Religion
Related: About this forumIs Sam Harris Really A White Supremacist?, Part Two
BY ANDREW AGHAPOUR AND MICHAEL SCHULSON MARCH 25, 2016
Last week, the blogger Hemant Mehta, who writes under the moniker The Friendly Atheist, told us to remove our heads from our asses and send Sam Harris an apology for an essay we published the previous week.
The pieces headline, Is Sam Harris Really a White Supremacist?, was provocative, but it wasnt a random ad hominem attack; a critic at Salon had recently suggested that Harris, a prominent atheist writer, was espousing white supremacy. Others have made similar charges in the past. And regardless of what you think of Harris reasoning, theres no question that some of his claims about Islam have started to sound awfully similar to the Islamophobic invective coming from the far right.
Harris has said that we are at war with Islam, and he has argued that Muslims ought to be profiled. Mehta himself agrees with critics that Harris plan to profile Muslims is, in part, racial profiling.
As we wrote last week, with attacks on American Muslims on the rise, and a serious presidential contender claiming that Islam hates us, its much easier to see the resemblance between New Atheist invectives against Islam and other, more traditional forms of American bigotry.
http://religiondispatches.org/mehta-response/
angstlessk
(11,862 posts)WE are against ALL religions...bar none!
We can be against one religion that promotes beheading of apostates, and stoning of women who love a man other than her husband, which may have been an arranged marriage when she was a child...sorry...to me it makes sense to be against that sort of religion.
rug
(82,333 posts)Antitheists, otoh, are, by definition. against all religions. That in no way exempts them from despisiing one more than another, particularly when pre-existing bigotry is involved.
Atheists and antitheists are not the same thing. One simply has no belief. The other opposes religious belief.
I wonder why so many antitheists seek refuge in the larger set of atheists.
angstlessk
(11,862 posts)Before you, I had never heard of antithesists, who do not believe in the existence of god, of which I am one.
I agree it is all wrapped in atheists, whom neither confirm nor deny the existence of god...
What a revelation (to be ironic)
Goblinmonger
(22,340 posts)He is very much not one and seems to have a lot of misunderstandings about them.
Major Nikon
(36,827 posts)Because it's a rather silly presumption to begin with.
rug
(82,333 posts)"Hey! They're attacking all of us!"
Watch. The next anti-theist post that is challeged wil be met with squeals of bias against atheists.
It's a shoddy, discredited and cowardly tactic.
Major Nikon
(36,827 posts)Is that also a shoddy, discredited and cowardly tactic?
I like where this is going.
rug
(82,333 posts)Tsk.
No that is as inapposite as you can get.
You will not like where this is going.
Better sound the whistle.
Major Nikon
(36,827 posts)I fully expect a negative response to the last question also, which also speaks volumes. No I think I will like where this is going. It's very satisfying to see you paint yourself into a corner and then pretend you didn't.
rug
(82,333 posts)Major Nikon
(36,827 posts)I told you I was going to like where this is going and you certainly didn't disappoint.
rug
(82,333 posts)So, how do you like Harris?
MellowDem
(5,018 posts)Well is he?
Criticism of Islam isn't white supremacy I'm afraid. Hell, even being a straight up bigot isn't white supremacy necessarily. But these authors aren't for having a discussion anyways, they are defending one of the most powerful and privileged bigotrd belief systems in the world, and it's useful to project when doing so.
rug
(82,333 posts)And he is.
Neocons usually are.
MellowDem
(5,018 posts)If neo-cons are often white supremacists, then it's a wonder Hillary isn't one.
Or maybe it was a bullshit, click bait comparison in the first place and the authors don't really care about nuance.
They eventually say real binary is that some sees Islam as at war with other ideas rather than a "dynamic tradition". So what? That's not white supremacy, and Islam is both, IMHO, as are all religions to some extent or other. Islam really does condone violence and bigotry in many parts of its texts, and a lot of Muslims hold heinous beliefs that come directly from Islam.
That is a very real issue, and one that the authors do everything they can to ignore and deflect.
It would be as if they were defending white supremacy as a "dynamic tradition" and condemning others who point out what white supremacists actually believe, to take their click bait analogy to its full conclusion.
Cartoonist
(7,320 posts)With the recent postings of more threads exposing the utter depravity of the Catholic church, googling for something Dawkins may have tweeted has come up blank.
Plan B: Regurgitate a baseless smear against Sam Harris.
One single instance of raping a child is far more horrific than ANYTHING said by Dawkins or Harris.
Some people have no sense of scale or honesty.
rug
(82,333 posts)Some people have no sense of scale or honesty.
What a score sheet you possess.
Accusations of Islamaphobia: MCLXI
Acknowledgement of RomanCC pederasty: 0
rug
(82,333 posts)Cartoonist
(7,320 posts)It's a fallback of yours when you've been nailed. Let me clear something up for you. No one's laughing at rape. We're all laughing at you. Not with you, AT you.
rug
(82,333 posts)Let me clear something up for you, cartoonist, and whoever the "we" is you speak for. Your view of religion is bigoted from ther start. You despise it from the get go. It doesn't matter to you in the slightest what is going on; you use whatever is handy, regardless of context, to righteously declaim religion is the source of all evil and religious people are its enablers. This time it's child rape. Tomorrow it will be a woman praying about cancer. After that it will be a mentally ill person arrested while talking of angels. It does not matter in the siightest to you what it is. You can use it.
You've committed the worst sin for a poseur - yo're obvious.
So go back to whatever warped offsite corner on the internet where you get your directions, and acceptance, and tell your "we" they are a sad, pathetic lot, whispering in the shadows until another child rape occurs and you draw straws to see who will troll this site with that news. Your alleged laughter rings hollow. Snickering in the shadows always does. Tell them next time to speak directly and not send such an inept proxy.
Cartoonist
(7,320 posts)Accusations of bigotry. A word you throw around as though you think it's a silver bullet and you're the Lone Ranger, defending the West from evil anti-theists. A word you never use to describe the leading bigot that you enable, Pope Frank.
As for my view that religion is evil, I merely point to the evidence of history. It is evil because at its very core it is based on a lie: the existence of a sentient omnipotent being. Religion doesn't have to be evil, it just is.
As for the WE that I presume to speak for, we are those you smear on an almost daily basis with accusations of bigotry, Islamophobia, and most recently, white supremacy. You are now deeply enmired in the cesspool that religion creates for its most rabid followers.
rug
(82,333 posts)You, plural, are incapable of discussing religion without resorting, lazily, to epithets of misogyny, homophobia and whatever other terms you think will play well. It's compulsive. To wit, "the leading bigot that you enable, Pope Frank."
As to your gleeful use of child rape, you've just revealed yourself:
Aside from how demonstrably stupid that statement is, I seriously doubt your motive here is to stop child rape more than it is to stop religion and people who have belief. That is prima facie bigotry.
I presume not a thing, cartoonist. The word "we" is yours. No sooner do you say I presume you speak for "we", than you proceed to speak for them. Do you even know what you're doing?
Why don't you, plural, have some integrity and speak directly for yourselves.
Cartoonist
(7,320 posts)So it's my fault that I can't discuss religion without mentioning child rape, misogyny, homophobia, and all the other evils that religion fosters. Should I overlook that stuff like You do?
rug
(82,333 posts)There is a way to discuss, address and oppose misogyny, homophobia and child rape intelligently.
I would welcome it in here.
Cartoonist
(7,320 posts)You can start by deleting these white supremacy posts and apologizing publicly here to Sam Harris.
Sam Harris is a neocon pig.
Too bad you, plural, defend him.
Cartoonist
(7,320 posts)And you defend him constantly. You set a fine example.
Major Nikon
(36,827 posts)rug
(82,333 posts)I keep winning on the other cards.
misogyny
homophobia
sky daddy
delusion
evidence
pedophiia
blank frank
enabler
murdering mothers
ISIS!
Which have I left out?
You've all taken whatever suspense there is out of bingo
Lordquinton
(7,886 posts)Many people are defending/deflecting from the multiple, ongoing child rape scandals of the Catholic church.
Maybe post part three in all caps?
rug
(82,333 posts)I assume therefore you are not defending Harris.
Part 3 can be in neon all caps and there will still be defenders.
Lordquinton
(7,886 posts)If there is please link to it.
Child rapists in the Catholic Church I can point to a thread with some really disgusting apologetics that is active an ongoing.