Atheist
Foundation of Australia
Web:
http://www.atheistfoundation.org.au/
The
Atheist Foundation of Australia is an organization promoting the worldview that
“there is no credible scientific or factually reliable evidence for the
existence of a god, gods or the supernatural”. While personally I have never
had a problem with such a definition of Atheism I have always worried about
putting things in the negative – perhaps it could be said that Atheism works
from the premise that “nothing should be accepted without being proved by the
scientific method”.
Atheism
is becoming a major issue today as we see the inroads that religion and
superstition is once again making into our lives. While the Sixties and to a
lesser extent Seventies was a period when many of us hoped the shackles of
superstition would fall away, alas, we hoped too soon and it seemed that as the
years went on our culture has become more and more irrational. Not only was
there a resurgence in Christian belief (especially in emotionally fringe sects
as the Pentecostals), but a cultural acceptance of all manner of “weirdness”
from alternative medicine to the new age.
Of
course with the advent of violent fundamentalism the far right and religious
conservatives had the ultimate weapon and using the fear of terrorism the
conservative revolution of John Howard and George Bush took control and put
religion back on the map.
Too
often it we see the media talking about the danger of “fundamentalists” and
“terrorists” without realizing that any superstitious or irrational belief is
only a breath away from violence. As soon as we jettison reason, anything is
possible. Have a nice quite talk to any supposedly non violent conservative
about Abortion or gay marriage and you will quickly find out what I mean ! All
the talk about protecting babies and stopping the decay of marriage seems to
simply underlie a violence personal demand the world accept their values – or
else.
It
is too easy to be tolerant, for example, of alternative medicine—what can
seemingly be wrong with an alternative cancer cure ? That is until we realize
the terrible cost in human suffering as the weak and the infirm are exploited
by either the money hungry or the self deceived, depending on how charitable
you wish to be about their motives.
As
someone with a health background, I am shocked by the horror stories I hear
about supposed treatments sold an exorbitant prices to those in the most vulnerable of situations.
For
me Atheism is not a choice but an ethical imperative.
At
last with the work of Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and others the debate is
squarely back on the map and the Australian Atheist Foundation is working to
both promote Atheism and to fight against infringements of our freedom by those
of religious (and spiritual) persuasions of all sorts. We need to move base to
an rational and evidence based approach to government policy and to promote a
truly scientific worldview in schools and I am pleased to see the Atheist
Foundation of Australia standing up and saying what needs to be said.
The
Australian Atheist is published bi-monthly and includes excellent articles,
news, columns such as Heretical Happenings and reviews; it is not all heavily
going and has a good sense of humour with some fun articles and cartoons as
well.
Their
website offers a free associate membership with a pdf of an issue of The
Australian Atheist; it is well worth a look as it also includes lots of
articles, links, background information and other pertinent material.
I
am very pleased to have found the Atheist Foundation of Australia and
commend it to you as an organisation that deserves our support.