Religion Does Not Entail Misogyny
Posted in Atheism, Blogosphere, Daylight Atheism, Religion, San Francisco, Skepticism, Thinking Critically on | 8 minutes | 18 Comments →
So, I was about sit down and write with a premeditated topic in mind: last week's sentiments on "evidence for God" as discussed last week at SI's. Problem was, I stopped by DaylightAtheism first, where I found the following interesting hypothesis: an inversely proportional relationship between religiosity and misogyny exists – at least – so suggests guest writer Sarah Braasch in her second essay there. I would've left it well alone, but she implied some things about San Francisco that I want to challenge from personal experience, and I feel any San Franciscan in their right mind would have to agree.
If you don't want to read her post first, it's basically a story about how some sailors took her on a cruise through the Neopolitan prostitution subculture, oddly juxtaposed against the religious beast that is Roman Catholicism. As I said, most of her post was easy to sympathize with. Sure, the moral indifference to the victims of prostitution she describes is deeply troubling, especially considering its close proximity to what is perhaps the world's leading religious superpower. Atheists aren't the only ones noting that the abject conditions of humanity ironically persist whether a culture is predominantly religious or not. Problem is, she starts to jump the gun and get a little bit preachy for atheism right about here if you ask me:
How can human beings be so inured to the suffering of their fellow creatures? As a human rights activist, I am sometimes awestruck by the absence of humanity in humans. And, how to account for the insensitivity? It is in our nature? Or, can we rise above? What is holding us back? I think religion is holding us back. It is all too easy to view human beings as unworthy of your sympathy and care if you think of them as the damned and filthy heathen hordes shunned by your Almighty.
I really enjoyed her first essay, and I really enjoyed 90% of this one. Still, I couldn't help but to nod in agreement with the many commenters who seemed to feel religion entered the discussion out of left field, and I would add a point most of the atheist commenters missed: this argument uses a ridiculously one-sided example of religion. The focus is near exclusively on the Judeo-Christian religions, whereas a larger number of religions exist that do not categorize people thusly, nor do the Judeo-Christian religions necessarily view the unrepentant as "shunned by [their] Almighty." Whether intentional or mere Freudian slip, this was clearly just another argument painting the Judeo-Christian religions as responsible for misogyny, lawlessness and callous indifference to human suffering, when in reality these unfortunate misgivings are caused by several interweaving and overlapping socio-cultural and economic factors, both religious and secular.
I'm not surprised Ebon let this one slip through the editorial cracks, because its a powerful rhetorical argument against religion, but the fact remains that Sarah gave "religion" as her singular answer to the question of "what's holding us back [from rising above our indifference to human suffering]" when I think it's fair to say a reasoned look at reality suggests the problems are more complex.
It's possible the more casual readers of her essay were equally impressed by the quality and eloquence of her writing, yet maybe didn't question the conclusion drawn for whatever reason. It would be sad to see them (or anyone) walk away with the impression that all atheists would be so selective and narrowly-focused as to suggest an inversely proportional relationship between religiosity and misogyny, lawlessness or callous indifference to human suffering. Nevermind the stinking corruption of secular politics! Forget all about the intrinsic fallibilities that have equally plagued humans for millennia regardless of their belief systems! Nevermind the evolutionary angles to the arguments, which we'd think might be more forthcoming from an atheist! It's religion, damn it!
Admittedly, I think all rational and honest people must agree that religion can and does have particularly negative effects in societies and families worldwide. Yet, like anything else, I think all rational and honest people must also agree that religion can and does have positive effects in societies and families worldwide, too. Lastly, all rational and honest people must also admit the same goes for atheism. That's why I couldn't help but resist when she suggested an inversely proportional relationship between religiosity and misogyny:
The more religious the society, the worse the human rights violations perpetrated against women, the less "moral" men behave towards women.
This is odd in theory and untrue in practice. In fact, just a few paragraphs earlier, Sarah also said her classmate's distant family members took her and her classmate "on a driving tour of all of San Francisco." If that's the case, they must've missed quite a few of the City's more flavorful neighborhoods that certainly don't qualify as religious or moral towards women, neighborhoods where things go down that are far more immoral than what she described in Naples – seemingly with police approval at that. What you don't see is the worse tragedy; many of these women simply disappear – and guess what? Many in the shadow of a City Hall in what's considered by many progressives to be the beacon of modern American secularism. Similar patterns exists in most all major American cities. Would she be so quick as to suggest an inversely proportional relationship between modern American secularism and misogyny? Drug abuse? Prostitution? Indifference to human suffering? What of the relationship between American neo-capitalist commercialism and misogyny? Why make religion the sole scapegoat for humanity's shortcomings?
Don't get me wrong: I'm not contesting the fact that just like any other expression of human authority, religion can beget moral hypocrisy up to and inlcuding the subjugation of women, and of course the sailors in her story were acting repulsively. Yes, it was also most certainly ironic that what she described took place in the Vatican's shadow, but to just blame it all on religion a la Dawkins and hoist that as a petard for atheism doesn't cut it.
The problem was the author's cherry-picked approach. As rationalists and freethinkers we need to remember that cold and impartial logic always cuts both ways: if the absence of religion does not necessarily entail immorality – as I feel confident most who consider themselves rationalists or freethinkers must agree, lest they concede the disingenuous arguments on atheists and morality – neither can the presence of religion necessarily entail immorality.
After about seven comments, Sarah joined the thread herself and asked a series of questions. Among them was this one, asked to the thread in general:
Why is it so easy for you to see that religion is an egregious obstacle to humanity's development in so many regards, but not when it comes to the subjugation of women?
I didn't get the feeling that commenters there would disagree that religion – like any other power structure – loans itself well to oppression. The problem is, Sarah conflates the entire category religion with her selective perception of its employment in a narrow range of the gamut. Like politics, religion can be an egregious obstacle to humanity's development in so many regards. It can also encourage humanity's development in so many regards.
We should not conflate the thing with what people do with it. The true catalyst behind the subjugation of women is the attitude of ruthless male dominance, which can express itself through any power structure – religious, secular, political, or otherwise. This attitude can be identified, challenged and successfully rebutted in nearly all of our cultural outposts, and religion is just one of them.
Sarah comes back again later and seems like quite the good sport, thanking people for their criticisms, and really, there's no other way to go if we want to get better. Earlier, she re-assured us that she was,
…fighting against religion and all dogmatic thinking.
..but I would say as freethinkers we should fight against dogmatic thinking whether it expresses itself through religion or something else. Not all dogmatic thinking is religious, and the errors of dogmatism can befall any belief system. Personally, I felt dogma's influence in Sarah's post, as the point it sought to establish was asserted dogmatically – that is to say, without evidence or even a reasoned case supporting its conclusion, a conclusion that needed to be considered against easily observable counterexamples from some of the very neighborhoods I walk in.
Tommykey
says...Even though I am an atheist, I thought her insertion of religion as the problem at the end was a bit of a stretch too. The problem is that too many men in this world view women as a commodity. While various stripes of religious fundamentalism consign women to the status of property, most people who consider themselves religious would be against patronizing prostitutes in the first place.
nal
says...I’m not sure inverse proportionality is correct. That would imply that the more religious, the less misogynistic.
The male/female relationship is extremely complex. Many aspects of the male/female relationship transcend culture and time. Many aspects of the male/female relationship transcend species. No culture or religion can fight mother nature, and survive.
cl
says...You know, Sarah came back and announced that she’s studying for the bar exam. On one hand, such ambition is always admirable and of course on the human level I hope the best for her and that she reaches her goals. On the other hand, I can’t help but be disheartened a bit, because if anything I think lawyers need to be less prone to see connections where connections may not necessarily exist, or where they exist in far different degree or form than claimed. Would she treat the Christian conservative male who is blatantly bigoted and sexist with the same impartial logic as a female Libertarian biology teacher? In this post, I showed what I thought was an irrefutable example of a selective attitude towards evidence and making connections that are tenuous at best.
Tommykey,
I agree. That’s what I was getting at with, “The true catalyst behind the subjugation of women is the attitude of ruthless male dominance, which can express itself through any power structure – religious, secular, political, or otherwise. This attitude can be identified, challenged and successfully rebutted in nearly all of our cultural outposts, and religion is just one of them.”
Sexists are just like racists in that they come in all shapes, colors and sizes. And when you say, “various stripes of religious fundamentalism,” that’s far more in scope and acceptable as a proffered causative influence than “religion.”
nal,
Well, yeah but let me explain – “an inversely proportional relationship between religiosity and misogyny” is indeed bad wording – you’re absolutely correct. The “inversely proportional” part of my argument was developed particularly in response to Sarah’s “the more religious the society, …the less ‘moral’ men behave towards women” clause, under which we can see it makes sense. But yeah, you’re right, I goofed the wording in the rewrite. Noted!
I agree with your second paragraph entirely and that’s why I was surprised nobody else mentioned what I described as “evolutionary angles” to the argument.
*************
PS – I still intend to get back to the prayer studies argument. I’m still kinda unclear on if we agree or not, as it’s went kind of back and forth I think. Anyways, I wanted to let it “cool off” for a few weeks, then get back to it. Such tends to have an illuminating effect on the more confusing threads now and again. Still, feel free to drop anything new there in the meantime. If you wanted to summarize your position as it stands today that would probably help me make the most up-to-date response, too – you know, if nothing else to do, that sort of thing.
Karla
says...I’m over on my blog arguing for the value of all humans to only have atheists tell me how they are not valuable unless given value by others who find value in them.
Then here I see you speak of an atheists accusing people of religion of not believing in the value of humanity.
The thing is that Christians who treat humans as less than priceless worth are living from outside the worldview they espouse. On the other hand, atheists who argue for the sanctity of human life have an insufficient philosophical framework from which to launch their case. To judge the religious as wrong, one needs a standard by which to judge them and thus one must borrow from the theists view on objective morality in order to substantiate this argument.
Note to Christians: people are watching our actions and we have a responsibility to represent Christ in our daily lives and show His true love to all humanity regardless of their religious beliefs or moral behaviors. It was while we were yet sinners that Christ died for us, and just as He loves us we are to love others.
cl
says...Karla,
Of course, but if you attempt to use this fact as a part of your argument, you’ll get hit with “No True Scotsman” accusations. When that happens, ask if the Jokela school shooter was a true atheist, which puts the atheist in a real predicament: they’ll either have to accept the “No True Scotsman” arguments they typically decry, or they’ll have to concede that the “religious” who don’t value human life are in fact “living from outside the worldview they espouse” as you put it so well.
Well, I’d say some atheists who argue for the sanctity of human life lack a sufficient philosophical framework from which to launch their case. I understand what you’re getting at, but unfortunately, it’s likely to be heard as the “atheists can’t be moral” argument, even though I believe that’s not what you’re saying. You do think that an atheist can be a moral person, correct?
I agree that a standard is needed to support any judgment, but where you and I seem to part ways is with your assertion that “atheists must borrow from the theists’ standard.” This goes back to the objective vs. subjective morality argument that’s been raging on your blog for weeks. Whereas you seem to be willing to only accept objective morality (correct me if I’m wrong) an atheist or a community of atheists could simply say that we should value all human life for reasons X, Y and Z. Reasons X, Y and Z then become their standard they can use to support their judgments. They would still have a standard, the only difference between their standard and yours becomes that theirs would be self-imposed, whereas yours is deduced from the Bible.
Karla
says...CL, I do think atheists can be moral, but their worldview doesn’t adequately support why they ought to be.
Yet I do see what you are saying in that they have a standard, albeit, a subjective one to which they point. But I don’t see how this can be a standard one “ought” to follow. I can see how they could choose to follow it, or desire to follow it, or feel like they should follow it, but not how it “ought” to be thus. I am just as free to come along and make my own standard.
In theism I would also be just as free, but just as wrong. Whereas in atheism I would be just as free and just as valid to have my own reasons and my own set of principals for living. I can say humans are or are not valuable and not have any anchor for which one view is correct and the other incorrect.
I realize I need to refine my argument, but I need to learn more to do so. I am still uncertain as to whether I fully get the atheists argument. I do know that I am misheard so I figure I mishear them too.
cl
says...I believe atheists can be moral, too, only I believe their worldview can adequately support why they ought to be – depending on what we mean when we allude to their worldview, of course. For example, let’s say I’m an atheist and I believe in the Golden Rule and karma – that I should not do to anyone else that which I wouldn’t want anyone else to do to me – and if I do, it will come back to me. Then, lest I want to contradict and hurt myself, I ought not kill my neighbor, steal his goats or beat his servants, right?
Now, don’t get me wrong, as I believe I understand the dilemma that’s bothering you as well:
Correct. My standard might just be that there are too many people on the planet already, and that we should kill off the weaker members of our species to make way for the genetically fit. I honestly believe that if more people were atheists, we’d see more prominent expression of this idea. So far as I’ve heard, the best argument an atheist can make to objectively anchor their morality is natural selection: what’s right is what’s best for the proliferation of the species. Okay, then technically – under atheism – my standard that it’s moral to decrease human population can be no more right or wrong than the atheist who espouses the Golden Rule and karma. The Jokela school shooter alluded to precisely these motivations in his suicide letter.
No matter what you say, you’ll never have an absolute anchor to justify morality claims with atheists, because by definition they don’t believe such an anchor exists. At least, I’ve not met one yet that does, so things like the Golden Rule and karma become subjective anchors for the atheist, and the reasons atheists who respect life don’t kill people are generally the same reasons theists who respect life don’t kill people – because both are in the set of humans who respect life.
Your question seems to be, “If we’re atheists, why ought we respect life?” The answer is the same as if we we’re believers: we should respect life because disrespecting life brings pain and suffering to other creatures, and if not wholly “wrong,” such seems at least “not nice” whether we’re atheists or believers, right?
I don’t think it needs too much refining. I’d suggest re-questioning the motivation for the argument first. Why are you arguing that morality cannot be anchored without God? In your opinion, what would be the ideal atheist response to your argument?
Well said, and true. I’m currently convinced that roughly 85% of online dialog between atheists and believers results in this “mishearing” you allude to. I’ve misheard others, and I know others have misheard me. It happens far more often than most people realize.
Mike aka MonolithTMA
says...First let me state, I’m using religion in the general sense and am not considering the religion vs. relationship concept here.
Religion, like most things in life, is what you make of it. Take a bunch of perfectly nice, non-misogynistic people, give them all bibles, put them in church, and they are pretty likely to remain perfectly nice, non-misogynistic people. Take a bunch of bigoted misogynists and give then bibles, well, you get my meaning.
Certainly religion can be a catalyst of change for what we perceive as good or evil. The nice boy grows up and joins a cult and ends up killing people. The alcoholic wife beater finds Jesus and changes his ways. What if the alcoholic wife beater joins the bigoted misogynist church? What if he meets a nice non-misogynistic group of secular humanists? What if he meets a group of bigoted misogynistic secular humanists.
We all know that their are whole groups people who claim to be Christians who pray and read their bible’s daily and spew hatred and bigotry. Were they that way before becoming Christians, or did they find some of the darker verses in the Bible and base their theology on those, or perhaps they found verses to fit their bigoted ways?
Do I see any evidence for God in any of this? Nope, but that’s not to say there isn’t some. What I do see is groups dictating their group’s morality, just as humanity has always done, religion or not.
Karla
says...Mike, nice to see you joining the conversation. Very good points, by the way. I agree people can take the Bible and use it to justify just about anything. If a person is the same person before they entered “religion” or “church” as after and the change is merely externally adhering to their new culture/social group then these kinds of things will be and are often prevalent. A wife beater joins a group of people who shun such activity and stops doing it to fit into the new community.
This certainly happens. One of the things we do at much church to guard against this sort of thing is that we don’t seek to fix externals. We don’t try and clean people up on the outside. Actually we believe that doing all the moral motions of a Christian by external effort instead of a by product of internal change is not any real good for us. It won’t last and it won’t meet the needs of the person. We weren’t ever meant to do good without God. That’s why we can’t earn righteousness. The “rules” of the Bible are an aid to help lead us to Him and not an end in themselves.
Even the Bible isn’t meant to be a book of religion, but a book of life and that life only becomes illuminated when combined with the Spirit of God. The Bible is to point to God, not to itself as an absolute. That’s when we get into trouble is when we use it as some kind of absolute law without the Spirit of God. It isn’t an end in itself, it was never intended to be.
Karla
says...Cl, yeah I understand the atheists sees the subjective standard as a standard and has no framework in their worldview for an anchor. I really aim to get past the language barrier of our worldviews. And by that I mean I want to learn to speak the language of the other worldviews and think it is my responsibility to learn to do so if I want to be heard. I don’t put the burden on others to do that for me, but I strive to do it for them. I have a long way to go though. When I hear what I have stated stated back to me and it comes out different from what I was trying to say then I feel I have not communicated it clearly enough and try again and again to remedy that.
nal
says...Karla:
I agree people can take the Bible and use it to justify just about anything.
And you complain that atheists have a subjective standard for morality?
cl
says...Mike the MonolithTMA,
I tend to agree and think you hit nail on the head.
Karla,
I’d say those are worthwhile goals..
It helps to argue with different atheists, too. Honestly, I’ve spent plenty of time interacting with “GCT / Anonymous” and in my experience he very restates something different than what was originally stated. Of course, that you or I are being unclear is always possible and it’s good to remain aware of that possibility – but it can also be the other person doing the misunderstanding, too.
nal,
I’d say people can use anything to justify just about anything, religious or not. I mean, Hollywood seems to operate on this “grasping-for-straws” principle near-exclusively :)
Karla
says...CL, my conversations with GCT aren’t to convert him or to win the argument one day. I really want to get to know him, I really care about him and Cyber and Mike and I think despite our differences I would enjoy hanging out with them if they lived in my city. I just want to take my time to be there for anyone who wants to talk about these things all the while giving the freedom to back away from the conversation if they desire.
But I also want to meet new people and learn from them too. I don’t like to learn in isolation, that creates the possibility of stereotyping and categorizing when people have their own individual and diverse thoughts, feelings, and characteristics. It wouldn’t be fair to engage in discussion with only a few and think I’ve got atheists figured out– far from it.
Karla
says...nal “And you complain that atheists have a subjective standard for morality?”
Christians believe that we can only know in part. So just because we believe there is an absolute, it doesn’t mean we can make our knowledge absolute. But it means we can seek a direction of knowing what is real because there is a real to know. Our knowledge of that real is always growing leaving behind false perceptions and gaining new ground in knowing, but the danger is always to make what we know absolute instead of to keep the idea of the absolute as something we don’t have all the absolute knowledge about. Sometimes we find the more we know the less we actually know and the farther we are from really knowing.
cl
says...Karla,
Well that’s just thing: the only difference between you and I in this case is that I have a goal in my interaction with whoever I talk to: to see if we can’t reach some sort of common ground by realizing that the same processes of rationalism and education can sustain a much wider spectrum of ideas than this whole “if we can’t detect it it’s not there” strain. I’ve noted, for example, that GCT and myself have similar tastes in music. I’ll bet GCT’s read or heard of at least a book or two I’ve been associated with publishing. I could go on and on about what I would say GCT’s positive traits are, although he’s only ever spewed hate against me. The guy’s got the tenacity of not just one bull but the whole stampede, for better or for worse he’s consistent, etc. etc. My goal in writing about religion isn’t to convert people because I can’t convert anyone. So I discuss my ideas and let the chips fall where they will. Lastly, I’ve achieved this “common ground” I allude to with plenty of commenters and that’s always cool, too.
That’s what I was getting at with the “talk to different atheists” comment. I agree.
cl
says...Karla,
Well that’s just thing: the only difference between you and I in this case is that I have a goal in my interaction with whoever I talk to: to see if we can’t reach some sort of common ground by realizing that the same processes of rationalism and education can sustain a much wider spectrum of ideas than this whole “if we can’t detect it it’s not there” strain. I’ve noted, for example, that GCT and myself have similar tastes in music. I’ll bet GCT’s read or heard of at least a book or two I’ve been associated with publishing. I could go on and on about what I would say GCT’s positive traits are, although he’s only ever spewed hate against me. The guy’s got the tenacity of not just one bull but the whole stampede, for better or for worse he’s consistent, etc. etc. My goal in writing about religion isn’t to convert people because I can’t convert anyone. So I discuss my ideas and let the chips fall where they will. Lastly, I’ve achieved this “common ground” I allude to with plenty of commenters and that’s always cool, too.
That’s what I was getting at with the “talk to different atheists” comment. I agree.
Tommykey
says...I believe atheists can be moral, too, only I believe their worldview can adequately support why they ought to be – depending on what we mean when we allude to their worldview, of course.
Kudos to you for that cl. As an atheist, my response to the theist is that their morality is subjective too, only their morals are wrapped up in the guise of divine command to give it the appearance of ohjective truth.
Part of the problem in this debate is that religious institutions have had a monopoly on matters of right and wrong for so long it is hard for many people to imagine the possibility of moral codes that are not based on religion.
Speaking as someone who used to be religious before becoming atheist, when I finally made the transition from Catholicism to atheism (with a phase of god belief without any formal religious belief in between), it wasn’t like “Oh gee, now I have to decide whether or not it is okay to commit murder or rob banks.” Basic morality is what it is, regardless of the label one chooses to apply to it.
Where I part company with other atheist bloggers such as Ebon at DA, is that I don’t feel the need to advance atheism as a cause at the expense of religious belief. I really don’t care what someone believes as long as they respect my right not to believe. My activism or interest in these matters, such as it is, is in response to these culture war issues that the Religious Right pushes to fire up their base and demonize their opponents.
I remember many years ago, when Phil Donahue had his afternoon talk show, he had on three families from different religions, an orthodox Jewish family, a Mormon family, and some Christian, probably Baptist, family. At the end of the episode, Donahue goes up to the father in the Christian family and gestures towards the Jewish family and says “They seem like nice people don’t they? Tell me then, are they going to burn in hell when they die” The Christian man replied to Donahue “You don’t want me to answer that question.” When Donahue pressed him on it, he basically repeated himself, but you knew that his answer to the question was yes. Donahue then crosses over to the other end of the stage where the Jewish family is and asks the father of the family, “What do you have to say to that?” And the Jewish man, with a cheery sounding voice, said, “I believe that God made heaven with different seating arrangements” or something along those lines to the laughter of the audience.
I remember thinking, what a shitty attitude for the Christian man to have and what a great answer by the Jewish man. The view of the Jewish man was basically “This is the path I believe I must follow because I believe it is true. You have your own path to follow and it is not for me to say how God will judge you” whereas the Christian man’s attitude was “If you don’t believe what I believe, then you will suffer for eternity in the after life.” I’m a universalist at heart, so anyone who offers an exclusivist message has no appeal for me.
Karla
says...Tommy, a couple thoughts if I may interject. The Bible teaches that we are all aware of the moral construct weather we have ever heard of the Bible or not.
It’s in our nature to know right from wrong. Not because it comes from our own making (not that we aren’t free to make up rules and laws–we all do it all the time) but because it is rather self-evident. We can reason about it because somehow we have this invisible standard or moral compass — this idea of the moral ought within our conscience. Even without ever being given direct divine direction of morality we have similar understandings in our nature and yet at the same time we do not do the things we know to be right or even the things we create to be right. We could, to illustrate, say it is good to read books (this is would be a self created rule for ones life) and yet not read them. So we have this propensity to fall short of whatever standard we hold to be true. The Scriptures tells us why this is so, but naturalism not so much.
As for the last thing you said about religion being about believing what I believe or I’ll condemn you–that’s not really accurate. While some do think and speak this way, the reality of what the Gospels teach is very different. It’s not that people are excluded for not believing the same things, but because they are separated from God relationally. A good worldview helps to point one to the way to be reconciled to God, but beliefs don’t save anyone. Someone could memorize the whole Bible and believe in their head every word of it and not know God.
Just like I can read everything George Washington every wrote and everything anyone ever wrote about him and know him intellectually very well, but having never met him, shared a meal with him, had friendship with him, I couldn’t ever say I truly knew him.
This is the difference. It isn’t about a set of intellectual beliefs when Christians talk about belief it is about that intimate relational knowing of God through Jesus that makes all the difference. To tell someone they are just fine living life without being connected to the God of love would be a lie and very unkind of us Christians who experience such intimacy with God.
It isn’t about intellectual knowledge, it’s about relational knowledge. That doesn’t mean the intellectual is abandoned, in fact, I enjoy learning intellectual things about God because it illuminates Him even more in my eyes and just excites my being and increases that intimacy. But if my knowledge of Him was disconnected from my relationship with Him I would just be learning rote facts and have nothing real to speak of.