Dawkins: Religion equals 'child abuse'

WorldNetDaily ^ | 1/8/06

[LibWhacker]

Scientist compares Moses to Hitler, calls New Testament 'sado-masochistic doctrine'

Controversial scientist and evolutionist Richard Dawkins, dubbed "Darwin's Rottweiler," calls religion a "virus" and faith-based education "child abuse" in a two-part series he wrote and appears in that begins airing on the UK's Channel 4, beginning tomorrow evening.

Entitled "Root of All Evil?," the series features the atheist Dawkins visiting Lourdes, France, Colorado Springs, Colo., the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem and a British religious school, using each of the venues to argue religion subverts reason.

In "The God Delusion," the first film in the series, Dawkins targets Catholicism at the pilgrimage site in Lourdes. "If you want to experience the medieval rituals of faith, the candle light, the incense, music, important-sounding dead languages, nobody does it better than the Catholics," he says.

Dawkins, using his visit to Colorado Springs' New Life Church, criticizes conservative U.S. evangelicals and warns his audience of the influence of "Christian fascism" and "an American Taliban."

The backdrop of the al-Aqsa mosque and an American-born Jew turned fundamentalist Muslim who tells Dawkins to prepare for the Islamic world empire – and who clashes with him after saying he hates atheists – rounds out the first program's case for the delusions of the faithful.

In part two, "The Virus of Faith," Dawkins attacks the teaching of religion to children, calling it child abuse.

"Innocent children are being saddled with demonstrable falsehoods," he says. "It's time to question the abuse of childhood innocence with superstitious ideas of hellfire and damnation. Isn't it weird the way we automatically label a tiny child with its parents' religion?"

"Sectarian religious schools," Dawkins asserts, have been "deeply damaging" to generations of children.

Dawkins, who makes no effort to disguise his atheism and contempt for religion, focuses on the Bible, too.

"The God of the Old Testament has got to be the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous, and proud of it, petty, vindictive, unjust, unforgiving, racist," he says. Dawkins then criticizes Abraham, compares Moses to Hitler and Saddam Hussein, and calls the New Testament "St Paul's nasty, sado-masochistic doctrine of atonement for original sin."

John Deighan, a spokesman for the Catholic Church, took issue with Dawkin's denunciation of religion, telling the Glasgow Sunday Herald, "Dawkins is well known for his vitriolic attacks on faith, and I think faith has withstood his attacks. He really is going beyond his abilities as a scientist when he starts to venture into the field of philosophy and theology. He is the guy with demonstrable problems."

Madeline Bunting, a columnist for the Guardian, who reviewed the series, wrote: "There's an aggrieved frustration that [atheist humanists] have been short-changed by history – we were supposed to be all atheist rationalists by now. Secularization was supposed to be an inextricable part of progress. Even more grating, what secularization there has been is accompanied by the growth of weird irrationalities from crystals to ley lines. As G.K. Chesterton pointed out, the problem when people don't believe in God is not that they believe nothing, it is that they believe anything."

Dawkins, perhaps best know for his much-cited comment that evolution "made it possible to be an intellectually satisfied atheist," appeals to John Lennon in a commentary he authored for the Belfast Telegraph on the eve of his program's premiere: "Religion may not be the root of all evil, but it is a serious contender. Even so it could be justified, if only its claims were true. But they are undermined by science and reason. Imagine a world where nobody is intimidated against following reason, wherever it leads. "You may say I'm a dreamer. But I'm not the only one."

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Well there you go, that fittest intellectual god declaring what is and what is not to us mere lessor fit. After all is it not the 'mind' that is what is the superior and fittest in the evolutionary chain???"

When you go off on these random thoughts it really makes it hard to know what the heck you are talking about. The above has nothing to do with what I just posted to you. Please, if you are not going to respond to my posts, don't post anything.

" To pervert Christianity means it is no longer Christianity, what part of that does your brain not process."

So if you change it a little bit, is it still not Christianity? Since every denomination is a little bit different, which one is the TRUE Church?

[Little Ray]

Reason shows that a lot of people are "useless eaters" and that we'd be better off without them. And, of course, I am the one sufficiently reasonable to who should and who should not live. And if you disagree, you obviously should be a member of the second group.

No thanks. I'll stick with religion and sentimentality.

[r9etb]

I understand the implications of what I wrote;

Either you don't understand the implications of what you wrote, or you do. Either way, you come out looking bad.

why don't you actually say something and tell me what YOU think they are.

Hmmmmm. Let's see. You continue to harp on the idea that Hitler was a theist. You've been reminded many times that Hitler was insane (on which point you parse in a most Clintonian manner), and that his views cannot be taken as representative of theistic thought.

And yet you continue to harp on this. I think you're tarring theistic thought in general on the basis of your belief that Hitler was theistic.

To get a better idea of his views, let's post again the quote from Mein Kampf, which perhaps you missed:

"Man must not fall into the error of thinking that he was ever meant to become lord and master of Nature. A lopsided education has helped to encourage that illusion. Man must realize that a fundamental law of necessity reigns throughout the whole realm of Nature and that his existence is subject to the law of eternal struggle and strife. He will then feel that there cannot be a separate law for mankind in a world in which planets and suns follow their orbits, where moons and planets trace their destined paths, where the strong are always the masters of the weak and where those subject to such laws must obey them or be destroyed. Man must also submit to the eternal principles of this supreme wisdom. He may try to understand them but he can never free himself from their sway." -- Adolf Hitler

This was probably the sanest statement of his worldview -- written before his quack doctor started shooting him full of crap. No theism here, but a pretty good summary of Nazism in practice, and it's pretty Darwinian.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

" Hmmmmm. Let's see. You continue to harp on the idea that Hitler was a theist."

He was.

"You've been reminded many times that Hitler was insane (on which point you parse in a most Clintonian manner), and that his views cannot be taken as representative of theistic thought."

If he was insane, that means he didn't know the consequences of his actions. It's a legal term, not a medical one. I think he knew damn well what he was doing. He was evil, not insane. And I NEVER said his views were representative of theistic thought; I said the OPPOSITE.

"And yet you continue to harp on this. I think you're tarring theistic thought in general on the basis of your belief that Hitler was theistic."

I think you are willfully ignoring what I posted so you can knock down a strawman. I specifically said his views were not like 99% of theists.

"This was probably the sanest statement of his worldview -- written before his quack doctor started shooting him full of crap. No theism here, but a pretty good summary of Nazism in practice, and it's pretty Darwinian."

1) In Mein Kampf he time and time again states that the Aryan Race is the creation of God. Your quote does NOTHING to argue against that. You think that using a quote that happens not to mention God negates all the ones he did? THAT'S Clintonian.

2) There is NOTHING Darwinian about that quote. The idea of a struggle in nature predates Darwin and predates evolution. It is a fact of nature. The idea of competition for resources was also one of the foundations of capitalism.

[r9etb]

Uh huh. Read your posts again. I'm done talking with you.

[Just mythoughts]

You have the need to insult literacy and intelligence, pure markers for a 'fittest' mind.


"So if you change it a little bit, is it still not Christianity? Since every denomination is a little bit different, which one is the TRUE Church?"


Christ did not plant the seeds of denomination-ism. Now once again, Christ set the standard in the volume of the Book, that means from Genesis to Revelation. Perversion of Christianity that removes Christ from the 'religion' makes it a religion of man not of Christ thus not Christian. We are told that judgment begins in the House of the God. I am but a mere student nowhere near that level, yet I too will sit in judgment on that day.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

OK, you weren't up to the challenge.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"You have the need to insult literacy and intelligence, pure markers for a 'fittest' mind."

This is laughably ridiculous. I denigrated your reading comprehension because you posted something completely unrelated to my post. You STILL have shown ZERO understanding of what natural selection is, and what's limits are.

" Christ did not plant the seeds of denomination-ism"

So, another non-answer. If every denomination is a little bit different, and they believe things a little different, which one is the true Christianity? Are none of them Christian?

[azhenfud]

I'll take my chances believing the words of a much Higher Authority than Richard Dawkins.

After all, if I'm right, Dawkins and I will have our places before the same Judge one day, and I'd much prefer His favor than Dawkins'.

[r9etb]

Uh huh. And you're dishonest.

[JohnnyM]

Lets hope taking reason where it leads does not lead to the world Dawkins envisions, where criminals are treated as malfunctioning computers in need of repair and not punishment.

http://www.edge.org/q2006/q06_9.html

JM

[Tribune7]

It has been established beyond debate that Hitler's goal was the eradication of Christianity.

No informed, thinking, honest person can call Hitler a Christian of any stripe. By definition, he was an anti-christ.

[BlackElk]

1. Rush never posed as a scholar or as infallible.

2. Logical fallacies????? Right, chief! La Rand's tendency to write in the style which Whittaker Chambers called "To a gas chamber, go!!!!" is also a reflection of her character and her philosophical shortcomings.

3. La Rand's novels are OK for adolescents. She loses most of them when they grow up.

[BlackElk]

Gee, doesn't that sound like a Nietzschean super race theory that Hitler had there?????

[BlackElk]

Lest I forget, libertoonianism is NOT conservatism, much less is the "objectivism" of La Rand conservatism. Atheism is not conservatism either.

Rand sold many copies of Atlas Shrugged. Then again Dan Brown has sold many copies of trash like The DaVinci Code and some other dimmie sold many copies of The Celestine Prophecy. As Mencken famously observed: No one ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American people.

Popularizing bookseller but philosophical poseur and lightweight.

[BlackElk]

Just to be helpful: Mein Kampf.

[trisham]

"To what Christian church did Hitler belong? How often did he attend?"

Is that what makes someone a Christian?

"How does the definition of a "Christian" involve someone who "was not following the teachings of the Bible as we know them"?"

He believed that Jesus was the son of God. He also thought that Jesus was an Aryan warrior against the Jews; that's the perverted part of his theology. That is why, if you read what I said instead of posting without reading, you would know I said he was a Christian TO SOME EXTENT. He was also Evil. Does that mean I am saying that Christians are Hitler and that Christians are Evil? Only if you are a kindergarten level in logical thinking.

*************

You may have noticed that I didn't insult you in my post.

I would argue that calling Hitler a Christian is a gross exaggeration. Unlike you, I am not going to attribute anything personal to you regarding your choice to continue argue the point.

[r9etb]

Here is a direct link to the papers mentioned in the article.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Uh huh. And you're dishonest."

I told the truth, deal with it.

[Just mythoughts]

"This is laughably ridiculous. I denigrated your reading comprehension because you posted something completely unrelated to my post. You STILL have shown ZERO understanding of what natural selection is, and what's limits are."

Kinda like you continually putting a supposed Christian dress over the evil Hitler.



"So, another non-answer. If every denomination is a little bit different, and they believe things a little different, which one is the true Christianity? Are none of them Christian?"


Where would you like to start, what little thing have you in mind? There are some who try to put a Christian dress upon the little Toe yet Christ Himself is the key to what makes evolution against Him. Christ said He foretold us all things, yet He also said that it is not given for all to understand for their own protection.

Kinda puts it out of mere old flesh hands of passing on to the minds of the Heavenly Father's children who has eyes to see and ears to hear. Sure is not talking to a "natural" flesh mind.