Telltale II

Perhaps though I do not give Telltale the Atheist enough credit. While his discourse will produce no mass conversion of any kind and should not from its very thinness he is propounding a position and a position is something around which people can rally. And people do rally around his position and do so reasonably if they know nothing better. His discourse wins spot conversions among a certain demographic of the wavering and, of course, performs the function of enacting and sustaining in group solidarity centered around the like function and other social media metrics. Indeed, he has stated his thoughts in such a way that a kind of cult can crystallize around them. This cult may well be growing as its principles are direct and easy to con and have, still, a certain iconoclastic glow. Now Telltale will no doubt say that there is NOTHING so gauche and stupid as claiming that atheism so constructed is a religious movement and a cult. I’m afraid he is very wrong about this at least where an ACADEMIC understanding of religion is concerned. You see, academics in the field of religion do not typically understand religion as a ‘thing’ having a clear cut definition. ‘Religion’ refers to a continuum of behaviors of varying levels of intensity. There is literally NO place we can point to, to say where this continuum begins and where it ends. Sports can be a religion in this sense and if sports can be a religion there is no reason why atheism cannot be one too. Or at least, and this is probably the more accurate thing to say, there is no reason it cannot construct itself in terms analogous to the way things like Christianity or Bahai construct themselves. Functionally and analogically there is no reason not to say that Marxist Leninism is a religion to cite one notorious example. Does it have rituals like parades or solemn public commemorations? Check. Does it venerate relics? Check. Does it have an ordered system of doctrine founded upon an exemplary teacher? Check. Does it police the boundaries of this doctrine in the name of maintaining cohesion through orthodoxy? Check and double and triple check. Does it have a deity or a deity like function such as fate or the dialectic? Indeed it does, just like capitalism with its veneration of the providential hand of the market! This all seems obvious to me and I suppose no one would bother to demur at the point unless they thought the word ‘religion’ here were being used as some subtle insult or put down; as if I were saying Marxism was a ‘mere’ religion. THAT I am not saying at all and anyone who wishes may consult the many things I have written on this and related matters.

Telltale will respond, of course with words like ‘fact’ ‘logic’ ‘reason’ ‘evidence’ ‘science’ and so on. If one says these words over and over rather than a rosary one has put oneself off the continuum of religious behavior. Here, though, is where the analogy with Marxist Leninism perhaps becomes clearest. Neither Telltale nor any other public atheist I have heard has ever given these or analogous words the kind of exploration basic in even an intro philosophy class. Sometimes, as in the case of Dennett, this is because they are talking down to an audience they regard as unsophisticated. Sometimes, as in the case of Dawkins, they are genuinely clueless and can’t fathom why anyone takes this Popper garbage seriously! These are words of power not working concepts. They are taken as notions lucid in themselves in their most direct and naïve sense. This is crippling for philosophy but Telltale and his pals are not doing philosophy. In a manner comparable to the way certain progressive activists take words and concepts from the jargon of the social sciences and use them as markers of boundaries and group identity so do Telltale and the gang. I don’t even mean this as a criticism. If Buddhism had 48 noble truths rather than 4 it would likely have gone nowhere. If Islam had not 5 pillars but 347 it would be no more expansive than Judaism. A social movement must simplify and typify if it is to spread on You Tube and have a small but measurable impact on polling. THAT is something THIS author will NEVER achieve and so I must, to use a religious image, give the devil his due in this one instance. However I can’t help but notice that to the extent that ‘You Tube Atheism’ is succeeding and growing it is by imitating some at least of the characteristics we put on the 'religious' continuum. It is succeeding by means of vivid conversion narratives (Telltale saved me from the JW’s!), easily conned words of power that function like creeds, AND (and here I find things not so benign) by defining an out group by anathema and abomination whose crime sand failings can be easily and readily pilloried.