Looking back on Riskas made me laugh, I caught a ban there at exmormon.org for that stunt. Probably not the approach I’d take today, but I also doubt time would improve my estimation of Riskas. I’m not really his audience though and neither is Kevin Christensen for that matter, that book was written for Ex-Mormons by an Ex-Mormon in my estimation.
Thomas Riskas comes from the world of counter-apologetics, a small but active sphere on the internet that churns out a steady stream of content of blog posts, books, and podcasts. The similarities between that community and mopologists are numerous and striking in my opinion. Both tend to be wildly insular and overestimate their abilities, often making liberal use of bombastic writing to make their content conform to the standards of clickbait. These communities have some well credentialed content creators and go to some lengths to present themselves as “academic adjacent”, but the merits of their work is mixed at best and crass polemics at the worst.
Gemli also bears the unmistakable marks of being a traveler in counter-apologetics, that book list Dr.Cam helpfully posted reveals someone who has made numerous purchases from the “Atheism & Agnosticism” section at a bookstore; with people like David Mills on that list, probably a used bookstore too. There really isn’t anything objectionable about the list, Gemli doesn’t present as anything other than a regular dude voicing his opinions in the comments section of a website.
While it seems apparent that Riskas had developed some kind of relationship with the late Kai Nielsen (he died in April of 2021), I think John Loftus exerts far more influence on Riskas. Nielsen was first and foremost someone primarily concerned with ethical behavior and governance and his entry into the philosophy of religion was due to his encounters with religious thinkers in politics. What made him so visible was the fact he was a philosopher who was very willing to debate Christian apologists, this is probably how Riskas discovered him. By the time Riskas was putting together his book, Nielsen was already part of a dying breed of philosophers whose influence was at an all time low. The time where Nielsen’s moral philosophy would have had currency in his field was long gone by the time he retired and his contributions to the philosophy of religion are either introductory in nature or echo what English philosophers at Oxford and Cambridge said in the 50s and 60s were already saying. None of this should reflect poorly on Nielsen, but very little of what Riskas has to say about Mormonism stems from him reading Nielsen.
Loftus on the other hand has his fingerprints all over the text. If you wanna see Loftus in action, pull up google and search for “Debunking Christianity” and enjoy the circus. Loftus is one of those goons who has decided to turn his past as a Christian minister turned atheist into a secular ministry dedicated to reaching the lost Christians who need to be taught how to think properly. If you peruse the man’s blog you will be treated to a self-serving array of image macros called “Cure-for-Christianity-Knockout-Quotes” which takes an image and overlays a text quote on it. The quotes range from things John Loftus has said or his friends, including past comments on his blog. All of this is done without a hint of self awareness, at first you might think it is a parody but let me assure you, this is absolutely done in the spirit of utmost confidence and seriousness. Here is a random example:
If you look at Riskas under the light of counter-apologetics, his work makes much more sense. ‘Deconstructing Mormonism’ isn’t a formal analysis conducted in a thorough manner with an eye for detail, it is a polemic that details how and why Riskas stopped being a Mormon. His “research” isn’t anything more than an amalgamation of different books he has read that he links through the common thread of Mormonism. He delivers his judgments about the intellectual viability of Mormonism in the same manner a professional wrestler performs strikes on an opponent: exaggerated and a little dramatic. There is value in this kind of writing and it has its place.
The real drawback of Riskas is that he doesn’t fully understand the ideas and concepts he imports into the book. Adopting Kai Nielsen’s stance on metaphysics and language is a major liability unless you came to those same conclusions yourself as a result of working through the various issues. Riskas doesn’t really seem to grasp that a personal journey from a believer to ex-believer doesn’t constitute a meaningful education and doesn’t confer upon him any unique access to the topic of religion. The unwarranted confidence Riskas has in himself is just a symptom of immersing yourself in the world of counter-apologetics; when “refuting the apologists” becomes a team sport your vision becomes clouded and narrowed.
Would I recommend the book? Sure, if it looks interesting at all and you want to read it, please do! Did I like it? Not at all. Does it constitute a meaningful challenge to Mormonism? Only inasmuch the sources Riskas uses do, he adds very little of value on top of that. I imagine that a Daniel McClellan or a Tarik LaCour wouldn’t be at all perturbed by the contents of this book and could meet its challenges in such a way that I would end up siding with them over Riskas, even though he and I are not believers and the other two gentlemen are.
Alas, the Interpreter Foundation doesn’t exactly have people like McClellan or LaCour on their active duty roster. That honor gets handed down to Kevin Christensen who has been recycling the same ideas for over two decades and is one of the most boring people to read. If I had to sum up Christensen in a word, that word would have to be “sedated”. To make matters worse, his grasp on philosophical topics is about even with Riskas. A “Christensen reads Riskas” type situation is like dumping old styrofoam coolers onto an active tire fire. Nobody comes away from it better off.
I’d place Thomas Riskas in the same category as most Mopologists in terms of substance, ironically though his book actually exceeds the standards that FAIR or the Interpreter Foundation use for their own in-house contributors. In that sense, Riskas is probably the kind of critic they deserve.
gemli is too kind.
