Richard Dawkins once again melts brains with reasonable comments about Islam and being a 'cultural Christian'.

Dawkins said he prefers Christianity to Islam and social media had a meltdown.

Once again, an interview with evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins is inspiring a significant amount of brain melt on social media.

There’s an odd feeling of relief generated by witnessing the man most famous for inspiring global sceptical and atheist movements continue to resist the lunacy of progressive dogma. Especially when so many previously sane people have fallen for it so spectacularly. But I suppose that’s the difference between an actual critical thinker and a poseur.

The interview in question was on LBC. You can watch a clip of the most ‘controversial’ section below:

In the clip, Dawkins reiterates that he is not a believer in the claims of Christianity, and is “pleased” to see a decline in belief in Christianity. He describes himself as a “cultural Christian” however and says he thinks it would be worse if Islam dominated our culture in place of Christianity.

He says he holds this view because he believes Islam to be especially hostile to women and gay rights. He’s also very clear and careful to make the distinction between Islamic ideas and Muslims in general or as a whole.

It’s worth pointing out that despite the celebrations from my fellow culture warriors that Dawkins has finally ‘caught up’ and seen the light—the reality is that Richard Dawkins has been open about his ‘cultural Christian’ identity for a long time. Not to mention his criticism of Islam. This interview does not reveal anything new to those of us familiar with his work.

What is especially telling however is the amount of people now hurling the accusation of “Islamophobe” in Richard Dawkins’s direction, such as Mehdi Hasan.

In doing so, they have invertedly revealed what many of us have often argued: that they simply use the word ‘islamophobia’ to mean ‘blasphemy’ rather than describing genuine bigotry towards Muslims—given there isn’t a single instance of bigotry towards people in Dawkins’s words.

Richard Dawkins was absolutely right to single out Islam for criticism. Those who are honest in their criticism of religion will have noticed that not all religious ideologies are the same—either due to their doctrinal contents, or the way in which they are practiced and understood in the current day. Some religious ideas really are preferable to others.

I think Sam Harris provided the best explanation of this important distinction with the following sports analogy:

Religion is a term like sports: Some sports are peaceful but spectacularly dangerous (“free solo” rock climbing); some are safer but synonymous with violence (mixed martial arts); and some entail little more risk of injury than standing in the shower (bowling). To speak of sports as a generic activity makes it impossible to discuss what athletes actually do or the physical attributes required to do it. What do all sports have in common apart from breathing? Not much. The term religion is hardly more useful.

And this is a truth that appeared to lead to the complete redundancy of organised atheism, especially in America. It was all fun and games patting each other on the back for mocking those crackpot Christian Republicans or sharing Flying Spaghetti Monster memes—but a lot of balls seemed to suddenly fall off when it came to saying anything useful about the bigger threat of global fundamentalist Islam.

American atheism has been utterly infected with dogmatic ‘progressive’ cowardice—exemplified by the fact numerous American atheist organisations condemned and cut ties with Richard Dawkins for asking some mild questions about gender self-ID.

Online drama aside, this whole discussion about the function of our Christian culture in the modern era does raise some interesting, yet potentially uncomfortable questions for me and my fellow secular atheists.

In the past, I had hoped—perhaps naively—that my fellow leftists would fill our cultural ‘god shaped hole’ with a staunch secular liberalism built on enlightenment principles. Instead, what we saw was the emergence of new godless religions.

These new ideologies are dogmatic and hostile to science, free expression and women in ways that could give conservative religion a run for its money. A vindictive, authoritarian, godless culture of cancellation was born.

And as many of us have previously warned until we were blue in the face, this was always going to have the undesired effect of making Christianity seem more appealing to a whole new generation—as well as inspiring older generations to reconnect with their faith in response to what they perceive to be the replacement of their culture and identity with something far worse.

On a personal note, I have just recently, over the space of a few months attended two funerals for close family members. Both of these funeral services were Christian in nature—including the singing of hymns and readings from the bible by the vicar.

And if I’m being honest, there was something comforting about all of us being unified in a familiar tradition to pay tribute to people we loved. It was a very Church of England affair.

Losing people you love is an especially difficult time. The anxiety inducing, guilt ridden question of “what are we supposed to do now?” is made slightly easier by the existence of a shared, familiar tradition we can all recognise and participate in. We all knew the steps to this dance.

It was a great honour to fulfil the role of pallbearer on both occasions. A tradition with roots in Roman/Christian tradition. Of course, Christianity is not necessary to sing songs and carry coffins—but we absolutely wouldn’t be doing these things, in the synchronicity and understanding with which we did them, were it not for the influence of our Christian culture.

Did I think about god or Jesus at any time? Of course not. That’s all nonsense. And the eulogy I read was entirely secular. But was it deeply meaningful and comforting that a room full of people I cared about united in a familiar tradition to pay tribute to people we loved? Of course it was.

This is the kind of thing Dawkins maintains his affection for—dignified tradition. And it’s very difficult to argue that secularism can, at this time, provide an equally uniting alternative, despite the efforts of humanist organisations to do so.

The simple truth is that Christianity had a head start on our culture, and whether you are practicing, non-practicing or a committed anti-theist, the cultural impact of Christianity appears to be here to stay. And whether this is a good or bad thing compared to the alternatives on offer is a perfectly legitimate topic for anyone to grapple with. 

Despite new “woke” ideology achieving little more than creating a massive PR win for conservative Christianity, we should never be complacent enough to forget how things were when Christianity had the run of it however. As the late, great Christopher Hitchens warned us:

“Many religions now come before us with ingratiating smirks and outspread hands, like an unctuous merchant in a bazaar. They offer consolation and solidarity and uplift, competing as they do in a marketplace. But we have a right to remember how barbarically they behaved when they were strong and were making an offer that people could not refuse.”

So, I will continue to push back on the encroachment of Christianity (or any worldview) in the direction of secularism and liberal freedoms. I happen to be someone who doesn't need Christianity for anything, but it would be dishonest to pretend I didn't understand its value to some people, some of the time. And it would also be dishonest to pretend that Christian tradition—if we are going to have a tradition—isn't preferable to Islam or woke lunacy.

But I’d much prefer an alternative to both options of course—so I once again appeal to my fellow secular leftists to reacquaint themselves with staunch liberal, secular enlightenment values, before it’s too late. If it isn’t already.