What's the Reason for the Reason Rally? Derail

[Gawdzilla Sama]

[maiforpeace]

Indeed Seraph...I think it's sloppy of such "Bright" people to overlook how that particular statement could be viewed as arrogant, and/or negatively. But, what would be a better way to present that idea?

(i.e. pro-peace vs anti-war, that sort of thing)

It's the unjustified presumption of superiority that gets me, and the exclusive arrogation of reason. An article Apophenia linked to elsewhere made it pretty clear that reasoning has precious little to do with being or becoming an atheist. Zuckerman notes, for instance that

• if the father had no religion but the mother did, about one-sixth of such children grew up to become religious ‘‘Nones;’’ if the mother had no religion but the father did, about half of such children became religious ‘‘Nones;’’ and if both parents had no religion, approximately 84 percent of such children grew up to have no religion themselves. Clearly, childhood socialization is a major factor in determining whether someone will be religious – or not.

[My bolding]

I'm clear what you think of it, Seraph.

Again...

what would be a better way to present that idea?

There are a few avenues. One of them would be to keep pointing out how we atheists differ from theists by only one god. Another is to point out the damage religious institutions theists almost invariably adhere to are inflicting on humanity. A third one might be to highlight the cherrypicking that necessarily happens when theists attempt to obey the commands of their holy texts. And perhaps it might be useful to highlight the absurdity of many of their religions' dogmas and doctrines, and the contradictions between many of them.

Most of all, though, I think that presentations of ideas are largely ineffectual. Communal harmony and security,

like a rally?

I agree that it doesn't feel safe to have your ideas ridiculed...which is, unfortunately what many atheists do to religious people. I too would rather focus on the positives of atheism versus the negatives of religion...however, if a religious person wants to point out something about their religion they think is positive that really isn't for me, I will say something. Mostly, that would be something to do in the area of civil rights.

freedom from material lack and ready availability of heaps of education would be much better.

I assure you plenty of education will be going on at the rally. I've been to a few atheist gatherings, and there's no shortage of that.

[apophenia]

I didn't realize this was here, but I think I and others have covered the ground reasonably well. I would just point out that this "Rally for Reason" sloganism is reminiscent of Orwellian newspeak (not that I've read Orwell). It's basically atheist/secular propaganda — and I mean that by the literal definition of attempting to persuade people to support a point, group or ideology by appeals to emotion, rather than reason. As I've shown, this rally isn't to persuade people that reason is a worthwhile thing, it's using our emotions about the worth and value of reason to enlist our support for specific ideologies and worldviews. Propaganda, if this is such, is formally known as a non sequitur — the conclusion doesn't follow from the premise, and therefore drawing the conclusion that the specific reasons of rationalists are valuable because reason itself is valuable is irrational. It seems an appropriately bizarre result that a rally ostensibly to support rationality, is using irrational means to encourage support and participation. And that's pretty Orwellian.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

tl:dr