Steven Parmenius

                   In this essay I will argue two things, The first is that Protestants and atheists are ruining the cultural discourse of North America and probably other nations as well. The second is that Protestants and atheists are the same people. Where I am concerned there is not a scintilla of difference between them. I used to think this relationship was dialectical in the sense I shall explain below. I have discovered, though, that it is literal as well. A great deal of ‘atheist’ discourse is being generated by bitter ex-Protestants who have not changed either their personality or style of engagement. Nor have they overcome their deep anti-intellectualism. In fact, they have intensified it. Other individuals may not be jaundiced ex-fundies but, in the U.S. especially, live in a culture defined by Evangelical Protestantism whether positively or negatively. Thus, by osmosis they absorb its theological categories and replicate the...

  Mr. Matt Dillahunty is an atheist who is an ex-fundamentalist. Watching clips from his show The Atheist Experience , where he mugs and grimaces at the naïve fundies who call in, I have come to the conclusion that being an ex-fundamentalist is something he sucks at. [1] I hope he does not mind my candor here but, as he pulls no punches with his callers, I will pull no punches with him. The worst atheists, bar none, are those who began as hyper-conservative evangelical protestants. That particular smell DOES NOT rub off no matter how many times you refute creationism or point out there is slavery in the Pentateuch. The smell is one of earnest, doctrinaire moralism and aggressive proselytizing. I don’t like that smell when fundamentalists emit it and I don’t like it any better wafting from atheists. I think though, that I have worked out the reason this is such a problem in the atheist community. I can only imagine the misery of growing up a JW for instance. In my house, a fairly...