No gods, masters, saints, prophets, icons…do I really need to make a list?


Hey! I forgot to mention! You know, that Anti-Theism International Convention that is handing out the most prestigious Awards in the Atheist Community is also having an auction.

If you attend, you can bid on a beautiful painting of Christopher Hitchens.

Not the photo to the right. A painting kind of like that that doesn’t exist. Yet.

They are now taking offers to paint it. Don’t worry, they’ll pay you! The offer even includes free admission to the conference.

I guess they’re appealing to the kinds of people who want a fancy painting, any painting, of Christopher Hitchens on their wall, and they think advertising the potential existence of such an object will be a draw for their event.

It’s two things I really detest: atheist idolatry and selling vapor. We might as well be Catholics.

Comments

  1. mikehuben says

    Even better, this one is at least twice as numerous as The Last Supper, without including PZ but including some of PZ’s least favorites.

    I’m sure we could find more examples.

    But I do have a serious question. Don’t images help us adopt ideas? Don’t we want to relate ideas with people who created or popularized them? And at what point does use of images become idolotry?

  2. JoeBuddha says

    Ideas are fine. Images are fine. Images of assholes are not, IMHO. I’m a huge fan of Isaac Asimov’s work. However, I would never have a pic of him on my wall. Too much of a creep in real life.

  3. says

    #1: “Always question authority”, accompanied by photos of authorities. I’m getting mixed messages here.

    I admit, I looked to see if I’d be one of the 32 authorities in their poster, but I wasn’t disappointed that I wasn’t included when C.K., Maher, Gervais, McAffee, TJ Kincaid, Dawkins, and Harris are. And who the heck is “darkantics”?

  4. mikehuben says

    Here’s the RationalWiki article on Jon Matter aka DarkAntics aka DarkMatter2525. “Jon Matter,[2] better known as DarkMatter2525(link) (and his alternate non-cartoon channel, DarkAntics(link)), is a popular atheist YouTuber who makes animations, mainly against fundamentalist religious views. He has another channel at which he has videos debunking fallacious theist claims.”

    Most of his positions seem acceptable here, excepting “DarkMatter2525 has criticized feminism, comparing feminists to radical Muslims.[9] He also believes that activism is being perverted by SJWs, though he admits that the term has been overused.”

  5. bryanfeir says

    @Ronald Couch, JoeBuddha:
    Asimov was a self-proclaimed ‘dirty old man’, and groping women at conventions, including in elevators, was not at all unheard of for him. It was generally covered up by the people running the conventions at the time, because he was an important man, but the whisper network was in full swing.

    Basically he was a boundary-disrespecting teenage horndog in a senior’s body, with a large host of enablers. I’m not aware of anything worse (i.e., drugging or refilling drinks) but he was still an active participant in how unfriendly the convention culture was to women at the time.

  6. says

    “DarkMatter2525 has criticized feminism, comparing feminists to radical Muslims.”

    I used to like his cartoons. They were funny.
    It sucks finding out that yet another atheist activist whose anti-theist content I used to enjoy is a misogynist or some other kind of bigot.

  7. consciousness razor says

    They haven’t gotten into the relics racket. Yet.

    I don’t see why they couldn’t auction off a Hitchens foreskin too. Well, I don’t really know what the market is like … perhaps make it a dozen.

  8. ColeYote says

    #1: that is a weird mixture of reactionary shites and people I actually respect. I’m gonna guess the dude who made that has since disavowed Jon Stewart, Adam Savage, Bill Nye and Patton Oswalt for being SJWs.

  9. JoeBuddha says

    Some of Asimovs books were pretty good. Especially the science stuff. However, his slimy attitude is one of the reasons my stupid self took so long to become an actual audult, though. (and, sadly, many of the other Golden Age sci-fi writers…)

  10. mikeschmitz says

    #1 at least 2 in that gallery aren’t even atheists (Yousafzai and King), and Tyson claims not to be…and where’s Dennet? You (not you personally) gonna put up the horsemen, including a dead one, and leave out one who is still alive?