I've said quite a bit about gun control; pretty much all I'm going to say, actually. There is something far more pernicious, more dangerous and more in need of control however
and that's God. It's hard to deny although that doesn't prevent most people from denying it, God has been on the wrong side of things as often as the right side: slavery, conquest, persecutions, genocide. You name it; God has been the universal justification as often as the universal opponent.So it isn't surprising that God now seems to be against Net Neutrality. Sure he is -- and our founding fathers who don't seem to have believed in the kind of god who gets involved in such matters as free markets thought so too. That's the thing about God's likes and dislikes and mysterious plans: people just make them up as they go along.
Take David Barton, for instance, allegedly one of the country's most influential Evangelicals. He thinks that government should stay out of the lives of selected people and should, in the name of freedom and less intrusive government, regulate the most private and personal consensual sexual behavior. That's nothing new, of course, but it may surprise you that according to the Gospel as invented by Barton, God hates net neutrality and wants the internet dominated by the powerful and rich. God and the Puritans brought us prosperity because we're not socialists. The rest of the world got their prosperity from the Devil apparently and Jesus was just joking about rich men and heaven. How can we question that?
God wills it -- just like God willed the Crusades and the extermination of European Jews: just like he willed the divine right of kings and the right of the Church to approve their power. He demanded a secular Democracy in the Colonies, some of them, while simultaneously mandating the power of George III, Rex Dei Gratia.
Face it, it's long since been far out of hand and the will of god has become indistinguishable from the background noise of commerce. Did God have an interest in boosting tobacco sales. He obviously, if we're to believe this radio troll, has an interest in the rights of corporations which exceeds his concern for the poor. Does God like free markets, or does he like kings? Does the Bible speak against Net Neutrality or call it Socialism. Does God hate Socialism or does he like you to share everything you have with the poor and sick? Depends on who you ask and of course I won't be asking the Religious right who I can't tell from the Religious wrong of late.
One thing our constitution does uphold, is the free exercise of religion, so lunatics and tyrants and even evil men like Barton get to rave on unmolested. The government can't really exercise God control and more than God can control the evil spewed out by Barton's forked tongue. It's up to me and you to be aware that whether or not it was God, Guns and Guts that made America "great" those things will serve any master with equal ferocity. Mention God and nobody can shut you up, nobody can really contradict you and millions will follow you through the gates of hell, raging and bellowing, cheering and jeering like the lost souls we are.
Jim Jones ... anyone?
ReplyDeleteIt's hard to imagine him being able to do what he did without human longing for certainty and the inability to distinguish between men, objects and God's will.
ReplyDeleteThere's no license requirement for being a disciple -- no intellectual discipline needed.
You're not talking about God. Not really. You're talking about using God to justify statism. God (or the gods if you prefer) is spiritual, not of this world. Have been reading some of Jung's thoughts on this. It's a deep and complicated shadow side with which we're struggling.
ReplyDeleteJung believe that our roots to spirituality have to do with primal forces within the human psyche and warned of the dangers of a rational society separated from a spiritual, non-worldly connection—and the misuse of religion for statist (and now corporate) control. This, he postulated, would leave modern man/woman adrift with no "extramundane" authority to whom he/she could turn for moral and ethical guidance—above the authority of the "Church" and the "State".
We ignore the need for our god(s) at our peril, Jung warns. That said, Jung had a rather more sophisticated and non-literal view of what a god is. It is the one thing, he says, that gives the individual true independence from the mass and the state.
So, while I don't give a rat's ass for Barton and his ilk, I do agree, there is something to fear and loath in these people...
Captain,
ReplyDeleteThis is happening on home turf, right here in the great Sunshine State, another assault on the anti-establishment clause of the Florida Constitution. This is from the ACLU (arrived in my email box earlier this week):
For nearly a century and a half, the Florida Constitution has included a clear and unique check on government's power to limit the free exercise of religion known as the "No Aid" Clause. But that could change this year. The Florida legislature is currently considering two pieces of legislation which would eliminate the "No Aid" Clause. SJR 1218 and HJR 1471 will end Florida's longstanding Constitutional protection against government-funded religion.
Removing the "No Aid" provision of our state Constitution would erode the limits on government power, giving the state the authority to pick and choose which religious groups receive taxpayer dollars. Moreover, it would pit individual religions and even denominations within religions against each other in the quest for government funding.
If the government ensures that one program is favored over another, the government will be supporting one religion or particular set of religious views over another. This doesn't promote religion; instead, it impedes its free exercise.”
The bill is sponsored by ARCH IDIOT Mike Haridopolos of Brevard County. I hate to say this, but I hear the ghost of Bill McCollum knocking at my door again.
Edge:
ReplyDelete"You're not talking about God"
Of course not. I'm talking about the second hand BS we get from people who claim they speak for God. I've been claiming all along that one cannot speak for God and that God does not speak.
Personally, I feel far more free without it, but that's me.
8π:
ReplyDeleteI get the same stuff from the ACLU. I prefer the piece of mind that comes with accepting that it's all over and that Homo Americanus isn't up to the challenges of civilization.
Excellent!
ReplyDelete"God Hates Net Neutrality" -- now THAT would make for an interesting bumper sticker! But you know who doesn't hate net neutrality? Yes, that's right: the Dinosaur Gods. They're all for net neutrality, to judge from the archaeopterix entrails I've read lately. They're also in favor of universal health care, gay marriage, re-regulating the financial sector, and ending the use of fossil fuels. Damn liberal Dinosaur Gods!
ReplyDeleteI tried to comment earlier and Blogger ate it!
ReplyDeleteSo, let me try again.
I agree with Jung that religion/spirituality in society can help to define a moral code that is beneficial to many.
I think Jung had a grasp on a spiritual concept of a God-spirit as a positive energy in the universe rather than the more infantile notion of God with flowing hair and a booming voice sitting on a cloud.
According to many:
A college student is gunned down in the street and it is the will of God. A baby survives being blown about in a tornado and it's the will of God.
A five year old dies of cancer and a person lives to be 105 and it's all the will of God.
Either God is rather cruel and arbitrary or he is getting a ton of unwarranted credit/blame.
Barton and his ilk and their notions of speaking for God are a threat to our society and to our civilization as evidenced by OCTO's report on what is happening in FL.
To those who ascribe to such "values" I say, go home, shut off your TVs and disconnect your DSL but stay the hell out of my life!
"There's no license requirement for being a disciple—no intellectual discipline needed."
ReplyDeleteYeah, fortunately our politicians are a lot more rational than Jim Jones. Oh, wait a minute. How did we get into Vietnam, Central America and Panama, Iraq and Afghanistan? OK, but our media are better. They warned us about the dangers of war and overspending and corporatists taking over the planet. Oh, wait a minute. They didn't, either.
If the scientific method, reason and rationalism are so successful, why the hell is the planet in such a mess? (Yes, we have longer human lifespans at the expense of absolutely everything else...) If we're not believing in a god, what are we believing, folks? Nothing? Well, it shows, and that was Jung's point.
We can't even manage enough compassion for the planet to build a low-impact transportation system (for godsakes!).
Fogg, we're all disciples. Of something.
Captain, your post calls to mind one of my favorite short stories by Mark Twain, The War Prayer. It was a satirical indictment of unfettered patriotism and religious fervor as motivations for war.
ReplyDeleteA community gathers in a church to pray for their young men who are going off to war when a stranger purporting to be a messenger from God shows up. He tells them that God has heard their prayers and that God wants to be certain that they fully understand exactly what it is that they are asking in their prayers.
Is it one prayer? No, it is two -- one uttered, the other not. Both have reached the ear of Him Who heareth all supplications, the spoken and the unspoken. Ponder this -- keep it in mind. If you would beseech a blessing upon yourself, beware! lest without intent you invoke a curse upon a neighbor at the same time. If you pray for the blessing of rain upon your crop which needs it, by that act you are possibly praying for a curse upon some neighbor's crop which may not need rain and can be injured by it.
Then the stranger tells them that the following is the full essence of their prayer:
O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle -- be Thou near them! With them -- in spirit -- we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it -- for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen.
While this is exactly what they have been asking for in their prayers, they refuse to recognize it as their desire and dismiss the stranger as a lunatic. I think that one of the most dangerous elements of the misappropriation of God as the author of human actions is that it allows people to blind themselves to the impact of their actions.
If the scientific method, reason and rationalism are so successful, why the hell is the planet in such a mess?... If we're not believing in a god, what are we believing, folks? Nothing? Well, it shows, and that was Jung's point.
ReplyDeleteEdge, Excellent questions, ones that I have struggled with myself.
Thanks Sheria. I think everyone here on this blog shares these struggles. I sometimes wonder how much more (or less) interesting a face-to-face discourse with this group would be...
ReplyDelete"If we're not believing in a god, what are we believing, folks? Nothing? Well, it shows, and that was Jung's point."
ReplyDeleteBut an overwhelming majority of humans on this planet are believers. Atheism is a definite minority.
So a majority of folks absolutely DO believe in something. I think we need to question what those beliefs lead human beings to do or, at the very least, how those beliefs allow humans to justify the wrongs they commit.
Edge:
ReplyDelete"If the scientific method, reason and rationalism are so successful, why the hell is the planet in such a mess? "
Seriously? Really?
If we're descended from monkeys, why are there still monkeys? Sure we've cured a thousand deadly diseases and doubled our lifespan but we still die, so why is scientific medicine any good? The law doesn't stop crime, so why bother with police and courts? The only way to get the ghosts out of your house is to burn sage. You have to believe in something you know.
What is this, a Tea Party meeting? Taxes aren't necessary to civilization but the God of the current American majority is? I'd ask for the evidence of that, but evidence seems to be the bad guy once again so let's just snicker and snark.
Come on, was that a serious question? If it was, I'd like to know just when reason became the basis of human actions! Gimme a break, if nobody has any clue about how it was in the age of belief: the dark ages, the medieval period -- if nobody remembers the godsoaked ages of ignorance, slavery, brutality, pestilence, witch hunts, crusades, inquisitions and wars of god willed conquests, starvation and slaughter that define human and pre-human history, there's no hope that reason will ever become widespread and there's an expectation that this self-defeating pessimism will drown us in our own prayers, while pragmatic and forward looking societies will prevail.
There's just something sad about bourgeois primitivists living better, longer and safer than at any time in history while complaining about how the source of our blessings is no good and we should go back to trembling before Wotan. And say, if your god is such a good deal, why do the wicked prevail and the good die young? Why not a different god? Why not Odin? His followers live longer than Jesus' disciples. (Sorry to be so rational, I know it's offensive.) Let's just say I believe in Odin, 'cause you gotta believe, you know.
ReplyDeleteSo if believing, including the belief in Jung, is so productive as opposed to science, why was the human condition nasty beyond our power to comprehend before it?
Sorry, this is a bullshit, head in the sand and ridiculous argument. It's one it's proponents don't actually believe in anyway since very few, throw away their clothes and run naked through the storm or graze in the fields like little Lears or Nebuchadnezzars, renouncing the evil science and technology of central heat, clean water and frozen foods.
Gods are always misappropriated -- that was my point -- and those who benefit from that misappropriation rise to the top while the humble believers become their pawns. That's the danger of theism and that's what my point is. How do we temper that danger? Reason, looking at facts and honesty about those facts and scepticism about belief.
We misuse the concept of god as we misuse nature and that's not because we're too rational, it's because we are not rationalists but rationalizers. God is never better and never different than his believers and if you don't believe me, than look at this group of essentially good people trying to crucify science in God's name. Prometheus wasn't punished by Greeks cooking over his fire - it was the gods. Jesus wasn't nailed up by rationalists but by believers.
If we're polluting the world, and we are, it isn't because we're reasonable creatures, it's because we're not. It isn't because we have too much technology, it's because we don't have enough and because we're individualists whose credo is individualism and irresponsibility. It isn't because we think about consequences, it's because we don't. Who is it telling us it doesn't matter if we rape our resources? Those who talk of God's gift of "dominion" and of god returning any day, so it doesn't matter.
Nothing that happens has anything to do with mysterious and slippery entities other than ourselves.
And is Jung a prophet we have to believe in? What is the test of a successful theory? Belief? Why do we have to believe and why do we have to elevate opinion, whim, subliminal intimation, the desire of the prophet to get rich and important and the voices in our heads above all else? You have to believe in something? Of course you don't, but I believe in honesty and that's just another name for science.
Can it ever be possible to tell the Fogg he's missing the point? This is not about someone's big man in the sky, appropriated by whomever for utilitarian purposes.
ReplyDeleteReason is an instrument. Science is an instrument. Both are being used to pollute the world consciously, and not by merely bad, greedy people, but by all of us. And you know this.
And of course history is the wreckage of human failing, which was certainly far less physically comfortable without modern technology. But I seriously doubt that our ancestors were less happy that we are.
I don't particularly think Jung was a prophet. His writing is interesting and strikes a resonant chord.
What I AM talking about is Jung's reference to the shadow in EACH of us, and our ability to see it. So, you believe in honesty—another name for science. That's about as profound as believing in a hammer—a tool. Sure the tool is honest. So is a sword.
Jung was talking about the inner journey. But perhaps I'm in the wrong forum...
To move forward as a society, to engage in small but steady steps towards a better reality for all, it is essential that we be able to engage in civil discussion without descending into insult. Come on Captain, was the "What is this, a Tea Party meeting" really necessary?
ReplyDeleteI don't think that Edge has characterized Jung as being a prophet or the founder of a belief system. Jung was a psychiatrist who focused on the study of the human psyche; in most eyes, that makes him a scientist not a purveyor of some pseudo religious belief system.
Jung observed that acts of the state parallel religious displays: "Brass bands, flags, banners, parades and monster demonstrations are no different in principle from ecclesiastical processions, cannonades and fire to scare off demons". (Jung, Carl. The Undiscovered Self: The Problem of the Individual in Modern Society. New American Library, (2006). p. 25) According to Jung, substituting the state for God led to the same fanaticism of the church-states of the Dark Ages—wherein the more the state is "worshiped", the more freedom and morality are suppressed; (Id. at 24) which ultimately leaves the individual psychically undeveloped with extreme feelings of marginalization. (Id. at 14 & 54)
I've always interpreted Jung to mean that swapping out one belief for another belief doesn't resolve the problem but merely leaves an even greater feeling of emptiness which fosters even more alienation from the whole and more devotion to the pursuit of the rights of the individual at the cost of the well being of the society as a whole. Jung doesn't advocate a belief in a god but an understanding of self and thereby an understanding of our motivations and how to channel the needs of self to also support the needs of the whole. A belief in science is no better than a belief in God in achieving that goal; I think that is Jung's point and the basis of Edge's philosophical question. It is a question that in some variation has been raised by philosophers across the ages.
It's not a belief in God that's important; it's a belief in something beyond the individual's own existence, a belief in a responsibility to work for the common good. A belief in the value of human life but tempered with a belief in the value of all life.
The Tea Party is a group of marginalized folks come together around their belief that everyone who is not with them is against them. They use the Bible and the Constitution as the justification for their existence and the foundation of their righteous beliefs. If we are to have any hope of dismantling their structure and influence, we have to understand it and recognize that it is their reality.
ReplyDeleteI think that another piece of Jungian analysis is that reality is subjective, based on our individual perceptions and beliefs. Societies bring groups of us together and we begin to agree upon some share realities. I see a person on the corner with a sign that reads "will work for food," and I think that it is absurd that in a country of so much excess that anyone should have to go hungry. That's my reality. However, I know people who upon seeing the same person on the corner, believe that he or she is a lazy individual unwilling to work and that entitlement programs just coddle such people and keep them from becoming independent. Their reality is just as powerful to them as mine is to me. Belief informs reality, so the question becomes how dowe shift their belief paradigm to reflect a broader concern for the welfare of all?
My answer isn't a belief in God. Such a belief doesn't change anyone's mind. People create God in their own image; God tends to reflect the believer's beliefs; if the believer holds petty, discriminatory beliefs so will their God.
However, I would remind us all that the litany of human atrocities that litter our history didn't begin with a belief in a Christian God. That entire period known as B.C., that was before Christianity existed. Humans weren't any better behaved then than they have been in the era known as A.D. (Btw, I am aware that the entire world does not measure calendar time by B.C. and A.D.)
For me this is where Jungian analysis comes in because Jung suggests that there are answers to be found and solutions to be generated if we look inwardly at what makes us tick, at who we are. It's a journey inward.
Thanks Sheria. You've presented it more thoroughly and compassionately than I have. The thing, I suppose, I'm striving for here with this group is moving (myself) beyond the reflex reactions to the disenfranchised reactionaries like the Christian Right or the Tea Partiers. I think our shadows will inform us more that their shadows, which already seem clear enough to those of us here.
ReplyDeleteEdge, no thanks needed, I merely expanded on what you began. I'm always delighted to encounter someone who has read Jung.
ReplyDeleteI also strive to move myself beyond reflexive reactions. I don't have any Tea Partiers in my family but there are some who are card carrying members of the Christian Right. I make an effort to listen carefully before I try to share my differing views.
Yes, it's a little more sensitive out there in the real world, in the heat of battle. Discretion...
ReplyDeleteAs for Jung, I keep coming back to him, as a good combination of philosophy and psychology and a voice for self-knowledge, coherent unity of the individual and equilibrium. Seems you've found some of that!
Edge:
ReplyDelete"Can it ever be possible to tell the Fogg he's missing the point?"
Of course - one can say anything, but I think you give me the same answer every time I mention the inherent peril of belief for belief's sake. Honesty is a tool and it is not, but to have to defend reason itself is absurd and I'm indeed feeling like I'm in the wrong forum every time I hint that the fuzziness of "inner journeys" and subjective truth could be cleared up with a bit of honesty rather than throwing it away with disdain. There is a reality beyond our ability to paint a picture of it and I'm not satisfied with pictures painted by the blind. It's as though it were being argued that knowledge of the moon is better obtained through myth and narcissistic rapture than with a telescope or an actual landing.
If there is a point missed, it's the one that belief is a tool, not a virtue and a tool that can more easily be misused than used for what the rational can see as a benefit. Is it possible to get that idea across without all the tribal dancing and references to authority?
Edge:
ReplyDelete"I think our shadows will inform us more that their shadows, which already seem clear enough to those of us here. "
Well how would you know? Is there a test for truth which does not involve that which you seem to disdain so much? It's as though the only true thing for you is what feels good. I'm afraid the teaparty position is quite the same and thus there is never anything but the nocturnal clashing and eternal exchange of anger.
How do we know a particular economic policy will or won't work or what it's true cost will be without ascertaining facts through observation rather than myth, ancient or modern?
Should we be content with being as bad as they are with out inner journeys?
Capt. Fogg,
ReplyDeleteI'm all for reason, though I think railroad-spike-sized teeth (like mine) are often more efficient, depending on the situation. Anyway, I suggest that some of the great writers -- Shakespeare and Milton, for instance -- point out the balanced way here: if you want to come to terms with the 'eavenly bodies, you need science and a touch of the mythopoetic: selene of Greek legend and what you can see through a fine telescope. We need science and reason and to disavow them is an abomination; we also thrive on imagination -- there's something wrong with the latter only when it leads to delusion, at which point it becomes dangerous and even lethal.
Sheria:
ReplyDelete"For me this is where Jungian analysis comes in because Jung suggests that there are answers to be found and solutions to be generated if we look inwardly at what makes us tick, at who we are. It's a journey inward."
Knowing how we tick, realizing our biases, our failings and how we're dishonest with ourselves, how we forgive our own trespasses, how we make our desires moral and yours immoral should, in my opinion, justify objectivity, not further mucking about in the hermetic darkness of conjecture, tripping over Doktor Jung and the furniture.
Look, I know that we can only get arbitrarily close to any kind of truth, yet that doesn't invalidate calculus, does it? This is all too much like arguing with Zeno or the hillbilly who says you can't get there from here. Are we going to fix or improve our culture if we journey inward or are we only going to find confirmation of our fantasies and desires? Human experience suggests the latter. Look where Charles Manson's and Adolph Hitler's Kampf took them. No two people are going to find the same interior reality and so there's no truth, but we just know we're right about economic policy and the need for universal health care? Sorry. "What would Ayn Rand do?" isn't enough.
We, as a species have been using spirits, shamans, gods. demons, witches and the reassurances of various religions to wage war and waste our resources from the beginning. That's what I'm talking about. My post was a tongue in cheek argument about the need for something to temper our instincts, our subliminal fears and prejudices and all the other nonsense that lurks in the bowels. we're as likely to use our innards to justify our greed as our altruism and that's why I joked that we need God control. I'm not condemning anyone elses beliefs, but their right to justify things with them and I'm mystified because I think you agree with that.
Saying we're on some inner journey and ultimate truth is elusive doesn't seem to be very useful if we're to rise above the bestial instincts that hide behind our unexamined motivations, our wars and genocides and persecutions. Hence I'm not going to blame reason for irrational behavior as seems to be the game here.
I'm anticipating an irrelevant and inflammatory mention of the glory of poetry and myth, but I'm talking about war and politics and civilization itself and without some scientific method, some objectivity to base our rules on, the future will be much like the past. That seems such an obvious point that I'm mystified at the irrelevance and tangential nature of the responses here.
Belief can be dangerous. I'm trying to talk about what makes it so: about what keeps this a game of dodge-ball rather than people working toward a solution for our eternal problem.
I'm saying 'question everything' de omnibus disputandum if you prefer. I don't consider that to be controversial, I consider it to be fundamentally honest.
And here we are mocking honesty and reason and saying all things are true if you believe them and thus all things are permitted, yet unreal.
I'm indeed in the wrong place, sorry to say.
Capt. Fogg,
ReplyDeleteYou haven't yet responded to my little post, which I think cuts to the heart of the matter. Perhaps religion and reason/science have a common partial basis: a need to control things, to tame them, exploit them. This is what makes humility so important for both science and religion when they advance their claims: even the Baconian experimenta lucifera slide too easily into destruction or exploitation; similarly, "faith" tends with dreadful facility towards oppression and mind-control. Neither impulse remains pure; both have their strengths and weaknesses. I think it's pretty hard to separate "reason" from the technologies and motives that drive it in the modern world; it's also difficult to extricate "faith" from its practical instantiations and motives. Caution and humility are in order, then. I'm guessing we probably agree on that.
Hey Capt. I know your no stupid, so don't assume that I am. I have never disputed the need and power of reason, ergo science, technology and rational thinking.
ReplyDeleteAs for belief, yes, that is a tool also. It's software for ideas. Now ideas, unlike reason, are not particularly linear. They depend on intuition and instinct, hunches and feelings and a general je ne sais quoi that some folks have and others don't. All of these mental attributes index quite nicely with reason. Until reason takes over the entire show, forcing the other attributes back into the darkness.
So, while I get your frustration with the "true" believers, there is more to this story than "thems are wrong and us be right."
As for me and my propensity for doing "what feels good", you seem to be doing fine in that department, boat and trips n all. Is there something wrong with that?
The inner journey is fuzzy. What makes me qualified? I spent my life in marketing figuring out what works and what doesn't. Rational reason doesn't work when it comes to motivating anyone (witness this particular discussion, in fact). What motivates people are ideas, humor, passion, fear and desire—not reason.
The same factors are driving the direction of modern science. The agenda is corporately driven. Science funding is not based on truth and reason, nor the good of society. It's based on the best profit potential.
The shadow side, that "fuzzy" shit to which you're referring, keeps each of us in lock-step with the system—if we refuse to acknowledge it in ourselves, and to change our own behaviour, rather than railing at the stupidity of the ignorant masses, which is just plain elitism.
As for who belongs on this forum, we both do. Without either one of us, we could soon become very bored...
If we wish to enforce "God control" we might first want to enforce some "misuse of reason and science control" which, as modern instruments, are much more powerful. After all, haven't you heard: God is dead. We need to begin looking for the enemy elsewhere.
@ 2:26 PM, April 23, 2011: “… I'm in the wrong forum …”
ReplyDelete@ 10:31 AM, April 25, 2011: “… I’m in the wrong forum …”
We have walked this stretch of beach before always with the same result. I recall an evening stroll along a Private Beach some time ago - the same arguments, the same reference points, the same impasse, the same hard feelings, and the same shell fragments of mind and scholarship lying in sand unnoticed and unacknowledged beneath the waves lapping the shore.
Did we even have this discussion? Shall we recycle old arguments repeatedly only to arrive at yet another impasse? Shall we gather up the same flotsam at high tide only to prove that the default condition of human beings, no matter how enlightened and rational we think we are, is always one of tribal groupthink, of derisiveness and divisiveness, and always an impulse to heap opprobrium on others?
So two people find themselves on opposites sides of an argument and think they are in the wrong forum. Has anyone read our blog description lately: “where thought meets thought and ideas are always in play?” If the free exchange of ideas among friends is a shared value of this community, then why are viewpoints sometimes treated with intolerance, resentment, and outright rudeness?
I am an atheist, but I count persons of faith of various denominations among my circle of friends, and religious belief is not a prerequisite for friendship and the breaking of bread. I do not regard every act of violence in this world as the sole product of religion when I can point to numerous exceptions. I do not exalt reason above other faculties of mind when sensory experience, emotions such as love, intuition and insight, consciousness, and pleasure are important aspects of my life experience.
Some of you may feel offended by this comment, but subtlety rarely has a lasting impact unless you get straight to the point. Do we exalt reason in the face of contradictions and double standards of discourse when we start acting like a dysfunctional family in a state of discord? When pushed to a limit where personal boundaries are violated, reason can be just as oppressive, hypocritical, and unethical as any dogma imposed on people under threat of coercion.
Is it possible to disagree without being disagreeable, simply by saying, “I present another viewpoint for consideration” or “these are my concerns” without turning comments into an attack on the person! Or must we treat each other with sarcasm and snark and descend to the level of street corner Bible thumpers spouting another form of dogma! Can we get a grip on our adrenaline before expelling bile from our spleens?
Is this really too much to ask?
Bloggingdino,
Humility is a favorite subject with me. The lack thereof, in my opinion, defines a fundamental flaw of the human species, whether one calls it Hubris, Pride (the first of the Seven Deadly Sins), or clinical narcissism. My favorite saying: A person cannot grow in spiritual, intellectual, or psychological terms without humility.
When we live too long inside our heads, our thoughts and our self-preoccupations, we no longer hear the rhythms of waves lapping upon our shores.
Rats. Gee thanks, Octo. Now I can't talk about humility or veer off to higher ground. But I think there's nothing wrong with dissent. It's openness to new ideas (or a broader set/interpretation of ideas) that might be a problem. But if we've reached the stage at which someone should throw in the white towel, let me know.
ReplyDeleteEdge,
ReplyDeleteGoodness gracious, lets not throw in a white towel nor refrain from spirited debate nor suppress our viewpoints nor repress our feelings on all matters. All I am saying, lets keep it mutually respectful and play nice with each other without offensive or judgmental crosstalk. Is that too much to ask of ourselves?
Sheria,
ReplyDeleteWell said – whatever approach one takes should lead towards excellent goals, not mere instrumentality.
Octo,
You took the words right out of my simple snout. Some commenters return too frequently to the subject of religion, usually in the context of smacking down benighted fools who have set forth some perfectly ridiculous tyrannical dogma. I know it’s an easy topic, but it’s too easy. Nobody here, I’m certain, is in favor of theocracy or against rational intellection. Enough with this vexed issue, unless it can be discussed expansively and with interesting variations. How about finding new, constructive things to say?
I pulled my comment and posted it as a blog post. I realized that I never have time to blog any more because I spend what free time that I have writing involved comments. I decided that it could stand on its own so I sent fledgling out of the nest. You were not dreaming that you thought that I had posted a comment!
ReplyDeleteEdge:
ReplyDelete"there is more to this story than "thems are wrong and us be right."
Exactly and that's why I can't understand why you're hearing me say that and hearing it as an attack. I'm challenging our Liberal lack of cynicism when looking at what we believe because we spend a lot of time challenging what "they" believe and laughing when they act unthinkingly, OK? I'm wondering how we call ourselves progressives when we're longing for a pre-technological elysium that never existed and never can.
Why is that controversial? Science, religion, a baseball bat, a gun, reason itself -- all tools that need to be controlled, yet there's one that we can't talk about tempering without a lot of shadow boxing and windmill tilting and false comparisons.
I'm simply not saying what you think I am when I suggest that we stop taking things on faith the way conservatives do. If you want to think that our problems stem from science rather than human stupidity causing us to misuse it, you're going to get an argument because it's fallacious and wrong. Sorry. We're not polluting the world because of science or mathematics or logic. We're doing it from greed aided by the notion that it's God's will that we exploit nature and kill the heathens. It's like those wingers who blame Darwin for Hitler, so pardon my annoyance.
Dino:
ReplyDelete"usually in the context of smacking down benighted fools who have set forth some perfectly ridiculous tyrannical dogma."
If someone is doing that it isn't me. Who have I called a fool unless it's mankind in general? Liberals and conservatives. I'm saying we, as humans, are too gullible, too prone to following dictates and dogmas, tarot cards, scriptures, entrails and selected scholars, whether they be Ayn Rand or Jung. Sorry, I don't buy the idea that science is no more beneficial than stone idols or calcified commandments or that reason is something to scoff at. That's a progressive and liberal attitude I thought I shared with others, yet. . .
Any advocacy for progress through reason and objectivity seems taboo here and I'm wondering why every time I ring that bell, I get a lot of barking. It wasn't the dinner bell and I wasn't ringing for tea.
All kinds of things we say we stand for are being opposed by people who cite their unquestioned faith as their reason to squelch human rights and opportunities. May we not mention it? Are we not Liberals? Is it not the religious who are preventing some medical research and is it science asking preachers not to burn Korans? Yes, I know, I'm smart but. . . that's what most of us hear from the trollery. We're not vampires, we could look in a mirror now and then.
So if I'm "smacking" anyone it's Liberals in general who seem to have their own set of unassailable axioms that may not be discussed without bringing on on the same responses we get from the people we like to feel superior to.
And yes, indeed, if I have to defend the very concept of reason vs. Received knowledge as a reliable basis for progress when compared to a lack of it, I do most definitely feel I'm not in the company of progressives.
Octo:
ReplyDelete"and religious belief is not a prerequisite for friendship and the breaking of bread."
It isn't for me either, although I'll have to chew through the words stuffed into my mouth before I get to the bread. Anyone who thinks I feel differently has never met me and I suspect the allegations are only hyperbole used to avoid having to deal with what I'm actually saying.
Say, isn't that what the wingers do? Obviously we don't use such tricks because we're superior in our beliefs, right? But yes that's arrogant of me to suggest we're not enlightened as Liberals, according to the rule of projection.
Yes, I know, love is grand and watching the sun set behind Montserrat surpasseth all understanding, particularly when there's a Chopin nocturne playing -- and not all religious people are like Reverend Phelps or Jerry Fallwell, but if Liberals can argue that a one in ten million chance of a gun owner committing mayhem justifies a universal ban, I can argue that if 60% of the born again want to criminalize consensual sex and dancing on Sunday we need some sort of god control. Especially if it's a tongue in cheek argument.
(Hey remember the post about how some people just don't get irony? How ironic.)
Actually we're supposed to have God control. It's called the constitution. How liberal of me to mention it. How arrogant of Jefferson.
Animals feel passion and perhaps more intensely than we do. What elevates us above the level of a love struck Cro-Magnon with lice, tape-worms and a 25 year life span is science and technology.
No, we don't foul the planet because of science. Okeechobee isn't polluted because of technology, but because the people in power don't care and the don't have to because they pull our emotional strings, because they put on robes of ecclesiastical authority and tell us what god wants and that god is under attack from liberals. (sound familiar?) It's polluted because we don't develop or use or pay for the technology to clean it up. Why should we if we have dominion and god's gonna end it all next thursday?
But hey - I just don't get it, I'm just not quite smart enough as the trolls say. I'm just not "open to new ideas" that seem so much like the old ideas. Projection at work again.
This post took on a life of its own and created some heated discussions and I hope you will forgive a humble raccoon for injecting a few observations here. I started here with the key points I took from Fogg"s post:
ReplyDelete“It's hard to deny although that doesn't prevent most people from denying it, God has been on the wrong side of things as often as the right side: slavery, conquest, persecutions, genocide. You name it; God has been the universal justification as often as the universal opponent.”
“That's the thing about God's likes and dislikes and mysterious plans: people just make them up as they go along.”
The Barton link Fogg provided excerpts from Barton’s radio talk show where he says that net neutrality violates free market precepts set forth in the Bible and by our founding fathers –( REALLY?)
“Face it, it's long since been far out of hand and the will of god has become indistinguishable from the background noise of commerce. Did God have an interest in boosting tobacco sales. He obviously, if we're to believe this radio troll, has an interest in the rights of corporations which exceeds his concern for the poor.”
“One thing our constitution does uphold, is the free exercise of religion, so lunatics and tyrants and even evil men like Barton get to rave on unmolested. The government can't really exercise God control and more than God can control the evil spewed out by Barton's forked tongue.”
“Mention God and nobody can shut you up, nobody can really contradict you and millions will follow you through the gates of hell, raging and bellowing, cheering and jeering like the lost souls we are.”
From the comments that followed:
Edge – “You're not talking about God. Not really. You're talking about using God to justify statism. God (or the gods if you prefer) is spiritual, not of this world.”
Fogg – “"You're not talking about God"
Of course not. I'm talking about the second hand BS we get from people who claim they speak for God. I've been claiming all along that one cannot speak for God and that God does not speak.
Personally, I feel far more free without it, but that's me.
Sheria – “I think that one of the most dangerous elements of the misappropriation of God as the author of human actions is that it allows people to blind themselves to the impact of their actions.”
Up to that point, seems everyone was on the same page more or less. This was my take away from this post:
There are those who, in current times as in the past invoke God as the author of whatever injury or atrocity they wish to commit. The example being Barton and his “net neutrality is not in God’s plan” meme.
God’s place or the choice not to believe is in our personal lives and beliefs.
We should not be coerced or compelled to accept a concept that defies sound science or infringes on secular activities because “God said so” or “the Bible said so.”
At some point this thread wandered into more philosophical/psychological territory and finally Sheria moved it to a new post – and rightly so because that discussion is a departure from the original context here.
We should be mindful of staying on topic at each post and not trying to throw everything including the kitchen sink into a discussion. I think that tendency speaks to all the brilliant minds here at the Swash Zone who naturally branch out from discussions which probably works better in a roundtable type discussion. With the constraints of a blog and posting comments, not so much.
Respectfully, Rocky
So, without irony, let's lay some fundamentals:
ReplyDelete1. we have this giant, life-threatening, life-extending super-cannon called "science" or "logic-reason" or "technology", yes? Our collective toolset now possesses incredibly vast, unprecedented potentiality...
2. to a large extent (since the evolution of economic globalization, this potentiality has been operating with few, if any, controls. International law is not yet a universal, enforceable regulatory system. Yes?
3. God has died, at least as a civic, moral and ethical control system (evangelism and Christian Right aside). Nor is God universal (how ironic), and also incapable of affecting worldwide/global moral controls.
4. the dark forces and light forces in our own hearts are now running the show, especially among our elites—without universal standards.
5. we are now a global superorganism without any effective self-regulating mechanism(s). Our cities and industries, for example, when seen from space appear like cancers on the ecosystem, which in fact they are.
So, perhaps organically-speaking, we were only "designed" (is that ironic?) to live for 25 years. Every natural adaptation has its price, and our advantage seems to come at the cost of a degraded natural environment. The entire discussion, then, revolves around the search for equilibrium. Now, as this discussion should illustrate, equilibrium involves MORE than just reason. (Not to be confused with LESS than mere reason.)
In your original post 'God Control', your underlying complaint seems to have to do with the secularization of God, the misuse of God for distorted worldly purposes—mostly based on the usurpation of earthly power. On that we agree. I do not support that. I don't support worldly Utopian ventures, either. And the last thing I want to do is preach at you... or have you preach at me about the meaning or meaninglessness of God.
So it all comes down to this: why are you (seemingly) so angry?
Yes, well you are indeed preaching once again and it seems to be a canned sermon having nothing to do with anything I say or believe. To be sure, you're not the only one, but that's a mystery science can't touch, I guess.
ReplyDeleteAt least I think we can dispense with the hypothesis that only conservatives are blind to irony, sarcasm and humor. The zone is still full of surprises.
The 'why are you angry if you're right?' argument is close to being the number one tool of trolls who need a person to seem angry so that they can use this familiar fallacy. So they say outrageous things. Why are you saying outrageous things?
Whether I'm angry or not, the question and the answer are irrelevant. The real question is why are you putting words in my mouth and interpreting what I say in a self-serving fashion?
Really, after a thousand or so words accusing me of talking down to the religious in an arrogant, presumptuous and condescending fashion, I'm a bit fed up at now being told I'm preaching since I wasn't doing that or anything like it. I'm standing up for secular democracy against ecclesiastical demands. That's all folks. That's the whole egg roll. Did I mention that I'm a Liberal?
If mentioning that the popular god is being used to preach against net neutrality (to get back to the post) and has been used for similar purposes for a long time: if I argue that since everyone claims to have god on their side, (that's what the picture shows) we need something else to sort out the claims, that isn't an attack on you or religion in general so why are you attacking me or telling me I'm telling you about what to believe? That's why I mentioned projection in case you're confused.
Where is this anti-science tirade coming from in the first place? I've been suggesting with some sarcasm that Americans stop pimping for politicians who prostitute religion and stop listing to their greedy arguments in the name of freedom. Is that a problem for you? If so, you're going to have a constant conflict with Liberals.
Well that's where I stand and if you get to stand on faith, then so do I. If your convictions are off limits then so are mine so it's your foot over the line. And why do you get so damned hostile if I don't buy arguments about what God wants from some politician? when I express dismay over non-democratic incursions into secular law? Doe anything someone claims in the name of god have validity, you might ask? Well, I think it does and that, without belaboring the point shows that 0 = 0. All faith has equal value and yours isn't better than mine. Too bad we don't have something like - oh, you know -- reason as a tie breaker.
Look, if we have one godseller insisting net neutrality or working on Sunday is bad and we have another demanding that it's Saturday that's holy and Jesus wants equal access to the net, how do we decide? Seriously, we can't ask what Jesus would do, because we don't have a clue. Might I suggest reason without tripping the circuit breakers? and what the hell is so arrogant about that, or so insulting or disrespectful?
Seems more like folks just hear the damned atheist unbeliever heretic talking about their own personal and monogrammed gods and like Pavlov's dogs, start barking.
For the last time, I don't care what your private beliefs are -- really -- or anyone elses for that matter, as long as they aren't used to justify corporate greed, the subjugation of the people to feudal lords or the suppression of my rights, so as far as I'm concerned, your concerns in this regard are not relevant, but of course, and as a Liberal, I'm here to speak out against such abuses of such secular democracy kinda thingies and as a Liberal to suggest that the dream of returning to some impossibly bucolic and Libertarian elysium where lions and lambs are all cozy and manna falls from heaven, where there's no central heat and the poor die to decrease the surplus population. That's what Glenn Beck does. If you don't think that's just a little arrogant, well then it's ten minutes until drowning my grief becomes legitimate.
ReplyDeleteFor what it's worth it sounds odd for Christians to support such libertarian ideas unless there's been a merger with Thugee I wasn't informed about. I don't think Jesus asked anyone to play God, but of course you never know.
So where in what I said was there an argument for suppressing religion? or selling atheism? or mocking anyone but abusers of faith? -- and if one is of the 'ten commandments rule' type, that one would agree with me that arguing against public access to a public utility in God's name is as Kosher as a ham and cheese sandwich or silk embroidery on your cotton shirt. In fact I could have substituted a bunch of Gospel quotes and saved a lot of time because both Jesus and Krishna both dislike Republicans. It's true because I believe it.
As to living longer and healthier having the price of degraded conditions, I have only one thing to say and that's BULLSHIT -- that's not too much different from the Medieval church arguing against bathing to prevent too much sex or the current one blaming hurricanes on you guessed it - sex. Not to get all scientific, but it's bullshit. For that matter, who the hell are you to tell me or anyone else what god/nature intends for us and If I were to ask you to die if you're over 25 so as to improve the environment you'd say the same thing and you'd have a right to.
Environmental degradation is not the consequence of more or better technology, it's the consequence of too many people, too much unbridled short sighted capitalism and not enough technology. You know damned well that fundamentalists and Republicans generally oppose conservation or clean energy and deny global warming ( using god as a justification.) It's science arguing for cleaning up the mess, demanding cleaner technology, more birth control and warning of the danger and you know it. And again, who are you going to pick to die when we turn off the power - how would you choose? And you'll need to because it's going to be the poor first and then the not so poor at your door with Mr. Kalashnikov's technology.
But sure, volunteer to give up your car and heating your home and your refrigerator and your stove and your computer and telephone and TV and your running water and flush toilets and soap and telephone and hunt and gather what you can using your teeth and fingernails like our tech-free cousins -- have a ball -- but don't ask billions to starve and die of disease because you think Exxon's crapping in the well is caused by hot showers. That's without a doubt, the most arrogant argument possible - unless you're God of course.
For the last time, I do not want to be told how to seek the truth, to know it from fiction, what I should believe about someone's god; that I'm ignorant or arrogant or the rest of that happy crap just because I am some sort of secular heretic who thinks reason solves more problems than prayer does. For Krishna's sake you're hinting that I'm better off dead to decrease the surplus population and you're asking me if I'm angry!
Fogg, you're beginning to read like fiction. I don't know where you get these inferences about what I'm thinking and what my beliefs might be.
ReplyDeleteAs to your BULLSHIT comment about extending human priorities at the expense of degrading the environment, you need to rationally and reasonably reassess the evidence. You're just plain wrong.
But I defer to your measured approach to the problems. If you say technology will save us, I can now relax. Problem solved.
INVITATION:
ReplyDeleteYour presence is requested.
There will be a reception of this august group at an undisclosed Private Beach where hors d'oeuvres and crudities will be served after a short pogrom.