Why LH?

Why the hell are we doing this?

This is a question that has been asked a quite few times during our back channel discussions.  It seems like week after week we are beating our heads against a wall of stupidity. And every time we make a crack or knock out a block, theists slap up the same brick of idiocy and adhere it with the mortar of repetition.  Not to mention all of the ridiculous bullshit that has been going on in the Atheosphere.  We’re a small blog.  Our readership is mostly a handful of regulars (and we thank you, one and all).  Even on Facebook and G+ we only have a few hundred followers, while pages that do nothing but re-post the same tired memes get tens of thousands.  We’re lucky to get one comment compared to the hundreds that “Global Secular Humanist Movement” or an FtB post gets, even though we’re sometimes weeks ahead in getting a story out.  And admittedly, one of us does the majority of the heavy lifting around here (It’s not me), which has to be tiring for him.  So why are we still doing this?  

I’d like to think that we’re helping to stem the tide, but I don’t know, because we don’t get the feedback.  We don’t even have theocracy-promoting trolls to use as a gauge.  And I’m not sure why.   Is it the layout?  Our writing?  Is it the quagmire that is Blogspot? 

Despite all this, we do continue on.  We've even expanded by starting to do a podcast, which I think is going pretty well.  I got to interview Taylor Muse of Quiet Company, and participate as a member of the press at Rock Beyond Belief.  I hope to do more like that.    

The mainstream media only picks up the stuff that appeals to our community when it can be spun into some sensationalist pap in support of the status quo, or to warn them of the “atheist threat” (The Black Hand is coming!).  This is the main reason why bloggers, vloggers, public speakers and authors are so vital to the secular community.  As Jello Biafra once said, “Don’t hate the media, become the media!”  So, for me, that’s why I do this.  That’s why I want to continue to do this. 

We live in a society that is still dancing to the beat of an imaginary drum; and without those voices, however small, to bring attention to that fact, the creeps organizing the conga line win.