Re: The Dirty Word: Secular Humanism Split

[eynon81]

[JDHURF]

I would be more than happy to have a nuanced discussion of this with someone, but Zeugma's baseless assertions that humanism is equivalent to Christianity and that both are evil is not a nuanced discussion that I am going to take the time to give a nuanced response to.

My general position has always been that religion is more of a neutral vessel than anything else, tipping towards the malevolent throughout history. Of course there are examples of religious traditions and religious people taking the side of freedom and justice and so on. The historical Jesus himself was a mediterranean Jewish revolutionary peasant. The nonviolent resistance movement in the United States, of particular interest to me, emerged in no small part from the Quaker movement. There's liberation theology with its preferential treatment of the poor and impoverished and on and on.

However, on balance, the history of religion isn't something to uphold or be proud of and it for damn sure isn't the only thing capable (if even capable of at all) of sustaining civilization. Any fair-minded reading of the history of human civilization and the progress made is the history of the erosion of the malevolent total authority of religious organizations and institutions. It is the history of secular reason and ethics chiseling away at the oppressive and malevolent aspects of religion and no doubt the religious themselves often participated.

[Zeugma]

[eynon81]

[eynon81]

[eynon81]