Writing at Why Evolution Is True, Coyne is upset that Britain has state-supported faith schools — seemingly he believes that atheism should be the official religion of the state, and he hates competitors. But he adds this:
Given that parents can (unfortunately) legally proselytize their children at home, there is no justification for publicly supporting religious education outside the home.
Does Coyne actually believe that parents should not be allowed by law to raise their own children in their own faith? That is what the sentence as written implies. Presumably the religion police in Coyne’s utopia would monitor discussions in private homes between parents and children, in order to catch and prosecute any illegal “proselytizing” within families.
This is not a theoretical scenario. Suppression of private religious faith within families was a hallmark of Communist totalitarianism from Soviet Russia to Mao’s China to Pol Pot’s Cambodia, and remains in force in North Korea, Laos, Vietnam, Cuba and China.
Slip of the pen, you say? He doesn’t really mean that? Then let him clarify. Sometimes the totalitarianism inherent in atheism doesn’t even run deep: it sits right on the surface. Coyne apparently intends to prove that he has earned his “Censor of the Year” award.