As I've written before, morality is a through-line in discussions between believers and atheists. There's a few through-lines like that, including the meaning of life, what happens after death, and whether a benevolent deity is looking out for humanity. With morality, the dumber believers will claim that the concept of a secular morality is completely impossible, while the smarter ones will either claim that nonbelievers inherit their morals from religion or that secular moral philosophy is human and flawed in such a way that it will always be inferior to religious morality. Defending these ideas has traditionally required claiming that Hitler was an atheist, which is false, and that Stalin was motivated in his murder by atheism, when, in fact, his greatest death count came in rejecting the theories of Darwin and Mendel in Soviet agriculture, resulting in a famine that killed tens of millions. Now, finally, they have fresh blood. A fervent atheist by name of Mr. Hicks murdered three Muslims at the University Of North Carolina Chapel Hill. Innocent religious people were gunned down by a extreme atheist and, boom, you've got a new symbol of what can happen with extreme atheism. Well, not exactly.
The first thing I want to establish is that atheism is not a philosophy of any sort. Neither is it a religion, which feels maddeningly absurd to need to type, but I've been told enough times that atheism is my new religion, defined as worshipping myself and self-deification, that I begrudgingly concede that this sentence is a necessary one. All atheism means is the lack of belief in supernatural deities. Ayn Rand and Karl Marx were both atheists, yet you'd hardly get their respective philosophies confused. Mr. Hicks' atheism could not any more influence his actions than a man who'd never heard of bespoke suits lack of knowledge about bespoke suits influence which cheese he consumes at a dinner party. One simply can't have any affect on the other. Much more helpful would be to ask whether he had any special hatred for Muslims. Upon this question, the whole incident shall turn. Some say that his hatred for Muslims was part and parcel of his anti-theistic feelings, and it is undeniable the man considered, as I do, all religion to be a bad thing. Others say he shot his victims over a parking dispute. While I cannot be certain which version of event is true, I know nothing inherent in what he believed mandated what he did.
People don't need philosophies to hate. They can do that all by themselves. My atheism and my anti-theism was formed primarily by the writings of Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris, and Daniel Dennett. Nothing in the writings of these men advocates violence against religious people, or even hatred towards them. It's all about how we may be a boon to humankind by supporting scientific progress, the emancipation of oppressed peoples and groups, and standing up for free speech, even in the face of death. See, anti-theists can point in the holy books and show followers of Abrahamic faiths where it says you can kill and torture people. Sure, you'll do a little dance about interpretation and translation, but that doesn't change the fact that you're putting a book in the hands of people who won't pick up on the subtleties and then telling them it is the morally perfect word of God. Believers will have a hard time citing the published works that formed the foundation of the New Atheist movement as condoning or recommending Mr. Hicks' actions. As for me, I'll put it to you this way. If I had to kill every other atheist on Earth to stop their efforts to murder even a single innocent Muslim, I wouldn't hesitate to do it.
-Frank
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