Episode 12: The New Atheists, Celebrity Crusaders For Empire

Citations Needed

News, Society & Culture

4.8 • 4.1K Ratings

🗓️ 11 October 2017

⏱️ 74 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Since the mid-2000's, a specific breed of liberalism has emerged broadly called "New Atheism". While the movement is hardly a monolith, it has at its core features of liberal chauvinism, anti-"political correctness", "science", secularism, and a general deference to U.S. foreign policy consensus. It's biggest champions, Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, Maajid Nawaz, Bill Maher and the late Christopher Hitchens were and are major features in mainstream discourse–from television shows on HBO to major podcasts to writings featured everywhere from The New York Times to The Guardian to The Daily Beast.

For years, however, leftists of all stripes--anti-imperialists, socialists, progressives--have expressed concern over this brand of liberal chauvinism, its outsized place in the media and its ability to turn the U.S., and white Americans in particular, into The Real Victims; its ability to offend the religious while championing boilerplate National Security consensus and imperial wars abroad. It seemed vaguely provocative but who was it really offending? And, more importantly, who was it serving? We discuss with guest Luke Savage.

Transcript

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0:45.3	So we are talking about something which is going to blow up our minges.
0:49.7	Anyone who's ever crossed the Great Sam Harrison Richard Dawkins.
0:52.8	It's true.
0:53.8	But if you ever criticize a lot of the New Atheist you get a bunch of guys in your mentions
0:59.8	with the name like Fallacy Seeker 37 and Truth Hunter and their Christopher Hitchens
1:05.5	are in their AVI.
1:06.5	There's a sort of militant cohort of New Atheist who dovetail with a kind of, which will
1:13.0	get into a kind of liberal showbizm.
1:14.7	Yeah, no, absolutely.
	...

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