Will Richard Dawkins Drive A Stake Through The Heart Of The 'Reason Rally'?

Next month, a non-believers' Woodstock comes to Washington. Commentator Barbara J. King considers whether headline speaker Richard Dawkins is the best person to lead The Reason Rally's fight against negative stereotypes of non-believers.

by Barbara J King

Mark Renders/Getty Images Richard Dawkins in 2009

This March 24th on the National Mall in Washington, thousands of secular humanists will come together at The Reason Rally. The Rally is billed as "the largest gathering of the secular movement in world history," a sort of "Woodstock for non-belief." According to a press release, the rally is to be a celebration, and its chief mission is to "combat negative stereotypes about nonreligious Americans." The keynote speaker is the famous scientist and atheist Richard Dawkins. I can't help but wonder if he's the best man for the job. I am taking up this question for a specific reason, a concern that echoes one I felt when Dawkins held (1995 - 2008) Oxford University's Simonyi Professorship for the Public Understanding of Science. But first, an admiring note: Dawkins is a brilliant evolutionary scientist. His ...