Comments | ljlee: Debating atheists, Part 1: A horrifying proposal

ljlee

Debating atheists, Part 1: A horrifying proposal

Jun 27, 2015 14:49

What a week. I traveled to China on Monday for a conference, made a presentation Tuesday, got back Wednesday night, went to work on Thursday, and went to school on Friday for a seminar and another presentation. After the travel-and-academics whirlwind it'll be a relief to settle into a boring workweek, but I am resolved to slack off this weekend ( Read more... )

religion, politics, internet, history

Comments 6

loopy777 June 27 2015, 19:04:34 UTC

Yeah, this is one of those issues that doesn't seem to have any kind of good solution, and I'd say it exists across the whole spectrum of any kind of belief. As a Catholic, I give the side-eye to the anti-science Christian fundamentalists, and as a person I'm down on bigotry and/or homophobia, but if it were at all possible to stop people from teaching bad things to other people, then we wouldn't be having these debates right now ( ... )

ljlee June 29 2015, 17:22:05 UTC

That's the eternal problem, isn't it? We want to stop bad ideas from spreading and hurting people, but at the same time to preserve the rights that make it possible for people to do those bad things. It's always hoped that people won't misuse their freedoms, but, well. They're people. It's like free will--without free will, people are just automata and morality itself is empty. With free will, of course, bad things happen. I totally understand the impulse to keep bad things from happening, but trying to forcibly keep people from ever doing bad things (however "bad" is defined by the powerful) is usually the worst problem of all. Maybe part of maturity is coming to terms with that, as you said ( ... )

lb_lee June 27 2015, 22:18:14 UTC

You know, I'd be hard-pressed to think of someone who hates God as much as I do, and even I think it's totally bullshit to forbid religion. I mean, the Jews were getting persecuted for their religion for a couple thousand years, and not only did that make things shitty for them and just be terrible in general, THEY STILL PRACTICED. So what makes EJ think it'd be so much better now?

And I don't know what planet he lives on where being a flaming racist is enough to get people to interfere on a kid's behalf, but it ain't mine. I lived in Texas; half the fucking population would've been "interfered" with!

It just sounds like total bogus thought police. Fuck that shit.

--Mori

EDIT: Also, how the fuck would you go about DEFINING religion, even? Would atheist Buddhism count as religion? How about yoga? Who decides?

ljlee June 29 2015, 17:32:28 UTC

Yeah, if your idea requires you to wonder, "Hmm, how can I come down harder on Jews than anyone ever has before?" then you know right there it's a terrible idea. But it's non-religious so non-evil by definition so yay? The only way to make this even remotely administrable is to abolish the family structure and have the government raise kids, and that's a nightmare despite the existence of objectively horrible families like yours.

And you just know that this sort of thing would trigger pandemonium among conservative Christians, "Ahhh they're going to take our kids away for teaching teh gay is ebul!" And they'd be right to panic, much as I loathe instilling homophobia in kids. America has changed almost unimaginably in regards to gay rights without trampling on anyone's liberties, and though that way may seem frustratingly slow it's also the only right way.

lb_lee June 29 2015, 19:38:29 UTC

Yeah, I have a HUGE issue with the whole "atheist oppression" argument, because I have seen no evidence that atheists are treated worse than any other disliked faith group. (And in Texas, I would have WAAAAAY rathered be an atheist than a Muslim.) If anything, I would see it as a subset of religious discrimination, rather than a whole new form of oppression ( ... )

ljlee June 30 2015, 17:34:52 UTC

That's a good point, that it's a subset of religious discrimination and not active oppression. Speaking of taking a lot of privilege to even notice, a cynical part of me wonders if anti-atheist oppression is upper- and middle-class, cis, abled white people's only possible claim to oppression and that's why they cling to the idea with grim ferocity.

The funny thing about these New Atheists is, they break out the "We have nothing in common so don't compare us!!!11one!" defense when anyone mentions that atheists can do horrible things to (e.g. the Stalin-who-must-not-be-named), but they're perfectly happy to form associations and demand better representation as a group. Dudes, I thought you had nothing in common?

And ELIZABETH FUCKING LOFTON IS A SKEPTIC?! Wow. So her skepticism is against science itself? And against incest victims?! I can see why you'd never ever want to touch that shit. Yet more people who think they're so above it all, they can't see their own biases and become part of the problem. Grow a sense of humility, dipshits ( ... )