The Magic of Reality: Dawkins Returns
On the popular website Boing Boing, Cory Doctorow reveals that “Richard Dawkins has a new kids’ book coming out in October 2011 called The Magic of Reality, which explains just how gosh-darned awesome the actual scientifically explained world is, and how wondrous the universe is when considered as a material, non-supernatural phenomenon. And if that wasn’t awesome enough, the book is illustrated by the wonderful Dave McKean”.[1] Dawkins has been highly critical of the way in which children are being used by religious institutions, and has thus also been most vocal about the injustice of subjecting children to religious indoctrination, or should I say education: “Innocent children are being saddled with demonstrable falsehoods . . . It’s time to question the abuse of childhood innocence with superstitious ideas of hellfire and damnation. Isn’t it weird the way we automatically label a tiny child with its parents’ religion?”.[2] In his quest to counter the religious indoctrination of ‘innocent children’, he has now finally taken the initiative by means of writing a book aimed at a younger audience, arguably in the hope that parents would choose his book to enlighten their offspring. And here is Dawkins selling his book on BBC 2’s Newsnight on 13 September 2011.
Ever since his God Delusion hit the bookshops in 2006, the Oxford professor Dawkins has become a public figure all across the world. As a result, many people have now become aware of his apparently controversial work and thinking. For instance, in Turkey his website was banned due to the machinations of the notorious charlatan Adnan Oktar, who employs the pseudonym Harun Yahya to distribute Islamic Creationist propaganda. The organisation behind Oktar has been active for many years, trying to convince the gullible that Darwin was a buffoon and the theory of evolution just a theory, or rather a theory which does not explain the emergence of complex forms of life. But not just in Turkey, Dawkins has also become very “popular” in the U.S., as a figure personifying all that is wrong with non-religious people. Many has consequently taken it upon themselves to tell the professor just how wrong he is via e-mail. And here is Professor Dawkins reading his hate-mail . . . the internet is a great leveller indeed, now just about anybody, or rather anybody living in the affluent part of the world where computers are readily available and internet access equally easy to come by, can get in touch with the most learned of scholars, as long as he or she deems the ability to have a publicly accessible e-mail address a virtue. In this respect, Professor Dawkins is most virtuous indeed and he clearly revels in reading what less educated (and more gullible) mortals feel like telling him. We live in interesting times indeed . . .
(2008)
(2011)
As for the other side of the equation, here is the well-known YouTuber Laci Green reading her favourite, “brutal” Dawkins quote in one of her videos.
(22 April 2008)
Miss Green has since moved on to other pastures, here she is talking about the myth of Adam and Eve in graphic detail.
(12 September 2009)
Here she is, a little bit older and a whole lot wiser, telling the world of her own struggles with God, family, and life as she knows it.
(8 July 2010)
[1] Cory Doctorow, “Richard Dawkins’s science book for kids, illustrated by Dave McKean” boingboing (18 May 2011). http://boingboing.net/2011/05/18/richard-dawkinss-sci.html.
[2] “Dawkins: Religion equals ‘child abuse’ Scientist compares Moses to Hitler, calls New Testament ‘sado-masochistic doctrine’” WorldNetDaily (08 January 2006). http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=34248.
Religion Claims Its Place in Occupy Wall Street
From Boston to New York, many religious faiths are playing a role in the Occupy Wall Street protests (24 Oct. 2011).
Category:
Americana, Anonymous, Christianity, Current Affairs, Democracy, Financial Crisis, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Obama, Political Commentary, Propaganda, Religion, Uncategorized, Wall Street