Undercover atheist

[Irish Murdoch]

Apologies if this has been covered elsewhere, but take a look here for a fascinating account of an atheist going undercover in a fundamentalist Christian group:

http://www.alternet.org/rights/84043?page=1

The account is by turns (and sometimes simultaneously) immensely disturbing and laugh-out-loud funny. The thought that in twenty-first century America someone can with a straight face attempt to cast out the demon of handwriting analysis ...!

 

[ExMinister]

The demon of philosophy? The demon of the intellect?

But they don't see the need to cast out the demon of ignorance, the one that influences people to believe homosexuality is always the result of childhood abuse. Or the demon of "pretending to speak in tongues." Or the demon that has caused people to believe for the past 2000 years that the world will be coming to an end any day now.

 

[krelnik]

Interesting article, thanks for posting the link, Irish. I found interesting this paragraph from right near the end:

By the end of the weekend I realized how quaint was the mere suggestion that Christians of this type should learn to "be rational" or "set aside your religion" about such things as the Iraq War or other policy matters. Once you've made a journey like this -- once you've gone this far -- you are beyond suggestible. It's not merely the informational indoctrination, the constant belittling of homosexuals and atheists and Muslims and pacifists, etc., that's the issue. It's that once you've gotten to this place, you've left behind the mental process that a person would need to form an independent opinion about such things. You make this journey precisely to experience the ecstasy of beating to the same big gristly heart with a roomful of like-minded folks. Once you reach that place with them, you're thinking with muscles, not neurons.

It looks like the book this is an excerpt from might be very interesting. In addition to fundamentalist Christians, he also covers the topic of the "truth movement":

The Great Derangement: A Terrifying True Story of War, Politics, and Religion at the Twilight of the American Empire
By Matt Taibbi

It just came out last week.