. . . and Ignoring of 35 of My Critiques of His Anti-Christian Polemics
Here’s how he does it (posted on 9-6-19):
This is a time of distress for Christian apologists. These are the die-hards who brag that they are devotees—in a professional capacity, no less—of the ancient Jesus mystery cult. They feel compelled to defend it at whatever cost. But times are changing, and they face challenges unknown to earlier apologists. . . .
So the burden of the apologist has become heavy indeed, and some don’t handle the anguish well. They vent and rage at critics, like toddlers throwing tantrums when a threadbare security blanket gets tossed out. We can smell their panic. Engaging with the ranters serves no purpose—any more than it does to engage with Flat-Earthers, Chemtrail conspiracy theorists, and those who argue that the moon landings were faked.
The five stages of Bible grief provide opportunities to initiate dialogue. I prefer to engage with NON-obsessive-compulsive-hysterical Christians, those who have spotted rubbish in the Bible, and might already have one foot out the door.
It’s a foolproof method: simply ignore any critic of your criticism on the grounds that they are panicked, hysterical ranters who merely throw temper tantrums, and are on the level of flat-earthers and fake moon landing kooks.
Poisoning the well and ad hominem at its finest . . .
It rather spectacularly confirms a point that I’ve made for a long time, about actively polemical, “preachy,” anti-theist atheists. I wrote, for example, in July 2017:
Many online atheists are extremely insulting towards Christians. Atheists love to interact with dumb Christians: it confirms to them that they were right in rejecting Christianity (baby-bathwater stuff, but still . . .). Atheists have a vested interest in thinking that Christianity is stupid and that Christians are imbeciles.
This refers, I should say, to the large strain of anti-theist atheists. Not all atheists are anti-theists: those who spend their days and nights gloating about how supposedly stupid and gullible all of us Christians are. But many, many are of this mindset, and they are clearly predominant in online atheist venues.
So Dr. Madison’s game is very apparent and transparent: he’s out to propagandize and brainwash Christians to forsake their faith, just as he did. He has no interest whatever in intelligent, respectful discussion with any Christian who actually can put up a fight and offer substantive criticism of his arguments. It doesn’t further his purposes (to put it mildly) if his readers ever see that he is wrong in an argument, or that a lowly, idiotic, fairy-tale believing Christian presents a much more plausible case. It can’t possibly happen (atheists being so intellectually superior to us), so he makes sure that it never happens by excluding and refusing to enter into all such dialogue (including replying to my 35 critiques) from the outset.
That ain’t part of the agenda. So what does a guy like him do? He does exactly what we see above: lie about the critic and paint him in the worst possible light, so as to dismiss him and act as if his challenge is nonexistent. Apologists for Christianity like myself are panicked, hysterical ranters who merely throw temper tantrums, and are on the level of flat-earthers and fake moon landing kooks. That’s me, down to a tee, isn’t it?
John Loftus, who runs the Debunking Christianity site where Madison posts, used the same unethical tactic in the last few weeks: for him (i.e., how he deludes himself and pretends, to maintain his game) I am a relentlessly “angry” person who “hates” anyone I disagree with. If you dare to disagree with anyone today, you get immediately pegged as a hater. What they call “hatred” and “anger,” I simply call honest intellectual differences and constructive dialogue.
These guys have no interest in actual dialogue, and so they have to smear those who advocate it and who threaten to overturn their nice little anti-theist atheist apple cart: who dare to pull back the curtain and expose what the Great Oz really is like.
I’m critiquing John Loftus’ book, Why I Became an Atheist now. There is no sign that he will be any more willing to interact than Dr. Madison, or Bob Seidensticker, who has also ignored 35 critiques of his stuff that he himself challenged me to write.
The game is up with all these clowns. Whatever one thinks of their atheism, wholly apart from that, they demonstrate over and over again that they are intellectual cowards, unable to defend their own positions, and lacking the courage of their convictions.
Small fry like me should be the easiest thing in the world for Madison, Loftus, and Seidensticker to dispose of: if indeed they believed their own triumphalistic, flatulent rhetoric and hideously inflated and exaggerated claims to supreme confidence in their own opinions. But they don’t. They name-call, lie, and flee for the hills. It’s obvious why they do it. They’re not fooling anyone who isn’t already a blind faith true believer in their pitiful cause of “proving” to the world that God doesn’t exist.
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Photo credit: No Swimming (1921), by Norman Rockwell (1894-1978) [public domain / Wikimedia Commons]
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