Via Fidalgo, First Things spots some scary atheist existentialism in the new Smurfs movie.
[pause to laugh very much for a long time]
It’s someone called Collin Garbarino who spotted this smurf atheist existentialism.
This weekend I saw the new trailer for Smurfs 2. It looks to be a fun romp. Gargamel is back, and he’s got a new plan for catching those little blue people who are two apples high. If the trailer accurately represents the film, we’ll be entertained by nonstop shenanigans and high jinks. We’ll also get a healthy dose of atheistic existentialism.
Watch the trailer below. At the 1:45 mark Papa Smurf says, “It doesn’t matter where you came from; what matters is who you choose to be.”
How inspiring! If only it were true.
It does matter where we come from. If God really is our creator, then we really do owe him something. Papa Smurf’s words of pseudo-wisdom only make sense if our existence is the product of meaningless forces. If we are the products of evolution, then we have to manufacture meaning for our lives. We have to choose to be someone. If we have a creator, chances are that he intended for us to be a certain someone, and maybe we should ask him about it if we’re confused.
Ok, let’s take Garbarino’s claims seriously.
If God really is our creator, then we really do owe him something.
Do we? Why? I don’t think we do. God didn’t get our consent, and without consent, how can it be true that we “owe” god something for creating us? I don’t see it.
Now, saving lives, as opposed to creating them – I can see that. We owe people who save our lives, and all the more so if they do it at risk to themselves. Consent doesn’t come into it in the same way. But creating us? That’s a different kind of thing.
And then there’s the “if” – that’s a big if. The reality is that “God” is not “our creator” and that there’s no reason to think it is, so the debt question doesn’t arise.
If we have a creator, chances are that he intended for us to be a certain someone
But there again the issue of consent comes into play, in fact it becomes very urgent. Garbarino is saying this god created us without our consent and had specific intentions about who and what we would be, still without our consent. Well the hell with that. I don’t consent to be whatever it is that some outside person intended me to be. My life belongs to me; our lives belong to us; we’re not toys in the hands of a bigger more powerful person. It’s slavish of Garbarino to think otherwise.
and maybe we should ask him about it if we’re confused.
Ok. What about it, god?
[waits]
Nothing.
Garbarino wants us to ask this “God” person about it while knowing perfectly well that “God” won’t answer so what does he think he’s saying? I suppose the usual – the mindless, obedient, unreflective usual – we should ask and then be quite content to get no answer, or, we should ask some member of the clergy or other and be quite content to take that as an answer even though it’s obviously no such thing.
They don’t think these things through. It gets tiresome.