When it comes to creating outgroup designations, Dr. Richard Carrier is the undisputed champion of the atheism plus “social justice” movement. He originally coined the idea of C.H.U.D.’s, that is, subhumans who dwell in sewers, in a bid to marginalize his ideological opponents. More recently, he has coined the idea of “Atheist Dudebros” as a somewhat less explicitly dehumanizing way of marginalizing his opponents.
If we are going to leverage these neologisms to more effectively demonize and cast out fellow atheists, though, we’re going to need clear operational definitions. According to Dr. Carrier, dudebros have three defining characteristics:
@BlueBallSkeptic That's one of three things I state in definition. Yes. It is one of the three things defining a Dudebro.
— Dr. Richard Carrier (@RichardCCarrier) December 5, 2015
Dudebros are people who, according to Dr. Carrier, “act like white privilege is awesome” and also “pontificate infallibly like the Pope, and don’t understand any of the things they complain about.” This is a confusing stipulative definition because (1) it doesn’t remotely comport with common usage, (2) it leaves out other forms of privilege, such as male privilege, cissexual privilege, and heterosexual privilege, and (3) the criterion of infallible pontification lacks specificity, as the pontificatory style of writing has become altogether commonplace in the age of freethought blogging.
While I remain firmly convinced that the broader atheist movement couldn’t care much less about the ongoing internet slapfight between Atheism Plus and what Dr. Carrier dubs “Atheism Less,” it seems that the social justice activists who act as secular takfiri need to be more clear about whom they are excluding from their moral circles and to what degree. To that end, I propose a three-tiered system along the following lines.
Dudebros
White male cissexual heterosexuals who fail to thoroughly check their privilege whenever told to do so by someone higher up in the progressive stack, along with those who just don’t know when to shut up and listen.
Example usage:
https://twitter.com/Rev_Xavier/status/673184387090022400
Shitlords
Someone who is perceived as racist, sexist, -phobic, or otherwise bigoted by those engaged in fighting for social justice online.
Example usage:
BTW I added some of you as friends on Steam. The rest I will add soon! I just have to do a quick non-Shitlord verification check for each
— RebeccaWatson@bsky.social why not (@rebeccawatson) July 16, 2012
CHUDs
The worst of the worst, people who openly support white supremacy, rape culture, transmisogyny, etc. Formerly this category was roughly coextensive with sort of the behavior which would land someone on Level 1 of the Atheism Plus Block Bot, prior to the inevitable grade inflation.
Example usage:
@RichardCCarrier I don't want to be Atheism Plus – am I a CHUD or just an Atheist who can ignore your movement?
— James Gavin (@mad_gav) September 21, 2015
Whereas “shitlords” and “dudebros” can hopefully be reformed into proper human beings, “CHUDs” are best considered subhuman and should be kicked down into the sewers, metaphorically at least.
Now that we have managed to label, point out, and call out those who have been designated as outgroup by the social justice wing of the freethought movement, all that remains is to come up with a clever new name for the ingroup.
