Dawkins loses humanist title

[Reforged]

The ideology of humanism is exactly that people should tow the humanist line, even if...and especially when...reality does not conform to the ideology.  

That's what humanism is, that's it's goal.  Not to accurately describe reality as it is, but to actively change reality so that it's closer to how we wish it to be.  

All of that is at play regardless of any disagreement you and I have about whether he was actually throwing himself against public opinion in the pursuit of empirical or objective truth.  I don't think he was, you might think he was...but the item of that disagreement is irrelevant to the advocacy and pursuit of an ideology.  That's what the aha does.  Advocates for and pursues a specific ideology.  I think it's strange to be upset at a dog for eating a biscuit.  He wasn't stripped of the title humanist, there is no such title, and the aha can't give it out or revoke it.  He was stripped of an award that -they- granted, because he no longer fits the organizations goals as they see them, due to a pattern of behavior and comment that is perfectly available for anyone to go and have a look at, for themselves.

But that doesn't stop an ideology forcing people to conform to what they say reality is. Stalinism springs to mind. There is an odd sort of logic to it. If you can get enough people to admit something they know isn't true then that can it as irrefutable and as binding as any reality. The fact is, you can be made to conform to a fiction. There isn't a single person here who doesn't know that to be true. 

How can you use a map if you can't begin to fathom where you are on it?

Alright, what do you think he was trying to do?

Being stripped of an award by a self-proclaimed society of humanists sends an unavoidably clear message. "You're not one of us, you're not a humanist". Thats a hell of a brand to be given.