Ever Feel Guilty?

[Jovanian Teapot]

I feel pretty strongly about this topic, so I’m going to outline my argument.
I am a militant atheist. Here it is, as I define it.
Militant atheist- an atheist who actively pursues religious discourse.
This in NO way implies that i get violent, or that i persecute people who disagree with me, or anything of that sort. i understand that militant carries some very strong connotations, so you should consider the definition i provided while you consider the rest of my argument.
I contend that militant atheism is not only justifiable, but necessary.

As to its justifiability,

1) Freedom of speech. Im not going to go any further because this is a pretty boring argument to make, and it seems like most would agree that I should be allowed to voice my opinion.
2) Religion gives license to people of that religion to justify their abhorrent behavior. To me, this means that while the majority of believers do not go about slashing each other’s throats out, any sense of religious tolerance has to be thrown out because by tolerating religious reasoning, you allow for religion to give license to religious people to justify their behavior, as stated above. THIS DOES NOT MEAN that i make fun of people for thinking differently. it just means that talking about religion as if it were a valid, justifiable opinion does not fly with me.
3) There does not seem to be any real danger in engaging any willing audience in discussion. So, by actively trying to engage people in the discussion while allowing them to abstain from participation, I allow for a meaningful, bipartisan dialogue to take place. If someone is uncomfortable talking about religion, i wont push the subject. however, that does not mean that i respect their ideas. it simply means that i take the conversation to someone who is interested (which usually happens to be someone nearby)

As to its necessity,

1) Religion as a whole promotes a pseudoscientific view of the world. A pseudoscientific view of the world is counterproductive to the growth of human society, and so there is to be no leniency toward its expression as a legitimate alternative view.
2) On the contrary, a secular world view is conducive to intellectual growth, thereby encouraging general human flourishing. Thus, a secular world view is necessary for the optimal expansion of human society
3) Childhood indoctrination hinders free thinking and critical reasoning skills that are required for a human to grow intellectually and emotionally.


I’m not gonna say I don’t get the occasional wave of sadness when I see someone questioning their own ideas. I have realized that although we may cause incredible pain and discomfort initially, as an end we have done the right thing by freeing their reasoning process from the iron-age grip of faith-reasoning. It seems to me that taking away religion from some people has the same effect as making a drug addict quit cold turkey. They mentally withdraw. They deny. They ‘Hate You!!’ (as my sister did [for a time]), but in the end they will benefit greatly from the change. I know this seems very similar to the reasoning for religious proselytizing, so I will argue to the contrary very briefly (if I can). The main reason that this is significantly different from religious proselytization is that by showing the contradictions that are inherent to their dogmatic beliefs, you are encouraging skepticism rather than telling them what to think. When I argue with theists (not just Christians [although in my area, as you may know, creationists are suffocatingly common ]), I do not argue that GOD DOESN’T EXIST; I simply show them how their religion is unreasonable in its claims. Nowhere do I encourage any set of dogma in its place.
At this point, it is important to note that in some extreme cases, taking religion away from someone is not necessarily an ethically sound thing to do (i.e. some child with a terminal illness deserves to be as happy as he/she possibly can for as long as he/she can). This way, you can certainly argue that religion serves as some type of hallucinogenic medicine that relieves mental anguish (if only temporarily). Even in this case, there is much to be argued concerning whether or not the child should be lied to so that the child can feel better about his/her predicament.
It does not make you or I an asshole to go about showing people the inconsistencies with their belief system.
Apathy is not a noble stance when considering the concept of religion, nor is nonchalance or tolerance.
Just as a note, calling me an asshole, bigot, elitist, what have you does nothing unless you justify your labeling of me. It doesn’t much bother me and I can take it at face value, but don’t insult me by claiming something without at least attempting to justify it.
Disclaimer: I DON’T go about pestering people. I think my definition of militant atheism solidly describes my view of it.