Vitriolic hatred of religion

[southernhybrid]

The opposite extreme might be Unitarians who promote social justice as a group, or how they open their doors to offer holiday dinner to the lonely in the community etc. Just because they are both forms of religion, doesn't mean they have anything in common. One promotes a narrow minded mythology that can promote violence under certain circumstances, and that also distances itself from anything resembling reality. The other promotes diversity, generosity and justice, while not taking any one set of myths too literally. It's hard for me to imagine a UU willing to kill or die for religion. I just don't think it's fair to put all of religion into one basket and then label it based on the worst parts. I guess we just see things from a different perspective.

But it's not necessarily a bad thing to be prepared to kill for your religion. Religion is fundamentally to be part of something greater than yourself, and you use some abstract symbol to bind yourself together. You create a story, and myths and aspirational behaviours. Perhaps a uniform clothing? Maybe hats? This is the kind of thinking that allowed the Allies to defeat Hitler in WW2. I'd say that was a good thing.

I don't see much difference between religion, nationalism, ideology, sports team supporting, being a punk rocker. They're all similar movements with similar results, they activate large groups of people towards shared goals. Which is essentially what civilisation is all about.

It would be very difficult for me to agree with the first part of your post, as I've been anti war my entire adult life. Perhaps there have been times when wars seemed necessary, but most of those who go to war have no intention of sacrificing themselves. I certainly can't imagine sacrificing oneself for a religion. I'd have to think long and hard about your claim.

The second part of your post makes sense. As I've mentioned in this thread before, I think that all human ideologies are mythological in nature. There is no pure truth in anything that humans make up or believe. Even science changes as new evidence comes available. This is especially true of medical science, an area that I'm very familiar with due to my past career. There is no perfect form of government. There is no perfect financial system. It's all based on wishful thinking. One of the biggest myths that American children are taught to believe is that we live in the greatest country on earth. We humans thrive on myths. That can be beneficial or harmful depending on circumstances.

 

[DrZoidberg]

The opposite extreme might be Unitarians who promote social justice as a group, or how they open their doors to offer holiday dinner to the lonely in the community etc. Just because they are both forms of religion, doesn't mean they have anything in common. One promotes a narrow minded mythology that can promote violence under certain circumstances, and that also distances itself from anything resembling reality. The other promotes diversity, generosity and justice, while not taking any one set of myths too literally. It's hard for me to imagine a UU willing to kill or die for religion. I just don't think it's fair to put all of religion into one basket and then label it based on the worst parts. I guess we just see things from a different perspective.

But it's not necessarily a bad thing to be prepared to kill for your religion. Religion is fundamentally to be part of something greater than yourself, and you use some abstract symbol to bind yourself together. You create a story, and myths and aspirational behaviours. Perhaps a uniform clothing? Maybe hats? This is the kind of thinking that allowed the Allies to defeat Hitler in WW2. I'd say that was a good thing.

I don't see much difference between religion, nationalism, ideology, sports team supporting, being a punk rocker. They're all similar movements with similar results, they activate large groups of people towards shared goals. Which is essentially what civilisation is all about.

It would be very difficult for me to agree with the first part of your post, as I've been anti war my entire adult life. Perhaps there have been times when wars seemed necessary, but most of those who go to war have no intention of sacrificing themselves. I certainly can't imagine sacrificing oneself for a religion. I'd have to think long and hard about your claim.

We do have professional soldiers on this forum. So we won't need to speculate too long about what motivates a soldier. But I think you are wrong. I think all soldiers are prepared to die on the job. It's a part of what it means to be a man, let alone soldier. A man not willing to fight to the death to protect his loved ones and closest tribe... I mean... nobody would respect such a man. Nobody. We just take it for granted as true. I think it's pretty hardwired into the male brain. That's my experience anyway.

But being anti-war isn't actually to be anti-war. You're still for war. You're just for allowing those more powerful than you push you around and take your stuff. People who truly are anti-war invest heavily in weapons and having an effective army, as well as building alliances with others with a similar idea, and then be very aggressive when anybody is out of line. That's how to create peace. Pacifists have always only made the world increasingly dangerous and unstable. I think we should stop calling them anti-war because their behaviour only encourages others to be more aggressive, leading to more war.

The second part of your post makes sense. As I've mentioned in this thread before, I think that all human ideologies are mythological in nature. There is no pure truth in anything that humans make up or believe. Even science changes as new evidence comes available. This is especially true of medical science, an area that I'm very familiar with due to my past career. There is no perfect form of government. There is no perfect financial system. It's all based on wishful thinking. One of the biggest myths that American children are taught to believe is that we live in the greatest country on earth. We humans thrive on myths. That can be beneficial or harmful depending on circumstances.

Isn't every child taught that their nation is the greatest on Earth? It's the secret sauce that keeps nations together.

I actually do think there is a perfect form of government. Just as the perfect science is a science that adapts and changes depending on available evidence. So the perfect form of government adapts and changes depending on needs. Which is democracy. While not actually perfect. It is as perfect as it's ever going to get IMHO.

I have a friend who's political identity is "Hegelian". Ie, whatever works is what we should be doing. He picks the best from the left. He picks the best from the right. And ignores tribalism is political dichotomies. More should do that.

 

[ronburgundy]

I think the kind of purely emotional reactionary hatred of religion does exist as described in the OP and can be a short-lived transitional phase. However, I think there is also a more intellectually grounded disdain for religion rooted in reasoned understanding of the inherent harm done by authoritarian monotheism rooted in irrational faith. The latter is more long term and sustained b/c the more knowledge one gains about religion and it's historical and current impact on society the more negative and harmful religion looks. I'd argue that someone like Dawkins is the latter and that most so called "militant atheism" is mostly just honest, rational, and warranted objections to the intellectual and moral that religion does.

I was raised moderate Congregational protestant, then my dad remarried to a Catholic and I was forced to attend a Catholic school in 6th grade (until I got kicked out), and attend Catholic mass and go to "youth groups". I consciously rejected Christianity in my mid teens based a little bit on finding it absurd, but mostly b/c I thought it's teachings were bigoted and immoral. I remember also thinking that the Jesus cursing the fig tree b/c it had no fruit made Jesus look rather petty and narcissistic. For the first 5 years or so (till early 20's), I didn't really focus much energy on Christianity but rather looked into other religions and philosophies (Taoism, Buddhism, Native American spiritualism). Although I found eastern philosophies far more appealing than monotheism, I ultimately realized that I didn't need or buy into any form of "spiritualism". In the 25 years since I studied history, politics, and human psychology and behavior and began to understand more and more the negative impact of monotheism and faith-based epistemology on forms of human progress (intellectual, political, moral). As I became more politically aware and active, social progress became more important to me and thus the enemies of progress (of which religion is one of the greatest) came into sharper relief. This is reinforced by the fact that I am well aware of the empirical data that links degree of Abrahamic religiosity to many negative elements of society, from climate change denial to misogyny, homophobia, racism, and authoritarian disdain for real democracy. And these things are not some abuse or distortion of Abrahamic religion, but an inherent byproduct of it's core assumptions and values within it's founding doctrines. The negative association between level of religiosity and these negative social/psychological forces is reliably observed whether doing comparisons between individuals within a single community, within a community over time, between different communities or US states, between types of regions (urban/rural), or between countries there are a reliable association.

Sure, most of what you have said has some basis in truth, imo, but do you honestly find liberal versions of religion to be harmful? Take Politesse, as an example of someone who enjoys liberal religion. Hope he doesn't mind mentioning him. He has labeled himself an agnostic Christian, finds some enjoyment in a variety of religions, and has mentioned that he attends or has attended a UU fellowship, which gave me the impression that he's inclined to like the principles of Unitarianism. I don't see that type of religious belief as the least bit harmful. In fact, I see it as beneficial for many people. I cold easily fit in with a UU fellowship, assuming it was a very diverse one, including diversity of belief. I have never lived near one, so it's not a possibility, but I do like Unitarianism in principle. I do see some value in some of the myths that humans have created. And, to be very honest, I don't understand why some atheists put that variety of religion in the same pot as the more conservative, extremist versions of religion.

And, there are so many good, loving, generous, religious believers, there must be some benefit that they receive from their collection of myths. I'm not making the claim that religion always reflects or influences one's morality, but I do think it can in either a positive or negative way. Just look at the crazed evangelical Christians/QAnon idiots who invaded the US capital building on January 6th. That would be an example of the negative impact of extremist religion.

The opposite extreme might be Unitarians who promote social justice as a group, or how they open their doors to offer holiday dinner to the lonely in the community etc. Just because they are both forms of religion, doesn't mean they have anything in common. One promotes a narrow minded mythology that can promote violence under certain circumstances, and that also distances itself from anything resembling reality. The other promotes diversity, generosity and justice, while not taking any one set of myths too literally. It's hard for me to imagine a UU willing to kill or die for religion. I just don't think it's fair to put all of religion into one basket and then label it based on the worst parts. I guess we just see things from a different perspective.

Much of "moderate religion" isn't actually religion, just people unwilling to give up an empty label that has no correspondence to one's actual ideas, beliefs, values, etc.. If an agnostic can be a "Christian" then the word is nothing but a meaningless string of letters and doesn't refer to an actual thing, thus cannot be positive or negative.

One thing that "moderate" religionists do often do is provide cover for the harms of religion. Their desire to maintain some of the trappings and veneer of religion leads them to deny inherently harmful aspects of it's core doctrines. The denial that faith is the inherent enemy of reason and thus of progress is one example. The Bible explicitly promotes unreason, denial of evidence and knowledge in favor of biased emotionalism. There are numerous passages that do this directly, plus it does so implicitly since theism is impossible unless reason is suppressed. Even without any of the other harms of the God of Abraham, that makes faith (and any ideology that promotes or defends it) harmful to progress in every area, intellectual, political, and moral. Morality depends upon reason b/c the application of principled values to actual situations requires knowing the objective consequences of various acts and applying reason link those consequences to values. It is impossible to avoid harm to others if you willfully deny evidence of consequences, which makes reliance on faith in and of itself an immoral act.

Then there is the authoritarianism that is inherent to core concept of the creator god in monotheism from which all morals and ethics are assumed to flow. The Bible (and Koran) both promote such an authority, and thus promote authoritarianism and theocracy, which is why countless studies show that those who most read the Bible and say they apply religion to daily life support anti-democratic, anti-civil liberty theocratic policies. Any "moderate" who lends any credence to the Bible as anything but pure fiction written by no so noble or ethical men is increasing it's impact and thus causing harm.

 

[ronburgundy]

The opposite extreme might be Unitarians who promote social justice as a group, or how they open their doors to offer holiday dinner to the lonely in the community etc. Just because they are both forms of religion, doesn't mean they have anything in common. One promotes a narrow minded mythology that can promote violence under certain circumstances, and that also distances itself from anything resembling reality. The other promotes diversity, generosity and justice, while not taking any one set of myths too literally. It's hard for me to imagine a UU willing to kill or die for religion. I just don't think it's fair to put all of religion into one basket and then label it based on the worst parts. I guess we just see things from a different perspective.

But it's not necessarily a bad thing to be prepared to kill for your religion. Religion is fundamentally to be part of something greater than yourself, and you use some abstract symbol to bind yourself together. You create a story, and myths and aspirational behaviours. Perhaps a uniform clothing? Maybe hats? This is the kind of thinking that allowed the Allies to defeat Hitler in WW2. I'd say that was a good thing.

I don't see much difference between religion, nationalism, ideology, sports team supporting, being a punk rocker. They're all similar movements with similar results, they activate large groups of people towards shared goals. Which is essentially what civilisation is all about.

Monotheism is authoritarian. Thus, monotheism means the goals are not "shared" by forced upon the followers by centralized authorities who claim to be the conduit to the one ultimate unquestionable and unelected authority. Uniting with people based on an actual common caused arrived at via free non-coerced evaluation of one's interests is good. Having the promotion of the association itself be the cause and determine what the "shared interests" are is not good, especially when belonging to the association is coerced and based upon lies and threats in the name of authoritarian obedience.

In a context, such as pre-civilization or on the front lines of a military battle, where there is an immediate external threat to a group of people that is equally shared by the authorities and the followers, then sure authoritarian loyalty can be effective. But that is the same argument for having an authoritarian dictatorship over a constitutional democracy with protected individual rights. Dictatorships can be useful, which we see even now with which countries have had more success in defeating and vaccinating against COVID. The difference between dictatorships and democracy maps on almost perfectly to the difference between monotheism vs. secularism on a cultural level. Morally and politically society had made little progress in 13 or so centuries under Christian dominance. In fact, it was less progressive than that of ancient Greece. Every form of exponential progress in the West over the past few centuries is a predictable result of the Enlightenment-based declining influence of Abrahamic religion on government, culture and and the ideas and actions of individuals.

In fact, relating back to southernhybrid's comments on "Moderate religion", that only exists b/c of the larger secualurism which serves as an external force that keeps religion from the extremism that is inherent to it. Dogma ungrounded by facts and reason (aka faith) with an unelected authority from which all ethics and power flows is inherently extreme and can only be sustained by suppression of reason and of the unfaithful who raise doubts and challenges that cannot be countered except by force and coercion. Islam is no more extreme and shares identical core ideas and values with Christianity. The seeming greater "moderation" of Christian majority countries compared to Islam majority countries is that the Enlightenment put restraints upon religion politically and ignited a reason-based secularism that restrains Christianity culturally and caused most of it's "adherents" to be doubtful and give very little weight to it's core doctrines or leaders, often being no more Christian in any way other than still checking that box they were trained to when asked.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

We do have professional soldiers on this forum. So we won't need to speculate too long about what motivates a soldier. But I think you are wrong. I think all soldiers are prepared to die on the job. It's a part of what it means to be a man, let alone soldier. A man not willing to fight to the death to protect his loved ones and closest tribe... I mean... nobody would respect such a man. Nobody. We just take it for granted as true. I think it's pretty hardwired into the male brain. That's my experience anyway.

Presently, most professional military are in it for the money. They may stay in for the money. It also looks okay on a job app and is a good gig to learn new skills and mature a bit. That was my experience and it was widely shared by the majority when I was in uniform.

As for putting themselves in harm's way, that's the job they're paid to do, everyone is told they're expendable in that sense, and the more dangerous the theater the more pay they get. One needn't be military to protect family or act nobly in a given situation, as many people do regularly.

 

[Keith&Co.]

I think all soldiers are prepared to die on the job.

Holy Christ, no we're not. A major point of our training and our procedures are to PREVENT dying on the job.
We're conditioned to kill the Other Guy, but we're constantly assured that we'll get out of the casualty, the battle, the shootout.

Maybe you didn't notice Trump's attempt to console a widow of one of 'his' soldiers. "He knew what he was getting into."
And the military's response to his hamfisted assumption of fatalism?

What we do, to be manly, is face understandable risks. Jumping out of airplanes looks CRAZY dangerous, but by the time Army Airborne does it, they're cognizant of the risks, and the steps taken to minimize them, and are pretty confident they'll survive, even if dropped into a war.
Riding a submarine down to 400 feet and staying there looks crazy dangerous, claustrophobic, dark, but by the time we get there, we're trained on all the risks AND all the ways to deal with them and get back to port. We're pretty confident that we'll survive, even if in conflict with another warship.

We've seen the movies where the guy throws himself onto a grenade to save the unit, or closes himself in the flooded compartment to save the ship, but those are special and unique situations. And dying for our comrades is completely apart from dying for the cause.

 

[Politesse]

Much of "moderate religion" isn't actually religion, just people unwilling to give up an empty label that has no correspondence to one's actual ideas, beliefs, values, etc.. If an agnostic can be a "Christian" then the word is nothing but a meaningless string of letters and doesn't refer to an actual thing, thus cannot be positive or negative.

I do not agree. Agnostics are more likely to carefully consider the meaning of their beliefs, not less. If you are critical of the limits of human knowledge, it is an inherent motivator to apply reason and creativity to your explorations of the universe. A considered faith is more meaningful than a bunch of recited nonsense, not less. If you ask me a question about my faith or religious practice, I don't just have an answer as to "what", but also a "how" and a "why". How is a more evolved and considerd perspective less meaningful than some stuff you were taught as a toddler?

One thing that "moderate" religionists do often do is provide cover for the harms of religion.

By opposing those harms, calling them out in the public sphere and trying to change them? You rail against the supposed unreason of Christianity in the rest of this paragraph, but also complain about those trying to apply reason. Presumably because they don't agree with you about the correct conclusion of reason. But such an unthinking attitude is not the path to reason. If your reason only applies to those who believe as you do, than it is not reason at all, for reason is objective by definition. If you cannot make your case to me despite our different religious perspectives but rather insist that I must agree with you out the gate or be accused of "helping your enemies" somehow by not being on your team, than you are not engaging in reasonable discourse, but rather rhetoric. Another noble and ancient art, but not the one you claim to aspire to.

Then there is the authoritarianism that is inherent to core concept of the creator god in monotheism from which all morals and ethics are assumed to flow. The Bible (and Koran) both promote such an authority, and thus promote authoritarianism and theocracy, which is why countless studies show that those who most read the Bible and say they apply religion to daily life support anti-democratic, anti-civil liberty theocratic policies. Any "moderate" who lends any credence to the Bible as anything but pure fiction written by no so noble or ethical men is increasing it's impact and thus causing harm.

I am anti-authoritarian to the core. Believing that there is a fundamental principle in this universe is not a synonym for supporting human tyrants. I do not agree with your read of Scripture, and would not care if you did, because I do not advocate for textual literalism in the way that you do. You say that I am supporting the fundamentalists by sharing a faith with them. But you are sharing a hermeneutic with them, amd elevating their teachings as the "inherent core" of religious society. How is that supposed to oppose them? No one ever changed their mind because a stranger said "I think everything you believe is wrong and evil, and even the things you are right about shouldn't count because you have the wrong label attached to you when you say them. Whereas "I think we have some common ground, but here's where I see a flaw in your reasoning" can actually get you somewhere.

Vitriol is worse than useless; it poisons your own mind much more than it effectively combats the errors that might exist in someone else's. I find southernhybrid's logic, tolerance and kindness to be a far more alluring case for the plausibility of atheism than your partisan bluster.

 

[abaddon]

... I think that all human ideologies are mythological in nature. There is no pure truth in anything that humans make up or believe .... We humans thrive on myths. That can be beneficial or harmful depending on circumstances.

Exactly. The discourse on religions should include more open talk about good versus bad stories. Too often atheists go on about "facts" as if all the facts are on the side of secularism when it's largely an issue of values. How simplistic the dichotomy is shows in how they repeatedly have to paint religion in black/white terms - always referencing fundies as the archetypal example of all "religion".

Ultimately it's story versus story. But not all stories are created equal.

I'm ok with religions that support valuing all the life here on earth. It's a highly motivating way to protect what matters, when you identify with, love, venerate a good thing. I don't think that that needs to be encased in religiosity. But I don't care if it is. The religiosity is a problem if it's devoted to something hateful of earthly life.

Supernatural monotheism isn't one of the better stories. It strips the value from the world and assigns it to a spirit realm. Then when some people ("secularists") stop valuing spirit realms, the world comes to seem "absurd" (void of meaning) to them and they don't know of anything to value other than themselves - "humanity". Nature as a hostile other that's distinct from "humanity" and thus needs to be domesticated by the "rational" animal, is a variant on the judeo-christian myth of a fallen world there for humans to subjugate. The ugly tale about minded (valuable) humans and mindless (not-valuable) nature doesn't come to us from science, it comes to the "scientific worldview" from ancient cultures that split the world into spirit and matter and then valued spirit but devalued matter.

We live by either a good story or a bad story. The science vs religion debate is actually a cultural war over stories. And both of those stories are bad stories. The solution is to improve our stories (our cultural narratives). To fight for one sick story (technical efficiency for the benefit of humans-only) in order to destroy the other story ('the sacred' exists but it's outside this world) wouldn't be an improvement. We need better stories... maybe preferably religious ones for their powerful ability to motivate.

The most pragmatic solution for those who find supernaturalist myths to be deranged is to encourage believers to modify such stories to something more life-affirming, rather than always misrepresenting it as a true/false choice.

 

[DrZoidberg]

The opposite extreme might be Unitarians who promote social justice as a group, or how they open their doors to offer holiday dinner to the lonely in the community etc. Just because they are both forms of religion, doesn't mean they have anything in common. One promotes a narrow minded mythology that can promote violence under certain circumstances, and that also distances itself from anything resembling reality. The other promotes diversity, generosity and justice, while not taking any one set of myths too literally. It's hard for me to imagine a UU willing to kill or die for religion. I just don't think it's fair to put all of religion into one basket and then label it based on the worst parts. I guess we just see things from a different perspective.

But it's not necessarily a bad thing to be prepared to kill for your religion. Religion is fundamentally to be part of something greater than yourself, and you use some abstract symbol to bind yourself together. You create a story, and myths and aspirational behaviours. Perhaps a uniform clothing? Maybe hats? This is the kind of thinking that allowed the Allies to defeat Hitler in WW2. I'd say that was a good thing.

I don't see much difference between religion, nationalism, ideology, sports team supporting, being a punk rocker. They're all similar movements with similar results, they activate large groups of people towards shared goals. Which is essentially what civilisation is all about.

Monotheism is authoritarian. Thus, monotheism means the goals are not "shared" by forced upon the followers by centralized authorities who claim to be the conduit to the one ultimate unquestionable and unelected authority. Uniting with people based on an actual common caused arrived at via free non-coerced evaluation of one's interests is good. Having the promotion of the association itself be the cause and determine what the "shared interests" are is not good, especially when belonging to the association is coerced and based upon lies and threats in the name of authoritarian obedience.

In a context, such as pre-civilization or on the front lines of a military battle, where there is an immediate external threat to a group of people that is equally shared by the authorities and the followers, then sure authoritarian loyalty can be effective. But that is the same argument for having an authoritarian dictatorship over a constitutional democracy with protected individual rights. Dictatorships can be useful, which we see even now with which countries have had more success in defeating and vaccinating against COVID. The difference between dictatorships and democracy maps on almost perfectly to the difference between monotheism vs. secularism on a cultural level. Morally and politically society had made little progress in 13 or so centuries under Christian dominance. In fact, it was less progressive than that of ancient Greece. Every form of exponential progress in the West over the past few centuries is a predictable result of the Enlightenment-based declining influence of Abrahamic religion on government, culture and and the ideas and actions of individuals.

In fact, relating back to southernhybrid's comments on "Moderate religion", that only exists b/c of the larger secualurism which serves as an external force that keeps religion from the extremism that is inherent to it. Dogma ungrounded by facts and reason (aka faith) with an unelected authority from which all ethics and power flows is inherently extreme and can only be sustained by suppression of reason and of the unfaithful who raise doubts and challenges that cannot be countered except by force and coercion. Islam is no more extreme and shares identical core ideas and values with Christianity. The seeming greater "moderation" of Christian majority countries compared to Islam majority countries is that the Enlightenment put restraints upon religion politically and ignited a reason-based secularism that restrains Christianity culturally and caused most of it's "adherents" to be doubtful and give very little weight to it's core doctrines or leaders, often being no more Christian in any way other than still checking that box they were trained to when asked.

I agree with all of this. But you're still leaving out an important dimension. Power and military might. I think this picture demonstrates what the problem is.



Authoritarian regimes and ideologies are great at motivating their followers to sacrifice everything for the greater goal and to commit extreme acts of violence.

Theocratic extremist loons against secular atheist rationalists is not a fair fight. With all things equal the atheists will lose. We won't fight as hard. We understand what we have to lose. Just like a business owner can't win against the maffia. The maffia doesn't win because they are stronger, because they aren't. They win because they are willing to sacrifice everything and anything to win.

It's a problem. We secularists need to create a story where we too can become unthinking death machines, when needed to. Or we won't stand a chance. In the long run.

I agree with Alain de Botton. Secularists suffer the delusion that the salvation of humanity is dependent on one thing only, more information or access to more information. As the information itself will enlighten these militant extremists.

Worth noting is that enlightened peace loving atheist secularism can only exist in a society with affluence. It can only exist in a society where you don't need to worry about food or your personal security. If your basic needs aren't being met or is under threat of being met, people turn extremist and violent at the drop of a hat. That's why we have wars in the world. That's the only reason. Nobody goes to war for fun.

It's when people are under a perceived existential threat they turn to authoritarianism. I think.

 

[GenesisNemesis]

... I think that all human ideologies are mythological in nature. There is no pure truth in anything that humans make up or believe .... We humans thrive on myths. That can be beneficial or harmful depending on circumstances.

Exactly. The discourse on religions should include more open talk about good versus bad stories. Too often atheists go on about "facts" as if all the facts are on the side of secularism when it's largely an issue of values. How simplistic the dichotomy is shows in how they repeatedly have to paint religion in black/white terms - always referencing fundies as the archetypal example of all "religion".

Ultimately it's story versus story. But not all stories are created equal.

I'm ok with religions that support valuing all the life here on earth. It's a highly motivating way to protect what matters, when you identify with, love, venerate a good thing. I don't think that that needs to be encased in religiosity. But I don't care if it is. The religiosity is a problem if it's devoted to something hateful of earthly life.

Supernatural monotheism isn't one of the better stories. It strips the value from the world and assigns it to a spirit realm. Then when some people ("secularists") stop valuing spirit realms, the world comes to seem "absurd" (void of meaning) to them and they don't know of anything to value other than themselves - "humanity". Nature as a hostile other that's distinct from "humanity" and thus needs to be domesticated by the "rational" animal, is a variant on the judeo-christian myth of a fallen world there for humans to subjugate. The ugly tale about minded (valuable) humans and mindless (not-valuable) nature doesn't come to us from science, it comes to the "scientific worldview" from ancient cultures that split the world into spirit and matter and then valued spirit but devalued matter.

We live by either a good story or a bad story. The science vs religion debate is actually a cultural war over stories. And both of those stories are bad stories. The solution is to improve our stories (our cultural narratives). To fight for one sick story (technical efficiency for the benefit of humans-only) in order to destroy the other story ('the sacred' exists but it's outside this world) wouldn't be an improvement. We need better stories... maybe preferably religious ones for their powerful ability to motivate.

The most pragmatic solution for those who find supernaturalist myths to be deranged is to encourage believers to modify such stories to something more life-affirming, rather than always misrepresenting it as a true/false choice.

There are claims like "ALL ATHEISTS ARE EVIL" that are just objectively false on their face. That's not hard to disprove.

 

[Politesse]

Monotheism is authoritarian. Thus, monotheism means the goals are not "shared" by forced upon the followers by centralized authorities who claim to be the conduit to the one ultimate unquestionable and unelected authority. Uniting with people based on an actual common caused arrived at via free non-coerced evaluation of one's interests is good. Having the promotion of the association itself be the cause and determine what the "shared interests" are is not good, especially when belonging to the association is coerced and based upon lies and threats in the name of authoritarian obedience.

In a context, such as pre-civilization or on the front lines of a military battle, where there is an immediate external threat to a group of people that is equally shared by the authorities and the followers, then sure authoritarian loyalty can be effective. But that is the same argument for having an authoritarian dictatorship over a constitutional democracy with protected individual rights. Dictatorships can be useful, which we see even now with which countries have had more success in defeating and vaccinating against COVID. The difference between dictatorships and democracy maps on almost perfectly to the difference between monotheism vs. secularism on a cultural level. Morally and politically society had made little progress in 13 or so centuries under Christian dominance. In fact, it was less progressive than that of ancient Greece. Every form of exponential progress in the West over the past few centuries is a predictable result of the Enlightenment-based declining influence of Abrahamic religion on government, culture and and the ideas and actions of individuals.

In fact, relating back to southernhybrid's comments on "Moderate religion", that only exists b/c of the larger secualurism which serves as an external force that keeps religion from the extremism that is inherent to it. Dogma ungrounded by facts and reason (aka faith) with an unelected authority from which all ethics and power flows is inherently extreme and can only be sustained by suppression of reason and of the unfaithful who raise doubts and challenges that cannot be countered except by force and coercion. Islam is no more extreme and shares identical core ideas and values with Christianity. The seeming greater "moderation" of Christian majority countries compared to Islam majority countries is that the Enlightenment put restraints upon religion politically and ignited a reason-based secularism that restrains Christianity culturally and caused most of it's "adherents" to be doubtful and give very little weight to it's core doctrines or leaders, often being no more Christian in any way other than still checking that box they were trained to when asked.

I agree with all of this. But you're still leaving out an important dimension. Power and military might. I think this picture demonstrates what the problem is.

View attachment 31803

Authoritarian regimes and ideologies are great at motivating their followers to sacrifice everything for the greater goal and to commit extreme acts of violence.

Theocratic extremist loons against secular atheist rationalists is not a fair fight. With all things equal the atheists will lose. We won't fight as hard. We understand what we have to lose. Just like a business owner can't win against the maffia. The maffia doesn't win because they are stronger, because they aren't. They win because they are willing to sacrifice everything and anything to win.

It's a problem. We secularists need to create a story where we too can become unthinking death machines, when needed to. Or we won't stand a chance. In the long run.

I agree with Alain de Botton. Secularists suffer the delusion that the salvation of humanity is dependent on one thing only, more information or access to more information. As the information itself will enlighten these militant extremists.

Worth noting is that enlightened peace loving atheist secularism can only exist in a society with affluence. It can only exist in a society where you don't need to worry about food or your personal security. If your basic needs aren't being met or is under threat of being met, people turn extremist and violent at the drop of a hat. That's why we have wars in the world. That's the only reason. Nobody goes to war for fun.

It's when people are under a perceived existential threat they turn to authoritarianism. I think.

It would be easy to pick different people to cartoonize, yes? I mean, there are plenty of drunk but harmless angry Christians in pubs as well, and atheists marching in invading armies to slaughter ethnic minorities in southeast Asia. You'd have to look harder to find a drunk Muslim, but you could certainly find some guys chilling over a cup of tea quietly complaining about things they don't ever intend to fix.

You say the rest of the world is unaware that atheists can become violent, but I don't think that's true from the perspectives of "the rest of the world"; it's atheists themselves who refuse to acknowledge that hatred of religion can turn into violence. Everyone else can see this plainly, even obviously. The Uyghurs are not being targeted for their hairstyles.

 

[abaddon]

There are claims like "ALL ATHEISTS ARE EVIL" that are just objectively false on their face. That's not hard to disprove.

I didn't anywhere mean to imply there are no true/false claims. I basically was saying "secularism good! religion bad!" is a stance as dumb as an "atheists are bad" claim.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Monotheism is authoritarian. Thus, monotheism means the goals are not "shared" by forced upon the followers by centralized authorities who claim to be the conduit to the one ultimate unquestionable and unelected authority. Uniting with people based on an actual common caused arrived at via free non-coerced evaluation of one's interests is good. Having the promotion of the association itself be the cause and determine what the "shared interests" are is not good, especially when belonging to the association is coerced and based upon lies and threats in the name of authoritarian obedience.

In a context, such as pre-civilization or on the front lines of a military battle, where there is an immediate external threat to a group of people that is equally shared by the authorities and the followers, then sure authoritarian loyalty can be effective. But that is the same argument for having an authoritarian dictatorship over a constitutional democracy with protected individual rights. Dictatorships can be useful, which we see even now with which countries have had more success in defeating and vaccinating against COVID. The difference between dictatorships and democracy maps on almost perfectly to the difference between monotheism vs. secularism on a cultural level. Morally and politically society had made little progress in 13 or so centuries under Christian dominance. In fact, it was less progressive than that of ancient Greece. Every form of exponential progress in the West over the past few centuries is a predictable result of the Enlightenment-based declining influence of Abrahamic religion on government, culture and and the ideas and actions of individuals.

In fact, relating back to southernhybrid's comments on "Moderate religion", that only exists b/c of the larger secualurism which serves as an external force that keeps religion from the extremism that is inherent to it. Dogma ungrounded by facts and reason (aka faith) with an unelected authority from which all ethics and power flows is inherently extreme and can only be sustained by suppression of reason and of the unfaithful who raise doubts and challenges that cannot be countered except by force and coercion. Islam is no more extreme and shares identical core ideas and values with Christianity. The seeming greater "moderation" of Christian majority countries compared to Islam majority countries is that the Enlightenment put restraints upon religion politically and ignited a reason-based secularism that restrains Christianity culturally and caused most of it's "adherents" to be doubtful and give very little weight to it's core doctrines or leaders, often being no more Christian in any way other than still checking that box they were trained to when asked.

I agree with all of this. But you're still leaving out an important dimension. Power and military might. I think this picture demonstrates what the problem is.

View attachment 31803

Authoritarian regimes and ideologies are great at motivating their followers to sacrifice everything for the greater goal and to commit extreme acts of violence.

Theocratic extremist loons against secular atheist rationalists is not a fair fight. With all things equal the atheists will lose. We won't fight as hard. We understand what we have to lose. Just like a business owner can't win against the maffia. The maffia doesn't win because they are stronger, because they aren't. They win because they are willing to sacrifice everything and anything to win.

It's a problem. We secularists need to create a story where we too can become unthinking death machines, when needed to. Or we won't stand a chance. In the long run.

I agree with Alain de Botton. Secularists suffer the delusion that the salvation of humanity is dependent on one thing only, more information or access to more information. As the information itself will enlighten these militant extremists.

Worth noting is that enlightened peace loving atheist secularism can only exist in a society with affluence. It can only exist in a society where you don't need to worry about food or your personal security. If your basic needs aren't being met or is under threat of being met, people turn extremist and violent at the drop of a hat. That's why we have wars in the world. That's the only reason. Nobody goes to war for fun.

It's when people are under a perceived existential threat they turn to authoritarianism. I think.

It would be easy to pick different people to cartoonize, yes? I mean, there are plenty of drunk but harmless angry Christians in pubs as well, and atheists marching in invading armies to slaughter ethnic minorities in southeast Asia. You'd have to look harder to find a drunk Muslim, but you could certainly find some guys chilling over a cup of tea quietly complaining about things they don't ever intend to fix.

You say the rest of the world is unaware that atheists can become violent, but I don't think that's true from the perspectives of "the rest of the world"; it's atheists themselves who refuse to acknowledge that hatred of religion can turn into violence. Everyone else can see this plainly, even obviously. The Uyghurs are not being targeted for their hairstyles.

The primary identity of the Chinese ideology isn't atheism. I'm not the first to have pointed out all the striking similarities between the ideals of communism and Christianity. Plenty of thinkers have made the observation that in communism God is replaced by The Party. Just like Christianity they have an absurd fixation with the words of Karl Marx, as if he's the messiah of Communism. Just like in Christianity the governments of USSR and China have spent plenty of ink to re-interpret Marx to better fit their visions of what a communist society should be like. For a bunch of atheistic secularists, it's a very strange behaviour. If they were truly atheists we'd perhaps expected them to say stuff like, "Marx was right about this, and not this. So we've updated the ideology". They don't do that. I put Chinese communism is the religious bracket, regardless what they have to say about the existence of God. They certainly behave more like religious people than secularists.

That's why I think it's better to talk about secularism, rather than atheism vs theism. I like Jürgen Habermas definition of religion and God. He does it functional terms, rather than as a belief system. Being religious is a type of behaviour and way to organise your thoughts rather than just what superstitious nonsense you believe in.

I should say, I'm not against the religious mindset. It's an extremely powerful tool to motivate people. But like anything powerful and can be used both for good and evil. I mean, socialism is good but communism is bad. And both come from the same source. It's just different applications.

 

[Politesse]

It would be easy to pick different people to cartoonize, yes? I mean, there are plenty of drunk but harmless angry Christians in pubs as well, and atheists marching in invading armies to slaughter ethnic minorities in southeast Asia. You'd have to look harder to find a drunk Muslim, but you could certainly find some guys chilling over a cup of tea quietly complaining about things they don't ever intend to fix.

You say the rest of the world is unaware that atheists can become violent, but I don't think that's true from the perspectives of "the rest of the world"; it's atheists themselves who refuse to acknowledge that hatred of religion can turn into violence. Everyone else can see this plainly, even obviously. The Uyghurs are not being targeted for their hairstyles.

The primary identity of the Chinese ideology isn't atheism. I'm not the first to have pointed out all the striking similarities between the ideals of communism and Christianity. Plenty of thinkers have made the observation that in communism God is replaced by The Party. Just like Christianity they have an absurd fixation with the words of Karl Marx, as if he's the messiah of Communism. Just like in Christianity the governments of USSR and China have spent plenty of ink to re-interpret Marx to better fit their visions of what a communist society should be like. For a bunch of atheistic secularists, it's a very strange behaviour. If they were truly atheists we'd perhaps expected them to say stuff like, "Marx was right about this, and not this. So we've updated the ideology". They don't do that. I put Chinese communism is the religious bracket, regardless what they have to say about the existence of God. They certainly behave more like religious people than secularists.

Ah, so you aren't really a "true atheist" either, but rather a Capitalist?

And have you considered applying to be a Scotsman?

The way the cartoon picks and chooses whom to be a representative of each social class it portrays is nakedly unreasonable and pejorative, and defending the cartoon by declaiming propoganda is ironic. If you had a point to make, you wouldn't have to cherry-pick examples of all the "bad people" among The Enemy, while denying the existence of "bad people" on Your Side. This is childish and unbecoming of anyone, and doubly so of anyone who claims to be promoting reason and freethought.

 

[DrZoidberg]

It would be easy to pick different people to cartoonize, yes? I mean, there are plenty of drunk but harmless angry Christians in pubs as well, and atheists marching in invading armies to slaughter ethnic minorities in southeast Asia. You'd have to look harder to find a drunk Muslim, but you could certainly find some guys chilling over a cup of tea quietly complaining about things they don't ever intend to fix.

You say the rest of the world is unaware that atheists can become violent, but I don't think that's true from the perspectives of "the rest of the world"; it's atheists themselves who refuse to acknowledge that hatred of religion can turn into violence. Everyone else can see this plainly, even obviously. The Uyghurs are not being targeted for their hairstyles.

The primary identity of the Chinese ideology isn't atheism. I'm not the first to have pointed out all the striking similarities between the ideals of communism and Christianity. Plenty of thinkers have made the observation that in communism God is replaced by The Party. Just like Christianity they have an absurd fixation with the words of Karl Marx, as if he's the messiah of Communism. Just like in Christianity the governments of USSR and China have spent plenty of ink to re-interpret Marx to better fit their visions of what a communist society should be like. For a bunch of atheistic secularists, it's a very strange behaviour. If they were truly atheists we'd perhaps expected them to say stuff like, "Marx was right about this, and not this. So we've updated the ideology". They don't do that. I put Chinese communism is the religious bracket, regardless what they have to say about the existence of God. They certainly behave more like religious people than secularists.

Ah, so you aren't really a "true atheist" either, but rather a Capitalist?

And have you considered applying to be a Scotsman?

The way the cartoon picks and chooses whom to be a representative of each social class it portrays is nakedly unreasonable and pejorative, and defending the cartoon by declaiming propoganda is ironic. If you had a point to make, you wouldn't have to cherry-pick examples of all the "bad people" among The Enemy, while denying the existence of "bad people" on Your Side. This is childish and unbecoming of anyone, and doubly so of anyone who claims to be promoting reason and freethought.

Sure. I agree that you can aply "No true Scotsman", on what I am saying. But I don't think I am wrong. It's not like Communism has some similarities with Christianity. It's virtually identical. Just with symbols switched out.

While atheistic secularists anywhere else don't. How often do atheists on this board defend themselves with references to scripture? Communists do it all the time.

There are historical reasons for why Communism is like this. It's modled on Calvins community in Geneva.