Author: Ophelia Benson

Now you knew I would have to pitch a fit about this. So here, have a fit.

Western liberal democracy owes much to the Christian view that all have equal worth before God, which in our political system reads as democracy and equality before the law; and those ideals have often been applied because of religious faith, not in spite of it.

No it doesn’t. Or at least no one knows if it does or not. That’s just that confusion of correlation with causation again. The ‘Christian’ (and not exclusively Christian, and not thoroughly Christian either, given how many exceptions Xianity always managed to find to its supposed ‘view’ over the years) view that all have equal worth before God, and the idea of democracy and equality, just happened to be around in the same part of the world now and then. That doesn’t mean Xianity caused it. And really, is it likely? Has Xianity really been all that egalitarian all this time? Hardly.

The anti-slavery movement had religious motivations of the evangelical persuasion that Buruma fears.

We’re always hearing that – but slavery was justified by Christians in good standing for centuries before the abolitionists even existed, let alone got a foothold. So how much is that supposed to count for? Not all that much, I would say.

Simply bemoaning the fanatics and mourning the demise of liberal democracy gets us nowhere…Faith is important to many.

Yes it does get us somewhere. And anyway what are we supposed to do, applaud the fanatics and cheer the partial retreat (not demise) of secular liberal democracy? And faith is important to many – really?! Who knew? That changes everything.

But Buruma is wrong to regard evangelicals as fundamentalists, because he equates that term with fanaticism and intolerance rather than with trying to apply orthodox Biblical doctrine to today’s world.

Well there’s a distinction without a difference. Trying to apply ‘orthodox Biblical doctrine’ to today’s world is fanaticism and intolerance. What else would it be? Has this guy ever read the dang Bible?

Christianity and Islam – the two faiths Buruma mentions – motivate believers to share their world-views with others. That means they will always want to be in the public square, engaging in the debates of the day.

Yes, we know. Like Iqbal Sacranie, flailing around in his search for a rationalization for his dislike of gays, and falling back on the fact that it is what he learns from his ‘faith’ – as if that makes his nasty nonsense better instead of worse. It’s this wanting to be in the public square arguing for political views that have no justification whatever except the arguers’ ‘faith’ that is so damn dangerous. That, oddly enough, is why secularists oppose religion in the public square.

Yet another to add to the Guardian’s list of slobbering-on-religion articles. And just as lame and vacuous and stale as all the others. I’m beginning to think that people of ‘faith’ just really don’t have anything of value to say on the subject.

I listened to the replay of Iqbal Sacranie’s interview on PM yesterday, and it was just as silly and irritating as I expected. He so obviously had nothing relevant to say, he so obviously was simply expressing unthinking dislike, he so obviously was just floundering around looking for rationalizations, it was so obvious how empty they were. Er, they’re harmful, uh, stability, um, society, er, stable, you know, ooh, ah, um – they get diseases! That’s it. They get diseases – that’s scientific, that is. So you see what I mean. It’s obvious. But, er, we have to put up with it, because this is a democracy. But I sure don’t want to! And of course you can see why. It’s obvious. Stability. Harmful. Mutter mutter choke.’ Yes, all very elevating and enlightening.

But. I don’t think it’s a police matter. Sacranie is a damn fool with a narrow mind, but that’s not a police matter either. He ought to wake up and learn to think properly, but I hardly think the police are going to teach him to do that. Not their job, is it. No, that’s our job – his fellow citizens of the world.

His (veiled?) threats against Rushdie are another matter. But those are not why the police were called. But he didn’t utter any threats, not even veiled ones (he said the death penalty was too good for Rushdie, that’s what – not all that veiled). No, his potential crime may have been a violation of section 5 of the Public Order Act. I wasn’t really aware of this act before…it’s rather interesting…

Scotland Yard’s community safety unit, which investigates homophobia and hate crime, is considering whether Sir Iqbal has broken telecommunications laws or the 1986 Public Order Act, which forbids the use of “threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour within the hearing or sight of a person likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress or thereby”.

You guys have an act that forbids the use of insulting words within the hearing of people likely to be caused distress thereby? Holy jumping Jesus! Are you crazy?! Were you all in a coma when that was passed, or what? Didn’t it cross anyone’s mind that those terms might be just ever so slightly broad and sweeping? That they might be just a tiny tiny tiny bit of an impediment to free speech? I mean – don’t you all use words every day, every hour, that are insulting (to something or someone somewhere) enough to cause someone somewhere possible potential distress? And who knows if she’s in earshot or not?! I know I do. I use words of that kind every hour, every moment – they are my life and breath and reason for existing. Imagine my surprise to find that they are illegal.

I must be missing something. There must be some reason this Act isn’t as ridiculous as it looks at first blush. I can’t think of what it is, but there must be. Either that or you were all on an outing to Preston that day, and missed it.

Some more on this question of comprehensive v political liberalism, and respect, and what is meant by it. G has been arguing for a more limited reading in comments, but I’m not convinced that the quoted passages fit such a reading.

One may sympathize…without feeling that he understands the type of mutual respect that is required in a pluralistic society. I agree with Rawls: such respect requires (in the public sphere at least) not showing up the claims of religion as damaging, and not adopting a public conception of truth and objectivity according to which such claims are false.

That seems pretty clear to me. Surely she’s not talking about leaving ‘our private differences over comprehensive conceptions of the good out of political discourse and negotiation, and certainly out of political institutions themselves’ there. Isn’t it pretty unequivocal? Such respect requires, at least in the public sphere, not showing up the claims of religion as damaging, and not adopting a public conception of truth and objectivity according to which such claims are false. She doesn’t say ‘in the political sphere at least’ – she says ‘public’. I take that to mean public talking and writing, not purely public political talking and writing – since she says the former and not the latter. Respect requires us not to adopt a public – not political, but public – conception of truth and objectivity according to which the claims of religion are false. Do public sphere and public conception actually mean political sphere and political conception in Rawlsian language? Maybe they do, I don’t know. But the multiculturalism essay was in the Boston Review, which is not a technical journal of philosophy – surely Nussbaum must have intended to use ordinary language there.

The autonomy question – as G said, ‘even this minimal notion of respect has a problem with conceptions of the good that advocate political subordination of others (women, ethnic groups, adherents to other religions, etc.), because respect for individual autonomy is so basic to political liberalism.’ But…

I think it is plausible to read [Okin] as endorsing a form of comprehensive liberalism, in which liberal values of autonomy and dignity pervade the fabric of the body politic…her view resembles the views of John Stuart Mill and Joseph Raz, who see the fostering of personal autonomy in all areas of life as an appropriate goal of the state. Such moral liberals can still recognize the intrinsic worth of religious liberty and thus respect the choices of religious believers – up to a point. But, given their view that autonomous lives are better than hierarchically ordered lives, they are bound to play favorites among the religions, using the state and its persuasive apparatus to wean people away from religions that do not foster personal autonomy – as John Stuart Mill explicitly urges in On Liberty, where he excoriates Calvinism…There can be little doubt that a Millean liberal state will show public disrespect for Calvinism in all sorts of ways and will make frequent pronouncements about human flourishing and human nature that go well beyond the core of the political conception.

So – valuing autonomy will cause the Millean liberal to show public disrespect for Calvinism in all sorts of ways – and surely I’m not reading uncharitably in thinking that Nussbaum is critical of such an outcome. In fact she sounds (to me) unpleasantly like all the would-be censors who are always zipping up and down telling us not to disrespect their cherished beliefs. Very unpleasantly, in fact. This passage (it’s on pages 108-109 of the Okin book) makes me more twitchy every time I read it.

She goes on:

The political liberal, by contrast, begins from the fact of reasonable disagreements in society, and the existence of a reasonable plurality of comprehensive doctrines about the good, prominent among which are the religious conceptions. By calling them reasonable, the political liberal shows respect for them and commits herself to a political course that is as protective of them as it is possible to be, compatibly with a just political structure.

I still don’t see how to read that other than as a condemnation of showing ‘public disrespect’ for religions in public discussions, and as something of a warning about putting autonomy ahead of a certain (rather peculiar) idea of respect.

PZ comments on ‘The Root of All Evil’ at Pharyngula.

Nobody should ever call Dawkins arrogant. On the scale established by American televangelists, by Christians in general, he is a timid model of bashful humility. Pit a man who works for his knowledge, who willingly tests and reviews it continually, against a mob who trusts in revealed knowledge dogmatically, and I’ll tell you who the arrogant ones are.

Well exactly. How it did irritate me, listening to that smug unctuous man telling Dawkins he is arrogant. What a joke! But it works, you know. It works all the time. The Limbaughs and O’Reillys never get enough of that (well they wouldn’t, would they – it works) ploy, calling any failure to submit to religious dogma ‘elitist’ and an ‘attack of people of faith’. So however upside down and backward it is, it just keeps going on and on and on.

There is a review-synopsis of the first show at this new blog, which I see some of you have already found via Pharyngula. I meant to link to it yesterday but [voice rises to shriek] I’ve been busy! But there it is now – with its name derived from Pope, just as (indirectly) B&W’s is.

The naming things is an issue for those that don’t believe there actually is a God or Gods but who don’t want to be seen as going beyond evidence and logic and claiming that there definitely isn’t a God or Gods (if only people would stop thinking atheism means this!), and the arrogance this is seen to entail (for a good little book on atheism, have a look at Julian Baggini’s ‘Atheism: A Very Short Introduction’; it’s cheap and easy to read quickly).

Same here. B&W is cheap and easy to read quickly. I take a lot of pride in that.

I gather that Brian Leiter is thinking about this subject too.

I am wondering whether any readers know of literature making the case for toleration of religion qua religion. What has struck me in reading the literature is that while religious toleration is often a paradigm case for discussions of toleration, the arguments for it are not specific to religion: arguments from autonomy and well-being would equally well encompass toleration of many other kinds of belief that are not religious in character…What I’m wondering is whether there are other articles that try to argue why religion in particular should be tolerated, arguments that make claims appealing to distinctive features of religious belief and practices. Or as Macklem frames the question: “What is it that distinguished religious beliefs from other beliefs, so as to make them worthy of distinctive, perhaps superior constitutional protection?” That, to my mind, would be an argument for religious toleration.

It looks as if there aren’t very many, and as if those there are aren’t very good. Which won’t surprise us much, I should think. It is apparently just what I’ve been saying for a long time: it’s just an unargued, assumed, longstanding, habitual asymmetry that everyone takes for granted but that doesn’t have much justification. Religion is a special case. Yes, but why? Dunno – it just is.

Let’s consider what Nussbaum says, again. From the earlier comment:

But to claim that freedom of speech promotes truth in metaphysics and morals would be to show disrespect for the idea of reasonable pluralism, and to venture onto a terrain where one is at high risk of showing disrespect to one’s fellow citizens. Mill is totally oblivious to all such considerations. He has none of the delicate regard for other people’s religious doctrines that characterizes the political liberal…In On Liberty he does not hesitate to speak contemptuously of Calvinism as an ‘insidious’ doctrine…One may sympathize…without feeling that he understands the type of mutual respect that is required in a pluralistic society. I agree with Rawls: such respect requires (in the public sphere at least) not showing up the claims of religion as damaging, and not adopting a public conception of truth and objectivity according to which such claims are false.

What does ‘respect’ mean there? What is the mutual respect that is required in a pluralistic society, and that requires us not to show up the claims of religion and not to adopt a conception of truth and objectivity according to which such claims are false?

Respect means at least two different things, I take it. One, it means basic civility, politeness, the right way to treat people; decency, good behavior, not shoving people or spitting on them or calling them rude names. It doesn’t require thinking the people are nice people, or interesting, or right about anything – it doesn’t require any opinion of them at all. That’s not the point. The point is that the default mode for how to treat people, unless they’re approaching you at speed with a sharp sword or trying to take your lunch and eat it themselves, is to be civil. That’s respect one; respect two is quite different. It’s cognitive, and substantive, and involves judgment; it has content, it’s about something, it’s earned in some way. That means it can’t possibly be universal, or automatic, or a default mode for how to treat everyone; or mandated, or expected or demanded. But Nussbaum seems to be demanding respect two in addition to or even instead of respect one. Well, that’s ridiculous. And not only ridiculous, but surely a recipe for mental abdication and vacuity. I don’t see how one could even begin to implement such a program without giving up thinking of any kind. Especially given that last terrifying clause – ‘and not adopting a public conception of truth and objectivity according to which such claims are false’. Eh? Such respect requires us not to adopt a public (B&W is public) idea of truth in which such claims are false and wrong? Well then respect requires us to adopt no conception of truth at all! To just bag the whole idea!

Respect one is a good thing, but Nussbaum’s expansive idea of universal entitlement to respect two and its entailing the non-disagreement with religion, seems to me to be an intellectual nightmare.

So, a couple of days ago, turning over and over in my mind this much-vexed subject of belief and respect and faith and religion and whether we are or are not allowed (‘allowed’ in the broadest sense, not the most literal one) to criticise them – I re-read an essay of Martha Nussbaum’s that has puzzled me in the past, and behold, it puzzled me all over again.

The essay is packed full of statements that puzzle me – the margins are riddled with question marks. I’ll give just a sample.

Even if one were convinced…that all religion is superstition, and that a comprehensive secular view of the good is correct, we do not show sufficient respect for our fellow citizens when we fail to acknowledge that they reasonably see the good differently…So it is hard to see how we can respect the bearers of such convictions and yet not respect the choices they make to lead traditional religious lives.

We do not show sufficient respect for our fellow citizens when we fail to acknowledge that they reasonably see the good differently? So – we have to acknowledge – in advance, without questioning in particular – that our fellow citizens reasonably see the good differently, in order to show them sufficient respect? That’s an odd idea.

By calling them [comprehensive doctrines about the good – OB] reasonable, the political liberal shows respect for them and commits herself to a political course that is as protective of them as it is possible to be, compatibly with a just political structure.

Well, yes, no doubt. By calling everything that anyone thinks or says ‘reasonable’ one does show respect – but at the price of calling everything that anyone thinks or says ‘reasonable’. The trouble with that idea is that not everything that anyone thinks or says is in fact reasonable. I’ve noticed that on more than one occasion.

Political liberalism [in contrast to comprehensive liberalism; this is a distinction from Rawls – OB], the type of liberalism I would defend, seems to me far more able…to accomodate the very great value of citizens’ religious freedom…by calling the conceptions ‘reasonable,’ it gestures toward the many contributions religions have made, and continue to make, to the goodness of human life.

But why would one want to gesture toward those instead of toward the opposite? Why would one want to gesture toward the contributions rather than toward the diminutions and deprivations, the subtractions and denials, the removals and excisions, the narrowing and stifling and stunting, the frightening and bullying, the dominating and tyrannizing? And then, another question, why would one want to perform such gesturing by calling the conceptions ‘reasonable’ when one in fact thinks they are the very opposite of reasonable? Why should one decide ahead of time, as a matter of principle, to call any conceptions ‘reasonable’? Why doesn’t one rather wait until one has learned what the conceptions are, and thought about them? Why doesn’t one then call them reasonable if they are reasonable and unreasonable if they are not? Why does Nussbaum think we should put the need to ‘respect’ our fellow citizens (and it’s highly debatable whether such an approach even does respect people, but that’s a separate question, which I want to pick at later) ahead of our need to evaluate conceptions on their merits?

I’ve talked about this before. I don’t understand it now any better than I did in June 2004. So I was pleased to note how Barbara Forrest’s contribution to the Kitzmiller comments starts:

One of the greatest gestures of respect for one’s fellow Americans is to tell them the truth. To do otherwise is the height of disrespect.

Well exactly. Surely ‘respecting’ people by firmly deciding in advance to assume that their conceptions are, sight unseen, reasonable, is – no respect at all. It’s just a caucus race, it’s just Lake Wobegon. All have won, all shall have prizes, all conceptions are above average. With respect like that who needs contempt?