My Kind

Being white, I've never been on the receiving end of a "your kind" or "you people" before I came out as an atheist. (Note: I am not saying that being an open atheist on the internet is in any way comparable to the experience of being a minority in the US, or in other countries.) It's rather jarring every time I come across it. Perhaps because for me, "you people" is not enough letters removed from words I can't even type, let alone say.

I came across "you people" directed at atheists on Ray Comfort's blog. (No matter how much Ray protests that he lurves all the little atheists, he doesn't mind letting through hateful comments about atheists, and someone at Atheist Central is heavily moderating those comments.)

Eddy Allen (of the unaccessible profile)

YES Ray that is true there are NO athiests in fox holes or death beds!! even monkey man Darwin gave up his foolish THEORY When he was faced with DEATH and as you said 10 out of 10 die and then no THEORY will save anybody!!

so dear athiests there you have it as Ray said there are no famous and respected of your foolish kind. and dont say Dawkins because he is NOT respected by me how can anyone believe we came from ALIENS! too much scifi channel and daydreaming there was no MAKER so he can sell foolish books to fools!!!

First of all, how could you possible know that there are no atheists in fox holes or death beds? Have you interviewed every active duty soldier and dying person in the entire world? That seems . . . unlikely. (Think of all the frequent flyer miles!)

Secondly, god doesn't save anyone from dying, so apparently he's no better than THEORIES. Supposedly, the wages of sin are death, but if I don't go to heaven, I'll be tortured forever in hell, which is still living forever. So, no death for anyone, ever.

Thirdly is the money quote: so dear athiests there you have it as Ray said there are no famous and respected of your foolish kind. Can I just say buy a fucking comma? Can I also just say that this is bizarre and unfounded and silly? Hitchens, Dawkins, PZ Myers, Eddie Izzard and Joss "the man himself" Whedon. Seriously, Joss Whedon. How much more famous or respected do you want than that? If you really want more, here you go.

Seriously, though the construction of that sentence makes me think of a time when black children in this country had few heroes, or when homosexuals had no one to point out as a famous and respected homosexual. Not because there weren't respectable people in both groups doing, or capable of doing, great things, but because the society they lived in either prevented them from achieving their potential, or prevented them from being honest about who they were. I've heard people say that President Obama is an atheist. He could be. I suspect he's probably agnostic, but we'll never know. You cannot become President of the United States as anything other than a Christian. So, politicians in this country are Christian whether they are or are not.

A lot of atheists hide. It doesn't mean we, my kind, aren't here.

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