The Raving Atheist has decided to convert to Christinity. I think it was Amanda of Pandagon who called it a few years back, so she should give herself a cookie.
This is actually not terribly surprising to me, but a little discomforting. When I was a new atheist, and new to the blogsphere, the Raving Atheist was the first place that I found someone saying what was percolating in my brain. I soon found much better blogs; Daylight Atheism, Pharyngula, and Letters from a Broad, but I had a soft spot for Raving Atheist who sometimes could really make me laugh.
Then he started getting a little…off. Started talking more and more about atheists being to strident, and making apologies for some of his other posts. Started saying that atheists needed to be quiet; and that Christianity was still how people should act, even if they don’t believe in it. Stuff I didn’t agree with, but hey, there isn’t anyone I agree with 100% on the internet. But, it started getting a little repetitive, and I started checking every other day instead of every day.
Then, however, he started talking about how abortion was immoral, and trying to come up with non-theistic reason. When it started to boil down to “I wouldn’t wanted to have been aborted” and that women’s right to personal autonomy was just not as important as someone’s existential crisis was when I stopped going. I kept loose tabs on him; generally on Pandagon or at Shakesville when he said something incredibly insulting to women, or if he wrote something that didn’t resemble logic at all.
But, it seemed almost a matter of time for him to become Christian. He just seemed too enamored with a certain sort of Christianity that had guys on top, or and a built-in justification for his misgynony.
Oh well; I hope he’ll be happy in his new beliefs.
The only time I ever heard of this guy was, indeed, on Pandagon, when Amanda said he was a guaranteed religious convert waiting to happen. I’m afraid to go look now!
Who knew that Jesus looked just like Charlton Heston?
But, it seemed almost a matter of time for him to become Christian. He just seemed too enamored with a certain sort of Christianity that had guys on top, or and a built-in justification for his misogyny.
Yep. Once it became difficult to sustain his belief in male superiority based on logic and evidence, he could either go John Cole and truly examine his assumptions or become a Christianist and, frankly, he’s not nearly as smart as John Cole.
I really hope he goes more Fred Clark than James Dobson, but I’m not counting on it.
I hate when I fuck up links. Here’s the correct link to Slacktivist.
Wow, your story could almost, word-for-word, be mine. I too started reading RA when I was new to blogs, but slowly drifted away almost the exact same time you did, to the exact same other sites (although for a subtly different reason – back then, I was pretty hectically all over the place, still reading junk like Andrew Sullivan and that bull moose guy. I didn’t quit RA because he wasn’t sufficiently feminist, because I wasn’t one at the time, but because he was letting up on Christianity too much).
In all fairness, RA’s conversion was obvious from a long way off. I remember a post of his from back in 2006 which contained some line about “jumping off” the “mountain of atheism”, and another soon after in which he explicitly argued that human beings must have souls because it would be very sad and depressing if we didn’t. Which is not to say that Amanda doesn’t deserve her victory lap for correctly calling it.
If his conversion is for real, then he’s doubtless found a place where his anti-choice beliefs will have a warmer reception. The consistently frosty reception he got from the atheist community about his wingnuttery may well have pushed him into the arms of the Christianists. Just goes to show, I suppose, that irrationality in one area is a kind of gateway drug.
I can’t say I’m surprised, given how long he’s had a Thing for Dawn Eden, but I am rather intrigued by the form in which his conversion was announced. “Raving” is certainly an adequate description, but then, it always was.