I'm of the opinion that humanism mainly grew as a secular movement in response to the overwhelming force of religion in most societies. Humanism is primarily anti-religious.
But at the same time it has the same elements of religion:
- we're ethically superior because we believe in [x] (reason / science) instead of [y] (God)
- we abide by a moral code that presumes [x] (reason / science) is what is good and just in the world, and is the closest thing to our savior
Maybe that's an improvement over relying on a deity, but if I were to build a humanist ideology I'd try to distance myself from the notion that science / technology is anything more than an amoral tool.
I don't know, in my experience at this forum and with humanist groups, I get the picture of smug academics looking down on the unwashed masses who just haven't seen the light yet. Sounds familiar.
I suppose there are "humanists" who are smug academics, but I was once a member of a now defunct group called, "Humanists of Georgia." Only one was an academic and you couldn't imagine a more humble man. He hated being referred to as doctor and was extremely down to earth. The rest of us were an assortment of odd balls. Some had college degrees, while some were high school graduates. Nobody was in the least bit arrogant. And, the Humanist label wasn't taken too seriously. It was just about trying to live a decent life without intentionally harming anyone else.
We sometimes had guest speakers who were from academia, but I have no idea if any of them were atheists to humanists. Actually, one of our best speakers was a Christian who was also a professor of history. He loved speaking to our group because we were more open minded than most of his students. We also had a Geology professor who gave us a lecture on global climate change. He was excellent and explained things using charts and actual evidence. The group eventually died out, primarily because we all lived quite far apart from each other. When we ended the group, we took the several thousand dollars that we had and donated to Atlanta Freethought Society, which is still a very active group.
I attended the last meeting of AFS, and the Black Non believers of Atlanta joined with us. There was a young Christian who was in seminary who visited and asked a lot of questions. He apologized for asking questions, but we told him we loved it when people honestly wanted to discuss religion with us. It was a very interesting, friendly meeting. I even barged my way into a photo of the Black Non believers. I told them they needed a token white girl in the photo. They all laughed and had me join them. So, I think you may have the wrong idea about humanists and assorted atheists who have organizations.
I grew up attending a large evangelical church. The arrogance there was overwhelming, and guess what? Some of them were highly educated academic types,. One man had a seat on the New York Stock exchange, another one had an appointment with the UN, several were engineers or scientists, but they all knew they were "saved" and the rest of society was going to hell. It doesn't get more arrogant that that, does it?