Why we need to help young atheists

[rug]

Posted at 12:49 PM ET, 12/05/2012
Dec 05, 2012 05:49 PM EST
By Hemant Mehta

Stephanie Kirmer attended high school in Kansas in the late 1990s, around the time the state was embroiled in a battle over teaching Creationism in science classes. She wrote letters to the editor of her local newspaper and testified in front of her school board to oppose the state Board of Education’s removal of evolution from the high school science curriculum. It wasn’t a very popular position for a high school freshman to take.

A few years later, when she joined the board of a fledgling organization called the Secular Student Alliance, she knew she wanted to focus on helping high school students. Not far removed from high school herself, she knew what it was like to become an atheist and feel like you were the only non-believer out there. She remembers the emails she received from students who, like her, didn’t know there was a growing movement for non-religious people. They would send her messages reading, “Oh my god, you guys exist! I’m the only atheist in my town!”

In response, Stephanie would send them reading material — books or magazines written from the atheist perspective. What surprised me was the way she prevented the potential problem of parents discovering the packages:

“We sent plain brown envelopes. I’m not making that up … There was no labeling on the outside to indicate what was in there. And if kids couldn’t receive it at their house, we’d send it to a friend’s house… It made a big difference for a lot of kids who didn’t otherwise have an outlet.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/guest-voices/post/why-we-need-to-help-young-atheists/2012/12/05/8798ba48-3f00-11e2-bca3-aadc9b7e29c5_blog.html

Hemant Mehta is a national board certified high school math teacher from Illinois and a blogger at FriendlyAtheist.com. He is the author of the new book “The Young Atheist's Survival Guide ."

[cbayer]

1. Progress is being made. I think the formation of groups at the high school

level that bring believers of various stripes and non-believers together to talk to each other is the way to go. It worked very well for GLBT issues in many places.

[rug]

2. Pepole, especially young people, should not be afraid of ideas.

Although I don't think comparing atheist teens to GLBT teens is very accurate. Thoughts change but sexual orientation doesn't. The latter have far more drastic obstacles.

[cbayer]

3. I agree, but lots of adolescents explore both sexual and religious options.

I think the atheist groups can learn some lessons from the GLBT community in terms of increasing acceptance and addressing prejudice.

[beam me up scottie]

6. Atheists "groups" aren't the ones persecuting GLBT people.

What rank hypocrisy.

[cbayer]

7. What? I didn't say anything even remotely like that.

[beam me up scottie]

9. "I think the atheist groups can learn some lessons from the GLBT community"

What can we learn from the religious community?

[cbayer]

12. GLBT kids made inroads by forming clubs that encouraged alliances with other

kids.

In doing so, they were able to educate others, increase their visibility and form relationships that helped them gain acceptance in the larger community.

I was suggesting that this was a good method to follow.

The GLBT community is not the religious community.

Why so freaking combative?

[rug]

11. Don't bother. She's already said she never changes her thoughts.

[beam me up scottie]

17. My thoughts about you have changed drastically.

I was once dumb enough to believe you actually respected atheists.

Young atheists don't need your kind of "help".

[rug]

18. You confuse the particular with the general.

[beam me up scottie]

5. Bullshit. I have always been an atheist, my "thoughts" never changed.

Religious belief or lack of it cannot be changed at will.

The comparison is accurate.

[rug]

10. Bullshit? Your thoughts never changed?

Let me see. You have always been an atheist? From infancy? As a toddler you announced your disbelief in a deity? Leaving aside the proposition that thoughts change in relation to new knowldege and experience, I find that hard to, pardon the expression, believe.

Leaving you and your peculiar experience aside, are you saying there are not atheists who were once believers and believers who were once atheists?

[beam me up scottie]

14. Yep, like all babies I was born an atheist.

I never believed in flying purple hippopotamuses either.

Atheists lack belief in gods, the idea that we practice active disbelief is a religious meme.

Leaving aside my not-peculiar-at-all experience, religious beliefs and/or lack of them are not "thoughts", I can no more choose to believe than you can choose not to.

[rug]

20. I have a sudden rush of disbelief myself.

Now, about others do you think their thoughts about belief and nonbelief change? (See, this is not really about you.)

[beam me up scottie]

23. Religious beliefs can change, just not at will.

You've been so busy making this about me the point sailed repeatedly over your head.

That was what that rushing sound was, btw.

[rug]

25. Nobody mentioned will, or whim.

But since it can and does change, that is why belief and nonbelief are not the same as a fixed biological trait like color or gender or orientation.

Had you not immediately reacted "Bullshit" you might have grasped that immediately.

[beam me up scottie]

26. Had you never equated beliefs with "thoughts" I wouldn't have called you on it.

Lack of religious belief is not a choice.

[rug]

27. You have a strange view of thought.

A belief is, if nothing else, a thought. And they can and do change.

If you are correct that a lack of religious belief is involuntary, then the presence of belief is also involuntary. Both propositions are nonsense.

[beam me up scottie]

28. My lack of religious belief IS involuntary, it is NOT a choice.

In order for it to be a choice I would first have to believe that gods do exist and then choose not to believe in them.

On the other side of the aisle, how many people have fought and died because of their religious beliefs? They would have been better off if they simply changed their minds but they didn't. They couldn't.

This issue has been discussed to death in this forum and iirc most believers and non agreed on this.

[rug]

29. You make it sound like a tic.

I don't buy it.

Let's assume, hypothetically, that you are correct.

What, then, occurs when a person changes his or her belief or nonbelief?

[beam me up scottie]

30. What would it take to make you decide to be an atheist?

[rug]

31. Many things.

Proof. A change of perspective. A shifting of values. Many things. I am not the product of an equation.

However, it is impolite to answer a question with a question. How about answering mine?

[beam me up scottie]

32. Your question can only be answered by the individual in question.

Getting back to your "choice" it's funny that you cite proof since there is no evidence that proves god(s) existence. If such evidence existed I would be a believer.

And the lack of such evidence should make your decision to become an atheist easy.

Where shall I send your membership packet?

[cbayer]

13. Maybe not for you, but belief systems change for a lot of people throughout their lives.

Stories about that are posted here frequently.

While adolescents often experiment with their sexual identity, it is much more likely that someone will know that they are gay or straight or something else and unlikely to experience any change in that way.

[beam me up scottie]

15. But they cannot change at will.

Are you saying you could become an atheist tomorrow just because you want to?

[cbayer]

16. I can be anything I want and whatever you have labeled me, you are most likely mistaken.

[beam me up scottie]

19. I'm not talking about you BEING anything,

I'm talking about your religious beliefs.

But if you want to claim that you can choose to be an atheist on a whim I'll have to take your word for it.

[cbayer]

21. You know nothing of my religious beliefs or lack of beliefs.

You appear to assume to know because the one thing you do know is I am not like you.

[beam me up scottie]

22. LMAO!

My apologies, comrade, I did not recognize a fellow atheist, you really should wear your badge and secret decoder ring to these dust-ups!

If you need another rubber chicken I can call someone.

[cbayer]

24. So much team sport, so little time.

See you around the campfire.

[DreamGypsy]

4. “Oh my god, you guys exist! I’m the only atheist in my town!”

OMG, it's not a big deal, but it is ironic that we so often are not aware of how deeply references to 'the deity' pervade our language and culture. Guess it takes more than few secular handi-wipes.

Good article about a very courageous young woman.

[beam me up scottie]

8. If you're a kid and you feel like you're the only atheist in your town it IS a big deal.

Coming out as an atheist adult is difficult, doing it as a teenager can be social suicide.