Recognizing Intolerance, The Easy Way.

Chances are, this has happened to you too: You start feeling slightly uncomfortable while listening to somebody, like there's something wrong with something they've just said, but somehow you can't quite put your finger on it.

Take, for example, Pope Francis' recent remarks on Homosexuality:

"The problem is not having this orientation, it is lobbying," he said. "That's the most serious problem I think.

"If someone is gay and seeks the Lord with good will, who am I to judge?"

That's great news, right? The Pope promoting tolerance of Gay people - perhaps there is actual change happening in the catholic church! Except, I can't seem to get rid of that funny feeling. Am I just prejudiced after years of criticizing the Pope? Have I become so used to the role of condemning everything the Pope says that I now feel the need to find something wrong with every statement he makes, even good ones? Am I being queasy for no reason here?

Well luckily, there's an easy way to test this. It works like this: Most of us have extremely well trained alarm-bells with regards to racism - It's just one of those things most of us have very little trouble spotting. So, to exploit that fact, all we need to do is to take the above statement, and change its content from gay vs straight to black vs white. While otherwise keeping the wording intact. The result looks something like this:

"The problem is not having black skin, it is lobbying," he said. "That's the most serious problem I think.

"If someone is black and seeks to act white with good will, who am I to judge?"

Suddenly, the reason for my uneasy feeling becomes very clear.

I highly recommend doing this every time somebody makes a public statement regarding any minority. Especially when what they're saying is designed to make them seem open-minded and tolerant. Gays, atheists, women - whatever they're talking about, just write down the exact statement and then replace the minority with "black". I promise, you'll be shocked what kind of statements you almost let people get away with.

My Tattooed Ode to Reason

I love tattoos. I plan to be covered head to toe at some point in the future, though I'm in no particular hurry to get there. Over the past few weeks, I've become aware of an increasing number of atheist-themed tattoos out there. A quick google search for "atheist tattoo" reveals most of them as rather unimaginative: Various versions of the letter "A" prevail, some more clever ones include pictures of the flying spaghetti monster or the invisible pink unicorn. In between there is the occasional tattoo depicting the desecration of various religious symbols - rather tasteless if you ask me. Also I find it kinda weird to go through such lengths to ostentatiously demonstrate the non-identification with a single particular idea. If I were to get a tattoo about each and every topic I strongly disagree with, I'd run out of skin by the end of the week.
Personally, I derive far greater enjoyment of more positive tattoo motives: All those nerdy scientists, for example, who choose to express their love for their respective fields by displays on their skin.

Of the ideologically motivated tattoos, one in particular caught my attention:
The CEO of the British Humanist Association got a tattoo of the Happy Human - the internationally recognized symbol for Humanism - tattooed on her upper arm as part of a fundraising effort. They aimed for 20.000 pounds, any sum beyond that goal would increase the size of the tattoo she got.
I like that a lot better than depictions of a broken cross in a garbage bin. I also like it better than the rather boring "Scarlet A"-logo. What I did not like about the story was the realization that, had I read that story when it was still news, I could have copied the fundraising-idea when I got my own Happy Human tattoo in June 2009:

I love the Happy Human logo. Happiness and People are all what Humanism is about, and the symbol captures that nicely while being a simple, adaptable, and beautiful form.

The other tattoo I'd like to show you is both a little more complex and a lot larger; The motive is an 18th century etching done by a spanish artist called Goya. It goes by the lovely title 'The Sleep of Reason Brings Forth Monsters'. Here it is, in all its considerable beauty:

The Original 'Sleep of Reason'

The Tattooed Version

Above all, I chose this because I simply admire the picture. It's a masterpiece. I don't care much for what else I've seen of Goya's works, but this one has always resonated with me. The combination of the lyrical title with the rather dark motive I have always found fascinating, in particular the little details like how the cross-eyed staring of the ghostly animals conveys an atmosphere of insanity that is outright scary.

Another reason, of course, is the message. As I have written before, the simple absence of religion is not sufficient to really improve anything. "Good" requires more than just the absence of "bad". Goya nailed it (see what I did there?) when he wrote that the sleep of reason is what produces monsters. There are thousands of people out there who believe in god and live perfectly benign lives, not obstructing stem cell research, not shooting abortion doctors, nor trying to corrupt the science curriculum by demanding that biblical creation be taught in our kids' schools. Religion is merely a multiplying factor, not the danger itself. What we need is not so much less religion - it is more reason.

What American Atheists Can Learn From Europe

In Europe, fundamentalism is rare. Not as rare as I’d like it to be, but still rare. Biblical literalists are laughed at. The fight against fundamentalism, one might argue, is already won over here.
Except that it isn’t. People are still irrational – they’ve largely turned from religion, but only to find pseudo-science and “spirituality”: horoscopes, homeopathy, traditional chinese medicine, weird forms of supposed "buddhism" tailored to the needs of those who are middle-aged, well-off and bored, and a wide selection of other new-age-hippie-shit. The majority of people here might be non-religious, but they're still far from being critical thinkers. Many still actively fight what they perceive as the "cold" naturalistic worldview, which they perceive as lacking in beauty and mystery.

Even though religion has largely been recognized as out-dated, people still need some values, some ideals to live their lives by. While religion slowly degenerates, it does seem to leave a gap. Religion has been (successfully) brought to its knees, but no viable alternative was presented to the people. Humanism has failed to step up and fill the void, failed to catch the attention of those who are looking for an alternative, who still seek ritual, celebration, community.

Our culture is distinctly influenced by the Enlightenment, but there is no formal acknowledgement of the values that are the basis of nearly all western constitutions and legal systems. Now that is a mistake that need not be repeated in the US – here we still have the chance. Fighting against religion is not enough, because people who stop being religious do not by default become reasonable - They just substitute one superstition for another. To win the fight, we do not only need to make people turn away from fundamentalism, but towards a culture of ethics, art and science - of compassion, tolerance and reason.