How many of you thought George Will was a Catholic? I bet it’s not only me. He’s long been a politically conservative columnist critical of “pro-choice” people, and I swear that, when I lived in the Washington, D.C. area, it was “common knowledge” that Will was a Catholic.
But common knowledge was wrong. Will is in fact a longtime atheist, and although I generally dislike his conservative views (he has some progressive ones, too), I give him credit for saying he’s not an agnostic, but a genuine atheist.
Or so he admits in an interview on baseball, politics, and faith at Real Clear Religion. The interview ranges widely, including Will’s favorite baseball team, the Chicago Cubs, but here’s what is of interest to us.
RCR: Do you believe in God?
GW: No. I’m an atheist. An agnostic is someone who is not sure; I’m pretty sure. I see no evidence of God. The basic question in life is not, “Is there a God,” but “Why does anything exist?” St. Thomas Aquinas said that there must be a first cause for everything, and we call the first cause God. Fine, but it just has no hold on me.
RCR: Were you raised with any religion?
GW: My father was the son of a Lutheran minster, and therefore he was an atheist. What I mean by that is — he went to so many church services, his father preached in many churches up near Antetum, eastern Ohio, Pennsylvania — my father had had his full of religion. He used to sit outside his father’s study and listen to him wrestle with members of the church over reconciling grace and free will. I think that’s where my father got his interest in philosophy.
I majored in religion in college. I was very interested, but I just came to a different conclusion. I’m married to a fierce Presbyterian and she raised our kids fierce Presbyterians.
I’m an amiable, low-voltage atheist.
I’ll be goddamned!
RCR: Does that present a problem for you as a conservative?
GW: No. The Republican Party’s base is largely religious. It would be impossible for me to run for high office as a Republican. Since I have no desire to run for office, it’s a minor inconvenience! I think William F. Buckley put it well when he said that a conservative need not be religious, but he cannot despise religion. Russell Kirk never quite fathomed this, which is one of the reasons why I’m not a big fan of The Conservative Mind. For him, conservatism without religion is meaningless.
He also takes a swing at fellow conservative writer Charles Krauthammer, mocking the “atheist/agnostic” distinction.
RCR: Your friend Charles Krauthammer likes to say he’s an agnostic.
GW: I think he’s an atheist. He flinches from saying it. I saw what he said: “I don’t believe in God, but I fear him greatly.” Oh, please!
Nevertheless, Will does try to distinguish himself from those militant atheists:
RCR: Do you see a creeping secularism in American culture?
GW: Oh, sure. There’s an active hostility to the religious impulse on the part of those who preach tolerance and diversity. But I think religion has withstood tougher opponents than today’s secularists.
Now that seems like a slur to me, and not correct at all. If religious ideas are false, and in general harmful, then is it “tolerant” to avoid criticizing them? Presumably there’s a reason Will is an atheist. Further, he’s long preached against abortion, and isn’t that hostility to a generally secular view for someone who preaches “tolerance and diversity”?
Finally, he makes one more statement that is a bit enigmatic, but seems like a dig at the anti-religious
RCR: It seems almost impossible to ignore religion nowadays, especially concerning what’s going on in the Middle East, but some politicians do anyway. Why?
GW: There’s a certain layer of political correctness involved: All cultures are created equal and all that rubbish. Bush’s initial reaction was quite understandable. There’s a large Muslim population and he didn’t want people to be scapegoated and isolated and abused. When you get a liberal administration like Barack Obama’s, it’s basically composed of people who think religion is retrograde. This is another iteration of the “liberal expectancy.” What’s it doing here? Here we are in the 21st century! They really think that when the calendar flipped over, human nature changed.
Well, we’re not sure what Obama’s “people” think, and the President himself has never said that religion is retrograde. But at least he admits why Obama won’t characterize the Middle East situation (i.e., ISIS) as religious in any respect.
I always just assumed he worshiped Stan Musial. Now I know he’s an atheist AND a Cubs fan. I couldn’t have been more wrong!
//
The circles overlap considerably in the Venn diagram of “atheists” and “bow-tie wearers.”
http://atheistsinbowties.tumblr.com/
I guess I’m not surprised, but I am disappointed to have to include him in my club.
Just pick a different club to feel good about. Secular humanist, for instance, or anti-religious.
I generally feel atheism is not so much a great intellectual achievement as a basic benchmark, at least when it comes to religion.
If you have to include him then you’re in the wrong club 🙂
Or as Groucho probably said, “I wouldn’t belong to any club that would have me as a member”.
More to the point, unless atheism is so important to you that it vastly outweighs all other attributes put together, you don’t have to have him in your ‘club’, you can set the rules of membership to be as exclusive as you like.
Speaking for myself, he wouldn’t make my ‘club’, just one of whose many rules (re abortion rights) would rule him right out.
It is possible to take an off-hand quip too seriously.
You forgot the 500 word disclaimer.
The problem is that disclaimers are usually exponential and the first one results in a 250000 word disclaimer* in the form of a novel for the second one.
*Disclaimer, anything here is said partially or fully in jest (or possibly not at all)…
[
…
400 pages explaining nuances of any disagreements we have
…
]
…and in the end, we agree on more that it appears due to the limited nature of electronic communication particularly in comment threads (or possibly, we remain in complete disagreement).
C’mon, this is WEIT. It’s what we do.
Well, I suppose I must admit to having my gabber at least somewhat flasted!
Maybe, if nothing else, he’ll inspire closeted conservative atheists to de-cloak, which would be good.
b&
I, too, hope for something along these lines. As an atheist I must admit to some conservative leanings myself and perplexity at a few liberal tendencies. I’ve always admired George to an extent and thought, just in the way his logical mind worked, that surely he’s atheist. His writings have never indicated belief, none that I could discern anyway.
I also wonder what he thinks of his colleague at Fox News Mike Huckabee, who came out at the Values Voter Summit saying atheists should be fired from government jobs in favour of people with God in their hearts. Here’s a link to a story about it at Patheos:
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/progressivesecularhumanist/2014/09/huckabee-wants-to-fire-atheists-working-for-the-government/
It would be nice to see a conservative argue against religion being a thing in the GOP. Sadly, he doesn’t seem to be the one to do it.
I am rather amazed by this. Since conservatism is almost always tightly linked to religiosity in the US. At least the public face of conservatism. There may be many more closet atheists out there who hold conservative fiscal and social views.
Indeed, there are many people of the cloth who are atheists.
One more observation though. Would he have been willing to “come out of the closet” 20 years ago? 10 years ago? I doubt it.
We’re winning.
I was going t make that exact same comment.
He described himself as a “heathen” and an “agnostic” (saying “I’m not decisive enough to be an atheist”) in a 2008 interview on the Colbert Report. I don’t know if this was the first time he mentioned it.
Yeah, I was going to mention that interview:
thecolbertreport.cc.com/videos/xhigi4/george-will
He gives your quote around 5:25, earlier he also said, “…christian science without the “christian”, sounds right to me”, in that same interview. It’s the first time I heard that he wasn’t christian, too.
Reblogged this on lit! and commented:
I had read George Will was an agnostic, but that was several years ago. I know he had given a favorable blurb to the Roman Catholic magazine New Oxford Review, and had mentioned C.S. Lewis somewhat favorably in his column collection, “The Pursuit of Happiness and Other Tory Notions.” As for pro-life atheism, he has at least one other fellow traveler, Nat Hentoff.
I find it hard to buy as well. George may have decided to say no to religion but he is sure to be right on with those 10 new commandments.
Conservative atheists do seem rare and they complain about feeling disrespected by the overwhelmingly liberal skeptical movement.
It all depends on what kind of conservative we’re talking about. My ex-girlfriend is a fiscally conservative atheist. She generally has cogent well evinced arguments. I disagree with her position on fiscal issues most of the time, but she typically has facts and figures to back up what she says. I also belong to an atheist group with a couple of libertarian members. These gentleman wouldn’t know a cogent fact if it bit them on the ass and have simply eschewed religious orthodoxy for right-wing political orthodoxy.
Sometimes the skeptical movement can be unfairly antagonistic to conservatives, but sometimes we’re just calling out some BS.
A lot depends on the user.
” eschewed religious orthodoxy for right-wing political orthodoxy.”
Yeah, I’ve observed the same thing. I had hoped it was just a sampling error. 😉 I don’t see how a genuine rationalist/skeptic could subscribe to much of anything advanced by today’s conservatism…too much of it relies on factual errors.
Cognitive dissonance is a strange and powerful force.
It baffles me as well.
Is it me, or does Will come across as somewhat sociopathic in his views?
He seems to glibly move concepts around like pegs on a cribbage board, but there seems to be no impulse toward true understanding or recognizing cognitive dissonance. He seems a mile wide but a micron thin – there is no “there” there, it seems. Like he play-acts at self-analysis.
Asked if being an atheist is problematic as a conservative, he replies, not for him – because he is not running for office. And that is as far as he takes it!
His assessment of Obama liberals is that they think religion is retrograde, yet Bush, who insisted 9/11 changed everything,is the guy that is looking out for the civil rights of Muslims.
The man thinks like every single Republican I have ever known – unscientifically, shallow, and without much empathy.
No wonder he thinks AGW is nonsense.
Perhaps, but sociopaths/psychopaths typically don’t have big feelings on social issues like abortions. Could be that’s just part of his act though.
“don’t have big feelings on social issues like abortions.”
Sure, but that doesn’t prevent them from having opinions. 🙂 I know some Christian fundamentalists who, I’m convinced, are sociopaths. I guess they might view conforming to some orthodoxy as a means of control over others.
They may have opinions but they typically don’t join a party and constantly voice those opinions. It could be, if said person is a sociopath, that he’s simply playing the role of right wing guy. I somehow don’t think he’s a sociopath though. Maybe he just has some narcissistic tendencies.
There should be a new internet game: sociopath or not. 😀
This raises the question of whether it’s logically and morally consistent for an atheist to be anti-abortion. I think it is. (I’m strongly pro-choice.) I think every enlightened atheist, or nearly every one, is anti-abortion to some degree — for example, against the practice in the Soviet Union to use abortion as birth control, or the forced abortions in China under the “One Child” policy. Even Roe v. Wade put (reasonable) restrictions on abortion.
I wonder where Will stands on birth control?
Being against enforced abortions is not being against abortions; it’s against violating the will of a human being.
My point is that there’s an arbitrary sliding scale, and where you put your marker depends on a lot of things, religion being only one, albeit an important one. For example, Roe v. Wade allows states to prohibit abortions in the third trimester, which I think is a mistake, for precisely the reason you gave.
The question arises, if those human beings want to have more little human beings than the country or the planet can sustain, should anyone respect their ‘will’ and just let them do it anyway?
But granted this is a totally separate issue from whether a woman should be allowed to have an abortion when she does want one.
“GW: No. I’m an atheist. An agnostic is someone who is not sure; I’m pretty sure. I see no evidence of God…”
I’ve always thought agnosticism was about knowledge claims, and atheism was about belief (or disbelief). However George seems to think of them as points along a continuum. Thoughts?
It’s been debated ad nauseam. Bertrand Russell famously said:
Exactly.
One can always construct some sort of bizarre-yet-irrefutable conspiracy theory such that the Sun does not, after all, actually rise in the East. In such hypothetical epistemological contexts, the only possible position is, of course, agnosticism, even about your own existence!
But, save for philosophical bullshitting (and even then), those sorts of discussions are generally quite silly.
I’m not agnostic about Newtonian Mechanics, and that in and of itself was enough to slam shut the door to the supernatural realms where the gods hid. Nor am I agnostic about Darwinian Evolution, which locked the door and tossed the key. Nor am I agnostic about all the rest that’s come after, which has done nothing but bury the door beneath an impenetrable mass of unobtanium.
Sure, I could be hallucinating all of this in Jesus’s living room…but so what?
Cheers,
b&
Sort of off topic, but given your views on philosophy you might enjoy, in a masochistic sort of way, this discussion.
The Last and Final Argument About Reality
For some reason I can’t explain, I am compelled to try and share this. Enjoy!!
Yes…but with a big caveat that perception must not be naïvely construed. You might look at an optical illusion, for example, and naïvely presume the direct perception to be “real”…but perception doesn’t stop there. It gets further filtered through our less-unconscious cognitive systems such that you perceive the illusion itself and thus the illusory nature of your naïve perception.
…which, really, is just another way of describing the scientific method….
b&
Oh that is just the mearest tip of the iceberg, as it were. The real meat of it is a debate among a handful of commentors on MDR (mind dependent reality) and MIR (mind independent reality). And that 35 page and still growing thread is a continuation from another, at least as long.
It has it all, brown nosing, sycophancy, obviousness paraded as profundity, much ado about very little, nastiness, and fallacies abound.
Sounds like a good old fashioned flamefest!
…and I personally think that anybody who claims that they invent their own reality would be best served by gently inviting them to place their hands in yours and close their eyes. Then, when they’re good and relaxed, and completely without warning, give them a sharp slap to the back of the hand — not enough to cause harm, but enough to startle and get the point across.
b&
There isn’t any proof about aliens either – Are you Agnostic or Atheistic towards Aliens? If you say Agnostic – then figure out why Russel’s Teapot does not apply. Then figure out why it doesn’t apply to the God question.
Then figure out why arguing by analogy isn’t a good way to demonstrate proof.
“Then figure out why arguing by analogy isn’t a good way to demonstrate proof.”
You don’t appear to understand Russell’s statement.
Right. The analogy is to demonstrate a consistent epistemological basis for evaluating claims, it says nothing about the reality of the teapot, aliens of gods.
Also, Deepak, hiding unbacked assertions inside of orders to figure something out isn’t an argument. It’s both begging the question and a red herring at the same time.
That should be aliens or gods.
Aliens don’t violate the laws of nature, there is no logical reason why they should not exist.
There is evidence to suggest they could exist, unlike a god.
I think George seems to have a limited view of agnosticism. An agnostic might claim that we cannot know (verify/measure/observe) if there is a god. This type of agnosticism is quite different than the waffling attitude of some people who are just unsure and want to sound kinder to religious folks.
That type of agnosticism bugs the living shit out of me. It’s a devout worship of the notion that you can’t prove a negative — even after being challenged to prove that there aren’t any nonexistence proofs!
b&
Yes indeed. Those who trot out the can’t-prove-a-negative claim seem quite unaware that this is itself a negative claim.
…and the fact that all affirmative proof can be rewritten as negative proofs, and that the most famous proof in history (the infinitude of primes) is generally expressed as a negative proof (no such thing as “the largest prime number)…
…and that last one is a real kicker, for similar logic demonstrates that “the ultimate power” is every bit as incoherent as “the ultimate prime”….
b&
Will is also a congenital liar on the subject of climate change which he religiously rejects. Chris Mooney called him out on his lies in a response printed in the Washington Post several years. IMHO, Mooney was much too polite.
Well I’ll be goddamned, too! I would have guessed Catholic, too, but now that I think about it he does look more Lutheran. As much as I don’t like his politics, this is good news.
It is somewhat odd to see a socially and fiscally conservative atheist, but this might only be because the political climate currently is such that conservatism has latched onto many arguments that are based in religion. It’s certainly not as far fetched to imagine more fiscally conservative atheists, as fiscal conservatism is much less tied up with religious nonsense. Michael Shermer and Penn Gillette immediately come to mind.
Working in finance in a center for heathens in New York City, it’s also common to run into non-religious fiscal conservatives. In principle, I fall pretty far left fiscally, but in practice when it comes to politics in the United States, too often the regulations are of the wrong sort and stifle the economy. Too lax on big business; too tough on small business and individuals. The mega-corporations have the funds and resources to circumvent (and effectively write loopholes into) the law while the smaller businesses end up tied up in red tape. It’s a big reason why I often don’t see the Democrats’ economic plans necessarily being better than what the Republicans throw out there. Of course, I don’t foresee myself voting for either of these all too similar parties any time in the near future.
I think you’ll find a lot of fiscally conservative atheists, but probably fewer socially conservative ones.
I think this idea that liberals are fiscally irresponsible is a myth.
Conservative =/= responsible. This is a myth the conservatives love to sell, that they are the responsible ones, but it’s a lie. They are the ones who cut taxes and leave countries in debt.
That cut taxes at the same time that they engage in a couple of wars.
I am not sure how they sell their “fiscally responsible” image when they do something like reduce income at the same time they significantly increase spending. But they do sell it, to about 45% of the population.
“I don’t foresee myself voting for either of these all too similar parties any time in the near future.”
Do you think the minimum wage should be increased?
Do you think the government should make tens of billions of profits on college loans?
Do you believe in equal pay for equal work?
Do you think voter suppression laws (factually unjustified by the near total absence of “voter fraud”) should be used to disenfranchise minority and poor voters?
Do you think creationism, or its thinly disguised stalking horse, Intelligent Design, should be taught in public schools?
Do you think that safe, legal abortion services should be available to all women?
Do think employers should be able make contraception decisions for their employees?
Do you believe in marriage equality?
Do you think androgenic climate change presents a clear and present danger?
The parties aren’t that similar.
Right, only three of those questions you posed have to do with economics. The rest are social issues, where the two parties have much less in common and I didn’t claim that they don’t. Even acknowledging that, there are many Republicans in areas like the northeast who support all those social issues and then disagree on economic issues. They may be a dying breed with the growing influence of the Tea Party, but they’re still around.
Both parties ran Presidential campaigns that raised billions of dollars during the last election cycle. Both hold fundraising meals catering to Wall Street and charging $40,000 or so per plate to attend; both parties participated in bailing out multinational corporations that were “too big to fail.” Both parties contributed to the disastrous bubbles spanning from the late 1990s into the mid-2000s. Congress voted 384-57 to overturn Glass-Stegall, then continued to make no effort to regulate derivatives until it was too late. Both parties are complicit in letting commercial and investment banks combine thus introducing global systemic risk, all the while Christopher Dodd and Barney Frank were leading the charge with the irrational mantra that everyone has the right to be a homeowner.
My point is that the Republican party has a stark division with the looniest of them being in the Bible Belt. I’ve met many Republicans in the northeast who would agree with you on all those social issues, yes, and even minimum wage, but would have considerable disagreements on what types of regulations and tax systems should be in place. Even Obama’s talking point about taxing earners who make over $250,000 (it eventually ended up being $450,000) is not much of a difference maker. The fact is that very rich people still get off with much lower effective tax rates than the middle and upper middle class. It is particularly a problem in high cost of living areas where tax breaks start phasing out well within what is a middle class standard of living while the perks for the very wealthy are left untouched. So, yes, in my book, the parties are all too similar on fiscal issues.
I don’t agree that the Democrats are essentially identical to the Republicans on fiscal issues, but be that as it may, would you agree that the parties are substantially different on social and environmental issues? Don’t you think those matter?
Certainly those issues do matter. My initial post was simply meant to convey that I think it’s far more common to see fiscally conservative atheists than socially conservative atheists. In America, I see this partially as the result of economics being less directly influenced by the religious views that influence social issues. Also, given the complexities of global economics, more cogent arguments can be made on both sides of the spectrum as to which policies work and which don’t.
My personal view is that at a high level, both Democrats and Republicans are overly influenced Wall Street and lobbyists and there simply isn’t much chance either party will propose major changes. Both spend irresponsibly and neither has the will to fix our tax code to address our deficit problem. I certainly find the Democrats to have more agreeable positions on social and environmental issues, but this doesn’t mean that I de facto think their economic proposals are always obviously superior, largely because I think that at a high level, there simply isn’t enough there to effect serious change.
I forgot to add last night, I certainly agree with you that there are stark differences on specific issues. You mentioned student loans. That’s an issue that hits close to home for me and I’m sure many readers here. Elizabeth Warren had a comprehensive law ready to go earlier this summer. Instead, the Republicans filibustered and we’re stuck with well above market interest rates, and the added insult of having to pay income taxes on forgiven amounts at the end of the loan. Fortunately, I’m in the position to pay my loans, but many people aren’t and it’s criminal the way we treat higher education in this country.
I’m not here to defend the Republican Party, merely pointing out that on many issues, there is enough overlap such that it’s not always clear what politicians’ positions are just because of the D or R next to their name.
Esp. more true the more one considers the local political landscape (rather than the national). At least round these here politically-confused parts (Colorado). I know I’m going to be voting for at least one Republican in the local elections this season… a few elections ago gladly voted for another for a school board. (specifically to defeat a Democrat who fervently believed in presenting all sides of scientifically “contentious” and “unsettled” issues, like evolution… and letting the kids decide for themselves. The Republican was a no-nonsense Air Force type who flatly answered the same question [paraphrasing]: “Science class is for teaching accepted science, end of story.”)
Oh yeah, I recall reading about that race somewhere. Maybe it was even on this site. It’s truly bizarre to see a Democrat tolerating creationists running against a no-nonsense Republican, but not so bizarre as to seem implausible. This perfectly underscores my point. That’s not to say the loony base and Tea Party movement that has taken over the Republicans in recent years isn’t awful, but there’s still enough legislators out there who put the R next to their name who viscerally disagree with the base. The Democrats are certainly not immune to lunacy either.
Well said, Stephen!
I’d also argue that Authoritarianism (ala Altmeyer) is a significant correlation between the group “US style conservatives” and the group “religious believers.”
Yeah, it’s an odd mix for sure. Complete anti-authoritarian stances on business, but very authoritarian stances on personal freedom. Even on the liberal side of the spectrum, a lot of people on this site are at complete odds with what mainstream liberalism is saying. I generally dislike the liberal/conservative labels for this reason; adding in the views on Authoritarianism tend to help paint a clearer picture.
What a huge surprise! He’s the last person I would have suspected.
Makes me wonder if there are more high-profile conservatives still in the closet.
Probably more surprising is that I had no idea who George Will was until I went to look him up on Wikipedia.
There probably are many more atheists out there than one ever thought. We need a Cerebro for atheists or as Dennett would say an ‘atheistdar’ like gaydar.
It’s a statistical certainty. There is but one single “out” atheist in all of the United States Congress — and she just happens to be my own Representative, too. With probability comparable to that with which we know that the CERN team found the Higgs, we can know that she’s not the only unbeliever on the Hill.
Cheers,
b&
Will makes a career out of attacking people whose views he regards a specious but attacks atheists who do the same to people who hold religious views–isn’t that a tad inconsistent, George?
My take: George Will, don’t you wish he wouldn’t?
Don’t be too surprised just yet. Once you rule out religious affiliation, that still leaves faitheism. Judging from his comments about not despising religion, and viewing “creeping” secularism as anti-religious-impulse pushovers, Mr Will seems to fall into that camp with ease.
“I’ll be goddamned!”
ME Too!!!!Is it true? I suppose so but how could I have been so deceived for so many many years. Something is amiss here…..
People are fooled because he’s a faitheist and has socially conservative views. Personally I find these things difficult to reconcile with atheism, but, after all, all atheism really means is lack of belief in gods. Most of us also embrace things like secularism and humanism too, so atheism means more to us than the strict meaning of the word.
Exactly.
“If religious ideas are false, and in general harmful, then is it “tolerant” to avoid criticizing them?”
Since he was happy to have his children brought up to be “fierce Lutherans” I guess he thinks religion is harmless or even beneficial if wrong. There is no way I would allow my kids to be raised like that. One of my fears was that they’d decide becoming religious was a good way to rebel. Didn’t happen thank gods.
Exactly how I feel! But the phenomenon of atheists being married to theists and deferring to the latter when it comes to child-raising is quite common.
How on earth could an atheist do that to their children??
I dunno, and I don’t know how you’d keep your mouth shut when your kids started telling how Jesus wanted them for a sunbeam either.
Arrgh!
Could not agree more. Luckily for me, and I really mean that, my wife feels the same way. But then, she was raised old school catholic, so it is only natural that she would be an atheist. (At least in my fantasy world that would be the natural outcome.)
When my ex, an atheist, remarried it was to a Catholic. When he took our young kids to church on one of his weekends I complained. If he had been a believer I might not have had as much of an argument, but to please her ( who was in fact very “unchristian” to the kids) was a different story. He stopped taking the kids to church.
Well, one positive outcome in what otherwise sounds like a prickly situation. I suppose it led to some “educational moments” for your kids, at least.
Yes, and they have both turned out to be totally secular and totally “christian”/charitable. By that “christian” you know I mean the good things that Christians think only they are.
Good job, Mom! 🙂
Thanks:-)
“…raised old school catholic, so it is only natural that she would be an atheist.”
Truth can be funny. 😀
Reblogged this on Democracy Science Capitalism and commented:
Awesome news.
How can you call yourself and atheist when you essentially worship Ronald Reagan and baseball, and you’re atheistic about climate change too.
I used to think that George Will was a conservative worth at least listening to. He has developed into such an ignoramus in so many ways that I know longer think he’s much worth listening to.
As for thinking that religion is retrograde – I’m guilty as charged. But do I think human nature has changed? Of course not – but we don’t do much bloodletting anymore and the cessation of that practice didn’t require a change in human nature – just some education and enlightenment.
know longer!? WTF?
At least you picked it up yourself and didn’t have us wondering about you! 🙂
I think not enough liberals in America think religion is retrograde – that’s why people like Aslan, Affleck etc etc etc get so much support, Obama is constantly coming across as an apologist, and there’s only one openly atheist person in your government.
I should hope there is “creeping secularism in American culture”- I only wish it would come in at full speed.
Now,if he meant “creeping atheism in American culture” – Nope. I don’t want that. I want the public sphere to be a-religious, or, in other words, secular, with no policies favoring either religion or non-religion.
And I suspect that before the Reagan administration courted the fundies and created the Religious Right as a political movement (because they needed a large, reliable voter base to stay in office for more than one term), conservatives could despise or be indifferent to religion.
The GOP thought they could control the fundies.Now the fundies control them. I think this is called hubris.
I would agree that I don’t want atheism per se creeping into American government – I want a secular government. I’m all for atheism creeping into American culture.
– “How many of you thought George Will was a Catholic? I bet it’s not only me. ”
You may be confusing him with Garry Wills. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garry_Wills)
– “Further, he’s long preached against abortion, and isn’t that hostility to a generally secular view for someone who preaches “tolerance and diversity”?”
While there may be a strong correlation between atheism and a pro-choice position, not all serious arguments against abortion are based on religious beliefs. IMO, about the only thing that should surprise you about an atheist is a belief in god.
I think it’s Wills who wrote some pretty impressive pieces in Harper’s maybe 40 years ago??
I doubt Jerry confused George Will with Garry Wills. Garry Wills is ideologically very different from George Will.
Even though I consider myself a progressive, I hate the assumption that atheists are naturally liberals. Absence of a belief in god(s) does not lead to any particular set of political beliefs.
This is great news. I hope more conservatives come out of the closet.
After I thought about it a little while, that was my reaction, too. Imagine politics without the religion card!
I think atheism can be a factor in political belief. But I think it is also very complex, that there are many other factors.
But for example, the factors that lead to atheism due to a penchant for rational assessment of well considered evidence seem like they would also have significant impact on political beliefs.
But yeah, I agree. The assumption that atheists are naturally liberals is bunk and irritating. It is just a smear tactic. Attribute to your opponents those things that the people you are trying to convince to empower you think are really awful.
As in Will’s smear about “those who preach tolerance and diversity.”
(Although he does have a point regarding some leftish positions…)
“There’s an active hostility to the religious impulse on the part of those who preach tolerance and diversity”
Wow! Talk about blaming the victim.
Very, very happy to hear about this on an atheist blo…um… website, and not on the headlines of CNN… I call that progress in the mainstreaming of non-belief!
It’s also a useful eye-opener to those who oppose a “big tent” approach. There are, indeed, conservative atheists who we should make an effort not to ignore or alienate on common ground issues.
“…conservative atheists who we should make an effort not to ignore or alienate on common ground issues.”
Completely concur. Strange bedfellows, and all.
I’ve known for some time that Will is an atheist. But he is a very strong accommodationist. He supports traditional institutional religion because of his conservative values. He thinks it an important part of our culture.
“While believing that “religion has been, and can still be, supremely important and helpful to the flourishing of our democracy… I do not think the idea of natural rights requires a religious foundation, or even that the founders uniformly thought it did. It is, however, indubitably the case that natural rights are especially firmly grounded when they are grounded in religious doctrine,” says George Will.” — American Spectator, August 6, 2013.
I know it may be bordering on something akin to sacrilege to quote anything from the American Spectator here, but I do so because this excerpt contains quotes that show that while George Will is an atheist, he is no friend of atheism or the atheist community.
Conservative atheists are relatively few in number, though their numbers may surprise some. According to an article from March of this year at TheHumanist.com, a PEW survey revealed that about 14% of atheists identify as conservatives. There are a number of conservative atheist bloggers. There are two whom I happen to follow just as a source of entertainment. I know, this may sound strange to some, but I really do get entertainment value out of giving the liberal atheist perspective in the comment section of their posts.
The association of atheism so strongly with liberalism seems to me to be an American phenomenon, probably because Reagan associated the Republican party so strongly with the religious right. In other countries socially liberal attitudes aren’t really predominant on the left or right, and the political spectrum is mostly about economic policies.
First there’s this,
“The Republican Party’s base is largely religious. It would be impossible for me to run for high office as a Republican.”
and then there’s this,
“…a conservative need not be religious, but he cannot despise religion.”
..Uhh, unless he wants to run for office. The idiot doesn’t see a contradiction here!
Or is it that if you’re a Republican being a phony like Reagan is A-OK. Kiss the fundies asses so that you can have suffficient number of idiots to vote for you while you’re screwing them over, but you don’t have to believe their bullshit. And if they should manage to ban abortion, for example, rich people know that such silly laws don’t really have to be obeyed if you’re rich – money can fix embarrassing problems just like in the old days.
Pretty much.
Cognitive Dissonance seems par for the course on the right for american conservatives.
Massive tax breaks / subsidies for oil companies (that would be profitable anyway and can’t leave because of the well locations) but if you help a poor person they are a ‘welfare queen’.
So we pay our taxes to subsidise billion dollar industries while thousands of people cant afford healthcare, something that ought to be a basic human right.
Liberals are not innocent. Just read Jerry’s posts on Maher/affleck etc… I guess people will always tell themselves what they want to hear.