Brights

There's one thing that's been quite a while on my mind and I've been collecting courage to put it here. Lots of my friends know it, but putting it on the web is, still, a different thing. No, I'm not gay, if that's what you think although it might be just as well, but it is socially a similar thing.

However strange as it seems, in our society it is perfectly acceptable to publicly declare faith in any religion, but to state the opposite, "I am an atheist" is a big no-no. It is even considered to be good manners to allow public declarations of faith, after all, it is politically correct, but no such considerations are reserved for the atheist. If you are not publicly stating your faith, then usually most people see no wrong in trying to, for example, persuade that person to come to the church. People are not supposed to talk about atheism since even the option, even the possibility that you do not believe in any supernatural things, undermines the very essence of religions: their faith.

Specifically, imagine the two following scenarios:

1. Person A is a Christian and person B a Muslim. Would you think it is politically correct for person A to ask person B to join the local church? Oh, no! Horrific error! Person B would slap person A on the face.
2. Person A is a again Christin and person B an atheist. Would you think it is politically correct for person A to ask person B to join the local church?

Objectively, the two situations are not at all different. Person A is asking person B to convert. However, in case 1 most people would see it as a terrible social blunder, while in case 2, I believe that most religious people cannot see any wrong in their actions. In case 2 I predict that many religious people can even see themselves as philanthropists, trying to relieve the atheist from his misery into the intellectually fuzzy world of religion.

So the situation is many ways similar to how homosexuals were perceived in the 60ies. It was socially acceptable to try to match homosexuals up with the opposite sex. Until the gay-movement. Today the social position of gays is incredibly much better than in the 60ies. Not perfect, but better. The brights movement tries to achieve the same for the atheists. Since the word atheist has for many people a negative sound to it, someone (check wikipedia) coined the word "brights" to mean people that are sufficiently enlightened (= bright) to abandon superstition. Similarly, those who still cling on to their superstitions, are called "supers". All nice and positive words, that is, trying really hard to be politically correct here.

So here it goes. I am a bright. I am an atheist. I will take it as an intellectual insult if you try to invite me to your church.

I will, in this context, not try to list the reasons why you should not be superstitious. There are many excellent books and speeches available on that already (check out Richard Dawkins, Dan Dennet, Susan Blackmore, etc.) and quoting them wrongly here would do no one no good. The purpose of this article is merely to bring more visibility to the prevalence of atheism and the term brights, as well as, to reach equality between people who have this world-view and those who publicly declare superstitions.



PS. I am fully conscious that I did not write anything original, anything that someone else wouldn't have said before. I just feel that it is important to spread the word, to make the message visible in as many places as possible.