Tolerant and Activist Atheists

The labels used to describe the positions in the abortion debate aren't really helpful. There's "pro-life," a position dominated by people who are in favor of the death penalty (except the Catholic pro-lifers, of course), and "pro-choice," which basically says, "people who like not being forced to do things they don't want to do." In other words, the labels are either inaccurate or overly broad; they're not exactly overflowing with information about those to whom they're applied.

And as far as I can tell, this is pretty much how labels work in our society. At first, there may be some value to framing a debate in a certain way by force-feeding your audience the labels you've chosen. Thus, for a very short time, "pro-life" might have implied that your opponents were "anti-life," and "pro-choice" might have implied that your opponents like slavery or something, but these days, unless you're a true believer already, it's unlikely the labels have such connotations for you. You just use them the same way you use the word "tiger" to refer to those big, striped cats in the zoo: you don't really pay attention to the origins of the label or its potential meanings, you just point at the thing and say, "tiger."

Which makes PZ Myers' obvious chagrin at the use of the term "tolerant atheist" somewhat amusing. The "tolerant atheist" label comes from this post by some Australian dude who has the temerity, nay, the gall! to give a positive label to an atheist temperament with which Dr. Myers disagrees. In essence, the Australian dude argues that atheists should promote more tolerant religion. This view he labels "tolerant atheism." Like a true adult, PZ goes all I'm-rubber-your-glue on dude's ass, and calls the Australian dude's atheism "do-nothing atheism." Because, you see, if that kind of atheism is "tolerant atheism," then any other form of atheism must be "intolerant atheism," just like anyone who's not "pro-life" is "anti-life," and any cat that's not a "tiger" is "anti-tiger" (oh, it just got all Hegelian up in this hizzy!). No one who knows Myers deep in his soul has ever accused him of being intolerant, so why is Australian dude so mean to damn him by implication? But wait, he may not be intolerant, but PZ does do stuff (or say stuff, at least). So PZ gives us a "snap, snap, oh no he didn't!" then lectures us on the active and the passive (channeling his inner Nietzsche), and replaces "tolerant" with "do-nothing," and "intolerant" with "activist." In your face Australian dude! That's how we do serious intellectual discussions in the United States of Friggin' America!

It is, of course, irrelevant at this point that the Australian dude was arguing for a position that involved doing something, namely promoting tolerant religion (it's doubly irrelevant that the Australian guy never called any other atheists intolerant). This is, in fact, asking atheists to do quite a lot, because intolerant religion seems to be gaining a bigger and bigger foothold in many parts of the world, including the U.S. (I don't know about Australia). But like I said, that's irrelevant, because the labels aren't really going to mean anything to anybody but the choir, should they stick. They won't stick, because they're stupid, but if they did, no one would think that PZ was an "intolerant atheist" because he wasn't a "tolerant atheist," and no one would think that Australian dude was a "do-nothing atheist" because he wasn't an "activist atheist." That's just not the way these things work.

By the way, more accurate labels for the two might be "adolescent atheists," which anyone who reads PZ's post will agree is an accurate description of his brand, and "tilting at windmills atheists," because that's pretty much what trying to have a conversation with adolescent atheists is like. But since labels end up being meaningless, better that they not start out as accurate anyway, right?