--- In atheismuk2@..., "Tony Kehoe" <elite@g...> wrote:
> Check out http://the-brights.net/dummy_icons.htm, where they have a
range of
> icons for atheists on display. Then pick your favourite.
> Tony Kehoe
> Elite@g...
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

I tried the icons for atheists website but drew a blank - age not
recognised.

In any case, is this 'pick a symbol' thing really the core of the
argument or a diversion from it? It fascinates me to try to
rationalise whether or not a group of people brought together by a
rejection of the irrational ought to identify themselves with an icon
of any sort. If France, as we are all now aware, secularism in
schools is represented by the absence of symbolic imagery relating to
the religious. Is it the cause of the atheist to rise above the
cognitive weakness for overt display of inner belief or is it for us
to realise that the desire for a symbol is authentic to the nature of
those who are alive in this world, and thus join in?

I am sure there are many apealing symbols, some with wit, some with a
sense of past narrative, some with sheer aesthetic elegance. I think
of the red poppy for the Earl Haig fund and the white for the peace
movement, the candle surrounded by barbed wire for Amnesty
International, the yin-yang symbol of Taoism, the smiley face for the
Glasgow's miles better campaign (and the acid house movement) in the
1980s-90s... and admit that these are imbued with visual value and
memory.

But does a disparate group (are we disparate? How many are left-
handed or the scions of stultifyingly religious families or public
schools? Are we in fact more alike than dissimilar? I do not know -
these are new waters to me) require its symbol?

I ask not because I know an answer - yes and no are equaly
satisfactory to me - but because the question is hanging on an
uncertain lever and I stare at it in wonder, unsure which way it will
tip.

Over to you lot.

Dd