Austin Bomber, Atheism, Statism, and The Argument From Authority

26Feb10

[Reposting my part of a conversation with eye2i2 from Liberating Minds. Original, including eye2i2's posts here]

I’ve been following “The Atheist Experience” videos for some time now, and recently started following the associated blog, where as you’d guess, fans of the show comment back and forth with the show presenters and others involved.

Right away, I noticed something interesting in the the discussion of an article by show host Don Baker called “A Suicide Note I Empathize With” . To me, as an outsider to this group, many of the comments seemed oddly fallacious. I say oddly because the show constantly goes through critical thinking and references several logical fallacies in theist positions, and the comments themselves demonstrate critical thinking of the Catholic Church. Also oddly because it seems, from an anarchist point of view, so unnecessary to strawman this guy and his actions in order to criticize.

So I jumped in, and some comments are pending moderation. I’m sure you can guess who I am if you don’t already know that pen name. It sticks out like a sore thumb in a pudding.

So, what do you understand about people’s ability to think rationally if they are anarchist, atheist, etc.. and some other area of their life goes unexamined or is irrationally defended? Why is it that we have brilliant scientists who are also theists, or brilliant rhetoricians who are prejudiced morons, or anarchist homophobes, or libertarian christians, or any of these combinations of ‘able to think clearly and decisively in this area, but not in this area’.

What is it that happens to people, or doesn’t happen, that allows them to really root around in their beliefs and really seek the truth, and why in some areas and not others?

And, I think importantly, what causes people to become unaware of their own poor argumentation on these ‘sensitive’ areas while still being able to retain that capacity and skill in other areas? Hypocrisy, it seems to me, isn’t so much about being an asshole as it is about what I would call the ‘false self’ taking over rationality and putting forward its hellish and transparent (to others, sometimes) ‘arguments’ that are clearly too bilinous to be anything but defensive shrapnel.

I’m still waiting for my last 3 comments to be posted to the article. We’ll see.

………..Part 2……….

Hey, thanks for the feedback and link eye2eye2. I like your simple metaphor take on it. It is like having the impulse to ‘just win’, rather than ‘just find the truth’. I have never really thought about it like that but I think you’re absolutely correct.

Lemme briefly label your insights with a few other terms to maybe draw out more of the process:

Paragraph 1: Black and White Thinking

Paragraph 2: Status-based false morality

Paragraph 3: Reflection on the need to belong to a group of admired peeps. “belonging over integrity”.

Paragraph 4: The source of the discomfort which prompts the above mechanisms is hinted at here.

I’m really getting fascinated by the aspects of #4 that I do not yet understand. I’m sure I’m as susceptible to this process as others, so I postulate that I protect the mechanism (to switch off critical thinking and adopt a ‘win-at-all-costs’ false self) by keeping certain aspects of it hidden.

Thanks again. By the way, my last 3 posts on that blog are now up. I never even had to go back to the early comments to demonstrate what I was talking about. The response to my ‘sticking a toe in’ was sufficient for analysis, which I found apropos to the whole topic. Makes me smile.

……….part 3………….

Quote:

I’ll quote Christina M here: “It all starts with the family.” I struck the “all” there simply because I find it too easily lends to a mental block/escape hatch, and perhaps more likely, is a bit of hyperbole/exaggeration, but the general idea I hold to be spot on.

I agree, it does start with the family, or to put it a little more broadly: It starts with the argument from authority being made to be accepted by a child. This, I hope, broadens it two ways: One, it is any non-enemy authority figure the child experiences contact with who can have this kind of influence, not just a parent. Two, it narrows the list of possible experiences of a child to the required mechanism in common with the kind of mind-damage we’re really talking about. This broadens the utility of the statement “It starts with the family” to something more akin to a kind of forensic tool to do the digging with, rather than leaving it as a general idea somewhere on the shelf of good ideas.

The details of why I think the forced acceptance of arguments from authority is the sin qua non process in common with all experiences that lead to corrupted thinking is an article I’d like to write at some point. Like Christina on the “its the family” statement though, I doubt I’d be the first to make the case I would make. But it would be worth it to me to at least to the froo froo hypothesizing part of it. I’ll wait till my unicorn comes in and I am getting paid for it to do the required research and actually make a solid case with supporting evidence.

It is ground we have been over here at LiMi time and again with Cult talk, Alice Miller discussions, DeFoo critique, and everything else, and I hope and imagine that each individual probably has gained some insight via these things. For me, I just wonder if there isn’t a way to take these insights a step further and come up with a perhaps more comprehensive and quite probably more compassionate conclusion out of the compost heap.

What I experienced when I was ‘slammed’ for critiquing the atheists’ subtle statist posturing was different than mere defensiveness. I did feel hurt by the snarky mischaracterizations of my position, but though hurt, I wasn’t stung, if that makes sense. Rather, I had expected both the response and my feelings to be just about what they were, and was ready to roll with the punches with the point of furthering the discussion as it has to unfold.

An interesting thing that is from time to time discussed on The Atheist Experience video show is that for many atheists it is a long process before one gives up theism for good. Why?

I think this too relates to the problem of broken thinking and why it is broken: Fear. Yes, I said ‘discomfort’ earlier, because proximately this is the cause. It is really uncomfortable to challenge ideas you’ve held for the wrong reasons for a long time. But ultimately, the cause of broken thinking is Fear, rich and terrible Fear. So it is that ultimately it takes an inner heroism to ‘do the work’ of moving past and through that terrain.

Well, back to finding a “more comprehensive and quite probably more compassionate conclusion”. Its one thing to ‘win’ an argument by employing better arguments, even in the most healthy way. But it is another thing to heal broken thinking. Quite rightly there is the cliche that “You can’t help someone who doesn’t want to be helped”, but I don’t think that is the whole story.

Consistently, when I look back to pivotal moments in my own development I find that I had support for the changes I made. Experience, relationships, and perhaps most relevant here: Heroes. Examples of courage that baffled or otherwise held my attention in the past had sat dormant in my mind for years before becoming pillars of courage and inspiration in sudden leaps in the present.

So what I felt when arguing with the atheist about their statism was actually a kind of patience. If I’m honest with them and they don’t want to hear it, maybe someday the conversation will come back to them in some ‘aha’ moment. I don’t lose anything by the exchange. I’m not dependent on their reaction in any way. I think what I say is useful, for me, for them, and quite probably for the reader who happens across it, so I say it,. I take the opportunity to demonstrate that one doesn’t have to be manipulated by arguments from authority. It isn’t a goal to do that, but it’s a consequence of being honest and unafraid in a particular milieu.

I suppose it could be a goal, but its just one of those things that seems like a silly goal. Clearly people are highly resistant to changing certain kinds of thinking in areas where they’ve suffered strong conditioning. But it doesn’t hurt to take the opportunities we find to demonstrate courage, even little tiny internet courage like this.

I think the parts of the mind that get stuck behind arguments from authority are always in a state of stress due to other parts of the mind that are unhindered by great fear. The ‘false self’ doesn’t want to die, doesn’t want to be found out, but in some sense, knows it is false. When it is confronted directly and unashamedly (ie, with natural confidence and honesty), leaving no vulnerabilities to exploit (as that is it’s way to escape), this event I think has some impact whether we know it or not.

The slow-to-form Atheist and the slow-to-form Anarchist, like the slow-to-reform slave owner, are changed through experience and reflection, just like everyone else. Its just that corrupt and damaged thinking needs greater and deeper healing to ‘give up’ and let go than say, learning how to type rather than write by hand. The threats that corrupt thinking defends are quite real to that part of the mind. As such, a response with the intention of helping this process should take this into consideration.

And fortunately I think the right response is also the simplest: Forthrightness and compassion. Doesn’t make it always easy though. Not at all. After all, one has to do this for oneself first.

……….

Beyond ‘what starts it’ —> ‘bad authority’, I think the pressing questions have to reach out and forward to trying to understand ‘What do we do?’. The real answers are not simple, and certainly aren’t anything as base as just being on the ‘right side’. We already know what that is about!

I’m optimistic though, for each time I ask the question in a general sense of “So how do we mitigate the problem of the cycle of the Argument From Authority?” I am instantly reminded of all those people who reached out to me and who I currently see reaching out to others. Even if as a culture, or even a species, we never quite ‘grow up’ and clear away the damaging of young minds by crap like churches and bad parents and the state itself, each individual that is freed from their own ignorance is indeed freed. A = A, and somehow that can be enough.

-GF

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