Richard Dawkins- Patronizing Git 2

A while ago I wrote an article entitled Richard Dawkins- Patronizing Git!, see: http://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.co.uk/2015/09/richard-dawkins-patronizing-git.html. Well, he's done it again! In a recording of a recent live stage performance he made with Sam Harris, Dawkins describes himself as an "elitist". He then makes the fair point that there's nothing wrong with being an elitist in some circumstances. If you're going into hospital for surgery you'd ideally want an elite surgeon to treat you. If you're taking a flight on an aeroplane then an elite pilot would make you feel much safer. That's only natural. However then he laments that people discard that principle when it comes to vital political decisions. He issues the usual portents of the Trumpocalypse by saying: "When you want a president of the most powerful country in the world you take almost no precautions at all." He then wheels out the Remoaner cliches about Brexit being a "catastrophe!" and says the decision on whether Britain should leave the EU "is a much too complicated and sophisticated question to be decided by idiots like me... and like the British people." Despite his rather transparent modesty-signalling I doubt if Dawkins really sees himself on the same level as most other British people. He calls David Cameron a "moron" for proposing a referendum on the EU... but not for anything else he has done. I personally count it as one of the few moves Cameron ever made that I consider admirable. Dawkins says plebiscites shouldn't be allowed for anything more crucial than fox-hunting. He then breaks his own skeptic rules by treating anecdotes as evidence, cherry-picked anecdotes too, for the reasons given by people who voted Leave: "It's nice to have a change!" "I prefer the old blue passport!" This is a gross misrepresentation of the mass of Leave-voters. And the reason "What is the EU?" was Googled has nothing to do with people not knowing what the EU is. It is just part of the usual symptoms of internet trending. Source: https://youtu.be/SYhtW-K90zY?t=50m49s. See here for more details: http://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.co.uk/2016/12/brexit-is-back.html and: http://hpanwo-tv.blogspot.co.uk/2016/11/us-presidential-election-2016.html. His words chillingly echo Henry Kissinger just before he overturned an election in Chile: "This is far too important for the people to decide."

It never occurs to Richard Dawkins that the people who voted for Brexit and those who voted Donald Trump for president are largely mature adults who made their decision for perfectly rational reasons. I've covered both issues in great detail in the links above. Like many atheo-skeptics Dawkins has a very patriarchal attitude to politics. He has enormous confidence in the legitimacy of big daddy government stepping in to control people's lives. To him we're just children who need to be told what to do because it's for our own good, as he sees it. There are many other examples of this in the atheo-skeptico-humanist community, see: https://youtu.be/kT6LAfDybKU?t=1h18m1s and: http://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.co.uk/2016/12/nurse-sacked-for-praying.html. Atheo-skeptico-humanists continuously profess a belief in "free speech!" "freedom of thought!" and "human rights!", but their actions do not match their words. When it comes to dictatorship they are really AOK with it so long as the government is dictating what they want. By the way, there has been an update since I wrote my first Richard Dawkins- Patronizing Git! article. Dawkins has indeed needed the services of the John Radcliffe Hospital because early in the year he suffered a stroke, see: http://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.co.uk/2016/02/richard-dawkins-has-stroke.html. He was rushed to the JRH Emergency Department by South Central Ambulance Service, was diagnosed by the neurological X-ray radiologists and then kept in the Neurosciences ward in the new West Wing. The Hospital Portering Service was involved at every stage of this process. I hoped that would make him think twice before belittling people. Unfortunately it has not.

See here for additional background: http://hpanwo.blogspot.co.uk/2008/04/god-delusion-by-richard-dawkins.html.

And: http://hpanwo-tv.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/richard-dawkins-mba-criminal.html.

And: http://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/an-open-letter-to-richard-dawkins.html.