Religion, Respect and being a dick

[Giliell]

Since there's quite some discussion about it when to offend and when not, so I thought I'd open the debate here, too.

I think we probably all agree that religion doesn't deserve any special respect, but I think people do, even if they believe stupid.
Probably most of the discussion started with DMD and the "you don't have the right not to be offended". Which is true. But you also have the right to take offense.

Personally, I don't see any sense in offending people just for the sake of demonstrating that you're allowed to. Being allowed to do something doesn't mean you should do it. And I don't think it's any helpful if your goal is to reason with people and maybe even change their point of view.

Of course, the seriously religious will be offended at our mere existence. So what do I think is acceptable and what not?
Well, I didn't think it a good idea because I thought it would do more harm than good, but I could see that people had some important reason why they did it, freedom of speech.
And I therefore think "burn a qu'ran day" not acceptable, because it is solely done to offend, and hurt as much as they can.

And there's another phenomenon around that gets quite a lot of applause from a lot of atheists, which is to "disturb the holy communion" in a roman catholic church by accepting it and then spitting it out or something like that. And people applaud it.
And I find that unacceptable. Not because I think there's something special about a tasteless piece of waffer. But because it is totally impolite and going against any basic respect for people.
Folks go there, to their house, as their guest with the sole purpose and intend to hurt and disgust and anger inocent ordinary people as much as they can.
Imagine somebody shitting on your carpet, it would come close.
So why should such a behaviour be acceptable just because it's anti-theist?

 

[ImprobableJoe]

Since there's quite some discussion about it when to offend and when not, so I thought I'd open the debate here, too.

I think we probably all agree that religion doesn't deserve any special respect, but I think people do, even if they believe stupid.
Probably most of the discussion started with DMD and the "you don't have the right not to be offended". Which is true. But you also have the right to take offense.

Personally, I don't see any sense in offending people just for the sake of demonstrating that you're allowed to. Being allowed to do something doesn't mean you should do it. And I don't think it's any helpful if your goal is to reason with people and maybe even change their point of view.

Of course, the seriously religious will be offended at our mere existence. So what do I think is acceptable and what not?
Well, I didn't think it a good idea because I thought it would do more harm than good, but I could see that people had some important reason why they did it, freedom of speech.
And I therefore think "burn a qu'ran day" not acceptable, because it is solely done to offend, and hurt as much as they can.

Well... burning one Koran can be speech of a protesting nature. Burning a pile of them is overkill, and obscures any possible point you might be trying to make. Of course, if you're an attention-seeking criminal in Gainesville, FL you might be burning a stack of Korans to obscure the fact that you pulled all the equity out of the church property in order to buy real estate in your own name.

And there's another phenomenon around that gets quite a lot of applause from a lot of atheists, which is to "disturb the holy communion" in a roman catholic church by accepting it and then spitting it out or something like that. And people applaud it.
And I find that unacceptable. Not because I think there's something special about a tasteless piece of waffer. But because it is totally impolite and going against any basic respect for people.
Folks go there, to their house, as their guest with the sole purpose and intend to hurt and disgust and anger inocent ordinary people as much as they can.
Imagine somebody shitting on your carpet, it would come close.
So why should such a behaviour be acceptable just because it's anti-theist?

Gosh, I think you misinterpreted the cracker bit... and I hope no one is doing what you describe. I remember the "kidnap a cracker" craze that was going on, but I remember the prominent atheists talking about it advocating getting the cracker only if you could do so without disturbing or otherwise interfering with the church service. I hope nobody was going out of their way to offend churchgoers in their own church during services.

There's a difference between doing something benign that other people find offensive, and going out of your way to offend in order to provoke a negative response. You can't poke someone with a stick until they smack you, and then use that as proof that they have anger management issues.

 

[RichardMNixon]

The intent and the way it's carried out are definitely very important. The point of DMD is that they were just cartoons. Muslims had a right to be offended. They didn't have a right to kill people for not following the rules they apply on themselves. It was a specific action on their part, prompting a specific response on ours. Burn a Qu'ran day was a much more violent act without any opportunity for conflict resolution. The ideal response to DMD would be "Hmm, maybe you're right, I guess our religion can't tell the entire world what they're allowed to draw a picture of." What could burning Qu'rans possible send as a message? Anything besides "Fuck you?" A constructive message is critical.

PZ Myers actually also expressed distaste for people messing with crackers in churches. Leave people who want to be left alone alone. If they want to read your website and look at your drawing, fine, but you start crossing the line when you shove it in their faces. I drew Mohammad and put it on facebook. I didn't track down all the Muslims in my department and give them an autographed copy. People don't have the right not to be offended, but they have the right not to be harassed.

Myers also didn't do anything extremely outlandish with the cracker like hanging in on a cross or lighting it on fire or something. He didn't add heaps of insult to injury. He threw it away because that was the point. It was a cracker. That was the message. The message wasn't "fuck you all for worshiping a cracker," it was "why are you all sending someone death threats over a cracker? It's a cracker."

 

[Yfelsung]

Offending and attacking the position of a believer is not to convert them, it's for the entertainment of the audience and in an attempt to do "splash damage" to those witnessing the debate who may be on the fence. If you can reduce your opponent to a blubbering mess who can't get a word in edgewise between all the stuttering and being offended, you have a better chance to prevent his message from getting out without being laughed at.

Your target is never the concern. You can't fix stupid, but you can use stupid people like the tools they are.

We have these two Mormon kids who walk around downtown in my city, I usually avoid them but one time I engaged them, quite loudly. I wasn't overly disrespectful in that I didn't just yell and curse, but I loudly ridiculed their religion and their points. Due to being in the center of my city during early afternoon, there was quite the audience and I had most of them in stitches and a couple at the end said stuff like "You know, I never thought of it that way" when I'd make jokes about how ridiculous the idea of God is.

Sure, the Mormons slinked off in a pissy mood and probably hate me, but the audience got entertainment and I might have made a few of them think different.

 

[KnowingLaughter]

To me the balance point is that DMD or even just standing up and saying "you all believe in a pile of crap" is simply exercising your own rights to say and think as you please. Burning something is a visual act of destruction and highly representative.

So I would say it is fine to mock someone's belief as much as you like, but destroying something of theirs is probably crossing a line. I think that holds true outside of religion too, words are fine, actions tend to have consequences.

 

[lrkun]

Being Courtous and respectful are better than being a dick when it comes to treating others, especially the belief of others, because in doing the former, one allows a path to open for purposes of better communication of ideas and understanding of ideas. Therefore, there is an exchange of ideas to further learning, and the path to revealing the truth to the religious.

 

[Aught3]

http://vimeo.com/13704095

More flies with honey and all that. And before anyone asks, yes I tried it and no it didn't work.

 

[Andiferous]

I think of it as something like peeing on a war memorial. No-one and nothing is physically hurt, and maybe you're making a statement. You might not agree with war, but it's just not a respectful thing to do. And it's often just about as effective as that, in the end.

 

[KnowingLaughter]

That's a really good analogy Andiferous!

Standing near the memorial criticising war would be one thing but that would be quite another.

I may use that analogy myself in future, thanks!

 

[Gunboat Diplomat]

To me the balance point is that DMD or even just standing up and saying "you all believe in a pile of crap" is simply exercising your own rights to say and think as you please. Burning something is a visual act of destruction and highly representative.

So I would say it is fine to mock someone's belief as much as you like, but destroying something of theirs is probably crossing a line. I think that holds true outside of religion too, words are fine, actions tend to have consequences.

In defense of Terry Jones, I'm sure he plans to burn his own copy of the Qur'an...

I think of it as something like peeing on a war memorial. No-one and nothing is physically hurt, and maybe you're making a statement. You might not agree with war, but it's just not a respectful thing to do. And it's often just about as effective as that, in the end.

That's a really good analogy Andiferous!

Standing near the memorial criticising war would be one thing but that would be quite another.

I may use that analogy myself in future, thanks!

It's a terrible analogy unless it was your personal war memorial. Please avoid using it. If you urinated on a copy of said war memorial or an effigy of one, that would be a better analogy...

 

[Yfelsung]

Gunboat has a good point. Religious people do not own their religious text. They may own their own copy, but the scripture itself is not their property and can be used by anyone.

It's why I can blaspheme anyone in any book I want and even publish books with blasphemy in them without getting nailed with copyright infringement.

I'm all for Terry Jones burning the Koran personally.

Muslims vs Christians... it's a win/win situation for me.

 

[KnowingLaughter]

In defense of Terry Jones, I'm sure he plans to burn his own copy of the Qur'an...

Haha, yes I appreciate that he would have bought his own copy, but the ideas within book itself could be reasonably called "theirs", and the destruction of it clearly representative of the destruction of their beliefs and knowledge.

Why would americans be so angry that a muslim burnt an american flag that the muslim had bought or made? Because it is representative. (Forgive my cliche example but I hope you get my gist.)

It's a terrible analogy unless it was your personal war memorial. Please avoid using it. If you urinated on a copy of said war memorial or an effigy of one, that would be a better analogy...

I disagree, I think the analogy is reasonable. The point is that it is a physical representation of an idea. If you think it matters that the representation is a one off, or a copy, that is for you to decide. Any analogy falls apart given enough scrutiny, I think this was appropriate enough to communicate a clear idea!

Gunboat has a good point. Religious people do not own their religious text. They may own their own copy, but the scripture itself is not their property and can be used by anyone.

I feel this is kind of missing the point, as I mentioned above. The assembly of words in the order of their scripture represent a belief, or a faith in that belief. Regardless of who paid for that copy to be printed, the ideas within are still relevant to all that believe them, and the destruction of those ideas offensive to the same. (ie. flag-burning)

It's why I can blaspheme anyone in any book I want and even publish books with blasphemy in them without getting nailed with copyright infringement.

I totally agree, blaspheme away! But destroying something is not the same as mocking it.

(I feel like a devils advocate here, I actually find the idolising of a fixed work of text to be unsavoury at the least, and contrary to self improvement.)

 

[Yfelsung]

But in the end, you're not destroying the scripture, you're destroying a book that contains it.

If such an act is enough to offend someone greatly, I think that says a lot about their faith.

Bottom line: If they're right, we're going to burn in hell for what we do. How could they do anything worse than that? I think the fact they take offense and even try to stop us tells me that there is that nugget of doubt about their God. It may be a subconscious nugget, but deep down they know it's bullshit too and that's why they need to defend it so fervently.

I would be much more impressed by a religion who just watched someone burn their book and went "So?"

 

[KnowingLaughter]

But in the end, you're not destroying the scripture, you're destroying a book that contains it.

Hence my comparison to flag burning. No muslim has actually burned america*, or its ideals, but the representation of that intent is clear.

If such an act is enough to offend someone greatly, I think that says a lot about their faith.

Agree 100%.

I am not saying that it is right to be offended that someone burnt a book. I am saying it is inevitable that doing so will cause offence. In that sense I am echoing the sentiment of the OP.

* Edit: I realise that I left a hole for someone to quote 9/11, I hope in context you can still understand my point.

 

[cs194]

I think it's important to respect anyone's views and beliefs and their rights to have them while of course disagreeing with them if you so wish. However a person that has or believes in a religion (I'm a liberal Jew myself) shouldn't have any extra or special "rights" over and above those with no faith. Religion can and should be debated along with everything else and those who get offended by the mere discussion of religion are often those that give the rest of us a bad name.

 

[Aught3]

I think it's important to respect anyone's views and beliefs and their rights to have them while of course disagreeing with them if you so wish. However a person that has or believes in a religion (I'm a liberal Jew myself) shouldn't have any extra or special "rights" over and above those with no faith. Religion can and should be debated along with everything else and those who get offended by the mere discussion of religion are often those that give the rest of us a bad name.

Totally agree with you. That's a great first post and welcome to the boards

 

[ImprobableJoe]

I think it's important to respect anyone's views and beliefs and their rights to have them while of course disagreeing with them if you so wish. However a person that has or believes in a religion (I'm a liberal Jew myself) shouldn't have any extra or special "rights" over and above those with no faith. Religion can and should be debated along with everything else and those who get offended by the mere discussion of religion are often those that give the rest of us a bad name.

I don't agree with the first bit. I don't have to respect the views or beliefs of others, and more often than not when those views disagree with mine I have zero respect... and I don't see any problem with that at all.

I agree with the rest of it though. I don't have to respect someone's views in order to respect their right to those views. And I'm sure it is clear that I wouldn't give religion any special pass from criticism.

 

[televator]

I think the one thing I really had a problem with was the porn for bibles stunt that happened at some University a while back. Offenses are going to happen either way, but as long as you can explain that the message you try to convey is a valid point then you can be excused. However to just offend seemingly without conveying a valid reason is not rational behavior at all. Yes, an atheist would think bibles area as much a human vice as porn and that the difference is that porn probably doesn't harm anywhere near as many people, but to the unsuspecting average god fearing Joe that message isn't clear in a noisy stunt like that. Consequently, the only thing you accomplish is pandering to atheists while failing to inform believers with anything substantive. I think there could have been a better way to make the point that bibles are a vice more clearly and perhaps without bringing up the porn comparison so hastily or at least have more time to clarify the porn comparison.

Should such things be banned? No. Should people do them anyway? I don't think I can tell them what to do but I can certainly criticize. After all, it's always best that folks arrive at such conclusions on their own rather than be pressured into not doing them. If they just don't arrive at that conclusion, then so be it.

 

[cs194]

I don't agree with the first bit. I don't have to respect the views or beliefs of others, and more often than not when those views disagree with mine I have zero respect... and I don't see any problem with that at all.

I agree with the rest of it though. I don't have to respect someone's views in order to respect their right to those views. And I'm sure it is clear that I wouldn't give religion any special pass from criticism.

Well I'm new to this board so I have no idea whether you would or would not give religion any special pass from criticism.

There's a fine line between respecting the person and their views and just respecting their right to have some. You could argue that if by that person holding those views it causes them (and perhaps others they interact with) to have a detrimental effect on others, on society, on perhaps the world, then perhaps it would be more valid for you to have less or no respect for them. However whether the effect caused is in fact detrimental may just be your view so it's difficult to say.

 

[ImprobableJoe]

Well I'm new to this board so I have no idea whether you would or would not give religion any special pass from criticism.

There's a fine line between respecting the person and their views and just respecting their right to have some. You could argue that if by that person holding those views it causes them (and perhaps others they interact with) to have a detrimental effect on others, on society, on perhaps the world, then perhaps it would be more valid for you to have less or no respect for them. However whether the effect caused is in fact detrimental may just be your view so it's difficult to say.

Do you realize that you've just shifted the goalposts on me? You started out with the respect for beliefs, and the respect for a person's right to hold those beliefs. Now you've changed it to add respect for the person, on top of their beliefs and their rights. Your post really doesn't answer mine at all, since you shifted the focus.

I can respect a person or not, I can respect a person's beliefs or not, and I don't at all have to show that their beliefs are "detrimental" to other people. Some beliefs are just wrong and stupid, and not worthy of even a hint of respect. If those beliefs are wrong, stupid, and harmless, you might decide to respect them as a whole and disregard their more foolish position... or not.

You have little problem deciding for yourself what is and isn't worthy of respect. I've decided to draw the line somewhere that makes more sense, and is more in line with what people do in real situations, rather than the ideal they espouse when there's nothing on the line.