Comments on: Barbara Bradley Hagerty Doesn’t Know What She’s Talking About

By: bernie

bernie — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 14:52:03 +0000

I expect better from NPR.

Why???

By: Creepy

Creepy — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 04:26:21 +0000

I think “schisms” are far more evident among the big three religions, as Christians, Jews and Muslims are unable to agree among their fellow believers how to propertly worship their god or behave themselves. (How many different sects of Christianity are there???)

And I’m a devout atheist but never heard of Blasphemy Day prior to reading your post.

By: Simon

Simon — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 21:31:37 +0000

NPR Check blog (turns out he’s an atheist too) also did a good piece on Barbara Bradley Hagerty’s past and recent antics: http://nprcheck.blogspot.com/2009/10/barbara-bradley-hagerty-god-help-us.html

By: Richard Wade

Richard Wade — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 19:16:52 +0000

We should coin a new term, “The New Journalists.”

These are journalists who, like Hagerty, don’t report the news, they report what they want the news to someday be. They write their wishful thinking presented as established fact in the hope that people will assume it is true, and eventually it will become true.

“Atheists disagree! The ‘new atheist’ movement is doomed!!”

Yeah, in other news, heat spreads out and cats are hard to herd.

Maybe she should write, “Corporations flock to donate millions to Barbara Hagerty!!”

By: Glen

Glen — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 18:14:43 +0000

You expected more of NPR?
That is the most disappointing revelation in this post.

By: David D.G.

David D.G. — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 17:27:12 +0000

Hemant, an article that consistently biased does not get that way just because of sloppiness. This is not simply a case of Hagerty “not knowing what she’s talking about.” The rhetoric and spin are clearly of the same mendacious sort used by the makers of Expelled! — in other words, this article was a hatchet job against atheists, pure and simple.

NPR has been going down the tubes for some time lately, but this blatant piece of “yellow journalism” is one of the strongest cases it’s had yet. Hagerty has no business working for NPR, at least not in the capacity of journalist; at best, she might be fit to empty the wastebaskets, since it seems that all she wants to do is gather and pile up trash.

~David D.G.

By: H

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 16:58:15 +0000

That’s just factually wrong.

For that reason, the believers, their target audience, will eat it right up. Just like everything else they’ve been told all their lives is not factual.

You don’t need fact when you’ve got faith.

By: Reginald Selkirk

Reginald Selkirk — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 16:43:12 +0000

What’s the dogma of atheism? That there are no gods?
Maybe it’s a schism between those who don’t believe in God and those who don’t believe in Allah.

By: Christophe Thill

Christophe Thill — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 15:55:20 +0000

It can’t be a “schism” unless you have a dogma, with people fighting around it. What’s the dogma of atheism? That there are no gods? But even this can be disputed. At one end you’ll find people who think that it’s impossible to know for sure, but that it’s the most likely possibility. At the other end of the spectrum, some people are absolutely sure. And there are many varieties in between. But they don’t fight. The can disagree and argue, but none will call others traitors to a true essence of atheism. This is something that can only happen with religion. Atheism isn’t one.

By: Siamang

Siamang — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 15:38:20 +0000

If BBH had wanted to do a story about the internal power struggle in a tiny, TINY non-profit group, I cannot imagine that would garner any kind of national press.

However, if she paints the CFI as representing all atheists of one stripe or the other (and of course, there ARE only two, right?) then she can make a wide, sweeping article about the “schism” within all of atheism.

(Oh, aren’t we CUTE! We used a religious word about a doctrinal split to refer to atheists! They’re just like those religious wackos! Kill the infidel!)

That’s just factually wrong. The Great Desecration occurred in July of last year.

Well, of course it’s wrong. If she had gotten that fact correct, then Crackergate wouldn’t make any sense to go in her article. Her entire story hinges on the idea that the CFI is the atheist Vatican, the One True and Authoritative Voice of the atheist movement.

If she stepped back, she could have written a story about the broader debate within atheism as far as how confrontational a tone we want. Heck, the TITLE of your blog, Hemant, is a nod to that discussion.