reposted from:bligbi

Militant Agnostic cries "Atheists are Mean!"

John Humphrys is upset with us “militant” atheists and he’s not too fond of the “militant” theists either. What’s got the militant agnostic’s boxers all twisted? We militants are pretty damn sure about our respective ideas. At least, that’s what Humphrys’ would like us to conclude, but there’s a problem. Humphrys is a journalist that has given interviews about his little god quest.

The fact of the matter is that it is we “militant” atheists that piss Humphrys off the most. In an article at the beginning of September Humphrys had this to say about prominent atheist authors (emphasis added):

“Perhaps it was a mistake to read one after the other, to gorge myself, but it was the unfairness of it all. I thought they’d no right to do that . . . I was surprised how offended I was by their attack on people who believe, but it was personal.”

So, it wasn’t what was said, but that it was said. It was “unfair” for those atheists to write books that criticized religion. Notice also how these authors were accused of “attacking” theists. Not criticizing, even if unfairly or rudely - but attacking. This is rather telling to me and I’m highly surprised by Humphrys’ surprise as his motivation is quite clear to me (from the first link, emphasis added):

After a lifetime puzzling over an insoluble conundrum, Humphrys concluded: “I am not prepared to say there is nothing there. I do believe there is something there. What the hell it is, I have absolutely no idea at all.”

So, while he may be upset with the Jews, the Christians and the Muslims for giving a name to that “something”, he’s especially upset with those of of who publicly state that the invisible and the non-existent have a striking resemblance to each other.