Freethought Stories, Stickers, and Slogans
Presented by Robert Collins, PhD, President of the Psychological Services Center, University of Michigan ,Kent State, University of Indiana
About the Speaker
Dr. Collins has degrees from the University of Michigan (B.A.-Psychology), Kent State University (M.A.-Psychology), and Indiana University (Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology, an American Psychological Association Approved Program). He was on the faculty of Grand Valley State University from 1969-1981 and in this time period was invited to the University of Western Australia in a suburb of Perth, Australia for one academic year as a Distinguished Visiting Professor. He toured Australia in 1976 giving a variety of talks, including one given to the medical staff at the Royal Children’s Hospital in Melbourne, Australia. Dr. Collins retired as President of the Psychological Services Center, LC on April 30, 2002 with offices in Grand Haven, Muskegon, and Holland, MI on “The Lakeshore” (Lake Michigan) of Western Michigan. He is operating Soiling Solutions from his home.
About the Event
Announcements
On March 2nd at 7PM the Pittmans will host another Freethought Movie Night at their house. Contact Jason Pittman for info at 616-634-2471 or .
The next scheduled F. Movie Night will be on March 16. at the same time and location.
Our next scheduled meeting topic is “Does Religion Do More Good or Harm?” to be presented by Dr. David Myers; Hope College Social Psychology Professor and author of leading textbooks. This will be on March 12 at 7PM.
After the Saturday, March 22 Annual Board Meeting, our next scheduled regular meeting will be on the topic: “Dow Jones 40,000” to be presented by Bill Van Oosterhout, a stockbroker and FAoWM member.
On April 9, Kimberly Blaker will speak to us on the topic of the book she edited and co-authored: “The Fundamentals of Extremism: The Christian Right in America.” Blaker is a social advocate and syndicated columnist and writes a regular column on Church & State issues: “The Wall.” Her book is based on her award winning research paper and has been praised by those ranging from Shelby Spong, author of “Rescuing the Bible from Fundamentalism” to Professor Richard Dawkins, who referred to the Fundamentalist Christian Right as “America’s Taliban.”
Check our website for more information, items of interest, links, submissions of materials by members, meeting minutes or to join our e-mail discussion list. http://www.cfimichigan.org. You may also ask questions, pose concerns, etc. at: .
Presentation
Our topic for this meeting was “Freethought Stories, Stickers and Slogans” and was presented by our own Robert Collins, PhD. He asked how we might “spread the word” to impact the general culture, from our perspective and if it was even a good idea try to expand our numbers or influence. He also had us explore with him what audience we might reach and in what ways. And we looked at how our impact relates to the intellectual, the emotional and the moral aspects of humankind.
Dr. Collins presented to us various media vehicles as possible outlets to reach people including television, books, comics, music and even a secular “Sunday School” such as exists in Grand Rapids at the humanistic Fountain Street Church. However, it was later mentioned that since children of religious families often dread actual Sunday school, should this be an area we would want to mimic? There is also Camp Quest, a youth camp for Secular Humanist children.
Before getting too deeply into how much influence in larger society we should have, Dr. Collins had us look at the question of how much influence we have already. Being a scientifically- minded group, the question posed was whether we could measure this. He responded with a well- researched visual presentation of information culled from various websites. He talked with us about search engines; how they work- including the search logic involved, the different kinds and sizes in existence and how to go about mining the web for the information you seek in an efficient and quality- rich manner. Word use, spacing, exclusion and quotation marks all give differing results. With quotation marks, one pulls up pages with the phrase in quotes in it. One example that he gave of these various search techniques, employing the above-mentioned ways of typing in the search target phrase was: Christianity, Christian, Science, Christian Science, “Christian Science”, Christian-Science, Science-Christian. All will give different results.
Dr. Collins noted that science is well represented on the Internet for one of two ways of knowing. In another search he ran he found a descending order of sites going from Scientific (with 13,500,000), to Secular, Materialism, Secularism, Freethought and finally Atheism, with this last topic having a meager 2,440 sites. When one searches for news with “atheism” one encounters mostly a pejorative slant and the small numbers for it highlight that when one has limited knowledge of something it is too often feared, kindles angry response or is, at best, confusing for people. Negative connotations spring up in many people’s mind over the term “atheist” before they have bothered to investigate it as well as great misinformation regarding what the term implies. As just one example, many equate it with satanic worship, not realizing that it is a nullification of all worship. One member mentioned how atheism talks about what one does not believe but does not address what one does stand for.
Because of the above-mentioned concerns for terms further down the list and, conversely, a rather positive association and representation generally for “science”, Dr. Collins suggested that it may be a “better crowbar to wedge influence…” “Philosophical” also gets a positive reaction and count. He found “Humanism” to fall between “Secularism” and “Materialism.” Science is poised to be a very dominant force in people’s consciousness. Dr. Forbes noted in his last presentation to us that there are more scientists living today than have lived all throughout history up to today combined.
Turning to Creationism vs. Evolution, one sees the most positive response when the two are seen as reconciled: God puts the spirit in man as he evolves. It seems that for many such a reconciliation is necessary. They “know” they are “supposed to believe” in evolution but do not really understand it, so for them, this reconciliation provides the gap for their God to dwell in and exercise Its will upon while they still retain the veneer of being a modern, post-Enlightenment, 1st-World country citizen.
In treatments in book categories of Christian and Science, Dr. Collins found a good balance. Some strange results showed up when he went to subcategory searches such as the oxymoronic “Christian- Non-fiction” where one finds such books as T. LaHaye’s End Times works or where Harry Potter is listed under Science Books for Children.
As to name impact on the Internet, Jesus Christ led the pack but interestingly Buddha came up close behind. Later, those known for their contributions in areas other than religion show up with an ordering of Ben Franklin, Charles Darwin, Isaac Newton, Francis Watson and Albert Einstein, respectively, among others.
Next, we examined how stories stack up as to ones of a Christian basis as opposed to ones on Science. Dr. Collins had mentioned at other times, the importance of story- telling in human societies all throughout time. Michael Shermer often refers to humans as “story- telling animals” and others mention our uniqueness among the primates as being the story telling ape.
No doubt the initial power of myths is their way of placing everyone in a society in a context—-knowing one’s place in the world and its comforting tales for people; making them feel loved and accepted in a group that defines itself under an over-arching story that they, as a people, play a starring role in. Later, myths still retain their power to get into human imagination due to them being stories, rather than data or pure information.
Secularists, by contrast, are not generally associated with such a non-prosaic practice. Some, like the late Carl Sagan, were able to wed the wonders and joys of science with good factual information, but they are still few in number.
While science actually connects us to each other, all the other forms of life on the planet, the planet itself, and even the cosmos (we are the product not only of biological evolution but of cosmological perturbations throughout billions of years-the molecules of our bodies being once forged in dying suns in the galaxy) whereas religion generally divides (the sexes, races, humans as a separate creation from animals and other life forms, a single sun and moon, an impoverished version of a changeless Earth existing for mere thousands of years, itself alone and unconnected to an unremarkable universe), religious stories are still easier to integrate for most people into their consciousness and respond to positively. A myth created by and for an ancient tribe in a far removed place, time and culture still resonates in greater degree for large swaths of people than a story about everyone and everything right up to this very moment. The late Professor S.J. Gould (another good story telling scientist) lamented that large numbers of people are interested in genealogy but not evolution, which is genealogy writ LARGE. And Dr. Forbes talked of how people respond positively to liking plants and flowers but not botany. They love all animals but zoology leaves them cold, and the night sky holds deep fascination for them, but not astronomy, etc. Dr. Collins noted the far greater degree of symbols and symbolism used in religious presentations and how this, too, is an area where secularists have fallen short.
One of the listeners asked if pitting science against Christianity was an apt juxtapositioning. Should it be Christianity, per se, or religion generally? Does this oppositional treatment make it too much of a horse race?
As to slogans and popular iconography, we were asked if we thought the religious use of them was effective or convincing. Some of the counter slogans and images (the Darwin fish, for instance, as a response to the Christian ichthyoid symbol) were mentioned at this point as well as the sort of arms race in this area: the Christian symbol (labeled “truth”) eating the Darwin (legged fish) one. It was noted that one feature of dogmatic religious exhortation is its desire to convert and the overabundance of proselytizing. Perhaps, then, we should not adopt this methodology.
There were those in attendance who talked about the unattractiveness of an “us vs. them” mentality and if our group stays focused on topics of wide interest and scope, rather than ones with negative portrayals of religion in general or Christianity specifically, we would stand a better chance of more robust growth. Jeff S. mentioned in this light that surveys of our group indicated a strong desire for BOTH approaches-a hunger by many for information that is iconoclastic as regards religion, and a goodly number of members wanting topics that diverge from this area of discussion.
It was mentioned that an in-your-face, confrontational style does little to engender a positive view for one’s ideas. People shut down if told how they are “wrong” or it elicits an angry reaction, precluding any assimilation of the information presented anyway. It was noted that most people come to their religious viewpoint without doing any real head- work. They imbibe it as a baby does his/her mother’s milk as a comforting and mindless experience. Many people simply have not investigated any other way of seeing things, so if one merely provides another way of looking at things or gently causes others to break outside the box for a moment and consider new information, they may turn on a small light inside another person. If nothing else, an unthreatening approach on the part of a religious skeptic may cause the listener to think differently (i.e. more positively) about non-believers and melt a few preconceived notions away. A more militant message only fuels their negative bias against non-believers.
The importance of humor, entertainment and purely social events for we social animals was mentioned for its importance, and not always such a heavy emphasis on philosophical discourse. Promotion of books and other materials for children that challenge entrenched beliefs or give them the tools for developing critical thinking skills was discussed. Jason Pittman, noted at the top of these minutes is providing a social gathering for movies and his wife, Deanna, is compiling a list of the type of books alluded to.
It was lamented that positive values and morality are almost always associated with religion but that we have a valid humanistic approach and this needs to be aired. Otherwise it is too easy to demonize those who employ a secular system of ethics. And as we talked about at another presentation, there is the need to provide a better setting and more outlets for women and children as with smaller shared interest groups and activities for young people for example.
Regarding slogans and bumper stickers, one person quipped how he saw a car with a “Honk if you love Jesus” sticker on it. He honked. The driver flipped him off! Another had a sadder story to relate of how his car was vandalized because it had a mild sticker on it from a non-religious point of view. Yet one of our other members boldly displays his “ATHEIST” license plate and has had no real friction as a result of it.
A few examples of slogans and stickers given at the meeting were: “Magic Fools the Eye/ Religion Fools the Mind.” “Allah, Jesus, Thor, Whatever!” “Rape, Incest, Slavery, Stoning-Check it all out in the Good Book” “Theory Can Be Tested-How About God?” “The End is Coming: 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003…” “Science Explores/ Religion Deplores” and “Fun Duh-h-h Mentalism.” A sampling of the many slogans and pithy quotes that this secretary collected just prior to the meeting are: “I Think, Therefore I’m Dangerous”, “Born Again Atheist”, “In Case of Rapture, Can We Have Your Wheels?”, “We are never quite so dear to God as when we admit that we are poor, corrupt, idiotic worms.” (Ingersoll). “The few have said ‘think!’ The many have said ‘believe!’” (also Ingersoll). “Theology is not what we know about God but what we don’t know about Nature.” “America is a Secular State recognizing Crimes, not Sins!”, “It is best to read the whether forecast before praying for rain” (Mark Twain), “Faith: n., Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge of things without parallel.” (Ambrose Bierce). “Why has a religious turn of mind always a tendency to narrow the mind and harden the heart?” (Robert Burns). “Reason should be destroyed in all Christians.” (Martin Luther), “Think not that I come to send peace, but a sword.” (Jesus- Matt. 10:34), “Man is certainly stark mad: he cannot make a worm, yet he makes gods by the dozen.” (Michel de Montaigne). “The creator who could put a cancer in a believer’s stomach is above being interfered with by prayers.” (Bret Harte). “Prayer is the attempt to get the Almighty to change His mind.”
Secretary: Charles LaRue
