Hi! I'm a tech guy, skeptic, feminist, gamer and atheist, and love OSS and science of all stripes. I enjoy a good bit of whargarbl now and again, and will occasionally even seek it out. I am also apparently responsible for the death of common sense on the internet. My bad.
I have opinions. So do you. You want to share them with me. I would like to do likewise. Please don't expect a platform for proselytizing that will go unchecked and unchallenged, though. Contact me via the clicky thingies under my banner.
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Just finished the video (in two sittings). I don’t mind the term “militant atheist” in the least.
I don’t know what it is that bothers me about it, considering there’s an accepted definition that basically says “is confrontational regarding a creed or cause”, without needing to be necessarily violent. It’s just the fact that it’s as easily applied to violent persons, I guess. Because of that fact, it’s used as a slur, basically. As though we’re somehow prone to radicalism.
I agree that the connotations of violence are regrettable, to say the least. However, violence seems to be always the last resort of the religious rather than the irreligious.
I’m somewhat partial to this definition:
Having forgotten my damned headphones, I will have to watch this after school. I would however, like to throw in my towel for militant before I even do.
There is evangelical, but the connotations and implications are more unpleasant than those of militant. Then there is fundamentalist. While I accept that there are actually atheists to whom this applies, they are few and far between – mainly because few people take any sort of dogmatic approach to their lack of belief.
Militant works, because I absolutely am aggressive and tenacious about pushing acceptance of that lack of belief. And I make no apologies for aggressively addressing the concerns that a lot of theists have about letting go of Faith. I skirt and probably often cross the line between education and proselytizing – and again, I have an aggressive approach, in that I refuse to let a person I am communicating with frame who and what I am.
And I realize this may come as a shock to everyone, but while I am not inclined to be particularly mean about it, I am not inclined to be nice about it either. Indeed, when I am provoked (please don’t hate me for it:) I can be a fairly hardcore asshole.
Silly DuWayne. That’s one of the things we love about you!
I do like the definition Dan gave, and I do openly state I have no compunction against mixing it up or being slightly or even very mean with my application of logic, reason and evidence to the destruction of someone else’s viewpoint. I’m just a little skittish about the use of the word “militant” given people’s propensity to associate the word with a) freedom fighters / revolutionaries, and b) violent organizations like the Black Panthers for instance. Like over at CyberLizard’s, where one of his commenters threw that possibility out there like it was an obvious conclusion to draw.
No matter what else, no matter how hardcore of assholes any of us are, at the bare minimum we are not violent about it. One of Sweetums’ most endearing qualities was the fact that he DIDN’T hurt anyone.
Oh, but often are the times when I want to be, really I do.