The Antichristian Phenomenon

Having grown up as the youngest son of a Christian minister, first in the Baptist denomination, then into Pentecostal and Non-Denominational Churches (part of the Charismatic movement for the most part), I was heavily indoctrinated in Protestant Christianity from a very young age (since birth really). From my earliest memories, I was in church everytime the doors were opened (mainly because my father usually was the one who opened them). For much of my early childhood, we even had a family bible study every single weeknight. As a result, I have a very strong understanding and knowledge of this religion, and it’s sacred writings.

Another effect of this style of upraising is that I have undergone a long, painful, arduous journey escaping what I now think of as the brainwashing that I was subjected to for more than half of my life. To this day, I still have not escaped all of the effects of this time in my life. After all, it was perpetrated at the most developmentally important part of my growth. My natural bend to intellectualism was discouraged and stunted, because it does not fit with the practice of blind faith. My kneejerk sense of morality, which has both negative and positive aspects, does not always correspond with a realistic purview of ethical behavior. Depite my initial liberation from irrational beliefs, I still pay a penalty for the brainwashing I endured in these, and many other different ways. I am progressing daily. But, it seems such an unnecessary struggle should have been avoided.

The steps of Brainwashing according to:

http://health.howstuffworks.com/brainwashing1.htm

1.Assault on identity
2.Guilt
3.Self-betrayal
4.Breaking point
5.Leniency
6.Compulsion to confess
7.Channeling of guilt
8.Releasing of guilt
9.Progress and harmony
10.Final confession and rebirth

Why do I think of this as brainwashing? Let’s consider the definition of brainwashing (according to Oxford American Dictionary): make (someone) adopt radically different beliefs by using systematic and often forcible pressure.

1. The first step to brainwashing is to attack the subject’s sense of self, or identity. Since a child is developing his/her sense of self within the context of the religious teachings, this step is fulfilled by default, as there is no prior sense of self to overcome.

2. Christianity is built upon the concept of guilt. We sinful creatures must be redeemed from the sinful nature we inherited, that was passed down through the generations from Adam and Eve. So, the second step, which is guilt is obviously fulfilled.

3. Attending church, listening to the songs, the sermon, and just the casual conversation of the congregation, constantly reinforces to the child how guilty everyone including the child him/her self are. This fulfills the step of self betrayal by convincing the child of his/her own lack of intrinsic worth. The child is forced to admit this, at least inside, if not to others. Ultimately, this step is about internalizing the guilt that is hammered down in step 2.

4. This leads to the point where the child wonders what he/she, the wretched sinful creature can possibly do about his/her dismal state. Obviously, there is nothing that he/she as an inherently evil creature can do. This is the point where God and Jesus come in. They are willing to forgive you, and give you a new life, one without the sinful nature that makes you so evil. The child is worn down to the point of relinquishing his/her control of self, the breaking point. I clearly remember spending many sleepless nights at the tender age of 8 crying out to God to save me. I was terrified of going to hell. It was much worse than any horror movie, or any other source of fear that I had felt before or since that time. It is a very powerful motivator to embrace the teachings of Christianity. To this day, I still have a deep fear of going to hell, even though I no longer even believe in such a place.

5. The step of leniency is fulfilled by the grace and mercy that God exhibits by giving the child a chance at salvation, simply by believing that Jesus died as a sacrifice to redeem him/her from his/her wretched sinful nature. He/She can now go to heaven, because she/he believes. Isn’t God good to help that child. Isn’t He showing leniency to such an unworthy creature.

6-10. To save time and space, I won’t belabor the obvious. I think that you get the gist of what I am saying here. For these reasons, I will summarize the rest of the steps in one short paragraph. The child is encouraged to confess his/her sins often, at various times, in various ways. The pain that is associated with the guilt is attributed to the “world” as opposed to the “things of God” or the “Kingdom of Heaven”. This encourages the child to avoid the “evil” things of the “world”. After the conversion experience, it is the world that is blamed for the evil that may occasionally overtake the child. To remedy this, the child is encouraged to avoid the world. It is by renewing his/her mind in the Word of God that he/she insulates him/her self from the world, and the attendant guilt. This renewing and dedication to the things of God are put forth as providing the peace and harmony that has been denied the child through the aforementioned mechanisms. This, in turn, provides a sense of comfort and a cessation of a sense of responsibility within the child, as long as he/she continues to live in the prescribed way.

Considering that nearly every one of these steps can take place in a single church service, and that many children go through thousands of these services in their lifetimes, one can easily see the erosive power of such a mechanism on a person’s will, especially as the personality, will, emotions, virtually every aspect that we think of as representing the very humanness of humanity, is yet to be formed. I have often thought that continuing to teach something that has already been learned ad nauseam must be a form or step of brainwashing. In what other aspect of life is this sort of instruction used, and considered normal?

The alert reader may wonder how the definition’s statement of adopting radically different beliefs is fulfilled. Well, I’m glad you asked. Part of what led to my eventual deconversion was my noticing the fact that many of the most important claims made in the Bible are of a supernatural nature. Though I have spoken with a few people who claim direct exposure to what they consider to be supernatural events, I have not witnessed nor heard of any experience or phenomena that could not either be explained using natural means, or reasonably doubted (most often because of humanity’s notoriously untrustworthy mechansisms of perception). This has lead me to ask the question, both of myself and others: What in our daily experiences supports the idea of the supernatural phenomena reported in the bible? Is there any reason or evidence that shows that such claims are truly possible/probable. These beliefs that we are expected to hold in Christianity really are radically different from our personal experiences of the natural world. What reason, other than the teaching (brainwashing), and widespread acceptance of such beliefs, do we have to believe these truly incredible claims?

Not sure how many who actually like to cook around here, or bake bread, but I was doing exactly that at my aunt’s place. As some of you may know, baking bread requires the dough to rest for a certain amount of time, usually thirty minutes or more, so I had nothing to do and joined my cousin who was zapping on the TV. Then this movie shows up and the whole premise sounds very exaggerated and bound to fail: Christian girl attending a Christian school leading her perfect (Christian) teenage life gets to know that not only is her boyfriend actually homosexual, but he also made her pregnant. Now, I am certain most people would go “Ewww!” over that, and I certainly did as well. However, my cousin decided to give this very convoluted plot a go, and I decided that at least I can laugh over how ridiculous it could turn out. The movie does start out decently with an ironical tint in the eye. It would possibly trick you to believe its general message would be religion sucks, but not quite. First we get to follow the main character, ironically named Mary, as she introduces us into what would seem to be the perfect teenage life. Then the scenery changes where Mary and her boyfriend Dean are telling each other secrets while under water in a swimming pool, and Dean tells her that he thinks he is gay. The events that follow are actually pretty genuinely funny, not because it sucks so much. Mary hits her head in shock, she gets a revelation that Jesus is trying to tell her that the only way to save Dean is to sacrifice her virginity to him, so so she does. Of course how Dean could even possibly be physically attracted to her so he can actually bang her is an interesting question, but she became pregnant nevertheless. The first half of the movie then revolves around how Mary is trying to avoid getting caught up and exposed by her more radical Christian friends as well as her mother and how Dean was sent to a place called Mercy Camp that “treats” homosexuals. In the second half, we are introduced to Roland and Cassandra, two students who both attend this Christian school without really being Christians themselves but really got no other choices left unless they would want homeschooling. Cassandra is depicted as your typical troublemaker – but this doesn’t bother you because in a way she is portrayed as an antihero and an antithesis to that which is Hilary Faye, the super-ultra conservative Christian girl who’s the also of course the most popular at the school they both attend. Now the movie tries less to be a comedy and more a drama, and the result is pretty much so-so. What is mostly lacking is character depth. Take for example Roland, who I don’t know who he is and where he came from and what motivates him. It might be that I missed some background introduction scenes while I had to run away to attend the dough, but obviously being wheelchair-bound would still warrant more character development than what he is doing in this very moment, which is basically following Cassandra around (they later become a couple). Roland and Cassandra befriend Mary, because they aren’t as bothered by her pregnancy as others and they support her in her choice to rather keep the baby than aborting it. So what happens at this point is that a war breaks out between Cassandra and Hilary Faye which is slightly over-the-top and unrealistic. It ends up with Hilary Faye spraying cuss words and other offensive statements (to Christians) all over the school walls and then tries to blame Cassandra for it since Cassandra is the trouble-maker. Then there’s the guy called Patrick who has a crush on Mary and also the principal’s son. All of this of course accumulating with the prom as the climax. The problem I had was that Hilary Faye was portrayed as single-minded. There was a mention of how she looked like before she took her diet pills and facial makeup and how that was suppose to fit her inside, with the movie hinting that maybe she really is so aggressive as she is because she’s really insecure and scared deep down, but she doesn’t get more development than that. And same unfortunately applies to the rest of the characters. Tagged along with a liberal message of being accepting and not judgmental, the second half felt cliché and trite. It kind of felt like the movie itself didn’t quite know whether it wanted to be a more light-spirited comedy or a deep drama, and it was really saved by Cassandra’s actor, Eva Amurri. She just stole all the light whenever she was around, because unfortunately, she was actually the really decent actor in this movie, and she carried her character well. Think of Jack Sparrow in Pirates of the Caribbean, and you should get an idea how it felt like whenever she was on the screen. That she lied, stole, smoked and basically did every other immoral thing a teenager can do didn’t bother you so much because you could sense her rebel spirit. It should be noted that Cassandra was also portrayed as a Jew.

Anyway, my conclusion of “Saved!” as a movie is that it’s half-decent high school stuff if one can bother to overlook the extreme Christian overtones. On the other hand, I do like how it tries to approach young Christians (obviously this movie has a very peculiar target audience which didn’t really include me) and tell them that being caring and loving is more important than judging others because they don’t fit into your particular worldview. There’s actually a quite nice quote uttered by Mary which goes; “If God wants us all to be similar, then why are all we so different?”.

This paper will be a copied version of my exam which deals with Hare Krishna. It should be noted it is lengthy, and can be considered an extension of my previous study visit about Hare Krishna.

Historical and ideological background
Hare Krishna, or also formerly known as ISKCON – International Society for Krishna Consciousness, was formed by A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada in New York, USA 1966. (Frisk, 2007) The religion’s focal point is the worship of Krishna, an avatar of the Hindu god Vishnu. A follower of Hare Krishna is an adherent of the Gaudiya Bhagavata Vaishnavas discipline; and it has its roots in Gaudiya Vaishnavism. Vaishnavism refers to the worship of Vishnu, and the most important scripture is to be the Bhagavad Gita. (Frisk, 2007, Studiehäfte 2) What differentiates a member of Hare Krishna to other branches of Hinduism is that a member of Hare Krishna considers Krishna to be the supreme god, not Vishnu, and that it is Krishna who is the source of all the other avatars and incarnations, the creation of the world etc. (Study visit 1) Hare Krishna thus seems far more monotheistic its approach than the other polytheistic variants of Hinduism.
Although Hare Krishna appears in a new modern iteration in the West, Gaudiya Bhagavata Vaishnavas is far from a new discipline and has its roots all the way back to the 15th century with the Hindu saint Sri Krishna Chaitanya, who was considered a reincarnation of Krishna. (Frisk, 2007) What was new and modern with Gaudiya Bhagavata Vaishnavas was that it had been heavily influenced by Islam, and proposed the idea that anyone could become spiritually exalted regardless of caste and emphasized an individual relationship with god rather than the holistic view found in other branches of Hinduism. (Frisk, 2007) Such ideas were quite revolutionary for their time, as Chaitanya considered that the essence of Krishna was reached when singing and repeating the Hare Krishna mantra, not depending on which caste your parents belonged to. (Frisk 2007) The interest in this branch of Gaudiya Bhagavata Vaishnavas faded however, until it was born again in the 19th century thanks to Bhaktivinoda Thakur. Bhaktivinoda Thakur thought that spiritual leadership did not have to be passed onto the next generation within one’s own family, but anyone could become a spiritual leader since spiritual quality was not directly linked to physical body. (Frisk, 2007) This idea would become persistent throughout Hare Krishna philosophy, where the thought that we are spiritually equal would later be strongly emphasized. (Frisk, 2007)
Bhaktivinoda Thakur’s son, Bhaktisiddhanta Thakur, would take over his father’s work and create Gaudiya Math, a form of temple that quickly spread over India. Gaudiya Math accepted all kind of peoples who lived as monks and nuns, and some were initiated as Brahmin, the highest social class in India that mostly consists of priests, doctors, teachers, preachers and law makers. (Frisk, 2007) Since the idea that anyone could become a Brahmin, would one possess the proper spiritual abilities, was prevalent in the Gaudiya Bhagavata Vaishnavas philosophy, it instantly created a lot of controversy. Bhaktisiddhanta Thakur started to initiate people as Brahmins, among those by A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, whom Bhaktisiddhanta Thakur also taught as a guru. (Frisk, 2007)
To spread the religion further, by A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada travelled to USA. This was also controversial as it is believed that casteless peoples, such as Americans and Europeans, cannot be taught about Krishna. They are, according to social standards, tainted since they are casteless, and do not thus possess a soul or a spiritual entity. (Frisk, 2007) However, since the primary philosophical idea in this variant of Gaudiya Bhagavata Vaishnavas is that the physical body is merely a shell and that we are all spiritually equal, this posed not to be a problem to spread the words of Krishna to the Americans. Well in America, by A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada encountered the back then, prevalent hippie culture, and eventually created International Society for Krishna Consciousness. It became highly popular and spread quickly. A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada made sure to spread it to other parts of the world as well, and initiated what would be formerly called CGC – Governing Body Comission – which would function as the primary decision-making organ. (Frisk, 2007) Before his death, A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada also initiated eleven different gurus that would control one part of the world each and aggressively recruit more members. This would turn out to be a fatal mistake as many of the members of ISKCON were all young and naïve, and instead of cooperating with each other, they fought over the leadership position. Eventually GBC had to ban many of the gurus whom would succeed A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada and the movement shifted from being very controlled and conservative, to secularized and democratic. (Frisk, 2007)
During the most recent years, the tension between ISKCON and the rest of the society has more or less completely disappeared, and ideas stemming from India and Hinduism are now often daily practiced and/or accepted, such as the use of yoga and meditation.

The study of ISKCON from an anthropological gender-perspective
While ISKCON’s ideas may have appeared as very controversial and liberal in India, it does not mean all of its ideas were. In fact, a closer look at the religious group seems to tell the complete opposite. It is important to understand that A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada came from a very conservative time, were the values and the view of women was different than today or even sixty years ago, and there’s no doubt that he carried these ideas with him when he would later form ISCKON. (Frisk, 2007) The early years of ISCKON consisted of a lot of dos and don’ts, such as the four principles:

• No eating of meat, fish, onion, garlic and eggs
• No illicit sex
• No gambling
• No intoxication (including alcohol, caffeine, tobacco and drugs) (Frisk, 2007, Studiehäfte 2)

The people who lived at the temples as monks and nuns had to follow other strict rules such as getting up early in the morning to chant the Hare Krishna mantra, and whom to socially interact with. (Studiehäfte 2) This is especially important when looking at the women’s situation in Hare Krishna. An important note is that India has been and still is a patriarchal society where men had and still have a greater social status than women. Women and men were for example supposed to perform different roles in society, where men typically were workers while the women took care of the family. While this idea is not particularly new in any way, it became controversial because women had fought against exactly those ideas not too long before A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada arrived in America. There was thus a stark difference between the liberal ideas found in the hippie culture to the more conservative ones found in Hare Krishna; and it’s speculated that it is exactly this difference that made it so popular during its time. Not only was it exotic because it represented a different culture, but it also gave a sense of worldly order because of the plenty dos and don’ts. (Studiehäfte 2) Unfortunately, it wouldn’t take long until problems would arise. From free-spirited to strictly controlled, many of the young people who became initiated into ISKCON had their lives turned upside down. A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada made clear that women and men should be separated, and while women and men are not difference in spirit, they are different in flesh and should thus perform different roles in the society. (Frisk, 2007) It was also made clear that women were inferior to men in such a sense that not only were women less spiritually pure because of their sexuality and ability to reproduce, they were also right-out dangerous to the spirituality of men. (Frisk, 2007) Lotta, a former follower of Hare Krishna, tells us that she wasn’t for example allowed to look a man into his eyes, and she was forced to cover her hair. (Studiehäfte 2) Frisk also mentions how one of her interviewees told her that she (the interviewee) felt verbally abused during her membership, where one of the men once said that the only thing she thought of was of the men’s genital organs. (Frisk, 2007) Other less apparent but social rules particularly pertaining women and women’s sexuality revolve around that they were not allowed to visit others while having their periods, or for the matter cook or be in the kitchen because of the risk of spiritual contamination. At the same time, there is also the idea that women are physically and mentally fragile and must be protected by the men from other men who may potentially harm them. (Studiehäfte 2) A woman cannot for example make decisions of her own, only a man, preferably her husband, can do that for her. This is because a woman is also considered more emotionally driven than men, and she cannot be considered to make rational decisions. The view of women is thus highly paradoxical in that women are considered weak but dangerous at the same time. (Frisk, 2007)
These ideas are far from unique and are commonly found in other patriarchal societies. In Veiled Sentiments, Lila Abu-Lughod argues that female fertility is often considered dangerous and tainted because it poses a threat to men. (Abu-Lughod, 1999) Women are considered to be more sexually driven than men, and their presence among men may thus entice men to engage in sexual activity against their wills. Therefore the only way to prevent women from creating harm is to control them through various means, even if it just means superficially. (Abu-Lughod, 1999) This means that men must control the actions of women, including their emotional and rational decisions. Since it is believed that women are so sexually aggressive to the point where they cannot control it themselves, this explains why women are considered to be less rational than men. (Frisk, 2007) All a woman can and will think about is how to entice a man to engage in sexual activity with her. This also explains why Frisk’s interviewee reported the incident of what she experienced as a form of verbal abuse and why this man said this to her at all to begin with. (Frisk, 2007) Furthermore, since a woman cannot think in terms of rationality and all her actions stem out of her sexual needs and desires, this means she must also be protected from herself, so she will not rush into a sexual relationship with a man who may potentially physically and/or verbally hurt her, against her better knowing. (Frisk, 2007) It is to be understood that the complexity of this idea lies in that it is still the woman at fault for enticing a man, not the man being unable to control himself. This may appear as highly confusing to a Westerner, where the idea that it is the man who suffers the lack of sexual control, is deeply rooted in our minds. The female fertility is thus the exact opposite of the male spirituality, and it is considered a hindrance towards spiritual enlightenment. The female fertility bonds the woman and the man she is engaging in sexuality activity with to the physical realm, the very thing most religions work against. Since asceticism is the only real way to reach spiritual enlightenment and meet Vishnu in the afterlife in the Hare Krishna philosophy, it is also natural that the woman is dangerous and considered more of an obstacle than of a help towards that goal.(Frisk, 2007)
It thus becomes clear that the view of women generally found within the Hare Krishna movement is highly negative, conservative and with patriarchal roots that bear no relevance in a post-modern society that has been striving for equality between men and women for centuries. Not only is it conservative, it is an extreme form of backwards-thinking which could potentially endanger a society that requires men and women to work in order for the society itself to function. It is also damaging to the women who are active within the movement, as the example Frisk brought up. In Studiehäfte 2, Lotta also tells us about an incident she had when one of her friends who also were a Hare Krishna member tells us that it was not allowed to talk about one’s own unhappiness or emotional distress. In a conversation between the two, Lotta’s friend suddenly bursts out in anger when Lotta tries to comfort her by touching her hair, because she finds herself and her own body so disgusting. Because of the idea that women are more strongly connected to their physical bodies than men, it is also not unlikely that women like Lotta’s friend might have suffered more because of this.
With that said, it should be noted that Hare Krishna is also a movement that has spread very quickly throughout the Western world, and it is unavoidable it too will become affected by the locality in which it is to be founded in. The Swedish movement has for example been noted for the lack of child abuse found within the gurukulas, private schools made for the children of Hare Krishna members, as well as sexual and/or verbal harassment towards the women. An example is how the view of women within ISKCON seems to correlate with the family organizing and marriage. Frisk notes that A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada seemed to encourage women to hold ceremonies, kirtan (the gathering of people who chant the Hare Krishna mantra at least 1728 times in a row) and a community for women living in celibate. It was also common of the young people who were members at the time to marry each other, and A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada also encouraged it to an extent. However, the situation became too uncontrolled and hard to manage, as the couples who married started to have children which cost the movement a lot of money, as well as ending in divorces. (Frisk, 2007) Here the problem, which I previously analyzed in how the women were considered more earthly, becomes apparent, as the dichotomy of the women as family supporters and the virtuous monks will separate the movement in two. The women became an obstacle for the movement once they were divorced from their husbands as they not only cost money since a woman who must support a child cannot work, but they had to demand additional money to feed their children as well. Furthermore, many of the male apprentices were very young, and understandably driven by their sexual desires. Since only men could become a sannyasa, a renouncer, they started to complain about the women enticing them sexually (a sannyasa must live a celibate life).
However, as the movement shifted from being very centralized to decentralized and the focus with a focus on part-time membership rather than full-time, the view of women also changed towards a more positive light. It was no longer possible for married couples with children to participate in ISKCON’s full-time activities, and the economical crisis ISKCON went through also forced many women and men to look for secular jobs outside the movement. This also put a focus on the importance of part-time membership, and the acceptance of having a secular life outside the religious practices. This in turn most likely improved the women’s status within the group as the group needed these part-time members in order to survive. (Frisk, 2007) Since the part-time members don’t live as virtuous lives as the monks and nuns, a greater acceptance thus developed towards women and women’s sexuality since sexual activity for pleasure rather than child-making is something that is kept private between wife and husband and is nothing the religious group should become involved with. Even though an ascetic lifestyle is to be preferred in order to meet Vishna in the afterlife, it is no longer as important as long you adhere to the basics such as repeating the Hare Krishna mantra and not breaking the four principles.

Slightly lost, I arrived at Chapmans Torg and was expecting some gathering or sign to point the way as to where to go. I knew the address, but there was nothing. Eventually I figured out that the entrance in fact was a vegetarian/vegan restaurant, and I saw some of my classmates already sitting inside. We were welcomed by our “lecturer”, whose name I never caught, but he was a pretty short, very considerate Indian man. He reminded me much of my Russian friend in personality and manners. There was a room further inside the restaurant where he had placed some cushions on the floor so we could all sit down. He started by introducing the Hare Krishna movement and the cosmology revolving it. Although I study Social Anthropology as my main field, I know shamefully little about Hinduism and Hare Krishna. For me Hare Krishna is a name only, and I had a loose idea of there being some scandals where group members were involved, but I didn’t know what it was, and I still don’t, and no one ever bothered to ask. Suffice to say, I arrived with a very open mind, although slightly disappointed over that I had mixed up the dates and thought we were originally supposed to visit the local Scientology church instead of Hare Krishna. In a very typical manner, I started to lead the “conversation” with a few others. It turned out to be one of the best spent two hours ever in my life actually, and it made me realize why I am educating myself in the field I am actually doing, and that I would have no problem spending days, months, maybe even years with people so different to me and just learn their ways of living. I have the outmost respect of our “lecturer” that he took the time to answer our questions and explain the movement for free I should add, and to me he seemed like a pretty simple man very satisfied with his life and his religious beliefs. He wasn’t one of the most faithful, as he was just a normal member of the movement, and thus didn’t follow many of the more extreme ascetic values such as fasting, which he said he had tried once but it was too hard for him or refraining from having sex, and I think that presentation worked very well. He could explain the religion from a point of view everyone could understand, and he was really good at explaining, often using different kind of metaphors to get a point across.
Being the person that I am, of course I questioned him many, many times. I sure hope he didn’t find me offensive, and I very much appreciated the time he took with me, especially considering that I know so little about Hare Krishna. Having to attend my grandfather’s funeral last week made me miss out the presentation of the group unfortunately, but now in retrospect it might actually have been the better choice. In Social Anthropology, one of the biggest fears is to trying to fit certain ideas or groups of people into a box either because of lack of understanding or prejudice. I felt this wasn’t the case today, and I really see it as one of the first examples I had at “working in the field”. More or less all studies in Social Anthropology today are done in the forms of fieldwork studies. Other types of studies are possible but generally frowned upon because of the lack of an emic (inside) perspective. Having little to no foreknowledge thus allowed me to be there with without prejudice, and I got to take part of how our “lecturer” viewed the Hare Krishna movement and his journey from warm India to cold Sweden. In a way, having him telling about his religious beliefs and the religion he practices was some kind of lifestory. He grew up in middleclass India, and professed to be some kind of atheist, studying as an engineer at some Indian university. (At this point I also realize how bad it was of me to not take any notes when he was talking! I thought he would actually lecture in the actual sense, so I didn’t think I would need any… Hence the citation marks.) One of his roommates from the UK or Australia had left some tapes (this was in the 80s) and he (our “lecturer”) decided to give them some listens before tossing them away, and it turns out they are records of some Hare Krishna lectures. The tapes intrigued him, and I can recognize my own curiosity in his own, now that I am sitting home at my computer writing down my two hour encounter, because regardless of scandals and mystery, Hare Krishna is a religion that fascinates and captures.

He explained that Hare Krishna worships Krishna, the one god. Krishna is generally referred to as “lord”. He said that Vishnu is a great god as well, if I remember correctly an avatar or aspect of Krishna, but according to some Sanskrit interpretations (there are obviously over 600 of them!), Krishna himself said that he is the creator of everything, as well as the end. One thing which surprised me was that Hare Krishna had a great focus on the individual rather than being holistic, which I didn’t expect considering that it’s a sect (here used to refer a branch of a main religion) of Hinduism, and I know that Hinduism puts a great focus on a holistic cosmology. He explained that Hare Krishna has a holistic view too, but the main goal is to create your own individuality so you can finally meet Krishna as a person. There are thus different kinds of stages that occur in the afterlife where you will either retain your individuality or you won’t. Retaining your individuality was thus greater than becoming a part of Krishna, whereas I had thought it to be the opposite. In this regard Hare Krishna thus sounds very similar to Christianity in the personal relationship you are supposed to have with god, or at least attempt to have. Such activities as prayers (repeating certain phrases constantly for a certain amount of time) and performing yoga are all means to get closer to god or create a communication with god. I also asked our “lecturer” about who the first guru was (prophet/apostle in some kind of sense, although the term “guru” just means “teacher”), since Hare Krishna was started by a guru who taught created the Krishna movement in the West. In Hare Krishna, and other forms of Hinduism, there must be some kind of teacher because humans are imperfect and it is thus impossible for a human to suddenly one day just realize all the great mysteries of god. Here too I notice a similarity with Christianity. Gurus are thus needed to spread the knowledge and messages further to the coming generations. Here I had to ask him who the first guru was, since it’s an interesting question. I actually think they solved the problem pretty well, at least when comparing to Christianity. Our “lecturer” explained that the very first guru was Brahma (sp?), and he taught the humans about Krishna. Of course the disconnection is still there, as Brahma is considered a divine being, even though he has a material body. In such a sense Brahma is in fact very similar to Jesus, who too, was sent to Earth to teach the word of god but at the same time being god in flesh. Now that I am writing about it, I forgot to ask if Hare Krishna consider all other deities to be mere parts of Krishna or whether they are entities of their own, but this is certainly an interesting aspect which should be explored further, although maybe not today. I do however know that there is some dispute among the academics whether Hinduism as an official religion should be considered polytheistic or monotheistic. At least the Brahma solution is better than “being inspired by god” or such nonsense. Even if god inspires us, and there is certainly proof that our beliefs in god at least can, it still doesn’t solve the problem that humans are imperfect and thus everything we do will be imperfect. Our “lecturer” did however seem to believe in some kind of perfect spirituality, where one reaches such a spiritual insight that it can be considered perfect to those who do not understand it. The guru who started the Hare Krishna movement was considered such a person for example. Therefore I suppose that it is logical in such a sense that a being such as Brahma can teach humans to reach such spiritual state of perfection that they too can become gurus.

As the “conversation” continued, it was unavoidable that we would eventually be touching such subjects as women’s rights and how women are treated in India and inside the Hare Krishna movement. It was explained that there have been female gurus, but they were no modern ones that our “lecturer” knew of that existed today, and not within the Hare Krishna movement, but there had been one 400 years ago. He further explained that women were never asked to take upon such a position, but when they wanted to no one stopped them. This was slightly surprising as well considering how patriarchal India is still today, even though it’s changing and has been changing rather rapidly throughout the past years. Within the Catholic Church female priests are forbidden and even in Sweden which is considered one of the most equal countries in the world, some male priests frown upon female priests. The “conversation” then went onto discussing the polygamy versus monogamy issue, and what view the Hare Krishna movement has on taking many wives. Our “lecturer” explained that it’s very uncommon for men to marry more than one woman today, but it happens often in the more rural parts of India, where having many wives might even symbolize a man’s social status. The more wives a man can afford to sustain the higher social status he has. Generally speaking though, no one’s looking down upon a man if he takes more than one wife, but the question is whether he can afford to be married to more than one. Naturally children were brought up after that. Hare Krishna believes that a parent should teach their children to be as good citizens as possible, and this is in fact the only reason why a member of Hare Krishna would have children, and thus didn’t fit too well with me. While I can understand that a member of Hare Krishna may consider their way of life to be the best one, and there are certainly aspects that I don’t mind at least, I do not agree with teaching a child that their way of living would naturally be the best one. However, our “lecturer” also said that it is not a failure for a parent if the child doesn’t follow the way of Krishna but takes a different path, and almost retorted to something like “god’s way is mysterious”. He didn’t express it in such a sense, but that our consciousness together with karma can more or less influence our lives both directly and indirectly. This also includes the religion or lack thereof we may follow.

At this point I had to ask what he thought about other religious beliefs or even making up your own, or what it meant to lead a “pious” life but yet not worship any god. To that he retorted, loosely quoted from memory, “that it’s like a road with many mailboxes, where some never received any mail to pick up”. He thus seemed to believe that some religions (most probably the ones he knew of and which shared similar ideas to his own) have more legitimacy than others. Some religions don’t worship any gods, Shinto being a more well-known example, but on the other hand, is it important if there would be some “answer” on the other side if you aren’t expecting any? Atheism and humanism comes to mind. I wasn’t asking it straight out because I didn’t think of formulating it in such a way, but I was of course thinking of the morality issue that many Christians throw around with in atheist/Christian discussions. I do think that he did believe that people can still lead pious lives though, without actually believing. There was no patronizing or threats such as “…but this will happen when you die!” sort of deal, just a simple answer that if you aren’t expecting anything of the religious or metaphysical nature, then probably nothing will happen. I think this is very interesting because it shows how important it may be for us to actually believe without there being anything to necessarily believe in. The belief itself is somehow more important than the worship, and I do believe it still boils down to what ways that works for each individuals that can help them to their self-empowerment, which I wrote about in a previous article here at the ACP. One of my classmates asked him whether he would’ve picked another religion, would it have been introduced to him in another environment, but she also said that he had answered it already in that he thought that Hare Krishna had all the right answers (that fit with him). But what I disagreed with here is that ultimately he believed that there must be some great divine authority that carries the knowledge over to humanity. We are ourselves unable to form our own answers to our existence. I do not believe in authorities, and people who know me well will probably also know that I like to form my own answers, not be given any. This is very true when it comes to my “spiritual” beliefs as well, as I do not share any ideas that move into the metaphysical and even if metaphysics would be true, I also ultimately believe that metaphysics is merely physics. I also do not share the sentiment that there would be a great divine being that controls all. I suppose that for some people it might give them relief knowing that they are not in control of everything and thus the cause of every action they take, in a way becomes some kind of excuse or crutch to say that “well, at least it wasn’t my fault it happened this way it happened”. I believe I am in control of my own life in that I can directly affect the world around me according the actions I take, or for the actions I choose not to for the matter. The free will versus causality is a tricky question. While I believe in free will in such a sense that I believe that we are free to decide our actions to a certain extent by becoming aware of our options, we are also controlled by causality because we are all part of a causal flow. When I feel hungry I feel hungry because my stomach just sent information to my brain that it’s empty, so my brain generates some signal substances that makes me feel hungry, but I at that moment I also got the option to eat and not eat, or if looking back into a previous moment in time, I could’ve eaten later to avoid becoming hungry, since I can calculate the causal flow that I will become hungry at a certain point. Eating before that point will thus change the causal flow. However, I am digressing; this is about my study visit at the Hare Krishna, not about the problems with Cartesian dualism.

Since I am already on the free will versus causality, Hare Krishna shares some peculiar ideas on the subject matter. First of all, every human being has a consciousness. It is something we can learn to control with increasing spiritual awareness. Our consciousness is thus similar to our normal mental processes and Descartes’ formulation “cogito, ergo sum” comes to mind, in a very literary sense. This is an idea strongly shared within Hare Krishna, and is also reflected in such terms as “civilized animals”. I can either learn to control my consciousness and become closer to god by doing so (read leading an ascetic and pious life) or I can be like an animal and merely act on my instincts. Consciousness is thus something that we can control with our “free wills”, and it may even be able to affect the environment around us. An example was when one of my classmates asked if our “lecturer” believed in Astrology, and he said he did, although “99% are fake”. He told us a story about one of his father’s coworkers who got his fate read by a local Astrologist whom he claimed was good at reading when people had bad luck. So this coworker got his fate read, and the Astrologist said that on a certain Monday he would be hurt by a very sharp object. So the coworker refused to go outside on that Monday, hoping that by limiting his movement that day he would reduce the risk of getting hurt. However, he had forgotten the antlers of a deer that hang on the wall above the sofa he had decided to sit in, and the antlers fell down and penetrated his chest. To this my classmate retorted that it could’ve as well actually been his consciousness that had been so focused on not getting hurt by this sharp object this very day that he actually got hurt. So in a way it’s like cognitive psychology where they speak about self-fulfilling prophecies. If you think something bad will happen, something bad will in fact happen because you will unconsciously expose yourself to such risks and may even cause them yourself without being aware that you are doing so. Then lastly there is karma. Most people are probably accustomed with the term that if we do good actions, we get good karma and if we do bad actions then we get bad karma. Depending on what kind of karma we have, it will also affect the environment around us. Karma also accumulates among a group of people so if a group of people do a lot of bad actions, the karma within that group will be generally bad. Karma is some kind of higher power of justice. If a person leads a very pious life but goes through many struggles, he or she may ultimately be rewarded thanks to karma; similarly, a person who leads a bad life might get punished. At this point asking about Haiti felt very natural, knowing that some Christian groups are so avid exclaiming that the earthquake in fact was caused by the god as punishment because of the Haiti people being so sinless or some equally silly nonsense. To this our “lecturer” explained that there are two things that can cause an earthquake. There are some demigods that control such things as the weather, and thus naturally also earthquakes, but earthquakes can also be caused by too much accumulated bad karma. I do not know which answer he believed was the right one here, but I felt he was treading very carefully in this matter considering how touchy the subject is, hence the vague answer.

At this point however, my two hours were up and we had to leave. It had been an interesting evening and I am really looking forward to the Scientology study visit in two weeks.

Agnosticism seems very popular at the moment. I think it is mostly so for the wrong reasons. I get the feeling that a lot of people who identify themselves as agnostics are doing so only to take a kind of moral high ground that, to them, equivocates with a neutral position on the issue at hand. I have seen many agnostics say something like this:

You can’t prove that God exists, nor that God doesn’t exist, therefore both theism and atheism are wrong and you should be agnostic

I find three things at fault with this position,  which I will elaborate on in the following paragraphs. I will sometimes refer to above position as “popular agnosticism” to distinguish it from actual agnosticism. I will end with what a proper application of agnosticism might be, but also argue why I think it’s pretty useless all-round.

• Agnosticism is not a position on the existence of God

It seems that agnosticism has been snuck in to form a trilemma on the issue of God’s existence. To many people, the possible positions on this issue are either atheism, theism, or agnosticism. This is a false trilemma for two reasons. Firstly, because no ground is left over for agnosticism. You either believe God exists (theism), or you don’t (a-theism – I emphasize on purpose). So what is left over? Nothing! This has to do with the second reason that it is a false trilemma, namely the untrue notion that agnosticism even is a position on the existence of God. It simply isn’t, as it is a position on what knowledge is attainable. Going a little bit into etymology, “gnosis” means “knowledge” which means that “agnosticism” can be roughly translated to the position that something is not knowable. Agnosticism can be compatible with both atheism and theism – I don’t accept theism but I don’t claim to know that theism is false: I am an agnostic atheist.

Agnosticism isn’t somewhere in the middle on the spectrum between atheism and theism. I would even argue that there isn’t a spectrum at all on this level of the issue. There is a simple proposition: “God exists”, and you can either agree (theism) or not (atheism). There are no other positions, by virtue of the logical principle of the excluded middle. Both theism and atheism are positions that one can have, and it doesn’t matter how good or bad the reasons are for you having them.

• Popular agnosticism is used for dodging the question

So now that we have established that agnosticism isn’t even a tenable position in regards to the existence of God, it will become increasingly difficult to critique the position because the original paraphrase I gave is making less and less sense. At the moment, we can substitute the definition of agnosticism into the citation and read:

You can’t prove that God exists, nor that God doesn’t exist, therefore both theism and atheism are wrong and you should have the position that it is unknowable whether God exists or not

But that shows another flaw, because (a)theism isn’t necessarily the belief that God’s existence is (dis)proven. It thus misrepresents the positions of theism and atheism, and shows perhaps a reluctance to commit to either theism or atheism. I do not believe anyone can be exactly on the fence between the two possible positions. Even if it is just a gut feeling, you can choose between the two. It is childish to say “no, I won’t choose either of the possibilities”. And of course there is no proof, as I have previously written and explained that proofs only exist in formal systems. Personally, I think a lot of people who identify themselves as agnostics because they are reluctant to bear the stigma of the atheist. Though I understand this, I still think it is a form of cowardice.

• Popular agnosticism is special pleading

Popular agnosticism is also a form of special pleading, as it is only used with reference to the issue of God’s existence. You don’t hear about faerie agnostics, or Santa Clause agnostics. Popular agnosticism is used uniquely for the God-question. But why is it so? There are no grounds on which the question “Does God exist?” is different from the question “Does Santa Clause exist?” other than the subject of the inquiry. You can’t prove Santa Clause exists, or that he doesn’t exist any more than it is the case with God. Why then still reserve this for God? It is blatantly a case of special pleading.

Proper agnosticism

So when is it useful to have a position of agnosticism? First of all, we have to have a decent definition of when something is considered knowledge - before we can say whether something is possible to be an item in what we consider knowledge. What is knowledge is is a question home to the philosophical field of epistemology, and very briefly I can ambiguously suggest that knowledge is the product of empirical investigation and rational discourse of the empirical results. Knowledge doesn’t even have to be complete – as long the knowledge fits whatever observations have been made so far, and are reasonably not the antithesis of other knowledge that is “better established” – and it can even turn out after more observation that prior knowledge is false and that it requires to be superseded with new knowledge: a new set of ideas, rules, or paradigm (knowledge isn’t necessarily true). It is perhaps shortest to say that knowledge is produced by science, the best application of the aforementioned methodology.

This is different from the stricter requirement in the original paraphrase, which demanded proof and not mere evidence. If we were to say that knowledge needs proof to be established, then we are agnostic about everything outside of formal systems. To me, such a requirement of knowledge renders agnosticism as a useless term that communicates nothing because it can be applied to (almost) everything. So if we were to take my understanding of knowledge, we can say that agnosticism can apply only to things that fall outside of the scope of science: outside of empirical investigation. If we can not empirically pursue a question then we can’t produce knowledge about it: we are agnostic about it.

An example of proper agnosticism is when “God” is defined as something that would prohibit scientific inquiry. If God is a being who is omnipotent, it is immediately outside the scope of science, because this God can play with the empirical evidence all it wants. Anything and nothing can be indicative of the existence of such a being. Hence, we are inherently agnostic about it. Parallel to agnosticism about this, I have never heard any argument that would make such a being logically necessary to exist, hence I am also atheistic towards it. But when you would suggest that “God” is a bearded man living on clouds in the sky, it is open to scientific inquiry. There has never been seen such a man, thus I am a gnostic atheist about this particular concept.

First of all, Happy/Merry whatever-holiday-you-celebrate. Hopefully everyone is enjoying the day off work and school and putting on a few pounds with tasty cookies.

Full article below the jump: Read the rest of this entry »

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0oR5GwAEYCE

That’s all folks.

Preface

This article will deal with the ideology of positivism, rationalism and Karl Popper’s idea of good science. It will also further deal with why “Praying for person X made person X well from ailment Y” is not being a good form of science, but pseudoscience at best, particularly when presented in a scientific manner.

Definitions

Postivism is a scientific idelogy that we can only produce good science with the help of empirical data, most notably, by gathering facts. Is something not a fact, then we cannot consider it to be a positivist claim. So if I make a statement that the earth is flat when we have clearly observed that the earth isn’t, it is a false statement simply because it is not based on empirical evidence and because it is not a given fact. If I however say that the earth is round, it is a good positivt claim because we have good supoprting evidence that the earth is round and people have observed it as such, we can thus consider it a fact and the statement to be true.

Rationalism is a specific scientific ideology in turn developed by Karl Popper, stemming from the idea of positivism. Karl Popper’s goal with developing rationalism was to first of all debunk pseudoscience, secondly to set up a border when something can be considered good science and when it isn’t. Karl Popper defined good rationalist science as “finding faults in the problemsolving”* and “by speaking to thinking and experience rather than to moods and emotion”*.1

So the biggest difference between positivism and rationalism lies in that positivism does not necessarily change a theory when the empirical data does not fully support it, but may use help-theses, something Karl Popper despised. Rationalism then, is the complete reforming of a theory when new data is found, or when the theory is incapable of explaining the current data properly without using help-theses which are applied ad hoc.

The good positivist or rationalist science

Then how would positivist or rationalist science look like? A positivist would try to study the empirical data as good as possible and then make factual statements about those, a rationalist would look at the same empirical data but is more interested in being critical to how to explain the data and finding faults in this explanation while at the same time trying to appeal to logic and experience rather than that of emotion. This brings us to the main point, namely why praying, as evidence for the existence of god, is not evidence and why it is not scientific.

Example

One of the most common stories you hear from Christians as evidence for god is when they make a statement that praying works and they’ve seen it. Now, let’s assume ourselves in the role of a Christian practioneer who is praying for a relative being seriously ill, to the point where this illness is endangering this person’s life. As a good Christian, we are praying every day for this relative to become better, but the doctor’s treatment seems to be negative. Instead this person seems to become more ill than well. Suddenly though, there is a turn of events, without any seemingly explainable cause, the relative is cured from the illness and our conclusion must be that it was the work of god. Or wait, is it really?

A positivist would not accept this explaination, because obviously the empirical data has not been studied enough. The primary data here being our now cured relative, and why this relative all of sudden became better when it seemed that the medication made no difference. There are many factors to consider, such as our relative’s physiology. Maybe our relative really didn’t need any medication, because this person’s physiology worked in such a way that this person was supposed to overcome this illness regardless. Maybe the doctors gave this person the wrong medication. This cannot be outruled either. Doctors are human and humans make errors. The doctors gave our relative the wrong diagnosis and thus also the wrong treatment. A variant of the previous point, but happens all the time as well. A positivist would then start to debunk these theses by investigating the empirical data related to them, such as taking blood samples from the relative and studying them, or asking the doctors whether they changed the medication or if they believe they missdiagnosed the relative.

A rationalist would of course also do the above, but would be even more interested to see if we can trace any fault of logic in the original reasoning. It seems we can find quite a few of them. First of all, we cannot be certain god exists, as we have no evidence for this. Not necessarily using Occham’s Razor here, but a rationalist would examine the claim how probable it would be that god intervened and did so because of our prayers. Secondly, we also have the issue of prayers themselves. In the Bible it states that god knows everything, god is omniscient. Would it not be enough then to just think that we want to save our relative for god to respond to such a need? God would know even without having us praying, thus, it actually seems more logical that it was not the praying that was the actual cause. Thirdly though, and probably the greatest issue with this example is the emotional part of the argument. A religious person would of course want to believe it was god, it speaks that the religious person’s needs. It has thus an emotional appeal, rather than it being rational. So while a religious person may be overlooking some logical inconsistencies in their problemsolving when it comes to such statements as “My prayers saved my relative from dying”, the reason why they would believe such a statement is more because of the emotional appeal, they want it to be true, not necessarily because it is true. So when Christians make statements like these, they are not scientific in their approach, because they overlook great many faults in their reasoning.

Legend
* – My translation

Sources
Vår Tids Filosofi, Part 2

Recently there has been a bit of a stir over the latest Mr. Deity: “Mr. Deity and the Woman”, in which Mr. Deity meets his latest creation, the rib-woman Eve.  After being posted to RichardDawkins.net and Pharyngula, its been stirring up debate over whether or not it is derogatory by negatively stereotyping women.  The short answer: No.  The long answer is below the jump.  I expect it will be largely unpopular, so don’t waste your time if you aren’t going to actually engage potentially uncomfortable ideas.

Read the rest of this entry »

It appears to be more important to rail against a preconceived notion of a concept rather than engage the idea itself.  What do you think this ad is saying about those children in the image?  Why are they so happy?  Is the message based on who the children are?

No, its not.  It doesn’t matter who those kids are, the point is that they’re kids.  They could be happy, sad, cute, or ugly, and the message would stay the same.  It also stays the same regardless of what religion their parents are members of… which happens to be Christianity.

The  idea that somehow the fact that these kid’s parents are Christian undermines the message of the advertisement is absolute nonsense.  It wouldn’t be reinforced if their parents were atheists.  The fact is, those kids are way too young to really choose whether or not they believe in any religion, so as the ad says, DON’T LABEL THEM.  They are not “Christian children”, they are children of Christian parents.  It is not ironic in any way that their parents are Christians.  This ad is not about their parents, its about them.

Additionally, they probably chose happy looking kids not to make any statement on religion itself, but because a picture of a smiling person is better suited to advertising.  Why do you think soap and underwear and laxative advertisements have “smiling” people?  Same reason this ad does, it grabs attention.  Also, look closely at their faces, they’re not *really* smiling and happy–just like every other lame ad photo, they’re being told to smile for the camera.  Their smiles are insincere zygomatic-only smiles, not the sincere Ducenne smile, which also entails the involuntary contraction of the orbicularis oculi, which creates “crow’s feet” at the corners of the eye. Due to the fact this muscle contraction is completely involuntary and unable to be recreated at will (short of artificial stimulation with electricity) when people are genuinely happy, they can’t help showing it, and they can’t force themselves to appear happy when they’re really not.

So they didn’t REALLY choose genuinely “happy and free” children.  They chose children who LOOKED “happy and free” because they possess the ability to “smile” on command… just like every other model in advertising.  Look closely at the next few ads and magazine covers you see with “smiling” models, you’ll find this phenomenon of not-really-smiling universal.

(And before the inevitable accusation–it would be exactly the same if the parents were Muslim.)