What's the Point?
Confession: I used to have an atheist blog. Boy, did I get tired of talking about atheism. I just got really tired of it really quickly. I have since spent most of my blogging days carefully skirting the issue, because I was so bored with it all. At the risk of opening a can of worms, I’ll briefly break the atheism blogging celibacy. Here’s an article about the so-called New Humanism, which is attacked as militant, as not standing for anything positive, but simply being a negative attitude towards an imaginary enemy, and much else besides. I have debated that many times before and I’m not even going to attempt to get into it yet again. No, I’m more concerned with a statement made in the comment section there, and that I occasionally see made elsewhere. It’s this, from someone called Ryan:
For me, I couldn’t be a humanist. If I wasn’t a Christian, I think I wouldn’t care about humanity because I don’t see the point of morality - with no deity to offend, what’s the point?
Really? REALLY? At this point I thought that attitude was as good as dead except in fundie circles, but apparently not. When I read that I had an overwhelming urge to just stick that question out there publicly: REALLY? You can’t come up with any reasons to be good except for not wanting to offend a deity? I’m not even going to argue with it (I said, but then I wrote the below). I’m not going to extol the virtues of atheism or the vices of theism. I’m just going to put that question out there: anyone else feel this way? Are there any people on Tumblr who can’t come up with a good reason to be good except for this? Is this a prevalent attitude? How can anyone really believe this? And incidentally, what is a good reason not to be an ass in a godless world? I can think of many reasons, and I don’t think “God said so” is a good reason either, but what do you think is the most pithy and rhetorically effective answer to this question? For me, the thing that pops up when I hear “with no deity to offend, what’s the point?” is the following. What about offending your fellow citizens? What about offending your fucking conscience? What about not wanting to cause pain to others, what about effin’ empathy with your fellow person? But I’m not quite sure how to pack that into a quick and rhetorically good statement.
I don’t think most believers in God are psychopaths, but the statement above, about not seeing any reason to care about humanity except for not wanting to offend God, makes me wonder about that person’s psyche. So, I just wanted to put those questions out there:
- REALLY?
- Anyone else feel this way? Why?
- What’s the most effective way to counter this? What is humanism to you, incidentally?
There. Go on, little questions, go on into the ether and make me proud. Just needed to process a wtf moment, there.
