Bonjour, canard
It’s kind of the friendly people at the “Battle of Ideas” (some of whom are also the people at the Institute of Ideas, some of whom are also the people at Spiked, some of whom are also the people who used to be Living Marxism and the Revolutionary Communist Party) to offer up a neat example of the backlash against gnu atheism just when the New Humanist posts online the article I wrote for the next issue, on that very subject. Caspar Melville invited me to write it in reply to his article on the new atheism at Comment is Free. Honorable!
As for David Bowden of the Battle of Ideas…well, he’s all too typical of that backlash.
Claims of heresy, iconoclasm and blasphemy in days gone by have now given way to the language of offence, with both sides equally guilty. Everything from cartoons of the Prophet Muhammed to ice cream adverts depicting pregnant nuns get censored, often pre-emptively, for fear of offending religious groups; yet militant secularists call for the Pope to be refused entry to the country on the grounds he offends victims of child abuse, sexism and homophobia.
Bullshit. Secularists and others call for the pope not to be invited on a state visit on the grounds that he is a criminal for being one of the Vatican officials who protected child-raping priests from the police. Secularists and others strongly criticize the pope for his illiberal anti-egalitarian views and pronouncements on women and gays as well as for his lethal pronouncements on condom use and his church’s ruthlessly lethal policy on abortion (better a woman should die than that a fetus should be aborted). That goes way beyond being “offended,” and Bowden probably knows it. This “both sides equally guilty” crap is just formulaic and lazy.
In their perceived role as guardians of European secular liberalism against the growth of Muslim communities across Europe, it seems that many New Atheists are now compromising the very principles of religious tolerance fundamental [to] this tradition. Secularism should be about allowing individuals and communities to live by their own values without official interference.
Bullshit, again. Secularism should not be about “allowing individuals and communities to live by their own values” without any qualifications at all. If the “values” in question include child marriage, or no education for girls, or no medical treatment for illness or injury, or mass suicide, for example, communities should not be allowed to live by them, and adult individuals should not be allowed to impose them on their children.
However what we are now seeing is the bizarre rise of illiberal liberals, where so-called “liberals” assert their right to micro-manage every aspect of individuals’ lives, from the clothes and symbols people wear, to the talks they choose to attend.
No we’re not. We are now seeing lots of people, of different views and allegiances, confronting some of the difficulties of simply “allowing individuals and communities to live by their own values without official interference.” We see few if any liberals asserting their right to micro-manage every aspect of individuals’ lives. That’s a canard, and as such, it’s satisfyingly typical of the backlash.
Funny, I would say that the true “illiberal liberals” are the types who say that FGM is just fine and dandy because it’s part of some people’s traditional culture, and that it’s chauvinistic cultural imperialism to suggest that maybe lopping off little girls’ body parts is not such a good idea.
In fairness, I share much of Bowden’s discomfort with the French burqa ban, as well as his concern that some elements of the Gnu Atheism are teetering on the edge between appropriate condemnation of Islam vs. an essentially xenophobic intolerance.
Most of the article is pure strawman though.
Indeed. It’s not generally the liberals who promote burka-bans or protest where mosques can or can’t be built.
Well, I think I’d describe it as a really big gap of Grand Canyon proportions before I’d call it an “edge”.
That comment editor has too many buttons.
It’s great actually, I swear I hit Preview.
I don’t think he understands what secular means… It’s just the state of being separate from religion. Having a secular state is, if I were still religious, would be on my front-burner of wants. Last thing I want is to live the religious wars of Europe’s past or the Mid-East and Indochina’s present.
If I were still religious, the last thing I want is having to follow the doctrine of the Catholic Church or the Mormon Church, or the Scientologists… Or whatever religion came out on top…
Following “Bonjour,” the word “canard” confused me for a moment. G’day, duck? ;-)
It fits neatly into the dialectic narrative to place uber atheist toss-pots into the same category as Bush or Blair or Geert Wilders, because we seem to disapprove of those poor oppressed proletariats. But yeah, I can understand how he bought a straw bale, untied it, and then made for himself a scarecrow.
But no, that’s not why we argue against the Pope or religion in general. Go pick up God Is Not Great by Christopher Hitchens, your comrade, and he’ll explain to you precisely why uber atheists are angry at the Pope and religion and why we’re not attacking poor ignorant muslims, but their unenlightened ignorant and dangerous religious beliefs that threaten your freedoms as much as mine.
I enjoyed Jenny Turner’s article, it was filled with prose perfection.
I also like the conflation of “New Atheists” with “liberals”. Sadly, not all Gnus are liberals, and as I’m sure everyone will be shocked to learn, liberals often vehemently disagree with each other over issues (check out any of the burqa articles written by Ebon’s guest contributor Sarah over at Daylight Atheism; she compares the French Burqa Ban to the US Civil Rights Act. The comment section gets interesting). But hey, let’s just call New Atheists illiberal and call it a day!
Je m’apelle Monsieur Canard. Comment allez vous?
[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Skeptic South Africa, Ophelia Benson. Ophelia Benson said: Bonjour, canard http://dlvr.it/6d362 […]
This is the Spiked mo: ridiculous belief X is wrong. Yet strawman Y is also wrong! Ergo: we rule, anti-human shits…
I don’t know if the Pope is guilty of the charges laid against him but I think they hold him blameful for more serious offences than, er – offending victims of abuse.
Confusion between liberal and libertarian?
Michael –
Spiked! have yet to find something that they can’t dub “liberal” and disparage…
Aaaargraargagh! Was my general frustrated response to this. It’s so easy and ever so fashionable, it seems, to suggest that the religious fundamentalists and new atheists are both as bad as each other, said with an insouciant wave of the hand as though the author is suggesting something established and uncontroversial, but it lacks so much basic thought.
Cannot he see the difference between these two things? Really? It’s a simple difference between ideas and beliefs, which are owned by no-one and can be used by anyone, and the actual, hateful, divisive and dangerous pronouncements of a real-life man whom millions take very seriously; he doesn’t merely ‘offend’ in this trivialised way.
I think the more pertinent way of putting it is the reverse: secularism is about maintaining neutral public spaces without the interference of individuals and communities and their particular and peculiar values. It’s why this bit: “…so-called “liberals” assert their right to micro-manage every aspect of individuals’ lives, from the clothes and symbols people wear, to the talks they choose to attend” demonstrates the misunderstanding it does – most people aren’t bothered about what people wear, but they are bothered if people think they can wear items that go against rules (jewellery in schools or on airport workers) because they happen to subscribe to a specific set of personal beliefs. It’s the same point about Christian B&B owners: it’s only their home in some circumstances; if they are setting up a B&B it ceases to be ‘just’ their home and becomes something open for public use, and if this is the case it needs to treat all of the public in a fair, neutral way.
To the extent that Spiked! is an attempt to carry forward the Living Marxism project, and as was pointed out some of the same people are involved, it is doing what Living Marxism always did, which is to identify what its political competitors (as opposed to opponents) were saying, and then say the opposite. They were a fascinating bunch, with some fascinating positions. Still are, and still often worth reading.
In this particular case they have decided that the secularist opposition to religious privilege is in fact “anti-humanist”, and that it is more “humanist” to embrace reactionary Catholicism a la Ratzinger and condemn its opponents. They probably imagine that this is a deliciously marketable and sexy contrary stance to take, rather than objectively conservative and itself reactionary.
They give the impression of having panicked at the sight of >10,000 people protesting Ratzinger and decided it was merely “liberal Paisleyism” or something.
Now, I think there is a strain of populist anti-religiosity which is politically naive and perhaps also conservative in some of its social attitudes (anti-Muslim in a kind of nationalistic, cultural-Christian, loyalist sense, if you like, too). I would add my voice in criticism.
But Spiked! are here just demonstrating that they just don’t understand what’s going on at all.
I do think our critics have a thorough misundestanding of what liberty is. We’re not imposing our non-beliefs on people, we’re against beliefs being opposed on people. I think the left or far-left and the far-right both have the opposite idea: that liberty must be imposed on people, for their own good. I don’t think we have any political associations other than being for liberty in a negative sense, while accepting some necessary rule of law apply, namely human rights.
Secularism, for us, means negative freedom, unrestricted freedom to say, think, feel, but to fully acknowledge that to do what we want must not impose or restrict or harm the freedom of others.
For *us* yes. But secularism exists in more than one form. In some countries, secularism means regulating religion, the state employing priests etc. When in the nineteenth century Charles Bradlaugh criticised French secularists for going too far, he was drawing attention to an argument among secularists, not just between secularists and their critics. I guess we’re still having those arguments, with the same countries!
There are secularists out there who want to ban things. Spiked! would have performed a useful service if they had supported a libertarian secularism and opposed it to illiberal statist secularism. But that’s not what they did.
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G – well yes! The canard thing was just a little late morning joke, and grab at a surrealist title. So yeah, g’day duck.
@Dan
I’m pretty sure secular countries are regulating religion in the positive sense. That there is always a restriction on all people on what they can do, for example people are not allowed to murder other people, or walk around naked in public. And in a sense, that is also about wearing the Burka, it’s not a restriction on negative liberty, but on positive liberty. It can be justified because the positive liberty of wearing the burka restricts on the negative liberty of others, because it can produce fear or can be a security hazard.
But what is really disturbing about what is happening in Europe is the restrictions on negative liberty (freedoms to think, feel, speak) such as hate laws. Such laws go against liberty in a profound way.
As for libertarianism, I hope you understand how positive liberty can and frequently does restrict on the liberties of others, hence why positive liberty can not be unrestricted.
G – well yes! The canard thing was just a little late morning joke, and grab at a surrealist title. So yeah, g’day duck.
What could be more illiberal than allowing “communities” to oppress their memebers in the name of tradition? Didn’t we used to call that conservatism?
We used to call that ‘life’; then we started to know better. Or apparently not.
The desperate pretence that coercion is simply a matter of aesthetics is one of the more obvious ways that liberals who are scared rather than tolerant hide the fact that there is a problem from themselves.
It’s also not an argument. It’s merely an observation—and indeed, an erroneous one.
dirigible, quite – except that the I of I people aren’t liberals. I don’t think they would even call themselves liberals. They’re a weird kind of authoritarian libertarian.
@Egbert:
I don’t buy a black and white distinction between “positive” and “negative” liberty (I don’t necessarily say there is no distinction).
Look at Turkey. Constitutionally secular, it in fact regulates religion through a Department of Religious Affairs. As for France, well see for example http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_France#Third_Republic.
I understand the arguments. I disagree with them. If we prohibit everything which “produces fear”, then we’d be prohibiting atheism, in many places. I think we have to be more robust that that. In security terms, there are ways of dealing with that which are not prohibition. I also think you don’t uphold women’s rights by locking them up, which is also why I oppose the criminalisation of prostitution.
But I don’t want to get into the argument about all this here.
Well yes, they do. But are “hate laws” worse than your “fear laws”?
I don’t know anybody – even anarchists – who think that people should be able to do whatever they want. There’s a contradiction in the very concept. But it’s one thing to sit here and say “ah yes, of course positive liberty can not be unrestricted”, and it’s another to come up with some “positive liberties” which should be restricted.
Dan
I also like the conflation of “New Atheists” with “liberals”. Sadly, not all Gnus are liberals,
Indeed this gnu atheist is much more of a libertarian (and not the straw man variety that eveyrone seems to know)
This whole positive/negative discussion is like arguing foreground vs background in an Escher drawing. It can often be viewed either way.
But the basic rule should be: anything not directly interfering with life and property of another is allowed. Hence, gGay marriage? no reason to prohibit it. Not your business, not the government’s business. Burqa ban? Not the gorenment’s choice (however being forced to wear it would be a bit different).
Not the strawman variety, and yet “the basic rule should be: anything not directly interfering with life and property of another is allowed” is massively simplistic. It omits, for instance, anything directly interfering with the well-being of another. I, for one, want the gummint to protect a bit more than life and property. Rights, for example…
Funny, Jean Kazez has abandoned what was apparently her policy of never mentioning me (except indirectly) or linking to anything I wrote (after that protracted er disagreement last July).
In the process of this abandonment, she misrepresents what I wrote.
I “alleged” no such “allegation.” I didn’t say nobody ever comes up with any examples. I said
See? I don’t say nobody ever comes up with any examples or that everybody always comes up with blog comments alone; I say that often happens.
What Kazez doesn’t know is that that’s what happened with Caspar. He emailed me about my comment on his CisF piece, and we talked a bit about the backlash against gnu atheism, and he said comments about his piece on Richard Dawkins’s site were evidence for what he was talking about – so I said yes but that is also an internet thing, and he said good point, want to write an article about that?
It does happen a lot. I’m not lying about that. It’s not just some “allegation” of mine. Resent it all you like, but I’m not making it up.
Update: a later comment indicates that it wasn’t my article that was being paraphrased; never mind.