The concept of evolution is widely considered to be a foundational
building block in atheist thought. Leaders of the New Atheist movement
have taken Darwin's work and used it to diminish the authority of
religious institutions and belief systems. But they have also embraced
it as a metaphor for the gradual replacement of religious faith with
secular reason. They have posed as harbingers of human progress,
claiming the moral high ground, and rejecting with intolerance any
message that challenges the hegemony of science and reason. Religion,
according to the New Atheists, should be relegated to the Dark Ages of
superstition and senseless violence.
Yet Darwin did not see
evolution as a linear progression to an improved state of being. The
more antagonistic members of the New Atheist movement who embrace this
idea are not only employing bad history, but also the kind of rigid,
black-and-white thinking they excoriate in their religious opponents.
Indeed, Stephen LeDrew argues, militant atheists have more in common
with religious fundamentalists than they would care to admit, advancing
what LeDrew calls
secular fundamentalism. In reaction to
fundamentalist Christianity and Islamism, this strain of atheism has
become an offshoot of the religion it tries so hard to malign.
The Evolution of Atheism
outlines the essential political tension at the heart of the atheist
movement. The New Atheism, LeDrew shows, is part of a tradition of
atheist thought and activism that promotes individualism and scientific
authority, which puts it at odds with atheist groups that are motivated
by humanistic ethics and social justice. LeDrew draws on public
relations campaigns, publications, podcasts, and in-depth interviews to
explore the belief systems, internal logics, and self-contradictions of
the people who consider themselves to be atheists. He argues that
evolving understandings of what atheism means, and how it should be put
into action, are threatening to irrevocably fragment the movement.
