Hell hath no fury like an atheist scorned

There is, it seems, a guaranteed way to get reaction to a column. At this writing, there are 94 comments on the Daily News website in response to my column Name Callers Are Just Stupid (which I also published on this blog). Many of them, of course, are calling me names for questioning the confrontational tactics of American university professor “PZ” Myers, who regularly indulges in inflammatory name-calling to insult theists.

Thereby confirming the mindset of many of Meyers’ supporters.

Several dismiss my comments because I didn’t show up at Meyers’ public lecture in Kamloops last week, totally (and probably purposely) missing the point of the column, which is that it’s not necessary to be mean-spirited and intolerant in order to argue your side of an issue. Most of the column, which you can read below, is actually based on his blog, not on his nasty comments during his presentation.

The reaction does show that I can be a little too subtle at times, for a couple of commenters did an “aha” to my sentence, “I’m tempted to call such comments inconsiderate, bigoted, narrow-minded, arrogant, idiotic and stupid, but I shall not.” WELL ISN’T THAT EXACTLY WHAT YOU JUST DID? they demanded.

Well, duh. I’m pretty sure even Prof. Meyers got that one.

Myers’ own blog featured a response of sorts today titled Reactions from Kamloops, complete with a bit of name-calling. Of course.

I’m not sure why atheists become so over-wrought when somebody disagrees with them, but since name calling is a call for attention, maybe they’re worried about being ignored. But then, as I say (being an agnostic), I’m just not sure.

I do know that if many of the comments today are representative of those who support Prof. Meyers, the professor should probably be worried.