postdogma

Michael Rock is a Deist, a secular humanist, and an undergraduate student of history at Brandeis University with a focus on the social, cultural, and religious history of China, India, and the Middle East.  He is also a comedian, musician, and an activist for autism awareness, gay rights, and an end to the War on Drugs

Many secularists oppose or do not practice any organized religion because of the common belief that "religion is the cause of all wars." If one looks at basic global religious history, we can see the horrors of the Christian-rooted inquisitions and global imperialism, Islamic jihads and terrorist attacks, counterproductive Jewish settlements in the Palestinian territories, Buddhists and Taoists killing each other in ancient China, the assassination of Indira Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards, the torture of Chinese nationals by the Shinto Japanese during World War Two, and the atrocities of the Hindu Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka. These examples are just a few of many instances of religiously-motivated violence. There are countless others that seem to further prove that case.

There is, however, a hole in the claim that religion causes war. If religion really is the cause of all wars, why is it that some of the Twentieth Century's greatest monsters, such as Hitler; Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot to name a few, were atheists and/or secular-minded? Similarly, why do some religions, such as Jainism, the Rastafari Movement, the Baha'i Faith, Druze, and the neo-pagan religions, have little-to-no blood on their hands? One theory is that religion in and of itself does not cause violence, but rather the fusion of religion and politics does. A look at the backgrounds of several religious traditions demonstrates this theory in action.

Many individuals have observed that Jesus preached ideas that were much more peaceful than Moses or Mohammad did. Unlike the latter two figures, Jesus's influence was purely spiritual and not political. His message of peace in many ways reflected the general nonviolence of Christians when they lived as a minority in the Roman Empire. It wasn't until the Roman Emperor Constantine established Christianity as the empire's state religion and became a Christian himself that Christianity became a political as well as a religious force. From that point onward, it is easy to find historical accounts of Christians committing acts of violence.

Looking at the Meccan and Medinan verses of the Qur'an also demonstrates the nonviolence of apolitical religion against the violence of theocracy. The fairly non-controversial revelations of the Meccan verses were made when Mohammad was merely a religious rebel in a similar vein to Jesus. The Medinan verses, revealed after the Prophet gained political power, are extremely violent and are used by such figures today as Yusuf al-Qaradawi, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and Ayman al-Zawahiri to justify the need for the whole world to be ruled by draconian sharia law and to subject non-Muslims to the status of second-class citizens at best.

Numerous other faiths have been shown to be very nonviolent when they have been without notions of statehood. From the Second Diaspora until the Zionist dream began to become a clear reality, there are few instances of Jewish violence. Zoroastrians have not been perceived as violent since Islam replaced it as the dominant religion of Persia/Iran, and many people have perceived that the neo-pagan religions, such as Wicca; Santeria; the Goddess Movement; and Voodoo, may have less blood on their hands combined than any other religion. Few adherents of those faiths seem to have a strong desire to let their faith represent a state.

Having spent most of my life in the culturally diverse metropolis of New York City, I have been exposed to more religious traditions and ideas than most people do in a lifetime, and I have found that being around apolitical yet religious men and women, be they Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, or any other such faith, is very comforting, provided they do not impose their views on me or others. However, it always pains me to know that the faiths that the wonderful people that I encounter adhere to also have political adherents that use these faiths to justify violence and hatred of nonbelievers.

(The views expressed above do not necessarily reflect the views of postdogma.com)

One of the features of this blog is analyzing media figures and media outlets. In our last such analysis, I analyzed The Daily Telegraph, which is a very well-known paper. But sometimes I'd like to analyze figures who might not be as well known generally, but are relatively influential in the circles in which they travel. I also think a substantial percentage of people who read this blog will have heard of this next one.

I try to read a lot of opinions from different perspectives. One of the people I read is Yonason (alternatively, when he tries to relate to secular readers, Jonathan) Rosenblum. He has written eight hagiographic books extolling the virtues of haredi (Ultra-Orthodox) rabbinic figures. He writes for the moderate haredi Mishpacha Jewish Family Weekly, the more extreme haredi Yated Ne'eman, and the secular (in my view, conservative) Jerusalem Post. Out of all the opinion columnists I read regularly, Yonason Rosenblum is probably my least favorite. Out of all the people I read regularly, including bloggers, Rosenblum is my fifth-least-favorite.

First off, he's a bit crazy. Despite the Obama campaign releasing the certificate of live birth in June 2008, in November Rosenblum found it "curious" that the "Obama campaign has suppressed" The Birth Certificate and wondered "what might be in" it. Also, he's a creationist.

Secondly, he's a relatively intransigient religious apologist, at least in public. Lawrence Kaplan of McGill University has written that he "sometimes get[s] the impression that there are two JRs: the private and the public...the private JR strikes me as being very sensitive, nuanced, and and understanding, while the public JR strikes me as very polemical, highly ideological, toeing the Hareidi line and not giving an inch, and at times even allowing himself to indulge in unworthy suspicions." I think this is correct, and I also think public JR wins over private JR every time. So for example, while Rosenblum told my friend Rabbi Slifkin how disappointed he was that rabbis had banned the latter's books, he then went on a trip to the creationist Discovery Institute to denounce his friend Rabbi Slifkin to the world.

Thirdly, he writes stuff which isn't true. The academic Yoel Finkelman has pointed out some of the historical revisionisms in his books, but doubtless, more work needs to be done. If you read his most recent volume, a hagiographic account of the life of Rabbi Moshe Sherer, you might be struck by how angelic Sherer and his cohorts were, while a certain vacuity of more moderate Orthodox figures (and strangely, Rabbi Sherer's mother-in-law) comes across in full view. It is not that no prominent Orthodox figures had anything negative to say about Sherer; rather, Rosenblum had the picture of heroes and villains he wanted to portray, and therefore wrote his hagiography with his presumptions in mind. I once wrote a blog post where I pointed out a few random errors in his columns that seemed rather lazy, but these are just a few examples of a tendency to care more about the agenda than the facts.

Finally, I think he lacks journalistic ethics. The Society of Professional Journalists has in its code of ethics the stipulation that journalists should "admit mistakes and correct them promptly." I once corrected Yonason Rosenblum -- in both a blog comment and email -- on something. He wanted to show that Obamacare would lead to rationing and therefore "heartrending" questions. So he wrote in the Yated Ne'eman that Britain's National Health Service won't pay for anybody over 59 to receive an arterial stent; I was skeptical and looked into it. It turned out to be a fabrication which had been spread by an anonymous emailer (and I seem to recall reading that somebody had slapped it into the Weekly Standard, which was where I hypothesized Rosenblum had read it). Rosenblum didn't owe anything to me, but as Yated readers -- encouraged to be insular --  depend on people like him for their knowledge of the secular world, I felt he owed the people of Britain a retraction. So I made a blog comment and sent him an email with references, to be doubly sure he'd be informed of his error, and duly retract. The punchline of the story's predictable: He didn't respond and he didn't retract.

The economy is not my strong suit. I have no economic expertise and I'm not interested in math. I certainly welcome guest posts on the economic crisis from any perspective so readers of this blog in the same boat as me can get a more enlightened perspective on this issue.

When I say "in the same boat as me," I think this includes most Americans. And I think that on this issue, I find myself conforming to what I think is one of the most mainstream opinions in American politics. Ironically then, my ignorance allows me to better articulate a populist perspective, as it is my own. So I'm going to put this out there and let you folks who know more about the economy tell me if this perspective on our recent credit downgrading is right or wrong:

The debt ceiling crisis was forseeable. The debt ceiling raise was anything but routine; President Obama was asking a hardline Republican house to approve the largest increase in history (with very few coming close to the amount asked for here). Obama himself had voted against a rise in the debt ceiling when Bush was in office and was well aware that congressmen could vote against such a rise; with the rise of the Tea Party, he should've been well aware of what was coming. In fact, the possibility of the Republicans making demands before they rose the debt ceiling was directly raised to Obama back in December and he dismissed it. What the Democrats should've done then, before the Republicans got control of the House (which everybody knew was coming), was pass a responsible budget. They failed to do so due to political cowardice of what a budget (in my view, with spending cuts or without) would do to their re-election campaigns.

The Republicans saw weakness and pounced. They demanded spending cuts up the wazoo and refused to compromise with any revenue increases. Even with their demands largely met, Tea Party representatives were so intransigent that they refused to vote for the debt ceiling increase.

Meanwhile, Standard and Poor's was analyzing all this. Having -- and on this liberals and conservatives agree -- little credibility after the mortgage crisis, S & P sought to be ahead of the curve this time and looked at the US with a cynical eye. Initially, they cited America's failure to reach their deficit reduction standards as a reason to downgrade the US's pristine credit rating, but then it was pointed out to them that their math was off by $2 trillion. So they changed their rationale: Noting that the budget plan only included modest entitlement reform and discretionary spending savings, as well as critiquing the US for revenue increases not being high-priority policy options (and perhaps taking a cue from some of the more extreme rhetoric bandied about by some politicians regarding the US perhaps defaulting in the future), S & P downgraded our credit rating from the coveted AAA to the not-as-good AA+ because we might default in the future. Maybe I'm just ignorant, but the US not paying its debts? I can't imagine that happening under any president, Republican or Democrat, at least in the near future. (Whatever you think of Barney Frank, it seemed to this layman that he had a properly blistering critique of S & P here.)

So in my view, everybody screwed up. The Democrats lacked the political will to pull off a reasonable budget back when they should've. This allowed the Republicans to take advantage and get what they wanted, which meant no revenue increases. S & P then hastily decreased our credit rating without proper basis.

Amber Kornreich is past President of the Brandeis Democrats, an advocate of LGBT rights and disability awareness, and a rising senior at Brandeis University studying Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies.

There is a distinct moment that the proudly liberal know well: looking someone deeply in the eyes and wondering, "you don't really believe that, do you?"

I would like to think that with the "liberal" label comes by default a limitless open mind for ideas of all sorts. Yet, I hesitate to admit that it is only when I came to terms with my "liberal-ness" that I realized I too fell victim to dogmatic impatience towards those who disagreed with my ideas. After all, I feel I advocate for the objective "good" in the world: adequate access to health care, civil rights for all people regardless of how they are born or choose to live, funding for education and social services, environmental protections, humane treatment for animals, and a government that truly cares about the well-being its citizens. How naive I am.

But from one moment to the next, whether it is a remark that is racist, sexist, homophobic, classist, ableist, or otherwise insensitive, mutual respect can transform into complete disdain. This person, who minutes ago seemed kind and interesting, expresses an opinion so twisted that it seems they are an alien being- some mutant from Planet Conservative several light years away. If you were to look inside their chests, would a heart be absent? President Obama likely asked himself the same question as he sat across the table from Speaker Boehner during last week's debt negotiations.

Perhaps the first logical step is to calmly reason. The old benefit of the doubt route: it is not that the individual is hateful, maybe they just don't quite "get it" yet. Five minutes later, with excruciating clarity, the realization hits. Just as I feel grounded in my truth, they feel grounded in theirs.

Where to proceed from here? Traditional in-group wisdom dictates that these people are simply lost causes. Don't waste energy trying to convert them; move on and accept some people won't "come around".

I hope to boldly confront the "liberal's dilemma", and realize that sometimes, even I refuse to seek common ground.

The way to achieve the forward-thinking society we want to see as Americans is dialogue; and it is far easier said than done. You may love me or hate me for saying, the passion we progressives muster up over our issues is sometimes so forceful that we impassion ourselves into a hole. This reality stunts our crusade towards our goals of a more inclusive, socially and environmentally conscious society.

In hopes of mainstreaming our ideas, we must tolerate those who do not tolerate others, as difficult as it is. The way towards meaningful social change in regards to (insert your issue here), is a willingness to truly understand and even more importantly, to honestly consider opposing points of view.

As we liberals struggle to live the values we preach, we must remind ourselves we have much to learn from people who are different than ourselves. Call me idealistic, but my deepest hope is that all people, from all places on the political spectrum, can recognize the basic humanity that unites us all. Even liberals sometimes forget to look.

 (The views expressed above do not necessarily reflect the views of postdogma.com)

In Sunday’s New York Times, Nicholas Kristof defended evangelical Christians. He writes as follows:

Evangelicals are disproportionately likely to donate 10 percent of their incomes to charities, mostly church-related. More important, go to the front lines, at home or abroad, in the battles against hunger, malaria, prison rape, obstetric fistula, human trafficking or genocide, and some of the bravest people you meet are evangelical Christians (or conservative Catholics, similar in many ways) who truly live their faith.

..religious people and secular people alike do fantastic work on humanitarian issues — but they often don’t work together because of mutual suspicions. If we could bridge this “God gulf,” we would make far more progress on the world’s ills.

I think Kristof has a point not just about evangelicals, but about religious folks in general.

Even us atheists have to realize that religious folks do good works and are inspired by (the current incarnation of their) religion. Unfortunately, much of this inspiration is fear-related. Religious folks are inspired by fear of what God will do to them if they don’t do the right thing. That’s not real morality, it’s a theology of a Orwellian Thought-Policeman.

But we can realize that as irrational as we may understand various views of theirs to be and as much of their motivation is misguided, we can still certainly talk with them and work with them on issues. And some of their motivation is good. “Making the world closer to God’s vision” is sometimes just code for “making the world a better place”, something we can all agree to.

Sometimes their theologies of how to make the world a better place, however, are really really bad. The always-interesting Larry Tanner makes this point in a recent blog post about why we ought to criticize even religion in moderation: He notes that the “inherent conservatism hampers substantive debate on key social and political issues.”

So what do I think? I think we ought to be willing to work with the religious on all sorts of issues and both sides should be willing to express their views on religions. They can tell us why they think their religion is the one true religion and we can tell them why we’re skeptical. We can agree to disagree (and if they can’t do that, then we can defriend ‘em), even if we think they’re being ridiculous; you can’t force somebody to adopt your point of view. We can tell them exactly what it is that bothers us about religions and particularly, if we’re experienced with it, their religion. And we can listen. We can try to understand exactly the things they’re getting from these religions and how we can provide some of those things – spirituality and a feeling of inclusion, for example – to all sorts of folks, and not just those inclined toward meditation, say.

Some people might think this post is uber-controversial. Maybe I’m naïve, but I bet a lot of atheists would agree with most of it. Many of us do think there is room for aggressive critiques of religion, just as atheism itself has been attacked for centuries, and so we arrogate the right to so critique (this blog certainly won't shy away from such critiques. But if you look at the National Center for Science Education or various human rights organizations, they’re certainly willing to work with theologians of all stripes who are willing to work toward the common goals. So I actually see a lot of room to be optimistic about atheists loving and working with religious folks.