So, Ezra, where are the Muslims radicals?

On February 3, I took issue with Ezra Levant for mocking atheists with their bus ad campaign. Ezra’s main point was that atheists should be attacking Islamists.

I tried to put paid to the notion that Islamists were a problem for atheists in Canada, that atheists still had issues with the majority Christians.

Since that post, the Canadian initiator of the campaign, Justin Trottier, has written an op-ed piece in the Ottawa Citizen pointing out that the neutral reference to God in the ads could just as easily apply to the God of Jews, Muslims and Christians. He is correct. He is also correct in stating that the purpose of the ads was not to attack any religion, but simply to promote discussion around the concept of God and morality.

I have been following the editorials across the country on this matter, as well as the letters to the editors, and in each and every case where a religious person weighed in on the issue, either for or against, they were Christians. I have yet to see an opinion expressed by a Muslim. I think this vindicates my view that Christians are more concerned with atheism, and its potential impact, than are the other religions.

Oh, yes, and as far as I been able to determine to date, Ezra is the only Jew who has commented. Unfortunately, he found himself on the wrong side of this one.

Attacks on atheist beliefs

As I go about my daily business I find myself surrounded by images, icons, symbols, and representations of religion.

Women will wear little crosses around their necks. Other women will wear headscarves and some even burquas. Jewish men sport the yarmulke. Priests and pastors wear their vestments outside of their churches. Imams favour full beards and headgear common to the Middle East. West of Toronto, there are thousands of men wearing turbans.

Their houses of worship are unmistakable.

Christian churches will be topped with crosses and if they are Catholic they may have statues of Mary near the front doors. The same is true of some Catholic schools. Around Christmas, some churches will display a Nativity scene on the front lawns. Protestant churches are fond of placing large signs facing the street announcing the hours of worship, the names of the pastors and the subject of their sermons. Some of these signs also announce religious events and others use humour to attract attention.

All of these things, directly and indirectly, are the ways the pious advertise their fealty to their god, or gods, as the case may be.

I have always thought that these were merely an exercise in the normal civil rights that our citizens enjoy in a free and liberal democracy, the right to visibly demonstrate their beliefs.

But, apparently, I have been deluding myself. Advertising these beliefs is nothing more than a blatant attack on atheists.

I have to thank Dr. Charles McVety and Bishop Fred Henry who took the time to comment on the proposed atheist bus advertisements for causing the scales to fall from my eyes and the light of truth to penetrate.

Ezra doesn't get it

The normally sound and enjoyable Ezra Levant kind of went off the rails with this one.

He is a Jew and therefore evaluates life through the prism of the religion he was taught. Not for him is there any concern that in public institutions: universities, schools, governments, and other taxpayer supported or subsidized entities, the God of the Christians still reigns supreme. This country is not supposed to have a state religion, but, when you add up all the public places that God and his alleged will intrudes, there is a de facto state religion if not de jure one, and that religion is Christianity.

Why should a mild bus banner campaign bring out accusations of cowardice simply because atheists identify Christians as their major opponents?

He is right that the message is to prick Christians, but he is wrong to think that there is no point in doing so. Christians are the majority in this country, by a long shot (70%), and they call the shots. Islamic radicals are few in number and don't have much political clout or significant public support. Not so Christians.

When atheists finally get what they need from the Christian majority, which is to say, respect, then we will turn our attention to radical Islam.

As Abraham Lincoln concluded, when it looked like the U.S. might end up fighting Britain during the Civil War, "One war at a time."

Christians are more afraid of atheists than they are of anything else and if Ezra is really that concerned about challenging radical Islam, he might want to take some time off from bashing his fellow Jews (and now atheists) and ask the more interesting question of why Christian leaders pay such deference to Islam, but spend most of their political capital fighting atheists.

On bigotry and buses

Canadian atheists are launching a transit campaign like the one started in Britain and copied in Spain and the United States. Buses will carry advertising suggesting that there is probably no God, so just enjoy the life we have now. In short, stop fussing about the supposed one in the hereafter. The point of the adverts is to simply cause people to think about the concept of God and any religious notions they may harbour. It is also to give more prominence to atheism, a creed which has been kept in the closet or under the stairs for centuries.

Christians are bewildered by what they see as “in your face” efforts by atheists, their organizations (yes, they do have organizations – I’ll bet you didn’t know that) and their prominent spokespeople to let the world know they exist and that they have something to say. Christians have never before been faced with organized atheism in a liberal-democracy.

But true to form, the instant reaction of Christian spokespeople is to resort to censorship, since burning heretics at the stake is no longer fashionable (damn!), as reported in the Globe and Mail.

Upon hearing that the Toronto Transit Commission had approved the atheist ads, Charles McVety, president of the Canada Family Action Coalition, which fought against the legalization of same-sex marriages, said his group has not decided whether it will formally complain about the ads once they appear.

"On the surface, I'm all for free speech. ... However, though, these are attack ads," Dr. McVety, president of Canada Christian College in Toronto, said in an interview yesterday.

"These ads are not saying what the atheists believe, they are attacking what other people believe," he said. "And if you look at the dictionary definition for ... bigot, that's exactly what it is, to be intolerant of someone else's belief system."

There is no doubt that Mr. McVety will complain to the TTC, notwithstanding his "thinking about it" posture. Naturally, if Mr. McVety can make the case for bigotry, then he may succeed in causing the TTC to review and rescind its decision.

These ads state exactly what atheists believe if one adopts the position of the world’s best known atheist, Richard Dawkins, author of The God Deception. He says that there is a possibility that God exists, but that the probability that there is a God is very low. Furthermore, if bigotry is attacking a belief rather than a person who holds that belief, then McVety is guilty of exactly the same thing he is complaining about.

It is perfectly reasonable to attack a belief, but it is not reasonable to attack a person simply because he or she holds a certain belief. Everybody is entitled to believe any old nonsense they want and to express their views about beliefs.