{"id":591,"date":"2010-12-24T20:26:00","date_gmt":"2010-12-24T20:26:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theatheistrabbi\/2010\/12\/we-werent-talking-to-you.html"},"modified":"2010-12-24T20:26:00","modified_gmt":"2010-12-24T20:26:00","slug":"we-werent-talking-to-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theatheistrabbi\/2010\/12\/we-werent-talking-to-you.html","title":{"rendered":"We Weren’t Talking To You!"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

There\u2019s a stereotypical ignorant kind of atheist hater that really stupefies me. \u00a0I will endeavor to shake my self free of stupefaction long enough to share with you its current cause.<\/p>\n

Tom Sears is a professor of accounting in Oneonta, NY, which I\u2019m sure is just a lovely place despite his presence.\u00a0 Somehow this ding-dong got himself a bimonthly column in the town\u2019s daily.\u00a0 This week he used that column to attack atheists earning him a link from none other than Richard Dawkins\u2019 website.\u00a0 Even though he\u2019s a big nobody, he does manage to express views that we hear over and over again from the ignorant and teeny-minded<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Atheists are once again trying to bring attention to themselves by attempting to denigrate, insult or demean religions and, in particular, Christianity and therefore Christians.<\/p>\n

This time it is a billboard advertising stunt in New Jersey; the billboard was placed there by some atheist activist group that calls itself American Atheists. Once again an attempt to put down Christianity will be doomed to irrelevance.<\/p>\n

Polls show atheists to be 3 percent or less of the total population of the United States, a number that has remained about the same over past years. However, in a desperate attempt to make the number appear higher, the president of this organization now claims that there are many more \u201ccloset atheists.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Actually, as I\u2019ve made clear<\/a>, non-theists actually make up closer to 16% of the population.\u00a0 Not all are self-described atheists, but they don\u2019t have faith in any god so there\u2019s no real difference in how they see the world.\u00a0 This is probably close to forty million adults.<\/p>\n

Hang on now, there\u2019s more:<\/p>\n

Since you believe that there is no being more supreme than yourself (a rather egocentric viewpoint), you can celebrate you by staring at yourself (or small groups staring at each other) in the mirror all day. Isn\u2019t this a better idea than going around and putting other religions down?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

First of all, ads like these were not meant to put down Christianity, but to speak to fellow non-theists and let them know they\u2019re not alone. \u00a0More to the point, when religious people accuse non-theists of egocentrism, it rings so false.\u00a0 Aren\u2019t these the same people who believe that the WHOLE universe was created just for us?\u00a0 Is it not the Christians that run around quoting John 3:16 that God loved US so much that he made his little boy die an agonizing death on a cross?\u00a0\u00a0And WE\u2019RE egocentric?<\/p>\n

He also has some questions for us, so I will take a shot at answering them:<\/p>\n

Why are atheists so afraid of Christianity that they feel they have to go out and aggressively attack it every year around this time? Why don\u2019t you instead proudly proclaim your \u201catheistic religion\u201d and explain all the reasons and research that led you to your stance. Maybe you can\u2019t? Maybe your choice was made out of laziness and you didn\u2019t even give religion a chance? Are you going to give your children the right to choose?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

First we\u2019re not afraid of Christianity, we\u2019re wary of Christians because you keep shoving it and its ridiculous rules down our throats.\u00a0 Second, atheism is not a religion.\u00a0 But just as an aside, why do the religious think it\u2019s an insult to call us religious?\u00a0 I thought they liked being religious.<\/p>\n

Next, we do proclaim our reasons and research.\u00a0 We write a lot of books.\u00a0 If he\u2019s interested he can read one.\u00a0 Moving on, and this is important, a whole lot of us used to be theistic.\u00a0 Some of us were even ministers.\u00a0 Hell, I still call myself a rabbi because I worked my ass off for the title and I am quite attached to my Jewish culture, if not its outdated theologies.<\/p>\n

Finally, we give our children lots of choices because we teach them to think for themselves.\u00a0 We don\u2019t indoctrinate them.\u00a0 Religion is the world champion in indoctrination.<\/p>\n

People like Sears are demonstrating the defense mechanism of projection which reduces their own anxieties about themselves.\u00a0 With projection, you attribute the things you dislike about yourself to others enabling you to blame someone else for traits you actually despise in yourself. It\u2019s extremely common with people who don\u2019t have a lot of self awareness or insight.\u00a0 A lot of closeted gays do it.\u00a0 They feel that their latent homosexuality is perverted and deviant so they are quite outspoken about calling gay people perverts and deviants.\u00a0 It\u2019s classic tested psychology.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s a stereotypical ignorant kind of atheist hater that really stupefies me. \u00a0I will endeavor to shake my self free of stupefaction long enough to share with you its current cause. Tom Sears is a professor of accounting in Oneonta, NY, which I\u2019m sure is just a lovely place despite his presence.\u00a0 Somehow this ding-dong […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2281,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[6],"class_list":["post-591","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blogentries","tag-atheism"],"yoast_head":"\nWe Weren't Talking To You!<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"There's a stereotypical ignorant kind of atheist hater that really stupefies me. \u00a0I will endeavor to shake my self free of stupefaction long enough to\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theatheistrabbi\/2010\/12\/we-werent-talking-to-you.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"We Weren't Talking To You!\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"There's a stereotypical ignorant kind of atheist hater that really stupefies me. \u00a0I will endeavor to shake my self free of stupefaction long enough to\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theatheistrabbi\/2010\/12\/we-werent-talking-to-you.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Atheist Rabbi\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-12-24T20:26:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Jeffrey L. 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