Religion is NOT a private matter!
Religion is NOT a private matter!
I have been reading Austin Dacey's book
The Secular Conscience.I am almost finished with it, and my only complaint is that Dacey gave his book the wrong title, he should have entitled it, "the most important book of 2008."
It is the most important book of 2008.
The basic argument of the book is that there is a public nature to ethics, because there is a public nature to ethics, all ethical claims are subject to public inquiry.
That may not sound contreversial until you understand that it has big implications.
For example when someone says something like "stem-cell research is wrong because life begins at conception."
or, "The Jews are chosen people, loved above other people, by God."
or, "Masturbation is harmful because imagining someone who is not your spouce is de facto adultery."
Most liberals, myself included, have tended to respond with a quiet respect for their neighbors belief.
You say that it would be wrong to say that this person is wrong.
After all this is a religious belief which they hold.
We must respect a person's religion.
After all, religion is a private matter.
Dacey says that this is not true.
That religion follows ethical claims, and that those ethical claims are universal to humanity. That is, we can hold religious claims to ethical standards.
This has even further political implications in that operating publically according to these principles, not only can one feel just in crticizing religious claims, one must.
Religious claims are attempts at ethical appeals, and can be ethically tested, and judged.
There is one particular part of the book in which the author takes a spectrum of statements and compares them to whether or not they are unethical attempts at persuasion.
They are:
1. I'm right, but I could be mistaken.
2.I'm right.
3.I'm right, you're wrong.
4.I'm right, you're wrong, here's why you should change your mind.
5. I'm right, you're wrong, go to hell.
6.I'm right, you're wrong, change your mind or be killed.
According to Dacey, statements 1-4 are equally ethical.
He argues that we as liberals shudder to tell someone they are wrong, while it is a simple law of rhetoric, that for some statements to be true others must be wrong.
This is has a powerful political implication by changing the language and style of liberal politics.
Allowing us to break the illusion that equates religion with morality, and assert that conscience is a human virtue, not a religious one.
Dacey gives liberalism back its teeth.
Your life is a love story!
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Hmmm...
It seems to me that religion is increasingly unable to claim a private sphere for itself, even apart from the ideas you're presenting. Consider:
1. Islamic terrorism. I could almost stop here, what with the obvious danger that this poses to...uh...everyone...but why?
2. Non-Islamic terrorism. Let's see...there are people who are so pro-life that they will kill you if you aren't...there are assorted religiously-based predictors of a "coming race war," (may they be forever wrong; AFAICT they actually support this hare-brained notion.) Does anybody know if Timothy McVeigh was in some way religiously motivated? I was never clear on that.
3. Children being abused in too many ways to mention by that FLDS cult.
4. Speaking of abuse, there are the, shall we say, "problem priests" that have collectively provided the Roman Catholic Church with so very many lawsuits in recent years. And contrary to what Catholic leaders insinuate, there is an awful lot of *heterosexual* abuse going on. (Not that that makes it any better.)
5. People in churches being told generally that Hell exists, is eternally torturous, and everyone on earth stands an *extremely* good chance of ending up there, unless you follow these instructions....(Insert instructions here. Don't forget the request for money.)
And on...and on...and on...
With all of this going on, it's a wonder that humanity in general isn't beating a path to the RRS's door. *Should* religion be allowed as a "private matter?" Is such a stance even possible, given that the foregoing just scratches the surface of the crimes of religion.
I hadn't heard of Dacey or his book before now...but I'll put it on my list of "must-read-somehow" books. It sounds interesting.
Conor
mindcore wrote:The basic
This is an odd argument. If it starts with religion, it could continue to lifestyles, races, and who knows where else.
I mean ethics to begin with is NOT inheritly based off religions. It is based on the society in which it should be applied, NOT what someone believes. In Eurpoe, ethical standards are similar to that in America but still different enough on issues like drugs, sex, and of course a handful of other social issues.
Saying that religion = ethics would also mean you'll have to apply the same ideas to those who are not religious and where would that stop.
What is faith? Is it to believe that which is evident? No. It is perfectly evident to my mind that there exists a necessary, eternal, supreme, and intelligent being. This is no matter of faith, but of reason. - Voltaire
The thing is that only
The thing is that only religion gets a free ride in the public sphere.
One need only listen to NPR , Pacifica, or Air America, all three liberal radio stations, to see that if I say anything is wrong because of Jesus, then they offer no criticism. Or they find some other religious person to disagree with me.
This is just ridiculous, what needs to be done is they should say I am wrong, and if it is a doctrine of my religion, its wrong too.
Your life is a love story!
Of course you are right, but
Of course you are right, but take the mormon fundamentalists for example, none of the criticism of the compounds I have heard on the media have addressed the fact that this kind of polygamy is sanctioned by the example of Joseph Smith, and why it is that these people feel like what they do is right.
We know that they are polygamist, but we are not told why.
It is in this way that the media fails us with its cowardice.
Your life is a love story!
Yeah, the FCC is not our
Yeah, the FCC is not our friend .... they are owned by the MEDIA ..... which is owned by the super RICH, ..... Eat the Rich ..... No MASTERS !
Atheism Books.
Carl Sagan - Pale Blue Dot
Carl Sagan - Pale Blue Dot , 3 mins .....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p86BPM1GV8M
wha?!?!
'based on the society in which it should be applied'?
how about when those societies are skewed and led by the 'moral majority'? does that not make your argument cyclical and ultimately redundant?
this is me wrote:'based on
That's completely irrelevant. The "moral majority" as you call it in the United States does not dictate what you should believe nor does it tell you to make it public. The argument here is to make what you believe or follow public and allow it to be open to ridicule.
Keep in mind that I was referring to anything else that could be called "private." What if someone made the same argument about the food you eat instead of the beliefs you held? Or
I see something almost like the move The Island somehow, but we are not clones.
What is faith? Is it to believe that which is evident? No. It is perfectly evident to my mind that there exists a necessary, eternal, supreme, and intelligent being. This is no matter of faith, but of reason. - Voltaire