On January 13 2011 00:27 Electric.Jesus wrote: Edit: The Baneling made me laugh. Is it possible to respect people's religious belief and derive joy from ridiculing their religion at the same time? Or does it make me a bad person?
Why should you respect people's religious beliefs in the first place?
Why should I not respect someone else's beliefs?
There's a fine line between respect and appreciation of a belief. Respect holds the weight of letting someone believe whatever they want without insulting them or deterring them in any way. Likewise there's a fine line between someone following a faith and being psychotic but if you cannot tell the difference between the two, you shouldn't be making judgement calls in the first place.
On January 13 2011 00:27 Electric.Jesus wrote: Edit: The Baneling made me laugh. Is it possible to respect people's religious belief and derive joy from ridiculing their religion at the same time? Or does it make me a bad person?
Why should you respect people's religious beliefs in the first place?
So mutual respect may be the best way to deal with the stalemate.
---and the only logical form of this mutual respect is good ol' freedom of speech. "You can say and think what you want, I can say and think what I want."
On January 13 2011 00:27 Electric.Jesus wrote: Edit: The Baneling made me laugh. Is it possible to respect people's religious belief and derive joy from ridiculing their religion at the same time? Or does it make me a bad person?
Why should you respect people's religious beliefs in the first place?
Mostly because everyone has to the right to be a moron as long as they don't start bothering others, I guess. ^^
Edit: On a more serious note, when it comes down to the core arguments you reach the point where on person believes in a higher entitiy and life after death and the other does not. Neither can prove or disprove the others opinion. So mutual respect may be the best way to deal with the stalemate.
There's no need to reduce the focus of the debate to simply the epistemological realm, especially when we're talking about a religion that makes a myriad of metaphysical claims, as most of them do. Doing so is giving the religious side an unfair advantage.
And you didn't particularly answer my question. Everyone has a right to be a moron, yes, but who said morons have to be respected? Why is respect warranted? Because they're a moron? Isn't that a bit contradictory?
On January 13 2011 00:27 Electric.Jesus wrote: Edit: The Baneling made me laugh. Is it possible to respect people's religious belief and derive joy from ridiculing their religion at the same time? Or does it make me a bad person?
Why should you respect people's religious beliefs in the first place?
Why should I not respect someone else's beliefs?
There's a fine line between respect and appreciation of a belief. Respect holds the weight of letting someone believe whatever they want without insulting them or deterring them in any way. Likewise there's a fine line between someone following a faith and being psychotic but if you cannot tell the difference between the two, you shouldn't be making judgement calls in the first place.
Why is respect the default position? Why do beliefs automatically deserve to be respected?
If someone believed in slavery and genocide, do you think the default position should be to let them believe in that without insulting them or deterring them in any way? That ridicule or even civilized attack on those beliefs, ie debate, would be disrespectful? What if they taught those beliefs to their children? What if they taught those beliefs to a congregation?
On January 13 2011 02:24 Krigwin wrote: And you didn't particularly answer my question. Everyone has a right to be a moron, yes, but who said morons have to be respected? Why is respect warranted? Because they're a moron? Isn't that a bit contradictory?
You are right, I need to answer your question in a differentiated way. Let us say I repsect poeple's religious beliefs as long as they are not conflicting with well-established empirical evidence. That is, I repect a person and his/her beliefs when he/she says that she beliefs in life after death or that some higher entity created the universe. I do not respect beliefs like "god hid some dinosaur skeletons to fool us" and "world was created in six days" because that view is simply not sustainable given empirical evidence.
I can however, respect people because they are fellow human beings regardless of whether I respect their opinions. Maybe that is two different forms of respect, the former consiting of respectful behavior in direct interactions or acknowleding that everyone is entitled to personal beliefs, however moronic they are, as long as the person does not cause harm to others. The latter may be more of an acknowledgement that another's personal beliefs are valid within my own normative value system.
On January 13 2011 02:24 Krigwin wrote: And you didn't particularly answer my question. Everyone has a right to be a moron, yes, but who said morons have to be respected? Why is respect warranted? Because they're a moron? Isn't that a bit contradictory?
You are right, I need to answer your question in a differentiated way. Let us say I repsect poeple's religious beliefs as long as they are not conflicting with well-established empirical evidence. That is, I repect a person and his/her beliefs when he/she says that she beliefs in life after death or that some higher entity created the universe. I do not respect beliefs like "god hid some dinosaur skeletons to fool us" and "world was created in six days" because that view is simply not sustainable given empirical evidence.
I can however, respect people because they are fellow human beings regardless of whether I respect their opinions. Maybe that is two different forms of respect, the former consiting of respectful behavior in direct interactions or acknowleding that everyone is entitled to personal beliefs, however moronic they are, as long as the person does not cause harm to others. The latter may be more of an acknowledgement that another's personal beliefs are valid within my own normative value system.
Firstly - you can respect a person while not respecting at all their beliefs, and in fact this seems a critical skill to learn in our religion-saturated world, although the two often go hand in hand.
Secondly - so you say you, by default, respect beliefs that are beyond empiricism? That seems a bit strange, don't you agree? So you respect solipsism then? Nihilist beliefs? You brought up this example yourself - the idea that we are all captured spirits brought to Earth by an intergalactic dictator, as per Scientology, is also a belief beyond empiricism. Do you respect that as well?
Listen more to the Muslims and they'll demand more and more. There are hundreds of jokes/memes about Jesus and or God, but you don't hear the Christians complain.
The Muslim extremists think that threatening with violence and forcing people to listen with violence is okay. It's not!
They even threatened Southpark because they showed a CENSORED image of Mohammed.
Terrorism it self has no face and can assume any identity although with popular times as it is are more on the islamic terrorist and that being said why should sweden governent be rattle by fanatics terrorist who are willing to excessive force to communicate their disagreement . In my opinion using religion to fund your group is such a cowardly act as most people are so weak in terms of faith which they rely on religion to seek refuge for all their problem thus using this to rally these people out to protect their interest Putting that aside some times its better to fight fire with fire as these is the only way to make these terrorist feel the same way as we do since the bombing of 9/11 .
On January 13 2011 00:27 Electric.Jesus wrote: Edit: The Baneling made me laugh. Is it possible to respect people's religious belief and derive joy from ridiculing their religion at the same time? Or does it make me a bad person?
Why should you respect people's religious beliefs in the first place?
Mostly because everyone has to the right to be a moron as long as they don't start bothering others, I guess. ^^
Edit: On a more serious note, when it comes down to the core arguments you reach the point where on person believes in a higher entitiy and life after death and the other does not. Neither can prove or disprove the others opinion. So mutual respect may be the best way to deal with the stalemate.
There's no need to reduce the focus of the debate to simply the epistemological realm, especially when we're talking about a religion that makes a myriad of metaphysical claims, as most of them do. Doing so is giving the religious side an unfair advantage.
And you didn't particularly answer my question. Everyone has a right to be a moron, yes, but who said morons have to be respected? Why is respect warranted? Because they're a moron? Isn't that a bit contradictory?
On January 13 2011 00:27 Electric.Jesus wrote: Edit: The Baneling made me laugh. Is it possible to respect people's religious belief and derive joy from ridiculing their religion at the same time? Or does it make me a bad person?
Why should you respect people's religious beliefs in the first place?
Why should I not respect someone else's beliefs?
There's a fine line between respect and appreciation of a belief. Respect holds the weight of letting someone believe whatever they want without insulting them or deterring them in any way. Likewise there's a fine line between someone following a faith and being psychotic but if you cannot tell the difference between the two, you shouldn't be making judgement calls in the first place.
Why is respect the default position? Why do beliefs automatically deserve to be respected?
If someone believed in slavery and genocide, do you think the default position should be to let them believe in that without insulting them or deterring them in any way? That ridicule or even civilized attack on those beliefs, ie debate, would be disrespectful? What if they taught those beliefs to their children? What if they taught those beliefs to a congregation?
So you're saying we should not even bother putting forth the effort to learning why we should not respect a belief and simply assume they're all bad (including Atheist beliefs because unless you're a Nihilist, you believe in something)? That is an extremely shallow and some would argue lazy approach to understanding life. Comparing the actual faith of say Islam or Christianity to something such as slavery or genocide is extremely unrealistic to compare (that would be like comparing StarCraft to Microsoft Office...there's nothing to really compare).
Again if you can't even put forth the effort to understand a belief, you shouldn't make a judgement call. You can still distrust something until you know it inside and out which is a fair and safe way to go about things.
On January 12 2011 23:32 Epicsalmon wrote: The problem with these numbers is that they are all fake. Its just propaganda used by the western world to persecute Muslims most likely for monetary gains similar to how Jews were also persecuted so that people could obtain their riches.
Maybe, but as it as it's your word against someone, who actually claims to have done some work on the issue. Can you provide any source that suggests that the actual numbers are different? Maybe local polling organizations asking similar questions and getting different results?
I realize it's just one poll and I do find the results surprising, but without any actual data to the contrary I can't just dismiss it as fraud.
So you're saying we should not even bother putting forth the effort to learning why we should not respect a belief and simply assume they're all bad (including Atheist beliefs because unless you're a Nihilist, you believe in something)?
Atheism isnt a belief, it is a disbelief. Theism->Religion, atheism is simply a lack of belief, thus not a belief system, and it lacks dogmas of any kind.
Religion is given all too much unearnead respect as it is, they have zero proof for their claims and we are supposed to respect this? give me a break.
It's your right to be offended, and mine to not care if you are.
On January 12 2011 21:45 Electric.Jesus wrote: It is from PewResearchCenter. They are considered a conservative think tank. I have no mean to judge, however, is that in any way influenced the veridicality or validity of the results.
I'm surprised you say that. Didn't know much about them, except that they are considered a reputable polling organization, but a quick lookup on wikipedia showed it's chaired by Madeleine Albright, Secretary of State under Clinton, and John Danforth, who I didn't know, but is apparently a former republican senator described in his wikipedia article as a moderate.
So it looks more like a centrist group to me and I see no reason why they would want to forge the results.
BTW, can you tell me why you think it's a conservative think tank? Or if you don't anymore, why you thought before?
It said so on the German wikipedia site. I checked what their source for this satement was but they do not list one. So may as well be misinformation.
Ah, ok. TBH, I'm not sure either way either and I was really surprised by the results. I still have my doubts but for now I think it's more likely to be accurate than not.
On the issue of respect I think there needs to be a distinction between public and private situations. I'd never go out of my way to ridicule someone's beliefs (even if I did think it was ridiculous). I have no intention to hurt someone's feelings or even to change their minds against their will.
However in public forums (including the old media) sometimes you want to make a point and it's impossible to hide it from those who would get offended.
To make the point explicit, I do think it's a bad idea to depict Muhammed with the goal of upsetting Muslims. However, sometimes you want to make a point to other non Muslims which is best made by drawing a Muhammed cartoon. There's no offence intended even if it is predictable that people will get offended. It's a necessary evil of making a point in the best possible way.
On January 13 2011 05:59 Nausea wrote: Religion is given all too much unearnead respect as it is, they have zero proof for their claims and we are supposed to respect this? give me a break.
I´m not sure if respect is the right word for what we are "supposed" to do.
We can´t treat religious people as adults. We can´t expect them to act as free thinking people. We need to treat religious groups with care just like we need to treat a child with care.
On January 13 2011 05:33 Neo7 wrote: So you're saying we should not even bother putting forth the effort to learning why we should not respect a belief and simply assume they're all bad (including Atheist beliefs because unless you're a Nihilist, you believe in something)? That is an extremely shallow and some would argue lazy approach to understanding life. Comparing the actual faith of say Islam or Christianity to something such as slavery or genocide is extremely unrealistic to compare (that would be like comparing StarCraft to Microsoft Office...there's nothing to really compare).
Again if you can't even put forth the effort to understand a belief, you shouldn't make a judgement call. You can still distrust something until you know it inside and out which is a fair and safe way to go about things.
...Atheist beliefs? Like what, exactly? Also I wasn't comparing any faith to anything, I was making an example to frame a question. A question that you went and dodged, I might add.
But okay, I'll go ahead and argue that yes, religion, and by extension religious people, should be met with skepticism, not unwarranted respect (which, as of yet, still no one has given any actual justification for). What is wrong with this idea?
On January 13 2011 05:59 Nausea wrote: Religion is given all too much unearnead respect as it is, they have zero proof for their claims and we are supposed to respect this? give me a break.
I´m not sure if respect is the right word for what we are "supposed" to do.
We can´t treat religious people as adults. We can´t expect them to act as free thinking people. We need to treat religious groups with care just like we need to treat a child with care.
you may be interest in a series on Transactional Analysis I found interesting on YouTube it reinforces your statement. + Show Spoiler +
On January 13 2011 02:24 Krigwin wrote: And you didn't particularly answer my question. Everyone has a right to be a moron, yes, but who said morons have to be respected? Why is respect warranted? Because they're a moron? Isn't that a bit contradictory?
You are right, I need to answer your question in a differentiated way. Let us say I repsect poeple's religious beliefs as long as they are not conflicting with well-established empirical evidence. That is, I repect a person and his/her beliefs when he/she says that she beliefs in life after death or that some higher entity created the universe. I do not respect beliefs like "god hid some dinosaur skeletons to fool us" and "world was created in six days" because that view is simply not sustainable given empirical evidence.
I can however, respect people because they are fellow human beings regardless of whether I respect their opinions. Maybe that is two different forms of respect, the former consiting of respectful behavior in direct interactions or acknowleding that everyone is entitled to personal beliefs, however moronic they are, as long as the person does not cause harm to others. The latter may be more of an acknowledgement that another's personal beliefs are valid within my own normative value system.
Firstly - you can respect a person while not respecting at all their beliefs, and in fact this seems a critical skill to learn in our religion-saturated world, although the two often go hand in hand.
Exactly. That is what I was trying to say with the second half of my post (that and the fact that the two types of respect are probably qualitatively different from a psychological perspective).
Secondly - so you say you, by default, respect beliefs that are beyond empiricism? That seems a bit strange, don't you agree? So you respect solipsism then? Nihilist beliefs? You brought up this example yourself - the idea that we are all captured spirits brought to Earth by an intergalactic dictator, as per Scientology, is also a belief beyond empiricism. Do you respect that as well?
No, what I am trying to say is that is, on a very rational level, not justified to disrespect a person for holding religious beliefs when believing that there is no god is, basically, an equally unprovable belief. I think the scientolgy thing contradicts scientific evidence in more than one respect and there does not fall into the category that I would respect.
But consider a person that subscribes to a monotheistic religion and says: "I believe that god created the universe, imbued us with immortal souls and awaits us in paradise after we die."
These are views commonly held and none of them contradict empirical evidence the way are formulated, mainly because they exceed the limits of our kowledge. At this point not believing in god or life after death could be considered an equally religious belief, lets called is agnosticism. Disrespecting a point of view soley because I adhere to a different point of view seems pointless to me.
Jesus is mocked a lot in art. There's an art exhibit in San Francisco with Jesus portrayed as homosexual and whatever. Of course we shouldnt have a prohibition on this. Freedom of speech/expression has to apply to everything or nothing at all, you cant just pick and choose.
On January 13 2011 06:27 Electric.Jesus wrote: No, what I am trying to say is that is, on a very rational level, not justified to disrespect a person for holding religious beliefs when believing that there is no god is, basically, an equally unprovable belief. I think the scientolgy thing contradicts scientific evidence in more than one respect and there does not fall into the category that I would respect.
But consider a person that subscribes to a monotheistic religion and says: "I believe that god created the universe, imbued us with immortal souls and awaits us in paradise after we die."
These are views commonly held and none of them contradict empirical evidence the way are formulated, mainly because they exceed the limits of our kowledge. At this point not believing in god or life after death could be considered an equally religious belief, lets called is agnosticism. Disrespecting a point of view soley because I adhere to a different point of view seems pointless to me.
Show me the great monotheistic religion that says "God created the universe, imbued us with immortal souls, and awaits us in paradise after we die" and ends it at that. Makes no metaphysical claims whatsoever, doesn't dictate our behavior, says nothing of unbelievers and blasphemy, and makes no judgments on human beings. Show me this amazingly brief holy scripture that apparently consists of only one line. Show me this fantastical religion.
I said nothing of disrespect, unless you consider skepticism disrespect, which I think only a fanatic would agree with. Zero respect is not the same as disrespect and is what I am instead advocating. Zero respect, and the skepticism that all religions rightfully deserve.
EPT
