If there is one thing that all atheists hate, it is the phrase, “There are no atheists in foxholes!” The problem with it is that it implies that atheists haven’t really thought through what they think and that when it comes right down to it, they will turn to God just like the theists. This goes right along with claims that Darwin had a deathbed conversion. He didn’t. But this is a whole genre of stories Christians tell about noted atheists. Voltaire did not convert. David Hume did not convert. Interestingly, Oscar Wilde did, although not on his deathbed and he wasn’t really an atheist.

Given this, I was very pleased when Nice Atheist Girl tweeted out a photo from Atheists On Air. It is a podcast about… well, guess! On their Facebook page, it says, “The Explicit, Honest, Humorous, Heathen Podcast with Cash & Love.” Here it is, especially for Veterans Day:

Also along the same lines of military people who are not as you normally think of them, Frank Conniff tweeted out the following:

Diversity in the military is a very good thing. Now we just need it in our politicians!

Update (11 November 2013 1:14 pm)

This is via Reed Richardson:

Now I think this article should have a different title: Military Diversity.

CJ Werleman has written an absolutely fabulous column over at Slate, Atheists Can’t Be Republicans. It is primarily an attack on what I call The Atheist Libertarian Connection. He notes, “I am acutely aware that a great number of atheists identify with the libertarian wing of the Republican Party, but this is comical.” He goes on from there to discuss how atheists claim to believe in things that have evidence, but there is no evidence for libertarianism. Unfortunately, I don’t think any atheist libertarians will be swayed by his claim.

Let me take a whack at it. The fundamental problem with libertarianism in this context is that it is a utopian ideology. It would be like believing in a communist utopia, but worse. In a communist utopia, all you need is for human psychology to be different. In the case of libertarianism, you have a system designed to appeal to the worst instincts of humans but expect that they will behave using the best instincts.

For example, libertarians claim that we don’t need environmental regulations because if someone pollutes on your land, you can sue them. But that won’t stop big companies from distorting the legal system to benefit themselves. But in the libertarian utopia, they would never do that! The courts would be perfect anyway. And come to think of it, given that the big companies would not try to distort the legal system, they would never pollute in the first place. So who needs the courts anyway? Libertarianism is perfect as long as it is theoretical, but the moment you try to implement even a small amount of it, it becomes a mess.

For the Ron Paul Libertarians, however, the situation is much worse. For one thing, do these people really think that if Ron Paul became president he would implement libertarian policies? As I learned rather quickly when I was a fellow traveler: vote libertarian and get conservative policy. When President Paul nominated someone to the Supreme Court, he would have to decide if he wanted someone who wanted to deprive women of the right to choose an abortion or someone who wanted to legalize drugs. There’s no doubt that we would end up with just another conservative judge. But this brings up an important point about Ron Paul: he’s as anti-choice as you can get. That isn’t a position that comes out libertarian first principles. It is reverse engineered from his Southern Baptist faith. I suspect that Paul would lose well over half the support he does have (which is small already) if he were pro-choice.

Werleman goes on to note that the Republican Party more generally is even more an anathema to atheist thinking, “The recent Values Voter Summit demonstrated that the likely 2016 GOP frontrunners and its base wish to transform America’s secular state into a tyrannical theocracy—a nirvana absent gays, liberals, immigrants, Muslims and science books.” But there are certain things that the atheist community shares with the Republican party. In general, it is white, male, and middle class or higher. That tends to make it economically conservative, having little understanding of what poor people go through in our society. And most sadly, it tends to make them raving kooks regarding Muslim fundamentalist violence while mostly ignoring both American aggression and Christian fundamentalist violence.

The last part of the article calls for atheists to see that they are really liberal and to decide to become a political force. But there is a major problem, I think, and that is the demographics of the movement. Werleman describes the atheist community very well as “white, middle class, intellectually smug and mostly apolitical.” Whether they know it or not, these are the winners in our society. They are having a good life and the only way they see to improve it is to allow themselves even more affluence and privilege. Hence: libertarianism. Sikivu Hutchinson perfectly explained the problem of the movement, “If mainstream freethought and humanism continue to reflect the narrow cultural interests of white elites who have disposable income to go to conferences then the secular movement is destined to remain marginal and insular.”

I’m actually a bit optimistic. I think that most atheists are pretty reasonable. The problem exists mostly in the “public” atheists—people like Penn Jillette, Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins. And of course, one of the most offensive public intellectuals of the 21st century: Christopher Hitchens. On the left side of this spectrum is Dawkins with his status quo apologetics and on the right side we have Sam Harris and his proto-fascist imperialism. Add to this that all these men know nothing of the religions they claim to despise and you have a recipe for a modestly successful, but irrelevant movement. But there are a lot of good thinkers in the movement and if they can shake off the bullshit of the likes of Penn Jillette, they might create something great.

Reading comprehension is not encouraged at Westboro Baptist Church…

I have long had a desire to be a member of a church. Being an atheist, I know that the kingdom of God must be here on earth if it is to be anywhere. It is only through our connections with others and our work for a better world that we can be whole. And I really would like to be part of an organized group to share in that.

Generally, I imagine something very nebulous in its theology but committed to social justice. So I’m surprised to see what’s happening in the Catholic Church. Pope Francis is making me feel like God (who I know doesn’t exist) really is reaching out to me. Up to now, I’ve been fairly impressed with him, but I thought a lot of what he said was a little too carefully stated. This morning, however, I read the following from the Associated Press:

The man is starting to sound like the Dalai Lama! The dogma is still a problem, of course. (It is with the Dalai Lama too.) The Bible does indeed say a lot of vile things. But it isn’t clear to me that the church is stuck with these things. Despite what Biblical literalists say (and Catholics are not Biblical literalists), there are things in the Bible that no one accepts today. For example, everyone is against slavery, even though the Bible is pretty keen on it. So the Catholic Church really is capable of changing into the kind of institution that I could support.

Now, I’m not expecting this in my lifetime. But if the Catholic Church is to get to the point where the Sermon on the Mount is its basis rather than Leviticus, it must start with a Pope who prioritizes mercy above dogma about whether embryos have souls. And it looks like this is what Francis is doing. I’ve long desired a religion that spoke to the needs of modern man. But maybe that isn’t really so necessary. Maybe all that is necessary is a reinterpretation of the old religions—one that jettisons the old fearful and bigoted dogma and focuses on enlightenment, community, and mercy.

Francis is the first Pope through whom it seems God just might be speaking—to me.

I really like Robert M. Price as a New Testament scholar. He does good work and I’ve learned a lot from him. But by listening to his lectures and reading his blog, it is clear that when it comes to politics, he isn’t a very clear thinker. For example, during one interview, he mentioned that he thought that abortion was almost always morally wrong. By that, I assume he means that abortions could be all right in the case of the life of the mother. I think too highly of him to think that he would be for the pernicious rape exception. But that’s still quite a statement: the right of a woman to her own body is trumped by a brainless three day old fetus.

That stuck out to me because I had heard a comment of his about the comic strip Jesus and Mo. It is kind of like a road picture, but instead of Hope and Crosby, it has Jesus and Mohammad. It is silly and insightful and even, I would say, sort of sweet. Price asked rhetorically why there hadn’t been a fatwa taken out against the writer. Here’s this week’s cartoon; see if you can’t spot a reason why Muslim’s might not find this cartoon so offensive:

I think that there isn’t anything particularly hateful about the cartoon and that it makes fun of a number of religious icons (Moses is sometimes in the strip as well). I think that Muslims probably feel a little insecure when it comes to their faith given the dominance of the United States and our creepy obsession with Christianity. So given that this comic is making fun of religion generally and not their religion in particular, I suspect that don’t see a big problem.

The picture that this paints to me of Price, however, is of a guy with very typical conservative prejudices. And other than his formal work and his pop culture obsessions, I don’t see him as a particularly reflective guy. And that’s all fine. I just hope I don’t start hearing a lot more of his ideology when all I really want to know is more about the Bible from a historical and analytical standpoint.