What if All Atheists Left America?

So, having my dashboard bookmarked, I did not notice the new format for the log-in page until now. This article was on the front page, so I thought I would comment on it. What set them off? A fake Letter to the Editor to some random Alaskan newspaper:

First, I’ll address Ms. Shannon’s semi-coherent rant.

The majority of Americans are not calling for atheists to be kicked out of the country and the 1st Amendment says nothing about requiring Americans to be theists. Someone took the old “Freedom of religion, not freedom from religion” line one step too far.

Atheism, while it does it’s part (promoting the false belief that there are no eternal consequences for their actions), is not the sole cause of America’s “ruin” and America’s crime problem. Adam’s sin, Woodrow Wilson’s internationalism, FDR’s overt socialism, Margaret Sanger’s eugenics program, the secular-progressive culture (starting with the Modernist movement) slowly eroding away traditional values, hippies, hippies in charge of public education, and Frank Lloyd Wright all need to share the blame, too, if we are going to assume America is irrevocably broken (which I am not quite there yet). When my opinion becomes in favor of Ms. Shannon’s assumption, we will need to add the contributions of Obama (who at least claims to be Christian) to the list, too.

That is not to say that atheists are the cause of ruin; it is thought process, not the individual people, that is the poison. While there are exceptions (Stalin, Pol Pot, Che, Castro, and Mao all come to mind), atheists do not intentionally do any more harm to society than converting others to their way of thinking.

But this is America, and people are allowed to believe what they want to believe. How did that quote go? “I disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”

So, what would happen if all the worshippers of Athor, rational god of logic, suddenly left for more rational pastures? The article makes faulty assumptions.

I cannot argue against the immediate shortage of scientists, but the argument that science would suddenly be less “progressive” seems a little over the top, depending on what he means.  Do you mean less creative? As I have noted before, American science is not exactly open to new ideas; there may be a radical shift in what research lines are pursued, but science is not going to become less open-minded. Do you mean less liberal? I could see that.

Sure, there are a lot of atheists in the entertainment fields (along with Kabbalah nuts, Scientologists, crystal worshippers, and other forms of stupidity), but saying that Bill Maher, Seth McFarlane, and Keanu Reeves are entertaining is an insult to entertainers. Arguing that they would no longer be able to entertain Americans is hyperbole. Ever heard of satellites? Bill Maher could continue to send out his hate speech, Seth McFarlane could continue to make retarded genitalia jokes, and Keanu Reeves could continue his wooden acting style (seriously, has he made any decent movie since Bill ‘n’ Ted), all from the comfort of Toronto or wherever the atheists settle.

And when only .7% of the American adult population calls itself atheists, how did you come up with 10% of tax revenue and purchasing power? That’s not even going to be the same number of people, since taxes take away purchasing power, and taxes do not hit people’s wallets evenly (bottom 40% of wage earners essentially do not pay taxes, top 5% paid over half of all tax revenue in 2007) . Overreaching much?

Finally, to address the desire of one of the original article’s commenters to move to an atheist country, you do have (at least) two choices: China and North Korea are essentially atheist and regularly try to quash theism (North Korea more so, from what I hear). Cuba might work for you too. It would be a shame to see you go (and you will come to regret it), but those options do exist.

A Serious Note…

…since Scott Wilder deserves a tip of the hat for telling me Chuck Norris’ column is up.

This is a new bit of dirt on Obamacare:

“The bill says that the government agents, “well-trained and competent staff,” would “provide parents with knowledge of age-appropriate child development in cognitive, language, social, emotional, and motor domains … modeling, consulting, and coaching on parenting practices,” and “skills to interact with their child to enhance age-appropriate development.””

“The state “shall identify and prioritize serving communities that are in high need of such services, especially communities with a high proportion of low-income families.””

Boy, is that scary. And not just in ways that Chuck points out.

So, a federal equivalent to Child Protection Services is going to target “high needs” communities for government mandated parent counseling? Here are some situations to consider:

• What kind of advice will the Federales give? What is considered acceptable by normal people (corporal punishment, for example) is hated by liberal sensibilities. Ever wondered what happened to swats at school? They were regulated away (with some vestigial remnants in common sense land, based on notarized parental consent forms). The result? A huge spike in disrespect and general disciplinary problems in the kiddos. Wonder what will happen once that touchy-feely discipline angle is sent to the home en masse?
• What will happen when parents choose to ignore the Federales advice? Child Protection Services are known to remove children from parents they deem “unfit”, shipping them off to the foster parent system. You think they will decide that parents who choose to forgo their expert advice are still fit to raise their own kids? The government-run school system already fails these “high needs” kids. Image how well the government will serve them once they run their homes, too.
• Do you think the government will fix the largest problems facing the generalized American family today (divorce and single never-been-wed parent households)? Do you think the Federales will include in their parental advice the vital importance of a father in a child’s life? How they are supposed to model proper male behavior? If the track record is any indication, I doubt it. There is nothing worse for a father than to have to go to divorce court, which believes them at fault by definition and takes away their rights to raise their kids unless the mother is clearly incapable of doing so. Even then, it is no guarantee. Writing pamphlets with “so, you’re now a single mother” themes (with radical feminist overtones) is going to make things worse, not better.

Nice to see someone bringing up specific policy effects of Obamacare instead of the generalized stuff.