The third annual Global Atheist Convention, ironically dubbed “Reason to Hope,” has been cancelled due to dismal ticket sales, The Sydney Morning Herald reports. Turns out, offering nihilism packaged as “hope” doesn’t sell too well to the masses. The conference, which was scheduled for February of this year, was set to be headlined by atheist novelist Sir Salman Rushdie, who was a huge get for the convention organizers. Iranian cleric Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa against Rushdie in 1989 in light
of his published work, “The Satanic Verses.” The book targeted the prophet Mohammad, Sikhs, and religion in general. “What is there to respect in any of this, or in any of the crimes now being committed almost daily around the world in religion’s dreaded name? How well, with what fatal results, religion erects totems, and how willing we are to kill for them,” Rushdie once critically said of religion, SMH notes. Fellow atheist Richard Dawkins was also on the anti-God roster. READ MORE
