Youtube Nation: May I Have A Moment, Internet Atheists?

There's a common sense rule about religion and the relative magnitude of annoyance of those who attempt to intellectualize it. Specifically, that the vast majority of people who talk about religion from any angle are insufferable twats. I'm no fan of any stripe of fundamentalism and I'm pretty sure that mega-churches will be the first targets of whatever superior alien species comes to dominate this planet. Still, I have no sympathy for proselytizing atheists, either. There's nothing more juvenile than soapboxing into the infinite echo chamber that is the Internet about how you're some kind of ubermensch who will inherit a bright future guided by almighty science and reason. Youtube is full of these people.

It's true that atheism still gets unfairly painted as a dark, wicked cabal of baby-eaters by a significant portion of mainstream blah blah whatever. I don't care. When an idiot challenges you to a debate, the proper thing is to refuse and then go do something worthwhile with your time. There's no need to respond, angrily or otherwise, to fundie missionaries who tell you you're going to Hell or that their particular version of Infinite Santa is going to punish you. Just shrug, walk away and realize that people on the religious extremes have really boring lives. Their music sucks, they can't see the best movies and they have terrible sex, if any at all.

All of this and more is why we as a society really don't need videos from the likes of the Landover Baptist Church. Someone ought to tell creator Chris Harper that fundamentalist Christian organizations like the ones he's trying to parody already unwittingly self-parody every time they do anything. Computer animation circa 1995 and that stupid-ass talking robot program we used to play with in middle school do not effective satire make.

And then there's this guy, Calpurnpiso. If you've ever fantasized about finding an intensely creepy, unbelievably smug Internet atheist with a home that looks like a 1960's date-rape den, he's your guy. With the slow, off-rhythm speaking style of the common vlogger and enough self-satisfaction to trump a room full of A-list actors giving bottles of Fiji water to third-world children, Calpurnpiso is like every Internet atheist's drug-abusing uncle.

Just like I can't stand it when some chasidic anachronism protests pork, I can imagine that the decent quarter of atheists hate it when loud-mouthed idiots speak for them. And Youtube's got digital barrels full of those. The sad irony of atheism is that it is both absurd and impossible to organize it, so there's no way for the better atheists to police the jerks among them.

I know it's too much for me to ask for a platform of civil discourse on the Web, let alone on a site like Youtube. That's not to say there aren't intelligent, reasonable vloggers on both sides of the religious divide, just that they are an unfortunate minority. Until the day we finally decide to make a special, secret Internet that idiots aren't allowed to use, we'll have to deal with a chorus of morons shouting over one another via cheap webcam.