So little time, so much nonsense

Muslim Student Murders A Wakeup Call For Atheists: We’re Capable Of Violence, Too

Starting with the finger-waving title.

Amanda Marcotte, notorious feminist virago, gets straight to it with an attack on Bill Maher, Sam Harris, and their poisonous Islamophobia.

It didn't take long for the left to turn from implausible attacks on the Chapel Hill shooter as a hate criminal to attacks on one of their standard targets, atheists prepared to face and state the fact that Islam is in our time a particularly nasty source of religious violence.

Attacks which, she says, are quite justified whether or not Hicks acted out of hate or was simply the rage-filled nut he seems to have been.

As an aside, I note this remark.

Unlike all the major world religions, atheists have no history of violence being done in the name of atheism—at best, you can try to round up some communist violence, but that’s hardly the same thing.

Pshaw, what an ignorant girl.

A good deal of communist, anarchist, and other left wing violence against churches, clergy, and the religious took place all over the world during the 20th Century, motivated by exactly the sort of anti-theist views she says characterize the contemporary atheist movement.

Atheism is a relatively new movement; people who don’t believe have always been with us, but it’s only been in recent years that atheism has really developed as an identity and a community, with a growing online presence, bestselling books and popular documentaries, and regular and growing conferences and conventions for non-believers to congregate in. 

. . . . 

We are not content simply to not believe, but are outspoken and aggressive in pointing out the logical fallacies of belief while also criticizing the negative influence faith has on society.

Leave aside her characterizing the ridicule and abuse, whether moderate or extreme, that make up the bulk of popular atheist polemics as "pointing out fallacies of belief" and "criticizing the negative influence" of faith.

Historically, a good many atheists have viewed religion as at least in net or often or sometimes a force for peace and social cohesion among humans otherwise little inclined to either.

But the contemporary atheist movement to which AM belongs is in some degree tainted by a different atheist tradition that has viewed religion as in net and sometimes entirely pernicious.

And revolutions of the left and revolutionary movements from the 18th Century through the 20th, at least, have often engaged in very serious and extensive anti-religious violence intended to combat this evil, or even rid the world of it.

Not that I mean to say she or today's atheist movement in general would favor any such thing.

Just a point in passing.