Standing with Troy Davis as a Non-Believer

By Sikivu Hutchinson

This is a day of outrage for all who believe in justice and morality. The pending execution of Georgia Death Row inmate Troy Davis is an egregious reminder of the vicious cycle of immoral lynch mob justice that masquerades as due process in the United States, the exceptionalist "Christian Nation." With 25% of the world’s prison population, the U.S. has devolved into the largest penitentiary on the planet. For poor people of color, the revolving door of incarceration often starts in K-12 schools that disproportionately suspend, transfer and expel black and Latino youth. But the media framing of black youth as violent lawless criminals influences their sense of self-image much earlier. When it comes to black youth, mainstream images of urban communities as crime-ridden cesspits with dysfunctional families shape the cultural perceptions of teachers, administrators, policymakers and law enforcement. These images disfigure the psyches of very young black children who see white lives humanized, prized and valued in the white supremacist American TV and film industries. Clearly, If Davis had been a white defendant the international outcry over his death sentence would have led to clemency. But in a nation in which African Americans are presumed guilty until proven innocent, the recanted testimony of seven witnesses is not enough to spare the life of an innocent black man.

Over the past several weeks, many prayers have been offered for Davis, his family and other Death Row inmates who may have been wrongly convicted. Certainly humanist atheists like me believe that the atrocity of Davis’ pending execution is yet another example of Epicurus’ caveat about the impotence of “God.” But the national visibility and leadership of the faith community around this issue highlights the need to develop explicitly secular humanist culturally responsive traditions for coping with death, mourning and grief in communities of color. It also highlights the continued need for the so-called secular movement to speak out on state-sanctioned human rights abuses perpetrated upon communities of color right here in the U.S.

At 9% of the Los Angeles Unified School District student population, black children are over 30% of those suspended. At 9% of the L.A. County population, black children and adults are nearly 40% of the County’s incarcerated population. In the final analysis, segregation, white supremacy and economic disenfranchisement—as well as heterosexism and patriarchy—keep many blacks and Latinos beholden to the faith community and faith traditions. Secularists who can’t wrap their mind around that, and continue to bemoan the lack of “diversity” in the movement, are a waste of crucial time and energy.

As activists across the globe stand for Davis against the all-American death machine, it should be clear that true justice has no faith and no religion.

Sikivu Hutchinson is the author of Moral Combat: Black Atheists, Gender Politics, and the Values Wars.

A Long Overdue Tribute to Black Women Non-Theists, By Norm R. Allen Jr.

One of my great regrets as a full-time secular humanist activist is that I never started my proposed pamphlet of quotations from African American women non-theists. Compared to when I first became involved with organized humanism, there are quite a few African American women that have come out of the closet and are eager and willing to make their voices heard.

Why not begin with Sikivu Hutchinson of the Black Skeptics? Hutchinson is the author of the excellent book Moral Combat: Black Atheists, Gender Politics, and the Values Wars. She has taken an impressive leadership role with the Black Skeptics. Her strong focus upon feminism, LGBT rights, and other progressive causes makes her refreshing among Black women non-theists.

Hutchinson and other Black women non-theists are able and willing to critique biblically based patriarchy, sexism, and misogyny in ways their religious counterparts never would. (NEWS FLASH: The biblical writers were primarily patriarchs living in a rigidly patriarchal society. How could biblical teachings regarding women not be sexist to the core?) Hutchinson has demonstrated that paradoxically, the same Bible that gives so many Black women solace is the same book that is responsible for so much of the suffering from which they seek solace. That is to say, the Bible causes the sickness and then suggests a cure.

Debbie Goddard has taken an active leadership role in organized humanism for quite some time. Even during high school she founded a philosophy group that appealed to atheists. While at Temple University she started a freethought group, and she eventually became a major leader in campus outreach throughout the U.S.

Goddard is an “out” lesbian that has been engaged in LGBT activism. She now heads African Americans for Humanism (AAH), the organization I founded in 1989. She and I shared offices near one another for many years, and we were usually the last ones to leave the building. It seems unlikely that anyone in the humanist movement has a stronger work ethic than Goddard.

Ayanna Watson heads the Black Atheists of America. She has conducted and broadcast interviews with Black atheists from all over the U.S. She has made her thoughts known on You Tube. She hosted a conference in New York. She has generated much controversy as a result of her biblical critiques.

Elayne Jones was one of the first African American tympani players with a major U.S. symphony. She rejected religion as a young adult and sought a sense of community with the Ethical Society. She has strong roots in Barbados, and she and I made attempts to start a humanist group there. Jones started a humanist group in a retirement community in Walnut Creek, California, where she has lived for several years.

Crystal Coleman was actively involved with the Black American Freethought Association (BAFTA) headquartered in Albany, New York. Coleman worked closely with McKinley Jones, the group’s founder. Coleman and Jones did research to uncover the history of Black American humanists in the Civil Rights movement.

Jamila Bey of Washington, D.C. has become a major humanist spokesperson in recent years. Bey has written about the need for African American women to come out of the closet and openly acknowledge their unbelief. She has spoken at conferences in Washington, D.C., Indianapolis, Boston (at Harvard), and other cities. She has been featured on major radio programs, including National Public Radio with me.

Mercedes Diane Griffin is the former managing director of the Institute for Humanist Studies. She writes a blog titled “Unscripted.” She is attempting to attract more African Americans, women, LGBT people, and young people to organized humanism. Her outreach includes combating HIV/AIDS among African Americans, in particular. For Griffin, an emphasis upon social justice will do far more to attract African Americans to humanism than mere atheism or scientific issues. As a full-time African American humanist activist, like Goddard, she is in rare company.

Carolyn M. Dejoie is a professor emerita at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She is a former Catholic, who, out of a sense of frustration and a need for community, joined the Unitarian Universalist Society. Later, she founded the Secular Humanist Society of Madison, Wisconsin and networked with like-minded people throughout the U.S. She might have been the first African American woman to have established such a group.

Last, but not least, is the atheist Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Ali, a Somali author and activist, now lives in the U.S. She has written such books as Infidel, in which she castigates Muslims and glorifies Western civilization. Not surprisingly, she was warmly embraced by the Bush administration and the ultra-conservative American Enterprise Institute. Still, her critiques of Islam have often been on the money.

I hope to one day start and finish my proposed pamphlet for African American women non-theists. Meanwhile, let’s honor these women and hope that, soon, Women’s Studies scholars will do likewise.