Religion, what's the point?

Raoul said:
:lol: "Mr. Definitely, can I call you that"?

Hitchens would've humiliated Affleck if he was on that panel.
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Hitchens was a world famous journalist who's travel's the world and has been to all 3 the axes of evil countries , so what they decide to do when he's on the show is for him to explain to MOS fecking DEF why Iran having nuclear weapons might not be such a good idea.

Still was worth it though. (Joe Rogan described it as Christopher Hitchens taking Mos Def into an intellectual pool and drowning him.)

I'm guess that just like Affleck(Affleck seemed surprised when Harris said he well educated on Islam)Mos Def had no idea who Hitchens was(Hitchens clearly had no fecking idea who Mos Def was). You would think if your a celebrity or someone who doesn't debate for a living then you do some research about who's on the panel and the topics that might be come.
 
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I think Affleck came into the interview with an obvious dislike for Harris, probably from following his prior work. Whatever Affleck was on obviously didn't help.
 
PedroMendez said:
the intellectual contribution of the late Hitch (all charism aside) is non existent. His opinion is simplistic nonsense.
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Possibly because you disagree with it ? His views have been well chronicled on far more serious debates than this one.
 
Raoul said:
Possibly because you disagree with it ? His views have been well chronicled on far more serious debates than this one.
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Needless to say that I disagree. I saw enough debates with Hitchens and know his ideas. There are opinions that I dont share and still respect, because they are grounded on facts and reason and there are plane stupid opinions.

Hitchens idea of the world was, that Islam is the one big evil and everything associated with it should be bombed. He was wrong with almost every prediction about the Iraq and Afghanistan and even his biggest fans should see that his opinions about the Islam/ME are at least overly simplistic.
I always gave him some credit for supporting the kurds. Sadly, in his blind hate, he didnt realize that his beloved US government didnt and doesnt give a damn about them and sold them out in several occasions.

The discussion with MosDef illustrates fairly well my point. You cant just ignore any context and break the whole thing down to: Iran=evil theocracy. evil theocracy + nuclear weapons = end of the world. Sorry, thats just not good enough. Anyone calling this "drowning MosDef in an intellectual pool", has remarkable low standards. Sometimes the world is just a bit more complex.
 
PedroMendez said:
Needless to say that I disagree. I saw enough debates with Hitchens and know his ideas. There are opinions that I dont share and still respect, because they are grounded on facts and reason and there are plane stupid opinions.

Hitchens idea of the world was, that Islam is the one big evil and everything associated with it should be bombed. He was wrong with almost every prediction about the Iraq and Afghanistan and even his biggest fans should see that his opinions about the Islam/ME are at least overly simplistic.
I always gave him some credit for supporting the kurds. Sadly, in his blind hate, he didnt realize that his beloved US government didnt and doesnt give a damn about them and sold them out in several occasions.

The discussion with MosDef illustrates fairly well my point. You cant just ignore any context and break the whole thing down to: Iran=evil theocracy. evil theocracy + nuclear weapons = end of the world. Sorry, thats just not good enough. Anyone calling this "drowning MosDef in an intellectual pool", has remarkable low standards. Sometimes the world is just a bit more complex.
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Hitchens was a neo-atheist polemicist (among other things). I don't think he favored bombing muslim countries because he was an atheist. Much of his support for the Iraq war came out of his relationship with Jalal Talabani, who at the time was presumably for it as well.

As for Harris, Hitchens, Dawkins and the like - their criticisms are spot on. I'd say most free thinking secular people would have a problem with the vile reaction to the Danish cartoons, among many other similar issues where people's lives are threatened after they exercise their freedom of expression.
 
Hitchens was in favour of any military intervention in the middle east. He supported the war in afghanistan, Irak and Lybia. He advocated for military actions against Iran and he´d love the idea of invading Syria or any other country in this geographic area. He also loved the idea of "democratising" this region of the world in an almost paternalistic manner. He also thought that military force was the best and only way to achieve this change. He also completely neglected or justified any commited cruelty or mistake by "hey, islam is worse; we had no other choice". I am fairly certain that he would be in favour of nuking Iran, if that would ensure that they dont get nuclear weapons themselves.

In the end he was more radical in his ideology than any neo-con. He also refused to acknowledge reality in his last years. In the end he was stuck on repeat, while the reality around him already proved him wrong. If I have time during the next week, I´ll look up his predictions about Irak and Afghanistan. They were almost exclusively wrong.

That obviously doesnt mean that he was wrong with everything. The one thing that hitchens was spot on about is, that criticism towards religion/islam shouldnt be toned down just because people might be offended by it. We need far far far far far far far far more critical thinking and outspoken criticism in the world, not less. The idea that you shouldnt attack an idea just because someone might get offended by it is ridiculous. He loved to insult core values/ideas/beliefs of people and I quite liked that.
 
PedroMendez said:
Hitchens was in favour of any military intervention in the middle east. He supported the war in afghanistan, Irak and Lybia. He advocated for military actions against Iran and he´d love the idea of invading Syria or any other country in this geographic area. He also loved the idea of "democratising" this region of the world in an almost paternalistic manner. He also thought that military force was the best and only way to achieve this change. He also completely neglected or justified any commited cruelty or mistake by "hey, islam is worse; we had no other choice". I am fairly certain that he would be in favour of nuking Iran, if that would ensure that they dont get nuclear weapons themselves.

In the end he was more radical in his ideology than any neo-con. He also just refused to acknowledge reality in his last years. If I have time during the next week, I´ll look up his predictions about Irak and Afghanistan. They were almost exclusively wrong.

That obviously doesnt mean that he was wrong with anything he said. The one thing that hitchens was spot on about is, that criticism towards religion/islam shouldnt be toned down just because people might be offended by it. We need far far far far far far far far more critical thinking and outspoken criticism in the world, not less. The idea that you shouldnt attack an idea just because someone might get offended by it is ridiculous. He loved to insult core values/ideas/beliefs of people and I quite liked that.
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I think you're grossly overreacting to his positions, which were basically fairly critical of religion. No one would agree that he would favor nuking Iran, even if he may have polemically alluded to it (which he may well not have). The truth is his criticisms of Islam, Catholicism, fundamentalist bible belt Christianity in the USA, and others, were grounded in a belief that religion is a poisonous construct that degrades the quality of human life in many areas, especially for women, gays, unbelievers, and any group who resist the patriarchal control of religious elites. Can't argue with any of that.
 
You can chose to ignore it, but he was outspokenly in favour of all military interventions in the middle east. I am also not overstating any of his positions regarding religion. He hated religion and thought that it "poisons everything". Its almost impossible to be more critical towards religion. I have little problem with his extreme views about religion so. I share most of his sentiment.
 
The region is a basket case and doubly so where reigious ideology replaces democratic governance.

I think the problem is that that the desired outcomes of military action can't be achieved by military action in the main because they just remove what was there without really addressing what comes next. Much of the region is so used to dictatorships, religious or secular, that the move to democracy is particularly difficult. As we have witnessed extreme religious loons often step in to fill the void.
 
Raoul said:
I think you're grossly overreacting to his positions, which were basically fairly critical of religion. No one would agree that he would favor nuking Iran, even if he may have polemically alluded to it (which he may well not have). The truth is his criticisms of Islam, Catholicism, fundamentalist bible belt Christianity in the USA, and others, were grounded in a belief that religion is a poisonous construct that degrades the quality of human life in many areas, especially for women, gays, unbelievers, and any group who resist the patriarchal control of religious elites. Can't argue with any of that.
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Spot on Raoul.
 
Raoul said:
I think you're grossly overreacting to his positions, which were basically fairly critical of religion. No one would agree that he would favor nuking Iran, even if he may have polemically alluded to it (which he may well not have). The truth is his criticisms of Islam, Catholicism, fundamentalist bible belt Christianity in the USA, and others, were grounded in a belief that religion is a poisonous construct that degrades the quality of human life in many areas, especially for women, gays, unbelievers, and any group who resist the patriarchal control of religious elites. Can't argue with any of that.
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I think he is wrong in that.

Would you argue that all Muslims are extremists, so that must be eradicated? If not, why would you generalize religion hate in principle, yet exempt muslim hate in specific?
Not all Muslims are terrorist. Similarly not all religious people are backward nutcases. It is those who misuse it that cause a stain to the bigger community.

I would support you on many instances wherein I disagree with the 'organized religious' groups stance, but that does not in any way make religion obsolete.
 
Edgar Allan Pillow said:
I think he is wrong in that.

Would you argue that all Muslims are extremists, so that must be eradicated? If not, why would you generalize religion hate in principle, yet exempt muslim hate in specific?
Not all Muslims are terrorist. Similarly not all religious people are backward nutcases. It is those who misuse it that cause a stain to the bigger community.

I would support you on many instances wherein I disagree with the 'organized religious' groups stance, but that does not in any way make religion obsolete.
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I'd say its important to differentiate hate with identifying bad ideas. I don't hate religion, nor do I believe Harris and Dawkins do, nor did Hitchens. I do agree with Harris' view that one religion in particular has a significantly higher level of radicalization than others, where he talks about the concentric circles of Islam in the video on the previous page. For me, not only is the logic behind the Abrahamic religions illegitimate and deeply flawed; its simply offensive that modern human society not only tolerates but still promotes moral and cultural values based on ancient mysticism, which by the way are probably still the fundamental driver of inequity in the world today. Thus today's Neo-Athiests and their ilk are absolutely justified in highlighting that such ideas are archaic and self-destructive to human society. Something a coked up Ben Affleck apparently disagreed with.
 
Raoul said:
I'd say its important to differentiate hate with identifying bad ideas. I don't hate religion, nor do I believe Harris and Dawkins do, nor did Hitchens. I do agree with Harris' view that one religion in particular has a significantly higher level of radicalization than others, where he talks about the concentric circles of Islam in the video on the previous page. For me, not only is the logic behind the Abrahamic religions illegitimate and deeply flawed; its simply offensive that modern human society not only tolerates but still promotes moral and cultural values based on ancient mysticism, which by the way are probably still the fundamental driver of inequity in the world today. Thus today's Neo-Athiests and their ilk are absolutely justified in highlighting that such ideas are archaic and self-destructive to human society. Something a coked up Ben Affleck apparently disagreed with.
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I usually try not to post on CE when drunk, but I'll get back after a long time to this thread.

It is not correct in judging religion at present and ignoring its history. So you point on one religion becoming more radical than others becomes just comparative than Christianity and Crusades. After all the witch burning and intolerable cruelty committed which I would say even pales the current Islamic extremists. Should we have called Christianity as a extremist religion and meted out the same judgement as Harris on current Islam? Surely time has proven otherwise!
Secondly I believe that you are confusing with values and mysticism. The core values of religion are not based on mysticism. In my opinion mysticism is added to bring enforce religion and it's adherence. When these mysticism takes precedence over the values themselves, it is a concern....but again given time, I believe the values would reinforce themselves as we see with Christianity now.
 
I'll have to watch that Affleck video again when I'm not in work, I skim watched it once and found myself fully agreeing with Affleck, the two on the right came across to me like complete cnuts playing the whole 'all Muslims are evil because they all believe you should die if you leave the religion' which they clearly don't, based on a poll that contradicts other polls. so I thought Affleck was 100% right to say what about the billion other people who are nothing like you say. Having read the comments here I'm surprised, maybe I missed something.
 
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Zarlak said:
I'll have to watch that Affleck video again when I'm not in work, I skim watched it once and found myself fully agreeing with Affleck, the two on the right came across to me like complete cnuts playing the whole 'all Muslims are evil because they all believe you should die if you leave the religion' which they clearly don't, based on a poll that contradicts other polls. so I thought Affleck was 100% right to say what about the billion other people who are nothing like you say. Having read the comments here I'm surprised, maybe I missed something.
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I'm on the same boat. Watched it quickly when I woke up but to me it seemed like Affleck had a point. I mean the guy said something like 78% of muslims believed the danish cartoonist should be prosecuted so most muslims are bad but then again, 92% of the israeli public think that bombing gaza is correct so does that mean all jews are bad? I don't really want to get into a political debate here as it's one of those things that really annoys me but the bad name Islam gets because of extremist groups is astonishing.
 
Dirty Schwein said:
I'm on the same boat. Watched it quickly when I woke up but to me it seemed like Affleck had a point. I mean the guy said something like 78% of muslims believed the danish cartoonist should be prosecuted so most muslims are bad but then again, 92% of the israeli public think that bombing gaza is correct so does that mean all jews are bad? I don't really want to get into a political debate here as it's one of those things that really annoys me but the bad name Islam gets because of extremist groups is astonishing.
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His point about the 78% was the figure and the country the poll was conducted in. Nearly 4/5 British Muslims thought that the Danish cartoonist should be prosecuted.
 
Even if Affleck had any salient points it was difficult to comprehend because he resorted to talking over people, shouting and then when all that failed, just saying they hate black people. That's not the way you get your point across.

I think @Raoul has been spot on with his replies too.
 
Dirty Schwein said:
I'm on the same boat. Watched it quickly when I woke up but to me it seemed like Affleck had a point. I mean the guy said something like 78% of muslims believed the danish cartoonist should be prosecuted so most muslims are bad but then again, 92% of the israeli public think that bombing gaza is correct so does that mean all jews are bad? I don't really want to get into a political debate here as it's one of those things that really annoys me but the bad name Islam gets because of extremist groups is astonishing.
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I didn't interpret it as such - he simply made the point that about 80% of British Muslims wanted the Danish cartoon guy prosecuted, which if true, is truly shocking.

A few more rather unnerving stats:

78% of Muslims thought that the publishers of the Danish cartoons of the Prophet Muhammed should be prosecuted

68% thought those who insulted Islam should be prosecuted and 62% of people disagree that freedom of speech should be allowed even if it insults and offends religious groups.

22% disagreed that religious leaders who supported terrorism should be removed
 
Raoul said:
I didn't interpret it as such - he simply made the point that about 80% of British Muslims wanted the Danish cartoon guy prosecuted, which if true, is truly shocking.

A few more rather unnerving stats:

78% of Muslims thought that the publishers of the Danish cartoons of the Prophet Muhammed should be prosecuted

68% thought those who insulted Islam should be prosecuted and 62% of people disagree that freedom of speech should be allowed even if it insults and offends religious groups.

22% disagreed that religious leaders who supported terrorism should be removed
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I only find the last bit shocking, the one you posted in bold. The Danish response is in no way that different from Vatican reaction to Da Vinci code or even the hindu reaction to MF Hussain's paintings. It is something people deeply believe in and not something to be poked fun of. The editors have the right to publish and the public have the right to protest. Nothing wrong in either side.

The debate on where one person's rights end when other person's begin is highly subjective. More so as in freedom of speecy and any rights movement (religion, race, sex etc). Polls runs on the aftermath of public incidents are highly skewed and would not represent the normal as people vote on emotional swings.

The last one is definitely a shocker and needs to be dealt with...and no surprise it is completely ignored without any followup!
 
Edgar Allan Pillow said:
I only find the last bit shocking, the one you posted in bold. The Danish response is in no way that different from Vatican reaction to Da Vinci code or even the hindu reaction to MF Hussain's paintings. It is something people deeply believe in and not something to be poked fun of. The editors have the right to publish and the public have the right to protest. Nothing wrong in either side.

The debate on where one person's rights end when other person's begin is highly subjective. More so as in freedom of speecy and any rights movement (religion, race, sex etc). Polls runs on the aftermath of public incidents are highly skewed and would not represent the normal as people vote on emotional swings.

The last one is definitely a shocker and needs to be dealt with...and no surprise it is completely ignored without any followup!
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The right to protest differs from prosecution. If the Vatican had encouraged people to kill Dan Brown, maybe.
 
Raoul said:
I didn't interpret it as such - he simply made the point that about 80% of British Muslims wanted the Danish cartoon guy prosecuted, which if true, is truly shocking.

A few more rather unnerving stats:

78% of Muslims thought that the publishers of the Danish cartoons of the Prophet Muhammed should be prosecuted

68% thought those who insulted Islam should be prosecuted and 62% of people disagree that freedom of speech should be allowed even if it insults and offends religious groups.

22% disagreed that religious leaders who supported terrorism should be removed
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All terrible statistics, they should be challenged each on its on merits and I regularly do so in arguments with family etc.

The worst of all is the spread of conspiracy theorism (not sure among Muslims per se or if its mainly with Pakistan-British), particularly with things like anti-semitic New world order type of stuff and all the other "inside job" kind of nonsense which too should be challenged. British Muslims I find are batshit crazy on many issues and and with a completely different mentality to say, American Muslims or even Muslims worldwide.

A lot of it is social media and the way people consume information, now it through a filter which reinforces their narrow-minded worldview. That being said many of them still, downright lovely people, just a warped stupid view of politics which should be challenged not by force but by arguments/dialogue.
 
Silva said:
If even they were it doesn't justify them. Not to mention too many Muslims take Muhammad way too seriously, the woman who was prosecuted for having a teddy bear of the same name comes to mind.
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That was in Sudan, on the main point I agree. But a lot of Muslim organisations in Britain, such as the Muslim council of Britain and many Muslims human rights activists condemned it for deying common sense (which is did) and pressured the Sudanese government in releasing her.
 
Silva said:
If even they were it doesn't justify them. Not to mention too many Muslims take Muhammad way too seriously, the woman who was prosecuted for having a teddy bear of the same name comes to mind.
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Now you are moving into thought policing, on how much seriousness one can have on a topic! Different perspectives, maybe not as important to you as it is to them.
 
Edgar Allan Pillow said:
Now you are moving into thought policing, on how much seriousness one can have on a topic! Different perspectives, maybe not as important to you as it is to them.
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I'm not. They're welcome to say people should be prosecuted for it, but I'm going to point out the lunacy in that every time they do.

Wolverine said:
That was in Sudan, on the main point I agree. But a lot of Muslim organisations in Britain, such as the Muslim council of Britain and many Muslims human rights activists condemned it for deying common sense (which is did) and pressured the Sudanese government in releasing her.
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Well yeah, regardless of religion people in more developed countries will be more moderate. It was the main point I was trying to make though, the example is just a good illustration of that.
 
I've brought up the point on here that Holocaust denial (as ignorant and stupid as it is, given the overwhelming evidence supporting it) is a crime in several European countries.
 
Is there any major religion today that doesn't owe some if not a large part of it's spread to the use of violence against those who beleived otherwise? Certainly Christianity and Islam do. Not sure about the various other religions.
 
adexkola said:
I've brought up the point on here that Holocaust denial (as ignorant and stupid as it is, given the overwhelming evidence supporting it) is a crime in several European countries.
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Yeah, I don't think that should be the case either. If someone denies the holocaust it should just be used as an indicator of how much of a dickhead they are. But it's at least slightly understandable given the holocaust is a very recent event in Europe's history.
 
Raoul said:
I didn't interpret it as such - he simply made the point that about 80% of British Muslims wanted the Danish cartoon guy prosecuted, which if true, is truly shocking.

A few more rather unnerving stats:

78% of Muslims thought that the publishers of the Danish cartoons of the Prophet Muhammed should be prosecuted

68% thought those who insulted Islam should be prosecuted and 62% of people disagree that freedom of speech should be allowed even if it insults and offends religious groups.

22% disagreed that religious leaders who supported terrorism should be removed
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I can assure you that many many British Muslims think this is complete horse shit. It's likely another poll that interviewed 100 people and claimed to represent the thoughts of almost 3 million.
 
Zarlak said:
I can assure you that many many British Muslims think this is complete horse shit. It's likely another poll that interviewed 100 people and claimed to represent the thoughts of almost 3 million.
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That's how polls work. The people who do them are good at getting a representative sample.
 
Silva said:
I don't see what's wrong with that. If we just went by the people we know in real life I'd be telling you that most Muslims vote for the green party, but that would blatantly be wrong.
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The moment you begin to extrapolate you must accept that it ceases to be a fact, and is merely an assumption, an estimate, a guess that may or may not actually be true because you lack the evidence to prove it is.

As long as that is acknowledged, rather than disregarded in favour of pretending that the assumption is fact, then it's okay.
 
Zarlak said:
The moment you begin to extrapolate you must accept that it ceases to be a fact, and is merely an assumption, an estimate, a guess that may or may not actually be true because you lack the evidence to prove it is.

As long as that is acknowledged, rather than disregarded in favour of pretending that the assumption is fact, then it's okay.
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What a strange post. What do you think the purpose of polls is if not extrapolation?
 
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