Dinesh D’Souza continues to astound us! The Hoover Institute conservative previously wowed us when he used the Catholic Church’s gay scandals to support Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. It was, in a word, remarkable.
D’Souza occupies himself with the gays and religion once again this week. Well, sort of religion. In his Town Hall piece, D’Souza writes against British theorist Richard Dawkins’ revolutionary idea that atheists should stage a “coming out” a la the gays. Such a suggestion, of course, doesn’t sit well with D’Souza.
Dawkins has also suggested that atheists, like gays, should come out of the closet. Well, what if they don’t want to? I doubt that Dawkins would support “outing” atheists. But can an atheist “rights” group be far behind? Hate crimes laws to protect atheists? Affirmative action for unbelievers? An Atheist Annual Parade, complete with dancers and floats? Atheist History Month?
Honestly, I think the whole atheist-gay analogy is quite absurd.
Indeed.
Whlie Dawkins has some pretty wild ideas, he lacks the raw wit employed in D’Souza’s zinger of a conclusion, during which he challenges Dawkins to a debate:
I hope Dawkins takes me up on my challenge to an intellectual joust. If you want to encourage him, write Dawkins and send the email to [email protected]. I’ll forward your thoughts to our wavering atheist knight. He may want to pattern atheism on the gay rights movement, but surely he doesn’t want the world to think that he’s a sissy.
We’d say we’re offended, but we wouldn’t expect anything less from a man who thinks the liberals caused 9/11.
How about we take this to the next level?
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WWH
Though many gays are athiests, no??
Dawster
here in Austin, we have The Atheist Community of Austin which is such a “rights” group. every week they have “The Atheist Experience” on one of the cable access channels.
as an ordained minister, i watch… and it’s funny because it’s a bunch of people sitting around bitching about religion. some of the nonsense is no more made up then the “scare stories” people told as urban legend when AIDS first started. you would think that atheists would have more to do with their time.
also as an atheist myself, i find it a bit shocking, as these people are not atheist, they are “anti-religion”… as there is a difference. their proclamations border on hate and fear.
as a homosexual, i’m a bit offended that a religious (or non-religious) belief had any similarities to someone who was born (and had no choice) to be gay.
plus… from what i’ve seen, most atheists don’t know the first shit about accessorizing properly.
3Dspleen
Well, there is a similarity in the choice to be openly gay or openly atheist. Sure, you’re born gay, but the choice is in acknowledging that and coming out, living openly. In a similar vein, one might come to the conclusion that there is no god, and then make the choice either to let other people know or keep it to themselves.
It’s the closet that causes all the problems, and coming out of the closet improves conditions for everyone.
(For what it’s worth, I think you can choose to follow the rituals of Catholic, Presbyterian, Sunni or whatever religion, but you can’t choose to believe or disbelieve in god. I feel like that happens based on internal brain workings we can’t really manipulate directly. So maybe it is similar to realizing one’s sexuality? Or at least for me, I never chose to believe in god or not, just that one day I realized I didn’t believe in a god, and from that point on it was just a matter of whether or not to share that information about myself.)
hisurfer
It’s an interesting idea. Personally, I get far more grief for being a non-believer than for being gay. I lose count of how many political, community, or sporting events I’ve been to which slip in a “non-denominational” prayer that ends with Jesus. Sometimes I’m an ass and object, sometimes I let it pass. So I guess I’m semi ‘closeted’ as an atheist – I save the topic for like-minded friends, and avoid it otherwise.
And yet no one gets bashed or fired from a job for being an atheist, so the analogy can only be taken so far.
matt123
Always hate political.
A gay on Findbilover.com