[mukto-mona] Fundamentalist Atheists (RE: To M. Harun uz Zaman)

Sun Nov 2, 2008 9:07 pm (PST)

Re: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/mukto-mona/message/50476

Quote from Audrey:

[Fundamentalist atheists such as Dawkins, Hitchens and Harris do not
differ much from fundamentalist religionists. They all believe they
are right and the others are wrong.]

"Dear Audrey,
I am a bit taken aback by your labelling of Dawkins as
Fundamentalist(atheist). As an early member of MM you must have read the
plethora of messages and exchanges (many in which I participated besides
Avijit and many other freethinkers) which clarified the fallacy of this
mislabelling of rationalist views as fundamentalist. So its a bit
disappointing to see you still making this characterization after all this.
Let me try to clarfiy this issue here again."

 

..........   rest of the post deleted for brevity.

 

I agree with all the essential arguments made by Aparthib here.  It is indeed incorrect to call Dr. Dawkins, Mr. Hitchens, etc. fundamentalists just because they believe they are right and others are wrong. I also disagree with Dr. Audrey Manning for invoking a false symmetry between dogmatic religionists and firm atheists, and calling both groups of people fundamentalists.  I say this in spite of the fact that I myself believe in religion.  Let me explain why.

 

I am also a firm believer in semantic clarity.   It is semantic confusion that causes a label to be expanded in meaning and distorted beyond recognition.  The term "fundamentalist" was originally coined to denote Biblical literalists.  Then, the term got expanded to mean any combination of the following: any dogmatic person, a fanatic, a bigot, an "extremist," a militant political group and finally, a terrorist.  One of the most distorted applications of the word has been "Hindu Fundamentalist" to mean groups like RSS, BJP, etc., when the appropriate term should have been "Hindu Nationalist."  These groups pursue a strong identity-based political activism, and has only a minor or no nterest in religious dogma.  Another connotation of the word is what we have seen in Dr. Audrey's post: an uncompromising and obdurate stance on one's own viewpoint and complete rejection or outright hostility to others' views.

 

As Aparthib has correctly pointed out, holding one's own beliefs to be true and those of others to be false is not fundamentalist. Let me expand on this a little further.  If I hold opinion A on issue X, I have to necessarily believe that A is superior to competing or alternative beliefs B,C, etc. Otherwise, say if C was superior to A, I would have chosen C.  Therefore, the very choice of a belief A implies its acceptance and rejection of all others.  By this line of reasoning, everybody holding an opinion or subscribing to a belief is a fundamentalist, which is obviously absurd. 

 

So, if an atheist firmly believes that there is no God and all believers in God are wrong, that by itself does not constitute fundamentalism.  Likewise, if a Christian believes firmly in God and believes that atheists are wrong, that by itself does not make her a fundamentalist. On this particular point, there is some symmetry between an atheist and a theist, and neither can be called a fundamentalist for just holding their respective beliefs.

 

However, there is no symmetry between the two groups when it comes to dogmatism. A typical religious fundamentalist is necessarily dogmatic but a typical atheist is not.  One becomes an atheist after a thoughtful examination and rejection of whatever religious traditions one is born into, while a beleiver is usually so by birth and as a result of social conditioning.  Finally, as Aparthib has pointed out, an atheist is open to changing her views based on new information while a dogmatic believer is not. So, religious fundamentalism is a legitimate term to characterize a certain group of believers and atheist fundamentalism is not.

 

None of the above should be construed as my support for atheism.  I believe in religion and reject atheism.  I also reject religious fundamentalism in any form. I just wanted to say that words should be correctly used and we should be careful about incorrectly invoking symmetry where it does not apply. 

 

There might be another perspective that Dr. Audrey wanted to convey when he called Dawkins et al fundamentalists. Dawkins, Harris and Hitchens' espousal of atheism sometimes goes beyond mere affirmation of their ideals and rejection of religion.  It often takes on an air of hubris, scorn or contempt for believers, and this might have similarities with the attitudes of religious fundamentalists.  This still does not make those atheists fundamentalists but does make them appear more intolerant than they ought to be.  Dr. Manning is free to correct me if I made any error in characterizing her views.  The same goes for Aparthib. They are also free to contradict my views.

 

All comments are welcome.

 

Best wishes.

 

M. Harun uz Zaman 

 

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