The Antichristian Phenomenon

When we talk about religion, we always see it as something cultural, even as a cultural phonomenon perhaps. Religion is however quite far from it, especially when we actually talk about religion and not so much about its practices (although we will get there too). Religion is first of all a political tool. Religion is used as a banner to divide or unite people, and it has been excused as a justification in warfare many times. Religion is also secondly a socio-political identity.

However, to understand what this means, we must first understand that religion in a political context is not always as much as believing or having faith in god(s), but merely faith in something, whether it be a divine being or not. The definition of religion is:

1. A belief or faith in something
2. Rituals
3. Rules

Suddenly the word religion gains a very broad meaning, and can span more than the world religions which be invoked in our thinking when the word religion is mentioned. As such, many of our current cultural phenomena can be seen as a religion. One of those can be the animal right activist groups. To be an animal rights activist, you should first of all share a belief that animals are equal to or better than humans, rituals might involve to not eat meat or consume any product taken from dead/living animals and lastly, rules that forbid you to say, eat meat. This is all put into an overarching system and also gives the animal right activist an identity with other animal right activists by following this agenda. Thus, to truly be an animal right activist means that you actually follow a religion of sorts, in a purely political context. The only reason why you or anyone else would declare yourself an animal right activist is only to politically prove you share the idea of these typical ethics and morals mentioned (animals are of equal or above equal worth compared to humans, you follow a vegetarian diet, you do not consider any form of research conducted on animals ethically correct etc), thus, declaring yourself an animal rights activist outside a political context is useless. Obviously, the idea also unites other animal rights activists under certain organizations such as WWF but also creates a we vs them mentality, let’s say, the evil factories that pollute the rivers and seas so fish will die.

It is also very evident that religion is also more strongly envoked upon when a political identity is needed. I saw a short three-part documentary called We Are All Neighbours today, conducted by anthropologist Tone Bringa in a small village in Bosnia. 1/3 of the population was Catholic, the remaining 2/3 Muslim. It is recorded during the early 90s, (1993) and the conflict between Croatians and Muslims over Bosnia has just begun. At first, the conflict can be heard because of gunshots and shelling, but it is only in a distance and remains so for quite a while. While the villagers are worried the war will break out and soldiers will invade their village, they still don’t understand much of the basic idea of the conflict, that different ethnical groups (Croats, Serbs, Muslims) struggle to gain politcal control over a country (Bosnia). Croats, Serbs and Muslims have lived peacefully in this village for quite some time, and they don’t understand why the fuss. Sure, some of them have different faiths (Catholics vs Muslims) but they still believe in the same god. They also openly declares they don’t understand how you can attack your own neighbour for belonging to a different ethnical group. However, as the violence draws closer it eventually escalates in a bloodbath, where neighbour stands against neighbour, and eventually the Catholics kill their Muslim neighbours when the Croatian soldiers arrive (Croatia is more strongly associated with Catholicism). We can clearly see as the violence draws closer the villagers also keep more and more to themselves; Muslims to Muslims and Catholics to Catholics, despite many of them being good friends before the war begun. They often excused their own newly gained animosity with that “they might consider me a spy” or equally farfetched reasonings. In a world of paranoia however, it doesn’t seem as impossible as it would have before the war.

Here, we can clearly see how one’s religious identity becomes more important to strengthen one’s national identity (Catholics associate themselves with Croatia and support the Croatian army, Muslims the Bosnians and Serbs). Thus, religion is merely a political construct, and when you openly declare you are this or that, you also openly declare a political stance. It might not sound very rational to claim, especially if we look at something such as Atheism.

However, Atheism maybe more than anything is a political construct and many ideas in Atheism support this. First of all, there is a “belief” in science, that at least science is more superior to any other way to view the world. Science is associated with a secular society, and in turn associated with freedom of thought. Here, we can slowly see how Atheism is taking upon more and more political leanings, since freedom of thought often reconciles with freedom of speech. Atheism also often stands for many other common ideas in secular societies, such as a more social welfare model as well as Liberalism (which has partly been mentioned with freedom of speech). Religion on the other hand, is often associated with Conservatism (in a political sense but also culturally) and then that religion’s internal structure (ie rules and rituals) will decide how a Conservative society will look like.

Of course, I am not going so far as saying it is always this way, this is merely shown to point out an example how many Atheists might actually consider themselves, and that at least in a political context, their lack of belief in a god will actually create such as strong socio-political identity that it can be considered a religion, and how the word religion in turn is merely there to express one’s raher ethical, moral and political views than actually your ideas of faith.

Since Db0 was so kind to remind me of this in his post, it was hard for me not to reply to that, especially after learning about the Seed Theory originally created by Carol Delaney and her colleague whose name escapes me right now. There is actually a reason why females are considered inferior in the Abrahamic religions. To understand this, we must first of all understand what was before Christianity and Judaism. That’s right, many pagan religions where some were cheerishing the fertility of women, since good fertility means a good harvest. Fertility of course, is the very central theme in many agricultures, and why shouldn’t they, when it’s the very thing they rely upon to survive? Looking at this further, we can also see a notion where every god of fertility in pagan religions is depicted as woman. Coincidence? I think not. Thus, fertility as a whole is more strongly connected to the female gender rather than the male one, and in addition connected to the earth since the earth can be fertile. Women then, stand for the earthly. Is there any question too why it is the female who gives birth to the world in most mythology sagas? As a quick example, we don’t need to go further than Gaia, which is probably the most well-known of all world birthgivers.

However, when the Abrahamic religions came into the picture and turned the world upside down with its monotheism, there was suddenly no room for a fertility godess. As a matter of fact, god is so divine that it is the very opposite of what is earthly. Men, who never were considered fertile in the sense as women then, were seen as closer to god. Why is that women cannot even sometimes leave their own house during their periods, or if they pray their prayers will not be reached? Periods if anything, is the very physical evidence of female’s fertility. Men, who do not have periods, and thus are not connected to the earthly are more pure, and also stands closer to the divine.

It is also noted that men not only are more divine, they are the actors, while women are merely spectators. Why is that the most romantic sex would be where the woman is passive, lying down on her back? This is a very old notion in Western society of how sex should be performed. Men once again, are the actors. This in turn refers back to god, where god created the world, not the woman. We call god the creator and god plants the seed. Men too, plant the seed in women, not only because you plant a seed into the ground but also literary, in English and many other European languages is the semen of men sometimes known as seed.

Why then is the earthly considered so bad that women’s sexuality should even become prosecuted? I cannot honestly answer, more than it seems to be an attempt to demonize pagan religions.

This is an analysis I based on Fall From Grace in Genesis:

My own tack on Fall From Grace? It’s a way to make a claim between the earthly and the divine. You see, in the Abrahamic religions and also in many pagan ones, women in particular are often considered being more “earthly”, because of their difference in fertility. This is primarily based on the fact that women can have children and have periods. This sets women further away from god, since god is divine and not earthly. Don’t you for example think it’s funny it’s Eve who ate the fruit first, not Adam? A serpent is often symbolized with cycles, notice how this seem to fit nicely with periods? Furthermore, this is probably a way for the Abrahamic religions to taint the pagan religions in where female fertility was seen as a positive thing. In paganism too, a cyclist thinking is not that uncommon. So in such a sense, the woman represents nature and paganism, which in Christianity is so far apart as you can get from god. Notice also how it is Eve who later suggested Adam to eat the fruit. Thus all the blame was to be put on Eve. Adam did nothing wrong, after all he is the man, and is closer to god. Even if he did wrong he did less wrong because he doesn’t have periods.

In addition, it is also the child who inherits the sin from its mother, not its father, further explaining that women are tainted but men are not. So frankly, I have actually no idea how some Christians could reproduce with this idea in mind. Going further to not have sex before marriage could be a part where a man who has sex with an unmarried woman will become tainted. Among gypsies, the skirt closest to the body is tainted as well, and among some Muslims women’s underwear cannot be mixed with men’s underwear during washing, or the men’s clothing will be tainted.

I would one day like to see where men’s semen is considered as tainted too, although that will probably not happen. Most often periods are also a sign with lack of body control, and to keep oneself clean and pure. This can be traced even further back from Ancient Greece where there some there were ideals a human should adhere to show dignity. One of those was to keep oneself pure. Of course, this notion too, was constructed by men for men, women were not often considered and even if they were, there were other ideals for them to follow.

Hm, I realize I am too tired to really think more clearly about the matter right now, so I will just continue when more ideas arise. I guess I call this part 1, so if there are anything else to discuss, it will be in part 2. Maybe a more elaborate analysis of From From Grace perhaps?

I will first provide definitions of the three words I used in the title. I will use Wikipedia as a source for the definitions, because I think the dictionary definitions I have seen are too short to encompass what they mean. I put more trust in the encyclopedic definition more or less agreed on by the collective conciousness that manifests itself on Wikipedia.

Religion:

A religion is a set of beliefs and practices, often centered upon specific supernatural and moral claims about reality, the cosmos, and human nature, and often codified as prayer, ritual, or religious law. Religion also encompasses ancestral or cultural traditions, writings, history, and mythology, as well as personal faith and religious experience.

(Source page)

Politics

Politics is the process by which groups of people make decisions.

(Source page

Science

Science (from the Latin scientia, meaning “knowledge”) is the effort to discover, understand, or to understand better, how the physical world works, with observable physical evidence as the basis of that understanding.

(Source page)

From their definitions alone one would not immediately suspect that these three come into contact with eachother. I need not remind you how the religionists (forgive my lack of a better word) have clashed with the scientists in deciding whether to teach creationism or intelligent design (which was ruled to be the same in this court case, so I will use the terms interchangeably) in public schools - which I will use as the primary example in this article, tiring as it may be. There are more interactions between these three than just collisions. There have been allegements, both explicit and implicit by the religious that I want to examine and, to be frank, tear down. Without going into the actual issue, I just want to make a few remarks about trends that I have seen.

First of all I want to talk about the religionists attempts to put the stamp of “science” on their ideas. This does not only concern creationism: rather a lot of Christians are trying to wedge in the idea that their claims about the bible, human nature and the universe are backed up by (scientific) evidence. These religionists’ reasons for this may be apparent: in convincing non-believers of their found “truth”, whacking them around the ears with a bible or qur’an does not work any more in these modern times. Rather than convincing people of the messages in their holy scriptures, they are convincing people that their supernatural claims are compatible with the world perspective science offers, or worse: that their supernatural claims are actually the product of science. Anyone who has ever really dealt with science would immediately remember that (in science) the bible and the qur’an are not accepted sources of information for reasons so plethoric I deem it unnecessary to mention any of them.

Secondly I want to talk about the religionists’ attempt to put the stamp of “religion” or “politics” on science. The argument that science is just another faith or religion is well-known. The question whether science is religion has been answered eloquently by Richard Dawkins (among others) in this article, concluding that science is “free of the main vice of religion, which is faith” and that even though nothing can epistemically be defended for a hundred percent, there is a “difference in the world between a belief that one is prepared to defend by quoting evidence and logic and a belief that is supported by nothing more than tradition, authority, or revelation.”

Science has also been bombarded as a political system with an agenda. Coined terms like “evolutionists” or “Darwinism” are the incarnations of these attacks. The terms don’t maky any sense at all, as the former merely seems to be a response to the term “creationists”. Calling someone an “evolutionist” accurately implies that that person accept evolution, but it is void of additional meaning when compared to “scientist”. Anyone who accepts science, automatically accepts all scientific concepts, including evolution. The word “evolutionists” would only make sense if there were people who do not accept science, but do accept evolution - which is silly.

The word “Darwinism” more explicit in it’s attempt to ascribe political load to the concept of evolution. More recently “Darwinism” has unapologetically been abused in the “documentary” Expelled as an inspiration for the Nazis, and subsequently, the holocaust. It is nasty blow below the belt and an unacceptable, blatantly misleading lie to the public. The line of reasoning involved in this conclusion hinges on basic misunderstandings of religion (a very illustrative one being that if Hitler was truly inspired by evolution, he would have needed to do nothing as evolution dictates that the better “race” prevails automatically). More importantly, it should be noted that there is no such thing is Darwinism. If there would be, then where is Einsteinism or Newtonism? “Darwinism”, like “evolutionist” is void.

It all seems like religionists are trying to divide science, putting the same scientific principles under different sounding categories, and then attacking these categories. They forget that science works under the assumptions that there is one universe (or “truth”) and that laws that describe that universe do not change with time or space. Therefore, science is a single, solid system. It is not at all like the macrocosmic variety of religions, varying (in time and space) from Zoroastrianism and Taoism to Christianity and the Norse pantheon, or the microcosm of one such religion such as Christianity, varying (again in time and space) from Mormonism and the Seventh Day Adventists to Catholicism and Protestantism).

I can only conclude that the religious are very desperately looking for measures to get what they want. It includes trying to level with the successful unity that is science and it’s foundation “reason”, either by trying to portray themselves as scientific or by making up sections of science which they attack with slanderous lies. Also resorting to claims that science has been infiltrated by the immoral godless who are purposely hiding the truth and demanding “equality” have luckily not had any legal support. I guess they also fail to realise that the high percentage of atheists in the scientific community is a product of the amounted knowledge and understanding of the universe that does not require a god.

I urge nobody to give into the usage of words like “evolutionist”, “Darwinist” or any other void description of what it is supposed to represent. We, as scientists, atheists, humanists, and freethinkers must keep an eye out for these kinds of religious political motives to safeguard the secular stronghold insofar it exists today and potentially exists tomorrow.

Debunking Christianity III — Of War and Manipulation

I deliberated quite a bit about whether or not to include this article under the Debunking Christianity series. I finally decided to include this with DC because it fits into my overall goal statement, which I will type up in the very near future, and should have posted before I even began the series. This is not your typical “Religion = war!1!! War iz teh evul! Stop relijuns = no more warz!111!!!” article that you might see elsewhere on this topic. It is less of a “debunking” and more of an awareness article, but it still fits.

Without further ado, here is the Debunking Christianity view of war and its ties with religion. (more…)