The Slacktiverse

Completely open thread Friday January 27 2012

2012-01-27T14:41:59-05:00

Due to several requests in the comment threads, we now declare this an ABSOLUTELY OPEN THREAD.

One, two, three... Comment!

The Slacktiverse is a community blog. Content reflects the individual opinions of the contributors. We welcome disagreement in the comment threads, and invite anyone who wishes to present an alternative interpretation of a situation to write and submit a post.

Board Post, January 26 2012

2012-01-26T18:42:19-05:00

Regular Business

Don't forget to send in items that you want included in This week in The Slacktiverse January 28/29 2012.

The three sections of the weekend post are:

The Blogaround

Any denizen of the Slacktiverse who has posted an article to their own website during since the previous weekend post is invited to send a short summary of that article along with its permalink to TBAT. That summary and link will be included in the next weekend blogaround. This will help to keep members of our community aware of the many excellent websites hosted by other members.

Atheist Announcements

2012-01-25T17:16:00-05:00

TBAT has two major announcements on this subject:

The round table will be published on February 8 2012. We hope that we will be able to agree final drafts of all the pieces submitted by then; however, if a piece is still not in a version that both the author and TBAT can agree on, it will have to be omitted. We hope to include everything, but at this stage, getting it published in a version that represents at least most of the authors is the priority. Authors who could not agree with TBAT on a final version will be, of course, welcome to add their comments to the thread. If they do and people feel they were left out unfairly, TBAT reserves the right to explain what the disagreements were; obviously we won't quote any private correspondence should we need to make such an explanation.

As most of us know, an Atheist 101 was requested some time ago and we've been working on it for ages. However, while it's been referred to on and off as 'the atheist 101', we've been planning to call it an atheist round table rather than a 101, because we felt '101' wasn't quite accurate: there are so many different ways of being an atheist that a 101 on the subject would be practically impossible. How do you do a 101 without overgeneralising to the point that some atheists end up getting excluded from something that's supposed to speak for them? Well, lately we were struck by Nick Kiddle's comment^[1] which talked about this very problem: there are certain myths circulating about atheists, many of them hostile, and atheist activists have been taking steps to correct and debunk them. However, those debunkings can be a problem in themselves when they're too sweeping; in trying to refute the basic misconception that atheists are all miserable rotten people, one can sometimes risk sounding as if unhappy atheists, or atheists with mixed feelings, or even just atheists who disagree with other atheists, aren't 'proper atheists'.

So, we now have a 101 idea:

Atheist Myths 101: It's More Complicated Than That

The structure will be this:

Introduction:

In cultures where atheism is a minority position, there are often misconceptions about what atheists are actually like - and if atheists are a mistrusted minority, those misconceptions are often rather hostile to boot. Atheist activists are attempting to debunk these myths, quite rightly; however, when trying to debunk a hostile myth it can be easy to go too far in the other direction and end up oversimplifying things in a way that makes other atheists feel excluded. In the spirit of our motto, we'd like to promote an understanding of the debunked myths about atheism that's rather more complicated than that.

We will then list common myths about atheists or atheism, the common refutation to them, followed by a longer and More Complicated Than That discussion of the issue.

For example:

Myth:

Atheists believe in a hostile and meaningless universe.

Oversimplified response:

No, atheists simply locate meaning in non-divine interpretations of the universe.

More Complicated Than That response:

Atheism as a philosophical position doesn't necessarily imply a meaningless or hostile universe. Concepts like 'meaning' and 'hostile' are very much dependent on personal interpretation: what one person finds meaningful, another finds meaningless, and there's no absolute scale of 'hostile' or 'not-hostile' to measure things against. Some atheists consider the material universe to be meaningful in itself. Some atheists aren't particularly bothered about the nature of the universe and find meaning in other things. Some atheists do think it's a hostile and meaningless universe. Of those, some think that this is no reason not to enjoy life and create our own meaning while we're here. Others find life hard - atheists are just as prone to depression as anyone else - but simply don't believe in any deities even if they wish they could. Atheism is simply a lack of belief in deities; this can co-exist with a wide variety of beliefs about what kind of universe this is.

In the interests of preserving the privacy of atheists who would suffer from being 'outed' in their communities, the piece will handled in the same communal way as with the Depression 101. This means:

1. It will be credited thus: 'Co-authored by the Slacktiverse community.'
2. Suggestions and additions should be e-mailed to slackmods@gmail.com, who will edit and compile them.
3. Copyright will be public domain.

So if anyone wants to write a piece on atheism that they can sign their name to and retain copyright, best to write a solo piece and send it to us for publication separately.

Everyone who sends in a suggestion, addition or contribution to the Atheism 101 and anyone who emails TBAT indicating their interest in the project (including beta reading) will be sent (by return email) a link to the location of the working draft.

^[1] The other thing that really bothers me is when people make pronouncements like "atheists don't see the universe as bleak and hostile". I know they mean that there is nothing inherent in atheism that would make you see the universe that way, but the way it comes across is always that atheists are all above such things. And I'm very much not. I do see the universe as bleak and hostile because of my history and my mental state. And I feel like I'm not welcome among atheists because I make the movement look untidy and give religious fundamentalists a weak point to attack. [The Problem of Proselytizing, Jan 20, 2012 at 05:40 AM]↩

At Patheos: TFTM: This story can’t be part of this story

2012-01-23T21:06:59-05:00

Fred Clark published a new post, TFTM: This story can’t be part of this story, at Patheos.com.

This week Fred writes about part 4 Left Behind II: Tribulation Force.

(Trigger Warning: Comments include discussions of suicide and suicidal ideation.)

Excerpt:

This is disappointing, a step backwards from the more capable and independent-minded Chloe we met in the first book and the first movie. The first Left Behind novel spent several chapters tracing Buck’s efforts to travel from Chicago to New York in the aftermath of the Event, yet Chloe managed to travel even further — from San Jose to Chicago — without any of the connections or financial resources Buck had at his disposal. She’s also the only person in that book with enough clarity and gumption to question Bruce’s pat, simplistic explanation of the calamity they’re all experiencing. But so far in this movie, she’s mostly been just a whiny brat.

And that seems deliberate. The earlier scene in the church-based emergency shelter seemed to have been included just to show us that Chloe is useless in a crisis. I wouldn’t have thought it possible, but the filmmakers’ treatment of female characters may be even worse than the madonna-whore abominations of the books. For the first half of this movie, Chloe exists only to serve as a foil — a weak character used to make Rayford and Buck seem stronger.

[Fred Clark, TFTM: This story can’t be part of this story, January 23, 2012, posted at Patheos.com]

Commentators who would like to share their responses to the new post with all of Fred's fans (old and new) can cross-post to both boards.

Kung Hei Fat Choi / Gong Xi Fa Cai

2012-01-23T13:19:33-05:00

Today marks the beginning of the 15 day celebration of the "Chinese" new year. A large proportion of our planet's population (including, but not limited to, people living in the People's Republic of China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Macau, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan and Thailand) will be taking part in the festivals that take place over the next 15 days.

Happy Year of the Dragon, one and all!

Updated -- This week in The Slacktiverse, January 21/22 2012

2012-01-21T21:44:00-05:00

The Blogaround

Sarah reports: In the past two weeks, I've posted on music and poetry and Yeats's "The Stolen Child". I also posted some bits of Martin Luther King's speeches on war and poverty.

This week Ana Mardoll posted:
Narnia: Playful Animals, Platonic Allies
We’re one chapter away from the end, and time for Aslan to gather the allies and join the battle. But I object to the conflation of “deformed” with “evil” and I am distressed that the “good” Giant in the Witch’s garden is good because of his family connections and not because he simply chose to be. Come explore classism and ableism in Narnia this week.

This week Ana Mardoll posted:
Twilight: Hunting Rapists, Condoning Rape Culture
Edward Cullen has lived his life as a rapist-hunting vigilante. He is uniquely poised to understand rapists, because of his telepathic talents. So why does he use the same techniques and tactics to abuse isolate, gaslight, and control Bella, and why does he condone his romantic rivals doing the same?

This week MercuryBlue posted a writeup for Affairs Magazine of the SOPA/PIPA/ACTA/Megaupload situation and the Black March boycott-the-media-industries meme that's going around.

Kit Whitfield continues her analyses of famous first sentences. This week: Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery, One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Brave New World by Aldous Huxley. She also explained why Among the many, many reasons I'm angry about the Stop Online Piracy Act.

This week Laiima wrote about: what to say when you don't have words, yet and using what's on hand to color fabric easily.

Chris the Cynic reports: This week I wrote about the police's multiple absurd and disturbing responses to theft and vandalism targeting Occupy Maine, and started a series of posts that will take an extended look at the videogame Deus Ex.

I made an introduction to Deus Ex, in which I completely derailed myself into trying to correct an old misconception, a post about the game's backstory, and a post explaining why I'll be using the original graphics when a better version exists). Then I started going through the training mission of the game. First I noticed how the future looks and a lack of exits, then I noticed some of the game mechanics and a lack of female characters. After that I talked about books in the game and my first coworker. Finally I discussed how very wrong the things being done for training actually are.

Storiteller started out the week with a seasonally-appropriate, hearty recipe that originated from throwing together some random ingredients in the fridge. After tweaking it a bit, she shares it in Vegan Umami for Beginners. After participating in the Great Internet Blackout against SOPA/PIPA on Wednesday, she explains why freedom of speech is so important to her personally and for society in "No Such Thing As Public Liberty, Without Freedom of Speech".

Coleslaw writes: This week I took an Excerpt I had deleted from a previous post and turned it into its own post. (Trigger Warning: mention of murder/suicide.) While shelving my Mikasa Fruit Panorama dinnerware, I recalled my late mother-in-law, who gave it to me (with pictures). I wrote about the losses of an important game and a local radio station in Scoreless. Finally, I have a new hobby, creating outfits (Such as thisSummer outfit) I can't possibly afford using online clip art (more pictures).

The former conservative blogger reports: This week I wrote an article wondering whether I should participate in the Republican primary, I wrote about robocalls from Mitt Romney, I continued my series about why I'm no longer conservative and I wrote a couple of fun posts about geeky stuff (Geeky stuff I’m excited about, I’m tired.)

Michael Mock writes: This week at Mock Ramblings, I posted some questions to keep in mind when reviewing scenes, described possibly the weirdest dream I've ever had, and revealed my latest invention: self-heating tea. I also added sections to two of my ongoing writing projects: Apocalypse River and They Are Legion.

rejiquar writes: Though posted to rejiquar.com & my tumblr a week ago, I only just managed to get x-posted to lj (which has the advantage of easy commenting): Kingdom Come intro and essay, which are xposted (though without the links) to livejournal and tumblr.

From the intro:
Fred over at slacktivist had a post on the upcoming superhero movie, and J Enigma urged Fred to check out Kingdom Come, saying he would love it.

I'd be curious indeed to see what Fred would make of it, but in the meantime, here's my reaction, in which I attempted some of the sort of thing Fred and Ana Mardoll do so well.

J. Enigma reports: First up, Human Black Box (Trigger Warning: Transhumanism, Language, Uplifting, Child Abuse, Violence, Disturbing Imagery.) I haven't updated Human Black Box in a while, but today, I finally managed to collect all of the posts relating to the first 8 parts into one PDF document, complete with pictures and character stats at the end. As it's released under the Share and Share-alike license, the content is free for anyone to edit, remix, or incorporate new content into, so long as you credit me first. You can find that post here: Human Black Box now a PDF. For those conscious about it, there's mild nudity in some of the pictures.

(Trigger Warning: Transhumanism.) I made a post a while back about Transhumanism and the ethnic identity. It's a tricky subject to write about, but an interesting one to explore. I also wrote a post about a couple of new technologies, including one that targets certain aspects of aging and slows them, and a look at some potential post-singularity technology, (Nanotech is so 21st century.)

I've spent some time busting up poor critical thinking lately, so I started with this whole 2012 nonsense, considering that's the big thing. I made a post about how Homer Predicted Air-conditioning (technically just an image) as a lead into a larger post about the fallacies that one finds when dealing with Bible code seekers, prophecy believers, and conspiracy theorists. I also took strong offense at the ableist notion that children with AD/HD are somehow "psychic" and "special" - and dismantled the entire notion of "indigo children", including how much harm it does to deny these children treatment, (Trigger Warning: discussion of ableism, discussion of negative attitudes toward ADHD and austism) (I am apparently an indigo child).

(Trigger Warning: Language, Bigotry, Homophobia, Extreme Misogyny, Theofascism.) Lastly, I took a look at the rewritten "Constitution" according to the fascists at the Liberty Council in "The New Christian Sharia". It's a very scary thing.

Last week Ana Mardoll posted:
Twilight: Bad Thoughts... Bad People?
I think a lot of the reason why people dislike Bella is because she thinks very negative things about people. And now she has Edward and they can be negative together! But does her persistently negative thoughts make her a bad person/character, or are they meant to be something more cathartic or... what? Come help me decide.

Last week Ana Mardoll posted:
Deconstruction: Why Your Well-Intentioned Advice Was Called 'Victim-Blaming'
(Trigger Warning: rape and rape discussion, racism.)
Written in response to the “If I Were A Poor Black Kid” opinion piece in Forbes.

In case you missed this

From MercuryBlue: the writeup, from a not-a-lawyer-but-very-familiar-with-applicable-law perspective, of the Megaupload situation. tl;dr: Megaupload did a laundry list of stupid things, but SOPA et al are not necessary to deal with them because existing US law does the job just fine.

According to an article in The New York Times a New Definition of Autism Will Exclude Many, Study Suggests: Proposed changes in the definition of autism would sharply reduce the skyrocketing rate at which the disorder is diagnosed and might make it harder for many people who would no longer meet the criteria to get health, educational and social services, a new analysis suggests.
The impact of these changes is further discussed in another New York Times article, A Specialists’ Debate on Autism Has Many Worried Observers

This week The Toronto Star published an article, Afghan schoolgirl Roya faced down police in Kandahar airport, about a seventeen-year-old woman from Afghanistan coming to Canada to get the education that she hopes will allow her to return, one day, to Afghanistan. Roya Shams's father, a district police chief, was assassinated by the Taliban last July.

Later in the week the same newspaper published a piece written by Roya Shams about her first days in Canada.

How the Internet blackout affected congressional support for PIPA/SOPA

MercuryBlue writes: Shattering the Stigma is a resource for the Venn intersection between folk with mental health issues and nonreligious folk. I don't know how helpful it'll be, but it's a start.

Things you can do

From Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières: Humanitarian negotiations are life-and-death issues for people in need, but they also raise troubling political and ethical dilemmas for the organizations that are engaged in them....Please join us for a live online discussion of these issues featuring several experienced MSF aid workers, who will share their first-hand experiences from past assignments. They will describe the often complicated process of negotiating with governments, armed groups, public health officials, international actors, community leaders, and local officials; as well as the struggle to define what compromises are acceptable in order to run programs in crisis zones.

Those who are interested in the discussion can register (online and free) for this live online event.

--Co-authored by the Slacktiverse Community

The Board Administration Team
(hapax, Kit Whitfield and mmy)

Taking Pride: Walking A Heathen Path Away from Guilt

2012-01-20T14:49:00-05:00

I was raised to be humble, to always think of others, not to be selfish, not to brag, and to always remember how much better off I was than most of the people in the world. A large part of this came from the Christian, specifically Congregationalist and Presbyterian, aspects of my heritage, and the way they intertwined with the specific Midwestern German cultures of my grandparents. Some of it certainly came from my parents' experiences traveling and living abroad and interacting with refugees. And some may have come from a family propensity to depression and related disorders.

So I've grown up bad at taking compliments, bad at saying no to volunteering, and terrible at spending money, especially on myself. I don't want to draw attention. I never want to speak in public unless my facts are unassailable, my preparation impeccable...and everyone else is too busy. I don't want to turn in school or work assignments that aren't perfect. My parents and my culture meant to teach me humility, but what I learned was shame.

I'm searching for a job, and writing and sending resumes and cover letters is the most painful thing in the world. It's not the writing...not mostly... I like writing, and it can come very easily... What I hate and do poorly is sales, especially when my work is the product, or I am. I paid for a professionally-written resume, and I think the person it describes sounds pretty awesome...and very little like me.

My mother once told me that she didn't think living a decent life and raising your family to be happy was enough to qualify you as a good person who had really served Christ. I'm not sure I disagree with that; I'm not against caring about, and working for, the good of other people, whether you know them or not. There's a lot of suffering and injustice that needs fixing. But somehow the way I grew up thinking about it just led to guilt and feelings of failure.

And then there came the days, and months, and years when getting out of bed and holding down a job were more than I could handle. The pinnacle of Good Person status seemed even higher and more unattainable from the depths of my personal abyss.

Yet even there I could know my gods. On days when I couldn't send an email, I could reach for the weak, long-dormant stirrings of poetry in my soul and reach out to Bragi^[1a]. On days when all I could manage was feeding the cat, I could touch my husband, or myself, and know the power in joy that Freya^[1b] can impart. Even when I lived in a tiny apartment with nothing but a stump in the gravel yard, I could hear, and feel, the crack of thunderbolts, and pour out a beer for Thor^[1c].

We Heathens have a few basic rituals, and one of them is sumbel. We pass a cup or horn, and toast, and boast, and hail, and occasionally swear. Before I ever knew that I would call myself a Heathen, I joined the Society for Creative Anachronism and sat in toasting circles. Pass the bottle, drink (or don't), and give a toast, make a boast, sing a song, tell a story, share a joke, do a trick... Mostly we sang songs and toasted our heroes and friends, living and dead. I sang a lot of songs, and wrote quite a few, as well. It felt like my soul had come home.

I never liked to sit in church, and now I don't have to. Sometimes I listen to sermons online. I listen to a lot of podcasts about religion. But for me the religious experience is much more about gathering, in the woods if you can, to share some of yourself with your folk and your gods.

I've done that quite a bit lately, but always alone, and I miss having a group to do it with. Every time I craft words to honor something that's important to me, I feel like I'm getting stronger. I can boast of my own deeds (though it's agonizingly hard, still, to see what I've done that's good enough). And I can honor the work and sacrifice of old heroes without thinking I need to live in their image. My grandmother. My parents. Archbishop Romero. Jesus.

Heathens spend a fair amount of time discussing what it means to adopt the worldview of this ancestral folkway, and the difficulties in doing that while percolating in a Christian culture. I'm not much worried about that. I don't really think there was much wrong (for me) with my worldview or ethics growing up; there was just a mismatch between my declared Christianity and the beliefs and practices I found to be true and meaningful. There is a wide variety of ways to be a Christian, and many of those traditions, especially in my Protestant heritage, were shaped by our Germanic pagan ancestors.

Wherever I am, I want to show my love and honor to everyone who shaped me, supported me, taught me, and inspired my search for spiritual fulfillment. I am so, so grateful that I don't have to choose between my faith and my family, or my current religious communities and the welcoming one I grew up in.

Christian friends of Christian family members often say insensitive things, assuming everybody in the room shares their assumptions. And my mom continues to buy books about The Easter Story and whatnot for my kids. I have to explain how these things feel, and why I want them to stop. But we have blended our Heathen and Christian holiday decorations and music. We live on the upstairs floor of my parents' house, they lent me a table for my altar, and their greatest concern is that I'll leave candles unattended.

My grandmother used to live up here too, and her influence is everywhere. In the mittens she knitted for my kids, and the knitting skills she taught them. In the pie pans and muffin tins she used to bake us wonderful, nourishing food. In the Bible quotes and little model churches decorating the kitchen. The mightiest of my Disir^[2] hang out with Jesus, and we're all fine with that. I look forward to toasting them among my Beloved Dead. I'm still proud of them, and hope they are of me. I think they are and should be. I feel more like a superhero-in-training each day.

--Lonespark

1. ^[a]Bragi is a god of poetry, mainly. ↩

^[b]Freya is a mighty goddess of lots of things, whose power and influence touch on magic and sexuality and war and prosperity. This is a good book about her.↩

^[c]Thor is a god of lightning and thunder and he fights giants and protects the world from chaos. Plus Sif and grain and farming and adventures and Loki…ok, you should really just go read some myths and Heathen scholarship instead of asking me. This might be a good place to start. Wikipedia is also your friend, and I can suggest more links.↩

2. Female guardian spirits associated with a given family. Female ancestors can be disir, not all disir are necessarily ancestors, not all ancestors can or should end up as disir, YMMV, etc.↩

Board Post, January 19 2012

2012-01-19T17:52:38-05:00

Regular Business

Don't forget to send in items that you want included in This week in The Slacktiverse January 21/1222012.

The three sections of the weekend post are:

The Blogaround

Any denizen of the Slacktiverse who has posted an article to their own website during since the previous weekend post is invited to send a short summary of that article along with its permalink to TBAT. That summary and link will be included in the next weekend blogaround. This will help to keep members of our community aware of the many excellent websites hosted by other members.

(Nearly) Open Thread, January 18 2012

2012-01-18T10:54:02-05:00

Today (January 18) a number of sites on the internet are "going black" in an effort to educate people as to the possible effects of pending American legislation. While we (TBAT) share those concerns we think it is also important to remember than many (perhaps most) people in the world are faced with other significant challenges (legal, economic and infrastructural) that prevent equal access to information and opportunities.

Consequently we throw this thread open to discuss any and all the things that stand in the way of equal access to the information and opportunities the internet can provide and to ways of changing those things.

At Patheos: TFTM: Leave the gun, take the salvation

2012-01-17T22:50:26-05:00

Fred Clark published a new post, TFTM: Leave the gun, take the salvation, at Patheos.com.

This week Fred writes about part 3 Left Behind II: Tribulation Force.

(Trigger Warning: Fred's post includes a discussion of suicide and suicidal ideation.)

Excerpt:

In our survey of the books, we’ve noted many scenes like this. The authors often assume that anyone who has heard the soterian gospel without immediately converting must be deliberately choosing to reject it despite, deep down, knowing it to be the truth. Here poor Macniven has to find some way of portraying that perverse rebellion, he has to embody it and try to make it appear like something a human might actually choose to do.

He fails.

[Fred Clark, TFTM: Leave the gun, take the salvation, January 17, 2012, posted at Patheos.com]

Commentators who would like to share their responses to the new post with all of Fred's fans (old and new) can cross-post to both boards.

The Problem of Proselytizing

2012-01-16T14:15:05-05:00

I have always been an atheist. My parents made it pretty clear: From a young age I knew we were Jewish, and we did not worship or believe in God. (Apparently, I was less clear on the distinction between the two, which led to me being enrolled in Hebrew School until I could differentiate them.) I have no “atheist conversion story,” although I could tell the story of how I became a skeptic some time.

That is a different article, however. The point I am trying to make is that I am happy as an atheist. I have never felt any particular need to be anything other than an atheist, never felt that I wanted to be anything other than an atheist, and never felt that I was missing out on anything by being an atheist.

Being an atheist is a huge part of who I am. I could not stop being an atheist without completely revising my outlook on the world. Becoming a believer would not be as simple as switching the “God” switch from “Yes” to “No.” In order to believe that God (or gods, or an impersonal supernatural force that comprised a privileged reference frame from which to view questions of morality and value) exists, I would have to redefine my understanding of the word “exists” to be able to include things not made of matter. I would have to redefine my definition of “true,” my definition of “evidence,” my definition of “reality.” I would have to completely revise the way I view the universe, and to get there, I would have to completely destroy the way I view the universe.

And beyond the existential distress of utterly transforming my worldview, there’s the social distress, too. Would such a drastic change influence the way my friends see me? Would it change my relationship with my fiancee? Depending on which religion I turned to, would it hurt my relationship with any of my family members?

No matter how it happened, becoming a believer would be an extremely stressful and painful experience. I’ve been told, by people who have done it, that the other way around is just as traumatic.

***

Greta Christina posted last month ^[1] that, “For many atheists, our main goal is persuading the world out of religion.” She goes on in the same post to establish herself in favor of that position:

We don’t want to see this happen by law or violence or any kind of force, of course. But we think religion isn’t just mistaken. We think it’s harmful. Some of think it’s appallingly harmful. Some of us think it’s inherently harmful: that the very qualities that make religion unique are exactly what make it capable of doing terrible harm. What’s more, we see religion as not just hurting atheists. We see it as hurting billions of believers. So we’re working towards a world where it no longer exists.

So, according to Greta Christina, her primary goal as an atheist is to make most of the world’s population suffer the trauma of losing their faith, so that they can then be better (read: more Greta Christina-like) people with truer (read: more similar to Greta Christina’s) beliefs. And I should be okay with this, because she promises not to use legal coercion or violence to bring it about.

I am not okay with this.

For starters, I am a skeptic. I demand truth claims be backed with empirical evidence. So: Where is the empirical evidence that religious belief is harmful, either to believers or non-believers? I want a serious study here: A comparison of abuse of power in religious institutions to similarly structured secular institutions, say, or of domestic abuse rates between religious and non-religious households, corrected for factors known or suspected to influence abuse rates not directly attributable to religion (such as authoritarianism, substance abuse, and abuse rates in past generations). Give me hard, empirical data that religion is harmful--that bad religious people would be less bad if they were atheists, that good religious people would be better if they were atheists, that suffering religious people would suffer less if they were atheists.

Then prove that it is always better to be atheist than religious. Show that there is never a person better off as a religious person, never a person whose religious faith makes the world around them better. Because if there is even one such person, then a world with universal atheism is worse than a world of pluralistic belief.

I find it absurd I have to make this argument. Somehow, large numbers of otherwise clearly very intelligent atheists are able to avoid seeing the blatant irony and hypocrisy of insisting, with no evidence whatsoever, that belief without evidence is harmful.

Second of all, I like diversity. Diversity is powerful and useful. In most fields of endeavor, empirical data and truth are not of primary importance; you can do data entry equally well regardless of whether you understand electronics or think your computer is powered by tiny gnomes. Without religious perspectives in particular, art, literature, music, and architecture would be sadly diminished. Imagine a world with no Sagrada Familia^[2], no Angkor Wat^[3], no Eddas^[4], no Lord of the Rings^[5], no Bach^[6]… the list is unfathomably long.

It is clear that, misapplied, religious faith is a hindrance to scientific and technical endeavors--creationism proves that. However, the existence of non-religious anti-science movements such as global warming denialism and the anti-vax movement call into question whether it is actually religion that is the problem, or clinging to demonstrably false, harmful beliefs in the face of overwhelming evidence, which hardly seems an exclusive problem of the religious. Meanwhile, the existence of religious scientists in large numbers (one 2007 study^[7] found that more than a third of biologists and psychologists believe in God or gods) suggests that religious faith is not an insurmountable obstacle to scientific endeavor, if it is even necessarily an obstacle at all (which I regard as, at the very least, not proven).

Third, and most importantly: You do not have a right to make others suffer for your beliefs.

No one has that right. Ever.

If Greta Christina’s assessment of religion were correct--if all religious belief is both false and inherently harmful--then religion would be not only a mental illness, but the most widespread mental illness in history. But even if that were true (and I do not believe it is), you do not have a right to cure people by force unless they are demonstrably an immediate danger to themselves or others.

I cannot reiterate this enough: Proselytizing is yet another word for making people suffer in order to transform them into what you think they should be, for no other reason than because they are not what you think they should be.

What Greta Christina advocates--what any atheist advocates when they suggest “increasing the numbers of atheists” as a laudable goal, what any adherent of any religion advocates when they suggest “increasing the number of members of my religion”--is evil in one of its purest forms.

--Froborr

^[1] What Are The Goals of the Atheist Movement?↩

^[2] Sagrada Família ↩

^[3] Angkor Wat ↩

^[4] Edda ↩

^[5] Lord of the Rings↩

^[6] Johann Sebastian Bach ↩

^[7] How Religious are America’s College and University Professors?↩

This week in The Slacktiverse, January 14/15 2012

2012-01-14T21:48:00-05:00

The Blogaround

Literata's blogging will be on hiatus for the next few weeks because her mother is ill and having surgery. Prayers and good wishes are very welcome.

This week Ana Mardoll posted:
Twilight: Bad Thoughts... Bad People?
I think a lot of the reason why people dislike Bella is because she thinks very negative things about people. And now she has Edward and they can be negative together! But does her persistently negative thoughts make her a bad person/character, or are they meant to be something more cathartic or... what? Come help me decide.

This week Ana Mardoll posted:
Deconstruction: Why Your Well-Intentioned Advice Was Called 'Victim-Blaming'
(Trigger Warning: rape and rape discussion, racism.)
Written in response to the “If I Were A Poor Black Kid” opinion piece in Forbes.

Kit Whitfield continues her deconstructions of famous first sentences. This week: Five Children and It by E. Nesbit, The Collector by John Fowles and I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith.

Coleslaw reports: I only wrote two posts this week. In anticipation of the movie, I wrote a book review of Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. I take issue with the author of a blogpost entitled So You Think You Married the Wrong Person.

yamikuronue writes: Last weekend I posted the first of a series of tea reviews, which will go up every weekend. I did two portions of This Present Darkness: a in-depth look at Young's advice on page 74 as well as the weird voodoo on pages 76-81. I also wrote a little musing about words, a post about bodies and sleep (Trigger Warning: body image)), and yet another of my drabblings and musings posts.

Chris the Cynic reports: This week I was planning on writing one post on the Mayan Calendar but ended up writing a series with posts on our calendar and the Long Count, ways one might make a hypothetical calendar, Modular Arithmetic and the Tzolk'in, and the Haab' and the Calendar Round.

Storiteller this week took a critical look at another museum exhibit, this one at the National Archives on the federal government's influence on food, in What's Cooking, Uncle Sam? She also wrote a mini-series on fear and sustainable behavior. In Nothing to Fear But..., she talks about ways to overcome fear when trying new activities like cycling to work and cooking from scratch. In Fear and Loathing in Bicycleland, she describes circumstances that still scare her while cycling (pets! people opening doors!) and some potential fixes.

This week, Jarred discussed some common statements (Trigger Warning: homophobia) people might make while trying to deny accusations of homophobia and why those statements are problematic. He also discussed (Trigger Warning: homophobia) why he found Cardinal's apology for comparing pride parade organizers to the KKK unsatisfactory. He was honored that Pam Hogeweide, whose book on sexism in Christian churches comes out later this month, wrote a guest post as a part of his on-going review of Alisa Harris's book, "Raised Right." (Trigger Warning: Religiously rationalized misogyny). Jarred ended the week by sharing some of his thoughts that were inspired by attending a trans* panel discussion, both on the importance of listening and an inspiring example of what it means to be an ally (Trigger Warning: transphobia, substance abuse, inpatient psychiatric care).

Michael Mock writes: This week over at Mock Ramblings, I added another section to the Right Behind story They Are Legion. I explained how Secondborn tried to get me in trouble, in Amateur Escape Artist At Work. Finally, I responded to a rather long post on someone else's blog, mainly in an attempt to clear up her misconceptions about atheism: The Darkness of Atheism Exposed (Part 1), The Truth of Atheism Told (Part 2). I also attempted to clarify my points of disagreement in a follow-up post: A Final Note For Gerie.

The former conservative blogger reports: This week I wrote about my past and the evolution of my views (College, My Twenties, Why I'm Now Formerly Conservative, Part One), I gave my official presidential candidate endorsement and I wrote about how "beating Obama" has become the goal of Republicans rather than being a good leader.

Last week Ana Mardoll posted:
Twilight: Doctors, Nurses, and Patients
The problem with this scene is that Edward is in his usual position of privilege and the women he is laughing at are marginalized. They can join him in privilege only if they join him in mocking the other marginalized woman. And that’s not humor, so much as it is cruelty.

Last week Ana Mardoll posted:
Deconstruction: No, You Probably Aren't (and other thoughts on the Zombie Apocalypse)
All the reasons why you dreaming about the Zombie Apocalypse doesn’t automatically mean you want me to die horribly.

Last week Ana Mardoll posted:
Narnia: The Resurrection of Aslan
The raison d'etre of "The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe", at least as I see it, is the death and resurrection of Aslan. Everything else -- the Pevensie children and their evolution from frightened kids to confident monarchs, the war for the liberation of Narnia, the defeat of the ancient evil that has plagued the land for centuries -- these things are significantly less important than the life, death, and rebirth of Aslan.

In case you missed this

India Reports Completely Drug-Resistant TB (Trigger Warning: Just avoid the comments -- which include racism, anti-science and vicious anti-anti science comments among other things)

From bikyamasr: Saudi moral committee threatens to cover “tempting” women’s eyes.
Women with sexy eyes in Saudi Arabia may be forced to cover them up, according to the spokesperson of the Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice (CPVPV) in the conservative Gulf kingdom.

From The Toronto Star Ottawa to change law so same-sex marriages are valid and open to divorce:
Two divorcing women, their lawyer and the powerful political advocates who supported them, expressed delight with an emphatic promise by the Conservative government that it will rewrite Canada’s marriage law to ensure same-sex marriages are “legally valid” and open to divorce — even if the marriages are not recognized abroad.

In a Friday speech to the Canadian Club in Toronto, Justice Minister Rob Nicholson .....said “our government has no intention of reopening the debate on the definition of marriage.”

Things you can do

Send prayers and good wishes to Literata and Litera's mother.

Lonespark proposes a New England Slacktivite field trip/meetup to go see Red Tails.

When: Um, after the release date, January 20th, as soon as we can figure out the logistics. We could do it to celebrate Imbolc/Disting/Groundhog Day, or we could...not.
Where: Some location reasonably reachable by the majority of the people who want to go. I'm guessing this would be some location in eastern or central MA reachable by a big highway, but it depends who's involved. I'm hoping we can coordinate rideshares and rides for those without cars.

MercuryBlue writes: As reported at The Friendly Atheist (Jessica Ahlquist Has Won Her Lawsuit!), there was an explicitly Christian banner hung in Ms. Ahlquist's public high school, and she sued, and she won, and the banner is coming down. She, being an atheist, is getting the usual plate of shit flying her way (Trigger Warning: rape, violence, death threats); I encourage everyone to donate to her college fund, which can be done via the ChipIn widget on the Friendly Atheist link (requires Paypal).

--Co-authored by the Slacktiverse Community

The Board Administration Team
(hapax, Kit Whitfield and mmy)