I was saying that one should try to respect people even if one doesn't respect their opinions or think that they are treating something as an opinion which seems to you to be a fact.
I don't respect the opinion that gay people are terrible, and it would be hard for me to respect a person who felt that way, but I would honestly try to do so, because I think that it doesn't help anyone for me to disrespect that person even if I disrespect their opinion.
Where I have a problem with the modern atheist movement is that sometimes I think it encourages a wholesale scorn of all religions and all people who practice religions/believe in a god or something like that/aren't atheists. A very superior attitude is often taken which doesn't seem to net any actual good for anyone and probably actually causes harm both to the atheist cause and to interpersonal relationships.
Like I said above, I was taught to disrespect "stupid" people by my parents and spent years of my childhood really believing that I was somehow "better" because I had better grades or a higher IQ or more achievements, etc. But in recent years, and partly as a result of spiritual exploration perhaps not coincidentally, I have come to believe that thinking myself better, wiser, more intelligent than others and spending time looking down at other people is a toxic behavior. It leads to alienating other people, concentrating on differences when I could concentrate on similarities and actually feeling worse and alienated myself.
I'm not a huge Obama fan (I voted for him, but you probably know Kucinich is my real favorite), but he is very big on being a "uniter" and everyone seems really into this energy right now of working together. The point I'm making here is simply that while I don't disagree significantly with the modern atheist movement in their ideas or even their aims (I think it's very important to separate church and state, church and education), I do disagree with the approach often presented and the across-the-board vilification of all religions and patronizing attitude towards religious/spiritual individuals. I don't think it helps achieve atheist political aims, nor do I think it encourages a truly healthy debate, and I think it ends up making what could be a dynamic, positive intellectual movement into a force of negativity.
To clarify, for me respecting an individual whose opinions you don't agree with would involve stepping back and imagining that that person has reasons for believing/thinking the way they do, giving them the benefit of the doubt and imagining that they have thought issues through and perhaps being curious about what their thought processes are/engaging in discussion, and, if upon further examination you feel that they just aren't thinking things through, letting that go and finding some other point of connection with the person, rather than wasting time calling these people "stupid."
All the great movements for change have concentrated on finding common ground and working together with diverse groups of people. One of the main complaints with religion is that it is judgmental and divisive. All I'm saying is that atheism can also be judgmental and divisive, and just because there is better evidence for it, doesn't mean that there should be any less concern with building a kind world capable of progressing together.
I guess what I'm saying is - is it more important to prove one's self right and superior and have fun laughing at religious people getting annoyed or is it important to build connections with moderate religious people in order to achieve ends such as separating church and state or simply building a better world in general.
For all they're hyped, religious fundamentalists aren't in the majority and there are plenty of religious people out there willing to have a dialogue about a non-Christianified nation if people reach out with kindness.
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2009-02-11 04:28 am (UTC)I was saying that one should try to respect people even if one doesn't respect their opinions or think that they are treating something as an opinion which seems to you to be a fact.
I don't respect the opinion that gay people are terrible, and it would be hard for me to respect a person who felt that way, but I would honestly try to do so, because I think that it doesn't help anyone for me to disrespect that person even if I disrespect their opinion.
Where I have a problem with the modern atheist movement is that sometimes I think it encourages a wholesale scorn of all religions and all people who practice religions/believe in a god or something like that/aren't atheists. A very superior attitude is often taken which doesn't seem to net any actual good for anyone and probably actually causes harm both to the atheist cause and to interpersonal relationships.
Like I said above, I was taught to disrespect "stupid" people by my parents and spent years of my childhood really believing that I was somehow "better" because I had better grades or a higher IQ or more achievements, etc. But in recent years, and partly as a result of spiritual exploration perhaps not coincidentally, I have come to believe that thinking myself better, wiser, more intelligent than others and spending time looking down at other people is a toxic behavior. It leads to alienating other people, concentrating on differences when I could concentrate on similarities and actually feeling worse and alienated myself.
I'm not a huge Obama fan (I voted for him, but you probably know Kucinich is my real favorite), but he is very big on being a "uniter" and everyone seems really into this energy right now of working together. The point I'm making here is simply that while I don't disagree significantly with the modern atheist movement in their ideas or even their aims (I think it's very important to separate church and state, church and education), I do disagree with the approach often presented and the across-the-board vilification of all religions and patronizing attitude towards religious/spiritual individuals. I don't think it helps achieve atheist political aims, nor do I think it encourages a truly healthy debate, and I think it ends up making what could be a dynamic, positive intellectual movement into a force of negativity.
To clarify, for me respecting an individual whose opinions you don't agree with would involve stepping back and imagining that that person has reasons for believing/thinking the way they do, giving them the benefit of the doubt and imagining that they have thought issues through and perhaps being curious about what their thought processes are/engaging in discussion, and, if upon further examination you feel that they just aren't thinking things through, letting that go and finding some other point of connection with the person, rather than wasting time calling these people "stupid."
All the great movements for change have concentrated on finding common ground and working together with diverse groups of people. One of the main complaints with religion is that it is judgmental and divisive. All I'm saying is that atheism can also be judgmental and divisive, and just because there is better evidence for it, doesn't mean that there should be any less concern with building a kind world capable of progressing together.
I guess what I'm saying is - is it more important to prove one's self right and superior and have fun laughing at religious people getting annoyed or is it important to build connections with moderate religious people in order to achieve ends such as separating church and state or simply building a better world in general.
For all they're hyped, religious fundamentalists aren't in the majority and there are plenty of religious people out there willing to have a dialogue about a non-Christianified nation if people reach out with kindness.