The atheist bus: Menticide on wheels

McGill University professor and philosopher Charles Taylor had all kinds of nasty things to say about the "atheist bus" campaign in Canada:

"Putting things on buses, as though that's going to make people somehow change their view about God, the universe, the meaning of life and so on," scoffed Taylor, a defender of religious faith and the recent winner of philosophy's two most prestigious international prizes following the 2007 publication of A Secular Age, his latest acclaimed critique of modern life.

"A bus slogan! It's not likely to trigger something very fundamental in anybody," Taylor told the magazine, the most widely read philosophy publication in the English language. "This new phenomena is puzzling — atheists that want to spread the 'gospel,' and are sometimes very angry."

Pish tosh. The professor, who goes on to call the bus campaign "pathetic", entirely misses the point. As no shortage of wiser people have already pointed out, no one expects the billboard's two-sentence message to send believers to their knees (or is that get up off their knees?) in a burst of mind-clearing enlightenment. Rather, the message sends a very clear message that atheists are out there. In number. Number enough to start making public pronouncements like other, so-far more visible interest groups.

The effect is to give pause to people who imagine atheists are too few or too quiet to stand up to religion's special privileges. More importantly, it's a shout out to all the closeted rejectors of God-babble, the non-believers who thought it's not okay to rock religion's boat, the fence-sitters who'd realize they've already got both feet on the secular side if they just stop to think about it. "You're not alone in thinking these things. We're legion, and we're no longer shy about being heard. Come speak up with us."

It's a beautiful message of menticide, the systematic undermining of a person's beliefs, attitudes, and values. As such, it's...

All right, all right, fine. Yes, "menticide" was today's Wordsmith.org A.Word.A.Day feature. Okay, you caught me. Anyway:

What's being menticided (?) here is not, as the above professor imagines to be the target, religious belief per se. It's that belief that atheists are few, quiet, separated, and doomed to talking amongst themselves in little gatherings or blogs. That mistaken belief is getting a busload of menticide. With much more to come, methinks. 

The A.Word.A.Day email newsletter also contains a daily quote. Interestingly, the quote in today's well-timed issue was this:

The doubts of an honest man contain more moral truth than the profession of faith of people under a worldly yoke. -Ximenes Doudan, journalist (1800-1872)

Not pithy enough for a bus billboard, but good all the same.