christian atheism
ive been an atheist for over half of my life at this point and i remember my initial excitement at discovering richard dawkins and christopher hitchins as a young man. i had recently left catholicism at age 15 and was trying to find some way to understand the world outside of the religious paradigm i had grown up in. my excitement, however, started to wear off once i started really engaging with how openly hateful some of these authors were, particularly towards islam. this is not to say that i am particularly fond of islam, or any religion for that matter, but having grown up in the (literal) fall out of 9/11, i recognized that the criticisms my supposed fellow atheists were giving out were based in racism.
this post on bluesky got me thinking about the concept of christian supremacy and how even western atheists will bend themselves into pretzels to uphold those values. however, what those values actually are seem to be very selective depending on which atheist youre talking to.
when you become an atheist, you are told that atheists dont have any specific unifying features except an absence of faith in god/gods. this is technically true, but all identities are political and socially constructed. my loss of faith and subsequent atheism didnt happen in a vacuum, and almost every atheist will tell you a similar story of falling out of faith. almost no one in the west is raised as a strict atheist which leads to a certain set of shared values and experiences. basically, our atheism came from somewhere, and that somewhere is the result of our cultural, social, and political backgrounds.
because i grew up and live in the political/geographic west, i dont feel a huge need to pillory islam like i do christianity. after all, both my homes (the US and brazil) are deeply christian countries that seem to deeply hate all other non christian religions, usually for overtly racist reasons. theres no reason to beat around the bush; you cant tell me that jews, muslims, macumbeiros, hindus etc arent othered and racialized as Not Belonging in the west. i know its a nice rhetorical and pedantic slight of hand to say that islamaphobia is about islam rather than race, for example, but this is frankly such a stupidly lazy argument its not worth anyones time. its like saying homophobia isnt real because of the word PHOBIA--no ones AFRAID of gay people, so homophobic violence isnt real! har har! (both arguments were, of course, very popular in the 2000s from people who thought watching south park made them critical thinkers.)
atheists and others who divest from the dominant ideology are not immune to absorbing their societies' values: dawkins famously calls himself a cultural anglican, whatever that means; and when i saw hitchins debate a christian at my college, they both said theyd rather their son be a christian or an atheist than a muslim--right to the face of a muslim student. why else would an atheist agree that being a christian is better than being a muslim if not for racism? what other explanation is there? do western atheists and right wing christians have more in common than with a progressive muslim?
i think its correct to say that there are many Atheisms. the infamous 'nu atheism' that people like to throw around as an accusation is obviously not representative of all atheists. there are religions and faith systems like buddhism that dont center around worshiping a god or gods, and a lot of ink has been spilled in trying to justify how buddhisms lack of a deity figure isnt actually atheistic. if atheism is a lack of faith in god or gods, then i think saying buddhism doesnt count means there are in fact different meanings to what we refer to as atheist. a white american nu atheist who watches a lot of south park and 'hates everyone equally' is going to be different from a communist atheist who criticizes religious institutions for their role in upholding capitalism. the former will participate in 'draw mohammad day', while the latter is often in community with religious people of all kinds. one sees religion as a way to punch down while the other sees it as an institution that must be criticized and understood in its proper context. in this, we find two Atheisms with two different approaches to the same simple idea.
referring to the post that got me thinking about all of this, im not sure if it really matters to the average non-christian if jesus was a good or bad guy. he certainly did a lot of cool things, at least according to the gospels. (also, the historical jesus christ almost certainly existed though the only thing atheists doubt is his divinity.) however, its interesting that many will defend jesus's honor as a matter of fact. jesus literally couldnt have been problematic in any way, and criticizing him is tantamount to blasphemy. when we compare to the islam once more, we see that even nominally non religious folks in the west are quick to criticize muhammad in ways they would never dream of doing to christ. ultimately, muhammad was a flawed man (which im pretty sure muslims dont dispute) but there is no reverence given to him like there is for christ. muhammads divinity and importance to one of the largest religions on earth is simply irrelevant to westerners, but jesus's importance is considered obvious and self-evident.
rather than take this 'i criticize everyone equally' approach that finds itself punching down more often than not, i prefer to take the good from wherever i can. im never returning to religion again and as a marxist i will criticize these powerful institutions for the rest of my life. i became an atheist because i didnt want to be beholden to an irrational and often cruel dogma that told me i needed to accept suffering as gods plan. i wanted to be my own man and live in community with the world rather than in constant terror of sin and degeneracy. in this, i admire the jesus of the gospels for being uncompromising about the humanity of those fanon would probably call the wretched of the earth. that empathy and humanity is fundamental to my values and thats a lesson im willing to embrace from christianity. however, the so-called culturally christian atheists are interested in yet another identity to consolidate their sense of supremacy over The Other.
the muslim is bad because he oppresses his women, but dont ask the nu atheist about the veritable epidemic of sexual harassment at atheist conferences or their connections to jeffrey epstein. the muslim is regressive because he denies science, but dont ask these nu atheists about what the science says on trans people. the muslim is violent because he is bellicose, but the nu atheist has never met an invasion of a third world country he didnt love. the muslim is primitive because he sticks to his tradition, but the nu atheist declares himself a 'cultural' christian entirely out of twee sentimentality and white supremacy. heres something from the christianity you claim to love so much: take the plank out of your eye first (matthew 7:5).