Ya know like the people like Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris? The “facts and logic” people who absolutely hated religion and blamed it for everything bad?
What’s a material Marxist analysis of this?
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In writing of any investigation in existential, metaphysical and epistemological questions in the name of science, the New Atheists not only reject religion, but philosophy in general including political philosophy, Marxism and crucially the philosophy of science itself.
For them, there is no need for any of that, because their trivial, superficial and ill defined understanding of “facts and logic” is seen as the end all be all. Similar to those who claim neoliberalism and US hegemony mark “the end of history”, these people claim the end of philosophy. They are right in a way, because if everyone adopted their views, philosophy would indeed be solved, as there would be no reason to discuss any philosophical questions any more. In this way, they are reactionary and seek to strengthen the status quo.
While claiming to be progressive, this idealist ideology of linear historical progress is anti-materialist and anti-dialectical.
That said, there are of course important and valid marxist critics of existing religious institutions, but that wasn’t the question.
Man I was embarrassing caught up in that for a while. Seems like a growing PMC secular element gaining strength against the more conservative Christian element in the country.
Religion is a narrative. People do not create or develop critical thinking with it.
If individuais imagined best possible world/universe(Kant), socialism would become inevitable. Humans organizated on common goals
Simply put, atheism with liberal characteristics, they see the completely shit role religions always had in the capitalist, feudal and slave societies as the hand of the ruling class (and indeed priesthood was often part of it, sometimes even just was it) but as liberals they don’t see the material reasons for it and since they are really idealists they can’t see the the material reason behind it, they just think it fallen from the sky and needs to be exorcised with the same method which naturally won’t work.
However, atheism is intergral and inseparate part of materialism and thus marixsm. Just because some libs claim to be atheists does not mean marxists should abandon it.
