Ah Yes the Friendly Atheist

                                                

As I write and blog on such matters Facebook is constantly sending me recommendations for ‘discussion sites’ on the general subject of Atheism and Theism. Some of these are Christian sites but most of them are not. One thing I have noted about both categories is that they are not, in fact, what they claim to be. By this I mean that they have ZERO to do with discussion. The Christian ones are safe spaces where people will not be laughed at for conspiratorial thinking. The secular ones are safe spaces for people to vent their feelings about their miserable upbringings or compete for likes or laughing emoticons in the never ending quest for the next ‘dunk’ or ‘mic drop’.  One discovers this when one injects a comment that does not conform to the categories or language typical on the site. The result is instant and deeply resentful dismissal. The problem, I have noticed, is one of elitism vs egalitarianism. Without boasting I can say that ‘philosophy of religion’ is a subject I know a bit about having devoted a lifetime of reading and study to a certain category of text. What is more, I have public status as a teacher and published researcher which indicates that my self-conception is not wildly off-base. One would assume then that I would have an enormous advantage in such discussions. Since the aim of Facebook arguments is to ‘win’ by one upping the other guy you would think I would come of the victor in every such encounter with the testosterone flushed, overconfident, strutting young males who are the typical (though not sole) denizens of the secularist groups. You would also think those grad school courses in the history of theology would give me a similar edge over people who think Trump second only to Joshua in the line of Old Testament judges.

Actually, this is not the case. In fact, I always LOSE such encounters by violating the rules of the game. All my plays are offside and all the balls I hit go foul. It is worthwhile reflecting on why this is so. The broad reason, of course, is that I miss the emotional tonality of such discussions which is the real point of them. Thus, whatever I say is a rude intrusion on a personal and very private thing. [1] One mistake I make, of course, is to take the titles of such groups literally. Let’s take for example our eponymous Facebook page the Friendly Atheist. The Friendly Atheist is not friendly and not intended to be. It is a forum for every kind of aggression, venting and gaslighting and that is how its denizens seem to want it. These people seek the intimacy and ‘friendliness’ of an in group and find it in the tried and true method of defining themselves against an out group. We are ‘friends’ in having the same enemies. Love is about strife and strife is about love which Empedocles said but herein lies the problem. ‘Empedocles’ is not a name that circulates in the in-group and a reference to him is ‘off-side’. I can’t actually bring him up because that would be to indicate some kind of expertise in an egalitarian and ‘friendly’ environment. The unfamiliarity of the name conceals a potential threat to the feeling of community. It brings a disruption. Who is Empedocles? What does this guy know about him? Could he KNOW MORE THAN ME? Am I SAFE here? This is like injecting a virus in a healthy body and the immune system of that body kicks into action. This sort of thing is generally considered a sort of anti-intellectualism though that is NOT quite what is happening when I flash a bit of classical education to the Friendly Atheists. What these sites reflect, in fact, is an uncertainty and unease about the exact nature of expertise and authority. I, in spite of all my degrees, am not an expert and will never be regarded as such by any Friendly Atheist. I do not have genuine expertise because I talk about the things EVERYONE ALREADY KNOWS ABOUT. 

Pascal noted this ages ago. Where taxes or kidney stones are concerned I consult an expert because I don’t know about taxes or kidney stones. This is because there is no shame and loss of face in doing so. In fact, when fundamentalist Christians dispute or deny THIS kind of expertise they are subject to instant shaming and ridicule. This is done in spite of the fact that shaming and ridicule will have no effect whatsoever on the people in question except to reinforce their mad convictions. If you energize the opposition of the out group, though, you make the in group correspondingly warmer and safer. This is the function of the ‘theists’ who disrupt the conversation by injecting their perspective. They are in a perverse sense necessary to the enterprise for when they say something foolish or bullishly dogmatic I can respond and collect a raft of reassuring likes, loves, laughs and other sorts of ‘high-five’. When the invader appears the tribe coalesces around the attacker and its feeling of identity amped up! 

However, Pascal also noted that on matters of morals and religion every man thinks his opinions just fine thank you as resting on his innate and god given common sense. In such matters EVERYONE is an expert. It does not and cannot matter how much Aquinas or Hegel one has read! As De Tocqueville noted this is doubly and triply the case in the United States where every farmer is a fount of wisdom on God and the soul. [2] Egalitarianism of opinion will out somewhere where the US and to a slightly lesser extent Canada are concerned. If the Friendly Atheists must grant epidemiologists authority and priestly expertise they must doubly enforce equality elsewhere. If the epidemiologist is an expert, then I the philosopher CANNOT BE!  There simply isn’t room for both of us! This leaves me rueful but not surprised. It is the way of the world and futile to complain about. Still, if I point out to someone that ‘no all Christians don’t say that stupid thing you just attributed to them here is a pertinent text from Aquinas or Kierkegaard’ and that is immediately perceived as a hostile and unfriendly gesture, if that is perceived as some kind of flex or pulling rank, then what actual public good is my or any other philosopher’s knowledge? I don’t actually know. Of course, I can try to pussy foot around such matters but eventually, inevitably, I will let slip that I have read and studied things that others have not. At that point I lose the audience AND the argument. Worse, to people dealing with trauma (and there are a certain number of those) I will appear as not just an obnoxious ‘expert’ but as an actual oppressor. [3] If this is the case though what, in our atmosphere of intellectual egalitarianism and hyper-sensitivity, is the actual good of having people who know things?  

[1] Despite being a Martian weirdo I have worked a few things out in the EQ department. One is that people who ask questions want to be affirmed in their puzzlement. They do not want an answer even if a ready answer exists. Another is that people who make angry arguments don’t want calm counter-arguments even if there are blindingly obvious ones: they want their anger and frustration understood. They want recognition as persons and I suspect this even of the testosterone driven, strutting, posturing trolls (in a perverse way they are trying to earn your respect). This, in fact, is the basic purpose of literally every discussion site I know whether political, religious, anti-religious or pop cultural. This tells me that discussion is something that can happen only under certain very limited and carefully demarcated conditions.    

[2] The problem with this position, of course, is that the following question becomes inevitable: if the farmer is an expert on religion and ethics why isn’t he, after all, an expert on vaccines too? I don’t say this sarcastically either for democratic participation in fundamental decisions seems a legitimate moral demand in our era. What is the just, democratic mode of exercising expertise?

[3] Alas, and it pains me to say this, Nietzsche is quite correct. Being a victim or professing a concern for victims can be a mask for simple bullying. What is more, the bully in question can always present his behavior to the public, and more importantly to himself, as the highest expression of virtue. Indeed, I do not think activists who use social justice rhetoric as a pretext to tyrannize over others (and before anyone gets enraged let me say that have SEEN this type of person with my own two eyes) are really that sure of themselves. The more I succeed in loudly pushing my point of view on others the less I have to stress about any contradiction, incoherence or bad faith it may contain. The forced agreement of a regime of soft fascism is a comfortable barrier that protects me from painful introspection. I think there is no better example of soft fascism than the culture of ‘politeness’ in the academy. Our ‘respectful workplace’ policies have had the entirely predictable effect of shielding bullies from ever being called out for their behavior and protecting administrators from any and all strenuous criticism.