When Atheists Attack (Each Other)

The squabble between Darwin lobbyists who openly hate religion and those who only quietly disdain it grows ever more personal, bitter and pathetic. On one side, evangelizing New or "Gnu" (ha ha) Atheists like Jerry Coyne and his acolytes at Why Evolution Is True. Dr. Coyne is a biologist who teaches and ostensibly researches at the University of Chicago but has a heck of a lot of free time on his hands for blogging and posting pictures of cute cats.

On the other side, so-called accommodationists like the crowd at the National Center for Science Education, who attack the New Atheists for the political offense of being rude to religious believers and supposedly messing up the alliance between religious and irreligious Darwinists.

I say "supposedly" because there's no evidence any substantial body of opinion is actually being changed on religion or evolution by anything the open haters or the quiet disdainers say. Everyone seems to seriously think they're either going to defeat religion, or merely "creationism," or both by blogging for an audience of fellow Darwinists.

Want to see what I mean? This is all pretty strictly a battle of stinkbugs in a bottle. Try to follow it without getting a headache.

Coyne recently drew excited applause from fellow biologist-atheist-blogger PZ Myers for Coyne's "open letter" (published on his blog) to the NCSE and its British equivalent, the British Centre for Science Education. In the letter, Coyne took umbrage at criticism of the New Atheists, mostly on blogs, emanating from the two accommodationist organizations. He vowed that,

We will continue to answer the misguided attacks [on the New Atheists] by people like Josh Rosenau, Roger Stanyard, and Nick Matzke so long as they keep mounting those attacks.

Like the NCSE, the BCSE seeks to pump up Darwin in the public mind without scaring religious people. This guy called Stanyard at the BCSE complains of losing a night's sleep over the nastiness of the rhetoric on Coyne's blog. Coyne in turn complained that Stanyard complained that a blog commenter complained that Nick Matzke, formerly of the NCSE, is like "vermin." Coyne also hit out at blogger Jason Rosenhouse for an "epic"-length blog post complaining of New Atheist "incivility." In the blog, Rosenhouse, who teaches math at James Madison University, wrote an update about how he had revised an insulting comment about the NCSE's Josh Rosenau that he, Rosenhouse, made in a previous version of the post.

That last bit briefly confused me. In occasionally skimming the writings of Jason Rosenhouse and Josh Rosenau in the past, I realized now I had been assuming they were the same person. They are not!

It goes on and on. In the course of his own blog post, Professor Coyne disavowed name-calling and berated Stanyard (remember him? The British guy) for "glomming onto" the Matzke-vermin insult like "white on rice, or Kwok on a Leica." What's a Kwok? Not a what but a who -- John Kwok, presumably a pseudonym, one of the most tirelessly obsessive commenters on Darwinist blog sites. Besides lashing at intelligent design, he often writes of his interest in photographic gear such as a camera by Leica. I have the impression that Kwok irritates even fellow Darwinists.

There's no need to keep all the names straight in your head. I certainly can't. I'm only taking your time, recounting just a small part of one confused exchange, to illustrate the culture of these Darwinists who write so impassionedly about religion, whether for abolishing it or befriending it. Writes Coyne in reply to Stanyard,

I'd suggest, then, that you lay off telling us what to do until you've read about our goals. The fact is that we'll always be fighting creationism until religion goes away, and when it does the fight will be over, as it is in Scandinavia.

A skeptic might suggest that turning America into Scandinavia, as far as religion goes, is an outsized goal, more like a delusion, for this group as they sit hunched over their computers shooting intemperate comments back and forth at each other all day. Or in poor Stanyard's case, all night.

There's a feverish, terrarium-like and oxygen-starved quality to this world of online Darwinists and atheists. It could only be sustained by the isolation of the Internet. They don't seem to realize that the public accepts Darwinism to the extent it does -- which is not much -- primarily because of what William James would call the sheer, simple "prestige" that the opinion grants. Arguments and evidence have little to do with it.

The prestige of Darwinism is not going to be affected by how the battle between Jerry Coyne and the NCSE turns out. New Atheist arguments are hobbled by the same isolation from what people think and feel. I have not yet read anything by any of these gentlemen or ladies, whether the open haters or the quiet disdainers, that conveys anything like a real comprehension of religious feeling or thought.

Even as they fight over the most effective way to relate to "religion," the open atheists and the accomodationists speak of an abstraction, a cartoon, that no actual religious person would recognize. No one is going to be persuaded if he doesn't already wish to be persuaded for other personal reasons. No faith is under threat from the likes of Jerry Coyne.

Worthy of belonging to a Christian Church. We are called to defend the faith, to martyrdom if necessary.

I do and will defend my faith in the Lord Jesus Christ even unto death. My local organization's building, not so much. I guess the disconnect is when one believes his "organization" is the church. It isn't. All those who are Christ's body are the church. They/we are members of the called-out assembly (ekklesia), which is translated as "church". Here is the Strong's concordance definition of the word:

In a Christian sense

1) an assembly of Christians gathered for worship in a religious meeting

2) a company of Christian, or of those who, hoping for eternal salvation through Jesus Christ, observe their own religious rites, hold their own religious meetings, and manage their own affairs, according to regulations prescribed for the body for order's sake

3) those who anywhere, in a city, village, constitute such a company and are united into one body

4) the whole body of Christians scattered throughout the earth

5) the assembly of faithful Christians already dead and received into heaven

What kind of Christians hides the church he/she is a member of during a debate on a religious forum? Maybe if you belonged to the "Church of the Folks Living in the Red House in the 600 Block of Maple Street in Cleveland, Ohio, 94567."

Again, I think anyone who is comfortable with disclosing their local church affiliation is fine and those do not wish to do so are fine, too. I have yet to see anyone on these forums for any length of time who has not said what they believe about the issue being discussed. Else, why even join the thread? I still don't think it is necessary that the denomination MUST be mentioned, and certainly not when certain people DEMAND such information. I think you and I both have seen what some will do with that information and go off on tangents with recriminations that have nothing whatsoever to do with the Freeper poster. Even when some people have given their views on doctrine or their denomination it is never enough for some unless they get a response at the snap of their fingers. People get tired of bullies.

I honestly can't believe the question has gotten this far and so far afield and off topic when a simple " I belong to a LCMS Lutheran Church" or "I'm a Unitarian Universalist" or whatever would suffice.

I hope I have explained this to you in a way that you can now understand. I think that for some bullies, there is no simple "I belong to...". It SHOULD suffice to discuss the specific issue and not let the extraneous stuff get in the way.

Back in post #3859 D-fendr made this comment:

“I honestly can't believe the question has gotten this far and so far afield and off topic when a simple “ I belong to a LCMS Lutheran Church” or “I'm a Unitarian Universalist” or whatever would suffice.”

Evidently a polite refusal to divulge information about ones self does not suffice for the questioner. They rudely persist despite the rebuff as though they have a right to the information or a right to demand what is not offered.

“Answer my question” some poster demands as if this site were governed by their wishes or demands.

This site is like a disembodied voice on the phone. I'm sure someone is there but who is it and what are their purposes for asking questions and why would they persist when refused? I get calls all the time asking for personal information and I simply tell the caller if they want to know something they can send a letter since I won't even reveal my name and I won’ accept what they say as fact.

But someone here protests:

“Why wouldn't you share your denominational affiliation?”

To which I would reply that they have no right to question me about my motives and choices any more than I can say a couple should explain to me why they have no children.

So in the relatively short time I've been here I've said nothing about where I live, whether in the U.S. or not, nothing about political leanings or denominational affiliations or age or family status or even gender for that matter.

Why? Because I feel it's no ones business unless I choose to volunteer such information. I haven't and I won't.
As to guesses that might be entertained....well, that's of no concern to me.

And that will have to suffice.

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