When Atheism Becomes Religion: America's New Fundamentalists

by Chris Hedges

From the New York Times bestselling author of American Fascists and the NBCC finalist for War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning comes this timely and compelling work about new atheists: those who attack religion to advance the worst of global capitalism, intolerance and imperial projects.

Chris Hedges, who graduated from seminary at Harvard Divinity School, has long been a courageous voice in a world where there are too few. He observes that there are two radical, polarized and dangerous sides to the debate on faith and religion in America: the fundamentalists who see religious faith as their prerogative, and the new atheists who brand all religious belief as irrational and dangerous. Both sides use faith to promote a radical agenda, while the religious majority, those with a commitment to tolerance and compassion as well as to their faith, are caught in the middle.

The new atheists, led by Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens and Sam Harris, do not make moral arguments about religion. Rather, they have created a new form of fundamentalism that attempts to permeate society with ideas about our own moral superiority and the omnipotence of human reason.

I Don't Believe in Atheists critiques the radical mindset that rages against religion and faith. Hedges identifies the pillars of the new atheist belief system, revealing that the stringent rules and rigid traditions in place are as strict as those of any religious practice.

Hedges claims that those who have placed blind faith in the morally neutral disciplines of reason and science create idols in their own image -- a sin for either side of the spectrum. He makes an impassioned, intelligent case against religious and secular fundamentalism, which seeks to divide the world into those worthy of moral and intellectual consideration and those who should be condemned, silenced and eradicated. Hedges shatters the new atheists' assault against religion in America, and in doing so, makes way for new, moderate voices to join the debate. This is a book that must be read to understand the state of the battle about faith.

Genres: Religion, Nonfiction, Philosophy, Politics, Atheism, Theology, Spirituality

224 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2008

About the author

Christopher Lynn Hedges is an American journalist, author, and war correspondent, specializing in American and Middle Eastern politics and societies.

Hedges is known as the best-selling author of War is a Force That Gives Us Meaning (2002), which was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction.

Chris Hedges is currently a senior fellow at The Nation Institute in New York City.

Reviews

[Trevor · Rating 3 out of 5]

The title of this one was bound to annoy me. I had, about a year ago, started another book with a similar title – God Does Not Believe in Atheists – and quickly came to the conclusion that God’s problem, in this case, is that he doesn’t exist and therefore can’t believe in anything.

Ginnie pointed to this book as worth reading and said that the title wasn’t a very good title or reflection of his main point in writing the book. It is not the title I would have chosen for the book, but then, it is not the book I would have written either.

Being an atheist, being told that someone does not believe I exist just makes me think they have a very limited imagination. I think that I should be easier to believe in than, say, the virgin birth or the resurrection, but apparently not.

This was not as stupid a book as I had imagined it might be – and was so well written that it has distracted me from other things I was reading and I’ve finished it in little more than a day. It is a particularly short book, though. In much the same way that Harris’ ‘Letter to a Christian Nation’ is also a short book.

I also need to start off by saying that the central thesis of this book, summed up by the subtitle ‘The Dangerous Rise of the Secular Fundamentalist’ – also strikes me as overwrought. If this book is seeking to ‘fight fire with fire’ I think the author really could have done with a hot cup of tea and a nice lie down before starting to write. I think it is also a bit of a stretch to judge the whole of Atheism (whatever such a phrase could possibly mean) on the basis of the rantings of a few controversialists, such as Harris, Hitchens, Dawkins or Dennett. There is no necessary nexus between being unable to believe in the existence of a universal creative power variously named (and just as often left unnamed) and a belief that Islam is the world’s greatest enemy and we need a ‘rational’ war against these religious fanatics (as Hedges says Harris, Hitchens and Dawkins believe).

Hedges central thesis is much more subtle and interesting than these rhetorical flourishes might have you think. I’m not even going to bother talking about why rationalism is not ‘fundamentalist’ – I believe this is such a complete confusion of terms that it amounts to little other than the casting of meaningless insults which do little to progress the discussion. This was, of course, my main criticism of the book and one that took away, I feel, from the central ideas of the book which were much more difficult to ‘dismiss out of hand’ in the way these hollow insults encourage.

The central idea is that the new atheists, not unlike the new fundamentalist Christians, are convinced they know ‘the truth’. That those who know ‘the truth’ have been the most dangerous people to be around ever since the dawn of time and that these ‘truth knowers’ tend to delight in purifying the world of those who have been lead astray by ‘ignorance’ of ‘the truth’. (That is, the rest of us).

I have a lot of sympathy with this view. He also points out that few of the things that are done in the name of ‘the good’ as defined by any human construction of what is ‘good’ is rarely unequivocally ‘good’. Everything good has other bad consequences. Good and evil are twins, rather than opposites. Religion, he feels, gets us to focus on the necessity of evil in the world and thereby reminds us of our common humanity in that we are all both good and evil in some respects. As one who has never had too much trouble agreeing with my mate Hamlet, “I am myself indifferent honest, but yet I could accuse me of such things, that it were better my mother had not borne me:” And so Hedges is preaching to the converted with this stuff. He uses Conrad’s ‘Heart of Darkness’ to show how hideous deeds are often clothed in beautiful gowns of moral rectitude and these are the most powerful sections of the book.

If I am ever to be tempted to the side of religion over the side of atheism it is going to be around the Western world’s arrogance and disgraceful excesses in the third world. The discussions in this book about the Iraq war, the disgusting passages describing Hiroshima, and the other passages reminding us of how we bare a moral responsibility for these actions, and yet turn away from them and thousands of others done in our name and done with our silent complicity, should be difficult for any first world person to read. Hedges makes a very strong case that all of the new atheists are chauvinists when it comes to the ‘war on terror’ and that chauvinism is precisely the last thing we self-congratulatory Westerners really need. He also points out that to define one fifth of humanity as morally stunted due to their religious belief in Islam (and therefore they are all worthy of death, torture and repression by any means available – as Harris and Hitchens do seem to put forward) is objectionable in the extreme. Objectionable and totally unwarranted and contrary to reality, which, as always, is much more complex.

Hedges also makes quite a point of showing his distaste for organised religion and when he talks about his religious beliefs at all talks mostly about Ecclesiastes – a book of the Bible I still need to read and one which I take it from what I’ve read about it, is perhaps the least ‘religious’ books of the Bible. Again, my problem with moderate religious people is in trying to understand what their ‘religion’ actually amounts to.

I have to admit that I really do not understand religion. Hedges claims his main problem with the criticism the new atheists make of religion is that it is so simple-minded. I got into an email argument with the guy who ran the Religion Report on Radio National after he had Alister McGrath on his show talking about, The Dawkins Delusion’. I wrote to say that it was a very strange show as McGrath did not seem to address any of the criticisms Dawkins made in his book and, in fact, raised others during the show which Dawkins had carefully dealt with in his book as if Dawkins had never mentioned them. I received a very strange email from Crittenden informing me that he felt Dawkins’ book was the ‘stupidest book’ he had read all year. So much for intellectual debate in Australia.

I have no idea why accepting that man is a mixture of good and bad impulses and that all attempts to ‘perfect’ humanity are bound to fail necessarily leads one to believe in either religion or God. Hedges seems to think that this syllogism is so self-evident that it does not even need to be established. He spends quite a bit of the book quoting Freud, but doesn’t mention that Freud was an atheist. This would seem to blunt his argument somewhat, at the very least.

Hedges’ skimming over the parts of the Bible which are clearly obnoxious still seems disingenuous to me. I would have preferred him to tell me why religion is better than philosophy – which I would have thought would allow more picking and choosing. I’m not sure how good a book of moral instruction – which I assume the Bible must be at least in part – can be if you can choose which bits to be instructed by and which bits to ignore.

The problem addressed in this book about the new atheists is that they take a very simple version of religion, and that is either fundamentalist or organised religion (the world was literally created in 6 days or Cardinal Pell today supported the Pope’s view on AIDS and condoms), and parade these idiocies as if they said something about religion in its full manifestation. Okay, I’m open to hearing why this is not the case – but I didn’t come away from this book having any idea of just what religion actually is. I know what Hedges thinks it is not – it is not any actual manifestation of religion, particularly not something with churches and other buildings. I also got the idea that it is ‘the transcendent’, whatever that might be. But I couldn’t see why I should become religious or what becoming religious would offer that is not offered by, say, philosophy, art or social theory. It seems these are things one must ‘just know’ and if you don’t get it, well, bad luck.

He spends a lot of time quoting Nietzsche, and this is interesting, I think. Nietzsche is an atheist, but a very particular kind of atheist – a religious atheist, I think. To Nietzsche we need myths, and therefore we need religion, it is just that all the current religions no longer make sense.

The book was substantially better and more thoughtful and thought-provoking than I expected from either the title or subtitle. And if we must spend time in the trenches, I do feel the war against Western chauvinism is a much more important battle to be won than the war against a non-existent God (and so I feel much more closely allied with someone who talks about this war than anyone who calls for a crusade against Islam) – all the same, I was left unable to agree with the central idea that atheists are as dangerous as fundamentalists. I feel this despite the disturbing quotes he gives from Harris, Hitchens and Dawkins that do seem to justify Western atrocities in Iraq, Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay. Like I said, it was hard for me to get any sense of what this guy’s religion meant (if it meant anything at all) – and so, the fact he is as repulsed by Western actions in the third world as I am made him my ally.

A curious book, but worth a read for reasons other than its central thesis, which I don’t feel it establishes.

[Mic · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the best book I've read in a long time with the worst title I've ever seen.
Despite my love for Chris Hedges I shelved this book for awhile because the prologue focuses on Sam Harris, and I thought to myself, "I like Sam Harris but I don't need you to tell me he's a racist; that doesn't discount the non-Islamophobic things he says."

This book is not really about atheism. It's about the current wave of "new atheists" which, in Hedges mind, err just as foolishly as their Religious Right counterparts by harkening the day when mankind will approach a utopia through reason. As a lifetime war correspondent, I think it's safe to say Hedges has no faith in mankind's better nature and is not awaiting any kind of utopia. Hedges persuasively argues that the important thing about religion is not the kindly-old-man-in-the-clouds straw man figure the new atheists have built up to break down, but the idea of sin, that man is inherently flawed. Hedges argues that belief that religion causes atrocity is misplaced, and he provides ample examples in recent global history in which secular belief in science and reason has nonetheless led to atrocities just as much, if not more, than religious faith. At no point in the book does Hedges claim that religion can prevent atrocities or is necessary for a moral life. He only cautions that ideologies which don't believe in he dark potential of human nature are dangerous, and blind faith in "reason" is misplaced, leading people to believe in a utopia just as specious as medieval peasants awaiting heaven.

This is a quick read, but a really good one. Pick it up!

Quote time!!!
"The liberal church also usually buys into the myth that we can morally progress as a species. It, too, accepts along with atheists and the fundamentalists, Pangloss's rosy vision in Voltaire's Candide that we live in, "the best of all possible worlds." and that if we have faith and trust in the forces around us, "all is for the best/" It is this naïve belief in our goodness and decency-- this inability to face the dark reality of human nature, our capacity for evil and the morally neutral universe we inhabit-- that is the most disturbing aspect of all of these systems."

"Reigns of terror are thus the bastard child of the Enlightenment. Terror in the name of utopian ideals would rise again and again in the coming centuries. The Nazi death camps and the Soviet gulags were spawned by the enlightenment. Fascists and communists were bred on visions of human perfectibility. Tens of millions of people have been murdered in the futile effort to reform human nature and build utopian societies. During these reigns of terror, science and reason served, as they continue to serve, interests purportedly devoted to the common good-- and to vast mechanisms of repression and mass killing. The belief in human perfectibility, in history as a march towards a glorious culmination, is a malformed theology."

"Environmental catastrophe, and wars fought for water and oil and other natural resources will become our collective reality. Terrorism will not be eradicated. We must accept our limitations as a species and curb our wanton disregard for the interconnectedness of life. We need to investigate and understand the desperation of those who oppose us. If we continue to dismiss those who oppose us as satanic or as religious zealots who must be silenced or eradicated, we stumble into the fundamentalist trap of a binary world of blacks and whites, a world without nuance. To explain is not an excuse. To understand is not to forgive. Those who look at others as simple, one-dimensional caricatures fuel the rage of the dispossessed. They answer violence with violence. These utopian belief systems, these forms of faith, are well-trod paths of self-delusion and self-destruction. They allow us to sleepwalk into disaster."

"We carry on a never-ending struggle with "the evil that I would not that I do, " as Paul wrote. It is this capacity for empathy, remorse and self-reflection that saves us from ourselves. The struggle for survival, the interplay between prey and predator, does not appear to engender feelings of guilt or remorse among animals. But as human beings, we can imagine and empathize with the plight of others. It is this remorse, this capacity for empathy, which plagues many of those who return from combat. The knowledge that we have the capacity to impose indignities on other human beings is the essence of human dignity. Non sum dignus. When we lose this capacity for empathy, when we see the other as someone who must be "educated" to embrace our values or eliminated, we slip swiftly back into the world of animals."

"A democratic state begins from the assumption that most of those who gravitate toward power are mediocre and probably immoral. It assumes that we must always protect ourselves from bad government. We must be prepared for the worst leaders even as we hope for the best. And as Karl Popper wrote, this understanding leads to a new approach to power, for "it forces us to replace the question: Who shall rule? By the new question: How can we so organize political institutions that bad or incompetent rulers can be prevented from doing too much damage?"

"Science can be as inexact and intuitive as theology, philosophy and every other human endeavor. The German chemist August Kekule fell asleep in his study after a fruitless struggle to identify the chemical structure of benzene. He dreamed of a snake eating its own tail and awoke instantly. The dream gave him, through the ancient subconscious language of symbolism, the circular structure of the benzene ring that had eluded his conscious mind. The dream may have had its basis in Kekule's experiments, but it was the nonrational that brought him his discovery. Many physicists see " string theory "-in which the structure of the universe is made up of resonating, one-dimensional submicroscopic strings-as plausible. Yet no scientist has
ever seen a string. No direct experimentation has established very firm ground for them. Cosmology routinely bases arguments on things that cannot be seen in order to explain things that can, as in the case of "dark" matter, which, it is argued, must exist since its effects can be seen throughout the universe. Quantum physics demolished the assumption that physical elements are governed by laws pervious to prediction and conventional analysis, meaning we cannot
ever know the ultimate workings of the universe beyond
the expedient of probability."

"James Luther Adams, my ethics professor at Harvard Divinity School, spoke of the "old triumvirate of tyrants in the human soul, the libido sciendi, the libido sentiendi, and the libido dominandi" [The lust of the mind, the lust of the flesh and the lust for power] . Adams, who worked with the anti-Nazi church leader Dietrich Bonhoeffer in 1935 and 1 93 6 in Germany, warned us that these lusts are universal and intractable. They lurk beneath the surface of the most refined cultures and civilizations. "We may call these tendencies by any name we wish," he said, "but we do not escape their destructive influence by a conspiracy of silence concerning them."
The belief that science or religion can eradicate these lusts leads to the worship of human potential and human power. These lusts are woven into our genetic map. We can ameliorate them, but they are always with us; we will never ultimately defeat them. The attempt to deny the lusts within us empowers this triumvirate. They surface, unexamined and unheeded, to commit evil in the name of good. We are not saved by reason. We are not saved by religion. We are saved by turning away from projects that tempt us to become God, and by accepting our own contamination and the limitations of being human."

"The atheists and Christian fundamentalists, because they serve mechanisms of power, because they refuse to deal in complexity, reduce the rage and violence of the world's dispossessed to human imperfections that can be eradicated. If the disaffected can be converted to Christianity or become endowed with reason, we will all be safe and happy. If not, we must do away with them. They do not
investigate the brutality and injustice of imperial aggression, the callousness of totalitarian capitalism and the role of poverty and repression as triggers for violence and terrorism. They blame the victims."

"Obermensch, Nietzsche wrote, rejects the sentimental tenets of traditional Christian civilization. The Obermensch creates his own morality based on human instincts, drive and will. The will to power means, for Nietzsche, that the modern man has gone "beyond good and evil." The modern man spurns established, traditional religious values. He has the moral fortitude and wisdom to create his own values.
This belief creates a human deity. Religion, which has failed humankind, will be banished. We will all become Obermenschen.
The absurdity of this human deity did not prevent Nietzsche from seeing where it could lead. Nietzsche warned that this new faith might, in fact, prefigure something else-a pathetic, middle-class farce. Nietzsche foresaw the deadening effects of the bourgeois lust for comfort and personal self-satisfaction. Science and technology might, instead, bring about a race of Dauermenschen, of Last Men."

"They promote, as Chalmers johnson says, a "consumerist Sparta." It is the poor and desperate who fight our wars. The impoverished, often without legal rights, do the dirty work for a bloated, self-absorbed oligarchy and its compliant middle-class managers. Curtis White in The Middle Mind argues that most Americans are aware of the brutality
and injustice used to maintain the excesses of their consumer society and empire. He suspects they do not care. They don't want to see what is done in their name. They do not want to look at the rows of flag-draped coffins or the horribly maimed bodies and faces of veterans who return home or the hundreds of thousands we have killed in Iraq. It is too upsetting. They do not want to read about the nation's growing
legions of underemployed and poor, or the child laborers in sweat shops who make our clothing and our shoes. Government and media censorship-increasingly common since the attacks of 200 1 -are appreciated. Most prefer to be entertained."

"The new atheists respond to this human hunger for telos, a belief that all that has gone before us is leading us somewhere. This desire for moral advancement has repeatedly corrupted religious and secular ideologies. We want to believe that human suffering and deprivation is meaningful, that it has a purpose and that our lives make sense. This
yearning for telos creates imaginary narratives of moral and historical progress. It feeds into the faith that human society will finally become reasonable and work collectively for the common good. It is a way to ward off the awful fact that things often do not get better, that they often get worse, and that the irrational urges of human nature will never be conquered."

"The United States of Andrew Jackson or George Washington is not the United States of Frederick Douglass or Sitting Bull. But we present
our history from the perspective of the winners, from those in power"

"Europeans, many of whom enthusiastically greeted the war, participated between 1914 and 1918 in collective suicide."

"Saddam Hussein was a tyrant, but the utopian project of the Bush administration to remake Iraq by force has created a hell that rivals the mass killing carried out by Hussein, including the genocidal campaign against the Kurds and the Shiites. Violence as an instrument of change alters landscapes so radically that it creates a new reality often as bloody as the one it attempted to halt....Time and patience would have worked to undo his regime. This was a policy built on
the possible. It accepted our own limitations as an imperial
power.
Utopian visions of a restructured Middle East, however, blinded the Bush administration and many of their supporters, including many liberal interventionists, to the endemic factionalism in Iraq and difficulty of occupation. They believed their utopian visions. They ignored the reality of Iraq. And because of their folly and blindness, their failure to work within the confines of reality, hundreds of thousands are dead, and Iraq no longer exists as a unified country."

"The occupation of Iraq, along with Afghanistan, has furthered the spread of failed states. It has increased authoritarianism, savage violence, instability and anarchy. It has swelled the ranks of our real enemies-the Islamic terrorists-and opened up voids of lawlessness where they can operate and plot against us. It has nearly scuttled the art of diplomacy. It has given us an outlaw state creating more outlaw states. It has empowered Iran, as well as Russia and China, which sit on the sidelines gleefully watching our selfimmolation.
This is what George W. Bush and all the "reluctant hawks" who supported him have bequeathed us. They bequeathed this to us because they turned away from the real and the possible to believe that American firepower could shape the world in our own image, in our own utopia"

"In a 2005 interview in The American Conservative, Pape said: "Since 1 990, the United States has stationed tens of thousands of ground troops on the Arabian Peninsula, and that is the main mobilization appeal of Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda. People who make the argument that it is a good thing to have them attacking us over there are missing that suicide terrorism is not a supply-limited phenomenon where
there are just a few hundred around the world willing to do it because they are religious fanatics. It is a demand-driven phenomenon. That is, it is driven by the presence of foreign forces on the territory that the terrorists view as their homeland. The operation in Iraq has stimulated suicide terrorism and has given suicide terrorism a new lease on life."

"The United States, as Lifton states, "becomes a Sisyphus with bombs,
able to set off explosions but unable to cope with its own burden, unable to roll its heavy stone to the top of the hill in Hades."

"Terrorists arise in all cultures, all nations and all religions. Terrorists lurk within our own society. The bombing on April 1 9, 1 995, of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City killed 1 68 people-1 9 of them children-and injured hundreds. It was carried out by an American citizen named Timothy McVeigh. William Krar and judith Bruey of Noonday, Texas, pleaded guilty in 2003 to possession of a weapon of mass destruction. Investigators found inside their home and in three storage facilities a sodium cyanide bomb capable of killing thousands, more than a hundred explosives, half a million rounds of ammunition, dozens of illegal weapons, and a mound of white-supremacist and antigovernment literature. McVeigh was not a Muslim; neither was Krar or Bruey."

"Terror is delivered in many forms. The industrial nations are not immune from employing terror. The only country that has deployed the greatest weapon of mass terror-the atomic bomb-is the United States. General Dwight Eisenhower opposed using the atomic bomb on a civilian population. He was overruled. The bomb was dropped for its psychological and emotional impact. It was meant to shock and demoralize not only the japanese population, who were already on the verge of surrender, but also the Soviets, who, political leaders in Washington hoped, would be intimidated by the devastating effects of the blast."

"The American military planners picked Hiroshima because the bombers would face less anti-aircraft fire. They calculated that the effect of obliterating a huge civilian population would be dramatic and terrifying. The "Strategic Bombing Survey, " conducted at President Harry Truman's request after the bomb hit Hiroshima on April 6, 1945,
noted that "nearly all the school children . . . were at work in the open," to be exploded, irradiated or incinerated in the perfect firestorm. Thousands of children on their way to school in Hiroshima and Nagasaki died. It had, as the planners at the University of California-run Los Alamos Lab envisioned, the maximum psychological impact.
The 370,000 overall deaths attributed to the bombings, 85 percent of which were civilian, do not permit us to place ourselves on a higher moral plane than terrorists. The use of an atomic weapon on noncombatants is not "regrettable but necessary." It is not part of the cost of war. It is morally indefensible. But heading into this kind of introspection is disturbing. It raises questions that shatter our self-image and question our moral purity. It is this realization of our own innate capacity for barbarity that sees Kurtz sputter at the
end of his life: "The horror, the horror! "

""The evil that is in the world always comes of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence, if they lack understanding," wrote Albert Camus in The Plague. "On the whole, men are more good than bad; that, however, isn't the real point. But they are more or less ignorant, and it is this that we call vice or virtue; the most incorrigible vice being that of an ignorance that fancies it knows everything and therefore claims for itself the right to kill." "

""Nothing worth doing is completed in our lifetime, therefore, we are saved by hope," Reinhold Niebuhr wrote. "Nothing true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; Therefore, we are saved by faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone. Therefore, we are saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as
from our own; Therefore, we are saved by the final form of love, which is forgiveness.""

[Mike (the Paladin) · Rating 2 out of 5]

I doubt I can review this without causing some consternation for some. I read another book by this author and found that it was a misinformed book. The ideas and impressions in the book were what I'd call mis or ill-informed.

Upon reading this i think I'm beginning to see the problem. I'm sure that Mr. Hedges is quite sincere in all he says and he's working on being honest.

That said he is I believe (based on what he says) laboring under some "preexisting ideas". In other words a certain amount of prejudice. He says and reports things that are at best based on the wost case scenarios.

In other words the Westboro Baptist church is not a typical Baptist church. It has only a few members and most are members of one family.

But still it simply gets called a Baptist church.

The same happens a lot here. I assume he believes himself to have an open mind and I get that. Still while there's some small amount of interesting content here (for me that is) I found the book mostly badly off center.

Of course I get many will disagree with me. And I get that in his own way Mr. Hedges is expressing his own understanding. To be fair I would guess that he's had some very bad experiences with people "referring to themselves" as Christians or Christians who are failing to live as Christians.

Decide for yourself, a book with a controversial subject and somewhat questionable viewpoint. It seems to me that it's "probably" a case of judging an entire group of people by the worst examples available... and examples who are "self described". I mean, a person can call him or herself anything they want but it doesn't make what they claim so. Ask the veterans who have been told non-veterans can claim to be veterans under freedom of speech.

Christians are human and have failings...real Christians want to walk with God and become more like him, loving, forgiving and full of grace.

[Joshua Stein · Rating 1 out of 5]

I swore to a friend that I would give this book a chance, and for a few moments I expected Hedges to provide a serious answer to the quandries offered to apologists by the Four Horsemen of atheism (Dawkins, Dennett, Harris and Hitchens). The book, unfortunately, failed me, as you can plainly see by my rating.

The fact is, Hedges' triteness makes the text unbearable and the fact that he does not even really provide any original ideas makes it all the more painful. The tooth-pulling sensation I got while working through the tiny book (a chore which reminded me of shoveling manuer on a ranch, without the perk of sunshine) made me wonder if it were even possible to cram so much crap into so small a manuscript.

I like apologetics, generally speaking. I like that they make me think about my position, make me dissect and change my premises and alter my conclusions. I like the way that they force me to reconsider my views about the world. What Hedges' offers, though, is not that wonderful, optimistic, debatable form of apologetics that fuel my mind, it is the monotonous droning of a power drill being run through my skull and into my brain, whirring as I become stupider to the point of death.

Hedges' arguments are not even arguments. He makes claims that anyone who has read the works of Harris and Dawkins and Hitchens knows are false. He constructs strawmen out of bullshit and lights it on fire so that it might add to the pollution in the ozone.

Generally, I am open for entertaining books that I disagree with, and I encourage those I talk to about books and belief to do the same. Avoid Hedges. It is not pleasant.

[Shannon · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is truly bad. I kind of wanted to throw the book into a fire.

Chris Hedges makes sweeping generalizations about the "new atheists", ones that make it impossible to take his points seriously. I can't tell if he's being intentionally daft and lazy, in failing to cite almost ANY specifics (ie, say, a quote, because some of the things he says that Dawkins, for example, claim, are clearly taken way out of context and misconstrued). Or he really believes the conclusions he has reached, through really shitty logic. Either way, bad times. (I'd give specific examples myself, but since Hedges didn't seem to bother in his PUBLISHED BOOK, I'm not going to in my goodreads review).

Hedges clearly has an angry emotional reaction to the "militant atheism" movement, which has impeded greatly on his ability to make a rational, objective, response to it.

And trust me, it's not that I don't want to read something that is critical of my existing beliefs- I'm currently reading "The Devil's Delusion" which is along the same lines as this book, in subject matter, but actually cites specific examples, is well thought out, and well-written. A good critique is an awesome thing to read. This, however, is just some drivel-y, whiny, nonsense.

You get an F, Chris Hedges. I'd expect more from a "journalist".

(I'm not even going to dignify this with "non-fiction" shelving).

[The Conspiracy is Capitalism · Rating 3 out of 5]

A debate from a life-time ago…

--I must have started writing reviews right after I finished this book, so it has always bothered me that I never properly closed this chapter.

--I’ve always liked the imagery of our past experiences as a library in the dark, where our consciousness is armed with only a flashlight. We have our familiar routes to familiar shelves, our conscious memories. Sometimes, our path is disrupted and we end up taking an unfamiliar route and encounter long-lost shelves of memories.

--As my book-reviewing process has grown more intensive, I’ve realized this is:
i) only in part due to my development as a more detailed/critical reader.
ii) The other part is my growing conscious memories, where the reviewing process helps retain more memories in the light rather than fall into the shadows.

--It takes so much work to recover shadow memories, so either I re-read this book or something disrupts my routine enough for me to revisit some long-lost memories. While neither has happened yet, I did sit down to update my current reflections on this book’s topic in reviewing: Why I am an Atheist and Other Works

[Tulpesh Patel · Rating 1 out of 5]

The story of how When Atheism Becomes a Religion got into my hands is almost more interesting than what’s contained within its pages. In 2009, whilst working at the University of California, Los Angeles, a friend tried to post me a copy, having found it in a Borders bargain bin and thinking, quite rightly, that it would be something I would be interested in. Two weeks later it was returned to her with "Unauthorized Circulation: Religious Content (Int'l) RTS" written on the package. She kept the packaging and waited until she returned to the UK to give the book to me in person last year.

My immediate reaction to hearing that the book had been returned was to cook up a conspiracy theory about censorship by the American postal system – but, knowing that the simplest explanation is usually the most likely, I quickly dismissed the idea. Months later I found out that it was actually the family that my friend was staying with in LA, who are devoutly Christian, who stopped the package being sent. It seems that it was enough for a member of my friend’s host family to object to the package for the post office to deem it ‘unauthorised circulation’.

My friend wrote of her surprise that the host family would do such a thing as she knew them to be religious, but “… this didn't even cross my mind, since I don't even think they're anti-religious...”. I’m more bothered with why the post office complied and wrote such an explicit message on the front. The ironic twist to this whole saga is that *When Atheism Becomes a Religion* is written by a Christian about the putative faults of atheism.

I knew from the off that I was in for an interesting read when a pro-religion/anti-atheism book uses the label ‘religion’ pejoratively in its title. In light of all the drama of getting hold of the book, and having read on the back that Hedges has won literary awards, including the 2002 Amnesty International Global Award for Human Rights Journalism, I was really looking forward to it.

With *When Atheism Becomes a Religion*, Chris Hedges aims to draw parallels between the dangers of Christian fundamentalists and the rise of the New Atheists. First, let’s just get this out of the way: careful consideration of the definition of faith and its concomitants shows atheism is clearly not a religion. AC Grayling has stated it most clearly: “Faith is the negation of reason. Reason is the faculty of proportioning judgement to evidence, after first weighing the evidence. Faith is belief even in the face of contrary evidence” (see Søren Kierkegaard’s famous ‘leap of [or rather to] faith’).

Hedges establishes his tone and ‘reasoning’ (I use the word lightly) very early on by distinguishing between Christian fundamentalism and his own moderate, ‘liberal’ Presbyterian Christianity, but conveniently lumps atheism, science (or rather scientism) and rationality into a homogenous fundamentalist ideology. Hedges’ main problem with New Atheists (Hedges specifically targets the Four Horsemen (Daniel Dennet, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens), but generalises to mean all those who do not believe in god and place importance on science, reason and rationality), is that they [all] “… believe, like the Christian Right, that we are moving forward to a paradise, a state of human perfection …” all the while ignoring original sin and “the acceptance that there will never be a final victory over evil, that the struggle for morality is a battle will always be fought.”

The book is steeped in defeatism and allusions to end-times philosophy. It is obvious that Hedges’ career as foreign correspondent and reporter of war have made a serious, and understandable, contribution to his bleak outlook on human society and its future (passages on the Balkan wars, for example, are a difficult read). Hedges argues that “We are all flawed. Human ambitions and pursuits are vanity.” If this were just essays on how vicious and vindictive people can be to each other, I wouldn’t really have much of a problem with it, it’s the second part I struggle with.

There is no question that those who apply science and reason are, on the whole, striving to make the world a better place. In his new book, The Better Angels of Our Nature, Steven Pinker argues that Enlightenment values have contributed to an overall decrease in violence over time. But even if Pinker is right, it does not make rationalists de facto Utopians. Humanist morality stems from the understanding that people have the capacity for evil, but that shared values can help minimise suffering. Equally importantly, understanding violence and evil is not the same as thinking that we can eradicate it, or eradicate people that commit violent or evil acts, which is one of Hedges’ more specious, incendiary arguments.

My main problem with this book is Hedges’ conflation of atheism (and the science/reason that underpins it) with political, racial and economic ideologies that have caused and are causing countless deaths and acts of violence. He is at pains to draw parallels between atheist and religious (specifically, Christian) fundamentalism, but seem to forget that few people have been killed by atheists for not believing in god. Throughout the book there are repeated references to the Enlightenment being directly responsible for fascism, the World Wars, the atomic bomb, the millions killed under Communist regimes, genocides, the war in Iraq and the invasion of Afghanistan. This is a seriously misguided view. Science is simply a process of discovery; there is no agenda other than to understand. What is done with the knowledge that is gained is up to people, and people are not always rationed, reasonable or benevolent. In all the cases that Hedges cites, it is not unbelief in god that is at the root of the destruction, but struggles for power and domination.

You have to admire the sheer balls of Hedges for labelling Christopher Hitchens illiterate for questioning ‘who created the Creator’. Indeed, what room is there for reasoned discussion when suggestions that people enjoy their sex lives as long as they don’t harm anyone else, or that parents should not indoctrinate their children, but teach them to evaluate evidence, are dismissed as “… hollow, liberal platitudes that casually deny the seductive lusts of violence, evil and abuse – lusts the biblical writers who write the {ten} commandments understood and feared.”

But then, having conceded that Darwin ”obliterated reliance on the Bible as the literal word of God”, Hedges also suffers from the same problem that all pick ‘n’ mix religious apologist must confront: if you disagree with something decreed in your holy text (and therefore with God), where does this moral sense come from? By explicitly eschewing the parts of Christianity that are flawed or ‘morally indefensible’ (claims of creation, the misogyny, the punitive violence, the homophobia, the racism etc. etc., ad infinitum), Hedges seem to think that he will come across as even-handed and sensible, but instead does nothing but remind you that the very things that his liberal Presbyterian interpretation of religion disregards are done so because of basic appeals to human respect and decency, and of course rationality and reason – the very things his book denounces.

Hedges arguments are constantly undermined by the contradictions and non sequiturs that litter this book. To flick through it and pluck a random example: “To believe in this deity [god] required abstract thinking. It made possible the moral life.” So there you have it. Morals come from the ability to think about the fact that god doesn’t exist in the real world. “The atheists believe they know religions’ inadequacies even though they have never investigated religious thought.” The old chestnut of ”if you really thought about it you wouldn’t have a problem with religion; you’re only sceptical because you haven’t thought about it enough”. Indeed the same could be said for Hedges, who seems to have ignored the vast swathes of literature on humanist ethics, rational explanations of altruism, and morality without god.

At several points in the book I thought I had been fooled into reading ingenious satire, a feeling which culminated in reading Hedges’ summation of his arguments against atheism (pg. 178):

“The contemporary atheist, while many are noted scientists, are deluded products of this image-based and culturally illiterate world. They speak about religion, human progress and meaning in impoverished language of television slogans. They play to our fears, especially of what we do not understand. Their words are sensational, fragmented and devoid of content. They appeal to our subliminal and irrational desires. They select a few facts and use them to dismiss historical, political, and cultural realities. They tell us what we want to believe about ourselves. They assure us that we are good. They proclaim the violence employed in our name as a virtue. They champion ignorance as knowledge. They assure us that there is no reason to investigate other ways of being.” And later on the same page: “Religious thought is a guide to morality. It points to inquiry. It seeks to unfetter the mind from prejudices that blunt reflection and self-criticism.”

If you swap the words ‘atheist’ and ‘religion’, and ‘rational’ for ‘religious’, you have one of the most succinct destructions of religion going. That Hedges writes this in complete earnest in a book written in criticism of atheism is beyond satire or even simple comprehension.

[Clif Hostetler · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book provides the best critic of the so called "new atheism" that I've encountered thus far. The book articulates the position that seeking the transcendent experience is an integral part of the human experience. Suggestions that progress in human knowledge and science make religion unnecessary is labeled as arrogance out of touch with human nature. The author comes from a Christian background; He even has seminary training. However, this book is a defense of all religions, not just Christianity. The author indicates that he seldom attends church services, and when he does he rolls his eyes at the things said which indicate that the members consider themselves to be honorary sinners. So he's certainly not defending any religious organization as an institution. But rather he's defending it from the standpoint of human psychology, sociology, politics and history.

To my tastes, the author was a bit guilty of demonizing the targets of his criticism. He describes Hitchens, Dawkins, and Harris as being irrationally extreme to the same degree as the radical religious fundamentalists on the other end of the spectrum. Apparently Hitchens and Harris have made comments that indicate that it may be necessary to make a preemptive military strike against radical Islamists to save civilization. (I don't think Dawkins has said anything like that.) Comments such as those don't deserve support. But I'm inclined to feel more accepting of atheist with a humanist inclination than I am of conservative religionists who seem to hate everything human. By painting his opponents in the worst possible light the author makes discrediting them easier. Ironically, that's the same tactic that Hitchens, Dawkins and Harris use against religion.

[Kaelan Ratcliffe ▪ كايِلان راتكِليف · Rating 5 out of 5]

Secular Fundamentalism

Oh boy. This one was fun.

There's some pre-planning for the reader to do before engaging with this extended essay. A good place to start would be Chris Hedges debate with Christopher Hitchens, as well as the debate Hedges also engaged in with Sam Harris . Both events are pretty illuminating and thought provoking, especially seeing as despite Hitchens death back in 2011 his following has not lessened one iota (if anything it's larger than ever due to today's ever polarising political landscape).

Having gotten the above out of the way, let's talk about the book. Honestly, I can see why this might, to put it bluntly, piss some people off. Despite knowing full well Hedges view on this topic, as well as having watched interviews with him discussing his feelings toward the New Atheists, I was still surprised at just how uncompromising he is in his criticisms. Hedges is brutal in his attack on the New Atheist movement, pretty much denouncing them to be as dogmatic and illiterate as the opponents they claim to despise. He criticises the binary world view of Dawkins, Harris and Hitchens and feels they assault a childish version of the monotheistic traditions, and ignore anything that contradicts their argument or presents a more three-dimensional shade of grey. It's pretty compelling reading, and certainly should be respected as a book that defends the opposing view quite fluently.

Not only this, but Hedges at times manages to be quite prophetic, his connection of the movement to an older issue of western supremacy is quite convincing, especially if the reader is to remove any ego from the equation and simply look at the argument from a birds-eye perspective.

Ultimately, I stand with Hedges on this topic, however I don't doubt it is sure to divide people for years to come.

[Katinka · Rating 5 out of 5]

I see how a lot of people pan this book, and I think maybe it is because people are afraid to open their eyes and see the similarities between the New Atheists and fundamentalism. This book resonates with me, as it should with anyone who knows well people of all faiths. It is a call for moderation. It is a call to question wether science can answer all things. Hedges, and I, think it can't. Hedges points out the universe physically is morally neutral, our ability to learn and use the universe around us can be for great good or great evil, and that human beings are irrational. The book is a bit all over the place at times, but the mosaic Hedges offers encourages us towards pondering concepts that science doesn't answer- reverence, humility, answers that are beyond the material universe. It is a MUST READ nowadays, with everything going on about this stupid video about Muhammed everyone is up in arms about.

[Jason · Rating 1 out of 5]

Reading this book was painful. There seems to be absolutely no logical structure to Hedges' argument. Hedges also presents himself as an expert on "human nature," making all types of conclusive statements and generalizations on the subject. Quotes from the "new atheists" are often presented with little context. He also doesn't really grapple much with the logical arguments for or against the existence of a supernatural omnipotent being. I think Hedges is a smart guy, but this was a really sad effort on his part.

[Jsb · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was inclined to like this book just from its premise, but I was totally disappointed. Hedges claims that Hitchens, Dawkins, et al as mirror-image fundamentalists to Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell, a view I cannot hold. Hedges rants and rants against atheist "fundamentalism" with hardly a citation.

[Serge Boucher · Rating 2 out of 5]

What a dreadful book. It has its moments ("We have nothing to fear from those who do, or do not, believe in God. We have much to fear from those who don't believe in sin.") but as an attack on the new atheists, which is how the author presents it, it's appalling.

Hedges central argument mixes all the new atheists in one big lump, referring to them usually as "these atheists", and claims that what "they" offer is a utopian vision, some perfect society that we could all enjoy if only all their opponents were silenced. He compares this view with religious fundamentalism or communism, and claims it should be attacked for the same reasons.

The problem with this is: none of the new atheists say anything like that. Hedges doesn't quote any passage from Dawkins, Harris or Hitchens, that would confirm that their project is indeed a utopian one, and for good reason: these passages don't exist.

So much of the book's argument resides on this gross misrepresentation of the opposite side's view that it's hard for anyone cognisant of the works of Harris or Hitchens to see this as anything more than a crude fraud. Especially when so much of Hedges' writing is gratuitously arrogant and insulting to the other side. He repeatedly asserts that "these atheists" know nothing about the middle east, religion, scripture, history or philosophy, even going as far as calling Christopher Hitchens (a polarising figure but almost universally-recognised as one of the greatest writer and critic of his generation) an "illiterate".

What's most frustrating is that there is a good book hidden somewhere in this mess. Hedges is right when he points out the differences between religious practice and fundamentalism, or denounces the simplistic view by atheists of scriptures as mere instruction manuals. There is room, need even, for a serious book about these flaws in at least some new atheist discourse. But instead of writing that, Hedges was seemingly so full of rage against what he saw as the fundamentalism of new atheists, he chose to write a long rant that only tangentially refers to actual NA writing. He blew it.

[Chrisman · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book was rubbish. It was nothing but an opportunity for the author to air out some personal grievances he has with a couple of prominent atheists he happened to debate.

His main argument is that atheists are similar to Abrahamic fundamentalists in that they --

1. Use their belief in Utopia to justify all manners of violent atrocities.
2. Are inherently racist towards Muslims.
3. Are unwilling to entertain opinions and viewpoints that differ from their own.

I read about half of the book before I was overwhelmed by how much it all smacks of personal, petty vendetta.

L'Anthony summarizes it thusly:

"This is a transparent, ultra-personal mishmash of ad hominem attacks. Saying that "the new atheism" is bad because some new atheists are racists is like saying that football is bad because some players are bad students."

[Stefan Detrez · Rating 1 out of 5]

I read this book for you, so you don't have to.

I'll select some issues per chapter:

1. The God Debate

* 'Science and reason will not save us.' Why are you wearing a seat belt, Mr Hedges?
* 'The question is not whether God exists', Mr Hedges writes, meaning he has nothing debatable to offer. Then why devote a chapter to 'The God Debate'? The God Debates: A 21st Century Guide for Atheists and Believers ('The God Debates' by is an excellent source for theist arguments, by the way.)
* 'Enlightenment facilitated slavery' - Uhm, the OT has legal slavery and Paul says you should obey your master. Mr Hedges is mindbogglingly disinformed about Enlightenment. I'm sure he'll find the American Constitution a work from the Devil, then.
* Mr Hedges stresses the importance of myths. A Christianity is a myth, then. Now we're talking.
* Mr Hedges thinks 'belief' in itself has a moral value. No, belief is a container word. Nothing becomes valuable just because it is believed. It's a covert tactic to put religious claims above scrutiny. You DON'T HAVE the moral right to just believe anything, and for you as a Christian, ESPECIALLY not in something else than your jealous god. The hypocrisy and inconsistency are patent theistic sofistry.

2. Science and religion

There is no 'science vs religion.' There is science vs bad science.

Science deals with facts, religion deals with beliefs. YET. If you say 'God exists', you're making a factual statement. 'God created the World' is also a factual statement. Since they are factual statements, and there for scientifically testable, religion DEPENDS on 'facts' for its validity. There is /an overlap/ between religious beliefs and factual statements. A religion is a system that says what you have to do, based on how it sees the world, and under scrutiny, religion IS BAD SCIENCE: there is no activity anywhere by anything close to a supernatural being. It's science vs superstition.

This has a lot of consequences: if belief is 'suprascientific', it cannot be proven nor justified. Your belief is nothing more than a claim.

If it IS scientific, it should be clear that we're talking facts, but no! Theists get uncomfy being questioned, so they hit the debate killer panic button: 'That's why it's my belief. I can't prove it, which is why I believe it (credo quia absurdum, remember)'. Well, if you believe, because you can't prove it, how about incorporating some other gods into your belief? You can't prove them, nor disprove them neither, so by your own standard: give them a chance!

That's where believers get a bit weird: they take their own religion on faith, but they know for a fact that the others are wrong! It would make more sense to take your own belief as fact, and others' beliefs on faith. But there is an end to how much you can fool your own mind. Thank God.

3. The New Fundamentalism

Mr Hedges represent in a silly ad hoc how Sam Harris - in Hedges' view - was cornered by Sheer. Harris made 'sweeping generalisations' about the Muslim world. This is strange in the light of the fact that Hedges himself tries to represent religion IN GENERAL as something beneficial to society.

Additionally, the extremists, who actually /live closer to their god's word/ are 'not true believers.' Mr Hedges wants people to believe in a Christianity with all the rough edges polished away with the brush of postmodernist interpretation, a Christianity that has been so functionally demythologised, that it cannot be criticized evermore. It's God's Plan and Word reduced to a vague, wolly, new-agey sentiment. THAT is the state of belief in many believers.

The New Fundamentalism is not atheists advancing atheological arguments and winning debates, the new fundamentalism is Mr Hedges' passive-aggressive agenda for religious relativism and inclusivism.

4. Self Delusion

* 'Writing freezes speech.' (p. 91) Then why do you hold on to one book?

* 'This singular attack on religion allows these atheists to avoid confronting moral and ethical dilemmas that stand outside of scientific testability.' Atheists attack religion to avoid moral and ethical dilemmas?!

*'The atheists and the Christian radicals, who cling to this
warped vision of our goodness, nobility and self-appointed
role as the saviors of civilization, urge us forward into imperial
projects that are as foolish as they are suicidal.' Yes, that's how the most Catholic country of Africa, Rwanda, became a horrific hack-a-thon between Christians in the Rwandan genocide of 1994. The progressive, uplifting and civilisational forces of Christianity still have to become apparent in 2018. Oh, and Mexican Catholics using chainsaws to execute inobedient brothers in belief. Good job, God. I wonder who's deluded here.

5. The Myth of Moral Progress

Mr Hedges isn't the only one doubting moral progress. So does John Gray in his book: Straw Dogs: Thoughts on Humans and Other Animals. Gray is quoted in the book.

Yet, the world is becoming a less and less violent place. Why? Because people think up laws to protect themselves and others. I think that is moral progress. Try and imagine you're a victim of pedophilia in the '20 and one now: do you think nothing has changed to the betterment of victims? Yes, victims are speaking out. Priests and similars don't get away with it that easy anymore.

The suffragettes? Women rights? Is their progress a myth? I don't think so.

Mr Hedges keep recycling this theme of moral nihilism. But at the same time he argues morals are religion-produced. What is it going to be? Are there morals or aren't there. Of course. Since the Enlightenment people have been freed from all sorts of things that, if it depended on the church, would've not been changed ever.

'Enlightenment fundamentalism' is his term for anti-intellectualism, something which, progressing through the book, totally seems his intellectual position. That and fatalism.

6. Humiliation and revenge

* Paraphase: 'Islamic terrorism is in the end the West's fault. We made them that way by humiliating them.'

Ah, the Marxist 'you-have-no-free-will,-you-are-a-product-of-society'-explanation. Well, then this is how we atheists became more outspoken. You made us! Atheism is the fault of the West and Islamophobia is then Islam's fault.

What about: Islam is at war with us? I leave in Belgium, the country that sent the most jihadis to the IS. Guys with jobs, families, social welfare, and diplomas and some dumber folks. Belgium has a pretty good social welfare system. What on earth can a father with children get into his mind that he would want to quit his job and go live under brutal shariah in the IS? Is that the West or is that Islam?

Why don't unemployed hindus and jews go loco? Where are the Christian African-Americans in Europe that turns Knights of Christ, because they didn't get a job? Why do Muslim kill other Muslims? Is that the West fault too? You'd expect all Muslims to team up, but they don't. Because there is no such thing as a Muslim Ummah. They all hate each other. There is no oneness. That's God working in mysterious way for you.

Weren't theists supposed to be forgiving? What happened?

7. The Illusive Self

The Self is difficult to grasp,... so religion must be true. Mkay.

I think this is Christian intimidation at work here. William James describes this as 'The Sick Soul' in his VORE. The Varieties of Religious Experience It boils down to you being imperfect. In case you didn't know, you have an imperfect soul and guess what: you can become perfect by believing in Jesus. Great marketing here: create a need (You need to be perfect, so buy into the Jesus-story for solutions) and then fulfill it. If Hedges if arguing for the irrationality of the human soul or of being human, I don't understand what the rationality is of proposing the illusion in an invisible god from hearsay.

* Free quote: 'The new atheists are products of the morally stunted world of entertainment.' and 'The contemporary atheists, while many are noted scientists, are deluded products of this image-based and culturally illiterate world.' Yes, most scientists are deluded when it comes to belief in specifically the stone-age Judeo-Christian literary character of Jahweh. Stupid scientists. You should either use your brain, or actually use it less. Then you'll see.

My conclusion:

* a lot of recycling of claims.
* equalling new atheists with religious fundamentalists is like comparing language purists to rabid illiterate tribalists.
* no highly anticipated arguments against atheism. 'But that's not the question.'
* not a convincing diatribe against the walks of life of atheists.
* the protruding lure of theistic fatalism, nihilism and anti-intellectualism will not get atheists out of bed for less than 10G.

[Jeff · Rating 1 out of 5]

The thesis, or at least the vague "Boo Hitchens, Dawkins, Harris, and Dennett!" sentiment that is meant to substitute for a thesis, is poorly argued, and the prose often drags for pages with enervating repetitions of simple contentions. In places the book turns to a boilerplate essay on the moral neutrality of science, with all the boredom and eye rolling that such usually entails. Here and there, Hedges manages to present criticisms of Harris, Dawkins and Hitchens (taken individually) which are surely worth consideration, and in Harris' case, the criticisms are no doubt correct (if unoriginal). In the latter half of the book, Hedges falls into what has become a habit - throughout his writing - of mentioning his experience in war and the horrors attendant to that. The problem is that these stories, as well as the moral lessons we might draw from them, do not seem applicable to the topic of the book in the remotest way; in many places my marginalia amount to complaints like "What on Earth has this got to do with militant atheism?" These and other reasonable questions are never answered.

It appears likely that Hedges put this book together hurriedly, hoping to benefit from and push back against the attention that Dawkins and Hitchens were getting in 2007 and 2008 with their well-received books on (a)theism. I say this because the content, chapter by chapter, is broadly divergent, yet in places is haphazardly duplicative, suggesting that the material is drawn from prewritten essays which weren't sufficiently reworked to congeal in a single, readable book-length message. I am gravely disappointed in Hedges as a writer and a as defender of his faith, mostly because the failure is occasioned by lack of effort; it's a betrayal of every reader who invests the time and money.

[Murtaza · Rating 5 out of 5]

Couldn't put this book down, a must-read.

[Justin Tapp · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read Dawkins, Harris, and Hitchens before reading this book, along with Stephen Hawking and Brian Greene. I would recommend reading this book after reading theirs. Chris Hedges debated Hitchens and Harris, inspiring him to collect the arguments in this book. Hedges is a foreign correspondent, covering multiple wars and directing the Middle East bureau of the NY Times. He is no evangelical, he grew up a liberal Presbyterian that rejects certain parts of the Bible as literal (This creates some logical errors for him, see below.) He is critical of fundamentalist, right-wing American Christianity and sees it as equally grievous as the New Atheists.

Hedges writes that American Christians have grown wealthy via America's prosperity and globalization, and this prosperity has lead to arrogant behavior and churches that "love the poor but hate how they smell." Liberal Christians err in thinking that by becoming all-inclusive and standing for few things in particular they can make everything better. Hedges is not a neocon but rejects Christian liberals who embrace pacifism and believe, like the New Atheists, that mankind is progressing toward some more-englightened utopian future of its own accord. He likewise points out that the religious right and secular humanists both hold up America as a light to the world-- a place of blessed freedom and enlightenment. But this is problematic, as history tells us our country was made prosperous in part by slave labor, breaking treaties and massacring Native Americans, and that our enlightened civilization killed hundreds of thousands of women and children by intentionally dropping the atomic bombs on civilian populations in WWII. These actions were supported both by Christians who believed God created certain men superior to others as well as social Darwinists like Herbert Spencer who argued that evolution demanded survival of the fittest races. In other words, we have no moral high ground to stand on.

Hedges seems not to have read Francis Schaeffer, which is a pity for his arguments. But he is similar to Schaeffer in his examination of art and culture. For example, WWI occurred after a period in which there was much talk about the evolution of an enlightened people. The post-war art reflected the jaded cynicism and a rejection of those views. Hedges rightly compares Sam Harris et al to Mr. Kurtz in Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness (1899), a highly civilized, enlightened European supposedly above the savages he meets in the Congo who becomes a savage himself. Such a vision is the logical conclusion of the New Atheists world. Harris, for example, advocates pre-emptive nuclear strikes on Muslims who he sees as a major threat to his secular freedoms. Likewise, Christopher Hitchens was supportive of the 2003 invasion of Iraq because it boded well for the spread of secularism over religious fanaticism.

New Atheists preach a utopia achieved by enlightened human evolution and argue that we're evolving toward a better nature. This leads to a sort of racism, because they purport that it's the religious people who are holding our society back. Eliminate them, and let the intellectually enlightened elite make the rules. (That's the logical conclusion of their vision as pointed out in the 1970s by Francis Schaeffer.) Hedges writes that this is not only dangerous, but absurd, and contrary to what history has shown time and again and that he has observed around the world in various cultures. We're not growing more peacefully enlightened but more violent, and the violence has little-to-nothing to do with religion. Hedges disagrees with Harris that the Balkan war was religious, or that wars are primarily religious. He covered many as a correspondent, and argues that religious systems all over the world have been pluralistic and tolerant of others, contra what Harris & Hitchens preach. Suicide bombers have little to do with religion and more about shame and occupation. Hedges points out that suicide bombings originated with anarchists and communists on the left, and were originally used by groups such as the Tamil Tigers. The first suicide bomber in the U.S. was a Leftist making a political statement. Saudis and Palestinians see this as a way to wage war in the absence of armies, they find their occupation by foreign powers shameful and worth fighting.

Hedges does well in explaining how Richard Dawkins misuses evolutionary biology, he uses it as a basis for designing the structures in which we should interact; our legal code. This is as grievous as codifying the Ten Commandments. Darwin's theory was not a litmus test for determining whether human behavior was beneficial or not. Darwin in no way thought mankind was evolving into a more enlightened state or to some utopian endpoint. Darwin was a student of Malthus and had his own racist views, but Herbert Spencer took them farther, making social Darwinism into its own religion. This misuse of Darwin has created a "cult of science" that is harmful. Dawkins' world leads to selective abortions, eugenics, and genetic manipulation to weed out the bad elements and make ourselves better, more immortal.

Real scientific study tells us that evolution is a series of random processes that always finds ways around attempts to control manipulation. Hedges writes that quantum mechanics demonstrates that some things are unknowable, and that there will always be randomness. Psychology (and behavioral economics) repeatedly shows that people do not make rational choices, no matter what amount of information they have. The book concludes with a diatribe against the poisonous obsession with image, status, and wealth that is destroying our society and keeping us ignorant. Hedges writes that these New Atheists are products of this culture, using marketing techniques that play to our fears and ignorance, to hold themselves up as the experts who we should buy the product from. They dismiss our cultural, biological, and psychological realities and promise salvation by science and the evolution of human character.

More troubling, Harris and Hitchens pretended to be open-minded while having very closed systems. Hedges quotes from a debate where Harris refused to change his views on people in the Middle East despite being shown that he spoke no Arabic, had never lived there, and misrepresented a Pew research poll he was citing. Hitchens, likewise, made all sorts of theological comments but refused to read any theological work because it was all "worthless."

Forgiveness cannot be explained biologically. People are more than a random compilation of molecules because we have a spirit or soul that is a "mystery." Hedges' weakness is accepting the New Atheists comments on morality. New Atheists use a measure of morality similar to that of Christians, but without the logical underpinnings. If there is no God and we are all just random molecules and there is no such thing as a "soul" or an "afterlife" and no one is made in God's image, then on what basis to we decide right and wrong? Majority rule? The rule of the elite like Sam Harris? This is the biggest weakness of the New Atheists and Hedges misses it. But he does argue that religion is what creates ethics. That there is a soul that is a "mystery," and therefore sacred and to be protected. Biology does not give us any reason to forgive others, or love them as ourselves. The author writes that religious thought encourages human inquiry, to explore our universe.

Hedges writes that to reject the idea of sin is "catastrophic." The concept of sin is a check on utopian visions of totalitarians. We will never have a final victory over evil or achieve some type of moral perfection. As such, he critiques both New Atheists who proclaim there is no God, no soul, no afterlife, and have no means of defining evil or sin as well as liberal Christians who downplay the depravity of man. He quotes heavily from Reinhold Niebuhr throughout the book.

I believe that Hedges has his own logic problem here. He rejects literal interpretations of the Bible yet criticizes liberal Christians for not taking sin literally enough. His argument relies on some absolutes, and since those are biblically-based it begs the question: How much of the Bible or truth does he believe in? How does he decide? He seems to embrace modern cosmology and natural selection. This is problematic because the Bible says death only entered the world because of sin-- you can't have millions of creatures dying in an evolutionary process and hold to biblical teachings about the origin of sin and death. If you reject Genesis, then you have to reject Jesus' quoting of the book, which makes even more things fallible.

Hedges is mainly arguing against the illogical arguments of the New Atheists and pointing out the danger in following their philosophies to their logical conclusions. Likewise, he is attacking both liberal Christians and evangelicals. About 70% of his critique is on those he debated, the other 30% is directed at Christians.

I enjoyed this book and agree with Hedges in much, but he has his own formal errors that need to be addressed. He would do well to read William Lane Craig, Francis Schaeffer, and Ravi Zacharias to name a few. 3.5 stars out of 5.

[Philip · Rating 4 out of 5]

To see the Hedges/Harris debate, go to YouTube and search, "Religion, politics and the end of the world." (I know I put this later in the review, but I thought it was worth it to go back and put it at the top.)

Premise: People do not advance morally at the same rate as they advance scientifically. “Those who teach that religion is evil and science and reason will save us are as deluded as those who believe in angels and demons. …Science and human reason, like institutional religion, have delivered as much suffering as comfort.” (p.28)

Premise: The problem is not religious fundamentalist fanatics; the problem is fundamentalist fanatics (religious or non-religious)

Premise: One cannot discount sin and human nature when looking at the progress of mankind. “We have nothing to fear from those who do or do not believe in God; we have much to fear from those who do not believe in sin.” (p.13)

Premise: The “progress of mankind” is a myth. “Human history is not a long chronicle of human advancement… history is not progressive.” (p.42)

Hedges goes on from these points to write the rest of his book. Throughout the book he makes points that are not always intended to be directed at atheists, but fundamentalists in general, although I think this is lost on some people who reviewed the book. He writes on many topics that link back to his main point, specifically the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. He purports that it would have been better to have left the aftermath of 9/11 in the hands of the intelligence community, but the nation was humiliated and demanded retaliation.

My problems with the book: Coming at it from a Christian fundamentalist view, I feel Hedges distorts what I believe. Just one example would be when he claims Christians view themselves as more moral than others. (p.87) Although this may have been true in the past, I believe this mindset to be the exception today. I do feel that most people believe Christians to have this mentality, but they are misinterpreting Christian belief, as Hedges did here. He also says that “The moment the writers of the gospels began to set down the words of Jesus they began to kill his message.” (p.95) … Yeah, either that, or they made it possible for his words to endure. People may claim Hedges is a Christian, but from these passages and some others later in the book, I would argue that he’s a Universalist who sees many ways to heaven.

If you’re one of the people that read the 1 starred goodreads review and saw the claim that Hedges left the fillers in for Sam Harris, but took them out when he was speaking, I encourage you to go to the debate and look at it yourself. Search YouTube for “Religion, politics and the end of the world.” You’ll find what was excerpted on part 8/9. The excerpt in the book is on page 72. My contention is that it was selective perception on Stu’s behalf, but maybe it’s selective perception on mine.

I’ll comment on his review when I have more time.

If you watch the debate with Harris, or the Hitchens/Hitchens debate or any of the like, you see a common thread. What’s implied by the atheists is that if we cast off religion and embrace atheism, we can advance as a society. Hedges argues that moral advancement doesn’t necessarily keep up.

One last problem with Harris, Harris wrongly attributes religious violence with stronger belief. He implies that if everyone truly believed their purported religion, people would be more violent. But it’s not belief, it is interpretation. What he says is like saying if you truly believe in evolution, you believe in racial superiority. If you follow all the precepts held in the book “On the Origin of the Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life,” I would suggest you are a racist. BUT, it’s not how strongly you believe in evolution that leads you to racism, it’s how you interpret the theory. Harris implies the Amish have less faith because they’re not violently radical… Maybe I’m the only one who sees a problem here.

[Chris Gager · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are some crappy(as in critical/crappy) reviews of this book up there but I'll give it a try.

I'm into this a ways now and am a bit puzzled. The author attacks a few atheism advocates like Hitchens as if they were at the forefront of some worldwide movement. I'm not seeing that. Is he anti-progressivism? Does he oppose movements that seek to make the world a better place and effectively address our many problems? Seems like he's kind of all over the place. I believe he was involved in some debate with Hitchens and others sometime in the recent past. Hitchens is dead now, of course. That'll learn him! Hedges' verbal assault on modern atheists seems to be the product of being verbally bullied or something. In that debate maybe? Were his opponents scornful of the Bible etc. ? Weird ...

That said, the author writes well and addresses many of the all-too-real problems we face these days. I find myself in agreement with him in a lot of ways. I like the Bible, but don't consider it any more valuable than many other bits of literature in telling me and others how to live our lives. I'm not religious but I accept that for many people some religious involvement serves them well in their lives. I go to 12-step meetings. We say that these are spiritual in nature, not religious. I have to say that I detect a faint whiff(at minimum) of the religiously fanatic in the author's dismissive attitude. I do not fear science or atheism. Both have their limitations in terms of moral instruction. However, I try to insist on a clear understanding of the physical reality of existence and history in my own mind as a basis for understanding the world. I do my best!

I have to confess I'm getting tired of reading this repetitious tirade but I will probably finish as the book's fairly readable and not too long. Thus far the author has made no attempt to justify a religious faith that's based on the supernatural and loaded with unverifiable mythology. I.E. "God-ism." Since he is a modern religious thinker I assume if does that he will resort to murky rhetorical gymnastics. OF COURSE religious teachings can provide valuable moral lessons for individuals and cultures, BUT ... what's it all based on??? If he and others want to believe in some non-physical God that they claim to know a lot about, that's OK with me, but(in my opinion) us humans ultimately need to make our decisions about the world and what we do with it based on what's in front of us. I think that the desire for a better world and better human behavior CAN be enough to produce a humanistic and moral way of being and living. I don't see why we need religion for that. Do we need to be wary of the uses of science and reason/logic? OF COURSE! Sheesh ...

Finished yesterday and as I suspected the author became more interested in cataloguing the woes of modern culture and promoting religion as a means of dealing with them than he was in keeping to the topic of evil atheists. Oh well ... as I've already mentioned I'm on board with his citation of and condemnation of a number of those seemingly intractable problems. Still not seeing that formal, aggressive atheism is a big problem, however, and certainly not as much of one as Bible-squeezing or any other form of rigid, orthodox religionism. Intellectual religionists like Hedges seem to be able to see and feel the possibilities much better than the "rest of us". It's just more gobble-de-gook to one such as me.

- Sci-fi writers like to address the same issues that Hedges raises - see Cordwainer Smith for instance.

- Why does the author capitalized the "H" in "Him"when referring to Jesus??? Does he think that "He" was not a mortal human being??? If not, why not???

- 2.75* rounds up to 3* as this highly flawed book still has enough interesting stuff to boost it beyond a 2* rating.

I just found out(7-11-17 that CH and I are grads of the same prep school - Loomis(Loomis Chaffee). That makes three(that I can think of off-hand) authors on my "read" list from Loomis.

[Nebuchadnezzar · Rating 2 out of 5]

Fortunately for the reader, Hedges decided to keep his overblown screed short. Really, there is little here for either the theist or atheist.

I found myself in a strange position going into this book as a follower of Hedges' journalism and an atheist who is not the biggest fan of the so-called "new" atheism. Hedges targets Christopher Hitchens and Sam Harris specifically in places, but slips between indicting those two, the "new" atheists, and atheists in general. This ends up being a fatal flaw, as even Dawkins, Dennett, Harris, and Hitchens have their differences.

Hedges paints his phantom atheist as an apologist for U.S. imperialism in the Middle East. Most of Hedges' criticisms only apply to Hitchens, who was an ardent supporter of the war in Iraq. Harris didn't explicitly endorse it, but cribbed enough neo-conservative talking points that I can give Hedges some leeway with him. Dawkins, however, explicitly opposed the war. Dennett has always been rather apolitical yet vaguely liberal. To my knowledge, he never took an overt position but has hinted in places that he was against it. Hedges' portrayal of "these atheists" is then fundamentally dishonest as this issue is central to his argument.

While Hedges delights in falsely painting neo-atheists as useful idiots for the neo-con agenda, he does correctly identify them as being in thrall to scientism. However, even on this point, his analysis is not that great. The chapter on the use of evolution in their apologetics is poorly done, especially compared to something like Alister E. McGrath's essay on the same topic in Biology and Ideology from Descartes to Dawkins.

There is nothing new in terms of Hedges' attack on the legacy of the Enlightenment, though I guess I can't fault him too much on that front as something like Adorno and Horkheimer's Dialectic of Enlightenment: Philosophical Fragments is probably like garlic to a vampire where the new atheist set is concerned, much less any vaguely postmodern philosophy. However, Hedges comes off like an utter nihilist, disclaiming any possibility of moral progress. While I'm no believer in the capital-P form of "Progress" that he rails against, he seems to be so dead set against the idea as to be reactionary in places.

The funny thing is, I agree with what a lot Hedges has to say. I think the core of his message is one the neo-atheist set needs to take seriously and he has sniffed out some of the underlying intellectual strains of the neo-atheist phenomenon. But he shoots himself in the foot by using guilt by association to tar his subjects. (Ironically, he accuses them of painting in broad brushtrokes.) The presentation and style will make this unconvincing to anyone who doesn't already agree with Hedges. It's not even a matter of tone as it is the disjointed style and the amount of misrepresentations to be found. Hedges rants and rambles, throwing out vague and unsubstantiated accusations left and right. His writing is often aimless and erratic, with so many quotations it feels too much like lazy namedropping at points. He had an easy target to hit, but still missed by a mile.

[Devogenes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent book, Hedges on fire. Truly baffling choice of title but there you go. An excoriation of the self-described New Atheists, particularly in regard to what Hedges accurately describes as the "historically and culturally illiterate" anti-Muslim rhetoric of Harris and Hitchens and their support for the unequivocally catastrophic western interventionism in the Middle East. Hedges, unlike Harris and Hitchens, has actually seen some shit.

This actually isn't a book about atheism, but rather an attack on the chauvinistic utopianism of the Enlightenment, first expressed by Rousseau and the Jacobins. That is, the psychologicaly and historically naive conceit that, under the guise of rationality, an intellectual elite can remake the world in its own image. Hedges places this millenarianism at the heart of the New Atheists' interventionism, as it was at the heart of the revolutionary terror and catastrophic wars of France, Russia, Germany, and China.

A central thesis throughout is the rejection of moral progress, which Hedges believes leads to millenarian utopianism. As is often the case with Hedges, I find this position to be one which is both difficult to accept and yet impossible to deny.

[William · Rating 1 out of 5]

Chris Hedges seems to have written this book just as a follow-up to some debates he did with Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens. Fine, there's a lot to criticize in Harris (I haven't read Hitchens). His major criticism is a kind of "utopian fundamentalism" that he imputes to both atheist and religious extremists, presumably promoting moderation for everyone (although he basically only criticizes others rather than offering any positive ideas of his own). He blames, or at least implies blame on this extremism most of the world's ills including racism, slavery, and even comes very close to the old religionists' canards of blaming the holocaust and communism on atheists, and even seems to blame atheists for Bush's War on Terror at one point (!). The whole thing is apparently a call for moderation and tolerance of all religions (he's a noted Christian scholar), but is so full of strawman arguing and ad hominem ranting with highly questionable examples and analogies that it ends up painting with at least as broad a brush as any of the writers he is attacking ever did. And he never comes close to addressing the one single issue that "atheism" as a whole is concerned with. Don't bother.

[Paul · Rating 2 out of 5]

Chris Hedges recently released American Fascists. i haven't read the book but i do know that it is a critique of the Christian fundamentalist movement in the US. Apparently, not wanting the atheists get away from his wrath, he penned I Don't Believe in Atheists. And wrath is exactly what the first two thirds of this work read like. Hedges rants and raves about the extreme positions of both atheist and fundamentalist thinkers. He tries to establish a middle ground but only sloppily so.

i do agree with the vast majority of Hedges' thinking in Atheists but wished that editors had forced him to clean up the work and put it into a better framework.

The last two chapters of the book are a first rate discussion of the ability of governments to turn a perception of national humiliation into vengeful action by the citizenry and of the individual's role in the world. Those were truly captivating and thought provoking pages, i just wish i didn't have to read past a hundred plus pages of shouting to get there.

[Matthew Klippenstein · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'd approached the book cautiously, not knowing much about Hedges, but recognizing that, after reading Dawkins and Hitchens, I owed it to myself to read their critics. (At least the ones who don't hold to literalist interpretations of their particular religious writings.)

To my surprise, the author blew me away with his methodical dissection of the New Atheism. His demonstration that the more strident New Atheists adopt the same rhetorical tactics as their Fundamentalist opponents was on its own, worth the sticker price.

While an atheist myself (albeit one who drinks deeply, and often, from the world's traditions) the book held up an unflinching mirror to the fact that noisily garrulous atheists are just as prone to corrosive absolutism, as the religious fundamentalists they condemn.

[Kent Winward · Rating 4 out of 5]

Forget the title and realize that Hedges lives up to his surname.

[Tucker · Rating 3 out of 5]

Instead of following the predictable career trajectory for a man with his Master of Divinity degree and an undergraduate degree in literature, Chris Hedges spent two decades reporting from the worst war zones all over the world. His opinions on human nature are especially valuable simply because they stem from this unique combination of education and experience.

My opinion of the book is mixed. Based on the title, I expected it a reactionary Christian screed, and was pleasantly surprised to find that Hedges argues against all forms of fundamentalism. But then I was disappointed that the book is not actually about atheism. It is about the inherent limitations of human beings that make us our own worst enemies and prevent us from solving our own social problems. As Hedges identifies it (end of Intro.), the book is "a call to reject simplistic utopian visions," to recognize that our own values are fallible and culture-bound, and to avoid pressuring others to be exactly like us. He believes that certain liberal religious and atheist influences draw from the worst legacies of Christianity and the Enlightenment to pursue "collective moral progress," which, he says, leaves humans prone to committing evil as a means to an end -- that is, persecuting or killing other human beings who are judged not to be aiding the moral progress of the species. Promising that cruelty and injustice can be overcome is an evasion of moral complexity: it effectively minimalizes the significance of evil, which implies that the victims' outrage is misplaced, which is an indirect form of blaming the victims -- moreover, it is misleading and wrong. Humans use technology to perpetrate the same old cruelties and therefore "we progress technologically and scientifically, but not morally." We may overcome some social injustices, but others arise, such as new forms of imperialism, nuclear terrorism, environmental crises, globalization, the "corporate state." I appreciated the unexpected opportunity to contemplate this topic and learned a good deal from it, but I wish he had actually talked about atheism.

What does atheism have to do with the mistaken belief in collective moral progress? The idea is that some atheists put reason and scientific progress on a pedestal and view atheism as some kind of intellectual liberation and a path to the evasion of all religious wars, when in fact human reason is fallible, scientific progress doesn't necessarily make us happier, and wars are fought mainly for political reasons. In my opinion, this is an inappropriate conflation of atheism with a particular set of beliefs, when, in fact, atheism means nothing more or less than the lack of belief in a god.

Hedges identifies a movement he calls New Atheism, but the only names he drops are Sam Harris and Chris Hitchens (whom he calls "tiresome epicures"), Richard Dawkins and briefly E. O. Wilson. Other than the widely known fact that these authors sell a lot of books, what makes their ideas constitute a "movement"? And what makes New Atheism different from garden variety atheism? Hedges does not make any claims about the influence of these writers over the general population, so when he complains about "New Atheism," it is hard to tell whether he is warning of a widespread intellectual trend (i.e. an actual movement) or simply penning harsh reviews of two or three books. "Hitchens and Harris," he complains, "describe the Muslim world...in language that is...racist, crude and intolerant." Very well; but what does this have to do with atheism, or even New Atheism (if there is such a thing)? When Hedges complains that "Harris mistakes a tiny subset of terrorists for one billion Muslims," I cannot help but think that Hedges in like manner extrapolates from the attitudes of a small number of atheists to stereotype all atheists.

He accuses atheists of being ignorant about their subject matter. "The atheists believe they know religion's inadequacies although they have never investigated religious thought," he accuses. "Stepping out of the cartoonish and childish taunting of religion to a discussion of the writings of Aquinas, Augustine, Paul Tillich, Karl Barth, and Reinhold Niebuhr is beyond the capacity of these atheists. They haven't read them, and they don't want to." Mutatis mutandis, I wonder if Hedges has read the work of Andre Comte-Sponville who describes himself as an atheist who is "faithful" in the sense of educated about and engaged with his heritage of a Western, Christian intellectual tradition, or of Karl Popper who questioned the meaning and the possibility of the progress of civilization, the very subject Hedges treats. At the beginning of his introduction, Hedges admits that, prior to debating Sam Harris and Chris Hitchens in 2007 (the year before his book was published), he hadn't focused on the topic of atheism. I don't know why he thinks he is entitled to publish a book on a topic that he considered for less than a year and simultaneously to complain about the paltry academic background of others.

He says there is no problem with atheism per se, only with certain flavors of atheism, as he assures us in his introduction "there is nothing intrinsically moral about being a believer or a nonbeliever." However, this is belied by his caution to specify "fundamentalists," "fanatics," or "terrorists" when criticizing anything religious, while simply referring to "New Atheists" (a label which is never adequately defined) or, more frequently, "these atheists" (who are never identified as a demographic) when criticizing anything atheist. The rhetorical effect is that he seems to criticize all atheists while nominally claiming that he is only bothered by fanatic, imperialist, chauvinistic atheists. (I wondered if perhaps he sometimes designated this subset of fanatic Atheists via a capital "A," but it was impossible for me to divine as I was listening to the audiobook version.) Moreover, if Hedges does not really have a problem with atheism, why did he title the book "I Don't Believe in Atheists"? In Ch. 1, he briefly comments that he respects atheism when it is a form of courageous dissent against authorities who demand intellectual conformity or when it arises naturally as a "form of despair" in the face of suffering and injustice. But this seems to imply that atheism is only respectable when theists are, or God himself is, behaving badly. Would Hedges respect an atheism born in a time of prosperity and peace? He doesn't say. Nowhere does he attempt to evaluate atheism's basic claim that God does not exist and neither does he promote the rival claim of theism. His attitude toward atheism per se (beyond the politicized Harris-Hitchens flavor) is impossible to determine.

Hedges does briefly mention that humans need contemplation, reverence, and the search for meaning. He refers emotion and ethics as "transcendent". And he says that, while these things fall under the domain of religion, they do not need to be tied to a belief in God. This confuses to me. In a book that purports to be about atheism, how does Hedges define "religion," if religion is not based in theism? It seems arrogant for him to identify some of humanity's highest philosophical pursuits and to categorize them as "religious" even as he acknowledges that atheists participate on their own terms. I am reminded of a line attributed to actress Julia Sweeney's mother, who reportedly admonished her daughter when she confessed her atheism: "Not believing in God is one thing...but an ATHEIST?" Hedges comes across as saying something similar: being an atheist is fine, but not being religious is appalling. In another passage, in Ch. 4, he seems to define "religion" as personal moral conscience. This, of course, either rules out of court the possibility of moral atheists or co-opts moral atheists under religion's umbrella.

He complains it isn't clear which god the New Atheists attack. "These are not questions these atheists answer," he says. (Although, one might point out, it is not at all clear which god Hedges himself worships, either. At one point, he seems to invoke a "god of the gaps" argument where he invokes "particle unpredictability," one area of our own scientific ignorance, as an opportunity to use God as an explanation.) He says the atheists attack straw men and ignore how religion -- aside from its many failings -- has historically promoted virtues of kindness and social justice. Allegedly, when faced with religious heroes, "these atheists" either deny that these figures were religious or that they were heroes. They are unable to appreciate the Bible as an allegorical text, wrongly assuming it makes factual claims. Most damning, they cannot acknowledge or accept human "contradictions, limitations and ambiguities."

The vision offered by Hedges seems radically pessimistic. He says, post-9/11, we can never restore security to the United States, and that, as a result of the invasion of Iraq, "No matter what happens, many, many Iraqis are going to die, and it is our fault." Throughout his insistence that humanity is incorrigibly bad, he never says we should continue trying to make the world a better place, nor does he suggest ways for people to rationalize their good work. Should activists, politicians, and people in the so-called helping professions consider themselves as performing short-term damage control, rather than actually contributing to any social transformation? Are we all -- as Hedges has been professionally -- essentially observers of a global war zone? Although there is a certain comfort in admitting that I cannot fix the world's problems, without some ray of hope that I can at least contribute to one solution of one problem, I do not find this defeatist "religious" philosophy inspiring, nor am I convinced that it is any less dangerous than a philosophy of hope that we can collectively morally progress.

[Daniel Cunningham · Rating 2 out of 5]

I will start by saying that I am sympathetic to the overall idea behind this book: a strict, "militant" atheism has the potential to -and in some people probably already has- become a fundamentalism. Fundamentalism, in any shape or form, is a "Bad Thing" that must be guarded against. I also am already a subscriber to the idea that humans are not morally perfectible, that this is usually a big component, implicit or explicit, of said fundamentalism. I think it evident, as well, that human society as a whole, if such a thing exists, is probably not steadily improving in some absolute moral sense; minimally, that any such gains can be lost in the blink of an eye.

So far, so good. Now, lets walk through how Hedges goes wrong.

Chapter One, a couple of Major Issues:

On page 20 Hedges quotes nearly a paragraph from Sam Harris. He cuts the quote to being with what reads like Harris proposing that "we" be prepared to kill other people if "we" deems their beliefs to be too dangerous.

But this not at all what the section in Harris is actually saying; if you go back to the source and read it, the paragraph (and preceding paragraphs) are talking about how beliefs shape our actions. Harris then he goes on to say, as quoted by Hedges, that, "Some propositions are so dangerous that it may even be ethical to kill people for believing them." But this is in a section discussion beliefs, systems of beliefs, and so forth! Including how much belief can motivate us, up to and including killing people!

Strike two. Page 36. Quotes Harris as, again, proposing that we nuke an Islamic regime that acquires long range nuclear weapons. Which is not at all what Harris is saying! He *clearly* states that this would be ridiculous outcome, and moreover a crime against humanity, but that some future US government might feel they have no alternative. He then goes on to say how this could result in a counter strike against the US, and this would lead to -obviously- more mass death, and all because of irrationality.

But Hedges doesn't present *any* of that. He again cuts the quote to make it sound like Harris is actively proposing we go out and nuke e.g. Iran as soon as we think they have a long range nuclear capability. In fact, the scenario describe is morally complicated; there is no "good solution." Again, all of which Hedges either missed completely or disingenuously ignored to better make his point.

Note: In the passage in The End of Faith Harris places blame squarely at the feet of "religion" for what would be a US first strike against a fundamentalist state. Which seems, well, not at all fair. It is *this* reasoning that Hedges seems to really, really get angry over. And I would say understandably so. This is also couched in page after page of Harris "demonstrating" how Islam is a religion of violence. Which strikes many as more than a bit bigoted. Here of there Harris walks this back a bit, saying that, more or less, e.g. Christianity was a religion of violence at one point. But that gets lost in his repetition of, "Islam, Islam, Islam" everywhere else.


In chapter two, Hedges discusses science and religion and how he sees scientists and atheists misusing "science" (e.g. turning it into what Hedges calls the "cult of science.") I, again, am sympathetic to some overarching ideas here: e.g. it seems ridiculous to me that there are some fairly smart people talking about "the singularity" in 10 to 50 years. This is fantasy dressed up as religion dressed up as science.

Hedges then goes on to commit a whole series of mistakes that reveal how little he understands both what he is criticizing directly, as well as the underlying science. He waves his arms at "Darwinism" being applied outside biology, and says this is a mistake; he seams to mean that theories that are part of modern, neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory are applied outside biology, and this is (universally?) bad. And then he talks about Nazis.

He waves his arms at Quantum Mechanics, talking about how processes at the particle level are irreducibly random, leaps from there to the fact that the world is unpredictable, and says viola. Of course, the two have nothing to do with each other. Quantum processes are inherently random, and at the sub-microscopic scale this randomness becomes evident in certain situations; "life" is random because we don't have enough information. Theoretically, at least, you could drive cars around from now until the heat death of the universe and not have an accident, given sufficient information; car accidents are not inherently random. International politics, driving cars, religious debates, and day to day life are not quantum processes, not inherently random either; just really, really complicated/information laden. Two different kinds of randomness, and never the twain shall meet.

I could go on in this vein, but will stop. I really have a pet peeve with people dragging out QM to explain stuff, as they nearly, nearly, nearly never have the foggiest idea of what they are talking about.

I'll just do one more chapter. In chapter three, I see much that I agree with. Yes, there is a brittleness to the "New Atheist" program, though I think Hedges overplays this somewhat. I began a couple of years ago to become dissatisfied with what I was hearing from e.g. "The Four Horsemen" because it was invariably to simplistic, or just illogical. To claim that "religion" is responsible for all wrongs committed in the name of one or another particular religion, while "atheism" is not responsible for anything is a severe double standard. To say the least. To dismiss, essentially, all other causes for discord, war, murder, etc. other than religion is, well, stupid.

However, Hedges overplays this a bit when he, in turn, simplifies and flattens the feelings of "new atheists." He sees them merely as yet another group of fundamentalists; he doesn't seem to even consider that they are reacting to the increasingly politicized fundamentalist religious movements in the US, or the hubris and privilege that "the religious" often express when confronted with the fact that some people are in fact not religious. He seems to lean toward blaming atheists for the misunderstanding and stress that the existence of two distinct, probably incommensurable, world views causes. E.g. that for a person who does not believe in a "higher power", anthropomorphic or not, it is actually often fairly *disturbing* to deal with full-grown adults *who have an invisible friend.* Add to this that said invisible-friend-having people also run, essentially, the whole world... it is difficult to simply accept that as an alternative world view. And I imagine it must be very disturbing for those who do believe in a God/god/gods/power to have people around who hold the very concept -not just your particular belief, but the concept itself- as invalid.


And that none of that has got anything to do with Empire or Globalization of the vapidity of middle class life. Which clearly are Hedges true concerns (and, to an extent, again, I have to agree with his views.)


Anyway, since this review is quickly becoming as long as the book, I will stop. I will say that I've rarely read something that I found myself so much in agreement with while simultaneously so strongly in disagreement with. Part of it is that Hedges is somewhat sloppy in his reasoning, part of it is that I just don't agree with him everywhere, part of it is that I think he is a bit hypocritical. But he does well point out the overreach of the "New Atheists." He is not as successful at explaining the idea behind the lack of absolute progress (I'd say go read John N. Gray if you are interested in this.) And I think he fails to address that his entire book is a call to a higher morality, a call for moral progress in effect, or that he is choosing to define religion and cherry-pick authors and beliefs (in Hedges case, in to case a good light) in just the same way that he accuses Hitchens and Harris of doing (in their cases, to cast in a very nearly uniformly bad light.)

[Abby · Rating 2 out of 5]

First, I should say that I read Hedges’s Empire of Illusion and loved it. After reading it, I characterized him as smart, well-informed, and courageous enough to speak the truth--not to mention an elegant writer. But I Don’t Believe in Atheists has problems.

The title alone is cutesy and reflects the vagueness of Hedges’s entire argument. It indicates that the book will be about atheists in general, although Hedges primarily targets the “new atheists” such as Harris, Dawkins, and Hitchens—sometimes collectively, sometimes individually; indeed, I wasn’t sure at most points exactly to whom he was referring. He condemns “atheists such as Harris or Hitchens,” or more often, simply “these atheists.” (Huh?) He mentions having debated Sam Harris and quotes his work frequently; if he has issues with Harris, I wish he’d chosen to write a rebuttal to Harris’s arguments and leave “these atheists” out of it.

Hedges’s premise is that “the battle underway in America is…a battle between religious and secular fundamentalists…between two groups intoxicated with the utopian and magical belief that humankind can master its destiny.” Both the “new atheists” and Christian fundamentalists, he says, are “deluding themselves” with the belief that humans “are morally advancing as a species.” “These atheists,” he charges, “idolize” technology, reason and science as the path to human perfectibility. I’m not sure if I believe we’re making moral progress as a species. Robert Wright has suggested as much in The Evolution of God and The Moral Animal. Proving that we are or aren’t may be beyond our capacity right now. Regardless, Hedges doesn’t provide enough support from the work of any the “new atheists” to convince me that they (whoever precisely “they” are) truly envision some kind of golden age in which religious belief has been eradicated and humans live purely by reason. As an atheist myself--one who is familiar with the work of the “new atheists”--I find it hard to believe that Dawkins et al., let alone atheists in general, are that naïve. Hedges is right: of course science and reason can’t answer the questions that religion and mythology seek to answer. But neither are atheists worshippers of science and reason “who remain trapped within the confines of knowledge and pedantry” and “cannot see or speak to the deeper truths of life.”

It is the fundamentalist mindset, Hedges asserts--this “Utopian vision” of a perfect world where the “right” rules over the “wrong”--that is responsible for the worst tyranny in human history. He cites as examples repressive regimes such as those of Hitler and Stalin, as well as the Western world’s imperialist ventures, including the recent debacle in Iraq. To back up his assertion that the fundamentalist, secular or religious, “murders, plunders, and subjugates in the name of humankind’s most exalted ideals,” he again quotes Sam Harris, who states in The End of Faith that torture and war may be ethically acceptable courses of action against Muslims. Personally, I’m not a fan of Harris, because I think his work is vastly inferior to some of the other “new atheists.” But again, one person’s work doesn’t represent the thinking of an entire movement.

Hedges makes a few good points in countering the anti-religious stance of the new atheists. For one, he says that it’s not religious belief, but in fact an interplay of psychological factors (alienation, humiliation, powerlessness) that spurs violence. He counters Dawkins’s argument that without religion, there would be no suicide bombers by pointing out that suicide bombing has its roots in (secular) Marxism and was later adopted by Islamic terrorists. I appreciate what he’s trying to do, especially because for me, the “new atheists” are preaching to the choir and I tend to take what I read from them at face value. So, I’m open to fair criticism.

Not all of Hedges’s criticism is fair, though. Of theologians such as Aquinas, Augustine, and Tillich, Hedges claims that the new atheists “haven’t read them” and “don’t want to.” (How exactly does he know this?) In lumping the new atheists with fundamentalists, he argues that they operate in an “intellectual void” and even at one point refers to Hitchens as “an illiterate.” “The new atheists are products of the morally stunted world of entertainment,” Hedges writes in his last chapter, adding that they “appeal neither to our reason nor our intellect” but instead merely “amuse” us, bolstering our “self-satisfaction, anti-intellectualism and provincialism.” These are heavy, poorly supported charges lobbed indiscriminately at an amorphous group of people--which is pretty much I Don’t Believe in Atheists in its entirety.

[Betty · Rating 1 out of 5]

On the back of the copy I found it said "The battle between these new atheists and the religious fundamentalists engages two bizarre subsets of American Culture. One distorts the scientific theory of evolution, applying it to complex social, economic and political systems it was never designed to explain. The other insists that the six day story of creation in Genesis is fact and Jesus will descend from the sky to establish the kingdom of God on earth. Neither God nor Science , will protect us from the destructive forces within human history and human nature."

From this I took it to mean that there are fundamentalists on both sides of the issue and brought it home interested in what the fundamentalist atheists were saying. I read the introduction and was very disappointed. At first it wasn't bad he states his thesis that new atheists are just as scary as religious fundamentalists but then he gets to specifics and uses Sam Harris as an example.

I have not read the entire book The End of Faith but I have read much of it and some other articles that Sam Harris has writen. So although I am not an expert I do know a bit about what he has to say on the topic of religon. I don't speak for any of the other 'atheists' that Chris Hedges talks about because I have never heard of them much less read them. And I feel that it is very important to stick to the facts with this argument because it is obvious Chris Hedges hasn't.

Hedges states that he started Sam Harris's book (he doesn't say which one) but never finished it. Then he goes on to say "His facile attack on a form of religious belief we all hate,(I looked up facile: it means shallow or simplistic),"his childish simplicity and ignorance of world affairs, as well as his demonetisation of Muslims, made the book tedious, at its best, and often idiotic and racist."

The introduction to The end of Faith is about a man with a bomb boarding a bus and blowing it up. Harris concludes by saying "Why is it then-- so easy to determine this mans religion?" I think it is a valid point.

I read later in Hedges introduction that he has a great affection for Muslims. Perhaps he did not notice that Sam Harris only said that this young mans religion was responsible for him blowing up a bus. He did not say all young Muslims are responsible for blowing up buses. I quote Chris "[Sam Harris's:] assertion that Muslim parents welcome the death of children as suicide bombers could only have been written by someone who never sat in the home of a grieving mother and father in Gaza who have just lost there child."

I simpathize with Chris Hedges expirence. It is very hard to look past personal expirence sometimes but I will point out that Sam was not talking about ALL parents of suicide bombers but of this particular suicide bomber. I went on a bit farther and found out Chris was raised religious. and he dose not agree with fundamental religion. He belives that chuches misuse authority. Then I read this:
"Religious institutions, should be separated from the religious values imparted to me by my religious figures, including my father."

What? Values are values, religion is religion. How are his 'religious values' separate from religion? That was vague and weird. But I persevered until he said Harris used language that was racist and crude about Muslims. I don't have the end of faith passage where Sam Harris talks about Muslims but I remember him being very careful to say that he was speaking about Fundamentalist Muslim's and yes he did say that Fundamentalist Muslim's were more dangerous than some other religions. Because of what religion said about non-believers. Specifically to kill them.

I had to stop reading. Chris Hedges is obviously very impassioned about athisits being fundimentalists but I believe that he has let his emotions cloud his vision. Chris Hedges has some good thoughts about how fundimentalisim is hard on socity but I think he has fallen into the very trap that he is railing about. He really needs to get down off his high horse and actually listen to what other people have to say without resorting to name calling and finger pointing.