A demonstration then?
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For atheists, imagine you have been transported back in time...
- Thread starter danieldemol
- Start date
Ha! Not quite what I meant. Saying to a supreme leader of the (apparent) nature of Genghis anything even remotely sounding like 'How would you like it?' would be treated as a threat.
Given that, better that he can't understand what you're saying (since he didn't speak English).
As much as I completely agree with the importance of convincing men to treat women with respect, and as equals, it's taken us 900 years to get from where Genghis was on this to the flawed position we are now in. No chance you can mount an argument that is even coherent to him (imho) no matter how noble the intent.
Hope that better explains what I meant!!
Ahh, so basically even if we could communicate I have a better chance of randomly stumbling upon a billion dollars than convince Mr Ghengis not to be a misogynist?
How did we “wear down” men enough for feminism to happen in the first place?
I mean I know the three waves and I know that there was a massive cultural shift in the zeitgeist (at least for the West) during those times. But I guess since it’s always talked about in historical contexts, it’s hard to fathom just how slowly progress was and how hard the fight really was. Because we all champion the wins more than we discuss the losses. Does that make sense?
Exactly.
I'm sure that by the time he was 5 it was took late to instill modern ethics. You'd have to get him when he was a baby and raise him in a different culture.
Tom
Yep, that all makes sense.
We like to see history as some sort of slow journey from caveman to enlightenment, but the facts are much more murky.
I used to live in Papua New Guinea, back in the mid nineties, and it's a pretty fascinating case study of culture shock.
If you have a spare ten minutes, consider this article;
Papua New Guinea: Tribal fighters bring back traditional rules of fighting and turn them into law
So. Apparently in the old days, wars were better regulated and less destructive than those today (and not just due to technology). A western approach would be to ban tribal wars. It's a pretty archaic way of settling land disputes (which is mostly where it kicks in, along with some fairly petty personal grievances between tribe members escalating at times). Instead they are trying to take old 'traditional rules' and turn them into modern laws with penalties attached. Basically a code of how these tribal wars should be fought, since arguing that they shouldn't be fought is not effective.
This is a country where witch-burnings are still a regular occurrence, and where 98% of the country is Christian...but ancestor worship and animism are rife.
Ultimately, if I was going to speak to how society reached a point where women were more respected and treated as individuals, I think it comes down to empowerment. Economic empowerment (which was boosted by the Black Plague in Europe...!), right to voting and representation, etc. Treating women as 'people' in terms of sexual relationships and violence requires us seeing women as people more holistically, I think, rather than as possessions. Even a 'benign' patriarchy does little to break this down, in my opinion.
Best you could do in his time is to make one tiny little difference in one tiny little area. What that would be specifically, I have no idea, but ethical change is incremental.
Milton Platt
Well-Known Member
I have no idea that I could convince him of anything. You could ask the same question of Christians. If you could go back to ancient Israel, what would you say to them to convince them that their god was wrong when he sanctioned slavery, genocide, and rape.....
Heyo
Veteran Member
The OP specified "using words only".
Heyo
Veteran Member
I don't see the importance of atheism in this endeavour.
A religious person could try to convert Ghengis and then tell him that his religion forbids rape, but an atheist could do the same (futile) things with humanism.
Well, a picture is worth a thousand words, right?
Can I make a slideshow?
**MOVED TO RELIGIONS Q&A**
It was asked of atheists so I don't get answers like, "because God says its wrong".
In other words I was looking for an answer which doesn't involve God/(s).
It was not a passive aggressive dig at atheists
If you can get Genghis to settle down to a PowerPoint show, I declare you automatic winner.
I've never known you to dig at atheists. All good.
Nah, I didn't think it was a dig.
A potentially interesting spin on the OP might have been to open to everyone but to say that no religious ideas could be used.
Rizdek
Member
I realize this is supposed to put the atheist into an awkward position of trying to convince someone who apparently didn't believe rape was wrong that rape IS wrong but without invoking God. But why can't an atheist invoke God beliefs?
For example, if I was really put into that position, I'd try to figure out what, if any, god beliefs Genghis Khan had, learn about them and try to convince him that his god thought rape was wrong. IOW, my personal beliefs about God or god(s) would be irrelevant. IF he had no god belief(s) or the god(s) he believed in didn't have any kind of rules against rape. then my invoking a god, even if I was a staunch believer, would be useless.
I think you may have answered your own question there ;-)
Then let's try asking how anybody could do it without referring to their own personal moral code?
It's generally theists who think that their beliefs are obvious and those of us who don't believe them are willfully ignorant and prefer to sin.
Tom
Now that's an interesting point.
Whilst I don't know too much specifically about Genghis' beliefs, he apparently was quite religious/superstitious, and tolerant of different beliefs up to a point (where it didn't negatively impact on him, I would presume).
I'm not sure that's true, actually. This is a complete bald-arsed guess, so just treat is as hypothetical, but...
If he followed some form of shamanism or similar, there may not have been any doctrinal argument against rape, or even much of a dogma at all. But it does open up additional possibilities for how to convince him not to rape. Rather than a rational argument, there could be portents or signs suggesting it's unfavourable to rape.
Meh, I'm broad brushing here, so it's not a great example/explanation, but hopefully you get what I mean.