When Dawkins says its "child abuse" to raise a child Catholic...

When Dawkins says its "child abuse" to raise a child Catholic, he is smashing the foundations of religious tolerance that have made modern Western civilization possible.

In the United States, and in the United Kingdom, the different churches have put aside their differences to live together in harmony.

Gone are the religious wars and persecutions that killed so many unnecessarily because one church was "high" and the other "low" and one church dunked the child in water and the other church sprinkled water on its head.

But Dawkins threatens to bring all that back by threatening Catholics in a way that brings back deep-seated fears of persecution, based on not-so-recent past discrimination in the United States and the United Kingdom.

It is important for responsible atheists to denounce Dawkins' hostile and divisive language in order to assure Catholics that a rise in atheist power will not result in a return to persecution against Catholics.

Discuss.

 

Dawkins didn't say it was child abuse to raise a child Catholic. He said it was child abuse to tell a child that he or she is "a Catholic or Muslim child, therefore that is what you believe."

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ren-child-abuse-claims-atheist-professor.html

Catholics in Britain have been persecuted and discriminated against for hundreds of years, and they still must deal with the hostility of their Protestant neighbors.

Dawkins opens that wound all over again by giving Catholics new fear of an atheist-led persecution that exceeds anything perpetrated by Protestants.

To tell a Catholic parent that he may not raise his child Catholic is to deny him his most fundamental freedom of religion.

Catholics may respond with hostility against atheists.

Dawkins should be denounced by all atheists, and loudly, for trying to restart a holy war.

 

He didn't say what you claim he said.

 

what a surprise.

 

Catholics gave as good as they got. The slaughter of the Huguenots, the Spanish in the Netherlands. I'd say at the least Catholics have broken even over the years

 

I was going to actually respond and participate but anytime I see the opening of a thread ended with "discuss" it really irritates me. It's like the op is giving a command to an animal. Just so you know, you're not the only one I've seen do it.

 

Athiest authors just want to make money selling their books and tickets to their religious gatherings.

 

I have this crazy idea. Why don't we actually read the link? Like, I mean, read each word individually, and also read them in the form of complete sentences, and attempt to actually understand the whole of what is being said. Isn't that a neato new idea?

OK, so I read it. And guess what? I found that you are mistaken! Imagine that.

You said Dawkins " says its "child abuse" to raise a child Catholic". What the article actually says is "What a child should never be taught is that you are a Catholic or Muslim child, therefore that is what you believe. That's child abuse". Take a look at those words. See how they're actually different? And not only that, they mean different things!

You suggested that there was some idea that one might "tell a Catholic parent that he may not raise his child Catholic". What the article actually says is "we must not indoctrinate our children". Whoops!

I'm not a big fan of Dawkins. I agree with the people in the article who says in this case he is being "attention-seeking and unhelpful". And I agree that one anecdote of a person whose sexual abuse was less painful to them than their psychological abuse is not exactly proof of what Dawkins is claiming.

However, I'm not keen on lying about what he said.

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How dare they. We all know that authors are artistes, lovely, and should suffer in poverty for their art.

 

I've never heard of anyone telling a child what the child believes.

My point about the money was that there's no reason to get bent out of shape over it. He's just a guy trying to make some cash. He wants to sell books about something he can't prove and he has an audience.

 

I think it probably doesn't happen very often in those exact words. But more parents surely tell children what to believe about religion than lets them decide.

 

Oh look, another thread by Blackrook that starts on faulty premise. What a (*)(*)(*)(*)ing surprise. Dude, Dawkins didn't say what you claim he said, and if you actually read his words (rather than just hunting for an excuse to attack him), you'll understand that.

 

I think most parents state their belief as fact and the children believe

 

Who said that moderate religion can result in extremist religion without including atheism?

Moderate athiesm can lead to extremist atheism.

 

"God definitely doesn't exist" is about as extreme as atheism gets. Anything beyond that is something else.

 

When do they get a choice? They are indoctrinated from early childhood.

 

Often attributed to Dawkins, but not one of his, is the phrase: "Science flies you to the moon, religion flies you into buildings."

 

Mao and Stalin were athiests, and their atheism lead them to murder the religious..

Science is based on faith, so it is impossible to separate science from faith.

 

Mao and Stalin were psychopathic mass murderers, being atheist or otherwise was the least of the problem. What makes you believe that not believing in God causes genocide? Is it only your fear of god that stops you killing your parents?
Science is based on evidence. Faith is belief without evidence.

 

To be a scientist one must have faith that the laws of physics are constant.

 

I don't believe you are being serious.

 

Wrong. The "laws" of physics are noted observations of reality that we have found to be overall consistent throughout the known universe. There is nothing that says our models couldn't be wrong, but the gigantic mass of evidence makes them reliable for further examination. It can't be proven, because science doesn't work with proof, but it can be shown to be internally consistent and match the evidence we have. They aren't taken on faith any more than a jury takes it on faith that a murderer is guilty - there is a massive preponderance of evidence to validate it.

 

False. Mao and Stalin were also going bald: does a receding hairline lead people to murder the religious? No, what led them to their atrocities was something else other than baldness or atheism.

Everything in life depends on a tiny, teeny bit of what might be called faith. It's far, far different from religious faith. So much so that to equate the two is beyond disingenuous.

 

When faced with evidence to the contrary, the religiously faithful will continue to believe whatever they know about their religion. When faced with evidence to the contrary, the scientific "faithful" will investigate and change their thoughts on a subject as necessary to fit with the evidence. You can try to equivocate on the two, but they're so different as to make such a comparison meaningless. It's like comparing kleptomania to Beatlemania.

 

Everyone makes a living doing some kind of work. Is that a problem for you?