Atheism is creative, not destructive; we're losing, here's why.
07 December 2018 [link youtube]
In the last 20 years, atheism has not had the (modestly) transformative effect on the world that gay rights (or even gay marriage) has had —it's been a failure even compared to veganism or communism. Why? Let's throw the underlying problems into a sharp contrast with a specific example: the creative challenge of destroying Christmas (no, I'm not joking, and I'm not a troll: I'm the sincere, secular parent of a 5 year old… and replacing Christmas is a real challenge).
#EndChristmas #ReplaceChristmas #Socmas
Youtube Automatic Transcription
but you are full of [ __ ] your point is
the equivalent of saying if you celebrate Halloween you are fine with witchcraft being taught in schools and special political rights for Wiccans okay just pause would he say that to a Muslim who was trying to get rid of Ramadan to an ex-muslim someone who's born Muslim and it's now atheist no you would never insult someone who is openly struggling to raise their children as atheist non-muslims in a Muslim majority that you would never say them you say that to me atheism is the laziest movement in the world secular humanism is the laziest most fatuous most self-indulgent movement in the world and that's why it's been failing to make progress in the last 20 years every other ideology calling for social change is aware that if you want change and if you're the one to make it happen you are going to be made uncomfortable by it and the atheists and secular humanists have a very statuesque that the world is going to change and that everyone else is going to be made uncomfortable except them because they're right and they think that being right means you get to sit back and just kind of congratulate yourself and throw conferences and have meetings where you pat yourself on the back and you live your whole life in a constant cycle of self-congratulation because you feel morally superior to the high school principal you grew up with because you feel morally superior to the nuns and priests and monks who talk to you when you were a child you feel intellectually superior to your own parents your own grandparents who believed in a religion you no longer believe in and you see your role now as sitting back passively and laughing as the rest of the world catches up with you and this brilliant insight you've had into reality that there is no God as Sarah Sarah why do you think you guys are losing why do you think gay rights made so much progress in the last twenty thirty years and you guys made none why do you think veganism made so much progress in the last twenty thirty years you guys made none hate to tell you this guys compared to communism and I'm an anti-communist completely anti-communist but I've got a degree in political science and spent many my life studying communism communism is still a major powerful influential ideology in the world it's still making moves it's still it's still affecting millions of people's lives even the Communists know if they want social change they've got to get uncomfortable they've got to get out there and start producing new meanings they've got to get out there and write their own story books and comic books and songs you wouldn't believe you wouldn't believe how many new songs the economy has come up with all over the world India China Russia everywhere and still to this day they're still doing it they're involved in cultural production and in trying to raise their children to repeat those memes those meanings to challenge and replace the culture they were born into to create what they think is a better world and that's what the vegans are doing that's the gay rights people were doing and there's a fundamentally sick and self-indulgent attitude that I see amongst the atheist activists the secular activists that I think is based on a sense of intellectual superiority that's completely unfounded I conducted a little tiny social experiment over the last several weeks by email and by Twitter message I reached out to people who had about the same number of total viewers I had on YouTube not famous internationally successful atheists like Richard Dawkins not people who are in such a towering scale of Fame and money and influence that they wouldn't answer an email from me people on about the same level I'm at a few thousand regular viewers doing this as a hobby to whatever extent on a podcast or on YouTube I reach out to them say hey look you know what I have a five-year-old daughter and I really don't want to raise her celebrating Christmas and I look around I don't see any other atheists secular humanists I don't see any other activists taking on the challenge of providing a set of songs and stories and rituals providing something more meaningful to their children to the next generation than what they've got right now and if you think repeating a ritual and a song again and again and again year after year in school and playing over the loudspeakers at the shopping center and acting that out if you think that doesn't that doesn't impact your children when they're growing up why don't you just raise your children secular Muslim or secular Hindu what why is it that atheists and secularists they have this unique blind spot for Christianity as a cultural tradition and not not for any other slightly unfamiliar culture division they don't see Buddhist rituals as secular nor Hindu Dharma just just the rituals of precisely the religion they claim to be in a state of rebellion against okay and this is the sense in which you guys are so much more fatuous then vegans gay rights activists communists you're not willing to make yourself even slightly uncomfortable challenging yourself to write a new story to come up with a new song to offer something more meaningful for the generation to come and to challenge the hegemony this is a case we're really really she's assuming the hegemony of Christian cultural traditions in as much as we can even recognize Christian cultural traditions as something separable from Christianity [Music] so I'd get these angry angry messages back totally unsympathetic messages that would always say quote Christmas is a cultural tradition I replied to one of them saying regarding quote Christmas is a cultural tradition would you make the same excuse for an Islamic holiday would you let your children participate in worshipping a fragment of a meteorite in Mecca on the grounds that it's just cultural quote unquote how about animal sacrifice within Islam more than any religion how would you how would you that I have not had a single one of these people reply on topic to this because none of them have actually answered those questions they've sent me insults before they've sent me insults after they've told me how completely insane I am to want to challenge and replace Christmas is a contradiction but they don't actually answer those questions now this is not hypothetical when I ask would you make the same excuse for Islamic holiday the some of these same people I wrote to so here's one again he has a youtube channel and a podcast and so on like most of this this guy you see on screen now he's participating in the hashtag hashtag when I was a Muslim and he says to all X Muslims please don't stop being open about leaving Islam you're not alone and people like you you guys are out there calling on Muslims to get real uncomfortable and to reject the cultural traditions of the oppressive societies they live in do you know how hard it is to not celebrate Ramadan when you're in Saudi Arabia Malaysia Indonesia you know how hard it is to be openly non-muslim when your whole family is Muslim in a Muslim majority country pretty much any Muslim of course some are easier than others Turkey is a lot easier than Saudi Arabia but we're not going to get the details you're asking for quite a high level of courage and effort in repudiating and refusing to participate in Ramadan and all the other Muslim festivals and traditions for X Muslims and you're celebrating them coming on Twitter and talking about rejecting Islam and what happens to them well there is and when I do it what I deal with Christianity when I say hey I'm gonna draw the line and I'm gonna refuse to be a part of Christmas I'm gonna make this little bit of an effort to offer my daughter something meaningful something more something positive instead of Christmas I'm gonna write new stories and new songs I'm gonna try to offer her something better than Christmas and something better than the x-men and Batman and Curious George I'm gonna take on that challenge all of you 100% of you wrote back with insults telling me that I was crazy okay so here's a reply from Noah plumb he's not famous but like myself he has a YouTube channel he has about the same number of total views on YouTube that I have I think he's been on YouTube for about the same length like the time I have too and he replies quote you are full of [ __ ] your point is the equivalent of saying if you celebrate Halloween you are fine with witchcraft being taught in schools and special political rights for Wiccans okay just pause would he say that to a Muslim who was trying to get rid of Ramadan to an ex-muslim someone who's born Muslim and it's now atheist no you would never insult someone who is openly struggling to raise their children as atheist non-muslims and a Muslim majority that you would never say them you say that to me and you say that to me because you're compensating for your own hypocrisy fatuousness and laziness no it's equivalent to saying people who celebrate Hitler's birthday are Nazi sympathizers it's equivalent to saying people who celebrate the life and accomplishments of stalin are Stalinists if you actually opposed christianity don't celebrate christmas not one person has replied to me honestly and directly on topic I've had insults of right back saying how crazy I am I have not had one person really right back on topic this way this is again a reply that involved him and one other youtuber podcaster you can see there long applying to your position is quote Christmas as a cultural celebration close quote to keep the same excuses of heard many times before I saw on reddit also talked to some so-called atheist activist on reddit where this it all goes back to you'll its pre-christian and it's just a cultural tradition there's no Christ in Christmas this this kind of nonsense okay your position is Christmas is cultural celebration the gadhimai festival is a cultural celebration that's a festival in India sorry Nepal actually I don't know if that maybe the adjacent part of India but mostly famous in Nepal rather than India involves slaughtering huge numbers of cows animal sacrifice the gadhimai festival is a cultural celebration Ramadan also is a cultural celebration communists commemorating Lenin Stalin and Mao cultural celebrations period stand for something versus fall for anything period guys the particular excuses these so-called atheist activists made are not worth talking about what's worth talking about is the motivation behind them what motivates them to make these excuses what is it really you're making excuses for no aplomb again quote but this acquitting celebrating Christmas - celebrating Stalin's birthday is absurd my family misses out on nothing culturally by ignoring Stalin's birthday that is why I say it is way more like Halloween it is a social event well yeah if you lived in a majority communist society a lot of these replies also it's very obvious I'm sincere I have one of the full-length letters I wrote to these podcasts I've posted it on my blog I'll give you guys the link below this video it's only I don't know ten sentences long it's really pretty brief but um there was no reason to treat me like a troll there's no reason to treat me like I'm joking and I've sent that link to these people saying hey I'm a father of a five-year-old daughter this is the challenge I'm taking on how about you and one of the main things I've noticed is none of them have anything of substance say back to me and the main breaking point is where they just recognized that I'm not joking that I am being sincere so here's my reply to this guy and I think this was the end of the discussion for him because he didn't have anything of substance to say on the points being raised quote I've lived in two different communist countries and one X communist country my parents were communists I'm really being sincere in this discussion : you aren't period I'm really sincerely trying to prepare an alternative to Christmas for my daughter this year i'm not a troll' make all the excuses you want to you wouldn't regard someone in Saudi Arabia or Jerusalem who just conforms the dominant religion with the excuse of quote it's only cultural or it's only traditional as an atheist or a secular activists either you live up to your own standards or you don't [Music]
the equivalent of saying if you celebrate Halloween you are fine with witchcraft being taught in schools and special political rights for Wiccans okay just pause would he say that to a Muslim who was trying to get rid of Ramadan to an ex-muslim someone who's born Muslim and it's now atheist no you would never insult someone who is openly struggling to raise their children as atheist non-muslims in a Muslim majority that you would never say them you say that to me atheism is the laziest movement in the world secular humanism is the laziest most fatuous most self-indulgent movement in the world and that's why it's been failing to make progress in the last 20 years every other ideology calling for social change is aware that if you want change and if you're the one to make it happen you are going to be made uncomfortable by it and the atheists and secular humanists have a very statuesque that the world is going to change and that everyone else is going to be made uncomfortable except them because they're right and they think that being right means you get to sit back and just kind of congratulate yourself and throw conferences and have meetings where you pat yourself on the back and you live your whole life in a constant cycle of self-congratulation because you feel morally superior to the high school principal you grew up with because you feel morally superior to the nuns and priests and monks who talk to you when you were a child you feel intellectually superior to your own parents your own grandparents who believed in a religion you no longer believe in and you see your role now as sitting back passively and laughing as the rest of the world catches up with you and this brilliant insight you've had into reality that there is no God as Sarah Sarah why do you think you guys are losing why do you think gay rights made so much progress in the last twenty thirty years and you guys made none why do you think veganism made so much progress in the last twenty thirty years you guys made none hate to tell you this guys compared to communism and I'm an anti-communist completely anti-communist but I've got a degree in political science and spent many my life studying communism communism is still a major powerful influential ideology in the world it's still making moves it's still it's still affecting millions of people's lives even the Communists know if they want social change they've got to get uncomfortable they've got to get out there and start producing new meanings they've got to get out there and write their own story books and comic books and songs you wouldn't believe you wouldn't believe how many new songs the economy has come up with all over the world India China Russia everywhere and still to this day they're still doing it they're involved in cultural production and in trying to raise their children to repeat those memes those meanings to challenge and replace the culture they were born into to create what they think is a better world and that's what the vegans are doing that's the gay rights people were doing and there's a fundamentally sick and self-indulgent attitude that I see amongst the atheist activists the secular activists that I think is based on a sense of intellectual superiority that's completely unfounded I conducted a little tiny social experiment over the last several weeks by email and by Twitter message I reached out to people who had about the same number of total viewers I had on YouTube not famous internationally successful atheists like Richard Dawkins not people who are in such a towering scale of Fame and money and influence that they wouldn't answer an email from me people on about the same level I'm at a few thousand regular viewers doing this as a hobby to whatever extent on a podcast or on YouTube I reach out to them say hey look you know what I have a five-year-old daughter and I really don't want to raise her celebrating Christmas and I look around I don't see any other atheists secular humanists I don't see any other activists taking on the challenge of providing a set of songs and stories and rituals providing something more meaningful to their children to the next generation than what they've got right now and if you think repeating a ritual and a song again and again and again year after year in school and playing over the loudspeakers at the shopping center and acting that out if you think that doesn't that doesn't impact your children when they're growing up why don't you just raise your children secular Muslim or secular Hindu what why is it that atheists and secularists they have this unique blind spot for Christianity as a cultural tradition and not not for any other slightly unfamiliar culture division they don't see Buddhist rituals as secular nor Hindu Dharma just just the rituals of precisely the religion they claim to be in a state of rebellion against okay and this is the sense in which you guys are so much more fatuous then vegans gay rights activists communists you're not willing to make yourself even slightly uncomfortable challenging yourself to write a new story to come up with a new song to offer something more meaningful for the generation to come and to challenge the hegemony this is a case we're really really she's assuming the hegemony of Christian cultural traditions in as much as we can even recognize Christian cultural traditions as something separable from Christianity [Music] so I'd get these angry angry messages back totally unsympathetic messages that would always say quote Christmas is a cultural tradition I replied to one of them saying regarding quote Christmas is a cultural tradition would you make the same excuse for an Islamic holiday would you let your children participate in worshipping a fragment of a meteorite in Mecca on the grounds that it's just cultural quote unquote how about animal sacrifice within Islam more than any religion how would you how would you that I have not had a single one of these people reply on topic to this because none of them have actually answered those questions they've sent me insults before they've sent me insults after they've told me how completely insane I am to want to challenge and replace Christmas is a contradiction but they don't actually answer those questions now this is not hypothetical when I ask would you make the same excuse for Islamic holiday the some of these same people I wrote to so here's one again he has a youtube channel and a podcast and so on like most of this this guy you see on screen now he's participating in the hashtag hashtag when I was a Muslim and he says to all X Muslims please don't stop being open about leaving Islam you're not alone and people like you you guys are out there calling on Muslims to get real uncomfortable and to reject the cultural traditions of the oppressive societies they live in do you know how hard it is to not celebrate Ramadan when you're in Saudi Arabia Malaysia Indonesia you know how hard it is to be openly non-muslim when your whole family is Muslim in a Muslim majority country pretty much any Muslim of course some are easier than others Turkey is a lot easier than Saudi Arabia but we're not going to get the details you're asking for quite a high level of courage and effort in repudiating and refusing to participate in Ramadan and all the other Muslim festivals and traditions for X Muslims and you're celebrating them coming on Twitter and talking about rejecting Islam and what happens to them well there is and when I do it what I deal with Christianity when I say hey I'm gonna draw the line and I'm gonna refuse to be a part of Christmas I'm gonna make this little bit of an effort to offer my daughter something meaningful something more something positive instead of Christmas I'm gonna write new stories and new songs I'm gonna try to offer her something better than Christmas and something better than the x-men and Batman and Curious George I'm gonna take on that challenge all of you 100% of you wrote back with insults telling me that I was crazy okay so here's a reply from Noah plumb he's not famous but like myself he has a YouTube channel he has about the same number of total views on YouTube that I have I think he's been on YouTube for about the same length like the time I have too and he replies quote you are full of [ __ ] your point is the equivalent of saying if you celebrate Halloween you are fine with witchcraft being taught in schools and special political rights for Wiccans okay just pause would he say that to a Muslim who was trying to get rid of Ramadan to an ex-muslim someone who's born Muslim and it's now atheist no you would never insult someone who is openly struggling to raise their children as atheist non-muslims and a Muslim majority that you would never say them you say that to me and you say that to me because you're compensating for your own hypocrisy fatuousness and laziness no it's equivalent to saying people who celebrate Hitler's birthday are Nazi sympathizers it's equivalent to saying people who celebrate the life and accomplishments of stalin are Stalinists if you actually opposed christianity don't celebrate christmas not one person has replied to me honestly and directly on topic I've had insults of right back saying how crazy I am I have not had one person really right back on topic this way this is again a reply that involved him and one other youtuber podcaster you can see there long applying to your position is quote Christmas as a cultural celebration close quote to keep the same excuses of heard many times before I saw on reddit also talked to some so-called atheist activist on reddit where this it all goes back to you'll its pre-christian and it's just a cultural tradition there's no Christ in Christmas this this kind of nonsense okay your position is Christmas is cultural celebration the gadhimai festival is a cultural celebration that's a festival in India sorry Nepal actually I don't know if that maybe the adjacent part of India but mostly famous in Nepal rather than India involves slaughtering huge numbers of cows animal sacrifice the gadhimai festival is a cultural celebration Ramadan also is a cultural celebration communists commemorating Lenin Stalin and Mao cultural celebrations period stand for something versus fall for anything period guys the particular excuses these so-called atheist activists made are not worth talking about what's worth talking about is the motivation behind them what motivates them to make these excuses what is it really you're making excuses for no aplomb again quote but this acquitting celebrating Christmas - celebrating Stalin's birthday is absurd my family misses out on nothing culturally by ignoring Stalin's birthday that is why I say it is way more like Halloween it is a social event well yeah if you lived in a majority communist society a lot of these replies also it's very obvious I'm sincere I have one of the full-length letters I wrote to these podcasts I've posted it on my blog I'll give you guys the link below this video it's only I don't know ten sentences long it's really pretty brief but um there was no reason to treat me like a troll there's no reason to treat me like I'm joking and I've sent that link to these people saying hey I'm a father of a five-year-old daughter this is the challenge I'm taking on how about you and one of the main things I've noticed is none of them have anything of substance say back to me and the main breaking point is where they just recognized that I'm not joking that I am being sincere so here's my reply to this guy and I think this was the end of the discussion for him because he didn't have anything of substance to say on the points being raised quote I've lived in two different communist countries and one X communist country my parents were communists I'm really being sincere in this discussion : you aren't period I'm really sincerely trying to prepare an alternative to Christmas for my daughter this year i'm not a troll' make all the excuses you want to you wouldn't regard someone in Saudi Arabia or Jerusalem who just conforms the dominant religion with the excuse of quote it's only cultural or it's only traditional as an atheist or a secular activists either you live up to your own standards or you don't [Music]