I might expound more fully on "Fundamentalist Antihumanist Personality Disorder" in the future. In the meantime, we have all encountered those who make their attitudes our problem.
I stumbled across an old post about The Need for Absurd Belief Among Fundamentalists on the Breaking Spells blog. It discusses, amongst other things, the fact that fundies are desperate to attack segments of scientific knowledge.
I read it with interest because I am fascinated — and dismayed — by what I regard as the Fundamentalist Cognitive Disorder*. This is often linked to the Fundamentalist Antihumanist Personality Disorder.**
The final line of the post reads:
""Eventually, perhaps, the spell of religion will be broken.""
I decided to convert my response into a post.
Let’s hope! Religion continues to support damaging and outright dangerous cognitive and behavioural disorders.
I completely agree that fundies are terrified of knowledge — whether it’s science or the expert conclusions of unbiased biblical scholars. I also agree that this rigid thinking is the result of childhood indoctrination. Why else would IDiots be fighting to insinuate creationism into secondary science curricula?
I think that the motivation is not merely habit — it is highly emotional. It is also deliberately anti-factual, and, most important, illogical. They are trained into illogic and this fallacious thinking is reinforced by Bible quotes.
Successful religions have set up clever reward and punishment systems. Community is the most mundane motivation, but is probably essential for many. An eternal afterlife with a loving SkyDaddy who punishes one’s enemies is an obvious incentive. The flip side is the prison door. They fear what they are instructed to fear.
However, based on long observation of how some fundies think, I conclude that much of the emotional appeal lies in certainty and the assurance that religious-rule-following renders one RIGHT and morally SUPERIOR. (Excuse the caps. They seemed appropriate.)
It always reminds me of prefects in a school playground. Not a highschool playground. Not a primary school playground in North America. No, a school playground for children up to age 11. That’s the moral level at which these authoritarianism-oriented folk function.
Ugh!
* and ** : not official terminology
* and ** Disclaimer: not all fundies, religionists other than fundies, the occasional atheist.
Islam gets more obnoxious. On one hand, I do understand their sensitivies, particularly since they personallyidentify with Islam, rather than merely accepting the better parts of the Quran. On the other hand, I think that this sort of proposal will backlash into increased resentment of fundamentalist Islam, or, by association, of Islam.
I do not for one second believe that Islamic nations will enact laws that prevent militant muslims from uttering hate-speech and threats against other religions and nations.
Religion is a menace! Theocracies are a bigger menace.
I stumbled across a blog in Australia in which the blogger decries the potential lunatic, fear-filled reactions of American Christians to the projected Obama/Biden victory. See: The anti-Obama Christian bloggers.
"Moreover, I have to say that I am starting to get concerned about where this will lead. Polls suggest a much greater chance of an Obama win than a McCain win, which means that a situation might arise in which a great number of angry, terrified Christians are faced with an Obama White House and a Pelosi/Reid Congress.
What will these Christians do? Hopefully they will settle down, look back at what they believed in the lead up to his victory and then begin to exmaine [sic] their beliefs more objectively. Unfortunately, given the propensity of American Christians to be convinced that fiction is fact (eg Harry Potter and Satanism) I don't think this is going to happen. I'm worried, though, that violence may occur in response to an Obama/Reid/Pelosi victory as Christians take up the arms guaranteed by the constitution, refuse to pay taxes and begin overt resistance to the world of evil that they believe exists in the form of Obama and the Democrats."
Dream on, buddy, "objective examination of beliefs" and fundamentalist Christianity are diametrically opposed.
Fundamentalist American Christians are "angry and terrified" because, in their ill-intentioned bid for power, Doofus (top left) and Dotty (right) have been telling lies and whipping up hatred against Obama, presumably because they read the unthinking emotionality of their "congregation" well.
(I probably did not need to clarify whom I am calling Doofus and Dotty.)
How else could Brat Maverick hope to win with a platform that can be summarized as: "Let's cut down on Washington waste while continuing to spend billions on a war that we will not admit cannot be won."?
In essence:
"He is interested in two things, and two things only: making you afraid of it,and telling you who's to blame for it. That, ladies and gentlemen, is how you win elections."
The writer is clear and fair, yet is an "evangelical" (what is Australia coming to?). I take this to indicate that he is familiar with the emotional reactivity that passes for thinking in fellow fundamentalists.
"That means I do believe in the spirit world, including the existence of Satan."
What an interesting example of philosophical tension!. He recognizes the disconnection between Harry Potter and the mythical "fallen angel", Mormon brother to Jesus, and yet he believes in equally ridiculous notions. Proof positive that otherwise intelligent people can entertain indoctrinated stupidities that are utterly without evidence. They call if Faith, I call it something completely different.
"But this volume is unusual, people who worked on it say, because it is intended specifically for the lay public and because it devotes much of its space to explaining the differences between science and religion, and asserting that acceptance of evolution does not require abandoning belief in God."
Unfortunately, the yawning chasm between rationality and creationism necessitates such a footbridge.
What's left once a person reconciles evolution with religion?
Plenty.
Deism, or moderate theism, or Catholicism, or Judaism, or Buddhism, or whatever other religious tradition of choice is compatible with science. There's also nonliteral interpretation of the best bits of the Bible as moral allegory, religious ritual, religious community, music, art, literature, and, most wondrous of all, the fabulous world of opening one's eyes to . . . understanding and appreciating the world.
Imagination is much better stimulated by recognition that modern theories of biological evolution offer the best explanation for the observable fact of biological evolution. Yes, Virginia, there really is a chimp ancestor in your family tree! Grounds for rejoicing. Yes, you really can count bacteria not only as your distant ancestors but also as the power houses of your cells and the photosynthetic machines that capture Ra's munificence. More grounds for rejoicing.
In an ideally rational world, it would not be necessary to pander to religious sensibilities so that some might open their closed minds to the wonders of reality. In an ideally rational world, there would be no need for supernatural mythologies or fantasies of special creation. In an ideal world, the nation whose Founding Fathers considered it expedient to entrench separation of Church and State would have honored and protected that prescient ethos by providing an educational system commensurate with the nation's wealth. In an ideally rational world, the wall would have been built higher rather than ignoring the fundamentalist sappers who were tunneling under the wall.
The good news is that young people are more skeptical than older people about the respectability of Christianity. And rightly so, I might add. Eventually, fundamentalists of any faith almost invariably earn their religion a bad name.
However, this poll was not conducted to offer hope of a more sanely secular society in the future, it was undoubtedly intended as a prompt to increase child-oriented evangelical efforts. "THE ENEMY HAS PLANS FOR YOUR CHILDREN— DO YOU?" It's amusing that they shout at one another in caps too. Perhaps they fear that readers will only consider something True if it is Capitalized.
The enemy has plans for your children? What, a good, rational education? Encouragement to think for oneself? Recognition of human rights? No wonder all creationists have hitched their wagon to the IDiocy campaign. At the heart of all fundamentalisms is fear, which is hardly surprising because fear-mongering is at the heart of what Dawkins decries as religionist child abuse.
I want to comment on this section:
"The study explored twenty specific images related to Christianity, including ten favorable and ten unfavorable perceptions. Among young non-Christians, nine out of the top 12 perceptions were negative. Common negative perceptions include that present-day Christianity is judgmental (87%), hypocritical (85%), old-fashioned (78%), and too involved in politics (75%) - representing large proportions of young outsiders who attach these negative labels to Christians. The most common favorable perceptions were that Christianity teaches the same basic ideas as other religions (82%), has good values and principles (76%), is friendly (71%), and is a faith they respect (55%)."
Let's look at a segment of the above:
"The most common favorable perceptions were that Christianity teaches the same basic ideas as other religions (82%)"
I would not actually consider that a positive! Presumably the designation of "positive" for this question was pre-assigned by the pollsters. Those interviewed were probably best acquainted with the Abrahamic religions, which make similar claims of beneficence, but which ultimately all derive from the same original OT patent of rule-by-divine-terror.
Recent studies have shown that most practicing Christians know little about the tenets of their own faith (not tenants, as so many Christians miswrite). Obviously, this suggests that they probably know even less about the history of Christianity and still less about the tenets of other faiths. So, particularly considering the age group polled, this 82% can hardly be assumed to reflect educated opinion. (This would cause no worry to the participants or the pollsters, American religionist society has been raised to believe that all opinion, no matter how ill-informed, matters.)
The poll invites a philosophical tension alert:
It's interesting that positives and negatives contradict one another, rather than being proportionally inverse. How can people simultaneously think that Christianity is judgmental (87%) and hypocritical (85%), yet has good values and principles (76%), is friendly (71%), and is a faith they respect (55%)?
In view of the post-Scopes resurgance of fundamentalist political-power ploys, I think that the negatives probably relate to the in-your-face-bigotry of fundamentalists. The positives probably reflect the claims that religious devotees make for Christianity, but which the church increasingly fails to deliver. Let's be generous to the intelligence of those polled, though. The apparent discrepancy may also reflect awareness of the huge, hypocritical disparities across Christian denominations. Some denominations actually do preach tolerance and love.
I'm referring to the movie and not to the ignoramus who is currently making a hash of international relations, the environment, the economy, and education, to name a few.
The movie was written by Aaron Sorkin, who also created "The West Wing". I'm referring to the TV drama, the passing of which is missed, and not the current administration, whose imminent passing will not be missed.
Back to the line in question: Michael Douglas, as Democratic President, Andy Sheppard, is summarizing the dirt-smearing antics of the Republican presidential hopeful, and says something like:
"I've known Bob Rumson for years. And I've been operating under the assumption that the reason Bob devotes so much time and energy to shouting at the rain was that he simply didn't get it. Well, I was wrong. Bob's problem isn't that he doesn't get it. Bob's problem is that he can't sell it!
We have serious problems to solve, and we need serious people to solve them. And whatever your particular problem is, I promise you Bob Rumson is not the least bit interested in solving it. He is interested in two things, and two things only: making you afraid of it, and telling you who's to blame for it. That, ladies and gentlemen, is how you win elections."
That, ladies and gentlemen, is also how fundamentalists and televangelists control fellow religious bigots. These are not the people who display, respond to, or appeal to admirable virtues, including rationality. These are the people whose worldviews are fear-filled and narrow. These are the people with simplistic moralistic attitudes that have arrested at an early, childish stage of development – black and white, reward and punishment, good and bad, 'God loves me and you are going to burn in hell'.
The mantra used to be that God was punishing America for various sins, including homosexuality and abortion, but this has changed. The new mantra, and it is no more justified than the old, is that God is punishing America because moral relativity and secularism tolerate homosexuality and abortion clinics. It's easy to see that this is a more inclusive category – now one does not need to be homosexual or to get an abortion (the two being mutually exclusive), all one needs to do is support separation of church and state, or to be tolerant of other humans, and the fundies' God-mascot will punish you.
Coming from the religion that reveres a probably-never-born preacher who is held allegorically responsible for preaching tolerance, these attitudes are hypocritical in the extreme. Yet again, they are hardly surprising because fundamentalists don't really care about Jesus' loving messages, they only care that someone who never lived supposedly died to ensure that fundamentalist sinners are guaranteed pre-arranged forgiveness and a ticket on the Rapture Express.
These people comprise a segment of the blue pie in the chart at right (I would have colored the pie brown!).
Thanks to ylooshi for the chart on the recent Harris poll (Harris Poll Interactive).
For a group that probably constitutes less than 21% of the American population, these people make up for numbers in volubility, obnoxiousness, and donations to political coffers.
Considering that the remaining 79% of the population ranges from "somewhat religious" to "not at all religious", the power of the browns ought to be comparatively easy to overcome. The anti-atheist strategy, though, is aimed at manipulating the 67% who range from "somewhat religious" to "not very religious" into viewing secularism, humanism, modernity, and atheism as the fearsome devil that is to blame for every ill – imaginary, anticipated, or real – that has befallen these idiots (who were largely responsible for the non-election of the worst president in American history).
Politicians either pander to these neurotic interest groups or, in the case of authoritarian dictators, use the credulity of the masses to establish and maintain autocratic power.
Dictators such as Hitler and Stalin were not acting out of atheism, per se, if they were atheists at all. They were acting out of desire to make themselves gods.
Hitler used Bob Rumson's fear-and-blame technique to scapegoat minority religious and social groups. Stalin outlawed a competing authority when he eliminated Russia's churches. Hitler, Stalin, Kim Il-sung, Enver Hoxha, etc – promoted in statues, busts, posters, portraits, newsreels, rallies, and parades – all attempted to secure and maintain absolute power by placing themselves in the position formerly occupied by supreme religious authorites. They attempted to turn themselves into the state god. This is not secularism, this is not atheism, these 'cults of personality' are merely religion in vicious disguise.
I'm happy to think that Hitler would not have approved of the following rap version:
The synchronization makes it hilarious.
And, in the same irreverent spirit, no doubt inspired by his haircut:
The ever-innovative Google corporation, as suggested by its playful tinkering with its page-header logo, has a sense of humor. The following is not the best example of googlewhimsy, it merely happens to be the banner flying today.
Judging by the hate mail that Google has received over this piece of irreverent whimsy, some Jesus groupies definitely lack a sense of humor.
Here's one of the more flagrant examples of X-purulence
"HATEMAIL #12
.....IS THERE SOMETHING WRONG WITH U GUYS.......DO U SMOKE WEED OR SOME CRAP......HOW STUPID CAN U GET...LOL U JUST PROVED THAT STUPIDNESS HAS NO LIMITS.. u gay freaks how on earth can you THINK that God is google and satan is Microsoft..... you SERIOUSLY NEED A DOCTOR.....stupid lowlife COMPUTER NERDS go get a life..... i heard there sealing them at supermarkets... which are probably angels to you guy...HAHAH ROFL LOL LMAO....
From: Someone WAY smarter than you guys are..."
This mysterical twit got it wrong from beginning to end!
"Gay freaks"?
"go get a life.....i heard they're *sealing* them at supermarkets"? (emphasis mine)
Gift-wrapped lives must be on sale at this xtianist's local supermarket. Pity that they aren't installing brains at the local service station.
Some victims of segregation fight against discrimination, some, like many fundamentalists, become discriminators. Just as some children of alcoholics become teetotalers, while others become alcoholics.
You have probably seen the latest news about a burly conservative Christian pastor of an evangelical fundamentalist megachurch who has vowed to take over Microsoft. This is not a move motivated by the urge to improve Microsoft’s product, instead it’s a bid to thwart the company's policy of championing gay rights by packing the Microsoft board with new bigotry-prone shareholders.
"I consider myself a warrior for Christ. Microsoft don't scare me. I got God with me.”
Such bad grammar is hardly a surprise from a former linebacker, though it could reflect the need to join with the ‘common man’ in his congregation, or it could reflect Rev Ken's background. Hutcherson grew up in segregated Alabama and boasts that he played football to "hurt whites." Now he has converted to what he fondly imagines is a “Christian”, and he has shifted the target of his rage to one of the Bible’s targets. Hutcherson, doubtless on the basis of utter lack of education about science or sociology, has chosen to believe that homosexuality is a sin rather than a biological phenomenon.
"How many homosexuals have you ever seen had to ride on the back of a bus? I haven't seen one. I know that many blacks have in the past.”
"I've never seen an ex-black. Michael Jackson couldn't even achieve that. But I've seen ex-gays. We minister to them every day. We talk to them about how to get out of that sin."
Yeah, right, as though gays can really change their preferences even though they can stop acting on them, as though promoting hatred is a lesser sin. I don't care whether or not someone is gay or straight, I only care whether people are happy without harming others. The Rev Ken appears not to be happy unless he's harming others. It is loudmouthed bullies like him who have given religion a bad name because they use it to legitimize their sins.
"What's in a name? That which is fundamentalist By any other name would stink as badly."
¬ with apologies to William Shakespeare*
Following the ignomy that was the 'Scopes Monkey Trial', American Fundamentalists took to calling themselves 'Evangelical Christians', as though this ameliorated their regressive, literalist, politically conservative, dogmatism.
I refer to these creationist bigots as fundamentalists and I think that others should act likewise. In dropping the term Fundamentalist Christian, these literalists hoped that people would forget their ignominious history of prejudice. Fundamentalism, whether applied to Christianity, Judaism, or Islam, shares regressive, power-mongering elements of bigotry and dogmatism.
* "What's in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet." --From Romeo and Juliet (II, ii, 1-2)
Hirsi Ali knows first hand the horrors perpetrated against Muslim women and has written two books about her ordeals. She escaped Somalia to the Netherlands in 1992, but relocated to the US in 2002 after Dutch Muslims made death threats. The Dutch Parliament lured Hirsi Ali back from the US to the Netherlands to run (successfully) for parliament. Having offered to pay for Hirsi Ali's protection from the violence threatened by fundamentalist (read 'psychotic') Muslims, the Dutch government reneged on its promise when Hirsi Ali returned to the US. The Dutch Parliament will be debating Hirsi Ali’s case this week. (Help Ayaan Hirsi Ali)
Historically, the Dutch have been noted for their liberal attitudes and generosity. When they make their decision, they need to bear in mind both the practice of Muslim leaders of inciting religious frenzy and the fact that giving in to bullies merely promotes an escalation of bullying.
If you give a mouse a cookie, he's going to want a glass of milk. If you extend citizenship and the protection of civil rights to people who are not sufficiently emotionally mature to honor, rather than manipulate, those principals, then you risk civil strife when the tolerance levels of honorable citizens are exceeded.
Haidt’s description of moral psychology blurs the distinction between personal emotionality and moral philosophy. Haidt dismisses rational moral systems as too slow, in comparison to gut reactions, to determine behaviour: “Reasoning by its very nature is slow, playing out in seconds.”
Haidt appears to be conveniently ignoring the fact that seconds rank as fast enough to override emotional responses so that our behaviour can be governed by our cognition rather than by every passing emotion. Most people regard this ability as associated with socialization, emotional maturity, and self-control.
Haidt’s description of studies performed for his dissertation demonstrate self-fulfilling experimental bias: “I told people short stories in which a person does something disgusting or disrespectful that was perfectly harmless (for example, a family cooks and eats its dog, after the dog was killed by a car). I was trying to pit the emotion of disgust against reasoning about harm and individual rights.” Needless to say, Haidt found what he was looking for: “I found that disgust won in nearly all groups I studied.”
We Westerners are accustomed to viewing dogs as beloved pets and would react with disgust to this story—after all, the story was designed to disgust. Substitute “pig” or “lamb” for “dog” and the semi-cannibalistic element of the moral story diminishes considerably. In Asia, dogs are considered a food group, so I’d predict that Vietnamese Americans might not have reacted with disgust to this practical, harm-no-animal, meal. In essence, emotive reactions are culturally governed and even though emotion might kick in more quickly than cognitive assessment of this story, the cognition— that dogs are family members—was established by custom before the aversive reaction could occur.
Haidt classifies the criteria for assessing morality: the classically recognized parameters of harm/care and fairness/justice, plus Haidt’s s proposed additional parameter of ingroup/loyalty, authority/respect, and purity/sanctity.
The inclusion of these additional parameters, which seem to govern conservative moralizing attitudes, lead Haidt to the mistaken conclusion that morality is equated with religion. Yes, the Abrahamic religious systems include moralistic rules, and, yes, the Abrahamic religions have flourished by emphasizing community, but this does not mean that religion is the only route to moral behaviour or community involvement.
Conservative insistence on giving primacy to the moral codes of ancient Israel too often runs counter to harm/care and fairness/justice to truly represent moral attitudes. Too often, conservatives clearly act solely under the dictates of emotional reactivity or inculcated absolutes without any regard for potential harm or injustice. Even Haidt would probably not argue that killing others in the name of fundamentalist religious dogma hardly qualifies as moral behavior. Loyalty, respect, and sanctity are not necessarily good guides to moral behavior because those who claim to have moral authority may be manipulating believers to serve the claimants personal economic or political ends.
Haidt focuses on the group survival advantage of religious belief to criticize Dawkins’ New Atheist position. I have not yet read Dawkins, but PZ Myers states that Dawkins did not summarily dismiss group selection, as Haidt would have us believe. I shall have to read Dawkins and judge for myself. Regardless of what Dawkins actually said, it strikes me that in large, post-agricultural societies religion probably best served rulers and priests rather than the society’s individuals. Some South American religious superstitions, which involved ever increasing human sacrifice during times of stress, could hardly be said to have ensured group survival.
Video : Haidt's presentation at Enlightenment 2.0, where he explains his research into moral thinking and makes a good argument as to why liberals need to borrow the conservative lesson regarding in-group solidarity to defeat the enemy,
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