Another Burnt Out Atheist

I, for one, am formally shunning ThunderFoot for this breech of ethic. What just came to light about his actions is beyond the pale.

Expecting a movement based upon scepticism to NOT examine claims from Feminism etc, much of which is an insular and self-reflective group, is foolish. It’s also foolish to expect ‘I don’t believe in god’ to mean you’re going to agree on everything else. There’s room for debate and argument if you can get over the shock of another logical person not agreeing with you on gender politics.

We have and we havn’t. She’s still identifies as an atheist and values critical thinking but has given up on dealing with the larger communities. So it depends on what you call losing her.

”
If all this blogger did was fight fellow atheists, no wonder she’s lost her affinity with atheists.”

Which she didn’t she mostly watched from the sidelines. Go read her blog sometime.

 As a relatively new atheist I am excited by all the forums and blogs where atheists come together and discuss topics. However what I don’t understand–and what I find disheartening– is how many times atheists will snipe at other atheists.  They call each other names, are rude, ect. 
  I happen to like both PZ Myers and Sam Harris. Most of the time I agree with them and other times I think they are wrong on certain issues. But I don’t hate them because they don’t agree with me 100% of the time.  And I don’t really understand the feud between them.  (As I said I came late into the game.)  I really would just like to use the Rodney King quote: “Can’t we just all get along?”  After all we are supposed to be dedicated to logic and reason. Why can’t we have civil discourses?  Do we have to act like 12 yr old?
  I admit that most of the discussions in said forums are good ones but there are a number of angry people out there who think they are always right and are snide to those who disagree with them. It should not be this way.   Atheists don’t need to walk in lockstep with each other. You CAN have different opinions on matters that concern you. But you also be willing to agree to disagree without being nasty. That is just my 2 cents worth.

The problem isn’t “Militant atheists” or “Dick Atheists” or even “r/Atheism”
Its that all humans have the capacity to be real ass-holes. Some like being ass-holes and some it just never occurs to them that there is another way.

While I don’t want to attack the victim, I want to say don’t attack the movement as a whole because your patiences and ability to deal with ass-holes has worn down to a nub.

Either work at fixing it or take the non ass-holes and start a new movement.
or go be quiet and get on with life. 

If all this blogger did was fight fellow atheists, no wonder she’s lost her affinity with atheists.

Best I can tell, she did nothing of the kind. If you actually want to know why she’s lost her affinity with atheists, maybe you should read her entire blog post. It’s a bit long, but very well written, and I think we can all learn something from it.

Well if you go read her blog post which is actually very long as is her style you’d get a more nuanced view.

“Why do we focus on the 2% we DON’T agree on?”

Because it’s hard to have a discussion when everyone agrees. When you see a blog post saying something that you think is totally true, obvious and uncontroversial, do you weigh into the comment section to say so?

I agree with you in the general case, but in my experience the skepticism of Feminism that you’re talking about is so very rarely actually followed by sincere analysis that it strikes me as something of a fig leaf, a fulfilled desire to reject uncomfortable claims without actually thinking about what they’re saying.

It’s definitely OK to be skeptical of the claims that feminists make about gender, it’s not OK to use that skepticism to bludgeon them out of the conversation. It is akin to another trope common in atheist communities that I’ve observed, that just because (obviously) atheists reject the metaphysical claims of Christianity,  it becomes a license to assume that nothing a Christian could ever say in a given conversation could possibly be insightful or valuable.

The nuance is basically that the community didn’t actually share all her ideas and ideals.

Pedantry. Gotta love it.

I was just really getting into the movement (I’ve been lurking for a while now, gradually working towards being more active, trying to figure a way that wouldn’t hurt my business or relationships while at the same time finding my own voice)… frankly there are times I don’t want to have anything to do with it any more. After seeing all the shit that women who hold similar opinions have to deal with (and with my own story of abuse and dealing with MRAs in the family etc, there’s been more than a few emotional triggers), I find I feel burned out before I even start. 

I want to get more involved, there’s so much I’d like to do and so much I know I could, but despite the fact that there are so many supportive voices out there when I see the tide of abuse that women/feminists face… it doesn’t seem worth it. I’m already fighting clinical depression while running my own business and dealing with standard day-to-day drama, I don’t need threats of rape and violence for having the audacity to voice an opinion while having a vagina. 

I’m stubborn, though, so I’m sticking in there… I do still want to find a way to make things better for everyone in the community. And I’m taking baby steps, slowly but surely. It would be nice, though, to not have to overcome this kind of block just to feel a part of a community. 

I sure do and I retweet it and FB post it. I almost never repost blogs complaining about other atheists or drama. I don’t even follow many bloggers, just Kate and a couple others.

It’s certainly taken it’s toll. Women have dropped out of the movement completely or are taking a break. I have had women tell me that this situation has caused them depression, anxiety, and insomnia… some of which I have experienced. Not too long ago, a woman wrote to Skepchick and said that she was feeling suicidal. We still have people telling us that we are overreacting, hysterical, or playing victim. Where is the empathy? Where is the rational, enlightened movement I thought I once belonged? 

I’d like to offer a few suggestions for bloggers, group leaders and individual activists.

1 Don’t be so quick to harshly criticize our own people. If they’ve screwed up, they’ll hear about it eventually anyway. Every time we crack down on our own people, the media can use that against us, and sometimes they do.  Yes we should police our own, but gently and carefully, not like a wild parade for all to enjoy. 

2 Stick to the primary issues: Atheist civil rights, state/church separation, the growth of our movement, things like that. Whenever we go off into side-issues, we inevitably find plenty of disagreement among ourselves. We need to remember that there are only a couple of things that we all agree on, if even that. More bickering over less than important issues, we don’t need.

3 If you’ve been offended or harmed in some way by one of our people, please remember that you’re not the first, and that it could probably be much worse. A lot of incidents of late have been inflated out of proportion, in my humble opinion. Not all, but enough to say that we often slow ourselves down for no good reasons with this bickering. This also tends to speed up burn out.

4 Get a second opinion! I’ve learned a lot in our movement since getting involved in 1996, and one big lesson I had to learn was that very few successful endeavors in our movement were accomplished by just one person, acting alone, without seeking advice from others. But a LOT of big mistakes have been made by individuals and bloggers who just couldn’t wait, who weren’t tasked with getting lots of permission and advice and guidance beforehand, like most groups do. It’s so easy too. Just ask someone else with experience about your plans, and you’ll be surprised at the giant blunders you can avoid making.

5 Don’t give up just yet. Trust me, if you give up too soon, you’ll kick yourself later on. It’s better to be angry on the field, than bored in the parking lot.  Stay strong! 

its*

Yeah, no.  Let’s not get all martyrish before anything has happened.  One has to decide if it’s their fight to “change the movement” or go out into the greater world and live their life as an atheist.  When we are so focused on the politics of the movement (and I get nauseated every time I use that word), we may miss out on an opportunity for service in some other meaningful way.

The problem is what if we have to go off topic to meet our goals? Particularly when trying to grow the movement. If there is a small but vocal contingent who carry a number of say anti trans assumptions how do we grow the movement and attract Trans atheists to participate if we don’t address the topic in our community?

I’m sorry, but being called names for disagreeing with someone is not sufficient excuse to engage with their arguments generally. And beyond that, I think the claim is unbelievably overblown; I personally have engaged with–and disagreed, sometimes quite sharply–with feminists both IRL and on teh Internetz, and I have not once been called a misogynist (or any related term) for my trouble.  I certainly have run into feminists who oversell their claims when making points, going too broadly or too quickly perceiving a slight, but that is a learned response from too often having their claims dismissed out of hand or interacting with people who are so inured to their own privilege they wouldn’t know they were being misogynist if their own mom called them on it.

Also, I have never heard atheists shout down Christians merely for being Christian.

Then you haven’t been paying attention. The “Christ-tard” jabs come out sometimes instantly, and often completely unjustifiably. To a certain extent, even that is OK on some level; an online atheist community is often intended not just as a discussion space but also as a safe haven for atheists (who are often isolated IRL from people who would sympathize with their points of view). But it bears recognizing that when the five-minute hate of the passing-through Christian is invoked, it is to sacrifice one role (being a discussion space) explicitly for the other (being a safe haven). At that point, it is disingenuous to claim to still function just fine as both.

I don’t let Internet trolls get my goat. I laugh at their stupidity and move on. I never take their asinine comments personally because they’re just keyboard commandos. At the conventions, where it matters, we have civil and respectful conversations about the issues. We actually talk face-to-face and accomplish things.

Even on my FB page the pedantry and in-fighting just wants to bust in: even by people who I know in person would never say something like that because I’ve met them in person and had these types of conversations. The psychological effect of Internet anonymity brings out the worst in people. I try my best not to react to it and take it personally because I am very aware of that effect. I also try to be conscious about not falling myself for that same effect and making sure that what I say is what I would say if I were sitting face-to-face with someone.

As a father of a lesbian daughter and a bi-sexual daughter whose ex-wife is a lesbian, I am 100% behind the LGBT community. So when I see stupid comments on blogs, I can either react viscerally and take it personally or I can realize that obvious troll is obvious and laugh at how stupid they are and move on to the important issues.

It’s sad to me to see all this infighting going on that has entrenched so many. Because I know that if we got a few people face-to-face that the conversation would go differently.

I saw an amazing example of that in Las Vegas at TAM when several people from opposing sides of this issue on the blogs (who had been engaged in a flame war) got together in my hotel room and talked about in person and actually came to an agreement and minds were changed! That’s what we need more of: not more flame wars and not more feeding of the trolls.

I’m not sure how to fix it until the people involved actually want to do so. In the meantime, I think we just have to continue to do the best we can to be civil in our interactions. While I see where AlabamaAtheist is coming from, it seems a bit hypocritical to give someone a pass for irrationality simply because they are an atheist. I prioritize separation of church and state too, and I certainly focus on Christian extremism. But I also strive to promote reason more broadly, and this does at times lead me to criticize myself and others in our community.

There is a problem with your assumptions that the only “real” issues worth addressing stem from religion. It may be true that the only major issues which affect your life stem from religious influence, but that is not true for a rather significant number of atheists– atheists of color, LGBTQI atheists, female atheists, young atheists, atheist parents, poor atheists, immigrant atheists, and so forth. We all live in a shared society, that society has more problems than just religion and woo, thus the atheist movement has more problems we need to address than just religion and woo.  If you want disenfranchised people in the movement, the issues keeping them from being welcome need to be addressed, not as a secondary issue, but as a primary one.

Not most atheists and not with the people at the top but for some atheists lower down yes.

Without a doubt! The comments and emails I get and the organization I represent gets are astoundingly silly and oozing in pedantry over the smallest of details. And getting so angry and miffed and troll worthy because we dared use a color they didn’t like or a font they didn’t like or used a word they wouldn’t have used.

I’ve given hour-long speeches in which 99% was agreed with, but because I said one sentence that someone didn’t agree with… the Internet wars begin!

It would be funny if it wasn’t so pathetic.

I trust that it is an issue, because trans people themselves have stated that it is an issue.

Being cisgendered myself, I have no lens of personal experience through which I feel I have the right to judge a trans person’s account of their own experiences. What I can do, though, is hear them and take their perspective seriously.

Isn’t the problem that atheism isn’t a natural movement.  It might have to be temporalily, but once we are all treating each other fairly (or even all treating each other equally unfairly) then atheism (or indeed gay rights or feminism) ceased to be a movement.  

That is where we should all be aiming for eventually.  And if that means that we can all go off and do something more useful for ourselves and others then that is good.

My comments are directed toward atheism activism. Nowhere did I say that other activism was not needed, etc.  I’m a huge LBGT supporter because one of my daughters is a lesbian and the other bi-sexual. The activism I do for LGBT is separate, but the same rules apply for me there: stay out of the pedantic mud and stupid in-fighting over details that don’t matter and focus on the main goals.

Because he’s not a smiley person?  We are all different.

I’m an atheist who smiles and laughs quite a bit.  

 Which is perfectly understandable. The problem lies in the fact that too many people want to link inseparably atheism with X, whatever X happens to be. Then you end up in situations where it is claimed that unless one believes in all these other causes, they are not a good enough atheist, if they are an atheist at all. That disenfranchises people as well.

So you run into the exact problem described in the OP: burn-out. Too many causes, too many conflicting theories and ideals that have nothing to do with the major topic under discussion: atheism.

If people want to form support groups for all those types of atheists you mentioned, I have absolutely no problem with that. It’s when we try to do it all from under umbrella that we get into trouble.

I’d like to see the idea that atheism needs activists go away. I’d like to see atheist-centered conventions go away. I’d like to see atheist clubs and organizations go away. Why? Because they encourage the viewpoint that atheism is some sort of belief, some sort of body of ideas that needs organizations and meetings to present itself. People should congregate around common interests, and atheism shouldn’t fall into that category. There are atheists I like and atheists I don’t like. The ones I like, I like because we have common interests- astronomy or politics. The ones I don’t like (I don’t mean actively dislike), I don’t like because we don’t share much in common. To me, a group of atheists getting together makes as much sense as a group of blondes getting together.

Lets separate atheism from actual areas of philosophy, and actual areas of action. In philosophy: logic, rationality, freethought, and humanism are all ideas that people can organize around- shared interests that are often associated with atheism, but are different. None of these areas is inherently exclusionary to theists (weak ones, at least).

In action, we have anti-theism, anti-religion, and assorted political efforts to maintain a secular state (or encourage secular states where they don’t exist). These all present rich opportunities for those with an activist inclination, and again, don’t actively involve the non-belief of atheism at all.

Finally- and this may be controversial- I have little sympathy for “activists” who choose to remain anonymous. If you can’t be public about who you are without messing up your life more than you’re willing to endure, then you shouldn’t be an activist. Maybe in a country where they’ll kill you for your beliefs, but not in the U.S. Hiding behind an anonymous Internet identity is simply not an acceptable form of activism in this country. There’s a better role for such people: simply existing in their lives as atheists, telling who they choose, being good, being wise, and guiding by example. That’s what the vast majority of atheists do, after all.

It’s been my experience, over the last handful of years+, that there is a disturbing level of intolerance and hostility (and no small amount of plain ol’ hate)  spewing from the atheist movement. If I’m forced to point a finger toward the cause, I’ll point it toward the likes of Dawkins and Hitchens. On their own, I admire the heck out of these folks for all kinds of reasons. But they’ve done zero to further outreach.

Frankly, I simply have no use for the unproductive drama that seems to dominate atheist movement these days. Whether it comes from the Religious Right or the “New Atheists” matters not a whit to me.

We should consider the possibility that secular activism is not for everyone. This is not to excuse anything that has occurred, but an observation that this is a time of upheaval and tumult for a young movement trying to define and (ultimately) stabilize. Thus, it is sometimes a tough & ugly business. 

Secular support groups for disenfranchised people, we have that, at least on line. It may not be as much as is needed (and I would argue that it’s not), but they exist.

Here is the problem I see. By setting up “other” groups for “other” people, we’re essentially telling those “other” people that the broader movement is cis, white, male, middle class, older, and everyone not in that group is “other.” That they can deal with their issues over there, but please don’t mess up the Really Important Stuff by dragging “your” issues into “our” issues. That chaps me in the same way it chaps me when people complain about Hemant posting LGBT issues on his blog. Intersectionality, it’s the way we *all* live our daily lives, and it’s counter productive to the movement as a whole to try and tell non-white, non-cis, non-male, non-middle class, et al atheists to compartmentalize their lives that way– not to call out unfair practices and privlege within the movement as a whole– just because the issues which affect them don’t affect “us.”  

 It’s a movement for no other reason than to collectively fight religion in all its harmful forms. Religion is organized, that’s one of its definitions, and it accomplish a great many things because of that organization. Most of those things aren’t good, and that’s atheism also has to be a movement, for the organization. Or else we’d be back in howling barbarism again, given the way things look in some heretofore civilized parts of the world.

This is where I think the secular humanist movement can help provide something energizing. Rather than arguing over unreasonable beliefs with both believers and non-believers, this forward-looking movement is about how to replace religiosity with reason and humanistic morality in an effort to move humanity out of the depths of superstition. Rather than trying to convince people that there is no god, humanists follow their world view courageously and hopefully set a high standard for how to live a good life grounded in the here and now.

I think his post really boils don to ‘don’t be a loud mouthed attentions grabbing drama queen about everything that happens to you”…. Good advice for anyone.

“Maybe in a country where they’ll kill you for your beliefs, but not in the U.S.”
 

Where is this mystical, magical U.S you speak of… because the United States of America is rife with stories and statistics of people getting killed because they are LGBT, the wrong religion, the wrong color, etc.

Wrong.   Tfoot hacked into a private list serve and have threatened to release personal information that puts her in danger.    Many people in the community are supporting him on this. 

Her “ideas and ideals” include being safe within the community.  Obviously Tfoot doesn’t share that.  So she’s out.

Get real. A tiny number of people in the U.S. have been killed for having the “wrong” beliefs. Your risk in this country of actual physical harm coming your way because of your beliefs alone is incredibly small.

I understand completely that many people with views at odds with their family, friends, or community choose to stay silent. But that isn’t the role of an activist.

 Yeah, I can’t imagine why people who aren’t straight cis white d00dz feel uncomfortable in the atheist movement, when you think sexual harassment policies are “unreasonable.”

 But are the LGBT and feminist issues really atheist issues? I know we want to be all-inclusive and all, but is dividing our attention really a good way to go about combating religious privilege in society? Which, really, is what atheism is about.

“I don’t do drama” = “I don’t want to be bothered with what are to me your petty concerns, no matter what they are.”

The catch 22: Engaging in debate regarding the treatment of women within the atheist community is frustrating, exhausting and sometimes even painful.  Not engaging at all in the debate is de facto support of the status quo, which was untenable.  I am looking forward to the changes that the struggle has brought about and more progress in the future.

I haven’t engaged…much.  Maybe a few comments on threads.  I let other women — Greta Christina, Rebecca Watson, a few others — speak for me, for which I am grateful to them.  And the debate has stayed away from my site of entry into the movement, Grief Beyond Belief, for which I am also grateful; the grieving — including grieving atheists — need space that is safe and comfortable.

But I do think that it is possible to engage in a debate about a specific topic without getting involved in back and forth drama.  What it takes is the ability to let someone say something negative about you, maybe even something untrue about you, without saying something back.  Or only restating your true position or describing your actual actions — setting the record straight — and leaving it at that.  Return to your original topic and keep your focus there, not on the conflict but on the issue.  The only way not to engage in drama is to let the other person get the last word.  It’s not easy, but it is possible.  And, if you are in the right, the last word they get usually does their argument far more damage than you could.

I’m sorry that there are people leaving the movement over this.  I would like to encourage them instead to find a new way to engage.  Ask JT what you can do to help the youth at Secular Student Alliance.  Volunteer at a Camp Quest.  Read the posts of grieving atheists at Grief Beyond Belief and post a thoughtful and compassionate comment to each one.  Pick a battle in the war with the religious right (there are plenty to choose from) and fight it with everything you’ve got.  Read fewer blogs and go to more local events if you can.

This is a big movement and a big community now.  We are big enough that we engage in internal as well as external struggles.  (Which occurs, by the way, in every successful movement.)  But we are also big enough now that when we burn out in one area of struggle, there is always another.

They may not be to some non-LGBT people, they may not be to non-feminist people, but for atheists who do fit into one of those categories and/or are supportive of people who fit into one of those categories, yes.

A personal example, which I hope does not come back to bite me–
 Feminism is inextricably linked to my atheism, and they are both linked to my sexuality.  It’s because the thought process and experiences by which I became an atheist are the same thought process and exeriences by which I became a feminist and are the same by which I came to accept my orientation. All of the above also influences greatly my parenting, my values. My desire to make a more fair and secular world in whatever way I am able is fueled by every part of my identity, not just one aspect in particular. When I am asked (or, often, told) to separate my female identity and experiences, to ignore my sexuality, to not take into account that I’m a parent, or that I am low income– all of which affect my daily life in a similar fashion as my atheism, as they are deeply personal parts of my identity–  I do not feel welcome. I feel othered. Once I can handle, twice I can handle, but as part of a continuing pattern, that sends a message that only some of me is important, not all of me. I bring a lot to the table. It isn’t possible for me to bring everything I have when I have to leave some of myself behind or deal with hosility on issues which affect me and my life. 

 A tiny number is enough to be a counter-example.

I am a privileged straight male, I am not white, but I live in a country in which being mixed is enough privilege. I think that for those of us, 3 or 4 deaths for being trans or gay sound like a tiny number. But I think that from the perspective of the people being killed, I would not be safe just because the statistic is smaller in your country than others.

My opinion about this is:

Fuck.

This is not right.

Please understand we aren’t really talking about being gay here, but about being atheist. I simply don’t buy the suggestion that being publicly atheist puts a person an any significant risk of harm, and certainly they are at no risk from the government itself, which is what my earlier comment was about.

 yes

Maybe because a lot of his books and public speaking are about rather serious topics, combined with a media filtering that often wants him to look like an “angry atheist”, you’re seeing a highly biased sample. Dawkins is probably happy and smiling just about as much as anyone else.

Happy Dawkins:
http://www.atheistunderworld.com/2011/02/25/does-dawkins-exist/ 
http://www.humanistlife.org.uk/2010/07/humanist-heroes-richard-dawkins-by-john-wayland/ 
http://www.atheistconvention.org.au/richard-dawkins/ 
http://www.nndb.com/people/281/000024209/ 

Now, can you stop poking about trying to derail threads about topics in which you clearly have no interest?

” Many people in the community are supporting him on this. ”

Should rephrase that to many of HIS community are supporting him on this. From what I can tell those followers are eating everything he is saying and not getting the whole story either.

Yes, it is hard to carry more than one umbrella. It does help when you know you’re not the only one carrying them! Not everyone is cut out to do multiple things at once and I fault them not in the least for doing what they’re good at. I would only ask that one not get in the way of those who can multitask. It is not that hard to (for example) not tell racist or sexist jokes because you know it hurts other atheists you care about. Fighting for the “right” to do so is in fact carrying more than one umbrella. It is also swinging that umbrella so that it hits other people in the face, which takes way more energy than just putting the umbrella down. (to run to the point of ridiculousness with your analogy, lol) 

We’ve got to be careful in going off topic to meet our goals. I know what you’re saying, but again and again, I’ve seen popular activists bring in their own issues, and shock the room. They suddenly had half as much support as they did a few seconds previous to that.

I think a lot of our people would chime in on these side-issues, but don’t because their opinion isn’t popular in the movement. Well if we talked more about what we agree on and kept our focus on the opposition, more of our otherwise silent people would help out by getting more involved. 

The only way to fix it is to unhesitatingly alienate sexists and bigots of all stripes. 

I’m sorry. 

There’s really no other way. 

Frankly, to me, if I hear ‘patriarchy’ my eyes start to glaze over and the person saying it starts to look and sound like David Icke going on about invisible space lizards.

Should atheists change what they call their arguments because theist critics’ eyes “glaze over” every time an atheist starts going on about the importance of evidence and how arguments should be backed up by it?

Honestly, and I don’t know you besides your comments here on this thread, so this may well be unfair, but from what you’ve said in the quoted portion above, my original assessment was painfully accurate. Feminists shouldn’t have to change how they describe their fundamental arguments, such as about the existence and prevalence of patriarchy, simply because their critics are too lazy or dismissive to engage with them. The concept they are talking about is called “patriarchy”. If that makes your eyes glaze over, that’s a problem for you, not for them.

If you see something wrong within the Atheist community, then why not try to fix it?    Is it not our civic duty?   If the LBGT community was prejudice against atheist, then I assume that atheist members of LBGT community would try to change that.

P.S. Addressing membership concerns in a movement is a primary issue.   You want to get people on your side, and therefor issues like sexism and homophobia, which keep people away are critically important.  

I am glad the movement is comfortable for you. Can you explain why that is more important than the comfort of others, especially people who also experience discrimination from society at large? 

“start to think about each other as human beings,” so you’re a feminist.  You want to address the issues about male privilege.  And how some members of our community don’t feel welcome or even safe.  Or did you actually mean “it’s time to stop thinking about all the ways our society treats men and women, cis and tran, and gay and straight, white and non-white differently, and as long as those that are on the short end of the stick keep their mouths shut, everything will be hunky-dory.” 

So much this.

Talking about problems isn’t the problem. The problems are the problem, and ignoring them does not make them go away.

I apparently misunderstood. Let me rephrase– why shouldn’t members of a movement feel comfortable within that movement? Surely a constant feeling of being uncomfortable and unwelcome contributes less to our success as a whole than a sense of personal comfort and inclusiveness, yes?

You assume that only religious theocrats are capable of screwing up lives.  Homophobia and misogyny are not exclusive of religion.   

True, but we should be better given that we are not tied to
the morals of bronze aged goat herders.

I agree with you that the end goal of the movement is to collectively fight harm from religion. I am right with you there. I ask you to imagine a scenario, though, that might help you understand where some of us are coming from. A group of people have assembled to discuss tactics for getting a religious banner removed from a government building. In the process of discussion, several members of the group use the term “faggot” to denigrate a particular (let’s say) board member who is trying to obstruct their actions. One person from the group speaks up and says hey, I’m gay, and that makes me feel unwelcome. He is told by a couple others that he is trying to hijack the discussion for his own politically correct agenda and should focus on what’s really important.

Does he feel like his contribution is welcome? Will he come back? Will he be missed? Should he be?
If we change the target individual to a woman, and the derogatory word to “pussy,” does that change anything?
What about if we change that person’s gender identity, or ethnicity, or culture, or social class? Is it still relevant whether or not they have to put up with such exclusionary behavior and language in order to participate in our common goals?

To me, it’s relevant, the language we use, the actions we take, if those actions and that language work to actively exclude members of our community in participating.

(and I swear, I am not deliberately or maliciously harping on you, I just know you’re a person and not a troll so responding to your comments feels more safe for me than responding to others)

I’m interested in the effects of religion on social policy, and the effects of theism on the critical thinking skills of people. Those are the discussions I tend to get involved in. I get involved with those kinds of discussions on other forums, as well. In short, I don’t see this purely as an atheist blog, just a window into some areas of interest.

I don’t think it’s silly for atheists to get together for the reasons you list, just for them to do it purely because they’re atheists, and not for their common interests (which may be related to their atheism, of course).

I am proud to have you call me “not perfectly healthy in the head”.

Considering that religion fuels much of the anti-LGBT and anti-woman rhetoric and behavior in the world, damn right that atheism should be concerned about those things. Atheists should point out religion’s role in trying to keep over half the U.S. population from being equal before the law, because (for example) even many well-meaning Christians will not approach these issues from that perspective.

We’re not just against religion, we’re against religion because IT HURTS PEOPLE.

Where is the empathy?

Your post really struck a chord with me, but this question, more than anything else, is it, imo.

What has shocked/disillusioned/disheartened me most about all of the dramas/infighting of the last year or so is the (apparent) complete lack of empathy and/or generosity of spirit displayed by some people.

The attempts to utterly dismiss peoples’ experiences, by slapping words like ‘paranoid’ or ‘irrational’ on them…….luckily, there are enough very intelligent, generous, compassionate and fair people in the places I frequent (like here:) to offset this for me, but yeah, it starts to wear on your after awhile.

Hey Bridget,

I’m a little confused. How are misogyny, homophobia, racism not the real enemies? I think what Natalie was saying was that atheism alone is not an answer; just as reasonable people should not believe in god and also not believe in Bigfoot, there are multiple issues that people are mistaken about because they are not thinking skeptically enough. If social issues are some of those, how are they not in the purview of the atheist movement?

You do realize that people who associate themselves with Skepchick are not perfectly healthy in the head to begin with?

Yeah, blanket ad homs ‘contribute’ sooooo much to the discussion.

Please tell me you’re like 12yrs old.

 Use “em” instead of “i”

So what you said isn’t the topic, and you’re not going to answer me. Good to know.

This….. This is what we are doing to each other when we don’t agree with a perspective, outlook or belief.

I feel that I’ve personally come a long way in the last few years of reading the various atheist and humanist blogs. Had the community unhesitatingly alienated me in the beginning for some of the stupid shit I said and believed, I wouldn’t have had the chance to learn all that I have and gained in the empathy that I have for the feminist and LBGT communities.

The point is; we’re all human and we say stupid and irrational things sometimes.
Maybe we should engage in the forgiveness that we accuse the religious groups
of hypocriticly lacking. None of us will ever be perfect.

 Natalie Reed blogs pseudonymously because she is a trans woman, not because she is an atheist.  And in much of the US, being transgendered is still a perfectly legal reason to fire someone and/or deny them housing, leaving aside the obvious threat of being openly trans* in many (if not most) US communities. Just because *you’re* not talking about being LGBT doesn’t mean it is not relevant to the discussion. In this case, it is the heart of the issue.

Small correction: She’s in Canada, not the US.

 I hope you don’t mind a brief derail, but all your comments in this thread are top notch, in my opinion. Well-reasoned and clearly presented.

 I dunno, when you have people in our movement telling other people in our movement that their experiences don’t matter, or making people feel unwelcome on the basis of their gender, race, or orientation, then I see that as a pretty big problem. And while it’s not always an either/or thing, it’s hard to say to the women in this movement “we value you as allies in the pursuit of secular aims” while also making common cause with misogynists. If I have to make a choice between which group to align with, I’m going to choose the one that cares about social justice in addition to atheism.

How to fix it? Simple. Stop believing our atheism unites us in anything other than a dis- belief in deities. The mistake is assuming the fellow atheist you are chatting to is going to share your ideals or moral stance or even taste in music.

I’m neither happy nor unhappy about it. It sounds like she made a wise choice.

Dude, that’s great that you don’t let internet trolls “get your goat”, and I get that you have some understanding of LGBT issues because of personal connections.  But (judging by your picture and previous posts) you will never have to move towns because the wrong people found out you were born a different sex then you now present, you will never be told that you can’t see your dying spouse in hospital because same sex couples can’t really get married, no one will ever assume you were only promoted so management would look more diverse, and you will never be told that it was your fault you were raped because your skirt was too short.

If prejudice and bigoted behavior were restricted to forum trolls and hit and run blog comments, you might have a point.  But reality is that  women, the LGBQ and trans communities, and visible minorities do deal with prejudice and bigoted behavior in “meat space”, too.

You can pretend all you want that you can safely ignore someone making a sexiest/racist/transphobic/homophobic comment on a blog because they are just using their anonymity to be a jerk and would never say that/act on those prejudices in the real world.

The people who do regularly have to put up with that real world prejudice and bigotry don’t have that luxury.

Even if I accepted your premise that activists should expect mistreatment (I don’t – activism is about correcting these kinds of wrongs), what about nonactivists who are victimized?

I blog under a pseudonym because I was raised in a family involved in the Christian Patriarchy movement, and if my family knew I blogged about it I might not be allowed to see my siblings again (and I have loads of them, including a number still in grade school – look up “quiverfull” if you’re curious). And I kind of, you know, like seeing my siblings. But I also feel passionate about opposing the ideas and viewpoints that caused me such harm, especially as a woman (again, look up “Christian patriarchy” sometime, it’s an actual movement and it teaches that women are always – ALWAYS – to be under and obedient to a male authority). So what I think I’m saying is, there are understandable reasons to blog under a pseudonym. I have one, and Natalie Reed has one too. 

Also, look up the sort of harassment trans women face, they DO face the threat of death, and that, NOT her atheism, is why Natalie Reed blogs under a pseudonym. 

 We should be better.  We need to be better.  But it takes work.  Most of us grew up in households or in communities that were tied to the morals of bronze age goat herders (myself included).  It is important that if we see crappy behavior that we point it out, and we try to fix it.  A lot of times, people behaving this way don’t realize the consequences of their actions.

You are deliberately trying to ignore the point and steer the conversation in the misguided direction you want. My point was precisely about the lack of legitimacy in doing just that. I have made my point, clearly and unequivocally. You are just being disingenuous.

If a subject matter strives or claims to be objective then personal feelings and desires become a source of error. It’s called “confirmation bias.” 

Look it up.

Mitigating confirmation bias and other error is a necessary prerequisite for “accomplishing anything.” Your view of accomplishing anything seems to lie in imposing something outside of the subject matter on the subject matter.

Science doesn’t always tell us what we want to hear, Are you telling us we must change it to make the experimental results more “comfortable?” Yours are the noises of an ideologue, a dogmatist. 

 Cutting your wrists is also more dangerous than starting smoking.

 Not all victim blaming is the same.

 I had a good job offer withdrawn when my prospective employer discovered I was an atheist.  I’ve become estranged from my brother because of my atheism.  There are real world problems with being an atheist in the US.

I’m not really concerned about atheist burnout. All sorts of people get burned out when they throw their body and soul into some cause. Religious people get burned out volunteering at church all the time. It is a common occurrence. Of course atheists can also get burned out if they spend lots and lots of time on the atheism cause. Being burned out is a way the body or mind tells you to slow things down. Achieve a better balance of things in your life. There will be others to pick up the baton. Don’t sweat it.

 Except for the fact that, you know, WOMEN ARE SAYING IT IS A PROBLEM.

I agree to the extent that temples to atheism and other apparent mimicries of religious organisations are to be largely avoided. However, I think  clubs and conventions and similar conventions for humanist and scientific interests that are largely atheistic are not only healthy for atheists, but for society as a whole. It’s a short and not disingenuous step to atheist clubs and conventions, and these are also needed to counter the effect of large scale faithism in society. I would be an atheist even if no one else was, and I have never been to a large atheist gathering or movement. However:

 1. Community and social affirmation are natural human needs.
2. Religionists and theists (faithers in general) are going to call atheists a religious group no matter what we do or do not do because they think it undermines our standpoint somehow and are of course happy to equivocate on their kind of faithist and religious community and a secular community that rejects all faith systems.3. Atheists absolutely are singled out for abuse and discrimination by religionists and faithers in general – especially in ever growing bible belts. This discrimination can be quite overt, or quite sophisticated. In the US it is at the level of congress and goes all the way down. The Senate in Australia is also full of faithism.
4. It is also a natural and psychological fact that it is easier to affect the thinking of most humans if they have a reference example of more than a few individuals scattered about. It is a sad but unavoidable fact that true freethinking is opposed by natural human propensities to seek social affirmation and safety in numbers. Many people need a group to teach them not to be led by any group think. 

I was a faither for many years myself, and the most interesting persons to me are atheists that have managed to continue to reject all faiths from 
young (I was an atheist until about 15 years of age.) I find that such persons are very robust as individuals. Unfortunately, they often do not recognise the benefits of community and social bonding.I have been vocal on the Web as an atheist for over ten years, but otherwise I tend to be quite isolated due to a lack of resources and time (I am a mature age student with three children fighting a custody dispute and working casually). However, I recently found myself utterly situationally stymied and reached out through an atheist forum asking for help from other like minded people. I am very glad I did and an excellent atheist barrister gave me his time and assistance pro-bono. Without this help and due to my lack of expertise and understanding I would have made some serious mistakes.There is a cost and a downside to group dynamics, however this cost is mitigated by other factors for atheists, a-faithers, and anti-religionists. One runs the risk of being associated with individuals and ideas that one does not endorse, and one’s individual identity can be somewhat diluted. However, the atheist community stands apart from all religious and faith communities in the  following centrally important respects that all embody a rejection of faith thinking and faith dynamics: 

– We embrace defeasible and revisable thinking and embrace and validate disagreement, dissent and the questioning of established thinking. No dogma allowed – not really.
– We reject arguments from authority, and regard arguments from scientific authority as defeasible and subject to question, debate, and rejection. If we discovered that evolution as it stands is wrong according to evidence – say that aliens tweaked the adaptive process or we are really evolved from molecules in the poop of  some ancient astronaut – we would embrace the more correct theory (intelligent design theorists actually cannot do this with respect to their central theses because that central thesis is ultimately a supernatural god as dictated by their religious texts – thus ID really does back up to religion and not science).
– We reject an epistemology based upon faith in favour of one based upon the above and upon what can be reasonably known from the pubically demonstrable and materially provable information of evidence.
– We don’t have to agree with each other on anything else at all, including moral realism and ethics.Randian atheists and socialist atheists don’t generally get along politically and politically and morally conservative atheists don’t go too well with liberals on moral issues. Then there are atheists that look more like agnostics, whom ‘strong’ atheists like myself think have largely missed the point and are vulnerable to Pascal’s  Wager (they would disagree). The central theme is that reason based upon scientific understanding with the defeasibility and revisability that goes along with it is our common epistemic pole star, and along with it the complementary rejection of faith based epistemologies (accepted ways of knowing facts, and what constitute facts). The human intellect directed at nature through science and the curiosity that goes with it is what solves our problems, not believing in spaghetti monsters.
Activism can be perceived as both evangelical and as embodying fanaticism, but this doesn’t change the fact that there are many things that activists do and say that protect atheists. People like Alexander Ann – and especially their speech and ability to criticise religious doctrines and beliefs – have to be protected. We will be identified as a group no matter what we do, and religionists and syncretists will ascribe religiosity to us anyway, even though it is completely nonsensical to do so. At best they will have to reduce their of faiths to ideologies pursuant to this, and they don’t want to do that.I am a PhD candidate in philosophy and many philosophers are atheists (the opposition between religionists and philosophers goes back at least as far as Socrates) – but there is also a concerted effort by theists to discredit philosophical thought  which is exemplified in the New Testament admonition to reject human philosophy as ’empty’ at best.It would be good just to be able to fade into the background, and I think that is a valid strategy open to atheists at any time in any place. I doubt that wil ever be a live option while faithism is so powerful and widespread. We are not called to witness or to live or die for any faith, and if we were, we should probably reject the idea (although I understand political and other associated activisms).  I like all kinds of friendly decent human being, and am happy to associate with religious individuals who are friendly and decent (although I find it best to avoid them in large groups where their group think usually takes hold), but I find it helpful and healthy to be around persons of my own intellectual and ideological disposition. The thing is, since atheism is the rejection of all faiths and of faith ‘thinking’ in general – the epistemology embraced by an atheist is going to be different from that used by faithers (I use ‘faithers’ as the short form of faith-adherents and yes, it is supposed to be somewhat disrespectful of faith-adherence). The scientific approach to epistemology is under attack from faithism continually at all levels of human society and endeavour. Athiest clubs and conventions are part of what is required to oppose it.Syncretic humanists and secularists may stand with you if someone tries to subject your children to Sharia law, but you will need atheists to stand with you to oppose the programming of your children’s minds with faithism.

I didn’t suggest otherwise. I was talking about the threat of physical harm- which is very small.

Social problems are another matter. But an atheist who is open about his beliefs chooses to accept that.

My only point here is that I think an activist who can’t reveal their identity isn’t much of an activist, and isn’t much of a loss to the community if they move on.

Don’t be so precious. Advising someone not to respond to obvious trolls is completely different from blaming them for the actions of the trolls. In your world, no one could ever offer a victim advice on how to respond to a bully.

Can you name even one incident where Natalie picked a fight with a fellow atheist? The only high-profile instance I can think of is John Loftus and he picked a fight with her. Her disputes have almost entirely been with non-atheists, notably Be Scofield.

I think there is way to much arguing about stupid things in the atheist movement. There is so little unity. I too get tired often.

She got burned out on the behavior of some of her fellow movement types, not on blogging about them.

It’s not a serious problem because YOU don’t experience it, right? Why, what’s wrong with being able to slap your secretary’s ass when you feel like it?

Git.

Right, because you’ve never been at the receiving end of it, so therefore Not Serious or Important.

Fuck you, you privilege-blinded donkeyfucking douchecake.

Is there a way we can fix this problem before we lose some strong activists from our fold?

I’m not convinced that the activists were ‘ours’ to begin with.

Advocates of progressive social policy do quite a bit of good.  I’m happy they’re doing their thing.  But, their thing is working to realize some political goal.  It’s not promoting skepticism.

One movement is saying, “Question everything, especially the sacred cows.”  The other is saying, “Now’s the time for action to fix a real harm.  If you want to debate the existence of the harm, so it somewhere else.”

Both movements have merit.  But they’d benefit from separation.  Activists aren’t helped by commentors questioning their cause.  Promoters of skepticism aren’t helped by people who insist that their issue be above debate.

I can’t see anywhere where your reasoning is “wrong”.  But I do think it’s such a murky and personal area in our society, that being right or wrong about this issue is more a matter of personal perspective than anything else.  So many people, in our society at least, come to reason, humanism, even philosophy as a basic concept, by way of issues of religion and therefore, also atheism.  Atheism, while not a full-fledged philosophy, is a position on an important philosophical issue that can and often does contain many different and potentially powerful implications for people.  You might not like the messy reality, but there are many cultural threads that connect to atheism, even if you think the connections tenuous or false.   

Maybe in a few decades, when and if this trend changes and religion is not the huge driving force it is today, you will have a more important and workable point.  As I see it right now, the differences in these issues are much smaller to most people than to you.  Whether or not you think it is the correct appraoch, I don’t really see it changing soon.      

 People get together because they’re people and are social and enjoy getting together with other people.

I’ve lived in some more religious areas of the country. A gathering of atheists was about the only place where I could expect to get away from the all-pervasive assumption that everyone was religious. Any other gathering often turned out to be a gathering around a common interest – religion, even if it wasn’t stated as such.

 Hello C Peterson. I just visited your blog and see that you’re a middle-aged, married white guy. It doesn’t look like there’s much of a reason for you to be anonymous on the internet. Would anybody fire you from your job or cut off familial ties with you if they found out that you’re a man? I’m guessing not, but that’s exactly what could happen to Natalie if the people in her offline life found out that she is trans. Do straight white men ever get randomly beaten–and possibly murdered–because they’re straight white men? No, but that happens to trans* people and other folks under the LGBTQ spectrum FAR too often, and that’s the risk that Natalie would be facing if TF revealed her real name.

So if blogging anonymously is really so terrible, then what you’re saying is that people like Natalie–who can’t blog under their real names because of risks like these–shouldn’t blog at all. Or, at least, they shouldn’t speak about experiences like these. You’re saying that trans* issues aren’t something people should discuss unless they’re willing to risk losing their jobs, apartments, and loved ones. You get to talk about YOUR life, but they don’t get to talk about theirs.

One more point: “I don’t completely trust anybody who won’t reveal who they are… why
should I? Any story may be true, or just made up. I expect a degree of
verifiability.” Even if someone uses their full name, how are you supposed to verify their stories? My full name is Miriam Mogilevsky. A guy sexually assaulted me once. Go verify that. It’s true!

 this is why so many New Left women activists left for women’s rights work, back in the day.
 
We’ll be happy to have all the atheist women, too.

I would say there is a third camp, the camp that actually advocates for skepticism and/or atheism themselves, rather than as mere niche markets for this or that ideology or opportunities for personal influence. This camp is interested in honest and open inquiry.

Sadly, the two camps you refer to assume this third camp has sided with the other. That’s the joys of dichotomous polarizing ideologies. With us or against us, to hell with any other perspective. In the sound and fury (the noise with no signal), the original subject matter is lost, drowned out in the fanaticism.

Skepticism is neither left nor right, neither Republican nor Democrat. And atheism has no other content than lacking a belief in god(s). Ideologues are trying to annex skepticism and atheism into their dogmas. 

The situation is now so bad that the so-called FreeThoughtBlogs are excommunicating people on ideological grounds and orthodoxy requirements. The JREF, of course, has been banning people so vigorously, that a whole other online forum (The Skeptical Community) consisting of JREF excommunicates. Secular shunning, it seems, is now the policy of the day. Did you know that banning from the JREF is permanent? For life. Seriously. Now, that’s inclusive.

We need new blood and new leadership in both movements. The old guard have become pure garbage. Randi and Shermer have popularized dysfunctional definitions of skepticism with limited scopes of inquiry – what protects skepticism from ideological annexation. Harris is incoherent, philosophically and scientifically, and Myers/Brayton are anti-free and open inquiry. We have lost our way.

It turns out skepticism needs its philosophical skeptics after all. It may have been expeditious to side with the apologists and accommodationists, but in the long run, the hobbled visions of skepticism have decimated the primary function of skepticism. 

Sorry, I just don’t buy turning various minorities in the U.S. into victim groups. Everyone has their problems, some more than others, certainly. I just don’t accept activists for most of these causes hiding behind walls of anonymity. And I don’t accept that most adult LGBT folks are at serious risk for physical harm in revealing themselves… the statistics don’t support that. A higher risk, certainly. A high risk, I think not. And I’m not telling anybody to out themselves, just arguing for the activists to do so.

I don’t know exactly what I’ve lost or gained because of my views. I hold an elected office, and mentor science at a school, both in a community with a fair number of religious people. So far, no real problem (a couple of kids who were pulled from the school in part because of teaching evolution, though). A few friends lost, a few gained. Maybe some consulting jobs affected. A couple of directly emailed death threats because of my very public comments about Focus on the Family.

Sure, it would be hard to test the veracity of your story (although far easier knowing your name). The point was that the situation would be very different for an influential blogger- the sort of person under discussion here. A person whose identity was known could not easily get away with making up stories like that an passing them off as true… a reality that a few bloggers have recently learned the hard way.

I’m sure you’re right, both about how most people see this, and with your timelines. I was only talking about what I’d like to see, not what I actually expect to see anytime soon.

And I’m not suggesting otherwise. I just don’t think that common interest should be atheism, but rather, something that really is an interest, and isn’t automatically exclusionary of theists… things I’ve already mentioned like rationalism, secularism, humanism. These things provide an actual focus for discussion and common interest, and by their nature will bring together groups consisting mostly of atheists, while at the same time being less alienating to theists, and less able to drive the perception that atheism is “just another religion”.

 So, in other words, you agree with the idiots who say: “Atheism is a religion, toooooooooooo!”

 Well said, although I suspect that reconcilliation is perhaps too much to hope for. Perhaps asking them to take it outside is a reasonable compromise though? Feminism and MRA both share a common feature – they have nothing to do with atheism. Taking their ideology elsewhere doesn’t seem too much to ask.

The trouble with atheist movements is that people bring a whole slew of normative assumptions that are not in the least implied in the concept of atheism; as well as lending credence to religionists who wail “atheism is a religion too”, they sow the seeds for their own eventual disappointment.

Unwitting arrogance and wishful thinking, not unlike that of the woman who tries to change the “bad boy” and gets scorched in the attempt.

How am I aloof or dismissive? I simply stated my view- as my view- and didn’t criticize anybody else for their differing opinions.

The suggestion that because I’m a white male I can’t understand the world that others live in is what is dismissive and aloof, IMO.

Wow. Way to condescend and misrepresent. 

“I’m leaving because I got caught in the crossfire of someone’s personal war.
She’s not actually going anywhere. She didn’t say she’s going to stop writing for FTB. 

Since I’m off anyway, lemme tell you something: I never liked you anyway. See, I’ve never really been particularly interested in atheism;

This is a lie; Natalie’s interest in skepticism and atheism is passionate and sincere. 

I was always more interested in LGBT and feminist issues.

More like, LGBT and feminist issues are closest to the problems that most directly affect her life as a trans woman. Prejudice against atheists exists and affects her, but not nearly as much as transphobia and misogyny. 

I kept waiting for you to get bored of secularism and to start focussing on my areas of interest, but you never did.

More like, she’s waiting for secularists to realize that there’s a gigantic overlap between LGBT/feminism and secularist issues, and take advantage of that fact to grow their areas of influence. 

I mean, really, who is interested in secularism anyway? Old, white men, that’s who!

Are you suggesting that she’s incorrect about this? I mean, anyone who’s not a straight white guy is most likely experience prejudice with a much more tangible and immediate effect on their ability to live their lives freely and happily than anti-atheist prejudice. Straight white guys are the only ones who ONLY have to worry about that sort of prejudice; black atheists have to worry about that plus racism; women have to worry about that plus sexism, LGBT folks have to worry about that plus homo- and transphobia, and so on. It’s not surprising, then, that the organized movement is dominated by those who have the relative luxury to make fighting for secularism their first priority, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to change that. 

So I’m cutting you atheists loose and I’m off to hang out with my gay friends – they’re interested in LGBT issues.” 

I feel her on that one, I really do. I recently went to a progressive political conference that was dominated by religious folks, but, since they were all anti-racists, feminists, and pro-LGBT people, I never felt like I had to hide my atheism, nor would I ever doubt that they would fail to have my back if I were to experience discrimination for being an atheist. Unlike you, who clearly would tell me to fuck off if I asked you to have my back while dealing with misogyny. 

How to identify sexism:

1. Identify cultural attitudes that are based on the idea of male superiority and female inferiority. Male strength/rationality/honesty being contrasted with female weakness/emotionality/unreliability. 

2. Identify tropes, narratives, stories, jokes, etc., which rely on and/or propagate this dichotomous narrative

It’s actually not that difficult, but you have to pay at least a tiny modicum of attention first. I recommend checking out Finally Feminism 101 to get tools for identifying sexism: http://finallyfeminism101.wordpress.com/

And Manboobz http://manboobz.com/ for a quick go-to example of what sexism looks like. 

Often, anti-feminists will claim that speaking out about injustice is the true victimization, and if women would just stop talking about sexism, the problem would disappear. Don’t fall into this trap: speaking out against injustice is the opposite of being victimized. 

Any more questions, Mr. Disingenuous? 

“and certainly they are at no risk from the government itself”

Oh, really now??  After going after my sheriff for violating church/state issues I just coincidentally got ARRESTED 3 times and held in solitary confinement for a week .  I am still at risk from my government. Don’t make such broad generalizations.

Granted not all MRA’ers promote or even endorse this thinking, just as not all zebras are born with stripes. 

I’m starting to think that you have never read any of Natalie Reid’s articles from the way you dismiss her here.

Yo, Peterson, your privilege is showing.

And, in fact, the statistics DO support the fact that women, LGBT, and particularly gender non-conforming people are at a much higher risk of violence than others. The numbers aren’t as high because there are nowhere near as many queer people as there are cis and straight people. But proportionally, it is off the scale. One in four women report being sexually assaulted.* In incidents of biased violence against LGBT people showed that transgender people were the subject of 20% of all violence and 40% of police-initiated violence.** According to the same source, in 2010 44% of all LGBTQH (lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, queer, and HIV-affected) murder victims were trans women, and in 2009 it was 50%, despite that trans people make up only about 1% of the LGBT population.***

I can spit these sources all day. Please, like any good rationalist, please do your fucking research before you open your mouth.

*http://www.oneinfourusa.org/statistics.php
**http://ncavp.org/publications/NationalPubs.aspx
***http://transfeminism.tumblr.com/on_violence_against_trans_women

 I find it odd that so many atheists understand the concept of religious privilege, yet they fail to understand that it works the sameway with race, gender and sexuality. I have talked to white, cis, male atheists who can understand and point out Christian privilege, but yet they act like they have no cultural privilege. I recently had a white, cis, male atheist friend (who understands privilege) explain to me that he has no privilege, because being an atheist has completely negated all the cultural privilege he gets from being a while cis male. If they understand Christian privlege, then they should understand male privilege, and cis privilege, andwhite privilege. It’s the same concept.

THIS. We can’t claim to be the bigger person (people) if we’re sinking to their level.

The risk of such things in the U.S. is exceedingly small, and should not be a serious concern. If this happened to you for the reason you believe, you have superb grounds for a lawsuit, and there are a number of organizations that would be likely to help you with that.

I maintain that my summary was accurate as could be expected given the disparity in length between the two pieces.

She’s not actually going anywhere. She didn’t say she’s going to stop writing for FTB.
True, but the post read as a resignation letter to the atheist movement, including the words, “I quit. Consider this my act of serving the movement my divorce papers.”

This is a lie; Natalie’s interest in skepticism and atheism is passionate and sincere.
I can only go by what she said. She starts off by saying how atheism was never really her thing to begin with, talks about how she was passionate about her idea of skepticism, but how that never really aligned with her idea of what it should be, because it didn’t realise the potential of taking on “[m]isogyny, sexism, cissexism, gender binarism, racism, able-ism…” Then she goes on to talk about how she resents the way that atheism dominates skepticism, how she doesn’t see why atheism should be such a big deal and calling the atheist movement a religion. She grudgingly admits the value of secularism, but seemingly only as a way of addressing her preferred issues when it comes to religiously motivated discrimination.

It seems to me that Natalie came to atheism/skepticism seeking a vehicle for her pet issues. She didn’t find the traction that she wanted and now she’s leaving to seek elsewhere. Hardly the actions of someone with a sincere passion for skepticism and atheism.

More like, she’s waiting for secularists to realize that there’s a gigantic overlap between LGBT/feminism and secularist issues, and take advantage of that fact to grow their areas of influence.
Perhaps there is. And Natalie has made her case to that end, failed to succeed to her satisfaction and is now leaving. It’s not whether or not she’s right that’s relevant, but how she responded to that “rejection”. And she responded not as “another burnt out atheist”, but rather as a frustrated LGBT/feminist activist.

It’s not surprising, then, that the organized movement is dominated by those who have the relative luxury to make fighting for secularism their first priority, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to change that.
But change it how? By changing the secular movement into a broad church social justice movement? I beg to differ. More pertinently, those who decide how the movement’s limited resources can best be allocated beg to differ. One thing is for certain, however, and that it is that this demographic is not going to change if people keep leaving the secular movement because it is not a LGBT/feminist movement.

Unlike you, who clearly would tell me to fuck off if I asked you to have my back while dealing with misogyny.
That’s uncalled for. And just as damaging to the movement as the behaviours that you condemn. Wanting to maintain a tight organisational agenda and turning away someone in distress are two very different things. Making personal attacks based on a difference of opinion does not help your case, nor does it create the sort of community that you claim to want.

I donno, C Peterson.  It seems to me that you are dismissing both the threat of violence and the potential to be an advocate while writing under a pseudonym.   I think that’s more reiterating your position than calling names.

Anonymity shouldn’t matter in blogging if the intended audience does not need to know the specific identity of who is speaking in order to meaningfully engage with the blog’s content or other commenters. The impact of a blog is not so dichotomously determined by whether or not the author is anonymous: there is a large array of reasons people are attracted to blogs, and the author’s name is small among these. The success of those popular blogs by pseudonymous persons and the subsequent thanks they get from commenters is good proof.

Particular persons are much more likely aware of their personal situation than random people on the internet. The statistics of harassment for groups of people are rather irrelevant when we’re talking about decisions individuals make in awareness of their personal situation. The person you are responding to for example, Libby Anne, just cited her own family as a reason for pseudonymity. I don’t think there are statistics on how Libby Annes’s families respond to Libby Annes when they go public with their feminist and atheist opinions. And indeed the very act of blogging and being widely-read amplifies the likelihood of harassment and bullying beyond anything the usual controlled studies could represent. I also take issue with the implication that physical harm is the only “real” thing to worry about when it comes to negative consequences.

Exactly what “basic human rights” are you being denied and what is my role in this oppression? You seem to feel that if you walk into a room and people aren’t talking about feminism then they’re actively oppressing you. News flash: there are lots of worthy issues in this world. Someone choosing to focus on an issue other than your pet issue is not an attack on you or your issue.

I always find people who insist that the only harm you have to worry about is physical harm. There are plenty of other harms which aren’t physically damaging, but damaging nonetheless.
And yes, I run the risk of physical attack everytime I go outside because there are plenty of people in the area ready and willing to physically assault me for being trans. In fact, a state representative recently openly claimed he would “stomp into the ground” any trans person who tried to get near his children. Most people in the area didn’t even challenge it.

 She doesn’t owe you anything, you condescending twit. “You’re damaging your own movement…” Thanks for your concern.

This is why I have never and will never have *any* desire to attend an atheist conference.

We’re at a turning point. Any social movement large enough to become relevant has a choice to make: Are we relevant to our society, or to ourselves alone? Are we seeking inclusion in our culture, or merely protection from it?

Let’s be honest, we don’t have to go very far to find racist, sexist, homo/transphobic rhetoric in the atheist/skeptic movements. In fact, we’re clogged with it. The real question, then, is whether we’ll do anything about it. Do we say, “Any skeptic is a good skeptic”, let the bigots rule the roost and allow the chips to fall where they may? Or do we set an outer limit and administer, as John Scalzi calls it, The Mallet of Loving Correction?

The choice is critical to the fate of any movement. Recall the history of the labor movement as it chose to desegregate. Contrast the history of the Republican Party as it chose to embrace and defend segregationists, homophobes, and fringe fundementalists of all stripes. That’s the choice: mainstream or fringe, inclusion or isolation, relevance or zeal. Either way, people will walk; the question is who. 

I’ve never regretted dumping the entitled, be they racists, misogynists, or homophobes. I won’t share a movement with them, period, and I’m not the only one. So, let’s decide: who stays, who goes.

It’s mainly the feminists that have been wrong, time and time again.