Down the Real Rabbit Hole

It has always seemed to me that the thing to really delve into is the common features of all religions that make religions so dangerous, violent, and murderous. Hence I focus on dogma. Not the particular prescriptions of particular dogmas, but the features of dogma itself. My studies in analytic ethics helped me to understand that prescriptivity or prescriptive language is the one feature *all* religions have (yes, including buddhism), as well as all other ideologies. "Prescription" is, roughly, a term for the command function of language about morality. They look like claims of truth, but make no mistake, they are really commands. I found it immediately interesting (and horrific) that some philosophies (most obvious in deontic logic) want us to assume the legitimacy of normative language in ethical systems. "Shoulds," "oughts," "good," "evil," and a host of other words that have command (or "perlocutionary") force. But, even then, it is still not the particular perlocutionary acts that are interesting to me (although they may certainly be pertinent), but the perlocutionary force (as a control-command) of the language. And hence, it boils down to control and the levels of convolution we are willing to implement to enable control systems - like religion. Religion carries baggage, and even those who divest themselves of the god(s) sometimes still carry the baggage. Included in most carried baggage are retributivism-based moral paradigms (Garden of Eden story), normative prescriptivity, and lethal attitudes towards those not in the fold. Buddhism can also be used in this way because it carries the same of functionally identical content. Hence Myanmar. Dogmas almost invariably prescribe their own survival. What islam does is get in your face with their dogma's expansionistic, world domination oriented elements (including the "war of numbers" mentality that informs them to treat women as breeding machines). People reflexively want to defend themselves from it, and seek the ability to muster strength in their own dogma's survival elements. I'm not saying this justifies using the horrid elements of buddhism to suppress islam in Myanmar, but I am saying this is an inevitable result in the modern day - and it is the result islam wants, because it allows its followers to use its own expansionistic elements most forcefully. Whether we will ever be able to unwind ourselves from the need/desire to control is an open question, but if we are to survive as a species, I suspect we must.

"Everything Is Permitted"

"Everything is Permitted"

How often have we heard theists proclaim that without God everything is permitted. Below is a short post that folks seemed to like, giving my response:

When we speak of "forbidden" or "proscribed" we must also ask "by whom?" Who is doing the forbidding/proscribing? Theists get in a big panic because atheism seems to be removing the ultimate forbidder/proscriber and in a sense that is true..., but it is only true of a vision of morality that requires some... ultimate forbidder/proscriber.

There are other visions of morality that do have those who do forbid/proscribe - indeed offer most, if not all, of the definitive qualities associated with morality. Secular morality sees morality as a human social enterprise, of humans, by humans and for humans. So, when we ask, "Forbidden by whom?" those who posit secular morality, without god, have a ready answer: everyone else.

So, no, atheism is not an excuse to do the forbidden. It is a reason to become more sophisticated about one's understanding of morality.
When someone asks you, "Was it an AK-47 or a MP5K you used to shoot the victim?" it is perfectly legitimate to say, "Your question is a leading question. I shot no one with anything, much less with one of two particular weapons."

When someone asks "What is the ultimate source of morality without god?" it is perfectly legitimate to say, "Your question is a leading question. It assumes morality must have an ultimate source. I can account for all the necessary features of morality without an ultimate source."

Morality is a tool for helping people live together in a social context. In many ways religion is anti-moral, since it relies on conflict against "the other" to polarize its populace into not living with others or sharing a social context with them.

The Seeming Good Intentions

I am seeing a fair number of "let people have their religion if it gives them comfort" posts and comments of late. Now I can see why this sounds appealing, but all of these are proceeding based on a false assumption - that the religious will reciprocate by letting us have our lack of belief. That is not how prescriptive dogma works. They will NOT reciprocate. That is the horrific lesson of history, repeated over and over and over and over ...

But if the understanding that the religious will NEVER leave us alone is not enough to sway you, let's take an example of someone being left to their faith when the flood waters are rising around their homes. So far, so good - if someone wants to die from stupidity, then that's their life. Body autonomy and all that. But what about when they are keeping their family from leaving as the waters rise?

Oh wait. That seemingly trivial example is exactly what is happening on the climate change and decimation of biodiversity front on the political stage. Gosh, darn, is it really true that the religious seek political power to impose their intellectual failures on others? Why, yes, they do. THAT is how prescriptive dogma works.

Prescriptive dogma is a psychological illness that must be dealt with before it kills us all - especially when it is a death-worshiping cult savagely pushing a belief (with gleeful anticipation no less) of the demise of everyone via some apocalyptic event. Make no mistake; all three of the Abrahamic trinity of holy horrors is just that death cult.

I have lived under the threat of the bomb all of my life and so have you. All it takes is one believer with their hands on the political football, lost in their grotesque high-mindedness, to make all of everyone's deliberations meaningless...

So, about Mike Pence and letting people have their idiotic religious beliefs ...

This cannot be stressed enough. All our lives are on the line!

Regressing Our Way to the Next Inflexible Dogma ...

The regressive left models itself after the very monstrous things we had to spend generations ridding ourselves of - prescriptive dogma in the guise of religious garbage.

Human societies, it seems, runs in stages over time. A dogma dominates, skeptical inquiry tears it down (for a brief instant there is actually hope for real freedom from dogma), and then a new dogma arise to replace the old.

The regressive left is striving to rid us of the benefits we gained through free and open inquiry, in the name of their "new" dogma. They aspire to be the next dominant dogma. This is why the regressive left appears to favour islam. They are modeling themselves after it imagining, just like every previous dominant dogma, that they are Right - this time. Just like the last time.

This is why the regressive left is regressive.

Dogma is the true enemy of humanity. Religion is merely open and obvious bigotry against humans in the name of this god or that god or this fluffy ideal. Currently, competing dogmas are ripping human societies apart, at a critical choose life or choose death moment in human history.

It seems we never learn.