And didn’t this person just get elected? I remember hearing NPR saying this is the most diverse congress ever with several Buddhists, at least one Muslim and some others.
Dude, its not like Dawkins is showing up at your house and yelling at you to give up God, he just published a book explaining his views on the subject. This is a long way from going door to door trying to shame people into atheism. And while I haven’t read his book, I’ve seen him interviewed on a few shows and he was far from a antagonistic as you seem to be implying. He didn’t characterize people that disagreed with him as idiots (indeed he pointed out that their are many obviously intelligent belivers), he just said that he thinks they’re wrong.
Strange. He’s never come across like that to me. His books are selling fairly well, or so I hear, so maybe it’s not that he comes across as a “gigantic, petulant twat” to believers so much as they don’t like to hear his message. I suppose you know of a better atheist spokesperson?
In my experience, if atheists even so much as identify themselves as such, they’re accused of persecuting theists.
I’d love that, too. Personally, I keep very quiet about my lack of belief.
But then I look down at the money in my pocket. Then I read the words in our Pledge of Allegiance, the pledge that our schoolchildren recite every day. Then I read how atheists are less likely to become president than, well, just about everyone else. Then I notice that just about every politician loudly proclaims his religion, or else he doesn’t get elected.
Theists don’t have to be evangelical to push their beliefs on everyone else. It happens by default.
I think your original assertion is faulty. The “fact” is a couple guys wrote books. The fact that they are best sellers is because people are buying them, not because the authors have gone missionary. That fact that people read about atheism is no more impressive now than it was 100 years ago. Nietzsche didn’t enlighten the ignorant, nor will Dawkins.
Atheists aren’t proselytizing much of anywhere but a very few message boards.
Well, for one thing, it makes me feel like I ought to read one or more of those best sellers so I can have a better answer to questions like these 
, but I don’t know which, if any, is worth my time and money.
My suspicion is that people like these aren’t going to have any huge effect on history, because they’re not really doing anything that hasn’t been done before. Maybe we’re seeing a surge in popularity of books about atheism, but there have been surges in popularity of books on all sorts of hot topics.
And I stand by the answer I gave in Post #36 of this thread: Richard Dawkins’ Brand of Atheism.
No, he’s been representing the 13th District of California since 1973.
Is it sad that I had to look up what “proselytizing” means? 
Wow, these guys must be so special that they can sell millions of copies of their books without any promotion whatsoever. It’s almost as if they are distributing Manna from Heaven. 
I’m not sure the OP does either 
Meh, I don’t think appearing on a talkshow or two to sell books counts as “going missionary” either.
I don’t think Stark ever said he was religious, but he only announced his atheism a couple of months ago.
Right, because ‘going missionary’ is only something the other guys do.
When atheists seek converts it’s only ‘marketing’.
Don’t worry, when I go on the Christian message boards I refer to religious sects as ‘corporate brands’. It garners much the same reaction I got from you.
Behind every atheist lies a closet Spinozist just struggling to come out.
Everyday at work I see art for the covers of religious books, primarily christian and I’m not exaggerating when I say every day. Bibles are just the tip of the iceberg and we made dies for at least 15 different editions just today (stamping dies that are used to put the foil titles etc. on the covers). The last time I walked through a Barnes and Noble I saw an entire bookshelf unit devoted to Sylvia Browne and her combination of crap predictions and crap platitudes about angels and “the other side.”
How is it that a few books on atheism are suddenly a “trend in proselytizing?”
By the way, I thought The God Delusion was well written, insightful and reasonable. I haven’t read the other books yet.
I find it amazing that some people writing books making arguments that no one ever seems to bother addressing can be characterized as “proselytizing.” If anything, these content-free arguments only demonstrate how vacuous the critics of people like Harris and Dawkins are. The reality is that they just don’t like the fact that intelligent people that aren’t religious are actually getting listened to.
Of course, I do make an exception for Christopher Hitchens, who seems to be a babbling mess on this issue and really DOES often fall into the caricature of a bullheaded atheist twat, which is disappointing given that his book about Mother Theresa was pretty powerful. I suspect his book is not going to be much of a success because of it.
Nope, not sure how you got that out of what I said. If a priest were to write down his thoughts on god and theology and then went and then did the talkshow circuit to sell it I wouldn’t count it as proselytizing either.
I mean, do you really think that Dawkins thinks many christians are even going to bother to read his book, nevermind be convinced by it? I don’t think his primary purpose was to gain “converts” in the sense of turning belivers into athiests.
By the way, some of the google ads in this thread are just…wow.
It doesn’t matter if atheists have gone missionary or not. That just means I get more space in heaven 
I saw Hitchens on the Daily Show speaking out against religion just two days ago. Yes, I think these people are seeking converts.
I am proud to free up room for your footstool, sir.
How dare those godless heathens use self-defense, instead of hiding how they feel about the encroachment of religion on their everyday lives!