Article writer of “The arrogance of the atheists: They batter believers in religion with smug certainty,” S.E. Cupp, and author of Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe, attempt to fulfill the incomplete story of atheism and the Ibo people that were written by the “hunters.” Achebe spends more than half of the book to explain the violent story, yet civilized culture, of the protagonist, Okonkwo. Similar to Achebe, Cupp explores the thoughts of “neoatheists” to show their arrogance and faults in representing the community of atheists. Achebe and Cupp both also describe people, such as Nwoye and Cupp’s father, that encompass open-mindedness and represent the incomplete side of their story. Cupp and Achebe challenge the stereotypes of atheism and Africa by creating and examining prominent and representative figures that highlight the dark sides of their stories; by analyzing these figures, both authors show us that they are outliers and do not properly embody their group as a whole.
Achebe and Cupp begin by diving into the worlds and thoughts of leading figures and using their flaws to exemplify the stereotypes of their story. Achebe describes his protagonist, Okonkwo, as a man “who knew how to kill a man’s spirit” (Achebe 26). Okonkwo so ferociously values masculinity that he feels that anybody who cannot live up to his standards is inferior. Similar to Okonkwo, the arrogance of popular and outspoken atheists has made Cupp question their intentions: “What spiritual quest are they on, except to put an abrupt end to those like [her] father’s” (Cupp, S.E.)? These popular atheists, such as Bill Maher or Christopher Hitchens, take atheism and turn it into the goal of “…nothing more than to spoil the believer’s spiritual journey” (Cupp, S.E.). Okonkwo’s firm belief of masculinity and use of violence to promote his alpha position causes him to “…never show any emotion openly,” as “…To show affection was a sign of weakness; the only thing worth demonstrating was strength” (Achebe 28).
Although Okonkwo’s tribe values masculine traits, they do not promote the senseless use of violence. When a man was accused of beating his wife needlessly, he was brought in front of the egwuwu, the effective judges of the tribe; they enforced a punishment and told him that “’It is not bravery when a man fights with a woman’” (Achebe 93). Like Okonkwo, militant Atheists like Cristopher Hitchens and Bill Maher, who use media and popularity to their advantage, are so devout to shredding other religions that people have begun to think of atheism more as antitheism.
To balance the single story represented by Okonkwo and the arrogant atheist, Achebe and Cupp provide an open-minded character that represents the other half of the story. Nwoye, the first son of Okonkwo, listens to the words of the white missionaries, and afterwards finds his “…callow mind was greatly puzzled” (Achebe 147). Despite being raised and beaten constantly in a house where masculinity and Ibo religion reigns supreme, Nwoye still finds himself interested in Christianity, even when he knew of the consequences. Nwoye represents the most of the Ibo people that are not single-minded and that are open to new cultures and religion, instead of being savage and uncivilized like the single story represents. In her article, Cupp describes her father, an open-minded equivalent to Nwoye, As “…[she] watched him pore over C.S. Lewis, Lee Strobel, and even neoatheist thinkers such as Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens, [she] thought it was amazing that he still wanted to learn something new” (Cupp, S.E.)
Often times, these open-minded people, such as Nwoye and Cupp’s father, are shadowed by their more outspoken and arrogant counterparts. When Okonkwo discovered that Nwoye had been visiting the church, he was furious and “…seized a heavy stick that lay on the dwarf wall and hit him two or three savage blows” (Achebe 152) It is the violence of Okonkwo attempting to stop his own son from learning about new religions that creates the uncivilized and barbaric stereotypes of the Ibo. In the modern world of religion, “God-hating comic Bill Maher shrugs [faith] off as a ‘neurological disorder’” (Cupp, S.E.).
Achebe finally represents the Ibo people as an evolving clan, as Cupp shows that the people of atheism learn to stray from the path of arrogance. After Okonkwo’s final act of savagery by killing the white messenger, “He knew that Umuofia would not go to war. He knew because they had broken into tumult instead of action” (Achebe 205). The clan’s resistance to following Okonkwo’s act of violence shows that they do not always resort to violence and that they have evolved and accepted the change of culture that the imperialists are bringing. Even Cupp herself realizes and admits her arrogance and strays away from being a militant atheist: “It wasn’t necessarily an acknowledgement of a higher power, but a realization that [she] knew little about the beliefs [she] had railed so arrogantly against” (Cupp, S.E.) Cupp still stays true to her own belief that a god does not exist, but she readily admits that it’s important to learn about other religions before degrading them. Besides Umuofia, other Ibo tribes exist that value different qualities, such as Mbante. Though they understand the importance of masculinity and the fatherland, they also acknowledge that “…when there is sorrow and bitterness [a man] finds refuge in his motherland” (Achebe 134). The Ibo people and atheists are constantly adapting to different cultures and religions, while the figures that Achebe and Cupp represent are too stubborn and arrogant to change.
By being fair and telling it as it is, Achebe and Cupp challenge the stereotypes and finish the incomplete stories of the savage Ibo people and the arrogant atheist. Achebe and Cupp create and explain figures that represent the cores of their stereotypes to show contrast between them and their cultures. Cupp herself believes that, “There’s still a lot to learn, but only if [we’re] not too busy being a know-it-all” (Cupp, S.E.)
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