Proofs, Disproofs, Labels and Semantics

[Jim__]

5. A couple of thoughts.

The second focus-- which has much fuzzier edges, as far as I can see-- is the issue of identity itself, and the extent to which it requires shared acceptance of labels, terms, etc.

When you say shared acceptance of labels, do you mean that we should accept the label that someone applies to herself? I would agree with that. Or, do you mean that we should all come to an agreement about what the various terms mean? That may be doable across a single thread - although I doubt even that will work; but, I strongly doubt that everyone will agree on a specific meaning of these terms in general; and I especially doubt that people will agree to accept the the usage of these terms in an outside article - which is often the cause of disputes.

So how do we achieve freedom from theoarchy?

There is the long, incremental, imperfect and challenging civil rights fight, changing laws, addressing assumptions, institutionalizing equity and negatively sanctioning discrimination. This is an agonizingly slow process and it seems never-ending. The benefits come slowly and incompletely in any given generation and only a future historian can assess success in any meaningful way.

There is also the dramatic, wholesale, and possibly even more challenging fight to annihilate belief itself, or at least to marginalize it and thus eliminate theoarchy via discreditation. I'm not actually opposed to this, because as far as I'm concerned, believers have it coming to some extent, and also if belief CAN be annihilated that way, it will prove me wrong and I'll convert.

But I think that second one is problematic, to say the least.

(Another aside, here: I do NOT, repeat NOT, believe that atheists who want to annihilate belief also want to discriminate against, damage, kill, etc., believers. It happens sometimes, when a sociopathic tyrant uses the cloak of atheism to eliminate potential opposition --see Stalin, Pol Pot, etc.-- but not even as often as when a sociopathic tyrant chooses the cloak of religion to do the same thing. I think most atheists who want to annihilate belief sincerely feel that to do so will increase the well-being, enlightenment, and humane status of our species.)

You want to end theoarchy, and you accept people trying to annihilate belief. Do you think that people trying to annihilate belief plays into the hands of religious people who want to demonize atheism? I do. I believe the best way to overturn a power-structure (somewhat of my understanding of your term theoarchy) is to win over reasonable and tolerant people within the structure. Trying to annihilate the beliefs of such people seems counter-productive to me.