HelenM

My personal experience is that no-one listens to someone who is offending them.

Therefore, to me, it's wise and strategic to be careful about how offensive our attempts to change the status quo are, because it maximises our effectiveness.

Even preschoolers often know that being charming can accomplish as much as being so persistent they wear down their parents ability to say 'no'.

I believe in Aesop's fable of the sun and the wind. (The wind couldn't blow the man's coat off but the sun shone and made him hot so he just took it off of his own free will; so the sun won the contest)

I believe strongly in limiting myself to methods that maintain my integrity; and I believe in maximizing my chances of being heard by not going at something like a bull in a china shop.

I don't know what the march is intended to convey; if I had to guess the name, to me, sounds like people who want to eradicate religion from America; I wouldn't support that any more than I'd support forcing religion on people. But I hope it's more a march to say "please recognize nontheists as a part of the American people". Something like that.

But even if it's to say that, I don't think it would make sense for me to march in it, since that would imply I'm a nontheist.

take care
Helen

galiel

I find the most significant thing in the above sentence to be your use of the elitist term "amateur". Even if unintentional, it is indicative of the very attitude of which I speak. Not only are the "leaders" disdainful of popular action, the populace itself has bought into the idea that "we are not worthy".

It is also a remarkably antidemocratic sentiment. You could just as easily make the same argument against free speech or the right of anyone to run for office, or the right of everyone to vote. In fact, precisely such a lack of faith in the democratic process underlies the desperate fight against anything that might lead to a constitutional convention, which has lead in turn to the Constitution becoming increasingly less of the living document it was designed to be, and more of a sort of secular, inerrant bible treated with reverence and awe.

Of course, what you say is precisely the argument FOR wide-spread, democratic action. The few jerks only gain prominence when they are not drowned by the voices of the thousand of reasonable people.

The extremists have disproprtionate power only when they are the only ones exercising it.

galiel

There are cases where "being reasonable" is not the approach of choice.

For example, when confronted with institutionalized oppression. Or, when facing a great evil. Or, when facing an ideologically absolutist foe such as the theocratic extremists who have battered the wall of separation to the point where its cracks are evident.

Since when did taking action gain such negative connotations? I suspect "pacifism" has become confused with "passivism." One could hardly call Gandhi or MLK (or, for that matter, Jesus as portrayed in liberal religious traditions) passive, despite their dedication to pacifism and nonviolence.

Again, the insidious conditioning of paternalistic elites is evident. I am sure you did not consciously intend it that way, but who is the child and who is the parent in this struggle for self-determination?

galiel

Actually, in my experience that is not the case. Few people are comfortable questioning their assumptions, questioning authority or questioning the status quo--and that is as true here as anywhere else.

Again, in my experience (the only thing about which I can speak with any authority), people most often use that phrase as a rationalization for remaining within their comfort zone. If I were merely proposing doing what has already been done, and what has already worked, and what everyone else was doing, it would hardly be controversial, would it.

galiel

I want to clarify something, and preempt a tangiential argument about the relative merits of various existing organizations.

I do not view anything I am advocating as in competition or conflict with existing organizations such as AU or CSH or FFRF.

On the contrary, the more conscoiusness is raised, the more potential members and financial support these organizations will garner.

The more people in general openly declare their nontheist beliefs, the more political clout these organizations will carry, regardless of their individual membership.

Similarly, the more previously passive and complaisent people are motivated to take the first step of personal activism, at whatever level is meaningful and effective for them, the more likely they are to take next steps, which may include participation in these organizations.

The advantage of what I am advocating is it is nonpartisan. A florishing grass-roots activism is a healthy foundation for any cause.

Why don't we learn from the "other side"? How is it that Christian churchgoers, despite the utter lack of uniformity or unanimity among the myriad of churches, cary such aggregate clout? They fundraise locally, self-motivate locally, educate locally, engage in local social and political action locally. Yet, despite heated theological and ritual differences, despite the extreme range of approaches to outreach from militant to meek, they have an enormous aggregate effect.

Contrary to the persistent myth, often repeated on this board, nontheists are no more difficult or easier to organize than anyone else. The implied insult, that theists are somehow more homogenious and pliable, flies in the face of eons of bloody struggle globally, and fierce public intellectual struggles in this country.

Besides, it is misdirection. The issue is not organizing nontheists, it is activating nontheists for independent action, whose aggregate effect will be quite powerful.

Jayhawker Soule

In my opinion, stripped of hyperbole, you say nothing.

galiel

(With apologies to Dr. Brian Reid, whose statement about "computer science" I shamelessly rephrase below)

Isaac Newton: If I have seen farther than others, it is because I was standing on the shoulders of giants.

Gerald Holton: In the sciences, we are now uniquely privileged to sit side by side with the giants on whose shoulders we stand.

Hal Abelson: If I have not seen as far as others, it is because giants were standing on my shoulders.

David Galiel: In iidb, we stand on each other's feet.

[ September 15, 2002: Message edited by: galiel ]</p>

Jayhawker Soule

This is the Alpha and Omega of sectarianism. What, we wonder, is this cause of nontheist rights as distinct from civil liberties? Why this ridicule of "innocuous" "Secular Democracy" when the emphasis on secular democracy is critical in many geographic areas?

Despite your litany of quotes, few people climb such a soapbox to gain perspective. Yours is clearly not a "broad-based diverse activism", and I would not be at all surprised to find groups like AU resistant to your brand of participation. I know that I certainly have no interest in any effort catalysed by such rhetoric.

[ September 15, 2002: Message edited by: ReasonableDoubt ]</p>

galiel

If I say nothing and offer nothing, ReasonableDoubt, why do you spend so much energy refuting?

If you are so convinced my "rhetoric" will not resonate, why are you so determined to counter it?

If you have a constructive suggestion for improving the plan, or have one of your own, why don't you present it?

Being a critic is easy.

I have reviewed all your recent posts on this board (as diffficult a task as that is on this user-unfriendly board system) and have found no instance of you making a constructive suggestion.

Since you are mostly active on the theoretical philosophical topics, where there is no danger of actually being challenged to *do* something tangible, I must ask why you post here only to be negative and tell us, to paraphrase Edison, all the ways in which it will not work?

How do your posts here make a difference? If they don't make a difference, what is the point?

livius drusus

And in which of those two categories would you place that statement, ReasonableDoubt? If it was at all effective it was only insofar as galiel chose to utilize its offensiveness to underscore his point about elitist contempt for grass roots activism.

I am frankly amazed by this non-response. What he is saying is that creating yet another hierarchical, incorporated, high overhead advocacy group would be futile. There are already several effective ones, but they provide little opportunity for even loosely associated local action. Creating another one would simply siphon off much-needed contributions from the limited pool of funds.

On the other hand, working locally using various social, political and educational methods, we can not only contribute in a more vibrant manner than writing a check, but we thereby increase the pool of contributors to the pre-existing organizations currently working for the cause of separation at rarified governmental levels peons like us are unlikely to ever be able to access outside of the hourly tours.

The implication that galiel has a "brand" of participation that AU would even know about, never mind be "resistant" to seems fantastical to me. Are you saying that AU didn't answer his calls because they knew galiel was some kind of dangerously divisive Savonarola?

AU is a fine advocate for separation and their website can be an excellent resource, but local effectiveness is not their bag. It's not a put-down. Just a fact.