not like they can even threaten people with eternal damnation if they don't accept atheism as the one true faith.

Mike

Posted by MBunge | December 18, 2007 6:20 PM

Yes, because we all know the way to get a devout individual to consider the possibility that his faith is misguided is to tell him how totally smart and awesome he is for swallowing wholesale the outrageous claims of the borderline insane made thousands of years before he was born.

Posted by gerontion | December 18, 2007 6:22 PM