Hemant Mehta, the radical atheist activist who once helped orchestrate a smear campaign against an orphanage, is at it again. This time he is attacking a high school student. But it’s actually quite delicious, as he does so in a way that exposes the flabby nature of his atheistic epistemology:
Over the past 24 hours, more details have emerged about the video featuring a Catholic school kid grinning at a Native American elder in a way that seemed both disrespectful and cruel……He says he smiled “at one point” like it was a brief moment. The grin stayed on his face for much longer than that, and anyone who’s been on the receiving end of a look like that knows exactly what it signals. (I’ve also never seen people pray for peace with that look on their faces.)
Whoa! What happened to the atheist’s supposed adherence to the need for evidence? I guess all that chest-thumping and posturing about “evidence” ultimately was nothing more than “anyone who’s been on the receiving end of a look like that knows exactly what it signals.”
As we can see, to the atheist actvist, evidence is a feeling. It’s this thing “you know in your bones” because it feels that way. And you know “exactly” what it signals.
Hat tip to Mehta for providing a nice, concrete example of how atheists approach evidence in the post-Christian, post-modern world – evidence is nothing more than a personal, subjective perception. It’s a moment I will bring up again the next time some atheist tries to sell us on the notion that they highly value evidence.
Shadow To Light 
Mehta doesn’t explain what the proper etiquette is when a Native American walks into your personal space banging a drum and stays there for an extended period. Maybe this is because he’s buying the narrative that “they all surrounded the Native American,” whereas if you simply rely on your own lying eyes and watch all the available coverage, you can see that the man in question deliberately marched into the middle of the crowd banging his drum. It would also be nice if Mehta could link to an excerpt from any of the available video in which any of the kids say anything about building a wall, rather than repeat, without evidence, the assertion that they were chanting about it.
I’m starting to see both New Atheism and SJWism as outworkings of an underlying (perhaps subconscious) assertion: “There is no God, because I am God”. If we believe our own subjective feelings and desires can construct reality, then what are we in our own eyes if not gods? There’s no room for an external, transcendent creator and teacher in that worldview.
I just see them (New Atheists and SJWs) as two sides of the same coin. The former believes in its own intellectual superiority and bases its morals off that, while the latter believes in its own moral superiority and bases its thinking off that. That’s why Atheism Plus is absolutely hideous to behold, as it is a never ending feedback loop into their own enlightenment.
Fortunately, since both groups are built on a foundation of hatred, Atheism Plus can do nothing but destroy itself.
There’s a Twitter thread here presenting a very different viewpoint to Hemant Mehta’s, and much more video’d context:
http://www.mobile.twitter.com/PolishPatriotTM/status/1086955744556171266
Replies include the claim the kids chanted “Build the wall” (etc), and a challenge to the claimant to produce video evidence for the claim — which so far remains evidence unprovided by the claimant, claim unsupported.
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Overviewing the incident, I see that Nathan Phillips has managed, accidentally or deliberately, to divert attention away from ‘The World’s Largest Pro-Life Event’, the March for Life, attended by (one figure says) 650,000 marchers and itself drawing attention to many thousands of unborn children killed each and every year; Phillips has diverted attention away from a major issue and made out It’s all about ME, NATHAN PHILLIPS!’ and MY “dignity.”
That’s brilliant self-publicity, and I guess in turn promoted the smaller Indigenous People’s March from being as overshadowed as it almost certainly would have been by the bigger March for Life, promoted from the shadows into the limelight. Wow, plainly Phillips is a veteran at publicity-seeking.
And, of course, Mehta (and the usual suspects also — PZ Myers’ post adds a dose of reverse social snobbery) has pitched in to likewise divert attention from the far bigger issue of the slaughter of the unborn, and to take an additional snide pot-shot at those Catholic kids Phillips targeted.
This video shows just how long Nathan Phillips was banging his drum close to the ear of the schoolboy he selected as his target:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8kxeFb84iw
The boy’s fortitude under provocation and duress is exemplary.
Of course, in the first Friendly Atheist post Hemant Mehta gleefully quoted and ‘owned’ a Tweet wildly spinning the boy as bothering Phillips:
Ah, serious journalism, then. It’s preceded by:
Er, no, the March for Life had finished and the kids were waiting at their rendezvous point for their bus back: there was no collision of two Marches. Although the route to the Lincoln Memorial — apparently that was the Indigenous Peoples March’s proclaimed destination — was clear and unobstructed, Phillips and his lead group accompanied by many filming cameras headed straight into the centre of the group of children and selected one to stare-down and bang his drum right close to the boy’s face. I understand Americans have a different sense of personal space, but observe that you wouldn’t get that close to a British person without a strong reaction, it’s outrageous behaviour.
And of course the aim of outrageous behaviour is to cause outrage. But the schoolboy was dignified.
Nonetheless, beyond the Tweet Mehta paints the schoolboy as disrespectful.
Was Phillips a volunteer — or drafted? Serving honourably according to the Geneva Convention and common humanity — or a participant in those My Lai type atrocities which I understand were commonplace at the time? Some Vietnam veterans were called “baby killer” or spat on when they got back, so bad was their general reputation. [ ** ] It suits Mehta to paint Phillips in glowing terms, but that’s what it suits Mehta to do. The reality might well be as Mehta paints it, but it also might be otherwise. And does it even make sense to claim that a schoolboy wearing a MAGA hat thinks he’s serving his country, why ever would anyone claim that of a schoolboy, surely that’s a mere fantasy of Mehta’s.
( ** See: https://newsmaven.io/indiancountrytoday/news/outrage-as-non-native-youth-wearing-maga-hats-taunt-and-disrespect-native-elder-jy7UVwdg8kK2uvT0L-JOig/ )
Well, some things go together, though certainly not always. Let’s turn that quote around and talk of the hypocrisy of a movement that is fighting for LGBTQ rights, would like to tackle income inequality, does oppose Donald Trump‘s border wall, but doesn’t give two shits about the mass slaughter of the unborn.
Let’s finish by slightly amending that bottom line of Mehta’s accordingly:
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Looking at Phillips’ own account in Indian Country Today, there’s his allegation that he was bombarded — bombarded, no less — (er, with what?) by the boys:
The videos don’t show any “bombardment”, not that I can see from videos at various angles; and it’s plain that Phillips made his way deliberately into a situation of his own contriving rather than trying to “get out of the situation.” Lies, damn lies, and media manipulation?
There’s an open question as to whether Phillips is a Vietnam Veteran at all. The news media is parroting the claim without fact-checking, of course, because it suits their narrative. If you pay closer attention to what Phillips has actually said in recent days, I think you’ll find he uses the phrase “Vietnam-era Veteran”, meaning that he claims to have been in the military at the time, but not necessarily deployed in Vietnam. Given Phillips’ age and the timing of the war’s end, it’s quite likely he hadn’t turned 18 at the time the troops were withdrawn, so never served in Vietnam.
I’m not going to claim that this is proof of anything: I’m just reminding everyone to stay vigilant in this flood of propaganda. Accept no assertions without evidence, not even if the news is reporting it. Especially if the news is reporting it.
From here:
Michael > …Yvonne Carlock said Wednesday. He did not deploy and left the service as a private after disciplinary issues.
“Disciplinary issues” sounds causal, albeit presumably something short of a dishonourable discharge. In the Don Shipley video (2 minutes) on this website Shipley sucks in his breath after telling listeners Nathan Phillips was “discharged as a Private”, something which is presumably surprising and significant in the US military, certainly Shipley is very dismissive. And that Phillips had gone AWOL several times.
Contrast with Hemant Mehta’s confident assertion that Phillips was “a Vietnam veteran who served this country proudly.” Yeah, yeah.
https://www.westernjournal.com/ex-seal-phillips-refrig-mechanic/
“He did not deploy”, “AWOL”: with apologies to Gilbert and Sullivan fans, it looks like Phillips did nothing in particular, nor did it very, very well.