Can we set aside intellectualizing and debating?
I’m going to disagree with Chris Stedman again. Let me preface my disagreement by saying he’s obviously a good guy, a better one than I am. There that’s out of the way; now let me shred him.
No but seriously. He’s a good guy but being a good guy isn’t enough. One has to learn that people have their own plans and projects and ways of doing things. Chris seems to have a missionary streak that prevents him from understanding that.
the last ten years have seen me change my philosophy in several dramatic ways — from born-again Christian to rejectionist atheist to my current work as a Secular Humanist and interfaith activist —
What’s a rejectionist atheist? It sounds nasty. Is it meant to sound nasty? Yes, I think so, a little. It probably means “an atheist who rejects theism” and is meant to contrast with the kinder, gentler, warmer sort of atheist who is an interfaith activist. And this is where the missionary note creeps in, already – this hint that rejecting atheism is not ok because the right thing to do is “interfaith activism.” Atheists who do interfaith activism are a rare breed, though, so I think Chris is being a little too stringent here.
As the Interfaith and Community Service Fellow for the Humanist Chaplaincy at Harvard, I had the opportunity to collaborate with the Humanist Graduate Community at Harvard to plan and lead a service trip to work at the CRYP last month.
And they did good things there, and that’s nice, but…
But it’s not the only way to make the world a better place, and it’s not something everyone wants to do, and the reasons for that are not just laziness or callousness or worldly ambition. I, for one, am uneasy about the noblesse oblige aspect. I don’t like it; it makes me feel squirmy. That’s just one angle on all this that Chris overlooks. He likes up close and personal stuff; good; but not everyone does, and more to the point, not everyone wants groups of Harvard students moving in.
Just a few days ago, I organized and ran a community service project for the American Humanist Association‘s (AHA) annual conference — the first time the AHA has featured one at its annual conference. After years of attending interfaith conferences and Humanist/atheist conferences but only encountering community service events at the former, I realized that if my community wants to be seen as equally ethical individuals, we will need to make good on our values. That we must actualize our commitments to justice and compassion — for our own sake, if not in respect to how we’re perceived by others.
But community service events aren’t the only way to do that, and maybe they’re not the best way. “Charity” isn’t the best way to deal with social problems. It may be more uplifting for the participants, but that’s a seriously crappy reason for thinking it’s the best way.
This is a call to Humanists and atheists everywhere: Can we set aside intellectualizing and debating, even just for a moment, and start putting our money where other people’s mouths are?
This is a reply from one atheist: Different people have different talents. Division of labor is a good thing. And to be perfectly honest, I don’t really want to be told to stop doing one thing and do another instead.
No. Not until our opponents stop pontificating and dissembling.
I’ve seen the call to quiescence before. I will not prove to theists that atheists are liars in order to try and win their unwinnable approval.
So, as I may have mentioned, no.
Well, here is a clear speaking atheist activist’s point of view from a year ago on Chris Stedman:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82BK5_AtVXs
And of course, the man himself joins her. Whatever you want to say, you have to give respect to his wizard mind control techniques!
And this is where the missionary note creeps in, already – this hint that rejecting atheism is not ok because the right thing to do is “interfaith activism.”
Did you mean “rejection” atheism? Adjective instead of verb? If not, then I’m not sure what you meant here.
I like what Chris is doing in getting into the community and being seen as doing good, not just from a strategic standpoint (so that people can see atheists actively being ethical), but also because it is beneficial to the people he’s helping. Some of it may just make a person feel good about themselves, and if that’s the only benefit, then that needs to be reexamined. But anything that actually helps deserves to be continued. You said that “charity” isn’t the best way to deal with social problems, which makes me wonder what is? What are the alternatives to just throwing money at an issue (and yes, that has obviously failed multiple times in multiple ways)?
I will agree with that, however.
I was listening to August Berkshire being interviewed by Robert Price recently when the subject of interfaith alliances came up in the conversation and August made a quite brilliant point that cut through the huffing and puffing that normally accompanies these discussions.
What he said was that interfaith alliances are fine so long as it is in aid of things that are unambiguously seen as beneficial to both parties and outside of pure charity work there is only one issue where this is the case – namely church state separation.
In other words all interfaith alliances between atheists and faith groups should be done on the basis of strengthening church state separation. I think the Rev Barry Lynns group is involved with this and I have never heard any gnu say anything bad or disparaging about joining with him to further this aim.
I’m going to go out on a limb here, and guess that what we’re really seeing is a personality flaw/quirk (depending on how generous we’re feeling) and not anything like an intellectual or philosophical position. I’m willing to bet that when he was a born-again, he was the type who carried Chick tracts to pass out to his friends at lunch, led a bunch of church groups, and was always being “more Christian” than everyone else. When he identified as a ” rejectionist atheist” he formed a club and started protesting churches and was way more into it than every single one of his peers. Now as a self-identified humanist, it isn’t enough for him to do what he does, he’s got to lord it over everyone else that they aren’t doing it right.
I’m sure if he’s a Star Trek fan, he spends too much time arguing with fellow Trekkers that they don’t love it as much as him, their costumes could be more professional, and their Klingon accents are terrible. :)
@Egbert,
I watched the entire video, but by the end I couldn’t tell if that girl was serious in stating that atheists should not be friends with anyone who believes in God. Perhaps I’m missing some background information here.
Michael De Dora,
Here she is the day before, with a very different perspective:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCJ0WzCOxAk&feature=relmfu
And see how the mind trick works? It’s a matter of identity. If you can identify with someone, then you like them and begin to think their agenda is the same as yours. Chris is an excellent chameleon, it works for him, it gets him where he is.
Maybe there is a touch of nastiness of “born-again Christian to rejectionist atheist” as opposite poles in his spectrum of thought. Presently he is in the Love Train middle, an atheist with christian values. I’ll remain cynical and wait to see what other belief system he’ll move to in the up coming years.
Does one that is good without god need to belong to an interfaith community to show that one is good without god? One should be able to demonstrate that without being part of an interfaith community within society. Chris is beating a drum that is not appealing to me.
It looks like Mr. Stedman is trying to appeal to the least controversial ‘good’ out there and build consensus from there. I’m sure it works fine amongst believers and non-believers who are eager to seem ‘moral’ but it falls flat with everyone else. When you don’t measure your worth by how you stack up against Mother Teresa, being told you should stop talking so you can help feed the hungry isn’tgoing to be very convincing.
“Sorry, brosef, but I’m in the middle of enacting social change, and making little kids everywhere realize, they got nothing to feel ashamed about. Pushing the samemoral system that tries to convince them otherwise isn’t on my list of thingsto do.”
What Jeff said.
This guy is neck deep in his own privelege…
Charity is more about soothing the guilty conscience of the charitable than doing any lasting good. To make the world better for everyone, we should continue to attack the ideas that put one person above another, for example theism, just like Ophelia does and apparently will continue to do (for which I’m glad). If we cease to intellectualize the problem and settle for whatever gives us the warm fuzzies, well, that’s just masturbation.
I think part of the new wave of activist atheism is to build communities external to those of believers. There are lots of secular student organizations cropping up everywhere and lots of courage and helpful work being displayed.
My problem is that a real naturalistic egalitarianism is possible among atheists, but not if they’re going to be immediately corrupted by muddleheaded interfaith movements, or by atheists who think we can co-exist with organizations that are steeped in privilege and inequalities. I think that is why confrontation is essential. Inequalities don’t go away by ignoring the elephant in the room.
This “rejectionist atheist” term drives me up the wall. No one runs around calling William Lane Craig a “rejectionist Christian.” That is to say, we don’t characterize his—or any believer’s—convictions as a “rejection” of atheism. And these religious Kirk Cameron-types who talk about how they were once hard-hearted atheists before being lifted up into the arms of the Lord, no one ever says they are “rejectionist theists.” So why then does this term “rejectionist atheist” exist? The term is itself a small capitulation to religious privilege.
The same reason that the terms “militant atheist” and “fundamentalist atheist” exist: so that accomodationists can position themselves as the reasonable moderates. (As that brilliant xkcd comic illustrates, the important thing is that they’ve found a way to feel superior to both.)
Hey, rejectionist sounds better than eliminationist, which showed up on the thread to the last Ruse post.
That’s interesting what you feel about community service, Ophelia. I have that same feeling. Give me paperwork to do in support of the cause, but I don’t want to be out there with the group; as you said, it makes me feel squirmy. I don’t think this is a good thing. It just is.
I wonder if there isn’t an age component to it. When we’re young, we see ourselves as followers, small players on a greater stage. As we get older, being a follower just doesn’t feel right. And, for me, it’s not just community service; it’s political action as well. When I was young, I took multiple arrests. Now you’d have to guilt trip me to get me to attend a demonstration.
“So why then does this term “rejectionist atheist” exist?”
He wants to differentiate between those who are SO RUDE that they’ll actually be honest about your beliefs and those who are too polite to be contrarian. In this mindset, people reject things not because they’ve looked at them and found them wanting but rather because they’re reject-y sort of people. Similarly, people argue not because they want to put forward (or rebut) certain ideas, but just because they’re nasty argumentative people. Why say no when it feels so good to say yes?
Ophelia,
What rides high above any opinions that I might have on this matter is the fact that you “took to task” a guy for saying the following (the key takeaways of Chris’s “missionary” work):
“Hey atheists – Please, do good things if you can. Doing good things is good. If you try to chip in in more substantial ways, perhaps the religious folks that are always deriding you for being a godless, amoral monster will stop treating you like that and you won’t have as much to bitch about. Us atheists can be just as much about alleviating human/environmental suffering as the most committed faith-person. Thanks, and you all rock.”
His post needed to be written – your response did not. It’s a poor attempt at filling a blog space that provides nothing new in the way of anything.
Thanks Tim! I love you too.
Ha! Word up, Ophelia. ;)
I don’t like the implication that atheists don’t do things. They do, it’s just that they don’t do it under the flag of atheism. They do it for its own sake, not as some kind of PR campaign for atheism. Why doesn’t Chris just point to them and say see atheist do things to, instead of pretending they don’t exist.
I found Stedman’s article refreshing. I came into atheist activism a decade ago (one of the original members of the Campus Freethought Alliance) as a secular humanist. Amongst our group of perky university activists, the intellectual unconvincingness of theism was taken as a given, and we were far more concerned about “eupraxsophy” and promoting positive secular ethical values (we were after all there on Paul Kurtz’s dime) than we were with questions of God’s existence (the answer to which we considered a given). Over the past five years or so, with the rise of New or Gnu or whatever you want to call it atheism in popular culture, the dialogue has been dominated by arguments about epistemology and the negatives of religion, with secular humanism, or other positive secular value systems, mostly disappearing. Obviously, there’s nothing wrong with discussing epistemology or the historical excesses of religion, but this isn’t all there is to discuss. Personally, I find atheism talk boring. God is either a silly concept, or a untestable concept, or an incomprehensible mystical concept (depending on how you define it), and so it is all pretty useless and yawn inducing. That’s me personally, right now (I found atheism/theism VERY interesting when i was 21, and so begrudge no one their passion).
Anyway, I am happy to see a parallel stream of discussion reemerge about what our moral obligations may be as secular individuals. The service commitment Chris lays out is not universal to all atheists (the Randians, for example, can skip this one), but it sure should be more important to people who self-describe as secular humanists. That might not be the commenters on this thread, it might be Ophelia (maybe it is, I have no idea), but it is me, and it is a quite a few of our fellow atheists. I for one quite enjoyed getting reminded that I have let my moral obligations to help my fellow human beings slip because of my preoccupations with science education and Internet debating. I am glad we have Chris’ voice commenting on one aspect of the secular sphere. (As I am glad we have other commenting on other aspects.)
On which note, it is tax time, and we all have charitable donations that can be written off. It is worth taking a second to pause from fighting theism to consider whether we each have a few dollars available that could be sent towards a humanitarian cause.
“Hey jews – Please, do good things if you can. Doing good things is good. If you try to chip in in more substantial ways, perhaps the christians that are always deriding you for being a greedy, body part stealing, rats will stop treating you like that and you won’t have as much to bitch about. Us jews can be just as much about alleviating human/environmental suffering as the most committed christian. Thanks, and you all rock.”
Jews are responsible for the stereotypes spread about them, because they aren’t doing enough to show that they aren’t stealing body parts or money. They should walk aroung with see through bags so we can be sure.
I’m sorry I’m not enough of a relativist to actually believe that debating is on par with activism. Lulz
I thought this disagreement was actually quite civil and reasonable. Some of the comments are not (@Improbable Joe “Personality flaw”? Let’s skip the amateur psychiatry and ad hominem, please?), but that’s to be expected in any internet forum. I thank Ophelia for her level-headedness despite her disagreement over this issue.
@Egbert,
So that girl really does believe atheists shouldn’t be friends with religious believers? I’m not for coddling or pulling punches, but that’s ludicrous.
Wasn’t she being heavily ironic? I thought she was – but I watched only a couple of minutes because I had to go do something else.
I really can’t tell. It’s not that important anyway, I suppose.
I should note, I was basing my assumption on both the first and the second video, in which she seems to be more like the “don’t be friends with religious people” camp she discusses in the first.
Ok I watched the rest. The second video is actually the first – it’s dated the day before. I think that’s what she’s more or less apologizing for in the second.
Not all that important, as you say. There’s a few minutes blown!
Ah well – now to post Leo’s article.
Win.
I’m pretty sure she was being ironic, considering Stedman is sitting next to her. But that’s all part of the charm and influence of religious privilege. It has the very opposite effect of enlightening people.
@Steve – Likening the approbation atheists in the US receive to the historic hatred of the Jews is so profoundly tasteless that it leaves a taste of bile in my mouth. There is a lack of appreciation for scale here that boggles the mind. It reminds me of when one atheist activist read out MLK’s “I Have a Dream” speech, substituting “Atheists” wherever there was a reference to African Americans. It is momentously offensive to seem to equate the current state of discrimination against atheists to the experience of Jewish people, which has involved forced segregation, ghettoization and genocide.
“Can we set aside the intellectuallizing and debating?”
It’s about time.
I’ve heard the riposte –“Look, atheism is just another belief system,see how atheists squabble over ideology,evangelize and have a de facto priesthood” –rather too often from the faithful.
This entire debacle is reminiscent of the Judaean People’s Liberation Front versus the People’s Liberation Front of Judaea.
I was gonna put a disclaimer in my post saying that I wasn’t likening the treatment of atheists to the persecution of the Jews, but then I thought nobody would use that as an excuse to miss the point I was trying to make in my comment.
James,
And I think that dismissing the very real discrimination suffered by atheists in the US (and elsewhere) is monstrously offensive.
@RJW Indeed.
This entire debacle is reminiscent of the Judaean People’s Liberation Front versus the People’s Liberation Front of Judaea
@themann1086 “And I think that dismissing the very real discrimination suffered by atheists in the US (and elsewhere) is monstrously offensive.” Are you suggesting I have I done that?
If so, read my work at my website, watch some of the videos there, take the measure of what I am actually doing to reduce discrimination against atheists in this country, then come back here and suggest I’m “dismissing” it. Nothing I wrote “dismissed” the very real discrimination atheists face in this country. I speak and write about that a lot. But I also have a sense of historical perspective, and Steve’s comment was just idiotic and senseless and very deeply offensive.
Yes. Let’s all stop thinking and follow Mr. Stedman’s view of what a good atheist should be.
@James Croft
Perhaps you should read my comment over and try understand what the point of it was? Seeing as I’ve said that it wasn’t supposed to compare the treatment of jews to that of atheists. Perhaps it was to draw attention to the stupidity of the view that says that stereotypes of groups are largely due to those groups not doing enough to show them to be false.
@Steve Perhaps you should consider how your words could be read before posting every idiotic comparison that comes into your head? I can see clearly the point you were trying to convey, and I don’t disagree with it entirely. However, you chose a fantastically stupid way to convey it.
@James Croft
Hey, I stand by it. The only thing I wish I had done differently was post the disclaimer in the original comment, that way I might not have had to put up with your exaggerated claims of offense, but I doubt it.
Actually the point of the whole post I thought is the belief that charity is a feel-good exercise, and while it alleviates the pain, what’s causing the pain needs to be dealt with as well. And yes, a lot of atheists think that overall theism is part of the problem. I personally agree, and it’s actually getting worse, and not better as theists double down on more literal concepts of theism.
For me the actual “not-helping” question isn’t a matter of tone. It’s if atheist cultural presence is resulting in this doubliing-down effect as a sort of blowback, then yes, it might be “not helping”…but what the hell can we do about that?
I personally adored the comparison to the Jews. Indeed, it was not too long ago when pronouncing one’s disbelief in God would get you tossed in the villans’ charnel pit. Let’s not diminish the suffering of those who have died for their atheism. Next year in Salem!
<Insert rhetorical flourish here>
I left this comment at James Croft site on this post:
http://www.templeofthefuture.net/current-affairs/when-atheists-attack-reasonless-schism
The point was specifically on stereotypes, Jews are stereotyped a certain way, atheists are stereotyped in a certain way. The approach to combatting those stereotypes is not to say “Hey look at me I’m an atheist and I’m doing good, bet you never thought you’d see that”. Just as it would be stupid for a Jew to say, “Hey, look at me I’m a Jew and I’m poor take a look at my bank statement, bet you didn’t expect that.” and I am sure your readers will go to the original post and look at the context of the comment.
It’s quite obvious, really.
What’s the difference between a rejectionist atheist and an interfaith activist?
A paycheck.
And now, in my after-snark comment, I want to point out that the word “rejectionist” is not being understood correctly by my fellow posters.
He’s not rejecting atheism. He’s saying that he was an atheist who REJECTED god. As opposed to an atheist who merely mildly and rationally reaches the most-logical conclusion possible. … which would be that the idea of a god is nucking futs.
Frankly, this kind of language makes me wonder whether or not he’s truly an atheist. Because it’s the kind of language you see a lot among theists. The implication of “rejecting” god is that atheist A actually knows there is a god, but “rejects” him anyway — primarily for selfish or prurient interests.
The most-common statement made during the accusation of “rejecting” god is “you just want to sin.”
Which is the single-dumbest thing I think a theist can say. Translated, it means “you’re claiming to be an atheist even though you know there’s a god so that you can do things which god says are wrong and which will land you in eternal torment.” It is an accusation that the atheist is nothing less than mentally disabled.
I feel like I’m missing a large part of this discussion. Such as the part where atheists don’t already put money, time, and effort into worthy causes. The part that makes this whole discussion necessary.
Well sure. It’s like the various definitions of atheism that phrase it as a “denial” of “God’s existence.” OK, well, you can tell that was not only not written by an atheist, but it was likely written by someone who wants to paint atheists in a negative way. The notion of denialism just doesn’t apply. Since there’s no verifiable reality to deny, that’s a mighty strange way to phrase it, you know?
@48…
Right. Same page of the playbook.
It’s a funny little “No True Atheist” ploy, I think. Extremely common in fundy circles — which makes me enormously suspicious to hear it flowing from the fingers of an avowed … what was it? … oh yeah … interfaith activist.
I think the intellectual critique does more good than building groups either across lines or within our own circle. To some extent this might be a matter of temperament, and I like the idea of everyone doing what they’re good at or find fulfilling. Thing is, atheists are often going to be people who remain unaffiliated by choice, because 1) people vary widely in their desire for group reinforcement and 2) atheists as a class don’t see grouping around atheism as necessary the way believers do around their church. Not that it isn’t desirable in a take-it-or-leave it way. It is, but many of the most urgent tasks will be done by organizing around an issue (science education, church/state separation) along with like-minded believers.
So I don’t see much need for interfaith efforts, but perhaps more important it has one rather large disadvantage: they serve the interests of religionists to tame and preemptively censor criticism, and in the process empowers “Vichy” atheists to do the dirty work of attacking the most prominent and threatening voices. For if there is one thing the accomodationists have consistently done, it is to take on those thinkers who have made the biggest difference with atheists and the public at large. There’s no question they attack those who matter, and it’s not a coincidence that these are the people that inspire fear in the hearts of the theist leadership.
Wow, not sure what I think here. Lots of words. Confusion. More confusion. Okay, now I get it.
I think there is a real hunger among a fair number of atheists to be seen as doing good in meaningful ways while under an atheist banner. Consider the Kiva lending team of atheists et al.: it’s the top-ranked team for, well, everything. And if you stop by the Seattle Atheists booth at any of our local street fairs, you’ll soon hear that a major selling point of the organization is its service component; they have food drives, go donate blood together, volunteer en masse, and so on. But any successful service project for any volunteer population has to be, if not appealing, then certainly at least not actively unappealing.
I thought it was odd that Chris first talked about his fun week out at the CRYP and then slid right into scolding atheists for not taking part in his service project at the AHA conference, which he left entirely undescribed. So I went looking, and this is what I found:
For crying out… Now, I have some do-gooder bona fides of my own. I am embarrassingly earnest about my do-gooding. But given the opportunity to participate in this project, especially after a long few conference days, I would produce a sickly smile and demur. It’s not an appealing project for a typical conference-goer. It’s boring and awful. Not even I, soft touch though I may be, am going to go off-site in a strange city to talk to people about light bulbs for N hours and then get stuck at some “celebration” afterwards. He’s extraordinarily lucky to have gotten the 10% participation that he did.
Rocket science this is not. Chris, if you’re out there, here is a tip: people at conferences tend to get exhausted from all the social activity. The last thing in the world an intelligently empathic organizer does is offer to trap them somewhere where they’d likely be forced into more face time through the entire event — especially if they’d have nothing concrete to show for it at the end.
What you want, ideally, is something fun with concrete results and a range of sub-tasks that can appeal to many different kinds of people, including introverts, people who like to work with their hands, and people with physical challenges. For an example off the top of my head, if this conference had been in Seattle, I would have suggested the AHA hook up with something like the Just Garden Project, an organization that builds veggie gardens for low-income residents. There are always lots of different kinds of things that need doing in a community garden, and people would be able to take a break from all the talking and work quietly with their shovel for a while if they wanted to.
I like a good service project once in a while. Picking trash off the beach is my idea of a cool day out. What is not cool is pitching a self-righteous fit at atheists/humanists because most of them did not hop to join up with some pretty ill-considered organizing.
James,
Apologies for not being intimately familiar with your work, but I can only respond to what I see, and your comment was dismissive. Steve’s point was “you don’t fight negative stereotypes of a group by trying to be the good Group Member”. My problem with Chris’ post was similar to The Letter K’s point. Most atheists are already good people, doing their thing. Chris’ post reinforces non-atheists’ preconception of atheists as socially uninvolved and selfish people, uninterested in helping their fellow man.
I also think playing Oppression Olympics is a losing game. Who cares who was treated worse? In the end it’s a difference of degree, not kind (those degrees do matter to the people affected by them, of course, but that’s besides the point).
TheMann:
Damn right! It’s eye-opening to see that term coming up on this thread—and boy howdy, are a lot of B&Wers talking about religious privilege lately. It’s a little frightening, though probably in a good way, how these memes are taking off. …Well, the privilege one seems to be, anyway.
In other news, it appears that Eric is all right. Phew! I was getting a little worried—as, it appears, was his daughter.
Funny, I was about to go the Rieuxphone and say we had an OO issue on ours hands, and lo, someone did beat me to it.
I have for many years contributed a few percent of my income to charity, including the homeless shelter in my town and my alma mater, a state university. I used to nod my head in agreement with a friend who noted how difficult it was to convince people of means to support social needs than the arts. Then came Katrina, and the spectacle of former presidents Clinton and Bush the Father being tasked with raising money to benefit the victims … and I suddenly realized that this was complete and utter bullshit. We have a duty as a society to take care of each other, and the way to do it is not to rely upon the generosity of the public, and particularly its most well-to-do members, because that is hardly likely ever to be adequate.
Most other countries take care of this sort of thing rather more practically by making it a public obligation funded through taxes. Relying on charity to handle basic needs is a confession of failure by a community that has no other choice, and it’s nearly guaranteed to be inadequate.
As an American, I live in an inadequate and grossly unequal country, so I’ve continued to devote most of my charitable contributions to social causes, including a state university which was much better funded by the taxpayers when I was a student, back in the ice ages. In election years I tend to put more dollars into political campaigns, not in the hope that it will make an immediate difference, but in the conviction that a better polity is a more readily achievable goal than a more generous public.
I would dearly prefer a situation in which my voluntary donations could all go to the arts because our basic needs were treated as human rights.
I’m guessing that a rejectionist non-collector of stamps refuses to use stamps at all in any context?
HelloGreat Stuff. To find out more details about ece then visit this website.http://www.evergreencollege.ca/psw.php
Those who are professional deriders of atheists obviously, from their pronouncements, aren’t interested in seeing us in a different light, no matter what we do to please them. If they cared to they could easily find out for themselves that atheists are just as committed to doing good things as are others. We try to do good becaues it’s the right thing to do – it’s like being “moral” – we don’t do it because we need to ingratiate ourselves with some mythical bronze age Urvater who has a lack of moral sense himself…….
I got scolded by a theist… awesome!
@James Croft
I’m interested in reading what part of this you disagree with (seeing as you don’t agree with it entirely):
Steve wrote:
Also, we aren’t all extroverts. An introvert who decides to write a check (to, say, Doctors without Borders) instead of doing hands-on stuff isn’t letting the side down; they are making a realistic assessment of what they have contribute.
My girlfriend volunteers with an organization that records books and other written material for blind and dyslexic people. She says it’s the only volunteer thing she’s ever seen or heard of that consists mostly of extroverts. Everyone basically sits in their own booth and does the work. The only way they’ll be discussing religion is if someone needs a textbook on the subject; even then, the volunteer will read it, and possibly talk to their friends about what they were reading.
Why are we drowning in this swamp of moral obligation all of a sudden? There must be some babies left to kill or old ladies to push under busses. Surely. Get a grip.
Great comment, Cam. Hilarious, for one thing – oh yes, a light bulb project with lots of face time, that’s a big winner.
Mmph. Chris has about six Facebook updates complaining about my daring to disagree with him. The latest one –
Hey, if anyone wants good community service for introverts, try platelet donation. Cancer patients think you’re an actual angel, and you get to look down your nose at whole blood donors. It helps if you’re a smidge Münchausen.
I want to make one tiny observation here. Chris gets paid for his Humanist/interfaith work – he’s a part-time employee of the Harvard chaplaincy. I don’t get paid for what I do – on the contrary, I pay for it. I work as it were pro bono. That’s my Community Work.
I think OB wan Ken Obe. Paid for this – she is not. Use Force – she does.
Thanks for writing about this Ophelia. I have been doing some monetary charity work for the last 15 years, but increasingly feel that my contributions there offer very little in terms of long term change. If I were at the receiving end of charity, and knowing what I know now about the nature of reality, I would prefer intellectual upliftment to short term material upliftment. “Dont give me fish.. Teach me to fish”
Your post reminded me of Steven Pinker.
Accomodationist atheists cozying up to the religious to show them how much they have in common would be a lot easier to stomach if the thing they seem to find most in common wasn’t an irrational hatred of gnus.
They see the atheist community as divided into the goodies (them) and the baddies (the gnus). Well goody Stedman, goody Ruse and goody Mooney can go on collecting twigs for their religious buddies as long as they like and they can go on pushing the rest of us towards the top of the queue for the fire but they would be rather mistaken to assume that the religious now consider them ineligible for the flames. They are still very much on the list.
Oh dear, my lot truly is a thankless one – I’m going to have to say something mean about love and compassion now.
Chris, if you’re reading this: smug is not attractive. Self-regard is not attractive. Polishing one’s own moral pedestal is not attractive. Quite aside from the legitimate objections Ophelia voiced to being scolded for not Doing Enough of The Right Things (wait, stop: she did not tell you that your community service was worthless, so don’t finish that sentence you started), your holier-than-thou egotism is a real turn-off. Funny that, since you believe you’re a very nice person. Well, you’re not acting like one. You sound like a condescending churchy guy bragging about how good he is for bringing the homeless Wonderbread and Star Kist. You don’t sound genuine, you sound hungry for accolades.
I get so annoyed when the Oh-Be-Nice crowd cops that attitude. It’s like the Mooney thing where you sharply criticize people, imply that they’re disgruntled assholes who just want to stir shit up, and then defend yourself by shrugging innocently at the audience and saying Oh, gee. Who ever would have thought that saying people should be nice would have been controversial? …As if that’s all he said, and as if that’s what people had a problem with.
And they call us reductionist.
Ah well there are a couple of things I won’t have to say now.
:- )
I’m afraid it’s true. Don’t go off all furious again, James – give it some thought, instead. I’m afraid it is true. It really is tricky, not to say impossible, to make a public point of one’s Charitable Work without seeming to be preening oneself on one’s superior Love and Compassion.
And the thing is…people don’t even want Love and Compassion. Think about it. Suppose some stranger knocked on your door and when you opened it said “I’m here to give you love and compassion.” Would you feel pleased?
I doubt it. (Feel free to correct me.) I know I wouldn’t – I would feel very affronted.
It’s a one-up thing. It implies need and brokenness in the recipient. It’s unequal, it’s hierarchical, it’s patronizing (as literally as it gets). Do useful things by all means, but just do them, don’t parade your Love and Compassion.
@Astrokid I liked your writeup, but it’s less about teaching them to fish as it is about making sure that they have a clean, accessible river to fish in.
It reminds me of the joke/saying. Sitting by a river, a child starts floating downstream, struggling for breath. Someone jumps in and saves them. then another child comes floating down. Someone else jumps in as well. Yet another child comes floating down. One person gets up and starts to run upriver. “Hey! Says someone in the water. Arn’t you going to help these kids?” “Yeah, says the runner. I’m going to stop the jerkwad who’s throwing them in the river”.
BTW, it’s fair to say that my above “parable” really is the core basis behind my personal moral structure.
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And a wonderful service it is, to which everyone agrees.