Atheism: Living Life Unfettered by Supernaturalism and Groupthink -- Interview With Sikivu Hutchinson

By Greta Christina, Greta Christina's Blog. Posted June 17, 2009.

GC: Getting away from race for a moment: Can you tell me a little about your own atheism? Were you raised as a non-believer, or did you have religion at one time and then deconvert... and if you deconverted, how did that happen? What effect did it have on your life and your relationship with family and friends at the time, and how has that changed over time?

SH: I was fortunate to have grown up in a very secular household. My parents were highly literate politically conscious writer-teachers and placed a premium on independent thought. That said religion was still a part of my life because it was so integral to much of African American extended family and community. My grandparents were very religious and I frequently went to their Methodist church when I was growing up. I had some vague notion of and belief in the existence of God up until the first year of high school when I was totally galvanized into agnosticism by an utterly brain-dead Catholic School experience which signaled the end of my suspension of disbelief!

GC: There's a common assumption that the black community, and other communities of color in the U.S. such as the Hispanic community, are more deeply religious than white people. Do you think that's true? If so, why do you think that is? And if not, where do you think that assumption comes from?

SH: As I mentioned before religious observance is a powerful influence in communities of color. However, given the enormous political influence of white Christian fundamentalism in the U.S. it would be reductive to say that people of color are "more" religious than whites —- rather, religion, for better or for ill, has in many respects played a formative role in allowing people of color to navigate and survive institutional racism and domestic terrorism. This is the defining difference between white Christian fundamentalist observance and, say, African American spiritualism predicated on a notion of liberation theology that derives from a redemptive view of the moral universe. In this regard African Americans who have broken from these traditions have a more complex "meta-critical" relationship with organized religion than do white atheists who have rejected religion.

GC: On that topic: When people criticize atheism and the newly vocal, "openly critical of religion" atheist movement, one of the tropes that I see a lot is that this openly critical atheism is disrespectful to marginalized communities like the black community. The argument goes that because religion is so deeply interwoven into black history and black culture, and because the comfort of religion is so important to a community that's had such a hard time of it, criticizing religion is disrespectful and racist. As a black atheist, what are your thoughts on that?

SH: Clearly criticizing religion is not racist. One of the charges of atheistic discourse is foregrounding how there is nothing intrinsically superior about religious observance -- its value for African Americans as a people derives from a specific cultural and historical context of institutional racism and oppression. The supposed basic moral precepts of Judeo- Christian theology -- love for one’s neighbor, tolerance, doing unto others, non-judgment, etc. -- are certainly not exclusive to religious doctrine, while the hierarchies, persecution and intolerance based on race, gender, sexuality and ideology that religious doctrine breeds effectively negate the moral preeminence that organized religion presumes. These contradictions open up a path for critical engagement by atheists of color with why organized religion has been so toxic vis-a-vis validating the rich diversity of communities of color. African American intellectuals and thinkers (see for example Frederick Douglass' critique of "slaveholding" Christianity) have always challenged the role religious orthodoxy plays in African American communities. This historical complexity has just never been "officially" recognized by white scholars.

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