Latest Activity
- Groups News
- Everything
Marianne replied to Neal's discussion Breaking News: 34% of Your Fellow Citizens Want a Theocracy in the group Imagine No Religion
Stephen Brodie posted a videoRichard Dawkins excerpts Marcus Brigstocke
Top Content
We are a worldwide social network of freethinkers, atheists, agnostics and secular humanists.
Birthdays
Birthdays Today
'Woodstock For Atheists': A Moment For Nonbelievers
Wow! The Reason Rally, which will be tomorrow at the Mall in Washington DC, is getting publicity! Very cool. I'm sorry I won't be able to be there. I think if there is one next year I definitively want to go, maybe we could even have a little atheist universe meet up.
To listen to the story, go here.
'Woodstock For Atheists': A Moment For Nonbelievers
Listen to the Story
Thousands of people are expect to descend on the Mall in Washington, D.C., on Saturday to celebrate not believing in God. It's being called a sort of "Woodstock for Atheists," a chance for atheists to show their power in numbers and change their image.
The "Reason Rally" could attract up to 30,000 people; organizer David Silverman says it marks a coming-of-age for nonbelievers.
"We'll look back at the Reason Rally as one of the game-changing events when people started to look at atheism and look at atheists in a different light," Silverman says.
Silverman, president of American Atheists, says this is a celebration, with famous atheists like Richard Dawkins, funny atheists like Eddie Izzard, and musical atheists like the rock group Bad Religion, who sings about "a careless creation where there's no above ..."
But the main point of the rally, Silverman says, is not to tweak the faithful. It's to encourage closeted atheists to take heart.
"The message is that if you can come out, you can out come out," he says. "And if you can't come out, at least you'll know you're not alone, and maybe sometime soon you'll be able to come out of the closet to your family."
'Coming Out Of The Closet'
Silverman says this is their moment, as important to atheists as the Stonewall riots were to the gay-rights movement four decades ago. But fellow nonbeliever Hemant Mehta says it's not easy to reveal your nonbelief. Atheism has an image problem.
"Every time you hear the word atheist in the media, there's always an adjective before it," he says. "It's always angry atheist, militant atheist, staunch atheist. It's never happy, smiling atheist."
Mehta, who writes a blog called The Friendly Atheist, says openly dismissing God in the most religious country in the West requires courage: You risk losing friends, family and even jobs because of your nonbelief. In poll after poll, he says, people say they don't like atheists; one showed that people think an atheist is more likely to steal than a rapist.
"People have this notion that atheists are immoral, not trustworthy, unelectable," Mehta says. "How do you change that at such a huge level? It starts by people everywhere just coming out of the closet as atheists."
Mehta helps run an atheist charity, and he's been invited to megachurches, such as Willow Creek near Chicago, to explain why he doesn't believe in God. He says atheists need to take a page from the gay-rights movement: If people know and love an atheist, they'll be less likely to stigmatize them.
Tension Within Movement
But not everyone thinks that's the best approach.
"I'm not sure it is to atheists' benefit to always present a kinder, gentler face," says Greta Christina, a prominent atheist blogger and author of a new book called Why Are You Atheists So Angry? 99 Things That Piss Off The Godless.
Christina says there's a tension in the movement. On one side are what she calls "firebrands," such as Oxford biologist Dawkins, who has called some believers "staggeringly ignorant" and "insane." On the other are the "diplomats," such as Mehta, who deliver the same message of a Godless universe — but politely. Christina says every modern social movement — civil rights, feminism, gay rights — had the same tension, and you need both.
"We certainly want to let people know, again, we're your friends, we're your neighbors, we're good people," she says. "But I think it's also to our benefit to let people know that we're to be reckoned with, that we're not going to let ourselves be doormats, and that we're mobilized, we're organized, and when people get us angry, we're going to take action."
For example, nearly 300 atheists will meet with staffers at the House and Senate this week, partly to lobby and partly to show their numbers.
Silverman, of American Atheists, says atheists have time and momentum on their side. He says the fastest-growing segment of religion in the U.S. is no religion — people who identify as atheist, agnostic or secular. Just look at Canada and parts of Europe, Silverman says; religion there is going "extinct."
"I believe America is not far behind," he says. "I believe in two decades, we will be in a position where secularism is the norm."
That would be great, says Christina. But in the meantime, she has a more immediate goal. She wants to go to the Reason Rally and have a good time.
"This is going to be the event that you don't want to have missed out on," she says. "You don't want 10 years from now to say, 'I could have gone to the Reason Rally and I didn't because I had to do my laundry.' "
Just like Woodstock, she says. She only hopes it doesn't rain.
Tags: Reason rally
Replies to This Discussion
-
Permalink Reply by Adriana on -
Did any of our members go to the Reason Rally?? If so, please write about your experience!
There is a photo gallery here, at the Washington Post.
-
Permalink Reply by Adriana on
-
Young Americans cheering for a scientist like he's a rock star is pretty cool!
The audio is terrible, I hope there would be better videos.
-
Permalink Reply by Becky on
-
I have to say I was really dismayed by the lack of coverage on the rally. I looked all over the internet thinking someone, anyone, would be live streaming....I missed it if it was out there. I did happen to catch Up With Chris Hays on MSNBC this morning where they were talking about it yesterday (rerun). That made me feel better.
Please, what Adriana asked, if you went, can you tell us some stories???? ;-)
-
Permalink Reply by Adriana on
-
I didn't go....But from what I read online, it was kind of disappointing, only about 8,000 to 10,000 people...
This is what Freethought blogger Ed Brayton thought:
Reason Rally Report
March 25, 2012 at 11:46 am 
Ed BraytonThe Reason Rally was great, though not perfect. First the good: Greta Christina, PZ Myers, Hemant Mehta, and Jessica Ahlquist were all great. Tim Minchin, Jamie Kilstein and Eddie Izzard were freaking brilliant. As was Paul Provenza, who was the emcee.
Hemant was one of the first speakers and he gave a rousing talk encouraging atheists to run for public office. He then introduced Jessica Ahlquist and presented her with a check for more than $62,000 for her scholarship, about $9,000 of which came from the sale of our Evil Little Thing shirts. That actually made me choke up, as did Jessica’s speech that followed. What a remarkable young woman. I can only wish that I had that kind of poise and grace at 16 years old.Greta gave her standard barnburner of a talk, drawing on the material in her new book expressing the many things that atheists are justifiably angry about. And PZ, in a white cowboy hat that seemed as out of place as a milk bucket under a mule, gave a similar speech about his favorite sin — wrath. But everyone near us thought he said “rap,” which caused me to utter a prayer: “Please let PZ do a rap, please let PZ do a rap.” Alas, he didn’t. But that would have been so memorable if he had.
The stand up comics were all amazing. Eddie Izzard was actually the weakest of the three of them, believe it or not. Minchin did several of his best songs, including Storm and Fuck the Pope. And Kilstein did another of his patented righteous rants that was just incredible. I can’t wait to see the video of that one. That was a highlight of the entertainment segments for me.
Now, the bad: Way too many speakers. Way, way too many speakers. Most of them had a few minutes to speak at the most. And several of them did the standard protest rally speech, the kind I absolutely hate. I hate chanting. Hate it with the fire of a thousand suns. I hate call and response even more than I hate chanting. And when Elizabeth Cornwall had everyone shouting things at Congress, I couldn’t have cringed any harder if Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter made a sex tape. That kind of thing just makes my skin crawl.
And I kind of felt bad for Dan Barker, though I think his wound was largely self-inflicted. Dan is a great speaker and a great guy, but he likes to do some really cheesy anti-religion songs. Unfortunately, he did a few of them shortly after Tim Minchin performed and the contrast was as stark as it could possibly be. The effect was like an open micer following George Carlin on stage. Why he attempted to pull it off is beyond me.
Read the rest here.
-
Permalink Reply by Adriana on
-
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
"Up with Chris Hayes" at MSNBC covered it. (This is clip you were talking about, Neal).
-
Permalink Reply by Adriana on
-
Another clip from "Up With Chris Hayes"
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
-
Permalink Reply by Adriana on
-
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
Dawkins at "Up with Chris Hayes"
-
Permalink Reply by Adriana on
-
*facepalm*, the Tennessee representative defending the monkey bill totally misses the point. It's not being afraid that science gets discussed, it's finding a controversy when there is none. The "monkey bill" is akin to teaching an Earth-centric view of the solar system, or to teach the "controversy" in germ theory. It is an absolutely ignorant view. What about challenging the kids minds by letting them make up their minds on the existence of Sasquatch?
© 2013 Created by Atheist Universe.
Powered by
Badges | Report an Issue | Privacy Policy | Terms of Service
