Yeah, no. It was never “cringey”, it was and is bigoted.
New Atheism isn’t going to get rid of Christofascism because a solid chunk of its founders and leaders are borderline or outright fascists themselves.
They have been, in essence, compromised by the Alt-Right, including a lot of their prominent founders.
There are far better secular paths to dismantling Christian Nationalism than this specific sub-section
Look at some of the founders and leaders of the New Atheist movement. I’m going to do a breakdown.
A lot of good sources on this are in this article by Émile P Torres, who initially wanted to associate with the movement but has since become disillusioned by its conservatism and cynical bigotry., but I’ve pulled out links confirming and expanding on specific bullshit by issue
James Lindsay, supposed “apolitical atheist”, works with Turning Point USA, is an anti-Critical Race Theory crusader, and literally works for a COVID conspiracy theorist and Christian Nationalist while still claiming fame as a New Atheist. Before his Twitter was suspended he claimed “woke Jews” caused antisemitism and “neo-Marxists” like Joe Biden were destroying the country.
He wrote an entire book railing against social justice.
He voted for and supports Donald Trump
Sam Harris’s side gigs from being a prominent New Atheist include being a Ben Shapiro fanboy.
David Silverman openly calls social justice and feminism “a cancer”.
Michael Shermer has plenty of nice things to say about Milo Yiannopolous. He is a libertarian who describes himself as “anti-woke, non progressive, [doesn’t] support affirmative action or reparations”.
Stephen Pinker is an “anti-safe space” libertarian
Peter Boghossian advocated New Atheists realigning themselves with conservative Christians for “Culture War 2.0”
Racism, Antisemitism, Islamophobia
There is a basic piece of historical context illuminating much of the antisemitism, which is that “eradicating religion” was the justification for mass scale oppression and murder of Jews under the Soviet Union, and “eradicating” Judaism specifically was the goal of the Nazis. The USSR barely hid its antisemitism behind ‘secularism’. That phrasing is always going to have those connotations.
Richard Dawkins famously attacked the “God of the Old Testament” specifically over the New Testament (which is blatantly antisemitic) and justified it by saying most Christians would agree with him. He literally backed his own position up with evangelical bigotry.
The article by Mark Oppenheimer (linked at the top of the “misogyny” section) goes into the common online problem of New Atheists calling others in their own movement who they dislike “Jews”.
Richard Dawkins self-identifies as an Islamophobe and declared that “All the world's Muslims have fewer Nobel Prizes than Trinity College, Cambridge. They did great things in the Middle Ages, though”. Don’t forget “I think Islam is the greatest force for evil in the world today. I’ve said so, often and loudly.” And let’s not forget the Dear Muslima letter
Sam Harris is a proponent of white supremacist race science. He also opposes BLM and advocates racial profiling of Muslims or anyone who “looks Muslim”. He said on his own site that "the people who speak most sensibly about the threat that Islam poses to Europe are actually fascists."
Peter Boghossian has publicly defended neo-Nazis and for some reason claimed slavery wasn’t institutionalized (???)
Boghossian is also a collaborator with open white supremacist Peter Molyneux, and personally called for “Full-scale full-scale ideological warfare against the enemies of Western Civilization.”
Dawkins claimed “mild pedophilia” isn’t sexual abuse and doesn’t cause lasting damage
Though that looks mild next to Lawrence Krause, avowed friend of Jeffrey Epstein, who says he doesn’t believe any of the women surrounding Epstein were underage (see the long read at the top)
Stephen Pinker, an associate of the movement and friend of Dawkins and Daniel Dennett is another prominent friend of Epstein’s (here they are all together on the “Lolita Express”)
Michael Shermer, a prominent New Atheist and accused rapist, defended Jerry Sandusky, a convicted rapist, as a victim of “woke” accusations (trauma victims are over-sensitive)
His opening review of the Yiannopolous book linked above also defends him against “cancellation” because Yiannopolous defended pedophilic priests.
Misogyny, Sexual Offenses
This is a long read about pervasive sexism in the New Atheist movement, which I’ve referenced below.
It includes the fact that Jen McCreight, Amy Davis Roth, and Melody Hensley - all public atheists - have faced harassment campaigns from male atheists (death threats, rape threats, being sent gore, etc).
Among the most damning things is the accusations against Michael Shermer, founder of Skeptic magazine was accused of sexual harassment and the rape of a drunk woman which took place at an atheist conference (TAM in 2008). The long read at the top has detailed descriptions of the allegations
David Silverman is another prominent accused rapist. He also spoke with a UKIP (UK ultra-conservative party) leader about Feminist Tyranny,
Lawrence Krauss (the one who’s friends with Jeffrey Epstein) is also a serial sexual harasser.
Dawkins repeatedly made antifeminist statements using his atheism as justification. That’s to say nothing of the ones he made, noted in the same article, about female rape victims not being trustworthy if they drink and sexual harassment not being real — made after the allegations against Michael Shermer. Dawkins also promoted Christina Hoff Sommers, a professional anti-feminist ally of Newt Gingrich who identifies as a neo-conservative.
I don’t even know how to file the Peter Boghossian & James Lindsay gender studies hoax, which they responded to by crying about having been cancelled, but definitely misogynistic
Sam Harris said the following when asked why New Atheism specifically has so many fewer women when there are plenty of feminist atheists:
“There’s something about that critical posture that is to some degree instrinsically male and more attractive to guys than to women.” He added, “The atheist variable just has this— it doesn’t obviously have this nurturing, coherence-building extra estrogen vibe that you would want by default if you wanted to attract as many women as men.”
Here’s an atheist blogger detailing sexist remarks by Penn Jilette and a long argument with him directed at her (and a follow-up on adding to the harassment of Lindy West, calling her a “stupid cunt”). He later quit the movement for being too PC.
Feminist & atheist artist Amy Davis Roth, who actually describes herself as having become a feminist in response to the abuse she received in the New Atheist movement:
The men and women in this community have a right to speak up about it, and if the best argument you have against us is that we are the ‘thought police’ or we are writing for ‘clickbait’ or that the weight of our words is equivalent to an actual ‘witch hunt’, then perhaps it’s time to retire to your study and calmly reevaluate the actual topics at hand.
Atheist writer Greta Christina:
“I can’t tell you how many women, people of color, other marginalized people I’ve talked with who’ve told me, ‘I’m an atheist, but I don’t want anything to do with organized atheism if these guys are the leaders.’”
There is a reason that New Atheism specifically attracted Reddit bros, MRAs and GamerGate people. There is a reason it attracted antisemites and islamophobes. There is a reason why female atheists who speak out within their own community are harassed and sent barrages of rape threats. There is a reason why many of the movement’s founders and followers are now alt-right, conservative Trumpists
The idea that this is the wing of the movement best equipped to fight institutionalized misogyny, racism and sexual abuse of adults and children is totally off-base in context.
I emphasize this not because I oppose atheism, but because platforming the criticisms of the movement’s leaders made by marginalized atheists - who have, admirably, worked hard to carve out niches like Skepchick - but because there are many forms of political atheism, and of determined paths to promote the separation of Church and State, of Church and medicine, of church and bodily autonomy.
We do not have to rely on New Atheism, or “cringe” atheism to get there.
If you (like me) are in favor of secular government which is separate from and not influenced by churches but also doesn’t discriminate against minority religious groups; if you are in favor of a progressive government that does not restrict the bodily autonomy and human rights of its citizens, I am sorry but New Atheists specifically (not all atheists, these guys in particular) are not your friends.
EDIT: Linked the wrong thing at the top of the misogyny section by accident (fixed). It’s an article by Mark Oppenheimer for Buzzfeed about misogyny.
Also while PZ Meyers has written about getting into fights over sexism, he is not a woman, so I fixed that
