A Delicate Balance

I have been helping a friend of mine from Bahrain edit an essay about Humanism. I am loving the essay. It continues to astonish me how people from all over the world manage to reach the same conclusions about life. Anyway, he said I could share some of it with you and the bit I want to share has to do with balancing the competing aspects of the Humanist philosophy. As I agree whole-heartedly I am sharing it here.

He quotes Barry Seidman who is a writer, producer and Humanist who wrote in an essay titled Imagine All the People the following statement.

If we cling to atheism as the basis for our behavior in society, then we may become what I call, "atheist avengers," putting our energies in debunking God while leaving social justice issues behind. If we only focus on science and skepticism we risk the twin evils of elitism and arrogance, finding more strength in attacking religionists or debunking the masses, than in making the world a better place to live. And if we focus only on social justice issues and ignore the problems of supernaturalism and the tool of science, we can find ourselves trapped in the labyrinth of postmodernism, and wind up building our societies on the fallacy that humans have free will. - Barry Seidman

My friend, A.R.M. of Bahrain, sums up the various aspects of Humanism thusly “So humanistic thoughts mostly concentrate on living a peaceful life, doing good, research, critical thinking, social justice, making the world better place to live, free will, and democracy.” Now that’s what I call balance.