politics – Page 3 – Good Reason

Category: politics (page 3 of 19)

Is atheism responsible for atrocities?

5 October 2011 / Daniel Midgley / 4 Comments

In a discussion with Sam Harris, Steven Pinker presents a cogent take-down of the “HitlerStalinPolPot” gambit that some Christians like to play. That’s the one where they say, “Hitler, Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot were atheists who killed millions of people, therefore atheism is terrible.”

Harris serves the ball.

Need I remind you that the “atheist regimes” of the 20th century killed tens of millions of people?

This is a popular argument among theoconservatives and critics of the new atheism, but for many reasons it is historically inaccurate.

First, the premise that Nazism and Communism were “atheist” ideologies makes sense only within a religiocentric worldview that divides political systems into those that are based on Judaeo-Christian ideology and those that are not. In fact, 20th-century totalitarian movements were no more defined by a rejection of Judaeo-Christianity than they were defined by a rejection of astrology, alchemy, Confucianism, Scientology, or any of hundreds of other belief systems. They were based on the ideas of Hitler and Marx, not David Hume and Bertrand Russell, and the horrors they inflicted are no more a vindication of Judeao-Christianity than they are of astrology or alchemy or Scientology.

Second, Nazism and Fascism were not atheistic in the first place. Hitler thought he was carrying out a divine plan. Nazism received extensive support from many German churches, and no opposition from the Vatican. Fascism happily coexisted with Catholicism in Spain, Italy, Portugal, and Croatia.
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When it comes to the history of violence, the significant distinction is not one between theistic and atheistic regimes. It’s the one between regimes that were based on demonizing, utopian ideologies (including Marxism, Nazism, and militant religions) and secular liberal democracies that are based on the ideal of human rights.

Not that Sam Harris hasn’t also done a fine job of answering that question himself.

Advance Australia what?

24 September 2011 / Daniel Midgley / 5 Comments

I’ve read that Christians in Roman times were mistrusted for having allegiance to a king other than Caesar. And now it seems that modern Christians are doing little to dispel such suspicion.

Some private Christian schools are singing an alternative version of the national anthem which promotes religious values and talks of Christ.

Instead of the official second verse of Advance Australia Fair, which starts “Beneath our radiant Southern Cross”, the alternative verse says “With Christ our head and cornerstone, we’ll build our nation’s might”.

The version of the anthem is sung every fortnight at Thornlie Christian College and Christian Schools Australia WA executive officer Ray Dallin confirmed that it was regularly sung at other school assemblies and churches.
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Original verses from 1879 in the National Library of Australia music collection do not include the Christian verse.

A spokeswoman from the office of Prime Minister Julia Gillard said that under national protocols, the anthem should not be modified and alternative words should not be used. The two authorised verses were proclaimed in 1984.

This story has been front-page news in Perth, but I’m actually having trouble getting worked up over it. For one thing, I’ve never been big on national fervour, anthems, or the like, so I don’t feel personally affronted that someone has altered it. It’s more annoying than sacrilegious. For another, this is happening in private religious schools, which is bad, but at least I’m not paying (as much) for it.

About the worst thing is that, just like in America, Christians are trying to re-write history, claiming that the original version was intended to be more Jesus-y. This kind of revisionism is SOP for that mob.

h/t to Calico in comments

Action Item: Support school secularism

22 September 2011 / Daniel Midgley / 2 Comments

There’s a primary school in Perth called Edgewater Primary. For 25 years, they forced students to say the “Lord’s Prayer” at school assemblies. Now, they’ve dropped it.

A WEST Australian government school has banned students from reciting the Lord’s Prayer before assembly in response to complaints from parents.

Edgewater Primary School, in Perth’s north, ended the 25-year practice after some parents said it contravened the WA Education Act, which stipulates schools cannot favour one religion over another.
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“We acknowledge that of the parents who did respond to the survey, many wanted to retain the Lord’s Prayer and it is right that we continue to recite it at culturally appropriate times such as Christmas and Easter, as part of our educational program,” [Edgewater principal Julie Tombs] said in a statement.

“However, at this school we have students from a range of backgrounds and it is important to consider all views and not promote one set of religious beliefs and practices over another.”

Good on them. They made the right call.

But some people of faith are foaming about it.

A state primary school in Perth has been inundated with hate mail after deciding to drop the recital of the Lord’s Prayer at assemblies.

The Education Department says the Edgewater Primary School has received letters, emails and abusive phone calls from people around Australia, venting their anger at the decision.
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The President of the Western Australian Primary Principals’ Association Stephen Breen says the complaints have been vengeful.

“We are getting comments like I’ll meet you in the grave, you know real loony stuff,’ he said.

“I don’t want to go on to it too much, but the receptionist is receiving phone calls and then people are slamming down the phone. It’s just gone over the top.”

I can understand that they’re not happy about losing their cultural hegemony, but as Australia and the world become more secular, it’s something they’re going to have to come to terms with.

In the meantime, I’ve written the school an email.

I just wanted to offer my support and tell you that I think your school made the right call. People can practice what religion they like, but it’s not fair for a public school to promote one religion over another. Keeping religion out of schools means that everyone’s religion is on an equal footing, and that’s good for everyone, religious or not. Good work.

If you’d like to convey your support, their email is Edgewater.PS@det.wa.edu.au.

Prayer ban: Like a burqa ban, but with prayer.

17 September 2011 / Daniel Midgley / Comments Off

France, what am I going to do with you? You know I love you, right? because you’re so cool, and you have a great language and everything. But I’m all torn about this.

Paris ban on Muslim street prayers comes into effect

A ban on saying prayers in the street, a practice by French Muslims unable to find space in mosques, has come into effect in the capital, Paris.

Interior Minister Claude Gueant has offered believers the use of a disused fire brigade barracks instead.

The phenomenon of street prayers, which see Muslims spreading mats on footpaths, became a political issue after far right protests.

Sure, they’re praying, which is stupid and useless. And it is unsightly having people clogging the streets like this.

I actually feel kind of embarrassed for those people, groveling around like that. But as obnoxious as public prayer is, banning it will heighten tension, and turn an annoying (but relatively harmless) public performance into a political football — or even an opportunity for civil disobedience. That brings in the sympathy. Shoot, even I’d be sympathetic to some non-violent civil disobedience on a issue of conscience.

There must some way of fixing this without some ad hoc law seemingly targeting Muslims. If all these people praying in the street is a problem, how about prosecuting it using an existing law? How about obstructing a footpath? Blocking traffic? Noise pollution? Littering?

Okay, that was reaching, but I’m trying to help here.

Does it matter what a candidate believes?

3 September 2011 / Daniel Midgley / 2 Comments

People are talking about this article by Bill Keller in the NYT about religion in politics.

Asking Candidates Tougher Questions About Faith

If a candidate for president said he believed that space aliens dwell among us, would that affect your willingness to vote for him? Personally, I might not disqualify him out of hand; one out of three Americans believe we have had Visitors and, hey, who knows? But I would certainly want to ask a few questions. Like, where does he get his information? Does he talk to the aliens? Do they have an economic plan?

Hal Boyd of the Deseret News gives a roundup of writers who are shocked — shocked! — at the impertinence of asking candidates about their religious beliefs. After all, isn’t that personal? Well, it could be, if the candidate makes it private. Colbert I. King thinks faith is no big deal, but he makes an exception for candidates who make a big deal out of it. Sounds fair, but it doesn’t go far enough for me.

I’d say that a candidate’s faith is fair game for a much more pragmatic reason. Let me start with evolution. If someone doesn’t accept evolution as true (as all but a few Republican candidates don’t), I won’t vote for them. That’s because this person is going to be making decisions on my behalf, and by rejecting evolution, they’re showing me that they don’t know how to tell if something’s true. They’re not good at making decisions based on evidence. And there’s a high probability that their thinking is compromised by undue influence from the religious sector. Those are all very worrying tendencies in a leader.

And that’s just evolution. I’d say the same goes for Mitt Romney’s underwear, Michele Bachmann’s superstition about a god controlling the weather, Rick Perry’s belief in ritual starving to attract the attention of his god, or anyone else’s beliefs in magical nonsense. Delusion is delusion.

Of course, even if someone is an atheist, they can still be a disappointing leader; check Australian PM Julia Gillard, an atheist who shows a bewildering opposition to gay marriage, and an unaccountable fondness for distributing federal dollars to Christian chaplains in high schools. Nor are religious beliefs the only ones to watch out for. There are also irrational and dangerous secular beliefs involving climate change denialism or free-market fundamentalism. For me, the key is: does this person know how to use science and evidence to find out what’s true? If not, keep them away from the levers of power. Ignorant people should be represented in government, but not by ignorant people.

Who likes Benny Lava?

31 August 2011 / Daniel Midgley / 1 Comment

Starting out with “Who likes white people?” seemed a little out there, even for Michele Bachmann.

Language Log has done a convincing job of demonstrating that she really said, “Who likes wet people?”, which you can prove to yourself by closing your eyes and listening. You know what it is — it’s those damn subtitles (or are they supertitles?). When you see the words up there, it sure sounds like “white”, even when you know it’s “wet”.

I like this as an example of the suggestibility of perception. Could this be the Benny Lava of American politics?

No, maybe not.

Census ‘No Religion’ billboard from the Atheist Foundation of Australia

25 June 2011 / Daniel Midgley / 2 Comments

Hey, look what just arrived in my neighbourhood.

It’s the new “No Religion” billboards from the Atheist Foundation of Australia.

Australia’s having a census this year, complete with the religion question.

As the next Australian Census approaches (9 August 2011), the Atheist Foundation of Australia (AFA) is preparing for one of its biggest and most important projects. The AFA is campaigning to encourage individuals and families to think about the importance and impact of their answer to this leading Census question: “What is the person’s religion?”

The AFA will be unveiling billboards across the nation in major cities stating “Census 2011: Not religious now? Mark ‘No religion’ and take religion out of politics.”

They’re addressing two distressing tendencies in the census.

One is that people just put ‘Anglican’ or whatever their religion of origin is, even if they’re non-believing. This inflates the religious numbers, and may overestimate the allocation of services to churches, insofar as the government relies on the census to make these decisions.

What is the data on religion used for?

Data on religious affiliation are used for such purposes as planning educational facilities, aged care and other social services provided by religion-based organisations; the location of church buildings; the assigning of chaplains to hospitals, prisons, armed services and universities; the allocation of time on public radio and other media; and sociological research.

The other tendency is to write down some joke religion. Don’t get me wrong; I love the FSM as much as anyone, but I advertise his message on t-shirts, not on serious documents. From the FAQ:

What happens if I write Jedi Knight?

It gets counted as ‘Not Defined’ and is not placed in the ‘No religion’ category. This takes away from the ‘No religion’ numbers and therefore advantages the religion count. It was funny to write Jedi once, now it is a serious mistake to do so.

This year I’m writing ‘Atheist’, which is a legitimate category, and can be taken together with the ‘No Religion’ and ‘Agnostic’ groups.

I’d love to see the number of ‘Nones’ in Australia grow as large as possible this year. If you’re not currently religious, consider the ‘No Religion’ box. It’s more honest and accurate.

The Modeerf Question

8 June 2011 / Daniel Midgley / 1 Comment

I’m on the docket for a ‘comedy debate‘ tomorrow. It’s about the fictional ‘Modeerf’ religion, and I’m the secular atheist of the group. Here’s the promo:

Where do we draw the line between religious freedom and the law of the land?

Between respecting diversity and double standards?

Between maintaining your culture and becoming Australian?

Come and meet migrants from the little known Modeerf religion.

They know that their practices of men going shirtless, having the holy month off work, annual cannabis burning and feeding children fermented mead are pretty unusual in an Australian context but they want similar legal exemptions and discrimination protection to other Aussie religions.

Here are my thoughts:

I’m against the Modeerf religion, just like I’m against every religion. Religions spread superstition, and we have enough of that already. I do not want to see them getting the okay to break the law for religious reasons. I don’t want to pay their taxes for them. I don’t want them meddling in civil rights issues like gay marriage. If they want to do their religious thing, they can. But the government has no business promoting them. Ideally, the government would be neutral towards religion.

But — and this is a big ‘but’ — we don’t have that kind of government. We live in a country where the government is helping to establish and promote religion, contrary to Section 116 of the Australian Constitution.

Thanks to John Howard and now Julia Gillard, the Australian government gives a lot of money to give Christian chaplains exclusive access to evangelise high school students.
The government allows religions to break laws pertaining to anti-discrimination — they get to deny social services and employment to gay and transgendered people.
And of course, the government allows religions not to pay taxes, which forces us to carry their tax burden.

If we can’t have government neutrality toward religion, then I have a terrible, but still second-best solution: Treat all religions the same. As an atheist, I don’t see that any religion as intrinsically better or worse, more sensible or crazier than any other, so every religion should get the same advantage as every other. How about Modeerf chaplains in schools? Come to think of it, how about Muslim chaplains in schools? (Can you imagine the freak-outs on talk radio?) Should the Modeerf be allowed to fire left-handed people in their charity work, if it’s against their religion?

I think this second-best solution would still be terrible. You’d have more discrimination, and less reason. But it would at least have the advantage of being fair. (And if some religions are unwilling to accord others the privileges that they receive, it shows their paper-thin commitment to equality.) The Modeerf example doesn’t show why it’s important that every religion get the same perks. It shows why no religion should.

In doing research for this event, I ran across this statement on a web page from the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade:

People are free to practise any religion as long as they obey the law.

Isn’t that a great ideal? I hope one day we get there.

Burqa ban

16 April 2011 / Daniel Midgley / 5 Comments

I’ve been ignoring the European burqa ban. It’s fraught. Nonetheless, the issue marches on. Recent attention has focused on France.

French burka ban: police arrest two veiled women

French police arrested two veiled women this morning just hours after the country’s new ban on wearing the burka in public came into force.

The women were arrested along with several other people protesting in front of Notre Dame cathedral in Paris against the new law.

Jourrnalists at the scene said the arrests came after police moved in to break up the protest which had not been authorised.

On Saturday police arrested 59 people, including 19 veiled women, who turned up for a banned protest in Paris against the draconian new law, the first of its kind to be enforced in Europe.

Earlier, French police said they will be enforcing the country’s new burka ban “extremely cautiously” because of fears of provoking violence.

To start off, I think the covering is a repressive religious tactic to keep women under wraps and under control.

On the other hand, if I wanted to flaunt my stuff rocking a burqa (or anything else that covers my bits), why should the government stop me? Good on those protesters for their civil disobedience. (Something one hasn’t always seen from certain quarters.) We don’t want the law to be just another form of coercion, unless some better good is served, like the liberation of women from religious tyranny.

Which brings up a point: Burqa bans do not automatically lead to female emancipation. When the Shah of Iran banned it (I am told), many women were accustomed to it, and would never have appeared outside without it. So they just didn’t go outside. But that just shows that religious tyranny, when entrenched, creates unfortunate situations of moral conflict for believers.

If there is a principle behind the burqa ban, it could be worded like this: People should be allowed to wear what they want, free of coercion. Unfortunately, it’s not simple to tell what someone ‘wants’, or when someone is being coerced. People can report that they want things that they have been coerced into wanting. The fact that the burqa is associated with religion tells me that, ipso facto, there’s some coercion going on. I have no doubt that women who wear burqas will tell you they ‘want’ to wear it, just as Mormon women will happily tell you they don’t ‘want’ the priesthood.

So, let’s give both sides their due. I think forced burqa wearing is coercive, and I’ll even allow that government prohibition of the burqa is also coercive. Which leaves Muslim women caught in the unenviable middle.

(Notice that I’m not touching the ‘security risk’ side of the argument. I think it’s bullshit, like all security theatre.)

But even though I can’t stand ostentatiously religious and/or oppressive clothing, I’m reluctantly coming down against the burqa ban. Two things are pushing me. One: Legislating against the rights of minorities is a Very Bad Thing, and I can only think of a few things that would justify it. Harming bystanders or children would be two. These women are adults. Maybe they are in a coercive environment. Yes, that is messed up. I wish it weren’t so. But we can fight this in better ways than controlling how people dress. If they can be told what not to wear, I can be told what not to wear. Will I be told not to wear my patently offensive ‘Gay Jesus’ t-shirt? Come on.

Two: The law also gives right-wing jerks the ability to push minorities around. Forget that.

What do you think? I’m still convincible.

UPDATE: A good bit, this.

A chat with Dallin H. Oaks

27 March 2011 / Daniel Midgley / 34 Comments

I was talking to Mormon apostle Dallin H. Oaks just the other day, and for some reason, we started talking about gay marriage. He was able to clear up a few things for me.