Atheists Talk: Carl Dix on "Tips for Tim Tebow"

Carl Dix is a longtime revolutionary and a founding member of the Revolutionary Communist Party. He is a co-issuer of the Call for the National Day of Resistance to Stop Mass Incarceration. In 1970, he was part of the largest mass refusal of U.S. soldiers to go to Vietnam . In 1996, he co-founded the October 22nd Coalition to Stop Police Brutality. In 2006, he coordinated the Katrina Hearings of the Bush Crimes Commission. In 2011, he co-issued a call for a campaign of civil disobedience to STOP “Stop & Frisk.” Most recently Dix participated a series of dialogues with Cornel West – “In the Age of Obama: Police Terror; Incarceration; No Jobs; Mis-Education… What Future for Our Youth”

Carl will join us to talk about Tim Tebow and his outsized notoriety, which is based on a combination of promoting religious fundamentalism and overhyped football skills. Last year, with moderate success on the field, Tim Tebow created a national sensation as the poster-boy fundamentalist Christian athlete. During the off-season, the Denver Broncos traded him to the New York Jets. What kind of welcome will Tebow receive in the Big Apple?

One of the main ways in which Tim Tebow proselytizes for his religious fundamentalism is through continual and prominent citation of verses from the Bible. Carl will discuss “Tips for Tim Tebow,” an article that suggests some Bible passages Tebow should cite if he really believes the biblical literalism he professes to uphold. The article highlights the actual content–the fundamental worldview, relations, values, and morals–which are promoted, and indeed insisted upon, in the Bible.

These biblical tips include passages from Deuteronomy, Exodus, Leviticus, Proverbs and Numbers which uphold slavery, the mass raping of women, the murder of babies and little children, the killing of homosexuals and women who are charged with losing their virginity out of wedlock. If Tim Tebow wants to truly inform people about what the Bible represents, he should tell them the truth about what it advocates.

Additionally, Carl is involved in the effort to manifest powerful resistance to mass incarceration on April 19th — the National Day of Resistance to Stop Mass Incarceration, and he will bring that, and the vigilante murder of Trayvon Martin, into the conversation as well.

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Atheists Talk: Carl Dix on "Tips for Tim Tebow"
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8 thoughts on “Atheists Talk: Carl Dix on "Tips for Tim Tebow"

  1. 2

    The guy who advocates an unprovoked nuclear attack on Iran (using bombs more powerful than the US even has) is lecturing about mass-murderers? That’s almost funny.

  2. 3

    Re Raging Bee @ #2

    Apparently my neighbor, Mr. Bee, has a different definition of provoked than I do. I consider the Government of Iran’s support of terrorist organizations such as Hamas and Hizbollah, its race to develop nuclear weapons, its support of the Assad kleptocracy in Syria, and its support of the Taliban in Afghanistan as very serious provocations and well meriting a serious put down.

  3. 4

    My own opinion on Iran – there isn’t any doubt in my mind that the government of Iran is pretty bad, and as a person who believes in human rights and secular governments I’m no fan of their regime.

    At the same time, I would consider the indiscriminate killing of Iranian civilians, many of whom are oppressed by and do not support their government, would be nonetheless a great crime.

    But as for Tim Tebow, I wonder what he’s doing with the money he’s making. I think that would be an interesting examination of how his beliefs really affect his life.

  4. 5

    This is a moment for true skepticism, that is, the skepticism that doesn’t poison the well. I have massive problems with the RCP, USA: their historical homophobia; their cult of personality around Bob Avakian; their claim to be the “vanguard” of the revolution; their Leninism/Maoism; their unquestioning allegiance to Shining Path; their historical tendency to hijacking radical political movements; etc. However, Carl Dix may have some enlightening/interesting/new things to say about the execrable Tim Tebow, and I would not dismiss what he has to say solely on the basis of his affiliation with RCP, USA. But I would be careful.

  5. 6

    Thanks for the post clamboy.

    It demonstrates an important principle; a person can be a member of a group that frequently expresses some questionable opinions (as a person who has studied the Cultural Revolution rather extensively I tend to get a bit leery of people who describe themselves as Maoist) does not invalidate what they might be saying on a particular issue.

    Perhaps a problem in the other direction many people have is that once a person seems to be “right” on a few issues, they are then assumed to be perfectly enlightened about everything and any judgments they make on anything are accepted uncritically, which is more or less the beginning of a cult of personality.

  6. 7

    I agree with Clamboy.

    I met Avakian in the middle 1970s when in grad school in a Boston suburb. Boston was in the midst of the a school busing desegregation conflict. Surprisingly the RCP stood steadfast with the white supremacists in opposing busing. This stance stemmed from the RCP’s perception of the U.S. working class as white and male. To his credit Avakian now admits the RCP’s objection to busing was a mistake. Other, similar mistakes included the RCP’s views on homosexuality, youth culture, and unmarried couples living together–all of which they opposed as being ultimately bourgeois.

    The arguments, then and now, made by Avakian show the logic of following ideological doctrine. Acts can be rationalized which would otherwise appall the person doing the rationalization. Likewise, mistakes are made when the doctrine itself is based on an incorrect understanding of the situation.

    Avakian is an avowed Maoist, the most authoritarian and possibly the most dogmatic, branch of Marxism. Avakian is following Mao in establishing a cult of personality. Eric Gordon says in The Maoist Cultism of the RCP Is Anti-Marxist:

    RCP members refer to themselves as “comrades and students of RCP Chairman Bob Avakian”, and argue that “if you want to change the world … you need to know Bob Avakian”. They talk of the need to “cherish and defend” him, because “a leader like this only comes along once in a great while”. We are called on to read his memoirs and listen to “the whole 11-hour DVD set” of Bob Avakian speaking, and hold parties to view it with everyone we know. One article describes an immigrant working 7 days a week, 12 hours a day, who takes his one day off on New Years day to travel to the Rose Bowl parade and “tell people about Bob Avakian”, and claims that in the projects in LA people now greet each other by “putting their fists to their hearts and shouting out, ‘B. A.’.” Someone even “begins to cry as he hears of the future envisioned by Bob Avakian — ‘People need this kind of leader to unleash their creativity'”. One acolyte is quoted on their website saying “if Lenin were alive today, he’d sound a lot like Bob Avakian”. At demonstrations, these students of Avakian have chanted, “The earth is quakin’/ Follow Bob Avakian/ The empire’s shakin’/ Follow Bob Avakian!”

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