Athée Canadien
Atheism
Two great videos from the SSA
Aug 21st
I apparently missed a great conference earlier this summer at the Secular Student Alliance (read Katie’s description here). If you have a spare hour and a half, watch both of these videos (if not, make the time).
The first is Debbie Goddard’s talk which focuses on diversity in the freethought movement. It’s a bit abbreviated, so I think her full-length talk might have been a bit more valuable, but it does do a very good job at introducing the challenges as they stand in the movement.
The next video is of Greta Christina who talked about what the atheist movement can learn from the LGBT movement. She has many great points which include the need for more community building (especially offline and off campuses), that our debates about tone are stupid and we need both firebrands and diplomats (something I strongly agree with), that our debates over language are equally stupid (atheist vs. agnostics vs. skeptic vs. humanist etc.), and that we need to be prepared for mainstream (i.e. when atheism is no longer cool). She also talked for a while about how the LGBT movement failed horribly at building a diverse movement and is now paying for being predominantly white men. She emphasized that we have the opportunity to fix this in the atheist movement (because it is a problem), and that we have to keep talking about it.
This talk is exceptional, and I can’t wait for her to come to Vancouver in the fall (details are still being negotiated between the SFU Skeptics and her).
Be sure to subscribe to Greta’s blog too as her writing is consistently awesome.
Atheist Chaplain
Aug 20th
Greg Epstein is trying to create “congregations” of non-believers implying that atheism is another religion that needs congregating.
Isn’t this just feeding into the argument that atheism is simply another “religion”.
He isn’t asking for a “pope” of atheism – just a “gathering”… So why call this a congregation? Atheists don’t want to be seen as another religion, I don’t think. So by calling it a “congregation” and having an “atheist chaplain” there are boundaries being crossed here that only make atheism seem to be taking some moral standpoint on life.
And, by the way, I think his book had already been written – and from what I’ve read so far, it was already written better by a much cooler guy.
What do you get when you mix socialists with Islamic fascists?
Aug 18th
Go visit The Canadian Charger to find out. I would have found the site funny if I didn’t know they were actually serious about what they were writing as if combining two annoying ideologies could create some sort of exciting content.
I was pointed to the site by an article in the National Post that commented on one of the Charger’s articles that criticizes sick boy Christopher Hitchens. The Charger author implies that Hitchens deserves to die from cancer because of all the mean things he’s written. The article is ripe with every bit of all standard gibberish the extreme left can throw out there and isn’t really worth reading except for it’s entertainment value.
But what I found interesting browsing through the site was that is seems to be staffed by a bunch of passionate people who just want to write about issues they care about that go largely unnoticed by mainsteam media. I can certainly relate since I think we are in a similar situation at this site (although our bloggers will rarely ever agree on anything).
Their rhetoric aside, I still like their style and am wondering if something similar can be replicated for Canadian atheists. Can we sustain out own media outlet someday? We are horrible at donating money to existing organizations like CFI who have full and parttime staff devoted to getting our message out there and are forced to operate on an embarrassingly low budget. And yet last year the FAC was able to raise $50k in under two months, mainly from small donations, to put stupid ads on buses across the country. So I know there are enough people out there willing to put out to fund all kinds of amazing things. So how do we find them and what are we, as activists, doing wrong?
A World of Injustice
Aug 18th
Atheists are selfish, it is religious people who give to charity more…. where would the poor and needy be without god?
Well, I’ve heard about them too, they did some studies that show believers are more giving, but I’m willing to bet at least some of that money has been used to build buildings that people only visit once a week… and then there are all those funky hats a former Cardinal wears all the time…
But shooting fish in a barrel is no fun, ok sometimes, but the question is, as an atheist, who at least nominally, believes in equality and such, in the words of Janet Jackson, what have you done for me lately??
I know, there is a recession.. and you have a busy life, but here is the what you can do from a recent TED talk.
And here is the how…
Kiva
Accion
And if you’re a godless capitalist, here is a way to make those poor looters pay, while you help out.
Don’t Be A Dick
Aug 18th
I know, this video is being posted everywhere – but that doesn’t make it less awesome. Have a look:
Phil Plait – Don’t Be A Dick from JREF on Vimeo.
“The tone is decaying…venom is on the rise.”
It’s a good point – people don’t make rational decisions by being screamed at and called a retard.
People PREFER fantasy over reality – it is more comforting. I am a very good example of this. People being very confrontational aren’t the ones that make me question my position. Having a good long meaningful conversation with someone who makes the ideas or atheism/skepticism more palatable and understanding to me are far more effective than someone telling me I’m irrational. I know I’m irrational! Faith isn’t meant to be rational!
I think this talk by Phil Plait is really useful for people involved in the skepticism movement… Everyone should have to listen to it.
Time for secular political parties?
Aug 17th
Tonight, I’m hosting a meeting to discuss the formation of a secular political party in Vancouver. To build some momentum for this and to get my ideas flowing, I have written a few pieces about the intersection of atheism and politics that I will be posting over the next week. The first article discussed categories of political atheism, the second called for atheists to get political, and this article will outline my thoughts on starting an atheist political party.
In Canada at the provincial and federal levels, representatives are chosen in a local plurality system, where the person with the most votes wins. This system tends to entrench local two-party races, and very rarely a three-way race.
Therefore, any new party that hopes to be successful (at those levels) needs a very strong regional presence (like the Reform Party or Bloc Quebecois). Support of 10% of the electors for the country has failed to net the Green Party one single election win thus far.
With winning out of the question at the federal and provincial levels, there is still the opportunity to use a doomed party to bring issues to the stage that have not previously been heard. Most local election forums are willing to invite any and all candidates running, and will give them an equal stage with the front-runners.
This strategy could be very successful at bringing secular causes to the stage for one or two elections, but in the long run would be very costly and provide less exposure as we drifted into the obscurity like the Communist and Marxist-Leninist parties (no offence meant to them, I do have a soft spot for their passionate rhetoric).
The greatest chance for electoral success for a secular, rationalist party would most likely be at the local level. Several Canadian cities, including Vancouver, allow for local political parties to compete, while in other cities, parties often support their favoured candidates without the same recognition (i.e. an acronym on the ballot). Vancouver has the added advantage of electing its councillors at large, meaning that support can be drawn from the entire city, and doesn’t have to be focussed in any one region.
There are many initiatives at the local level for a secular party to pursue: specifically, the tax exemption for churches and promoting science and critical thinking in our schools. Even on the Vancouver Parks Board, a rationalist can stand for freedom of speech and assembly at local parks and community centres, where controversy is often banned.
Obscure parties run at the local level in Vancouver too. The Nude Garden and Work Less Party have for years run unsuccessful mayoral and council candidates.
However, I don’t think we need to aim so low in a city that is over 40% non-religious.
The difficulty here, I believe, is ensuring that a party, and its candidates, are not perceived as single-issue candidates. And with our movement’s diversity of political beliefs, it may be especially difficult to have a party that stands for reason and secularism and candidates who may have entirely different views outside of the party platform.
I think it is possible to run a party on secularism, and the Aussie’s have already beat us to it. I’ll be sure to let you know how the meeting goes though and what comes of it.
Why atheists need to be political
Aug 16th
Tomorrow, I’m hosting a meeting to discuss the formation of a secular political party in Vancouver. To build some momentum for this and to get my ideas flowing, I have written a few pieces about the intersection of atheism and politics that I will be posting over the next week. The first article discussed categories of political atheism, this article will seek to find their common ground and hopefully provide reasons to be active.
Even across the seemingly diverse groups that I mentioned last time, I believe that can find some ground.
Almost all active atheists are true democrats in that they reject totalitarian regimes. Democracy, despite its flaws, is regarded as the best system that we have come up with thus far, and as supporters of human reason, atheists are strong defenders of it.
Similarly, we generally support freedoms that do not infringe upon other beings. You can feel free to talk to yourself five times a day as long as you don’t kill someone who doesn’t.
Finally, we all generally oppose government endorsement of religion. Tax exemptions for churches whose sole mission is to proselytise is seen as an unfair advantage and special treatment for one belief.
Most atheists are also rationalists. They use reason and science to inform their worldview. To that end, atheist politics ought to be informed by rational arguments, and not special appeals to emotion or the supernatural.
When there is enough common ground between a large enough group of people, it is beneficial to form a political group to lobby for those shared goals. In some cases, this takes the form of non-partisan think-tanks that advocate certain systems, and in other cases it can take the shape of a political party that endorses candidates for election, and may try to form government. The direction to take is highly dependent on the arena, and sometimes multiple approaches are the most effective.
Hopefully the challenges to secularism aren’t that obscure that I need to point them out, but at the very least, skim a bit of Marci McDonald’s latest book The Armageddon Factor for some insight.
In the past few weeks we’ve observed that we have a government that distrusts statistics to the point where they want to cripple the census and build prisons for the vast numbers of unreported crimes, since actual crime rates are declining.
If that doesn’t really worry you, perhaps you should recall that our Minister of State for Science is a chiropractor who can’t tell you how old the Earth is or how all the animals got here (or maybe he can).
If we want these discussions to take place, we need to get political. No one is going to stand up and defend secular values for us.
What shape that action takes, lobbying, partisan involvement, or a new party, is still up for debate, but it is definitely time to get vocal.
Is Atheism Enough?
Aug 15th
Brent recently commented on the fact that more and more people are identifying themselves primarily by their non-belief. I do think this is a better situation than when atheists are scared to tell people their worldview. However, I don’t think just not believing in god warrants a person any amount of respect, at least from myself. People who are born into an atheist family and don’t want to or care to delve into the rational underpinning of atheism, I think, deserve far less respect than religious people who question their faith and arrive at their beliefs after extensive intellectual exploration.
Being an atheist also does not automatically make someone a good person. Take China for example. I remember a few years back when Dr. Paul Kurtz spoke very fondly of the high amount of atheism in China, that it is an enlightened country that values scientific values and critical thinking. This is unfortunately far from the truth. Although the communist regime decried religion through propaganda, most Chinese people are incredibly superstitious, petty, selfish, greedy, xenophobic, and all-round nasty. I can’t really blame them – entire generations of Chinese were raised venerating the cult of the communist regime, and when they realized that it is rotten to the core, all they had left to believe in was money. Morality and ethics be damned, as long as they can live long and prosper.
Even the most educated city Chinese are very superstitious. My cousin living in Shanghai, one of the biggest and richest cities in China, to give a personal example, was exorcised at the request of her mother by a Daoist nun because she wasn’t doing well in school. Buddhist temples in China get so much donation by people seeking better fortune and wealth, that there is a saying: if you want a quick way to get rich, shave your head and become a monk for five years. I’m not even going to go into traditional Chinese medicine and other witchcraft-like beliefs that permeate the entire country and replace Western, evidence-based medicine.
China, I think, is the perfect example of why atheism alone really isn’t enough. What matters should be the intellectual path one takes to get to being an atheist, and what happens after. What is important for me above all is whether or not you’re a good person who tries to make the world a better place. This is why atheists need to rise above mere non-belief, and where the ethical philosophies of secular humanism is sorely needed.
On a side note, I will be flying to China in a couple of hours for a 3-week vacation and family visits, and will surely discover many new social problems to complain about after I get back :P
Categories of atheist politics
Aug 14th
On Tuesday, I’m hosting a meeting to discuss the formation of a secular political party in Vancouver. To build some momentum for this and to get my ideas flowing, I have written a few pieces about the intersection of atheism and politics that I will be posting over the next week. This first article is on the most frequent views that atheists tend to hold.
I usually define atheism as a very minimalist philosophy. It is simply the disbelief in any supernatural deities. As such, ideas like political atheism should seem somewhat paradoxical. Believing or not believing in god has very little to do with general social, economic and foreign policy. Of course in the latter case, some use their belief to justify expansionist tactics.
However, if we use the New Atheist definition for atheism – a more skeptical and positive disbeliever, one who is good without god – we can start to identify common political trends.
Anecdotally, I have observed that there are about three rough categories that atheists fall into if you divide them by their political beliefs. Of course there’s some overlap and people who will never fit into a strict box, but nevertheless, there are the social democrats, the libertarians, and the apathetic. Naturally, there will be some contrarians who won’t fit into any of these labels, but we’ll ignore them for now (since it’s usually unwise to provoke a contrarian troll).
Now the apathetic are the easiest to define, but also the least homogenous. They generally do not care a lot about politics and leave those debates for other activists. The apathetic atheists range from complete disinterest to those who care but do not have the motivation.
The social democrats are your standard bleeding-heart liberal secular humanist. They are what the Christian Right are always blathering on about. They generally support an expansive and democratic government, with a strong welfare state. While generally supportive of personal liberties, some will be more hesitant in regards to hate crimes, while others reject any censorship of free speech. I consider myself a social democrat.
The smallest group, by my anecdotal estimation, is the libertarian crowd. By libertarian, I don’t just refer to supporters of personal liberty (freedom of speech, conscience, religion, etc.) but of the Randian objectivists who view government as an oppressive enemy which must be reigned in at all times. A subset of this group believes that personal liberty ought to trump all other considerations and that the only role for the state is to protect one’s rights to life, liberty and property. Others are less fundamental and just want to see smaller government.
Of course, these are just my observations. There is also a lot of overlap between the groups in regards to support of freedoms and democracy.
What do you call your brand of politics?
Bull market, minus the bull.
Aug 13th
I don’t have much to say on this one, except… Awesome job!
Kevin writes regularly for the Ottawa citizen. And apparently gets his share of religious hatemail…. but often you can do more damage to the other side’s position with a good metaphor(or similie), than with the worst insult you can think of.
And speaking of bull,…
Happy Friday 13th!
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