Five Before Chaos

I haven’t mentioned bestselling atheist author Sam Harris lately. I used to, but recently, I reached a point in my (un)belief where hearing people like Harris and Dawkins, althought I agree with most of what they say, is really speaking to the choir. Yes. religion is a mind virus and a delusion, and it’s safe to say that most athiests agree, some more vocally than others. As I did a lot of study on the psychology of religion this year, I have widened my perspective a bit. The thing that Harris, Kurtz, Dawkins and other seem to consistently miss the mark on is understanding on a deper level why people believe these crazy, irrational beliefs.. you know, the search for meaning, higher purpose, etc. I don’t struggle with those issues, but at least I understand them. I don’t think that those authors are going to get any new unbelievers until they start to address that in a less condesending way. Not all of the believers would have that void filled with the wonders of science. And frankly, a lot of em aren’t too bright to begin with, so that needs to be taken into account as well.

Anyways, my biggest beef with Harris is his Islamophobia and what seems to be his defense of torture. It’s what keeps me from really taking everything he says too seriously. His basic presise, that religion is ridiculous and should be held up to the same intense public scrutiny as anything else, well, I’m behind that 110%. But I can’t get past his stance on torture. It’s deplorable.

However, I read a criticism of Harris yesterday that adresses this (and the his supposed tolerance of Eastern mysticism, which I addressed here). It’s called “Why Is Sam Harris a Best-Selling Atheist?” and it makes the erroneous conclusion that somehow Harris’ popularity is indeed because of his Islamophobic pro-torture stance:

Why do the readers go for Harris?

Here’s the tricky part: It’s not because of his atheism. It’s because, buried in his books like Easter eggs, Harris makes the word and sensibility of atheism safe for two very unstable, deeply “irrational” sets of audiences.

1. Making torture of Muslims safe for atheists. The first group is the huge number of superficially secular and humanist Americans who have the good sense not to believe in the religious system of the white tribe, but still share the rest of its tribal mindsets, aka most atheists. These include a fairly unconscious general loathing of Arabs and Muslim culture, a scarcely legitimate belief that they represent an existential threat, and a simple vengeful, spiteful mood akin to the alarmingly calm expressions that white people make when they are exposed to the facts and stats about the rate of black incarceration in America.

Now the author most certainly has a valid gripe with Harris’ stance. And he even goes so far as to mention how it is ‘hidden’ in the “End of Faith”. And there is some truth to that, because of the many people I know who read this book, (all of which are secular and progressive), a few of them missed that when I mentioned it. And if you read through the pages of Free Inquiry magazine, with the exception of a few authors such as drunken gasbag Christopher Hitchens and one or two others, the tone of the magazine, although heavy on attacking religion, is still one that strives for compassion in humanity, an important premise of secular humanism. Harris has written there and recieved his share of criticism, as well.

To somehow imply that Harris’ popularity is because of his regressive views on torture, instead of in spite of it, is ridiculous, and although the author of the article has a good way with words (esp. the last paragraph), he doesn’t offer any evidence that this is indeed the case. Now I’m not going to offer any evidence either, but I think it’s more likely that those of us reading the book take huge issue with that premise, if anything. I think the truth is that in his outspoken criticism of religion, we find Harris is saying things that need to be said, again, and louder.

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