“Exhibit A: In his discussion of slavery, Hitchens focuses entirely on the American experience so that he can damn Christianity for the peculiar institution. He overlooks the role of the Catholic Church in abolishing slavery in Europe and gives scant attention to the role of the Muslim slave trade in starting it up again in the new world, and he manages to gloss over the fact that slavery predates organized religion.
“Exhibit B: Hitchens maintains that the non-religious can be just as moral and, more to the point, as charitable as religious believers, intentionally ignoring a rather impressive body of evidence in the process. Yes, atheists and freethinkers can be more charitable, but that isn’t how it actually shakes out.
(…)
“Playing to his audience, Hitchens feigns some tolerance for religious believers. He would not ‘prohibit’ religion, ‘even if I thought I could.’ He isn’t so much bothered by the fact that people believe in daffy things. He just wishes the religious would reciprocate his generosity by ‘leav[ing] me alone.’
“The sentiment behind those three words was responsible for tens of thousands of book sales, at least. Certain people are made massively uncomfortable by religious people even talking about their faith. Any discussion of such things seems to them oppressive, and possibly sinister. Hitchens offers them plenty of faux arguments, half-baked half-truths, and stale Britty witticisms to make them feel more comfortable with their discomfort.”
