Author: Ophelia Benson

A guest post by Bruce Everett

Day Four – Sunday: Last day of the convention proper…

I have to confess, owing to considerations arising out of personal matters not mine to recount, coupled with a genuine need for more sleep, I missed the first three speakers of Sunday’s presentations: Eugenie Scott, Tanya Smith and Annie Laurie Gaylor.

I can’t comment on the merits of their respective showings; however I’m noticeably left with a black hole in the overall convention experience. Missing out on the presentations of three women in a row, in a convention touted to demonstrate the increasing alignment of feminism and atheism, is quite a gap.

I’m wondering, other concerns permitting, whether priority categories of speakers (in this case, women) could be scheduled so as not to be clumped together, to avoid risking their being missed by misfortune, or by convenience to those who’d miss them deliberately (sniffy misogynists?)

I suspect there may be an ongoing debate about these kinds of things amongst organisers, perhaps worthy of being opened up to the broader public. I’ll be looking forward to the release of the DVD of the convention, in any case.

***

When I finally got settled in, it was time for Sam Harris to make his appearance…

Harris was going to give a talk on ‘the illusion of free will’, but apparently for reasons out of his control, it was predetermined that he’d give a talk on the topic of death.

This was the kind of Sam Harris I’d wanted to see. Warren at Embiggen Books would tell me the following afternoon that of all the prominent atheist authors, he thought Harris was the one who put out the most novel content. Harris certainly didn’t disappoint in this respect on Sunday.

There’s been a lot of talk of extracting, or reverse engineering from religion, elements that still contribute to some degree of human utility, but to adapt them without the harm, or the annoying frilly bits. Alain de Botton has made this the theme of his most recent project, and Dennett has been talking about it ever since Breaking The Spell.

(You’d think Alain de Botton had invented the idea just recently, owing to his style of self-promotion).

I have to confess, that reason-exalting gospel music, showcased by Dennett in the past, doesn’t do it for me – it seems far too white-middle-class (especially when white dudes dance awkwardly to it). Further, the idea of bird-watching as a scientific experience available to the masses, while not useless, is hardly an aesthetic salve for the world-weary and the over-worked. I find Alain de Botton’s idea of constructing temples to atheism frivolous, pointless, pretentious, and utterly repulsive (much like his middle-class, School of Life, self-help cult – yuck!)

Harris, for his part delved into a materialistic, neuroscientific perspective on dealing with death – our predictions, projections and anticipations about the future are just thoughts, and our memories of the departed and the past, similarly, are just thoughts. A great deal of our suffering is, Harris argued, brought about by dwelling on such thoughts – the departed, impending doom, anxieties over future needs not being met – over and over.

The crowd was instructed through a session of meditation, informed again by a neuroscientific outlook. It was joked at the end that we’d been duped, and that the audience were now all converts to Buddhism. While deliberately not tipping a hat to solipsism, Harris explained our conscious sense experience as like a dream constrained by external reality – i.e. don’t expect to be able to fly if you jump off a building.

During the questions and answers, it was explained that the consolations offered by this kind of approach weren’t a justification for apathy about suffering in the world, and that some Buddhist sects, disturbingly, had gone down precisely this road. The consolations of meditation were for respite, when our thoughts tortured us without any payoff (i.e. excessive, unproductive worrying).

Ray Kurtzweil copped it in the neck for utopian visions of uploaded consciousness, as did a specimen of transhumanist twee during the Q&A, about the sum of everyone’s memories of loved ones giving a kind of networked immortality. Call me biased, but I’m giving Harris bonus points for this.

The presentation was delivered in good humour, with compassion, and in a crisp, lucid manner. It was to my mind possibly the best talk of the convention. It was, I think, as Warren would later echo, the most novel discussion.

***

After a morning break, with nasty coffee and nice vegetarian-friendly biscuits, the crowd was treated to the premiere of Emma McKenna and Craig Foster’s short film, Parrot. (Dear SBS, please do screen it on SOS!)

Parrot told the story of two young Australian lads, both closeted atheists, raised in a Catholic family with an overbearing, dogmatically religious mother, and an enabling, feckless Dad. Tragedy strikes, and while the young protagonist of the film has to deal with the strife in his own way, his mother turns ever more to her faith, harbouring similar expectations for her family.

While Australia is generally an easy place for the godless to be out about who they are, such that it’s most often not mentioned, there are niches where religious dogmatism still gets an upper hand, causing problems for the godless (and those of the ‘wrong religion’). Traditional, conservative, church-going families are such a niche, and it’s still worth paying attention to what life is like in these environments, even here in safe, supposedly secular, Australia.

At its core, Parrot is still a little didactic, and if you’re watching out for it, mildly contrived. However, in the subsequent discussion between directors Foster and McKenna, and MC Lawrence Leung, it was revealed this was a much bigger problem in earlier copies of the draft, subsequent efforts preventing the protagonist from merely being a ‘voice-box’. Perhaps, if this concern had underpinned the project from the beginning, the final product would be perfect. Still, as is, it’s quite considerably better than the alt.atheism lecture dressed-up as dialogue that calls itself The Ledge (an atheistic high-concept film, not saved even by its considerably talented cast).

***

Jason Ball…

What can I say? The young man is impressive. He’s all over the place (in a good way): guest editing The Rationalist, making media appearances for the Atheist Foundation of Australia and whoever else, and doing a good job of all of it. It seems anywhere you look these days in Australian free-thought, there’s Jason Ball, doing his thing. It’s quite heartening.

The young Mr Ball recounted to the audience just how he came to atheism, secularism and free-thought, from the background of a moderately religious family (football was explicitly allowed to come before church, which seems to be a norm amongst Australian Christians). An exchange trip to theUS saw Jason as the only person in his class who believed in evolution, and from then on the young man was changed…

(There are more details to it than that, obviously; like many of the talks, it’s worth your watching the DVD when it comes out).

There are other young secular Australians amongst Mr Ball’s cohort, and I wonder if their interest in the movement comes from a similar background, and if it wouldn’t be worth considering head-hunting young individuals with similar goals, but with possibly complementary perspectives (working class, Aboriginal Australian, and so on…) Also, I’m told that Leigh, one of the young committee members behind the scenes, is similarly impressive, so perhaps we could see a little more of her take on things as well.

***

…and then there was PZ Myers. He’s published the speech he gave at the GAC, Sacking the City of God, over here, if you’re so inclined.

Maybe it was my mood at the time, or maybe it’s these anti-depressants I’ve been taking lately, but PZ’s hyperbole didn’t reach me the way it used to. Sure, I agree with a number, if not all of the substantive points raised in the talk to various degrees (the anthropology of religion and morals, truth, autonomy and community), and I’m not about to misconstrue the intent of the talk, or tone troll PZ for Not Helping(^tm). But…

… PZ just didn’t rock me.

Maybe if Eugenie Scott had given a lecture on why we need to be ultra-deferential-to-religion in order to combat creationism, and I’d seen it, and I had frustration pent-up from it, then maybe PZ’s talk would have been an outlet. Perhaps if there’d been a comedic warm-up act, maybe if it was PZ headlining the first night rather than Jim Jeffries, I’d have seen things differently.

Maybe it’s because PZ followed the awesome Jason Ball. Maybe I just needed lunch.

Or maybe, in as far as I agreed with PZ, I found the substance of his talk uncontroversial and obvious, while in as far as it pushed the envelope, I found it unconvincing and difficult to take seriously – atheists are a hunting pack! Yes, well, maybe someone in the audience needed a bloviated confidence booster, but, whatever issues we do have (and we have plenty), we’re hardly under siege here inAustralia.

I’m not entirely sure I wasn’t witnessing projected nerd-affirmation in drag as secular activism. And I’m not entirely sure PZ appreciates the irony in his recent overuse of the word ‘wanker’, either.

Again, being so rhetorical, interpreting the content is subject to mood, so don’t take my word for it. No doubt footage will become available at some point for you to make up your own mind. Maybe I’ll even change mine.

(It wasn’t my intention at the outset of this post to suggest that on the night, PZ Myers was a bloviating wanker, but here we are at the end of the process, and… oh well.)

***

Lunch was served, eventually, being the same meal as the day before (I loved the vegetarian wraps – so this is good), although this time, there was a different accompaniment; visitors of another flavour than the last.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5z2avI516pk]

Islamic protest outside the 2012 GAC (1:24)

Okay, maybe I should take back that comment about PZ’s talk being bloviated; these guys (ALL OF THEM GUYS) really know how to billow hot air into empty rhetoric. I love how blue-shirted beard at 13 seconds seemed rather agitated with the hand waving, but I hope he wasn’t telling the other fellow (‘use your brains!’) not to give them the satisfaction, or anything like that. Kudos to Mr ‘use your brains’.

Now… as for the claim that Hitchens is burning in hellfire, it’s like the famous Josh Thomas quote from Good News Week; it’s like we’re being told that Hitchens, dead, is being punched in the aura by hippies. It’s hardly menacing, and makes more of a joke of the people claiming it, rather than impugning anyone else, dead or alive.

But the threats of hellfire against Ayaan Hirsi Ali are more menacing – you don’t experience hellfire in life, so there’s an implicit threat of death. Oddly enough, this didn’t seem to be taken particularly seriously by the Victorian police, who have a reputation for cracking down on protests (when they inconvenience rich people, at least).

I asked a couple of people, rhetorically, why there were no Muslim women protesting alongside the men, before heading back inside. It would turn out later, that ‘where are the women?’ would be chanted back at the Islamic protest, by a much larger group of atheists. I’d like to think this was my idea, but that’d be stretching credulity more than just a little – I’m just satisfied it happened.

…and then there was The Kiss.

                       

Gregory Storer and Michael Barnett share a kiss – (used with permission)

They brought Allah, anger and hate, and we brought love. I think it’s obvious which won out on the day.

I’ve been told a few things about the exchanges surrounding the protest that I can’t verify, things which would be interesting to know if true. I’m told, for example, that a few Muslim men holding placards intentionally posed with members of the atheist choir, as a statement of peaceful, mutual, if hyperbolic disagreement. I’m also told that one atheist fellow shouted words to the effect of ‘go home’, before being turned upon by other (sarcasm wielding) atheists.

I’m not entirely sure this situation didn’t have the capacity to blow up into something nastier though – the implicit threats against Ayaan Hirsi Ali hint at as much. I’ve been to quite a few union rallies over the years, so it’s not the yelling that gets at me. It’s just in my experience such violent rhetoric is either abstained from, or results in controversy and sackings. Call me provincial if you will, but I think it’s something to keep an eye on, even if such concerns aren’t fashionable in edgy, radicalMelbourne.

***

Lawrence Krauss and Richard Dawkins gave a wonderful tribute to Christopher Hitchens; Krauss sharing personal anecdotes, and Dawkins referring to his interview with Hitchens in last year’s Christmas edition of New Statesman (which I had with me at all times during my stay in Melbourne, incidentally). This was accompanied by a montage of Hitchens at his most razor-sharp.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iR0GyYaeI-k

Tribute to Christopher Hitchens (11:09)

It has to be said, that hearing Dawkins emulating the manner of speech of Hitchens, was like listening to pan pipes attempting to imitate a tuba; all dry air and reedy, without the necessary, rich baritone. It’s not the worst thing to be accused of falling short of though, the bar being set so high.

This is the part where I suspect people in the audience most wish he were still around, occasional tears being shed; something that must have grated on a number of envious, less prominent, less respected authors around RadiCool Melbourne.

(This is the part where I’ll also point out that wherever I went in Melbourne, they only had Johnny Walker Red.)

The tribute segued into the Three Horsemen Panel, with Ayaan Hirsi Ali. After the huge applause had subsided, the proceedings were held in an informal manner, which Dawkins told us they’d play by ear, and see how it went.

Cooperation and secularism seemed to be the de facto theme of this Global Atheist Convention. I thought it might have just been me, owing to my attending secularist fringe events where cooperation in secular campaigning was discussed, but I’ve seen other people make much the same observations, here and there.

Cooperation, discussed by the panel, touched on a few interesting observations; Dennett raised Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s call for people to help secular Muslims, stating his own experience that while secular Muslims were not wary of atheists, they could be wary of being found by fundamentalist Muslims to have associated with atheists, which was risky.

I suspect that this may be more of an issue in the antipode than down-under, although it doesn’t seem to be hurting George Galloway’s prospects much – why deal with moderate, secular Muslims when you can treat the fundamentalists as a voting bloc, right? Well, it works for some people.

I digress.

Contrary to a lot of public opinion, ‘new atheists’ aren’t opposed to cooperation, which makes any such line of questioning just a bit more trivial. Distinctions then, if sensible ones are to be made, as well as subsequent discussion, should be based on something like the conditions under which such cooperation would best occur, not on the prospect of cooperation itself. Unless of course you’re one of those parties benefiting from public confusion on the matter, in which case you’d want to present your political opposition as uncooperative, while being uncooperative yourself.

The Q&A session was pretty entertaining; one poor chap asking Richard Dawkins why a brain hadn’t evolved to the size of the entire universe. Ahem. Dawkins answered by pointing out the somewhat finite size of the birth canal.

While there are probably better, more technical objections to the query, it was a funny retort, and a nice light-hearted note on which to end the GAC proper. Although, having booked for a fringe event the following night, featuring PZ Myers, Chris Stedman and Leslie Cannold, on that very vexed of topics, cooperation still weighed on my mind.

I’ll write more on the topic in the next installation; Night of the Wankers (or Way kin whiff Strine)…

~ Bruce

Maryam points out this helpful item: a speech last summer by Ayatollah Mohammad Taghi Mesbah-Yazdi, religious advisor to Ahmadinejad, explaining that human rights have no place in Islam. Oh. Well thank you; that’s what critics keep saying, and it’s helpful to have the corroboration.

Mesbah-Yazdi, the theoretician of violence, gave a new speech at the end of Ramadan (end of August) in which he criticized the opinion of those people who claim Islam is based on generosity and respect for  Human Rights.

Yes exactly! I’m always criticizing the opinion of those people too. I keep asking them to name just one place where that works out in practice – just one country where the government is “Islamic” in some sense and generosity and respect for human rights are running the show. Just one.

In this speech he said: “Democracy, Human Rights and the rights  of citizenship have no place in Islam.” He continued that there is no room for freedom of speech and thought in Islam, and that Islam is based  on strictness and violence. Muslims and those who convert to the religion of Islam must only adhere to the opinions of the leader of the  Islamic Republic, according to Mesbah. He continued: “Until a person has  converted to Islam, he is free — but democracy and Human Rights have no  meaning within Islam. Everything must be under the surveillance of the  government, even the way people dress. And if some people say otherwise,  they don’t know Islam.”

Tariq Ramadan please note.

“There is no room for freedom of speech and thought in Islam, and that Islam is based  on strictness and violence.” That really sums it up admirably. Two words do the job. That’s exactly what I fear and loathe about Islam-in-power: strictness and violence. That’s a horrible way to live; absolutely horrible. It’s very helpful of Mesbah-Yazdi to make it so clear for us. It’s not as if people can accuse him of Islamophobia! And they can’t pretend it’s Western racism, either.

Ah the dear US Conference of Catholic bishops – how it does love itself a chance to tell people to obey it. The same of course goes for the dear Inquisition, now thoughtfully renamed the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which was Ratzinger’s part of the organization until he got the top job. The Inquisition has issued a new Obey Us, which the UCCB has kindly shared. It begins with – well, with Obey Us, of course.

The context in which the current doctrinal Assessment of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious in the United States of America is best situated is articulated by Pope John Paul II in the Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Vita consecrata of 1996. Commenting on the genius of the charism of religious life in the Church, Pope John Paul says: “In founders and foundresses we see a constant and lively sense of the Church, which they manifest by their full participation in all aspects of the Church’s life, and in their ready obedience to the Bishops and especially to the Roman Pontiff. Against this background of love towards Holy Church ‘the pillar and bulwark of truth’ (1 Tim 3:15), we readily understand…the full ecclesial communion which the Saints, founders and foundresses, have shared in diverse and often difficult times and circumstances. They are examples which consecrated persons need constantly to recall if they are to resist the particularly strong centrifugal and disruptive forces at work today. A distinctive aspect of ecclesial communion is allegiance of mind and heart to the Magisterium of the Bishops, an allegiance which must be lived honestly and clearly testified to before the People of God by all consecrated persons, especially those involved in theological research, teaching, publishing, catechesis and the use of the means of social communication. Because consecrated persons have a special place in the Church, their attitude in this regard is of immense importance for the whole People of God” (n. 46).

Obey Us. Obey. Obey obey obey obey. Do what we tell you. Obey. Submit. Obey obey obey. Ready obedience to the Bishops and especially to the Roman Pontiff. Resist the particularly strong centrifugal and disruptive forces at work today. Allegiance of mind and heart to the Magisterium of the Bishops. Their attitude in this regard. Obey obey obey obey.

But the women in the Leadership Conference of Women Religious haven’t been doing it. They haven’t been obeying enough.

For instance they sent letters to the Inquisition saying they disagreed with things.

The Cardinal spoke of this issue in reference to letters the CDF received from “Leadership Teams” of various Congregations, among them LCWR Officers, protesting the Holy See’s actions regarding the question of women’s ordination and of a correct pastoral approach to ministry to homosexual persons, e.g. letters about New Ways Ministry’s conferences. The terms of the letters suggest that these sisters collectively take a position not in agreement with the Church’s teaching on human sexuality. It is a serious matter when these Leadership Teams are not providing effective leadership and example to their communities, but place themselves outside the Church’s teaching.

Right; because that’s not obeying. They’re supposed to obey.

And not only that, but – they are (brace yourselves) Radical Feminists!!1! 

Radical Feminism. The Cardinal noted a prevalence of certain radical feminist themes incompatible with the Catholic faith in some of the programs and presentations sponsored by the LCWR, including theological interpretations that risk distorting faith in Jesus and his loving Father who sent his Son for the salvation of the world. Moreover, some commentaries on “patriarchy” distort the way in which Jesus has structured sacramental life in the Church; others even undermine the revealed doctrines of the Holy Trinity, the divinity of Christ, and the inspiration of Sacred Scripture.

I take it the Inquisition is trying to get a mention on Manboobz.

They got a US bishop to look into it, and what the bishop found is a pervasive failure to obey.

On June 25, 2010, Bishop Blair presented further documentation on the content of the LCWR’s Mentoring Leadership Manual and also on the organizations associated with the LCWR, namely Network and The Resource Center for Religious Institutes. The documentation reveals that, while there has been a great deal of work on the part of LCWR promoting issues of social justice in harmony with the Church’s social doctrine, it is silent on the right to life from conception to natural death, a question that is part of the lively public debate about abortion and euthanasia in the United States. Further, issues of crucial importance to the life of Church and society, such as the Church’s Biblical view of family life and human sexuality, are not part of the LCWR agenda in a way that promotes Church teaching. Moreover, occasional public statements by the LCWR that disagree with or challenge positions taken by the Bishops, who are the Church’s authentic teachers of faith and morals, are not compatible with its purpose.

They’re also not compatible with the fact that the bishops are men while the people in the LCWR are women (that’s what the W stands for), so obviously the latter don’t get to disobey the former. Any fule kno that.

 

A guy in Russia was arrested for saying gay people should have rights.

Sergey Kondrashov was jailed in St. Petersburg, Russia for defying a new draconian “homosexual propaganda” law. His crime? Holding up a sign saying a close family friend, who happens to be lesbian, deserves the same rights as he and his wife. Stand with Sergey – and other Russians who are refusing to be silenced, and challenging the spread of this backwards law nationwide.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tm9S03BzENM

There’s a petition you can sign. Only 30 thousand to go and they’ll have 100 thousand.

So people are trying to combat the bullying of LGBQ teenagers in school, and religious conservative lunatics are trying to combat the efforts to combat the bullying. Yes that’s right. Grown-ups in grown-up organizations full of grown-ups are trying to prevent people from stopping bullying in schools.

Last  year, many conservative political organizations, including Focus on the Family,  the Family Research Council, the American Family Association, Liberty Counsel  and Concerned Women for America vocally opposed attempts by school districts  and public officials to combat bullying based on actual or perceived sexual  orientation and gender identity—categories typically considered along with  other attributes such as race, sex, age, disability and national origin.  Moreover, these groups smeared and demonized advocacy groups that collaborate  with teachers and administrators in developing best practices to combat bullying,  warning that anti-bullying groups would encourage everything from  “homosexualizing” youth to anti-Christian persecution to pedophilia.

Religious Right organizations demanded that schools and localities adopt policies that  would effectively leave LGBT and LGBT-perceived students unprotected and tie  the hands of schools that try to deal with the problem.

…

Liberty  Counsel Director of Cultural Affairs Matt Barber said there is “no evidence” that  LGBT people face either discrimination or violence, and Robert Newman of the  California Christian Coalition said that  bullying is “part of the maturational process,” adding, “I hardly think that  bullying is a real issue in schools.” Fox News host Steve Doocy even hosted a  segment called “Bullying: Crisis or Panic?” in which he asked if  bullying is an “exaggerated epidemic.”

WallBuilders  president and Republican operative David Barton falsely claimed that “the  leading pediatric association in America” opposed anti-bullying policies that  cover sexual orientation. Barton argued, “If  you’ll just let this develop naturally, they’ll end up being heterosexual  unless you force them to be homosexual…. If you let it run its course it’s  gonna turn out normal and natural, unless you guys intervene and make the  unnatural stuff natural.”

As it  turned out, the group Barton cited was a tiny, fringe anti-gay organization.  The country’s actual leading pediatric group, the American Academy of  Pediatricians, contacted Barton’s  group and requested a retraction, which Barton promptly refused.

These are adults. These are adults dismissing or making light of bullying in schools. These are adults trying to stop other adults preventing bullying. These are adults who want to keep bullying in schools.

One guy even came right out and said so, without even the thinnest veil of disguise.

When  whitewashing doesn’t work, some anti-gay activists just try to condone  bullying. That’s what Rich Swier of Tea Party Nation attempted to do in a column sent  out to members nationwide, dubbing the bullying of LGBT youth a “sham” and  adding that if it does take place, it is “healthy” since homosexuality, like  drug abuse, “cannot be condoned” and must be stopped:

This is not bullying. It is peer pressure and is healthy. There are many bad behaviors such as smoking, under age drinking [sic] and drug abuse that are behaviors that cannot be condoned. Homosexuality falls  into this category. Homosexuality is simply bad behavior that youth see as such and rightly pressure their peers to stop it.

#compassionisattheheartofeverygreatreligion

Leo Igwe reports there is a new church in Cross River-Akwa Ibom states in Nigeria that looks set to cause more misery, torture and death with accusations of witchcraft.

 Leo writes:

Recently, the prophetic ministry joined the vanguard of witch hunting churches that are fueling witchcraft related abuse in the region.

In what appears to be a clear and targeted attempt to undermine the progress which government and non-governmental agencies have made in the fight against witch hunting in Akwa Ibom, the church organized in March a crusade tagged ‘Uyo Festival of Fire’ at Ibom Hall in Uyo, the state capital. The theme of the crusade was ‘My Father! My Father!! That Witch Must Die’.

Religion is poison. It doesn’t poison everything, because not everything is poisoned; but it is poison. That billboard is poisonous. It’s demanding the torture and murder of children and other vulnerable people.