Category: secularism

0 Not a good day to be Pope

March 2, 2011
by Crommunist
· blog · Catholic church · crapitalism · forces of stupid · news · religion · secularism

For the first time in more than 1000 years, it might be considered a bad thing to be Pope. Up until now, the Pope has commanded a great deal of influence and respect (the Reformation notwithstanding) worldwide. Being Pope means that whatever thought crosses your mind carries the force of law for millions of adherents worldwide. Get caught in a lie? No problem, it’s one of those divine mysteries. Want to declare war or raise an army? Justify it by calling it a holy war. Want to raise money for your ridiculously huge home in your city/state with your own private guards? Sell indulgences! Don’t like the concept of limbo? Fuck it – it’s done.

Yeah, being Pope is a pretty sweet deal, giving you control over people’s bodies, minds and souls. No other leader in the world commands the kind of power that the Pope has. Except the cracks are starting to show in the facade:

Two German lawyers have initiated charges against Pope Benedict XVI at the International Criminal Court, alleging crimes against humanity. Christian Sailer and Gert-Joachim Hetzel, based at Marktheidenfeld in the Pope’s home state of Bavaria, last week submitted a 16,500-word document to the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court at the Hague, Dr Luis Moreno Ocampo. Their charges concern “three worldwide crimes which until now have not been denounced . . . (as) the traditional reverence toward ‘ecclesiastical authority’ has clouded the sense of right and wrong”.

They claim the Pope “is responsible for the preservation and leadership of a worldwide totalitarian regime of coercion which subjugates its members with terrifying and health-endangering threats”.

It can be difficult to pull back from revering religion and those who claim its authority to examine their actions dispassionately. However, once you do, you immediately begin to recognize that the Catholic Church is a massive organization with hundreds of thousands of employees worldwide. Imagine for a moment that BP required that all of its employees refrain from using birth control and outlawed extramarital sex. Imagine that Microsoft recruited its software developers as infants and threatened them with torture if they ever quit. Imagine that Google tried to regulate how its marketing directors thought, compelling them to report all unapproved thoughts and handing out punishments as “atonement”.

Divorced from its God claim, this is exactly what the RCC has done for centuries. Of course one could make the argument that membership is voluntary, but how “voluntary” can it possibly be when their main source of recruitment is infants who are then indoctrinated in corporate schools to have many babies and continue the cycle ad infinitum? As someone who has broken out of the indoctrination I can personally attest to the fact that it ain’t so easy as “voluntary” makes it sound.

That’s what those evil secularists do though, right Joseph? It’s all those darn secularists that are making your life so hard:

Six Moroccan men have been arrested in northern Italy on suspicion of seeking to incite hatred of Pope Benedict among Muslims. Police in the city of Brescia said the suspects had allegedly banded together to stir up religious hatred. A note was found calling for the Pope to be punished for converting a Muslim journalist to Roman Catholicism.

Oooor maybe it’s your co-religionists. The Pope has a very fine line to walk. First, he has to assert (without evidence) that his particular interpretation of scripture is the correct one. Second, he has to assert that his particular scripture is the correct one. Third, he has to do all this while simultaneously reaching out to all those people who are so clearly wrong as to believe in a different magic book. He has, of late, decided to try and unite the faithful by putting all the blame against a common enemy – those with no magic book whatsoever. Sadly, while the non-book people have been content to voice their objections through legal channels, those of a different belief are fomenting violence and hatred against him.

Ratzinger has done a poor job of picking his allies, and has done an even worse job of picking his enemies. The history of his own organization should have been enough to teach him that religious groups will always fracture, splinter, and turn against each other. Those same groups he’s reaching out to for some kind of ecumenical allegiance against those who would simply like religion gone from the public sphere will turn against him at the first opportunity, but not before his influence and numbers have dwindled past the point where he can mount a sufficient defense.

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0 Thou shalt NOT believe

February 24, 2011
by Crommunist
· blog · critical thinking · culture · free speech · religion · secularism

One of the more tedious and bizarrely inaccurate straw men that anti-secularists like to pin on secular advocates is that we want to take people’s religion away from them. Having established this completely untrue assertion, they trot out the shopworn examples of people like Pol Pot, Joseph Stalin, and Adolph Hitler. While atheists often counter that Hitler was a Catholic, that Stalin created a new religion based on worship of the state, and that Pol Pot created a cult of personality centred on himself – hardly non-religious actions – I think that this response grants far too much credence to the complete lack of merit present in the assertion.

There is a world of difference between the kind of mandatory atheism that were attempted in Cambodia, Soviet Russia and Nazi Germany and the kind of state atheism that is proposed by secularists. The first is an attempt at thought control – criminalizing certain types of beliefs as being non-harmonious with the interest of the state and punishing any kind of expression of those beliefs. The second is the prescription of a stance toward religion by the state – a refusal to recognize the supremacy of any supernatural belief as worthy of state sanction. The difference between these two positions is akin to the difference between eating at a vegetarian restaurant and murdering anyone who’s ever had a hamburger (albeit inverted – and I’m not likely to do either).

As a committed secularist (not to mention a decent, feeling person) I am an ardent supporter of the principle of freedom of conscience and belief. The punishment of thoughtcrime was, for me, one of the most chilling aspects of Orwell’s masterpiece 1984 – one did not even have to do something to merit punishment; one only had to betray a thought that didn’t meet official approval and one was subject to torture. Hand in hand with the idea of freedom of conscience must be freedom of expression – to me, the most important and least negotiable of the fundamental human freedoms. Every human person has the right to be sovereign in her/his own head, and should be allowed to civilly discuss and disagree with even our most closely-held ideals – it is the only path toward freedom and progress.

If this wasn’t a compelling enough reason to oppose the caricature of secularism that is mandatory state-sponsored atheism, there’s also the fact that it doesn’t work:

One of the last great efforts at state-sponsored atheism is a failure. And not just any kind of failure. China has enforced its anti-religion policy through decades of repression, coercion and persecution, but the lack of success is spectacular, according to a major new study. No more than 15 percent of adults in the world’s most populous country are “real atheists;” 85 percent of the Chinese either hold some religious beliefs or practice some kind of religion, according to the Chinese Spiritual Life Survey.

Members of the Chinese Communist Party and Youth League are required to be atheists, yet 17 percent of them self-identified with a religion, and 65 percent indicated they had engaged in religious practices in the last year, reported sociologist Fenggang Yang of Purdue University, a lead researcher in the project.

What’s interesting is that a place like China, which has been officially anti-theist for more than a generation, has much higher rates of religious belief than places like Denmark or Sweden (or even my homeland of Vancouver), with their strictly secular attitudes toward religion. It somewhat reminds me of a poem I read on a bus in Toronto about two dogs who strain at the leash, yearning for freedom, until the leash is removed. The dogs, newly freed, are content to stay where they were. Of course, in this example, religion is closer to a leash than it is to freedom, but mandatory atheism is not much preferable to state religion.

Defenders of the faith will be quick to seize upon results like the ones found in the study as evidence to support the conjecture that faith is an organic part of being human – that our brains are “wired” to believe in some kind of god. These results do not show any such thing. I’m more inclined to believe that if there is any connection between brains and faith, it is that we have a tendency to invent explanations for strange phenomena, irrespective of how plausible those explanations are (bump in the night? must be a ghost). What they do suggest is that religion cannot be abolished by simply making it illegal.

Personally I am relieved to know that mandatory atheism in China isn’t working. Compelling people to hold a certain belief is an immensely evil act, whether that belief is religious or anti-religious. While it’s disappointing that people are turning toward religion, China is a place that places great value in ancient wisdom and tradition as opposed to science and reason. Atheism is the result of a refusal to accept antiquity and authority as legitimate paths to truth – once those props are gone, religious and other supernatural beliefs are left without anything to hold them up. This is not a process that can be forced on someone; only encouraged.

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3 The ongoing battle for cultural accommodation loses two skirmishes

February 17, 2011
by Crommunist
· blog · Canada · cultural tolerance · culture · law · politics · racism · secularism

Regular readers may recall last month’s discussion over the kirpan, a piece of Sikh religious iconography that has been the subject of recent debate in the Quebec legislature:

While it would be a complete failure on our part to refuse to recognize the impact on the Sikh community (as a manifestation of privilege) of such a ban, we also must respect the fact that Canada is a secular nation, meaning that religious symbols are not to be given any kind of legal standing.

Finding equally compelling arguments on both sides of the issue, I was forced to swallow the bitter pill of compromise and suggest that a reasonable accommodation would be to allow kirpans that could not be used as weapons – either because they were locked or because they were too small (some are worn like lockets around the neck and are less than an inch long). I dislike advocating compromise, because it is usually a sign that both sides have given up trying to convince the other and are trying to get out of the room in time for lunch. In this case, I found myself stuck between two secular principles and unable to arbitrarily pick a side.

It seems that the Quebec legislature suffers from no such quandary:

Quebec’s governing Liberals voted in favour of an opposition motion to ban ceremonial daggers from the provincial legislature. The Parti Québécois tabled its motion Wednesday — requesting the government prevent Sikhs from carrying their ceremonial daggers into the national assembly building — and the legislature voted unanimously in favour.

The Opposition PQ was more strident and applauded the building’s security details, while stressing the party’s view that multiculturalism is a Canadian but not a Quebec value. PQ MNA Louise Beaudoin urged Sikhs to make a “little bit of an effort” and demanded the Liberal government clarify its position on religious objects in the legislature.

It’s nice to see that despite our differences, lawmakers can all agree that there is no room for accommodation of any of those weird foreign practices. Certainly no middle ground to be found between respecting individual freedoms and the secular nature of the state – that would be ridiculous.

Sikhs, predictably, are unhappy with the ruling:

The World Sikh Organization of Canada is disappointed with the Quebec national assembly’s decision to ban Sikhs from wearing a kirpan in the legislature. Arguing that multiculturalism is under threat, Canadian Sikhs pointed out that the Supreme Court of Canada decided in 2006 that the ceremonial dagger, traditionally worn underneath the clothing, is an article of faith — not a weapon.

While I sympathize with their feelings on this issue, I can’t help but roll my eyes whenever someone tries to claim that the kirpan isn’t a weapon. It is true that the religious dictates requiring Sikhs to wear kirpans do not require them to be viable as weapons, but to say that the kirpan isn’t designed with that purpose in mind is willful ignorance masquerading as tolerance. The question is whether or not the religious belief surrounding the weapon allows it to be exempted, under the assumption that nobody will ever use it for violence. That would be a stupid decision made for a stupid reason.

There have been accusations of racism/xenophobia that accompany this decision, and for the most part I tend to agree. There have been exactly zero incidents of someone being attacked in the Quebec legislature by a kirpan, so passing a law that bans them isn’t motivated by self-preservation so much as the wish to make a statement that people who look and behave different must fall in line. Again, I think a reasonable accommodation could have been made here, and failing to pursue that (with a unanimous decision it’s hard to argue otherwise) is strongly suggestive to me of a pervasive attitude that precludes the idea of accommodation.

This issue of religious behaviour functioning in secular society may become the defining issue of our discourse in the next little while. With the Supreme Court wrangling over the constitutionality of bans on polygamy, the Ontario provincial court grappling with veils on testifying witnesses, and now the kirpan issue, can we throw one more log on the fire?

Immigration Minister Jason Kenney says a private members bill that would force people to show their faces when they vote is “reasonable.” A Quebec Conservative backbencher, Steven Blaney, rekindled the debate over veiled voters on Friday with the tabling of a bill that critics decry as an attempt to divide the electorate.

It is tempting to try and weigh the merits of this kind of issue and try to figure out if it is indeed reasonable. I would argue that asking someone to identify themselves in order to vote is very reasonable, and if that cannot be done by means of facial identification and there is no other alternative, requiring someone to show their face is perfectly fine. However, such a view of this issue ignores the real purpose – this is simply an attempt to find wedge issues in anticipation of an upcoming election. Unless there is a suspicion that voter fraud is happening at such a level that national-level legislation needs to be enacted, then this is simply an argument for argument’s sake. It’s a typical tactic of the Harper government that is about as transparent as it is utterly meaningless.

However, there is a larger point to be gleaned in all of this. Canada has to decide how it wants to define itself – as a rigidly secular nation where immigrants have to learn to adopt our customs, or as a place where accommodations are made as often as possible to ensure that everyone feels welcome. Both of these approaches have their merits, but I’m more optimistic about the second one working out as a long-term strategy.

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2 The religious right

February 16, 2011
by Crommunist
· blog · Canada · civil rights · funny · law · religion · secularism

Section 2 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms (also sometimes called the Constitution of Canada) guarantees all Canadians the following:

(a) freedom of conscience and religion;

(b) freedom of thought, belief, opinion and expression, including freedom of the press and other media of communication;

While there is a great deal of haggling over what this actually means (more on that in a second), at the very minimum it says that any Canadian person is entitled to hold their own private beliefs (whether religious or otherwise), and is allowed to express those beliefs openly without fear of official government infringement. This is the part of the Charter that gives me warm fuzzy feelings, incidentally. Pretty much everything else is good also, but this particular part makes my nature rise.

Personally, I favour this minimum definition – you’re allowed to believe and say anything you like, just so long as you don’t a) break the law in doing so, and/or b) try to forcibly compel others to adopt your beliefs. Other interpretations of the “freedom of religion” clause seem to think that you’re allowed to do pretty much whatever you want as long as you can find a religious justification for doing so. Both interpretations are, strictly speaking, in line with the wording of the Charter; however, the second one is both dangerous and stupid. Dangerous, because pretty much anything can be justified by claiming religious origin, and stupid because it leads to things like this:

A judge has thrown out a legal challenge that claimed Canada’s marijuana laws violate the freedom of religion provisions of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The challenge was brought by two Toronto men — Peter Styrsky and Shahrooz Kharaghani — who are reverends in a group called the Church of the Universe… The church uses the drug as a sacrament and argues the law infringes on their freedom of religion rights under the charter.

Trying to claim that the right to religious freedom grants religious adherents freedoms that transcend those of the general populace is absurd. This particular church is obviously a bunch of crazies who think that marijuana is God’s “tree of life” (I am not making that up), but that’s really not that far a step above Rastafari who believe in ganja’s powers to cleanse and refocus the mind. Rastafari isn’t too many steps beyond Orthodox Judaism or anyone who keeps kosher, believing that the milk of a animal cannot be consumed with its meat through some kind of totemic magical properties that make it “unclean” to do so. Orthodox Judaism lies well within the mainstream view of religion, and its dietary restrictions are surely no more absurd than the requirement for Muslim women to cover up, or the Catholic admonishment to abstain from meat on certain days of the week.

Happily, the judge appears to agree with my assessment of where “religious freedom” begins and ends, which is that even the most pious and sincere religious conviction does not trump the law:

“I do not accept that providing cannabis to people in the basement … was a religious act,” she wrote. “They may well believe that providing [marijuana] to others is a good thing to do. That does not, however, transform its distribution into a religious belief or practice.”

This applies in equal measure to all attempts to circumvent the laws and statutes of society in the name of “religious expression”. Christians like to claim persecution when they have to treat LGBT people as though they are full human beings, entitled to the same level of jobs, services and treatment that anyone else is. This ruling speaks to that issue as well – your beliefs are fine so long as you keep them in the comfort of your own head. The second you bring them out into the open and begin contravening the laws of the land, you’re no longer entitled and must obey the same rules as everyone else. The irony is of course lost on the religious that the same rules that prevent them from discriminating against others also protect them from the selfsame discrimination they worry that we secularists are going to inflict upon them.

I think they should relax – the Charter already prohibits the things they’re worried about. Can’t relax? Ask the guys at the Church of the Universe – they might be able to help you out…

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0 And in case you thought I was being unfair…

February 2, 2011
by Crommunist
· blog · crapitalism · forces of stupid · news · religion · secularism

In addition to the majority of my family, I have friends who are Catholic. A person with whom I did my undergraduate degree, who I have a great deal of affection for, reacted strongly to one of my previous posts about the ongoing stupidity present in the Catholic Church. She did not appreciate my characterization of the Church’s policies toward sex and sexuality as destructive and backwards, suggesting that perhaps I lacked understanding of why it was actually God’s manifest will that people in Africa get AIDS because condoms are a greater evil than human suffering.

When I explained to her that I was very familiar with Catholic doctrine, having been an active participant in the Church for the first half of my life, she intimated that perhaps my upbringing was part of the reason I was unfairly targeting the Church. This is a pretty popular attempt to derail a discussion that is common to believers in any kind of deity – you really do believe but you’re just angry so that’s why you’re speaking up. I don’t think it was Mary’s (not her real name) intent to make this argument explicitly, but the subtext was pretty clear.

If I haven’t made this clear before, I will absolutely own up to the fact that I have a particular axe to grind with the Roman Catholic Church. I had great trust in the institution when I was young, but the more I learned about it the more it let me down. I can’t help but feel a sense of personal betrayal that a group that preached morality to me for years is, in fact, so shockingly immoral that it beggars belief. The schadenfreude part of my lizard brain does take some personal delight in their hypocrisy and evil being laid bare. However, as I try my utmost to be a fair journalist in all matters, I take the utmost care to prevent too much of my personal beef from leaking into my analysis of events.

My criticisms of religion, like the one from this morning (which I’m sure Mary will hate, although it’s doubtful she’ll even read it) are about religion, not about a particular religion. I am equally incensed by the stupidity of Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, new-age “spirituality” and any other invocation of supernatural nonsense that drapes itself in the robes of undeserved respect that we call “religion”.

An Indian court has remanded in custody a Hindu holy man accused of a string of bomb attacks previously thought to be the work of Muslim militants. Swami Aseemanand allegedly admitted to placing bombs on a train to Pakistan, at a Sufi shrine and at a mosque. He has also allegedly confessed to carrying out two assaults on the southern Indian town of Malegaon, which has a large Muslim population.

There is no religious tradition that is immune from the kind of abuse of its power that is the hallmark of religion. Hindu and Muslim violence is tearing Southern Asia apart, much the way that Buddhist and Muslim violence tore apart the country of Sri Lanka. There is no special status granted to Buddhism or Hinduism (despite what Sam Harris would try to convince you) – supernatural claims and their associated tribal affiliations are not unique to the Abrahamic religions.

Men and women have been banned from shaking hands in a district of Somalia controlled by the Islamist group al-Shabab. Under the ban imposed in the southern town of Jowhar, men and women who are not related are also barred from walking together or chatting in public. It is the first time such social restrictions have been introduced. The al-Shabab administration said those who disobeyed the new rules would be punished according to Sharia law.

Is there any way in which this nonsense makes for a better world? The Orwelian doublethink of the religious would have you believe that such ridiculous restrictions are the way to instill a sense of dignity in the women of Somalia (at least that’s what Mary tried to convince me) – ultimately opening the path to their gaining civil rights. I can’t imagine how difficult it must be for a rational mind to look at this kind of abject nonsense and have to square the circle of clear maleficence being committed in the name of morality. Well, actually I can imagine because I did it myself for the better part of a decade.

An Indian shaman who allegedly forced women to drink a potion to prove they were not witches has been arrested. Nearly 30 women fell ill after they were rounded up in Shivni village in central Chhattisgarh state on Sunday and made to drink the herbal brew. A senior police officer told the BBC that six villagers had also been arrested. Witch hunts targeting women are common in east and central India, and a number of accused are killed every year.

This isn’t happening because of a religion, or a particular religious tradition. This is what happens when people actually believe the ridiculous superstitious nonsense that is the bread and butter of faith. When we are told that belief without evidence is some kind of virtue, we open a dangerous door – a door that permits us to murder those who believe differently, to outlaw completely harmless and potentially beneficial practices in the name of an unseen deity, and to poison people on the suspicion of heresy. It is only by throwing out the need for logic and evidence in the name of “faith” that such things are permissible – I don’t care what religious tradition that kind of brainlessness manifests itself as.

Of course the real problem isn’t the religious – it’s us. The emperor’s clothes only exist because we willingly insist that because he believes that he’s not nude, we must do so too. Any respect we grant to the bare naked stupidity that is “faith” is too much. While I’m perfectly willing to respect my neighbour’s right to believe whatever she likes, I will confer no such deference to how I treat the lunacy itself.

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2 Israel doesn’t have a race problem

December 22, 2010
by Crommunist
· blog · conservativism · cultural tolerance · forces of stupid · racism · religion · secularism

Okay, this one is admittedly stretching it a bit…

Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu has criticised rabbis who issued a statement saying it is a “sin” for Jews to rent or sell property to non-Jews. About 40 rabbis, many employed by the state, signed the statement, citing concerns about potential mixed marriages and falling property values.

I have purposefully avoided commenting on the situation in Israel/Palestine. Setting one foot in that conflict is opening myself up to a whole host of criticism, which I do not have enough factual background to defend myself against. There exists in that region a maelstrom of political, historical, religious, and racial narratives that are so intertwined that I find it impossible to come down on one side or another of an issue. However, in this case I am happy to suspend my cautious equipoise and dive into this one as a clear-cut situation where there is a clear right and clear wrong.

Any time anyone uses the word “sin” in an argument, they’re wrong. The concept of “sin” makes a whole host of assumptions for which there can be no evidence whatsoever:

That there is a supreme being
That the supreme being is consciously aware of human activity
That the supreme being cares about human activity
That the supreme being has a list of “naughty” and “nice” human activities
That this list is available to humans
That your particular list is the correct one

None of those assumptions can be demonstrated with any kind of compelling evidence. To an independent observer, there is no good reason to assume the truth of any of those claims, let alone all six of them in succession. While it may be overwhelmingly true that the speaker doesn’t like the activity in question (whether that’s buttsecks or pork or renting to people of a slightly different ethnicity), it does not necessarily follow that partaking in the activity in question is wrong in and of itself. What is required is a discussion of the necessary consequences of that action; I make that specification to separate it from people who make ridiculous claims like “homosex is wrong because some gay men are promiscuous”.

This one hits home for me particularly, since race-based housing discrimination is one of the primary reasons (in my opinion) that racism persists today. The problem with the conservative approach to race is that it wants to skip right to the end. To be sure, the liberal approach to race skips a bunch of intermediate steps too, but in a different way. Conservatives make the assumption that once you remove legal barriers to access, then all the work is done; consequently, any continuing problems experienced by a formerly-oppressed group are their own fault. After all, once you take your foot off of someone’s neck, it’s his own fault if he doesn’t immediately leap to his feet. Or, to put it another way:

“You do not take a person who, for years, has been hobbled by chains and liberate him, bring him up to the starting line of a race and then say, `You are free to compete with an the others,’ and still justly believe that you have been completely fair.” – Lyndon Johnson

Of course conservatives disagree with the idea that a) human beings should be in the business of creating fairness, or that b) there is any unfairness to begin with. However, when we look at the consequences of housing disparity, we see that de facto segregation necessarily has negative consequences in terms of income inequalities and a persistent attitude of “us” and “them” that starts in the schools and lasts through generations.

This seems to be what is happening in this Israeli case. These rabbis have a hate-on for Arabs (for reasons that I’m sure don’t stretch credulity) and have cobbled together some post-hoc justification for their hatred, branding the practice as “sin”. Unlike yesterday’s example, however, these religious leaders don’t have much influence outside their own conservative community, and cannot claim any sway over state power:

The Association for Civil Rights in Israel has called on Mr Netanyahu to take disciplinary action against the chief municipal rabbis on the list, whose salaries are publicly funded. Religious edicts are often ignored in predominantly secular Israel.

However, this edict is perhaps a useful red flag for the simmering racial climate that defines much of Israel’s domestic policy (and a great deal of its foreign policy too). It also serves an example of how a country that is essentially founded on religious grounds can still model secularism and restraint from going full-on God crazy.

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26 Why separation of church and state is important

December 21, 2010
by Crommunist
· blog · Canada · civil rights · law · news · politics · religion · secularism

Canada does not have an explicit legal separation between religion and government, which is obviously cause for concern for me as an atheist. However, whatever your beliefs, this kind of thing should concern you too:

A senior Iranian cleric, Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, has suggested that opposing the country’s supreme leader amounts to a denial of God. Correspondents say the unusually strong comments appear to be aimed at silencing internal dissent over the leadership of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Sometimes in our more contentious debates, we are tempted to accuse political opponents of being heartless, or say that a position we hold is what God wants. I’m not sure how much anyone actually believes that God cares about politics, but the rhetoric definitely gets amped up at times. However, that’s (mostly) harmless talk; we don’t hear that kind of stuff from our political leaders. This is a good thing, because both of those arguments (liberal and conservative respectively) are thought-stoppers – no reasonable conversation can proceed once we start building our house on the sand of emotion or in the cognitive quagmire of faith.

However, Iran has no such restraint:

The latest comments were made by conservative cleric, Ayatollah Jannati, who heads Iran’s powerful Guardian Council, which oversees the country’s elections and the constitution.

Analysts say the unusually strong demand for public loyalty to Iran’s supreme leader is an attempt by the influential cleric to liken political dissent to religious apostasy – a crime which carries heavy punishment under Iran’s strict Islamic code.

The danger of such statements, especially when backed by state power, is fairly obvious. When the religious establishment controls the state power, and opposition to a political leader is tantamount to a religious crime, then any political opposition is, as a result, a crime. If the leader is corrupt, if the leader abuses his power, if the leader violates the rights of the people, the people have no recourse. Political speech is blasphemy, subject to severe punishment. Forget the idea of an opposition party, forget the idea of free speech, forget the idea of fairness or justice under the law.

Obviously nothing about this particular story will be surprising to anyone who’s been paying any attention at all to the situation in Iran. I only began paying attention in the wake of the election madness a couple years ago, but since then I’ve seen nothing but repeated arrogance, stupidity and evil come from this religious republic. However, abstracting a general rule from this specific case may be possible – it is to everyone’s benefit to have religious power separated by law from state power. The only people who would benefit from an erosion of state sovereignty by the religious establishment is those who agree completely with the leading class’ views. History shows us again and again that fractions will appear within religious communities as they grow larger and more powerful. There is no long-term benefit to the rule of religion – there will always be a group that is seen as heretical until there is only one absolute ruler. Religion knows no satiety in its appetite for power.

So regardless of your religious beliefs, a separation of state power from religious influence is to your benefit. Eventually your beliefs will come into conflict with the ruling party’s, at which point you will find the religious/state power directed at you. The solution, of course, is to wall off religion – allow people their individual rights to believe as they want, but to ensure that state power flows from the people, not from the whims of a capricious God.

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1 Two faces of India

December 14, 2010
by Crommunist
· blog · civil rights · culture · news · religion · secularism · sex

You’ll undoubtedly have noticed by this time that the majority of these posts are taken from the news. I assume that you can read the newspaper yourself, I just try to pick out the juiciest nuggets and comment on them. Most of the pieces I write revolve around a single news item, which I use to demonstrate some underlying point. However, I am aware that presenting a single story might give you a mistaken impression, particularly when I comment of goings-on in other countries.

So I thought today I’d contrast two stories coming out of India. First, the bad:

Hindu hardline opposition parties have often raised questions about Italian-born Sonia Gandhi’s faith. They have questioned Mrs Gandhi’s right to rule a country where a vast majority of the population is Hindu.

We are somewhat spoiled here in Canada, living in a country where public discussion of religion is considered rude. Our politicians don’t (by and large) trumpet their religion, and while the word “God” is in our national anthem, we don’t really spend much time or energy on trying to keep religion out of the public square.

India is quite another story, where tribalism and religious differences are intractably linked, and deep suspicions and hatred between groups go back generations. Religion is, to the person on the street, very important. Regular readers may remember the story of the Indian and Pakistani tennis players whose partnership flies in the face of religious schism. It is the same within India.

Luckily, the court has struck down this request for religious identification, so this story isn’t all bad. The fact that it made it that far gives cause for pause, because the only reason it isn’t happening here is because nobody cares… yet.

The next story, though, is all good:

About 2,000 people have joined a gay pride parade in the Indian capital, Delhi, the first such event since homosexuality was legalised last year. Organisers said gay people were demonstrating that they have a place in society, and that the parade was a celebration of being different.

I am so weary of hearing straight people get all hot and bothered over Pride events. “Why do you need to go out and flaunt it? We don’t have straight pride parades!” Mmm, just bask in the privilege denial. The whole point of a Pride parade is to counteract the stigma of shame that has been attached to homosexuality for generations – a stigma that found its way into laws and is still tearing the United States apart.

Here in Canada where gay people have (nearly) equal rights (anyone who feels the need to make the tired and brainless assertion that they have more rights because you’re not allowed to discriminate against them, you’re really overestimating my willingness to listen to stupid arguments), Pride parades might seem redundant. However, we don’t live in a bubble, and our society’s public willingness to allow gay people the freedom to celebrate their identity sends a message to the rest of the world, including India.

The message that is sent by India to the rest of the world is that maybe, just maybe, they’re starting to shake off the crushing yoke of religion and becoming a modern, secular democracy.

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6 ‘Tis the season… to shove it in their faces!

December 13, 2010
by Crommunist
· blog · medicine · religion · secularism · skeptivism

Cross-posted from Canadian Atheist, in direct (and repeated) violation of the unofficial policy prohibiting such things.

This one will brief, since Hemant over at Friendly Atheist has already given us all the relevant information:

The Atheism subReddit has taken up the cause to raise $42,000 for Doctors without Borders — the amount is an homage to Douglas Adams.

This is a friendly competition with the members of the Christianity subReddit, who are donating to the World Vision Clean Water Fund. Much like with Kiva, we’re crushing them with our generosity (I should’ve pointed out that this is hardly a fair fight because the Atheism subReddit outnumbers the Christian subReddit by a longshot. There’s waaaaay more of us. So the “competition” is all in good fun. Still, Christians are more than welcome to try to beat us )

As I write this, the atheists have already raised $30,000. The Christians have raised a little over $10,000.

Let’s help the atheists reach their goal (and, as a bonus, give more than the Christians).

If you’re in the U.K., you can give here.

If you’re in America (or elsewhere), you can give here.

I just gave $10. What are you donating?

Personally I think this is an awesome idea. Despite being at odds with a large segment of the atheist community with my stance toward religion, I think this is the kind of collaboration and friendly rivalry that the “accommodationists” are talking about most of the time. I’m happy to channel some of my vitriol (and one night out’s worth of cash – I donated $50) into a cause that sees real and positive results for someone else on the planet.

So atheists, put down your deep-fried baby sandwiches, click on the link, and cough up whatever dough you can spare to finally destroy Christianity once and for all! Or, get a poor kid some medicine. Whatever lifts your luggage. Christians, you can donate here.

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5 Religious “education”

December 9, 2010
by Crommunist
· blog · critical thinking · ethics · religion · secularism

Last week, Ian Bushfield wrote some thoughts on the idea of religious education in public schools:

By offering religious education/instruction, we could hopefully convince parents that the public school system is where their kids should be. Further, we can hopefully expose the children to different ideas about religion and morality, which, demonstrated by the uproar over the comparative ethics course in Quebec, can challenge the basic notions of faith as a virtue.

I happen to agree with Ian on this point (small wonder, we tend to agree with each other generally). Comparative religious education is like comparative literature or anthropology or history – presenting overlapping but non-redundant narratives presents fertile ground for developing a skeptic mind. Teaching kids that there may not always be a “right answer”, particularly when talking about humanity, invites them to consider and critique the evidence for the answers they are presented with. In the context of society, religion is something we should be particularly skeptical about.

Many atheists are wary of religious education in public schools, arguing that there ought to be an inviolable barrier between church and state. While those of us living in Canada do not enjoy that separation as a matter of law (we don’t have an equivalent of the First Amendment in the Canadian Charter), many of us still feel it would violate an important principle of a just society. Maybe those opposed to teaching religion in public schools are worried about something like this:

BBC Panorama found that more than 40 Saudi Students’ Schools and Clubs are teaching the official Saudi national curriculum to about 5,000 pupils. One text book shows how the hands and feet of thieves are chopped off…

One of the text books asks children to list the “reprehensible” qualities of Jewish people. A text for younger children asks what happens to someone who dies who is not a believer in Islam – the answer given in the text book is “hellfire”. Another text describes the punishment for gay sex as death and states a difference of opinion about whether it should be carried out by stoning, burning with fire or throwing the person over a cliff.

Well at least they’re teaching kids about their options…

I think the problem with the blanket objection to religion in schools is a failure to articulate the difference between teaching religion and teaching about religion. Religion, like science, or math, or art, or history, is an important subject to have a factual grasp on. I myself took a course on world religions in high school. Of course by the time I was that age I had pretty much dismissed all religions as having any claim to exclusive truth. However, learning about the historical roots of the different religions helped me better understand both the various faiths and their respective adherents.

I would argue that a proper understanding of religion requires a comprehension of world history and an appreciation for humanity’s foibles. The kind of education (for the former) and critical appraisal and mature cognition (for the latter) that is required for this kind of deep understanding might be beyond the mental capabilities of an elementary school child. However, kids can understand ethics on a more-or-less intuitive level. I would suggest instruction in ethics at that age – not simply a list of things that are right and wrong (the religious equivalent of “ethical instruction”), but instruction on how the kids can work their way through ethical dilemmas.

This would accomplish two things. First, it would help ingrain moral behaviour by equipping children with the tools to make good judgments in the absence of supervising authority. Second, it would help dispel the idea that morals come from religion, by showing the actual process by which we decide morality.

I am not opposed to instruction about religion in public schools. Just like we teach the orbital model of atomic structure as a way of showing what we used to believe, we can teach religion as one of mankind’s many failed models of the world, and what we’ve learned since then.

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