As humans, we do not expect to walk out of our houses and be punched in the face, or at least we don't want that to happen. I GET THAT, but that doesn't mean that people who take opposite positions are incapable of verbally duking it out without taking it personally.

 

Seriously Rook, we've had a president being Bush Sr, say atheists shouldn't be allowed to be citizens? Why should we be polite about such an ignorant statement? Should blacks have always been polite in protesting separate bathrooms or sitting at the back of the bus?

Matt Penfold wrote: "I think this is all that might be said to be new about the "new" atheists. We refuse to accept that religious beliefs should not be criticised in the way we would criticise political beliefs. It is understandable that religious people might be upset by that, but it is not good reason to carry on treating religion with kid gloves."

Benjamin Nelson wrote: "I suggested something like "making norms explicit". This can be a double-edged sword. On the one hand, once we make the norms explicit, there's a moratorium on hostility, at least while we think it through. On the other hand, it doesn't apply to this case. The new atheists have said: "we've thought it through -- we've tried the way of NOMA, and it has led to all these disgusting and avoidable consequences, and we find it unacceptable"."

Ophelia Benson wrote: "The thing about 'new' atheism and the idea that religion should not get extra deference - yes, and that's my view and I've been saying so with tedious regularity for years. ... We think all this extra sensitivity is itself a problem, in all kinds of ways - not least the infantilization effect. We think believers would mostly benefit from toughening up."

Eric McDonald wrote: "But the claim that we have a prima facie duty not to do this is, that is, not to offend the religious sanctities of other people, is, I suggest, a power play on the part of the religious people concerned, a demand for respect foe ideas or symbols for which other people have a right to express not only criticism but even condemnation. "

Cam wrote: "Consider the kiss-in. Shocking behavior, especially at the time, right? Polite people would do no such thing. But of course the point is to demonstrate the opinion that kissing someone of the same sex is fine. The kiss-in says, "Your sensitivity is not okay and we will not accommodate it. Here we are, not accommodating it. So you'd better re-evaluate, because your discomfort is not our problem.""

I would like to suggest that all of these comments point to an underlying position, the position of the so-called 'new atheists', which I think is more accurately summed up by one word: Unapologetic.

The idea is simple. We have done nothing wrong, and so we have nothing to apologize for. (Please see my post promoting the usage of the word 'unapologetic' at http://www.rationalresponders.com/forum/18586 )

Jean Kazez is saying that we've done something wrong. We have supposedly violated an unwritten rule, a 'prima facie duty', to avoid hurting others' sensibilities. At least, she directly states that she fears/believes that PZ has transgressed this duty without adequate consideration. However, she states that it is merely a prima facie duty, and so could easily be overcome by having a better reason to break the rule. The implication is that we do not, in fact, have these better reasons. Why else bring up this idea of prima facie duties in the first place, if she doesn't think we have not considered them enough to have good reasons to overcome them?

The unapologetic position is this: Yes, we've considered the prima facie duties, and we believe that, all things considered, we are taking the right action. All things considered, it is right to criticize religion, including religious sensitivities themselves, even if we risk hurting people's feelings on this issue. All things considered, we have not done anything wrong, and so we have nothing to apologize for.

I believe this is the core of the unapologetic vs. accommodationist issue. The accommodationists fall on the other side: They think that, all things considered, we are wrong to criticize religion, precisely because we might hurt people's feelings. They see it as counter-productive. If you hurt people's feelings, all sorts of bad things could happen: Those people might not side with you on evolution, they might entrench themselves in a more-fundamentalist position, making it even harder to convince them of anything.

The accommodationists' critiques of the unapologetics are along the lines of: Don't you see all the possible negative consequences of hurting people's feelings? Geez! It's like you don't even consider people's feelings at all. (Hence Jean Kazez' proto-argument that she thinks PZ has not considered the prima facie duties.)

But we *have* considered people's feelings. And we *do* feel that we have sufficient justification to be unapologetic atheists.

We were silent before, and look where that got us. The situation did not improve, and things in many ways got worse. Other prima facie duties gained more relevance and urgency than the duty to avoid hurting feelings.

Been there, done that, as they say. Instead of remaining apologetic about people's overblown religious sensitivities, we now see that it is those sensitivities themselves, and the resulting environment of lack of criticism that they foster, that are a big part of the problem. It is excessive respect for those sensitivities that accounts for the persistence of dangerous religious ideas, which should long ago have been laughed into marginalization.

And so, we have given up on apologies. We have chosen to become unapologetic in our criticism of religion. And we maintain that we have done nothing wrong, and are not doing anything wrong, in being openly critical of religion.

Furthermore, we have the defence of "innocent until proven guilty". If the religionists and the accommodationists insist that we are doing something wrong in our open criticism, then it is up to them to prove it.

There is a reason why prima facie duties are not, and should not become, enforced by law. It is their very triviality, the fact that there are so many good reasons to break them, and that there are so many competing and contradictory duties, that it is not enough to claim someone has broken one duty to show that they are acting in the wrong. Everybody breaks prima facie duties all the time, every day, in simple daily life. There are too many exceptions to these rules to hold them up as a damning indictment of someone's considered actions.

What about all the other prima facie duties? The duty to be honest, to speak truth to power, to confront dangerous ideas, to help people break out of mental prisons, to stand up for freedom of speech?

The one thing I think all of us unapologetic atheists can agree on is that there is currently a taboo, or double-standard, against criticism of religion. And I think we can all get behind a defence of our unapologetic atheism by arguing that there is an overriding prima facie duty to challenge unreasonable and dangerous taboos. That competing duty is enough to throw Jean Kazez' argument out the window; for her argument rests on the idea that there are no other competing duties against the one about hurting peoples' feelings. Her argument is simply that, all other things being equal, it's better not to hurt people's feelings. But all other things are not equal. People's feelings are not the only consideration here. There are many other competing considerations. And in the grand scheme of things, people's feelings are frankly small potatoes compared to the motivations we have for being unapologetic in our criticisms of religion.

Consider that PZ Myers was very reluctant to even go through with the cracker desecration. At first, he just wrote a blog post about the incident and that was that. But then things escalated, and he felt compelled to go a step further.

Consider further that PZ took the time and consideration to include pages from the Quran and pages from the God Delusion. This was not an act of 'glee' in offending people. He tried to make it clear that there was a message attached to his action, and the message was: This taboo of religious sensitivity needs to be challenged and put into context; hurt feelings are no defence for death threats and harassment.

Consider also that over-sensitive people can literally be offended by *anything*. For some religious people, the mere existence of atheists is offensive. Should we all kill ourselves out of deference to their sensitivity? Clearly not.

There is no case to be made for a human right to *not* be offended. Even Kazez did not attempt to make such a case.

And so I repeat: We have done nothing wrong, and we have nothing to apologize for.

I would finally like to suggest that we should collectively promote the term 'unapologetic atheist' to replace 'new atheist'. The latter has become a dumping ground for uninformed recycling of old anti-atheist stereotypes. Please read my post arguing in favour of the word 'unapologetic' here: http://www.rationalresponders.com/forum/18586
| Wonderist | 2009-11-02 - 02:24:16 |

I for one, 100% agree with Rook. He doesn't want atheists simply pissing on crosses or burning down churches, because what will happen? The media will portray atheists as angry teens who piss on crosses and burn down churches.

How could we complian about the media saying atheists piss on crosses or burn down churches when atheists are actually pissing on crosses and burning down churches?

Now I know Brian37 will be the first to speak out and condemn the atheists that do that, however he shouldn't have to condemn it, because it shouldn't happen in the first place.

I also agree that we shouldn't hold back on saying something because it may offend somebody, but we shouldn't say something just because we think it will offend somebody there should be a message in it.