Wednesday, March 29, 2017

What defining moral stand of atheism has Trump violated? Excerpts From A Blog Brawl

In an exchange with an atheist at another website, I got these claims made to me.

Actually I think the problem is that Liberals, whether religious or non-religious believe that emotions, which is what moral opinions are, should be left out of political decisions. Decisions should be based upon facts, logic, rational thinking! Unfortunately that leaves their campaigns (Clinton was a good example) lacking any fire or spirit. People are moved by emotions not rationality or logic!

So much to unpack in that assertion.  I should have led with my afterthought in the discussion so I will lead with that:

"Decisions should be based upon facts, logic, rational thinking!"

Uh, like it or not, that's a statement of moral opinion. By your own assertion, your moral position is self-contradicting.

And my first and longer response.

"emotions, which is what moral opinions are"

Oh, where do you get that idea? Do you mean that morality is based on what you want or want to be true? That's rather curious considering the assertions of moral obligations that are definitely contrary to what is wanted, often by those who assert those moral obligations as much as those who they are asserting them to. Do unto others that which you would have done unto you is certainly not how most people generally want to have things, they want to be able to do to others what they would not want to be done to them. As to other moral obligations such as to do justice to people you would not care about or like, or even to your enemies would certainly be the opposite of what their emotions would lead them to.

What makes you think that morals aren't exercised on the basis of fact, logic and rational thinking? That seems to me to be a totally absurd idea, an illegitimate classification and absurdly reductionist, something I have often seen done by atheists out of nothing so much as their emotional need to reduce and classify things so as to make them favor what they want.

Another, one of the biggest atheist trolls at Religion Dispatches got into it, most of what he said was stupid but he did give me something to respond to as well.

Christians try to force their morality on the rest of us. They want Christianity to be accepted by the nation as the ultimate morality. We see Christians and what they do, so we don't buy it.

The answer:

Let's see what that assertion could be applied to:

Democrats try to force their morality on Republicans,

Egalitarians try to force their morality on the promoters of privilege.

The supporters of women's' suffrage try to force their morality on anti-suffragists.

Civil Rights agitators try to force their morality on segregationists.

Those who assert the rights of Native Americans try to force their morality on people who want to kill them and steal their land.....

Atheists try to force their morality on Christians, Jews, Muslims, etc.

In short, you've got nuthin'.

This question seems to have stumped him for how:

What defining moral stand of atheism has Trump violated?

3 comments:

  1. "Christians try to force their morality on the rest of us. They want Christianity to be accepted by the nation as the ultimate morality. We see Christians and what they do, so we don't buy it."

    the problem with racism is not just it's disgusting reductio arguments which reduce human beings to things; it's with the sweeping generalizations necessary to make racism work (and to end anything remotely resembling reasoning, much less "logical thinking").

    So here we have "Christians" described in a way that would be offensive if the word was replaced with "Jews" or stupid if replaced with "liberals" (or "conservatives"), and racist if replaced with "Muslims." Stupidly racist, since the majority of the world's Muslims are Asian, and the second larges grouping is African.

    But ISIS=Islam, so there you have it.

    One could ask "Which Christians?", and then ask "Which Christian morality?", and then start asking if he means MO Synod Lutherans, who think no Roman Catholic is a "true Christian," or WI Synod Lutheran, who think even MO Synod Lutherans are not doing it right. And go on from there.

    The "Christian morality" that would ban abortions? Or the "Christian morality" that would require us all to care for the poor, the widow and orphan, the imprisoned, the lame, the halt, the blind, the deaf? The "Christian morality" that would (apparently) post police at bathroom doors to...well, no one knows what they would do there; or the "Christian morality" that says the first of all will be last, and servant of all?

    Ignorance, parading itself as knowledge. And it's why I quit reading "Religion Dispatches" and almost any blog about religion: the articles are usually stupid and superficial (Look! "Nones!") and the comments are worse.

    I grow old. The stupid makes me tired.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I seldom go to RD anymore. I don't even remember what brought me there this morning.

      Your response is better than mine.

      Delete
  2. I preferred your line about atheist morality.

    ReplyDelete