Is Humanism Failing to Meet the Moment?

There is no doubt that darkness has descended upon the United States. Donald Trump – who uses lies and hatred to gather unto him the dissatisfied and alienated in our country, and who weaponizes these grievances to attack liberal thought, objective facts, and reason – now reigns supreme. It would be no exaggeration to state a dictatorship is being built upon the corpse of our democracy. For many of us in the movement, it can feel like humanism has been shoved into the dirt and is suffocating in the muck.

Where do we go from here? Why have we failed to “enlighten” or “reason with” our fellow Americans? Is the issue that we’re not meeting people where they are (or even halfway)? To locate the answers to these existential questions, I believe we have to better understand the foundations and power of humanism itself.

What Is Humanism?

Humanism is a philosophical stance that emphasizes human potential, agency, and the importance of human values and dignity – advocating for reason, ethics, and a focus on the natural world, while questioning directives supposedly provided by supernatural entities. In many ways humanism is a personal discipline, much in the same way others silently recite prayers on the rosary or sit in meditative silence. It doesn’t necessarily describe the world, or even how we would want the world to be, but how we should be, act and behave, despite the world around us.

Humanist Blinders

Humanists often think that we should be able to reason people out of false notions, but that is not often how people think. Humans do not navigate the world with reason and fact, but with story and lore. Humanists tend to point out flawed reasoning or incorrect facts in attempts to change minds, but this merely upsets most. Someone on social media posts that a neighborhood is dangerous and to be avoided. The admonition might contain a lurid story. As humanists, we believe in reason and fact, but showing statistics indicating the locale is safe rarely convinces. People won’t remember the statistics; they will remember the story.

If you wish to persuade people, it is an appeal to emotions through storytelling that works, not statistics. Salespeople understand that; they do not sell a product, but the experience or emotional feeling they seek: love, security, prestige, respect, or power. We saw that in the last presidential election where outright lies defeated facts at every turn. For example, one can repeatedly point out that immigrants are statistically more law-abiding than their U.S.-born counterparts, but that cold fact was overwhelmed by the image of them devouring beloved pets in Springfield, OH.

There are innumerable examples of how stories overwhelm facts: nurse Edith Cavell was shot by German forces during World War I for admittedly helping British and French soldiers escape German-occupied Belgium. Her execution (which was legal under German law) was used by British propaganda experts to create, in both text and imagery, a legend of an innocent woman cravenly murdered and debased by inhuman German barbarity. The Germans technically had both facts and law on their side. The British instead exploited human passions stirred by (mostly inaccurate) images and narrations, and Edith’s death became a powerful rallying point to inspire Tommies and inflame U.S opinion against Germans—even their German-American neighbors.

Stories—not facts—are the way to convince. Think of how scammers work: there is some emergency that calls for an action now. It’s often linked to a loved one, like a relative supposedly in trouble overseas, or a soulmate in a far-off land. Emotions overwhelm reasoning, and stories convince better than cold facts. If you have facts on your side, weave them into a story, or find one that expresses them.

The Alliance Of The Alienated

The coalition of the American right has evolved from one guided by conservative philosophy into an amalgam of odd factions—anti-vaxxers, conspiracy theorists, racists, libertarians, cultic Trump followers, and Millenarianist Christians. What do these groups have in common? I’d argue three things: rejection of expertise (and along with it science and authority); a belief that reality is deliberately hidden from others (the “sheeple”) but revealed to them; and a belief in mystical or unseen forces (George Soros, the Deep State, Satanists, etc.). Some of their concepts reach people with understandable concerns about health, the lack of control over their lives, feelings that their rights are being taken away, and people who fear – rightly or wrongly – religious persecution.

Arguing Isn’t Going To Work

Think of how the right has used particular slogans and phrases to herd large segments of the population towards a position where they lack any ability to see alternatives.

Among the first actions of this new movement was to spread the slogan, “I don’t believe the mainstream media.” This cut off conservatives from more reliable information sources, making them more dependent upon conservative media outlets that convey fear and conspiracy theories.

Another move was to reduce all arguments to “either/or.” Either you’re for the 2nd Amendment or for gun confiscation. You’re either for the free market or a Socialist. There are no grays or blended solutions. There is only good or evil; you have to take sides.

Third, they’ve conflated everything to the left of them with Communism. There is no distinction made between Liberals, Progressives, Democratic Socialists, Socialists, Communists, or Marxist Leninists. Everything is just Communism, and every story of Communism ends badly.

Many conservative voters, therefore, lack any real psychological freedom to consider or select alternatives. In their worldview, they can only vote for Trump. They can’t accept evidence against everyday propaganda because they have been alienated from reliable information sources and emotionally bound to the right’s narrative. To them, the other party is composed of Communists duping their followers. A liberal victory would lead to destruction and death; voting Democrat is simply not imaginable.

These people are no more free than the average North Korean pummeled daily with patriotic chants and fearful messages about the outside world. You can’t fight this with facts and statistics. There first has to be a new story, with a new possible ending.

Finding Allies In The Faithful

Humanism has of late been conflated with atheism, but we humanists need to be more tolerant of religion and its social value. Religion has been a powerful force since before civilization itself. For myself, the evidence of God’s nonexistence is conclusive. Cosmological and evolutionary theories sufficiently explain the universe and our existence for me without His presence. He is, in my opinion, an unnecessary theory, unless you define Him as the universe itself.

But while the arguments against God may be conclusive to me, they are not necessarily convincing to others – and they will never be so. God is a necessary idea for many people: He provides the hope of ultimate justice in an unjust world. His promise makes tolerable mortal suffering and evil. He is the explanation for existence itself.

Whether people profess or deny God’s existence, however, tells us almost nothing. The real issue is: what then? Shall they become convinced their visions are the sole way to live, and then compel others to do so, as the Islamic State did? Shall they use their creeds as bludgeons against those who disagree, or as shields to defend otherwise indefensible acts, like the Klan does? Or does the believer proceed, as Saint Francis suggested, to be an instrument of peace and to sow love? Does the believer gauge their actions based on visible human need rather than scripture? If so, they are humanists.

This critique is equal for the disbeliever: does the atheist go forth like Ayn Rand promulgated, demeaning the poor as parasites, or as Felix Adler proposed, to “act so as to elicit the best in others and thereby in thyself”?

In their desire to address social ills, the Salvation Army adherent, the peaceful Quaker, and the Buddhist monk find common ground with the disbelieving humanist. Introduce me to any individual who can treat another human being as having inherent worth and value, and each person as an end rather than a means to a greater goal, and I’ll greet that trusted companion – whatever their religious profession. These are the people humanists must bring to their side. We shouldn’t care whether they believe in one god or twenty. The question is how they decide right from wrong.

Religion As A Social Network

It also seems to me that many humanists confuse religion – the doctrines of the faith – with the local organization. The religious community is a critical seam in our social fabric that, especially in North America, provides the organizing structure for social action, charitable giving, and support. And there are religions without God. We have had Ethical Societies for over a century. There are many Universal Unitarians bereft of faith, and there are many individuals who attend their local parish without believing a word of the homily.

If tomorrow the remains of Jesus Christ were discovered in a tomb, his all too mortal remains disfigured by The Passion, the churches would still be full the next Sunday, celebrating life’s events, passing traditions down generations, joining the individual to a greater community, and aiding the poor. The religious communities are greater, in my opinion, than the often incoherent creeds which are silently ignored or dismissed by many members. Humanists should see their local churches and mosques as models, not opponents.

Learning To Speak A New Language

We humanists rely too much on cold data, facts, and figures, and not enough on story, arts, and music. Great art and music is the epitome of what it means to be human, yet we do not exploit these gifts on our behalf. We lack lyrical prose once quite evident and persuasive in the past, like 19th-century humanist Moncure Conway:

“Every rational truth, we hold, has been planted in the earth and nourished with the tears of men who gave their service in purity of love and fidelity to truth. Every divine truth that is to us as a fragrant flower, is crimsoned with the blood of a brave man’s heart. They who are free from all authority but truth, are the heirs of their faith and trustees of their example; on them mainly depends whether, in the coming time, the religion of love, reason and right shall more largely manifest its power to conquer selfishness, without terror, and stimulate to high action without any sealed contract for payment in Paradise.”

We should concede that fiction is often the way to persuade. The grey-haired among us might have been brought to humanism by the original “Star Trek” or its later iterations. “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” brought the agony of U.S. chattel slavery to antebellum households through fiction. “1984” warned about modern propaganda and dictatorship. All had far more impact than any chart, editorial, or academic thesis.

Humanists also need to be aware of the “culture” of those they argue with. I was listening to an overseas skeptic group and they described U.S. skeptics as sarcastic and condescending. We will tend to talk down to others if we decide we’re always right. Nobody likes to be lectured or mocked. And our dialogue needs to take into account the persons we dialogue with. Trump to many of us is crude and shallow, but he has attributes of a professional wrestling “face” (good guy wrestling character), which appeal to the wrestling audience. He weaves a narrative of a fight against evil, and him going to war for his followers. If you’re going to speak to a bunch of wrestling fans, you better learn wrestling lingo.

Many of his voters believe themselves to be “alpha males” (a misunderstanding of animal behavior) who have a natural right to rule over lessors. Speaking calmly to such people, correcting grammar, or pointing out flaws in reasoning only increases their disdain and reinforces their belief in their innate superiority. Sometimes swearing at someone tells them you’re equal and not to be trifled with. Sometimes good manners win. It depends on who you talk to. When talking, talk as they do.

What Is To Be Done?

Humanism can rise to the occasion, but we need to rethink what – and who, we are. We are people with a personal discipline, one which we will not abandon even now, in the darkest of our nation’s times.

We need to understand how humans think and learn: they learn by story, the arts, and music. We need to exalt these very human hallmarks to express our beliefs and ideals. We must encompass more persons into our community, including the religious who decide moral issues based upon the impact of their actions on others. We also need to build communities where people find support and comfort in difficult times. We need to lecture and correct less, and engage in ways appropriate to the listener.

We should also be sober about what we can accomplish. We are faced with cult-like thinking that has seized all around us. The more you attack cults, the stronger their internal controls become. Pointing out lies or failed prophecies tends to increase, not decrease belief. As one former member of the cult NXIVM said, “People don’t join cults. They join a good thing.” In the cult they have found meaning and community. The cult begins to falter as reality increasingly clashes with the ideology. This typically happens one member at a time, and is a lengthy process.

A virtuous humanist will be there when doubts arise, to talk to the believer as a kind and sympathetic confidant. They will display an alternative way to live and see the world: a happy, joyful one that plays beneath the cosmos, both our parent and home. Many cult members will die still embracing Trump to their end, just like many Germans could never denounce Hitler, but one by one many believers can be peeled away, leaving only the hardened core exposed. That should be our goal. It is easy to write these suggestions, but it will take the humanist saints among us to be so patient, so kind, and so forgiving. I hope we have enough among us.