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Darij Grinberg's avatar

I think it's no coincidence that the atheist community got overtaken by delusions related to gender specifically -- as opposed to, say, astrology, JFK conspiracy theories, ley lines or a thousand other folk beliefs. The delusions at hand had the competitive advantages of (1) coming out of the science/medicine community, which understandably has an elevated position in atheism, and (2) playing to the wishes and desires of us atheists, who generally want to see innate social roles replaced by a choose-your-own-adventure society and view sex differences as one of the major hurdles on that way. "Scientists learn to change people's sex" is an irresistible story for us, both due to its heroes and to their alleged achievement. Big if true! Much easier to call the fraud when it's coming from antivaxxers, mediums or 5G truthers.

Still shocking how long it lasted. Back in 2020 I made a bet that it would be widely seen as a medical malpractice scandal along the lines of fentanyl and thalidomide in 5 years' time; looks like I'm quite on track with that prediction now. But if someone had told me about what was going on back in 2010, I would have never expected it to last 15 years and perhaps take the US Democrats down with it.

That said, I don't believe your theory of religion creating a floor for stupid ideas. It might be true for a greatly deradicalized and institutionalized religion like Christianity, but it is hardly true for Islam in the Middle East, unless you take it rather literally and conclude that much of the region is stuck under that floor. It is also far too easy for religious apologists to pick and choose who they consider to be religious; e.g. are Russians religions by dint of going to church?

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Michael David Cobb Bowen's avatar

I'm amused by the anecdote of the atheist who asked the monotheist how many gods are to be believed given than mankind has worshipped so many throughout the ages. The monotheist replies something to the effect of 'the one true god' to which the atheist replies that he only believes in one less. The implication is that the moral capacity of the atheist who rejects N gods is only marginally different than the monotheist who rejects N-1 gods.

One of my axioms is that absolute zero tolerance requires infinite policing. So if we consider the practical matter of tolerance of religious faith, the atheist has his work cut out for him when he professes to accept zero.

I think that it's useful to consider two camps when it comes to ideologies. There are devotees and there are shareholders. The intolerant devotees have the greatest burden. Shareholders are more flexible. I'd say shareholders, while paying attention to the fundamentals of their investments are the least likely to become fundamentalists. They'd rather switch than fight. Whereas devotees, especially fundamentalists, would rather fight than switch.

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