User talk:Waitingforgodot/Atheism and sexism

Stuff
The title sound like one of Ken's "essays". Just sayin'. :) I also take exception to using capital A in atheism.

I wanted to do a write-up on Elevatorgate with a somewhat uncharacteristic for RW tone, but I never found the time.--ZooGuard (talk) 18:46, 22 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Friedrich Nietzsche would be relevant here, though out of place going by the outline. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 18:52, 22 June 2012 (UTC)
 * If this intended for mainspace, it doesn't need to start by defining what atheism is, as that's plenty covered elsewhere. Also, atheism is a pretty much the antithesis of an organized movement.  18:55, 22 June 2012 (UTC)
 * T:here is NO outline yet. this is so me pulling things out of my butt to see what sticks to the wall, what floats, and what should be flushed!  so any ideas are very very very very welcome.  I know we need something like this, but I don't know what that really means yet, and the way i think is by writing, evne if it's crap at first.
 * Zoo - I struggle a lot with how to differientate between people who happen to be atheist cause they don't happen to have a belief in god, but never talk about it, think about or express it beyond the very confrontational "well, if you don't believe in God, what ARE you" comments Xians love to hand out. Vs the people who really are "Atheist" as a proselytizing position.  Meyers, Hitch, Harris, Dawkins who all say "why are you a theist! be an atheist".  people who post all over my wall at facebook with "at least I don't have to have a daddy god telling me what to do", and "Have you tried rational thinking?" and what not.  They are very different positions in life, and i use an "A" to distinguish between the two.  [[Image:green mowse.png|25px]]Godot Three words: SALON DU CHOCOLAT  19:00, 22 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Weasel - BS. It's a hughly organized movement.  There are meetings all over denver to support the movement, at least 4 a month that I know of, from ones focused on college students, to ones focused on ummm "adults?" who've been long time free thinkers.  There are national meetings every year, for American Atheists.  France has several large organizations that focus largely on issues involving laws about and by muslims.  To suggest it's a bunch of individuals out free thinking is to miss the forrest that has grown up around each of us as individual atheist trees.[[Image:green mowse.png|25px]]Godot Three words: SALON DU CHOCOLAT  19:00, 22 June 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm very aware that those sorts of meetings & organisations exist, and there's some scope for seeing them as part of one big movement (though that's debatable), but to suggest that it's one big organised movement would suggest that all of those groups are in some way working together (which they often aren't) and that the organisations are the driving force within the movement (which overlooks a lot of non-organised things like blogging). As for defining atheism itself as that movement, there are all kinds of flaws with that & it contradicts a lot of what we say about atheism elsewhere.  It's important to recognise the distinction between that "atheist movement" as a cultural/intellectual thing involving some (by no means all) atheists, and atheism as a wider phenomenon which is no more or less than not-believing-in-gods.  20:52, 22 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Which frankly, I clearly did, right from the start. There are people who are atheist, and there are people who desire to prosytize their athiesm.  There are people who care about religion in schools over all, and there are those who do it as a calling of their Atheism. [[Image:green mowse.png|25px]]Godot Three words: SALON DU CHOCOLAT  20:55, 22 June 2012 (UTC)
 * You said that atheism has become a strong, well informed, well publicized organized movement, which suggests that the multitude of independent freethinkers have morphed into one big concerted movement and when we say "atheism" we are referring to that movement.  21:05, 22 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes. I hold that that's largly what has happened in the last 10 years.  Same way Christianity, or movements against religion in schools (NSCE) have.  I don't see why we would treat atheists and their organizations any differently from the myriad of xians and their organizations.  [[Image:green mowse.png|25px]]Godot Three words: SALON DU CHOCOLAT  21:54, 22 June 2012 (UTC)