Atheists should criticize religion, but how we do it matters

[Underseer]

I think that atheists being careful how we address and criticize religion has far more to do with the reaction from theists than the militarization of atheists. Reverse the roles and the opposite applies. I doubt anything Chris Hitchens wrote will lead to a bloodbath, even if some true nutter atheists read it.

I'm not worried about the things public atheists say. They are generally careful in how they word the things they say, and do use the kind of caveats and mention exceptions, although I do wish they did that a little more.

The really hateful stuff without the careful exceptions and with overly broad generalizations tends to come from less prominent atheists (such as YouTube personalities), or more likely regular people on message boards and Facebook groups.

 

[Underseer]

Special pleading fallacy.

Whether or not atheists believe we have a magical invisible friend who is being insulted does not change the fact that hate in our rhetoric could influence the behavior of those among us who happen to be crazy.

But has it? How often do atheists go on killing sprees against the deluded theists? Crazy plus the authoritarianism and tribalism that comes with religion seems to be far more dangerous. The most anti-religious people I can think of just go around mocking religious people. I can't imagine many, if any, of them turning to violence based on atheism. Religious crazies snap into violence enough to keep headlines busy.

Again, the sample size is too small for strong conclusions. However, the only incidents I know of involving atheists killing or trying to kill someone because of their demographic designation both involves Muslims.

It might not be a pattern at all. This could just be a statistical anomaly. However, on the off chance that it isn't, I want to spend time talking about the kind of rhetoric we use when talking about external populations. I have caught myself making overly broad negative generalizations about Christians and Muslims, and I have seen plenty of other atheists do the same here and in social media. I have also noticed that the hate is a bit more intense and the generalizations are a bit more broad when the topic is Muslims rather than Christians.

Humans have a natural tendency to demonize and dehumanize the other, and America has a particularly ugly history in this regard. I think this bears discussing.

 

[TSwizzle]

We cannot ignore the critical role Christianity played in selling the Iraq war to the American people. Anyone who participated in those debates knows damn well that most Christians wanted that war because they wanted to kill Muslims. As far as I'm concerned, Christianity is to blame for the invasion of Iraq as much as any oil company or neoconservative strategist.

This means that Christians have a lot more blood on their hands than Muslims even before we take into account those African evangelicals who are setting children on fire for witchcraft.

You have completely lost the plot.

Our numbers are growing. This means that over time, the number of violent incidents caused by atheists is going to rise. If there is something we can do about it now, I would rather address this sooner than later.

If it does (which is very, very unlikely) it will be no match for the violence, destruction and misery we see on a daily basis that muslims mete out, not only to infidels, gays and what not but to other muslims.

 

[Underseer]

You have completely lost the plot.

Not sure I understand your argument. Jolly claimed that Islam is worse than Christianity. I'm not so certain that is true, although I agree it is irrelevant to the broader discussion.

Our numbers are growing. This means that over time, the number of violent incidents caused by atheists is going to rise. If there is something we can do about it now, I would rather address this sooner than later.

If it does (which is very, very unlikely) it will be no match for the violence, destruction and misery we see on a daily basis that muslims mete out, not only to infidels, gays and what not but to other muslims.

It sounds like you have already made a conclusion, and thus don't want to discuss the possibility of our rhetoric having negative consequences.

There are so few cases of religiously-motivated violence by atheists that I don't see how anyone can form a strong conclusion either way. Given that it is possible that the nature of our rhetoric could influence the actions of the crazies among us in the future, isn't it reasonable to at least discuss this?

 

[TSwizzle]

Not sure I understand your argument.

Anyone who participated in those debates knows damn well that most Christians wanted that war because they wanted to kill Muslims.

I don't know damn well. You've lost the plot fella.

It sounds like you have already made a conclusion, and thus don't want to discuss the possibility of our rhetoric having negative consequences. There are so few cases of religiously-motivated violence by atheists that I don't see how anyone can form a strong conclusion either way. Given that it is possible that the nature of our rhetoric could influence the actions of the crazies among us in the future, isn't it reasonable to at least discuss this?

It is far more likely an atheist will be on the receiving end of of violence from a follower of islam than the other way round. So no, I don't think it's a worthwhile discussion.

Cheers.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

If atheism carried a strong group identity, tribalism and authoritarian bent to it, I'd be far more concerned. As it is, no, I'm really not. My only concern about speaking gently around Muslims is the Muslim crazies that have proved themselves to be incredibly thin skinned, and have flipped out and gone murderous over criticisms as tame as cartoons. And I would rather err on the side of insulting them than on the side of letting their bully tactics and threats prevail in shutting down criticism.

 

[Lion IRC]

Yes. And it's a very interesting and worthy Op.

So you didn't read it...

?

In this thread, I do not want to talk about Christian hate....

Lion, I hope that you will consider the consequences of the hate that you spread, but your hate is not what I want to talk about...

You keep saying that but...

 

[Cheerful Charlie]

One thing that seems to be a common idea among religious believers is that thugs who commit a lot of crimes are not religious. Sort of the opposite of the no true scotsman fallacy. The rise of the nones and the large numbers of young Americans who do not find religion important in their lives is taken as proof that the rise of atheism and secularism is responsible for the sorry state of civilization in America.
Of course the drop in crime during the Clinton era is ignored. Plus the fact that the most religious states of the South seem to have the highest rates of violent crime.

 

[Underseer]

So you didn't read it...

?

In this thread, I do not want to talk about Christian hate....

Lion, I hope that you will consider the consequences of the hate that you spread, but your hate is not what I want to talk about...

You keep saying that but...

If you want to talk about how hateful Christian rhetoric is, then we can start a separate thread. Will that suffice?

Although honestly, your own comments in this thread about LGBT are more than sufficient to establish the very hate you deny exists.

Look, I get that you don't consider it hateful, just like you don't consider it hateful when Christians demand that women give birth to rape babies, or when Christians argue that we should let millions of war refugees die.

Just like many Muslims do not consider the things they do to be hateful.

However, simply denying it belies the words and actions of Christians and Muslims, and it is obvious that the teachings of their religions are what motivates otherwise decent people to say and do hateful things.

 

[Underseer]

If atheism carried a strong group identity, tribalism and authoritarian bent to it, I'd be far more concerned. As it is, no, I'm really not. My only concern about speaking gently around Muslims is the Muslim crazies that have proved themselves to be incredibly thin skinned, and have flipped out and gone murderous over criticisms as tame as cartoons. And I would rather err on the side of insulting them than on the side of letting their bully tactics and threats prevail in shutting down criticism.

So the hate is OK as long as there isn't an authoritarian, patriarchal organization involved?

If that's OK, then you don't have a problem with hate coming from Muslims? Because they have nothing remotely resembling the Catholic patriarchy. Each mosque is an island (organizationally speaking). Muslims are only barely more organized than atheists.

 

[blastula]

Craig Stephen Hicks killed three people because they were Muslim.

I don't believe it's been proven he was motivated by their religion.

 

[Underseer]

Craig Stephen Hicks killed three people because they were Muslim.

I don't believe it's been proven he was motivated by their religion.

Yeah, that fact is in dispute.

Also, I'm not sure the guy who slashed that cab driver was atheist, although he definitely was motivated by hatred of Muslims.

Even if both cases were atheist and motivated by hatred of Muslims, that's still a sample size of only two and not enough to form any kind of a strong conclusion.

However, I'm still worried about the possibility. Too often in atheist discussion groups on the Internet, the rhetoric can be overly broad and heated. Too often the rhetoric is directed at the believers instead of the beliefs. I still worry about the possibility that as our numbers grow, our rhetoric could influence the target choices of those among us who happen to be insane.

 

[ronburgundy]

"Political correctness" and discussions about Islam

Back in the 2000s, many new atheists passionately argued about how political correctness prevented criticism of religion.

Honestly, before 9/11, there was a taboo against any criticism of religion. I don't think it was political correctness (I don't think political correctness is even a thing, other than a blanket excuse to change the subject any time someone gets caught being a bigot), but there very much was a taboo against criticism of religion.

I agree that there was a taboo and that the taboo was wrong. However, thanks to the new atheists in the previous decade, the taboo has more or less fallen away. Oh, theists still claim that all criticism of religion is wrong, but they will always say that. Among liberals (the supposed villains responsible for "political correctness"), the taboo against criticizing religion is pretty much gone. I can spew just about any atheist meme I want on my Facebook feed without a peep from any liberal friends.

The problem is that right-leaning atheists have latched on to those old arguments from the 2000s and insist that "political correctness" still exists and "prevents all criticism" of Islam by anyone at any time.

I don't see how anyone can still think this. None of the liberal circles I truck with give me any grief over any criticism I make of Christianity, Islam, religion in general, etc.

The problem should be obvious. Conservative politicians are openly arguing that we should deport all Muslims, or that we should refuse to allow any Muslim to immigrate here for any reason, or that we should let all the refugees die, etc. You know the drill, you've heard the arguments. Conservatives have even murdered Sikhs because they thought they were Muslim. Mosques face protests from right wing loonies making bizarre accusations barely connected to reality. So of course whenever conservatives do things like this, people accuse them of being bigots.

Like good little conservatives, they reflexively respond with accusations of "political correctness." They can't possibly be bigots because all accusations of bigotry are false and nothing more than people using "political correctness" to "silence their free speech rights."

Because of the Trump candidacy, I've been dealing with a lot of whining about "political correctness" from other atheists lately. I'm getting sick of all the "political correctness does not allow us to criticize Islam" memes on my Facebook feed from atheist groups. Any time Trump says something stupid and ignorant and bigoted about Muslims, you can bet you're going to see a lot of those memes from atheist Facebook groups.

I'm getting sick and tired of it, but I think we do need to have it out on this topic.


Theist treatment of homosexuals

To get into why I think this discussion is so important, I want to talk about Christian and Muslim prejudice against homosexuals.

Christianity and Islam both share blame for the recent shooting at that gay nightclub. Contrary to what people say, they did not directly cause that shooting. The vast majority of Christians and Muslims do not go around killing gay people. The Muslim who did was clearly a lunatic. The connection is that Christians and Muslims constantly spew hate at homosexuals. The shooter got anti-gay messages from home, from his mosque, and from the Christian-majority society outside his immediate circle. When Christians and Muslims constantly fan the fires of hate against homosexuals, it is inevitable that the lunatics among them will target homosexuals when they go crazy.

The vast majority of Christians and Muslims are able to process all of this hate without going on killing sprees. If Christianity and Islam did not create this environment of hate, Omar Mateen would probably still have gone on a killing spree, but the victims would probably been different. Maybe he would have shot up a post office. Maybe he would have shot up a local supermarket. Who knows? The man was crazy. However because of the environment of hate directed at homosexuals by both the Muslim and Christian communities, his choice of targets was more likely to involve gay people, and so he shot up a gay nightclub instead of a post office.

That's the connection. That's what makes Christianity and Islam at least partially responsible for that killing spree at a gay nightclub.


Atheist violence

We atheists can be proud that religiously-motivated violence is rare in our ranks, but we do have our own crazies. In any population, you're going to get crazies. That's just how it works. You can't avoid it. Unfortunately, the number of religiously-motivated attacks by atheists is not zero.

Craig Stephen Hicks killed three people because they were Muslim.

I'm pretty sure that Michael Enright (who slashed a cab driver's throat for saying he was Muslim) is an atheist, but I could be remembering that wrong.

The thing is, the few acts of religiously-motivated violence by atheists seem to involve Muslims as victims.

We atheists as a community spend an awful lot of time talking about how much we dislike Islam and how much worse Islam is than all the other religions (and in may ways it is). I cannot confidently connect anti-Muslim rhetoric among atheists to these violent incidents because, well, I have a sample size of only one or two. It's just not enough for a conclusion, is it?

But isn't it possible that all the time we spend talking about Islam in the way we do a contributing factor? I don't always watch my language when bad-mouthing Christians and Muslims. I try my best to criticize the ideas of those religions and not the people, but when I'm among atheists, I do not really check my language before spewing a diatribe. Not as much as I probably should.

What if we did create an environment in which the crazies among us were more likely to choose Muslim (or Christian if we're going to be honest about our language) victims when they go nuts?

I'm concerned because if the numbers stay the way they are, then some generation soon we are going to be in the majority (we already are in a few countries). If we get in the habit of spewing hate at theists in general or theists from certain religions, then eventually we will create an environment in which we make it more likely that the crazies among us choose certain targets based on our rhetoric. I would really rather we fix this before we become the majority. Mark Twain said "When you find yourself in the majority, it is time to pause and reflect," but why not be more proactive than that and start the reflection sooner?

For myself, I'm going to try more to criticize the ideas of religion and not the people, and when I talk to make it more clear that that is what I am doing. After all, I think of theists as victims. They are victims of a political control scheme whose original creators died a long time ago. As Peter Boghossian would say, they are the victims of a bad epistemology that warps their view of the world. I should do more to remember that while I hate the ideas of religion, its adherents are human beings and worthy of empathy.

Anyway, what do you think? Are we careful enough about criticizing ideas instead of people? Should we criticize ideas instead of people? Where is the line between criticizing bad ideas and being an asshole? If enough of us are assholes, could this influence the behavior of the crazies in our own community?

The taboo against criticizing religion is far from dead. We see all over this board, people go to great and irrational lengths to deny basic facts and logic in order to argue that religion is nothing but a symptom and plays no causal role in the harms attributed to it. That is still a pervasive idea in the culture, where religion is view as essentially harmless and thus it is either needless or outright cruel to upset people by criticizing beliefs they use to cope with life.
Sure, one can criticize specific religious leaders or specific actions done in the name of religion, but it is still widely unacceptable to argue the fundamental, core defining features of all faiths are inherently immoral, anti-liberty, and ant-thetical to moral and political progress. The entire notion that the harm of religion is confined to only when it is "perverted" is rooted in the ideological unwillingness to criticize the core elements of religion and faith.

However, that is not actually the sole or even primary taboo that drives leftist unwillingness to acknowledge the realities of Islam. That is more about their taboo against ever being critical of non-white "victims" of white Imperialist aggression. While they may use bullshit arguments about religion only being a symptom or only harmful when "perverted", that may not reflect how they honestly think about religion in general. It is just a rhetorical tactic used to deflect any blame from going anywhere other than towards the white-man's imperialism and US foreign policy. Those things do deserve blame for helping Islam to retain or increase its control over that region, but they did not change the nature of Islam which is inherently an authoritarian, anti-reason worldview rooted in fear and intolerance (just like Christianity).

As for Trump and right-wing conservative racists, they use "PC" as a meme to spread their views. However, their ability to do so is in large part because their is in fact real anti-reason leftist PC they can point to, and then pretend that anything they do or say against people that are Muslim is just going against PC.

Those atheists that are rationally wary of having 2% of a modern societies population, suddenly become the equivalent of Dark Ages mentality supporters of the Inquisition are not aligned with Trump and his arguments, and their critique of leftists for being blinded by PC ideology in acknowledging the dangers and problems with things like the Muslim immigration situation are valid.

 

[Underseer]

Did you actually read the post? The whole thing?...

Yes. And it's a very interesting and worthy Op.
But the thing which stands out like a sore thumb is that accusing Christians of having Orlando LGBTQIA blood on their hands incites hatred - hatred of Christians.

So if I point out that Christians are creating an environment of hate that increases the likelihood that homosexuals are killed, then therefore I am "inciting hatred" of Christians and should therefore not point out the negative consequences of what Christians are doing?

- - - Updated - - -

"Political correctness" and discussions about Islam

Back in the 2000s, many new atheists passionately argued about how political correctness prevented criticism of religion.

Honestly, before 9/11, there was a taboo against any criticism of religion. I don't think it was political correctness (I don't think political correctness is even a thing, other than a blanket excuse to change the subject any time someone gets caught being a bigot), but there very much was a taboo against criticism of religion.

I agree that there was a taboo and that the taboo was wrong. However, thanks to the new atheists in the previous decade, the taboo has more or less fallen away. Oh, theists still claim that all criticism of religion is wrong, but they will always say that. Among liberals (the supposed villains responsible for "political correctness"), the taboo against criticizing religion is pretty much gone. I can spew just about any atheist meme I want on my Facebook feed without a peep from any liberal friends.

The problem is that right-leaning atheists have latched on to those old arguments from the 2000s and insist that "political correctness" still exists and "prevents all criticism" of Islam by anyone at any time.

I don't see how anyone can still think this. None of the liberal circles I truck with give me any grief over any criticism I make of Christianity, Islam, religion in general, etc.

The problem should be obvious. Conservative politicians are openly arguing that we should deport all Muslims, or that we should refuse to allow any Muslim to immigrate here for any reason, or that we should let all the refugees die, etc. You know the drill, you've heard the arguments. Conservatives have even murdered Sikhs because they thought they were Muslim. Mosques face protests from right wing loonies making bizarre accusations barely connected to reality. So of course whenever conservatives do things like this, people accuse them of being bigots.

Like good little conservatives, they reflexively respond with accusations of "political correctness." They can't possibly be bigots because all accusations of bigotry are false and nothing more than people using "political correctness" to "silence their free speech rights."

Because of the Trump candidacy, I've been dealing with a lot of whining about "political correctness" from other atheists lately. I'm getting sick of all the "political correctness does not allow us to criticize Islam" memes on my Facebook feed from atheist groups. Any time Trump says something stupid and ignorant and bigoted about Muslims, you can bet you're going to see a lot of those memes from atheist Facebook groups.

I'm getting sick and tired of it, but I think we do need to have it out on this topic.


Theist treatment of homosexuals

To get into why I think this discussion is so important, I want to talk about Christian and Muslim prejudice against homosexuals.

Christianity and Islam both share blame for the recent shooting at that gay nightclub. Contrary to what people say, they did not directly cause that shooting. The vast majority of Christians and Muslims do not go around killing gay people. The Muslim who did was clearly a lunatic. The connection is that Christians and Muslims constantly spew hate at homosexuals. The shooter got anti-gay messages from home, from his mosque, and from the Christian-majority society outside his immediate circle. When Christians and Muslims constantly fan the fires of hate against homosexuals, it is inevitable that the lunatics among them will target homosexuals when they go crazy.

The vast majority of Christians and Muslims are able to process all of this hate without going on killing sprees. If Christianity and Islam did not create this environment of hate, Omar Mateen would probably still have gone on a killing spree, but the victims would probably been different. Maybe he would have shot up a post office. Maybe he would have shot up a local supermarket. Who knows? The man was crazy. However because of the environment of hate directed at homosexuals by both the Muslim and Christian communities, his choice of targets was more likely to involve gay people, and so he shot up a gay nightclub instead of a post office.

That's the connection. That's what makes Christianity and Islam at least partially responsible for that killing spree at a gay nightclub.


Atheist violence

We atheists can be proud that religiously-motivated violence is rare in our ranks, but we do have our own crazies. In any population, you're going to get crazies. That's just how it works. You can't avoid it. Unfortunately, the number of religiously-motivated attacks by atheists is not zero.

Craig Stephen Hicks killed three people because they were Muslim.

I'm pretty sure that Michael Enright (who slashed a cab driver's throat for saying he was Muslim) is an atheist, but I could be remembering that wrong.

The thing is, the few acts of religiously-motivated violence by atheists seem to involve Muslims as victims.

We atheists as a community spend an awful lot of time talking about how much we dislike Islam and how much worse Islam is than all the other religions (and in may ways it is). I cannot confidently connect anti-Muslim rhetoric among atheists to these violent incidents because, well, I have a sample size of only one or two. It's just not enough for a conclusion, is it?

But isn't it possible that all the time we spend talking about Islam in the way we do a contributing factor? I don't always watch my language when bad-mouthing Christians and Muslims. I try my best to criticize the ideas of those religions and not the people, but when I'm among atheists, I do not really check my language before spewing a diatribe. Not as much as I probably should.

What if we did create an environment in which the crazies among us were more likely to choose Muslim (or Christian if we're going to be honest about our language) victims when they go nuts?

I'm concerned because if the numbers stay the way they are, then some generation soon we are going to be in the majority (we already are in a few countries). If we get in the habit of spewing hate at theists in general or theists from certain religions, then eventually we will create an environment in which we make it more likely that the crazies among us choose certain targets based on our rhetoric. I would really rather we fix this before we become the majority. Mark Twain said "When you find yourself in the majority, it is time to pause and reflect," but why not be more proactive than that and start the reflection sooner?

For myself, I'm going to try more to criticize the ideas of religion and not the people, and when I talk to make it more clear that that is what I am doing. After all, I think of theists as victims. They are victims of a political control scheme whose original creators died a long time ago. As Peter Boghossian would say, they are the victims of a bad epistemology that warps their view of the world. I should do more to remember that while I hate the ideas of religion, its adherents are human beings and worthy of empathy.

Anyway, what do you think? Are we careful enough about criticizing ideas instead of people? Should we criticize ideas instead of people? Where is the line between criticizing bad ideas and being an asshole? If enough of us are assholes, could this influence the behavior of the crazies in our own community?

The taboo against criticizing religion is far from dead. We see all over this board, people go to great and irrational lengths to deny basic facts and logic in order to argue that religion is nothing but a symptom and plays no causal role in the harms attributed to it. That is still a pervasive idea in the culture, where religion is view as essentially harmless and thus it is either needless or outright cruel to upset people by criticizing beliefs they use to cope with life.
Sure, one can criticize specific religious leaders or specific actions done in the name of religion, but it is still widely unacceptable to argue the fundamental, core defining features of all faiths are inherently immoral, anti-liberty, and ant-thetical to moral and political progress. The entire notion that the harm of religion is confined to only when it is "perverted" is rooted in the ideological unwillingness to criticize the core elements of religion and faith.

However, that is not actually the sole or even primary taboo that drives leftist unwillingness to acknowledge the realities of Islam. That is more about their taboo against ever being critical of non-white "victims" of white Imperialist aggression. While they may use bullshit arguments about religion only being a symptom or only harmful when "perverted", that may not reflect how they honestly think about religion in general. It is just a rhetorical tactic used to deflect any blame from going anywhere other than towards the white-man's imperialism and US foreign policy. Those things do deserve blame for helping Islam to retain or increase its control over that region, but they did not change the nature of Islam which is inherently an authoritarian, anti-reason worldview rooted in fear and intolerance (just like Christianity).

As for Trump and right-wing conservative racists, they use "PC" as a meme to spread their views. However, their ability to do so is in large part because their is in fact real anti-reason leftist PC they can point to, and then pretend that anything they do or say against people that are Muslim is just going against PC.

Those atheists that are rationally wary of having 2% of a modern societies population, suddenly become the equivalent of Dark Ages mentality supporters of the Inquisition are not aligned with Trump and his arguments, and their critique of leftists for being blinded by PC ideology in acknowledging the dangers and problems with things like the Muslim immigration situation are valid.

Yes, there are still people arguing for the taboo. Namely, theists. Theists will always claim that criticizing religion is a taboo. That does not validate the view that "political correctness" (assuming that is even a thing) somehow "prevents" criticism of religion, and it certainly does not justify the kind of hatred that routinely gets spewed at religious minorities.

 

[Sea of red]

In my experience, 'political correctness' is just a slur used by people to excuse ignorant remarks, and protect them from criticism - ironically becoming an actual form of political correctness.

 

[Sea of red]

I don't believe it's been proven he was motivated by their religion.

Yeah, that fact is in dispute.

Also, I'm not sure the guy who slashed that cab driver was atheist, although he definitely was motivated by hatred of Muslims.

Even if both cases were atheist and motivated by hatred of Muslims, that's still a sample size of only two and not enough to form any kind of a strong conclusion.

However, I'm still worried about the possibility. Too often in atheist discussion groups on the Internet, the rhetoric can be overly broad and heated. Too often the rhetoric is directed at the believers instead of the beliefs. I still worry about the possibility that as our numbers grow, our rhetoric could influence the target choices of those among us who happen to be insane.

The atheist movement has gone off the rails a bit. Too many of the anti-theists (a term I don't like) act like the very religious fanatics we all loathe, and whenever you point out flaws in their logic, they can become very irrational. There is also a trend to incorporate other political philosophies that have nothing to do with secularism into atheist organizations, and that concerns me also. Secularism should be about keeping society religiously neutral, and keeping religious morality a private choice not to be imposed on the public.

 

[Angry Floof]

I agree with all the talk about being kinder, etc., etc. But today I had two religious believers land on my facebook page to carry out their religious programming in response to an article I posted that disputes most of what people believe about the history of Christianity. All they have contributed is snide remarks, tap dancing, moving goal posts, commenting on my personal shortcomings, and generally just being monkeys throwing poop because they can't or won't address the actual article and points. Their comments were starting to look like harassment and nothing more. I could not get any response from them on the actual topic.

It's very hard to be kind with this shit going on all the fucking time. Religion has turned them into fucking trained monkeys, programmed to punish the doubters.

 

[ronburgundy]

Yes. And it's a very interesting and worthy Op.
But the thing which stands out like a sore thumb is that accusing Christians of having Orlando LGBTQIA blood on their hands incites hatred - hatred of Christians.

So if I point out that Christians are creating an environment of hate that increases the likelihood that homosexuals are killed, then therefore I am "inciting hatred" of Christians and should therefore not point out the negative consequences of what Christians are doing?

- - - Updated - - -

"Political correctness" and discussions about Islam

Back in the 2000s, many new atheists passionately argued about how political correctness prevented criticism of religion.

Honestly, before 9/11, there was a taboo against any criticism of religion. I don't think it was political correctness (I don't think political correctness is even a thing, other than a blanket excuse to change the subject any time someone gets caught being a bigot), but there very much was a taboo against criticism of religion.

I agree that there was a taboo and that the taboo was wrong. However, thanks to the new atheists in the previous decade, the taboo has more or less fallen away. Oh, theists still claim that all criticism of religion is wrong, but they will always say that. Among liberals (the supposed villains responsible for "political correctness"), the taboo against criticizing religion is pretty much gone. I can spew just about any atheist meme I want on my Facebook feed without a peep from any liberal friends.

The problem is that right-leaning atheists have latched on to those old arguments from the 2000s and insist that "political correctness" still exists and "prevents all criticism" of Islam by anyone at any time.

I don't see how anyone can still think this. None of the liberal circles I truck with give me any grief over any criticism I make of Christianity, Islam, religion in general, etc.

The problem should be obvious. Conservative politicians are openly arguing that we should deport all Muslims, or that we should refuse to allow any Muslim to immigrate here for any reason, or that we should let all the refugees die, etc. You know the drill, you've heard the arguments. Conservatives have even murdered Sikhs because they thought they were Muslim. Mosques face protests from right wing loonies making bizarre accusations barely connected to reality. So of course whenever conservatives do things like this, people accuse them of being bigots.

Like good little conservatives, they reflexively respond with accusations of "political correctness." They can't possibly be bigots because all accusations of bigotry are false and nothing more than people using "political correctness" to "silence their free speech rights."

Because of the Trump candidacy, I've been dealing with a lot of whining about "political correctness" from other atheists lately. I'm getting sick of all the "political correctness does not allow us to criticize Islam" memes on my Facebook feed from atheist groups. Any time Trump says something stupid and ignorant and bigoted about Muslims, you can bet you're going to see a lot of those memes from atheist Facebook groups.

I'm getting sick and tired of it, but I think we do need to have it out on this topic.


Theist treatment of homosexuals

To get into why I think this discussion is so important, I want to talk about Christian and Muslim prejudice against homosexuals.

Christianity and Islam both share blame for the recent shooting at that gay nightclub. Contrary to what people say, they did not directly cause that shooting. The vast majority of Christians and Muslims do not go around killing gay people. The Muslim who did was clearly a lunatic. The connection is that Christians and Muslims constantly spew hate at homosexuals. The shooter got anti-gay messages from home, from his mosque, and from the Christian-majority society outside his immediate circle. When Christians and Muslims constantly fan the fires of hate against homosexuals, it is inevitable that the lunatics among them will target homosexuals when they go crazy.

The vast majority of Christians and Muslims are able to process all of this hate without going on killing sprees. If Christianity and Islam did not create this environment of hate, Omar Mateen would probably still have gone on a killing spree, but the victims would probably been different. Maybe he would have shot up a post office. Maybe he would have shot up a local supermarket. Who knows? The man was crazy. However because of the environment of hate directed at homosexuals by both the Muslim and Christian communities, his choice of targets was more likely to involve gay people, and so he shot up a gay nightclub instead of a post office.

That's the connection. That's what makes Christianity and Islam at least partially responsible for that killing spree at a gay nightclub.


Atheist violence

We atheists can be proud that religiously-motivated violence is rare in our ranks, but we do have our own crazies. In any population, you're going to get crazies. That's just how it works. You can't avoid it. Unfortunately, the number of religiously-motivated attacks by atheists is not zero.

Craig Stephen Hicks killed three people because they were Muslim.

I'm pretty sure that Michael Enright (who slashed a cab driver's throat for saying he was Muslim) is an atheist, but I could be remembering that wrong.

The thing is, the few acts of religiously-motivated violence by atheists seem to involve Muslims as victims.

We atheists as a community spend an awful lot of time talking about how much we dislike Islam and how much worse Islam is than all the other religions (and in may ways it is). I cannot confidently connect anti-Muslim rhetoric among atheists to these violent incidents because, well, I have a sample size of only one or two. It's just not enough for a conclusion, is it?

But isn't it possible that all the time we spend talking about Islam in the way we do a contributing factor? I don't always watch my language when bad-mouthing Christians and Muslims. I try my best to criticize the ideas of those religions and not the people, but when I'm among atheists, I do not really check my language before spewing a diatribe. Not as much as I probably should.

What if we did create an environment in which the crazies among us were more likely to choose Muslim (or Christian if we're going to be honest about our language) victims when they go nuts?

I'm concerned because if the numbers stay the way they are, then some generation soon we are going to be in the majority (we already are in a few countries). If we get in the habit of spewing hate at theists in general or theists from certain religions, then eventually we will create an environment in which we make it more likely that the crazies among us choose certain targets based on our rhetoric. I would really rather we fix this before we become the majority. Mark Twain said "When you find yourself in the majority, it is time to pause and reflect," but why not be more proactive than that and start the reflection sooner?

For myself, I'm going to try more to criticize the ideas of religion and not the people, and when I talk to make it more clear that that is what I am doing. After all, I think of theists as victims. They are victims of a political control scheme whose original creators died a long time ago. As Peter Boghossian would say, they are the victims of a bad epistemology that warps their view of the world. I should do more to remember that while I hate the ideas of religion, its adherents are human beings and worthy of empathy.

Anyway, what do you think? Are we careful enough about criticizing ideas instead of people? Should we criticize ideas instead of people? Where is the line between criticizing bad ideas and being an asshole? If enough of us are assholes, could this influence the behavior of the crazies in our own community?

The taboo against criticizing religion is far from dead. We see all over this board, people go to great and irrational lengths to deny basic facts and logic in order to argue that religion is nothing but a symptom and plays no causal role in the harms attributed to it. That is still a pervasive idea in the culture, where religion is view as essentially harmless and thus it is either needless or outright cruel to upset people by criticizing beliefs they use to cope with life.
Sure, one can criticize specific religious leaders or specific actions done in the name of religion, but it is still widely unacceptable to argue the fundamental, core defining features of all faiths are inherently immoral, anti-liberty, and ant-thetical to moral and political progress. The entire notion that the harm of religion is confined to only when it is "perverted" is rooted in the ideological unwillingness to criticize the core elements of religion and faith.

However, that is not actually the sole or even primary taboo that drives leftist unwillingness to acknowledge the realities of Islam. That is more about their taboo against ever being critical of non-white "victims" of white Imperialist aggression. While they may use bullshit arguments about religion only being a symptom or only harmful when "perverted", that may not reflect how they honestly think about religion in general. It is just a rhetorical tactic used to deflect any blame from going anywhere other than towards the white-man's imperialism and US foreign policy. Those things do deserve blame for helping Islam to retain or increase its control over that region, but they did not change the nature of Islam which is inherently an authoritarian, anti-reason worldview rooted in fear and intolerance (just like Christianity).

As for Trump and right-wing conservative racists, they use "PC" as a meme to spread their views. However, their ability to do so is in large part because their is in fact real anti-reason leftist PC they can point to, and then pretend that anything they do or say against people that are Muslim is just going against PC.

Those atheists that are rationally wary of having 2% of a modern societies population, suddenly become the equivalent of Dark Ages mentality supporters of the Inquisition are not aligned with Trump and his arguments, and their critique of leftists for being blinded by PC ideology in acknowledging the dangers and problems with things like the Muslim immigration situation are valid.

Yes, there are still people arguing for the taboo. Namely, theists. Theists will always claim that criticizing religion is a taboo. That does not validate the view that "political correctness" (assuming that is even a thing) somehow "prevents" criticism of religion, and it certainly does not justify the kind of hatred that routinely gets spewed at religious minorities.

We are agreed that the right-wing racist hatred that uses critiques against Islam as cover while failing to see the same inherent dangers of Christianity is unjustified.

Where we disagree is I think it is equally unjustified (and equally or more common) for many on the left to ignore or deny the dangers of religions, especially when and because they are held by minority groups.

Many leftists who are NOT themselves strong theists still support the taboo against criticizing religion. Many of them are in the post-modernist anti-science camp, such as those who make bullshit arguments about science and religion being separate but equal "ways of knowing". Others romanticize pre-modern cultures (and are often hostile to modernism) and since such culture are often dominated by pre-scientific relgious worldviews, they romanticize those as well, treating modern science as a form of intellectual western imperialism. That kind of soft-minded bullshit is rampant on the left and tends to breed a resistance to open, honest, and thus critical analyses of the dangers of religion.

Mingled with that general post-modern sensibility toward spiritualism is often the political agenda of trying to make whitey the bad guy responsible for all wrongs, which results in double standards and special efforts to excuse wrongs committed by minorities that the narrative says are the victims. This manifests as denial of objective dangers and wrongs of religions practiced by those minority groups.

Both right-wing and left-wing efforts to engage in irrational bias (against and in favor of, respectively) minority religions help to fuel each other. Meaning that irrational and biased left is partly to blame for the rise of Trump and his counter irrational bias. Meanwhile, rational critique of Islam and minority religions gets ignored, lost, or tossed into the same bin as Trumpian racism by leftists seeking to dismiss such criticisms.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

If atheism carried a strong group identity, tribalism and authoritarian bent to it, I'd be far more concerned. As it is, no, I'm really not. My only concern about speaking gently around Muslims is the Muslim crazies that have proved themselves to be incredibly thin skinned, and have flipped out and gone murderous over criticisms as tame as cartoons. And I would rather err on the side of insulting them than on the side of letting their bully tactics and threats prevail in shutting down criticism.

So the hate is OK as long as there isn't an authoritarian, patriarchal organization involved?

If that's OK, then you don't have a problem with hate coming from Muslims? Because they have nothing remotely resembling the Catholic patriarchy. Each mosque is an island (organizationally speaking). Muslims are only barely more organized than atheists.

Islam is INCREDIBLY authoritarian. The whole thing is based on full submission to perceived authority, in the form of Allah. I have had numerous conversations with numerous Muslims who completely prioritize obedience to this Allah over any internal sense of empathy or fairness or other true morality. Tribalism also runs rampant in Islam, as in most religions. We see some of that in atheists, but far far less. The odds of an atheist reading something some other atheist wrote, and then going batshit crazy and murdering people is very very slim.

As for hurt feelings of Muslims, yes, that is a concern, because many are prone to be very thin skinned and far more will react violently than atheists will when their ideology is questioned or "insulted". But I say this is a risk worth taking, and indeed one that has to be taken. We can't let Islam bully its way into silencing its critics.

 

[Sea of red]

I agree with all the talk about being kinder, etc., etc. But today I had two religious believers land on my facebook page to carry out their religious programming in response to an article I posted that disputes most of what people believe about the history of Christianity. All they have contributed is snide remarks, tap dancing, moving goal posts, commenting on my personal shortcomings, and generally just being monkeys throwing poop because they can't or won't address the actual article and points. Their comments were starting to look like harassment and nothing more. I could not get any response from them on the actual topic.

It's very hard to be kind with this shit going on all the fucking time. Religion has turned them into fucking trained monkeys, programmed to punish the doubters.

Your best option is to ignore their posts and ban them from your wall. They will never educate themselves; everybody else is the problem. You'll waste a lot of time like I did (until recently) if you try to reason with them. I know they can be frustrating little fuckers but it's the best choice.

If they're going to have a complex about being marginalized in society, why not do the Christian thing, and reinforce that idea for them?