RIP Hitchens

Being revealed as an Atheist in Texas at age 9 during recess wasn’t easy. It was actually shocking to me to discover that I was the only one and alarming to me to see the reactions of my classmates: sheer disbelief – for a change (zing!). In middle school, a few classmates tried to bully me about it by calling me a Satan worshipper. In high school, many friends tried to help me “see the light” by giving me books and lectures. This was also when a few of my classmates, generally the oddballs, would approach me and whisper, “me too.” By the time I went to college in Austin, everyone was an Atheist. Nowadays, my friends are all over the board, but we don’t talk about religion very often. It’s mostly a non-issue. Being in the public sector, however, is a whole different story. Christopher Hitchens embraced public Atheism and went head-to-head with some fierce believers, armed with facts and wit.

I was never really a huge fan of Hitchens as a writer, but for his efforts in educating the world about the dark side of religion and about what it means to not believe, I must pay tribute. Rest in peace, Hitchens.

“Religion comes from the period of human prehistory where nobody—not even the mighty Democritus who concluded that all matter was made from atoms—had the smallest idea what was going on. It comes from the bawling and fearful infancy of our species, and is a babyish attempt to meet our inescapable demand for knowledge (as well as for comfort, reassurance, and other infantile needs). Today the least educated of my children knows much more about the natural order than any of the founders of religion.”