It’s nothing new for atheism to have slurs aimed at it; even the accusation of bigotry against popular atheist writers and speakers isn’t really a fresh take. But recently I saw a column in which atheism was called “an idealogical branch” of white supremacy and “the twin brother of... rabid Christian conservatism”. This is indeed a fresh perspective, but one so shockingly wrong that I had trouble comprehending its point.

The Column

(The column’s author, Hamid Dabashi, has authored more than twenty books and is a professor at Columbia University in New York City.)

Dabashi begins by discussing a “new” book — released a couple of a months ago — which is really just a transcript of a 12-year-old conversation between four men (Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris, and Daniel Dennett). After describing the book and the four men in sharply loaded terms, Dabashi calls new atheism “a pseudo-intellectual movement that has heavily contributed to” the rise of “white supremacy”.

He pauses there and offers a caveat — because he knows already that he’s upsetting some people — and clarifies that “atheism as such is a perfectly healthy proposition” and he asserts that there exist “decent and reasonable atheists”. Now that he’s patted our heads and made sure we feel okay, he switches back to the “Four Horsemen” with a vengeance: “the entirety of their work is just a vicious attack on a 1.5-billion-strong, immensely diverse and dynamic community”, Dabashi claims. He adds that “They are, literally, illiterate.”

He doesn’t end there, however. Dabashi goes on to write this paragraph:

“Indeed, ‘new atheism’ is the ideological foregrounding of liberal imperialism whose fanatical secularism extends the racist logic of white supremacy. It purports to be areligious, but it is not. It is, in fact, the twin brother of the rabid Christian conservatism which currently feeds the Trump administration’s destructive policies at home and abroad — minus all the biblical references.”

In case he wasn’t clear, Dabashi says the same thing again with different words: “right-wing conservatives” and “the liberals... are in perfect agreement about their perceived white supremacy, which supposedly gives them the right to wreak havoc across the world... they are the two faces of that same cheap imperialist coin.” Again, to make sure he gets this absurd point across, he rephrases: “Historically, the ‘liberal atheists’ have always eagerly joined their ‘Christian conservative’ brethren in the battle call in advance of any US aggression anywhere in the world.”

Near the end, he acknowledges in a halfhearted way that “deadly fanaticism” and “hateful, toxic ideologies” are the actual problems, and that it is in no way limited to the West or the United States, but he has already made his (incorrect) case that new atheism and Christianity are bedfellows in white supremacy against Muslims, and so his weak acknowledgements and clarifications are worthless.

New Atheism and Islamophobia

Why does Dabashi draw a distinction between a “new atheist” and a regular atheist? The term new atheism was coined by a journalist who thought it was a new idea for atheists to counter, criticize, and expose religion, ignoring that atheists have done this for generations (though they often met with horrid ends for doing so). Dabashi seems to buy that there is some qualitative difference, though really the only difference I can find is the level of outspokenness, the willingness to spout non-theistic opinions on social media or national TV.

Somehow, Dabashi took that difference and equated it to Islamophobia.

To be clear, Islamophobia — just like new atheist — is a loaded and vaguely defined term. As I noted previously, all forms of bigotry exist on a continuum though few acknowledge this. People who accuse others of “Islamophobia” like to use it in the loosest way possible, to include any criticism of or insult against anything associated with Islam. And people who defend themselves against accusations of Islamophobia like to use the word in the tightest, most exclusive way possible in order to excuse themselves of bigotry.

The most astute commentators are careful to (1) clarify the difference between Islam as an ideology and Muslims as people, and (2) further delineate between broader Islam and the specific offshoots that have inspired certain violent acts. Dabashi is correct that some of the “Four Horsemen” haven’t always been circumspect in this regard — especially when composing brisk soundbites or limited-character social media posts. But his response — to lump all outspoken atheists and white supremacists into one ugly group — is in my view just as egregious — if not more so because of the hypocrisy.

Atheism And Theism Are Opposites

To be clear, atheism and Christianity cannot possibly be “two sides of the same coin”. Yes, there are right-wing atheists who team up with right-wing Christians to push their right-wing ideology, whether it’s opposing LGBTQ rights or giving comfy tax breaks to the wealthy. But that is their right-wing-ness that unites them, not their atheism or Christianity. In fact it is very similar to the left-leaning Muslims and left-leaning atheists teaming up to push left-leaning ideology — it’s the leftness that unites them, not their atheism or Islamic beliefs.

As almost anyone can tell you, atheism is, by definition, the opposite of theism. On the scale of religious beliefs, Christianity and Islam are right next to each other, and atheism is at the farthest point on the scale from both of them. (And remember, new atheism is simply regular atheism with the added ingredient of increased vocal criticism of religion.) So it’s absurd and incorrect for Dabashi to somehow bend the religious belief scale into a pretzel so that Christianity and atheism somehow appear next to each other, while Islam is off by itself.

It is further absurd and incorrect in that all four men in question have been blisteringly critical of Christianity as well as other religious belief systems — not only Islam.

Atheism, Religion, And White Supremacy

Notice how Dabashi skipped several steps and equated criticism of Islam with white supremacy. (This is similar to how any criticism of Israel is sometimes equated to anti-semitism.) It helps his argument that the Four Horsemen are each perceived as “white men”, though Dabashi inaccurately says “They are all white older men”; only two are old. (Hitchens has been dead for eight years, and Harris is much younger than the others.) His case is further eroded when one learns that both Harris and Hitchens were born to mothers identified as Jewish. (While it is possible, I suppose, for one to be a white supremacist and Jewish, it is certainly incongruous.)

However, all of this is moot because — to my knowledge — none of the four men have ever expressed sentiments of white supremacy. To be clear, at least a couple are known to have said problematic things. Dawkins regularly says awful things like “church bells [are] so much nicer than the aggressive-sounding ‘Allahu Akhbar’ ”, and Harris took plenty of flak for his ill-advised support of flawed IQ-based racial statements. And so on. These are all reflections of implicit bias, casual bigotry, etc. — but do not pass the smell test for white supremacy, which requires the belief that whites “should be dominant over other races”. None of the Four Horsemen appear to believe or advocate for such a position, yet Dabashi overtly accuses them of it — and in the process rounds up all “liberal atheists” as agreeing with them.

Dabashi also skips the part where Islam isn’t a race (even if races were real). Much like Christianity, Islam is a religion, to which anyone can convert and into which anyone can be born. While it is certainly arguable that much of anti-Islam sentiment in the West has roots in racism — we’ve all heard of the idiot bigots who mistakenly assault Sikhs or other brown-skinned people assumed to be Muslim due to their appearance — that comes from a combination of racism and stupidty — and is irrelevant to whether Islam itself is a race (it isn’t). Anecdotally: the first Muslim I met was an African-American; the first Muslims my wife ever met were white people.

By now, it should be clear that racism and white supremacy are not strictly aligned with particular brands of religion (or lack of religion). So it makes little sense for Dabashi or anyone else to attempt to squeeze white supremacy, Christianity, and atheism into the same Venn diagram circle. They are three different circles, two of them overlapping hardly at all.

New Atheists Tend To Be ATHEIST Supremacists

If anything, the vocal atheists who write books and appear on TV shows tend to be atheist supremacists, if I may coin such a term. They certainly agree that skepticism, secularism, and humanism are loftier, more admirable viewpoints than holding the tenets of any religion. Many of them agree that religion (of any stripe) should quiet down and calmly reside in houses of worship or private homes and keep very well out of the halls of power. It’s a common refrain among today’s more strident atheists that (as Hitchens said) “religion poisons everything”.

But working toward a world in which more people reject unsupported claims and childhood indoctrination is a far cry from either racism or white supremacy, as well as vastly different from the strict enforcements on religion seen in authoritarian regimes.

Conclusion

In brief, Dabashi’s errors are many: (1) conflating criticism of an ideology (Islam) with hate for 1.5 billion people (Muslims), (2) making “new atheism” out to be something substantially different than run-of-the-mill atheism, and (3) pretending that Christianity and atheism are joined at the hip against Islam — just to name the three most egregious.

In the West, especially in the United States, liberal atheism is most concerned with Christianity. It isn’t Islam voting to squelch human rights here; it’s right-wing Christians. And when Islam does rear its head in our communities, it is most often asking to be left alone, or to be allowed the same rights as Christians — as it should be. When atheists read the tenets of Islam and Christianity, the two religions (in general) look far more similar to each other than either does to godlessness or humanism.

Dabashi’s widely read column won’t be the last time a big media outlet gives voice to atheist-bashing, but it was certainly the most ridiculous attempt I’ve read in a while.