# Offense/Defense - Secular Organizations **URL:** \ **Category:** Religion and Secularism\ **Created:** [January 10, 2024, 3:31pm UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652 "2024-01-10T15:31:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![vitolear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/e47774/32.png) [@vitolear](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/vitolear)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2024, 12:15pm UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/21 "2024-01-12T12:15:02Z")
> [@citizenschallengev4](#): > > Okay, what message would connect with them? (1) a short list of all the harm religion does (2) a simple timeline of the bible’s creation and outline of its contradictions (belief or works, etc.) (3) Proof that doubters may come out of the closet because they are actually a majority. > [@lausten](#): > > I don’t think pamphlets are going to get much response. There are things on subscription TV. The hotels, hmm, it’s not a fit. Corporations aren’t going to get behind a 10% demographic. Well they get behind gays and trans and whatnot. But now we’re quibbling about tactics. I’m looking for an organization with a Mission. > [@thatoneguy](#): > > Exactly. Coercion is not an option for atheists. Even if they wanted to, they couldn’t do it. Nobody’s talking about coercion! > [@zedenko77](#): > > Do you think if america was mature enough to have an atheist as president , it would make a difference to govts of today in terms of their priorities, decision making and policies? Yes! For starters, I would love to see the day when the Supreme Court does not have 6 Catholics striking 50 years’ precedent on abortion and allowing football coaches to force public school students to pray. ---
**Author:** ![vitolear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/e47774/32.png) [@vitolear](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/vitolear)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2024, 12:30pm UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/22 "2024-01-12T12:30:33Z")
Thanks for the replies everybody. My question is answered: nobody here knows of an Offensive organization. We’ve got good Defensive organizations. CFI features self-congratulatory intellectuals complaining about politicians who pander to religion. FFRF leads courageous uphill litigation before judges appointed by such politicians. SSA will help secular students feel better about themselves when politicians and judges enable religious teachers and coaches. But nobody’s trying to lift the cloud of religion from voters’ minds, so those politicians will not change. ---
**Author:** ![lausten](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.centerforinquiry.org/lausten/32/23705_2.png) [@lausten](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/lausten)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2024, 1:02pm UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/23 "2024-01-12T13:02:27Z")
> [@vitolear](#): > > . But now we’re quibbling about tactics. I’m looking for an organization with a Mission. An organized mission has tactics. I’m trying to understand you. ---
**Author:** ![lausten](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.centerforinquiry.org/lausten/32/23705_2.png) [@lausten](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/lausten)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2024, 1:05pm UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/24 "2024-01-12T13:05:44Z")
> [@vitolear](#): > > But nobody’s trying to lift the cloud of religion from voters’ minds, I’ve been studying this for 15 years. I’ve been to conventions. I don’t understand how you can make this statement. > **[My Bibliography](http://winter60.blogspot.com/2017/03/my-bibliography.html)** > > In case you're wondering where I get my ideas. This is about 25 years of reading.              Christian days The Tao - Lao Tzu Meetin... ---
**Author:** ![vitolear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/e47774/32.png) [@vitolear](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/vitolear)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2024, 5:28pm UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/25 "2024-01-12T17:28:37Z")
> [@lausten](#): > > I’ve been to conventions. I don’t understand LOL what we have here is a failure to communicate. So you go to conventions. What about the people who don’t. That’s whom I worry about. Your bibliography is impressive, to _me_. I have heard of Sam Harris and Richard Carrier and their good work. You have heard of Sam Harris and Richard Carrier and their good work. At least 95% of this forum have heard of Sam Harris and Richard Carrier and their good work. _But 95% of this country’s voters have never heard of Sam Harris and Richard Carrier and their good work._ I was wandering whether somebody was trying to change that. Sounds like not. Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![lausten](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.centerforinquiry.org/lausten/32/23705_2.png) [@lausten](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/lausten)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2024, 8:25pm UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/26 "2024-01-12T20:25:10Z")
> [@vitolear](#): > > Sounds like not. Thanks. There isn’t some other way to be heard other than billboards, legal work, news media, books, public talks, TV commercials, call-in shows, and this list could on. It’s the things that have been done and are being done. They are making a difference. Your critique seems to be that the 6,000 year old patriarchal structure has not yet been taken down. Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![zedenko77](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/779978/32.png) [@zedenko77](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/zedenko77)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2024, 8:28pm UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/27 "2024-01-12T20:28:19Z")
> [@vitolear](#): > > Supreme Court does not have 6 Catholics striking 50 years’ precedent on abortion Not all catholics are anti abortion. “allowing football coaches to force public school students to pray.” If that is whats keeping you up late at night ---
**Author:** ![write4u](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.centerforinquiry.org/write4u/32/23410_2.png) [@write4u](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/write4u)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2024, 8:51pm UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/28 "2024-01-12T20:51:56Z")
> [@vitolear](#): > > Your bibliography is impressive, to _me_. I have heard of Sam Harris and Richard Carrier and their good work. You have heard of Sam Harris and Richard Carrier and their good work. At least 95% of this forum have heard of Sam Harris and Richard Carrier and their good work. _But 95% of this country’s voters have never heard of Sam Harris and Richard Carrier and their good work._ I was wandering whether somebody was trying to change that. Sounds like not. Thanks. CFI does have public discussions on these matters on YouTube. Do a search with **“Center for Inquiry”** and most of CFI sponsored presentations will be visible. Try this entertaining video. [![](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/uploads/centerforinquiry/original/2X/c/cc17d160c07b2e75901e2517341c8af0134d5b27.jpeg "Ricky Gervais and Richard Dawkins in Conversation") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0BC3F0kqtw) and [![](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/uploads/centerforinquiry/original/2X/0/0a57c8d19231acebed10632013e2025589260ef7.jpeg "Stephen Fry and Richard Dawkins in Conversation") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYPZwZud_PA) ---
**Author:** ![vitolear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/e47774/32.png) [@vitolear](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/vitolear)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2024, 1:45pm UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/29 "2024-01-13T13:45:25Z")
LOL some folks are so desperate to post an immediate witty reply that they forget what question they are replying to, Any video including both Gervais and Dawkins will have already been boosted to the top of my YouTube suggestions, because I search for stuff like that. The question was, what about the people who do NOT search for stuff like that? “Things that have been done and are being done” - that is news to me because I have never seen any such billboards or commercials, But it is “being done” - great, I want to support it with money. The question was, what organization is doing it? ---
**Author:** ![lausten](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.centerforinquiry.org/lausten/32/23705_2.png) [@lausten](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/lausten)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2024, 2:28pm UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/30 "2024-01-13T14:28:43Z")
> [@vitolear](#): > > The question was, what organization is doing it? I’ve already answered that. You’re asking how to reach billions of people. Your criteria for success seems to be massive. Good luck in your pursuits. ---
**Author:** ![write4u](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.centerforinquiry.org/write4u/32/23410_2.png) [@write4u](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/write4u)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2024, 5:42pm UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/31 "2024-01-13T17:42:29Z")
> [@vitolear](#): > > Any video including both Gervais and Dawkins will have already been boosted to the top of my YouTube suggestions, because I search for stuff like that. The question was, what about the people who do NOT search for stuff like that? Let them know it is available. That is why I suggested it here… 🧐 ---
**Author:** ![citizenschallengev4](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.centerforinquiry.org/citizenschallengev4/32/28718_2.png) [@citizenschallengev4](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/citizenschallengev4)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2024, 6:15pm UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/32 "2024-01-13T18:15:33Z")
Vitolear, I don’t have any answer or suggestion for your challenge. But, if you want to look at the problem a little deeper, you just might find **[these comments by Prof Lisa Feldman Barrett](https://youtu.be/QfY2QvbhrKo?si=vEvPS0VCZmpdlqF9)** interesting. It doesn’t answer your question either, but it is an interesting examination of the situation. > Seven and a Half Lessons About the Brain | [Prof Lisa Feldman Barrett](https://lisafeldmanbarrett.com) interviewed by [Prof Maryanne Garry](https://profiles.waikato.ac.nz/maryanne.garry) > [The University of Waikato](https://www.youtube.com/@TheUniversityOfWaikato) - Dec 9, 2020 ---
**Author:** ![zedenko77](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/779978/32.png) [@zedenko77](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/zedenko77)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2024, 6:20am UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/33 "2024-01-14T06:20:07Z")
Sam Harris is a psychopathic maniac who advocates for a nuclear first strike policy on muslim countries full quote “What will we do if an Islamist regime, which grows dewy-eyed at the mere mention of paradise, ever acquires long-range nuclear weaponry? If history is any guide, we will not be sure about where the offending warheads are or what their state of readiness is, and so we will be unable to rely on targeted, conventional weapons to destroy them. In such a situation, the only thing likely to ensure our survival may be a nuclear first strike of our own. Needless to say, this would be an unthinkable crime—as it would kill tens of millions of innocent civilians in a single day—but it may be the only course of action available to us, given what Islamists believe. How would such an unconscionable act of self-defense be perceived by the rest of the Muslim world? It would likely be seen as the first incursion of a genocidal crusade. The horrible irony here is that seeing could make it so: this very perception could plunge us into a state of hot war with any Muslim state that had the capacity to pose a nuclear threat of its own. All of this is perfectly insane, of course: I have just described a plausible scenario in which much of the world’s population could be annihilated on account of religious ideas that belong on the same shelf with Batman, the philosopher’s stone, and unicorns.” ---
**Author:** ![lausten](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.centerforinquiry.org/lausten/32/23705_2.png) [@lausten](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/lausten)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2024, 2:19pm UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/34 "2024-01-14T14:19:06Z")
> [@zedenko77](#): > > Needless to say, this would be an unthinkable crime—as it would kill tens of millions of innocent civilians in a single day—but it may be the only course of action available Harris says a lot of things, usually in long speeches like this. I’m still not clear if he is racist or not. I don’t dismiss a person’s entire body of work based on parts of it. As for this, he is not making a case for a first strike, he’s presenting a plausible scenario where the people who have their finger on the button would get us into a nuclear exchange because of reliogious extremism. ---
**Author:** ![zedenko77](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/779978/32.png) [@zedenko77](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/zedenko77)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2024, 9:08pm UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/35 "2024-01-14T21:08:59Z")
> [@lausten](#): > > because of reliogious extremism. No. He is saying all muslims as their faith makes them capable of extremism on par with what nazis claimed about the jews. Thoughts from Norman on this. "Sam Harris prides himself on his exquisite, cool rationality. It is “obvious,” he says, that Muslim society is “powerfully deranged.” It produces a prodigious number of suicide bombers. Even Muslim children are “rigged to explode.” It is thus “obvious” that this “powerfully deranged” culture poses a lethal threat to Western civilization. What is to be done? Israel has found one answer that Harris has embraced: do unto them as was done unto Amalek–i.e., kill every man, woman, and child. It happens that Harris’s coolly rational Nazi precursors faced a comparable dilemma. Jews exerted a “disintegrating effect” on Aryan civilization. For all I know, that’s as true as the postulate that every time a Muslim student steps into my class, I should be on the alert that he might explode. What was to be done? Isn’t it “obvious” that the only solution was to kill all the Jews. Himmler, who was a smart fellow (obviously not as smart as Harris, who is Jewish), famously elocuted that “we had the moral right, we had the duty to our people, to destroy this people which wanted to destroy us.” It’s such a rational argument–how could Harris disagree? But even the children? Yes, said Himmler. Isn’t it obvious that, once we murder their parents, the offspring will eventually want to kill us: “We, as Germans, however deeply we may feel in our hearts, are not entitled to allow a generation of avengers filled with hatred to grow up with whom our children and grandchildren will have to deal because we, too weak and cowardly, left it to them.” Now, isn’t that obvious, isn’t that logical? " > **[Sam Harris: Rational Man](http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/sam-harris-rational-man/)** > > Sam Harris prides himself on his exquisite, cool rationality.  It is “obvious,” he says, that Muslim society is “powerfully deranged.”  It produces a prodigious number of su… ---
**Author:** ![lausten](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.centerforinquiry.org/lausten/32/23705_2.png) [@lausten](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/lausten)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2024, 9:52pm UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/36 "2024-01-14T21:52:31Z")
Character attacking and mixing quotes with comments is usually not my style, but, just to clarify, are we talking about the Finkelstein that said, > it is more socially consequential to be short, fat, bald or ugly than to be Jewish ? > **[I Debated With Norman Finkelstein at King's College. It Was Dire, and Scary.](https://www.meforum.org/campus-watch/22368/i-debated-with-norman-finkelstein-at-king-college)** > > Debating Israel with Norman Finkelstein at King's College, London, was never going to be easy. He is a ferociously anti-Zionist Jew, a tough political street fighter forged in the ranks of American Maoism, and a hugely experienced and skilful debater... ---
**Author:** ![zedenko77](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/779978/32.png) [@zedenko77](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/zedenko77)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2024, 5:57am UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/37 "2024-01-15T05:57:41Z")
> [@lausten](#): > > but, just to clarify, are we talking about the Finkelstein that said, What exactly are “we” clarifying??? john defends Sam Harris’s rationalising the annihilation of a muslim country by highlighting Norman’s thoughts on the laughable claims for the rise of new antisemitism in the UK and the weaponizing of the holocaust Good job John Dub . ---
**Author:** ![lausten](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.centerforinquiry.org/lausten/32/23705_2.png) [@lausten](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/u/lausten)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2024, 12:45pm UTC](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652/38 "2024-01-15T12:45:59Z")
> [@zedenko77](#): > > john defends Sam Harris’s When did I defend Harris? [Previous page](https://forum.centerforinquiry.org/t/offense-defense-secular-organizations/10652.md?page=1)