Your rants just get better and better, don't they Mr Nicholls.

>>...you are probably a know-it-all smartarse in real life, and definitely an ineffectual blowhard on the internet... I would be exceedingly embarrassed if I were you but possibly your relentless bitterness blinds you to that... Deep down this insecurity is what keeps you fearful about appearing on the AFA Forums<<

My shrink was highly impressed with your claim to be able to remotely diagnose my "issues" (as he calls them), and entirely unsurprised at the tears in my eyes when I showed him your latest salvo.

"Stop laughing" he said, "I think he may be serious".

Not at all, I told him. It's just the knee-jerk reaction of someone having their foibles exposed to a chuckling audience. I suspect that in his embarrassment, he simply grabs the nearest Roget, and off he goes.

"Well, please be gentle with him" he continued, "He is obviously deeply hurt. But what's that about the AFA Forums? What point is he making there?"

It's just part of his game, I explained. On his own forum, he not only knows exactly who you are and where you live, but more importantly he can exert complete control over what gets published. And, from the look of it, that's precisely what he does. There isn't a skerrick of criticism, on any of the threads, either of him or his organization. I expect he will tell us that this is because everybody thinks that both he and the Association are perfect. Anyone who says anything different must be a smartarse and a blowhard, who by definition hasn't earned the right to share their opinions with genuinely intelligent folk.

"I can buy that" says my shrink. "That fits the profile neatly. But please..."

It's ok, I reassure him. I'll be kind.

Poirot,

Tut…tut! Your namesake would be horrified. ;)

Why do you always get the wrong end of the stick? If your case is that weak that you lose control of rationality, then you should keep quiet.

All people gossip. There are a few people in all demographics who consider their ego as an important first and whatever cause they may be fighting, that second. This makes them prime targets to be gossiped about. That is natural. That gossip often reaches me.

I have been an atheist for 50 years, in the AFA for 30, on the Committee for many of those years and the president for 8 and I know an extraordinarily huge number of atheists. It would be odd, considering all of this, if lots of gossip didn’t reach me.

Gossip is a healthy part of humanity and it means and infers nothing but I learn heaps from it.

Pericles,

It is wonderful news that you are getting ongoing psychological help. God knows, you need it. We know what you are going through with the paranoia about me controlling what goes up on the AFA forums. In actual fact, I have no control over that. Have you heard of delegating responsibility?

The AFA is a very big organisation and I couldn’t possibly control every little bit of it even if I wanted to. The AFA Committee would throw me out if I tried by the way. We are a democratic organisation.

David

David,

Gossip is one thing, but to rub your hands with glee in the knowledge that you "...know lots of humans willing to betray confidences..." is hardly an honourable virtue.

However I'll say one thing. You appear to have one of the healthiest (biggest) egos I think I've come across. I'm still somewhat puzzled, however, as to why you sprinkled the "euphoric" rhetoric so liberally through your article. It's so laden with religious-style jargon that it would pass handsomely as a satire.

Bonne nuit

David,
I found your article interesting and your subsequent debate of a high standard.

If debates were judged on the same standards as boxing matches.
The referee should have stepped in and stopped the match by now.
Since your opponents are clearly showing severe symptoms of delirium.

And if their handlers had any real concern for their chargers welfare both Pericles and Poirots corners would have thrown in the white towels by now and be ushering them off to the nearest CAT scan.

KarlX,

That's rich! You wouldn't be one of Nichols's toadies would you?

I can't be bothered debating the silly bugger, besides he wisely chooses to ignore me.
I've debated him before on substantial issues of critique, for which he had no answers and I have a mental picture of him clenching his whitened fists and shaking his locks furiously.
All he's done here is what he always does: self-promotion and supercilious ridicule.
In the unlikely event that he or other New Atheists provide a manifesto, reflect politically or have anything noteworthy to say, I'll engage with them, and positiviely.
But unless such a blue moon occurs, Nichols is on my list of dimwits not worth talking to.

I beg to differ, KarlX.
I think Poirot and Pericles have more than substantiated their arguments, and I don't believe the essential criticism (by Poirot and myself, at least), that the language used in this article would be far more appropriate for a revivalist meeting than a 'rational' review, has been addressed at all.
After all the jokes about 'Apatheism' and 'Pugnatheism', the essential question remains:
Is Atheism (disbelief in a God or Gods), non-religious or anti-religious?
The 'New Atheists' are quite clearly the latter.
As a 'de facto' Atheist (Apatheist, A-theist, whatever), I consider the question of God to be unprovable and irrelevant to the human condition.
Yes, individuals and groups espousing one religion or another have done enormous harm over the centuries, and in certain instances, continue to do so.
However, individuals and groups espousing Atheism have also done their share, and more than a few individuals in history with no apparent interest in religion one way or the other have done just as much harm.
To blame religion for all or even some of the world's ills is just plain silly.
Genuine rat bags will use any excuse to do what they want.
If you really want an enemy to hate, I would suggest the inadequacy of language, and the dexterity of lawyers and clerics. Look at all the straight forward rules and statements just in the Christian faith that are completely ignored:
Thou shalt not kill -there's an end to war, capital punishment and murder.
It would be harder for a rich man to enter the Gates of Heaven... The world is chocka block with rich christians, starting with the Pope.
Vengeance is mine... (But GW Bush is God's instrument...)
Love your enemies...
Do unto others...
Turn the other cheek...
Is religion the problem, or is it people just claiming to be something, while doing exactly as they please?