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Rape or Religion?

ajay0

ajay0

Well-Known Member
I would say it is religion that is raped by abusive interpretations of intolerant, divisive priests and followers, that ought to be banned, so that it ceases to be a conditioning instrument for them to rape and enslave people's minds.
 
sun rise

sun rise

The world is on fire
Premium Member
Revoltingest said:
I have a conspiracy theory about this....
Some secret atheist cabal (one I'm not invited to) created Harris as a Poe.
He serves the purpose of a lightning rod....attracting all the vitriol which
might otherwise rain down upon us more slack jawed atheists.
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Personally I have nothing against slack jawed atheists. But those who serve up vitriol get served vitriol.
 
Nakosis

Nakosis

Non-Binary Physicalist
Premium Member
Holdasown said:
No idea who this is but sounds like something a rapist would say.
Click to expand...

He is a fairly well know secularist who has public debates against religious beliefs and is often quoted by skeptics, though not so much on these forums.
 
sun rise

sun rise

The world is on fire
Premium Member
Revoltingest said:
See.....that's how sophisticated the conspiracy is.
He's cromulent often enuf to have some credibility.
Fiendishly clever those atheists are!
Click to expand...
You realize you've opened yourself up to an obvious reply when you admitted that "those atheists are" fiendishly clever.
 
9-10ths_Penguin

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
Debater Slayer said:
I think religion as it actually exists has potential for reinterpretation, and, for instance, Christianity has already seen a lot of improvement from its medieval days.
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Sure, but it's still pretty awful.

As for the second point, it seems to me that deciding which side has more weight, if either, would require making a judgment concerning whether certain kinds of suffering are worse—however the word "worse" is defined in this context—than others. I don't think it's meaningful to make such a judgment between two things like rape and murder; I view Harris's hypothetical as a way to draw an emotional reaction and not as an argument that has much meaning in the real world.
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Harris's quote - and objections to it - really do depend on making judgements about which is worse... though I do agree with you about it being rhetoric to create an emotional reaction.

I do agree that it would be needlessly nit-picky to somehow quantify all of religion's harm and compare it to the quantified harm of all the rape in the world (or at least all the rape that would persist without religion). I think the point of what he said is to call attention to the fact that the harm inflicted by religion is staggering.

There's no real-world scenario where people would stop trying to combat rape in order to focus on religion; the real issue we're dealing with is that religion is singled out for praise, special benefit, and tax breaks, and isn't generally pointed to as a problem at all.
 
9-10ths_Penguin

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
Holdasown said:
What kind of religious people you hanging out with?
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Ones who attach stigma to divorce, for starters.

And I suppose I should call him an alleged child rapist - since he died before his case went to trial - but the priest at my ex's church.
 
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