by Shelley Mountjoy and Roy Roberts

On Tuesday, September 9, 2008, over 700 people arrived at Virginia Commonwealth University’s (VCU) Student Commons to hear Christopher Hitchens and Frank Turek debate the existence of god.  Even with limited publicity, the attendance was overwhelming; many stated they had only heard about the debate earlier that day.  The room held 500.  Those who decided to stay despite not making it into the main room listened to audio in two overflow rooms.

The United Secular Alliance was excited to present this debate after over a year of planning.  Among the lessons learned was the need to get the funding and contract paperwork started early.  This alone took six months.  Funding for Hitchens’ honorarium as well various event services expenses came together from direct allocations from the University Student Government to the United Secular Alliance as well as contributions from the Deans of the Honors College and College of Arts and Sciences.  The contributions from the colleges were accomplished via meetings between United Secular Alliance officers and the Deans of the respective colleges.  After no Christian group showed interest in co-sponsorship or finding an opponent, a VCU student independently approached members of the Christian community surrounding VCU to fund Turek's appearance.  

Frank Turek is the founder and president of CrossExamined.org.  He’s written two books: I Don’t have Enough Faith to be an Atheist and Legislating Morality.  Turek expressed his admiration of Hitchens when the two first met earlier that evening; Turek stated he was a fan.  Hitchens’ response: "The night is young."

The debate opened with 10-minute statements; Turek went first as he was arguing in the affirmative.  The rebuttals (15 minutes each) were followed by a 20-minute Q&A between the two opponents.  Finally a few questions were selected from the audience.  There was only time for about four questions from the audience. In hindsight, the audience would have likely been more interested if the debate was followed by a longer Q&A session – eliminating the questions between the two.

A reception followed where those present had an opportunity to meet one of both of the opponents.  While those listening in the overflow rooms had priority, the lines for each extended over an hour.  Afterward, several students joined Hitchens for scotch at a nearby pub.  Hitchens had to catch a plane the following morning as he was scheduled to debate Dinesh D’Souza in less than 24 hours.

The debate did help in making the United Secular Alliance's name better known across the campus and as a result students and members of the community have come to our meetings throughout the semester.  In a regular meeting following the debate, the group went through and directly discussed each of the points brought up by Turek since they are commonly used apologetic techniques.

The debate was also covered in The Commonwealth Times, an independent student newspaper at VCU.  The debate is available online.

Roy Roberts is a senior at VCU majoring in Business Information Systems with a minor in Sociology.  Roy is the co-Founder and President of the United Secular Alliance at VCU.  Shelley Mountjoy is a graduate student at George Mason University, majoring in Telecommunications.  Shelley is the Founder and President of the Rational Response Squad at GMU and the Organizer of Beltway Atheists.  

Roy and Shelley discuss more about the planning of this debate as guests on Answers in Atheism (hosted by Edwin Kagin), which aired September 12, 2008.