Merry Newtonmas from Carnival of the Godless
Skeptico has posted the latest Carnival of the Godless. It’s a special Newtonmas edition.
Although there are a lot of good holiday posts there, the article that jumped out at me is “Why I am not an Atheist”, published by Hank at Dangerous Intersection (three months ago! Hmmm… I thought carnival submissions were supposed to be current.).
In the article, Hank rattles off a lot of misconceptions people have about atheists. As silly as these beliefs are, I have seen every single one of these on multiple occasions in the fundie drivel I read. These have all be put forth as serious explanations for why somebody would become an atheist. Here’s the list:
I am not an atheist because:
• I hate God
• I prayed to God and my prayers weren’t answered
• Militant/fundamentalist atheists converted me away from God
• I worship science and the works of man instead of God
• I’m rebelling against God like I rebelled against my parents & teachers in high school
• I think I’m better than God
• I had a bad experience with a priest or church or religious person
• I can’t decide which religion to subscribe to
• Atheism is my religion
• I think religious people are idiots
• I worship Batman
• I worship Satan
• I’m immoral/amoral and would rather do what I want
• I want to destroy religion
Actually, the Batman one is new to me. I think that’s in there as a joke. Anyway, go on over to Dangerous Intersection and read the rest of the article. Then be sure to check out the rest of the carnival at Skeptico.
[Note: I've closed off comments on this post, because it is getting massively hammered by the spambots. You can thank your do-nothing elected representatives for this. I know most spam comes from places like Russia and China, but if the international community applied some pressure, the problem could be reduced significantly.]
December 23rd, 2008 at 12:52 pm
One of my favorite accusations is that I am somehow less happy and feel less whole as a person because I’m an atheist. If only I could let “God” into my heart I would be so much happier!
December 23rd, 2008 at 8:03 pm
That’s an excellent article over at DI, but he’s got a real mule-headed young-earth creationist posting (or trolling) on the thread. This fundie isn’t stupid, but he’s got a bullet-proof shield of christian delusion wrapped around his brain. It’s really something to behold.
I get the same aggrieved comments from my fundie family – I must be an atheist because I think Sky Daddy done me wrong somehow. Satan’s just waiting in the wings for those tough times when prayers go unanswered and I just don’t feel like fighting my natural, sinful urges to rape, murder, fornicate and push the evil, corrupt gay liberal abortionist agenda any more. My atheist goggles also let in all that evidence and stuff that a good set of Christian blinders would keep out, causing me to glorify evolution and worship dinosaur bones and such.