Sunday, December 24, 2006

Hey teacher preacher… leave those kids alone!

ANDERSON COOPER INTERVIEW [edited] (CNN Anderson Cooper 360): A firestorm of controversy is brewing in the Kearny, New Jersey, school district. It all started when Matthew Laclair's teacher began preaching about God in class… Matthew recorded the teacher's comments.

COOPER: So why do you start recording your teacher? 

MATTHEW LACLAIR, STUDENT: Well, a lot of the comments that he was making during the first two days of class were extremely inappropriate. COOPER: Like what? 

LACLAIR: Well, there were some cases where he would go just into his religion….”

COOPER: This wasn't a religion class? LACLAIR: No, no, this is U.S. history.

AUDIO CLIP of DAVID PASZIEWICZ, TEACHER: “God is not only all loving. The way he describes himself in the scriptures, he is also completely just. He did everything in his power to make sure that you could go to heaven, so much so that he put your sin on his own body, suffered your pains for you and is saying please accept me, believe. You reject that and you belong in Hell.”

COOPER: So he's not talking about, you know, what a religion believes. He's talking about what he believes and stating it as fact. LACLAIR: Exactly… …What he basically said almost in every instance was this [acceptance of Jesus] is the right way and this is only way. 



COOPER: What happened then? You approached the principal? 

LACLAIR: After I chased him down for about two weeks to get some other kind of meeting with me and Mr. Pasziewicz and a few others. We had the meeting and in that meeting he denied ever making any of these statements. COOPER: So after a lengthy meeting in which this teacher has denied saying this stuff, you say, "Well, I actually have a tape"? LACLAIR: Exactly.

AUDEO CLIP
PASZIEWICZ: The Big Bang theory is that there was nothing out there that was no matter. But yet nothing exploded and created something. Let me give you a clue guys. If there's nothing, it can't explode.

COOPER: What is it that upset you most about his comments? LACLAIR: I have to say just the -- the outright hypocrisy in some of the statements that he would make. And also just how he would blatantly say that evolution is not a science, the big bang theory cannot be true. Anyone with common sense knows that. Even though these scientific statements are accepted widely.

COOPER: …this guy's been teaching for 14 years. 

LACLAIR: Fourteen years. And I've talked to former students that have told me the same thing happened in [their] class. And again, this would not have been a big story whatsoever if somebody along the line in the chain of command would have done something right. 



COOPER: What we didn't say in that report is [that Laclair’s] actually had death threats against him [yes sir, there you go, that’s just so typically Christian] and the reaction in the community largely against him, [which] has been something that the family is quite surprised by.

Yet another dangerous creature is exposed… a moralizing god-dam American bible pushing dill unfortunately disguised as a history teacher… Imagine he can potentially mess up a lot more people than one poor futile bomb toting Islamic terrorist. You do the math’s, 14 years times say 200 students a year… well that’s almost World Trade Centre numbers… 2,800 history flunkies turned into Jesus junkies… hallelujah brother!

www.caliibre.com

ref and full report here: http://edition.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0612/18/acd.01.html

Saturday, December 02, 2006

“Asiarabia” - More evidence of the growing Arabization of South East Asia

Newsweek International - Dec 4 Issue - By Joe Cochrane and Jonathan Kent

“The meeting of the united Malays National Organization, the ruling pro-Muslim party in Malaysia, was a shocking display of divisiveness. Some UMNO delegates at the rally, which ended Nov. 17, gave speeches that, either explicitly or in veiled terms, were racist or called for violence as a means of settling religious or political differences. One of them, Hasnoor Sidang Hussein, declared: "UMNO is willing to risk lives and bathe in blood in defense of race and religion." Education Minister Hishammuddin Hussein unsheathed a keris (Malay dagger) at the meeting. Party supporters perceived the gesture as invoking Malay power and pride[…]. Twenty years ago, the youth wing had displayed banners calling for the keris to be bathed in the blood of the minority Malaysian Chinese.”

“Southeast Asia's two most important countries [Malaysia and Indonesia] are both drifting toward fundamentalism—a trend made scarier by the inability or unwillingness of some senior political leaders to condemn those promoting the shift. Some analysts are already calling this the "Arabization of the region.

“Certainly, most agree that mainstream Muslims generally are more religious and conservative than they were 10 years ago, and Southeast Asia's Muslim regions (Indonesia, Malaysia, southern Thailand, southern Philippines) are more radical.

Full Newsweek story here...

http://ori.msnbc.msn.com/id/15898227/site/newsweek/

Professor Richard Dawkins and (others) are right when they say we must point out the dangerous (and crass) folly of insisting that “the rest of us” should see mainstream religious belief as a taboo area to comment on because of issues of political correctness. Lets face we all know that radicalism grows out of conservative religious practice, which in turn is grounded in mainstream beliefs. The mainstream religious ‘victims’ then by default protect their radical elements by insisting that their religious sensibilities must be respected. Respect needs to be earned by actions not demanded by rhetoric and they, none of them deserve our respect; they are divisive and threaten our civilization, all based on their unsupported myths, what a nasty joke they are.

If you really want to understand more go to “YouTube” and type in “Beyond Belief 06” and listen to some intelligent people discuss the problem of religion. Then if you are ready for some more see this:

video Dawkins 1

and this:

video Root of all evil Dawkins

How do they do it? They grab your unsuspecting kids, unfortunately probably with parental mind-numbed irrational consent or worse, with complicity through parental (our/your) actions of “intellectual incest”…

Back to Arabization… Muslims want support for schools – Reuters - By Manny Mogato

Philippines - MANILA, Nov 23 2006 - Muslim scholars in Southeast Asia urged governments on Thursday to provide Islamic schools with books on local history, culture and customs to check the growing influence of Arab radicalism.

"We're alienating our children from our history, culture and sense of nationalism because we're not producing enough books and materials for our madrasas," Salipada Tamano, a professor of Islamic Studies in the Philippines, told Reuters.”

"It doesn't surprise me if our children were more oriented to Islamic teaching from the Middle East because we've been getting most of our reading materials and our Arabic teachers from Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Libya."

“The Philippines has around 2,000 madrasas, relying on material and financial support from local communities and donations from wealthy Islamic states and organisations in the Middle East.”

Full Reuters alert here...

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/MAN263919.htm

Time to resist!

www.caliibre.com

Thursday, November 23, 2006

Creationists, Intelligent Design and Sudoku

Why can “Creationists” &/or “Intelligent Design” advocates ‘solve’ Sudoku Number Puzzles so quickly?

Sample game:
[ - ][ 6 ][ - ]l[ 1 ][ - ][ 4 ]l[ - ][ 5 ][ - ]
[ - ][ - ][ 8 ]l[ 3 ][ - ][ 5 ]l[ 6 ][ - ][ - ]
[ 2 ][ - ][ - ]l[ - ][ - ][ - ]l[ - ][ - ][ 1 ]
-------------+-------------+--------------
[ 8 ][ - ][ - ]l[ 4 ][ - ][ 7 ]l[ - ][ - ][ 6 ]
[ - ][ - ][ 6 ]l[ - ][ - ][ - ]l[ 3 ][ - ][ - ]
[ 7 ][ - ][ - ]l[ 9 ][ - ][ 1 ]l[ - ][ - ][ 4 ]
-------------+-------------+----------------
[ 5 ][ - ][ - ]l[ - ][ - ][ - ]l[ - ][ - ][ 2 ]
[ - ][ - ][ 7 ]l[ 2 ][ - ][ 6 ]l[ 9 ][ - ][ - ]
[ - ][ 4 ][ - ]l[ 5 ][ - ][ 8 ]l[ - ][ 7 ][ - ]


Thinkers Solution: Concentrate turn on the brain and think about it. It's just logic after all. You can check your answer here:
(http://www.sudoku.com/)... just move your curser over the puzzle and the numbers appear.

However why should we turn on our brain and think? Just use a creationists approach and life is much simpler…

Creationist’s solution:
[ G ][ 6 ][ G ]l[ 1 ][ G ][ 4 ]l[ G ][ 5 ][ G ]
[ G ][ G ][ 8 ]l[ 3 ][ G ][ 5 ]l[ 6 ][ G ][ G ]
[ 2 ][ G ][ G ]l[ G ][ G ][ G ]l[ G ][G ][ 1 ]
----------------+---------------+-------------
[ 8 ][ G ][ G ]l[ 4 ][ G ][ 7 ]l[ G ][ G ][ 6 ]
[ G ][ G ][ 6 ]l[ G ][ G ][ G ]l[ 3 ][ G ][ G ]
[ 7 ][ G ][ G ]l[ 9 ][ G ][ 1 ]l[ G ][ G ][ 4 ]
----------------+--------------+--------------
[ 5 ][ G ][ G ]l[ G ][ G ][ G ]l[ G ][ G ][ 2 ]
[ G ][ G ][ 7 ]l[ 2 ][ G ][ 6 ]l[ 9 ][ G ][ G ]
[ G ][ 4 ][ G ]l[ 5 ][ G ][ 8 ]l[ G ][ 7 ][ G ]

THEY JUST PUT A “G” IN ALL THE EMPTY SQUARES; it’s just a matter of faith you know! It’s the same method 'Design so called Scientists' resort to in trying to prove their unsustainable “intelligent design theory”. They just assume all gaps in current understanding and/or knowledge regarding evolution must be filled with a (G=god) solution. Saves them having to think and question I suppose; blind faith, a refuge for the feeble-minded!

If you are thinking “Christian” when we mention creationists here is a little information…

“Islamic creationists are more likely to be day-age, Old Earth creationists; accepting Genesis only as a corrupted version of the original message of God to the Hebrews. The Qur'an account is relatively vague, even as to the number of days of creation: while most have the conventional six, one ambiguous passage adds up to eight. Also, in various verses the "days of God" are taken to be a thousand (Al-Hajj 47, As-Sajdah 5) or even fifty thousand (Al-Ma`arij 4) years in length, though these are in different contexts than creation. [Huh!!!?] So forcing the text into a day-age interpretation is somewhat easier for the Islamic case. They also don't have to worry as much about the stated order of creation in the Genesis story, as little is said about this matter in the Qur'an.

Contemporary Islam in general has a greater tendency towards literalism than Christianity regarding its sacred texts. The Qur'an is taken by almost all Muslims, conservative and liberal, as being the direct and unaltered word of their God. The historical conditions being such that many Muslims feel culturally threatened by a powerful and intrusive West that is more technologically advanced, there may be less of an opportunity at the present to develop analogues to non literal modernist theologies. Since science is indispensable in order to emerge from backwardness relative to the cultural competitor and religious identity is nonnegotiable to large degree, creationism can be an attractive compromise. Science must validate, not threaten, the revealed truth.”

For the full disturbing story you can go here:

Friday, November 17, 2006

Parents should think carefully before subjecting their children to Religious Indoctrination

Pascal Boyer’s research into “Children’s Acquisition of Religious Concepts through Intuitive Ontology and Cultural Input” (*) on which much of which this post is based gives us great insights into the workings and development of the ‘hardwired’ human brain. It should also give thinking parents something to ponder before automatically carrying on the narrow religious perspectives that have shaped their own lives and that have both been in the past and are today, the cause of many of societies most violent and ‘human existence threatening’ problems.

First the definition of Ontology (1.0):

Ontology is variously described as: The study of the broadest range of categories of existence, which also asks questions about the existence of particular kinds of objects, such as numbers or moral facts. (1.1) The study of the nature of being, reality, and substance. (1.2) A branch of metaphysics concerned specifically with what (kinds of) things there are. (1.3) A study of the ultimate nature of things. (1.4) The science of being or reality in the abstract, particularly as related to ideas or theories. (1.5) The study of being and what constitutes objective and subjective existence and what it means to exist (1.6)

Do children have a natural propensity to develop religious beliefs?

‘Recent research on children's thinking about imaginary beings, magic, religion and the supernatural indicates that their thinking stretches beyond the ordinary boundaries of reality. The evolution of imaginative capacities in humans, becomes clear when we focus on basic imagination that is generally automatic and largely unconscious that helps us produce representations of such basic things as; what people will say next, that people exist when out of sight, or what aspects of our environment are potentially dangerous. These examples suggest that there may not be one faculty of imagination but many specialised "what if" inferential systems in human minds. The more recent research offers a counterpoint on the development of children's domain-specific knowledge about the ordinary nature of things that has traditionally suggested that children [only] become increasingly scientific and rational over the course of their development.’ (*)

In acquiring an intuitive understanding of the physical, biological or psychological domains, even young children recognize that there are constraints on what can happen. However, once such constraints are acknowledged, children are in a position to think about the violation of those very same constraints and to contemplate the impossible. Perhaps the real contribution of this research is that it introduces the notion that children's ideas about fantasy, magic, religion, and science are interrelated in important ways. (2.0)

Cognition is “the process of being or ability to be aware, knowing, thinking, learning, reasoning and judging”. Cognitive developmental evidence is sometimes conscripted to support "naturalized epistemology" arguments to the effect that a general epistemic stance leads children to build theory-like accounts of underlying properties of different kinds of input. (3.1)

Epistemology

Epistemology is the study of the nature and scope of knowledge. The term "epistemology" is based on the Greek words "episteme" (knowledge) and "logos" (account/explanation). Epistemology looks at the proposition that knowledge is what is both true and believed, though not all that is both true and believed counts as knowledge. For a diagram of this you can go here:

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Classical-Definition-of-Kno.gif).

Much of the debate in this field has focused on analyzing the nature of knowledge and how it relates to similar notions such as truth, belief and justification. It also deals with the means of production of knowledge, as well as skepticism about different knowledge claims. In other words, epistemology primarily addresses the following questions: "What is knowledge?", "How is knowledge acquired?", and "What do people know?". Recent studies have dramatically challenged centuries-old assumptions. (3.2)

Two Levels of the mental representation of conceptual knowledge

‘In the mental representation of conceptual knowledge we can distinguish between two levels of organisation, that of ‘kind-concepts’ (or ‘entry-level’ concepts) on the one hand and that of ‘ontological categories’ on the other. The former are concepts like ‘giraffe’ or ‘telephone’ or ‘uncle’ or ‘tree’ or ‘river’. Their representation activates higher-level categories of the fundamental kinds of things in the world, like animal, artefact, person, plant, natural object. Any object in the word that is identified as belonging to a kind-concept thereby activates a particular ontological category. In the same way, concepts of imaginary objects and beings are intuitively associated with particular ontological categories. The concept of ‘spirit’ we find in so many cultures activates the category PERSON. If you pray to a particular statue of the Virgin, you are standing or kneeling in front of an ARTEFACT. If you think that some antelopes can disappear at will, you must activate your ANIMAL category to represent these special beings.’ (3.3)

‘Two inferential routes allow children to produce expectations about new instances of ontological categories like 'animal' and 'artefact'. One is to generalise information from a 'look-up table' of familiar kind-concepts. The other one is to use independent expectations at the level of ontological domains. Evidence suggests that what prompts conceptual acquisition is not a general epistemic stance but a series of category-specific intuitive principles that constitute an evolved 'natural metaphysics'. [Metaphysics (Greek/Latin words meta = after/beyond and physics = nature) is a branch of study concerned with abstract thought and philosophy about topics not on the concrete or physical level of understanding].’ (*)

What we can perhaps conclude is that the human mind through the process of evolution has become hardwired with, what for the sake of a better term, we could call ‘instinctual survival knowledge of which perhaps a natural tendency to be religious is a part.

Humans have therefore it appears developed or inherited from previous generations a system of mind ‘categories and category-specific inferential processes founded on definite biases in prototype formation. Evidence for this system provides a better understanding of the limited 'plasticity' of ontological commitments as well as a computationally plausible account of their initial state, avoiding ambiguities about innateness. This may provide a starting point for a 'naturalized epistemology' that takes into account evolved properties of human conceptual structures.’ (*)

Human ‘expertise’ consists of different domains of competence

‘Research has also begun to suggest that human expertise about the natural and social environment, including what is often called 'semantic knowledge', or “Semantic memory which refers to the memory of meanings, understandings and other knowledge; in contrast to episodic memory” (3.4) is best construed as consisting of different domains of competence. Each of these corresponds to recurrent evolutionary problems, is organised along specific principles, is the outcome of a specific developmental pathway and is based on specific neural structures. What we call a 'human evolved intuitive ontology' comprises a catalogue of broad domains of information, different sets of principles applied to these different domains as well as different learning rules to acquire more information about those objects. Neuro-imaging and cognitive neuroscience are now adding to the picture of a federation of evolved competencies.’ (*)

‘Children's learning - in the domains of science and religion specifically and in many other cultural domains as well, relies extensively on testimony and other forms of culturally transmitted information. The cognitive processes that enable such learning must also administrate the evaluation, qualification, and storage of that information, while guarding against the dangers of false or misleading information. Currently, the development of these appraisal processes is not clearly understood. Recent work has begun to address three important dimensions of the problem: how children and adults evaluate truth in communication, how they gauge the inferential potential of information and how they encode and evaluate its source.’ (*)

Another element that comes into play here is ‘trust’ and it has also been discovered that the human tendency to trust is a chemical process stimulated by the oxytocin hormone that is secreted in brain tissues and synthesized by the hypothalamus. This small, but crucial feature located deep in the brain controls biological reactions like hunger, thirst and body temperature, as well as visceral fight-or-flight reactions associated with powerful, basic emotions like fear and anger. (3.5) Obviously one of the processes that children will fall victim to when assessing information validity is naturally higher level of the trust hormone that would be present between parents and children in ‘normal’ relationships. So if mum and dad are filling their head with rubbish it is more likely to be accepted as truth (or worse reality) due to the child’s weaken resistance or ability to analyse because of the trust bond.

Evolution of the modern mind and the origins of culture

The human cultural explosion is often explained in terms of "liberating events", of a newly acquired flexibility in mental representations. Actual cultural transmission is in fact constrained by evolved properties of ontological categories and principles. More generally, "cultural mind" typical of recent human evolution is not so much an "unconstrained" mind as a mind equipped with a host of complex specialised capacities that make certain kinds of mental representations likely to succeed in cultural transmission. (*)

Religious Thought and Behaviour As By-products of Brain Function

Religious concepts activate various functionally distinct mental systems, present also in non-religious contexts and 'tweak' the usual inferences of these systems.

They deal firstly with detection and representation of “animacy” (combination of initiative or autonomy, choice or purposefulness and strategy or reactivity). (4.1) Animacy can be more properly understood as a framework or way of thinking. Animate thinking stems from a basic need to explain happenings and tell simple stories about them and a need to fit things into roles in the stories as actors and objects of action. Scientific and mechanistic ways of thinking are in some sense attempts to get beyond these basic animistic tendencies, in that they tend to eliminate autonomy by searching for a cause for every action. But the tendency to describe the world in terms of [individuals as] autonomous actors is strong. (4.2)

Secondly religious concepts activate mental systems that deal with “agency”. Briefly, agency in simple terms deals with four factors: stimulating agency, behaviour-cue, behaviour-object and behaviour-act. They may be thought of as very loosely analogous to the physiologist's concepts of external stimulus, receptor-process, conductor-process, and effector-process. The stimulating agency may be defined in any standardized terms, those of physics, of physiology, or of common sense and it constitutes the independent, initiating cause of the whole behaviour phenomenon. Thus on different occasions it may consists variously in and be describable as, as sense-organ stimulation (in the case of perceptual behaviour), as the administering of a particular drug, e.g., hashish (in the case of hallucinatory behaviour), or as the neurological end-result of a preceding activity (in the case of a behaviour based upon memory or recall). (4.3) In the theory of Agency the key concepts present within "agency" are that “the individual”, “action”, “will” (as in the will to do something), “intentionality”, “”choice” and “freedom” Key concepts against which "agency" is commonly situated are: structure, determinism, society, environment, inevitability. From the point of view of “philosophy” agency is about “what is the individual, self or person?” (e.g., what is the unit of 'agency'?), or what, as a contrast, is not-agent (e.g. environment, structure, inanimate)? Agency can also be expressed as the concept of: the self is that which knows itself; existence is best understood by radical categorical divisions between mind-body, self-other, etcetera, for heuristic and ontological reasons. (4.4)

‘Religious concepts also activate mental systems involved in normal, social exchange, moral intuitions, precaution against natural hazards and the understanding of misfortune. Each of these activates distinct neural resources or families of networks. What makes notions of supernatural agency intuitively plausible? Evidence suggests that it is the joint, coordinated activation of these diverse systems, a supposition that opens up the prospect of a cognitive neuroscience as a legitimate way of exploring religious beliefs [as a being a natural function of the evolution the human brain and based on some level of survival the mechanism or even a ‘misfiring’ of that mechanism].’ (*)

The role of rituals and… why do we indulge in “Collective Ritual”?

‘Ritualized behaviour is a specific way of organizing the flow of action, characterized by stereotypy, rigidity in performance, a feeling of compulsion and specific themes, in particular the potential danger from contamination, predation and social hazard. A neuro-cognitive model of ritualized behaviour in human development and pathology, based on the activation of a specific hazard-precaution system specialized in the detection of and response to potential threats seems to exist. Certain features of collective rituals, by conveying information about potential danger and presenting appropriate reaction as a sequence of rigidly described precautionary measures, probably activate this neuro-cognitive system. This makes some collective ritual sequences highly attention-demanding and intuitively compelling and contributes to their transmission from place to place or generation to generation. The recurrence of ritualized behaviour [as used in many religious and cult practices] as a central feature of collective ceremonies may be explained as a consequence of this bias in selective transmission.’ (*)

This of course explains why religious organisations are so keen on rituals and it is also why cult like governments such as North Korea hold large cultural rituals to denigrate the US and to worn the citizenry of the ‘evils’ beyond their borders.

Ritualized Behaviour, Precaution Systems and Action-Parsing in Developmental, Pathological and Cultural Rituals

‘Stereotypic, rigidly scripted behaviour found in cultural rituals is also found in children's routines, in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and in normal adults around certain stages of the life-cycle. Researchers now offer an explanation of an evolved “Precaution System” geared to the detection of and reaction to INFERRED THREATS TO FITNESS, distinct from systems for manifest danger. The “Precaution System” includes a repertoire of potential hazards as well as a repertoire of species-typical precautions. Impairment in the system's feedback accounts for OCD rituals. Gradual calibration of this system occurs through childhood routines. Mimicry of this system's natural input makes cultural rituals salient and compelling.’ (*)

One could from this standpoint almost view highly religious people as suffering from varying levels of socialised obsessive-compulsive disorder. They again, to my way of thinking, could be seen as individuals suffering from seeing themself existing at the lower “Maslow Needs Motivation Levels” of physiological/security (or insecurity?) or at best prestige seeking, thus they are being locked into a system that is constantly stimulating a ‘natural’ “Precaution System” response.

Conceptual and Strategic Selection in Evolved Minds

‘Culturally successful religious concepts are the outcome of selective processes that make some concepts more likely than others to be easily acquired, stored and transmitted. Among the constructs of human imagination, some connect to intuitive ontological principles in such a way that they constitute a small catalogue of culturally successful supernatural concepts. Experimental and anthropological evidence confirm the salience and transmission potential of this catalogue. Among these supernatural concepts, cognitive capacities for social interaction introduce a further selection. As a result, some concepts of supernatural agents are connected to morality, group-identity, ritual and emotion. These typical 'religious' supernatural agents are tacitly presumed to have access to information that is crucial to social interaction, an assumption that boosts their spread in human groups.’ (*)
Why Is Religion Natural?

‘Is religious belief a mere leap into irrationality as many sceptics assume? Psychology suggests that there may be more to belief than the suspension of reason. Religious beliefs and practices are found in all human groups and go back to the very beginnings of human culture. What makes religion so 'natural'? One particular [traditional] view of religion, popular among sceptics, is what Boyer calls the 'sleep of reason' interpretation. According to this view, people have religious beliefs because they fail to reason properly. If only they grounded their reasoning in sound logic or rational order, they would not have supernatural beliefs, including superstitions and religion. Boyer thinks this view is misguided, for several reasons; because it assumes a dramatic difference between religious and commonsense ordinary thinking, where there isn't one; because it suggests that belief is a matter of deliberate weighing of evidence, which is generally not the case; because it implies that religious concepts could be eliminated by mere argument, which is implausible; and most importantly because it obscures the real reasons why religion is so extraordinarily widespread in human cultures.’ (*)

Boyer’s interesting article, which explains his thoughts on this subject can be found in its entirety here: http://www.csicop.org/si/2004-03/religion.html

For in depth information you can also read “Functional Origins of Religious Concepts” here: http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/anthro/bec/papers/

Another insight into the human mind and ‘God’ titled “Gods, Spirits and the Mental Instincts that Create Them” can be found here:
http://www.srhe.ucsb.edu/lectures/text/boyerText.html

So what’s the point Richard?

According to Boyer, “RELIGIOUS CONCEPTS ARE PARASITIC UPON MORAL INTUITIONS”. He also says, “there is an early-developed specific inference system, a specialised 'moral sense' underlying moral intuitions. Notions of morality are distinct from those used to evaluate other aspects of social interaction (this is why social conventions and moral imperatives are so easily distinguished). They provide an initial basis on which children can understand adult moral understandings.” ‘This capacity for entertaining abstract intuitions about the moral nature of courses of action was found in children with various amounts of experience with other children [and also in children] of different cultures.’

What I also find interesting is this: “That children have early moral concepts does not mean that they have the same moral understandings as adults, far from it. First, young children have more difficulty in figuring out other agents' intentions and feelings; second, they do not have a rich repertoire of past episodes to draw from when representing the key features of a situation; third, they may not be aware of local parameters of social interaction.” (5.1)

So my point is that the traditional (and current) practice of indoctrination of children, particularly by parents (“intellectual incest” as I have called it) in a singular religious view or “faith labelling” as Prof. Dawkins calls it, IS AN INDEFENSIBLE PRACTICE. The reason is that much religious practice actually corrupts the inherent moral nature of innocents and contributes to the delinquency of individuals by providing and promoting a belief, which in effect is saying, that all that is moral can be ignored and subjugated in the name of the influencing agent’s concept or view of ‘god’ and ‘god’s word’ and by the influencing parties’ interpretation of ‘god’s’ laws. Corruption of the innocent by the powerful.

So rather than being a system of morality or a recipe for a ‘correct and righteous lifestyle’ as religious adherents claim, their faiths are actually nothing more than a divisive mind numbing load old rubbish inflicted by immoral adults on children that are too young to resist. If religious traditions where true (and moral) there could only be one religion. Not only are there many religions, there are many grubby factions all arguing about who has the correct view of their particular prophet’s teachings. If the religions truly did represent “god’s word” and god was there in the theistic sense these divisions of opinion surely could not exist. Where for example is the morality in the ‘Caliph succession’ argument between Shiites and Sunnis or in the procedural or doctrinal argument between the Catholics and the Anglicans?

The religious leaders and their abetting adult followers are on about power influence and “ownership” rather than any moral crusade. The ownership of children by parents is a contentious issue and I believe that parents do not own their children however they do bare responsibility for protection and support until the child can fend for itself. Adults that for example give their daughters up to marriage at ages as young as five are not living up to their ‘human moral’ responsibility any more than are domineering parents who over manage their children’s decisions and/or indoctrinate them in such things as an Evangelistic way of life.

“In a high-ownership situation, parents feel they have a right to control their children's behaviour and life choices, even that of adult children. They themselves often live their lives through their children. Their children's professional success or breeding success is their own. Their children's disgrace is theirs too. Reinforcing this set-up, communication in the family tends to be one-way. The parents communicate their expectations (not always explicitly either) and the children are expected to deliver. Through the growing up years, emotional control is fine-tuned to make the children feel extremely guilty about letting the parents down. The parents may even expect that they should be the ones choosing the marriage spouse for their son or daughter. In extreme cases, the head of the family (almost always the father) may feel he owns the family or family name to such an extent that if a daughter dishonours the family by having sexual flings, the head of the family feels empowered to kill her. Even in the present time, this kind of thing happens.” (5.2)

As an alternative, parents who do not feel any right of ownership over their grown children and see their offspring as equals are more likely to produce an adult person of mature ‘character’ rather than a lesser being who needs to rely on a religious crutch. The United Nations and much of educated society that has more humanistic values are in a battle to encourage this kind of relationship and to the more open kind of parent-child communication that goes with it, even when the children are young. Parents may be disappointed, even hurt, when it turns out that a son or daughter is not a carbon image of themselves however in all of nature it is the parent’s responsibility to produce an independent person able to pursue their own life goals. This done it helps if the society they live in makes them responsible for outcomes and builds on human progress as a whole.

This is not any easy concept to get agreement on and some downsides for non acceptance

“In the United States [for example], people talk about wanting a child of their own and by this they usually mean a child born to them from their own genes to create a biological connection. Americans often think of "their" child as a possession that they alone control, free from the interference of others. People do not willingly share control over a child, as seen by the difficulties divorced couples face in custody disputes that involve sharing their "own" child. Each parent wants full custody of the child, or complete ownership and control. Visiting rights are not usually awarded to the grandparents, aunts, uncles, or other members of either parent's kin group. Sharing would be interpreted as losing control.” (6.1)

Go a little farther east and you find ‘the Arab father has traditionally maintained his authority and responsibility mainly because he has owned the family's property and provided the family's livelihood. This hierarchical structure of the traditional Arab family reflects the fact that families are stratified on the basis of sex and age, where the young are subordinate to the old and females to males leading to a situation where the most repressed elements of Arab society are the poor, the women, and their children. In such relationships, downward communication often takes the form of orders, instructions, warnings, threats, shaming and the like.’ (6.2)

So what’s the harm, you still may think? Well tradition and culture are not always deserving of protection just because they are a traditional culture that may have existed for centuries. The world is changing and obsolete, or even worse immoral, acts perpetrated in the name of ownership need to be stopped. Cannibalism for example has been stamped out of New Guinea for both moral and practical health reasons.

A current case in point of the downside of individuals assuming they own their children: “Sociologists and government officials began documenting sporadic examples of female infanticide in India about 10 years ago. The practice of killing newborn girls is largely a rural phenomenon in India; although its extent has not been documented, one indication came in a survey by the Community Services Guild of Madras, a city in Tamil Nadu. Of the 1,250 women questioned, the survey concluded that more than half had killed baby daughters.” (6.3)

So who fights for the parents to maintain ownership?

The partners in crime, Christian Churches, Islamic Muftis and Mullahs and all the other god botherers in the world.

“Presented by the Holy See to all persons, institutions and authorities concerned with the mission of the family in today's world October 22, 1983 CHARTER OF THE [Catholic] RIGHTS OF THE FAMILY”

Excerpts:

“The activities of public authorities and private organizations which attempt in any way to limit the freedom of couples in deciding about their children constitute a grave offence against human dignity and justice.”

“Since they have conferred life on their children, parents have the original, primary and inalienable right to educate them; hence they must be acknowledged as the first and foremost educators of their children.”

“Parents have the right to educate their children in conformity with their moral and religious convictions, taking into account the cultural traditions of the family…”

“Parents have the right to freely choose schools or other means necessary to educate their children in keeping with their convictions. Public authorities must ensure that public subsidies are so allocated that parents are truly free to exercise this right without incurring unjust burdens. Parents should not have to sustain, directly or indirectly, extra charges which would deny or unjustly limit the exercise of this freedom.” Yes we must keep those divisive church schools funded by the government!

“Parents have the right to ensure that their children are not compelled to attend classes which are not in agreement with their own moral and religious convictions. In particular, sex education is a basic right of the parents and must always be carried out under their close supervision, whether at home or in educational centres chosen and controlled by them.” Ah yes for gods’ sake don’t teach them any evolution stuff, they may see the truth (realty)!

“The rights of parents are violated when a compulsory system of education is imposed by the State from which all religious formation is excluded.” Rubbish!

“Every family has the right to live freely its own domestic religious life under the guidance of the parents, as well as the right to profess publicly and to propagate the faith, to take part in public worship and in freely chosen programs of religious instruction, without suffering discrimination.” Nope, can’t anymore, you can thank the radical Islamists for that! Oh, I guess oversexed Priests also must take some of the blame for the tighter civil control now obviously required as well. (7.1)

And… The First Presidency and Council of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints The Family: A Proclamation to the World - This proclamation was read by President Gordon B. Hinckley as part of his message at the General Relief Society Meeting held September 23, 1995, in Salt Lake City, Utah: “Parents have a sacred duty to rear their children in love and righteousness, to provide for their physical and spiritual needs, to teach them to love and serve one another, to observe the commandments of God and to be law-abiding citizens wherever they live.” “BY DIVINE DESIGN, FATHERS ARE TO PRESIDE [hold authority] over their families in love and righteousness and are responsible to provide the necessities of life and protection for their families.” (7.2)

A warning for all

“Amartya Sen [is] a Nobel laureate, a former master of Trinity College, Cambridge, and professor of economics and philosophy at Harvard. [...] In his recent book Identity and Violence: The Illusion of Destiny. [In the book] Sen argues that we are doing something terrible to our children by letting them attend faith schools. He writes: "[...] Under this system, young children are placed in the domain of singular affiliations well before they have the ability to reason about different systems of identification that may compete for their attention." It's a dismal image (isn't it?) of small children thus having destinies foisted upon them before they can think. Sen argues that this classification is not just disastrous for the child's development, but for community solidarity too. We saw something similar in Northern Ireland, he contends, where state-run denominational schools "fed the political distancing of Catholics and Protestants". The Guardian, July 2006 (8.1)

A better view (The wording of The UN’s cartoon no. 23 on the right’s of the Child…)

"Your children, are not YOUR children,
They are the sons and the daughters of life's longing for itself,
They come through you, but not from you
And although they are with you, they belong not to you,
You can give them your love but not your thoughts,
They have their own thoughts,
They have their own thoughts." (8.2)

www.caliibre.com

Refs:
Note* A number of references and authors of essays, report, books, etc., that Boyer is commenting
on are not shown and a full list can be found at Pascal Boyer’s site listed immediately below.
http://artsci.wustl.edu/%7Epboyer/PBoyerHomeSite/articles.html (*)
http://www.google.co.id/search?hl=en&lr=&defl=en&q=define:
Ontology&sa=X&oi=glossary_definition&ct=title (1.0)
www.filosofia.net/materiales/rec/glosaen.htm (1.1)
www.carm.org/atheism/terms.htm (1.2)
www.shef.ac.uk/~phil/other/philterms.html (1.3)
www.willdurant.com/glossary.htm (1.4)
www.mises.org/easier/O.asp (1.5)
web.cn.edu/kwheeler/lit_terms_P.html (1.6)
(http://72.14.235.104/search?q=cache:tH6QE0mwcSwJ:www.abebooks.com
/sm-search-more-books-from-this-seller--is!0521665876.html+New+lines+of+research
+on+children%27s+thinking+that+stretches+beyond+the+ordinary+boundaries+of+reality.
The+study+of+early+cognitive+development+has+emphasized+the+way+in+which+young
+children&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1) (2.0)
www.memorydisorder.org/glossaryterms.htm (3.1)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epistemology (3.2)
http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/anthro/bec/papers/boyer_religious_concepts.htm (3.3)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semantic_memory (3.4)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1414568/posts (3.5)
http://hometown.aol.com/miletus1/animacy.htm (4.1)
http://xenia.media.mit.edu/~mt/thesis/mt-thesis-3.2.html#Heading47 (4.2)
http://www.answers.com/topic/means-agency-way (4.3)
http://www.swarthmore.edu/SocSci/tburke1/agency.html (4.4)
http://www.srhe.ucsb.edu/lectures/text/boyerText.html (5.1)
http://www.yawningbread.org/arch_2001/yax-249.htm (5.2)
http://www.scu.edu/ethics/publications/other/lawreview/manymothers.html (6.1)
http://arabworld.nitle.org/texts.php?module_id=8&reading_id=13&sequence=3 (6.2)
http://acc6.its.brooklyn.cuny.edu/~phalsall/texts/chinwomn.html (6.3)
http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/family/documents/rc_pc_family
_doc_19831022_family-rights_en.html (7.1)
http://www.lds.org/library/display/0,4945,161-1-11-1,00.html (7.2)
http://www.vexen.co.uk/religion/faithschools.html (8.1)
http://www.unicef.org/crcartoons/ (8.2)

Thursday, November 02, 2006

Hell House yet another perverse religious abuse of children


For Anderson cooper 360, CNN's Tom Foreman took a look in Texas. October 31 2006Excerpts edited for brevity:

‘FOREMAN: This is Hell House, a shocking, rocking, roaring attempt to transform the horrors of Halloween into the fear of God. The man, who has turned Hell House into a US national phenomenon, is Pastor Keenan Roberts. PASTOR KEENAN ROBERTS, HELL HOUSE CREATOR: Hell House is aggressive. We're very aggressive in the name of Jesus. FOREMAN: How many churches have you seen this done in? ROBERTS: Well, across the United States, they'll be probably about 3,000. ROBERTS: This is absolutely a modern day parable. It is helping portray and colour and bring to life, to reach the sight and sound generation. It is -- it is using the tools that are attractive to this culture to help them understand spiritual principles of Christ. FOREMAN: Certainly, learning about sin and salvation is why many came here. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it's a fair reflection of what's going on in the world today. You know, some of the scenes.’

‘FOREMAN: Ordelia Ortiz brought her daughter, Araceli (ph). UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You can't trust anybody nowadays. I mean, you have to be careful with everybody, anybody. So I just want her to have an open eye out for it. FOREMAN: What are you scared of? What do you think you're going to see? UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Things I might go through later on during life. FOREMAN: But in the very first room on the 45-minute free tour, it is clear this is not Sunday School. UNIDENTIFIED MALE ACTOR IN SCENE: Let's have ourselves a little gay pride. FOREMAN: This is what makes Hell House so controversial: a mock gay wedding presided over by a demon, who doesn't just say this is wrong but quite literally damns homosexuals to death by AIDS and eternity in hell. Room after room the sins roll by: domestic violence, Internet porn, drinking and driving. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's no gray. There's right and wrong. There's heaven and hell. There's Jesus and Satan. There's forgiveness and unforgiveness. And this makes the message of the gospel, it packages it in a contemporary rather format that young people will come and see.’ ’FOREMAN: Certainly, many people experience something powerful. The exit is a parade of emotion. Remember Araceli Ortiz and her mother? [Then you see a shot of the distressed sobbing Arceli] [To Arceli] You're pretty upset. What's so upsetting about this? ARCELI: Sobs and puts her face in her hankerchief unable to speak. FORMAN: [To the dopey mother] was this good to bring her here? THE MOTHER DOPEY ORDELIA: In a way I would say yes; in way, no. FOREMAN: Hell House organizers say 75 percent of their visitors are people who don't regularly go to church. And that's who they're after. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Best thing that could ever happen to me. FOREMAN: Why? UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Because I need the lord in my life.’ They then cut to an interview with Pastor Philip Wise, Senior Pastor of the 2nd Baptist Church and Critic of the Hell House movement. ‘FOREMAN [The organisers of the Hell House] would also say we believe something, and we're acting on it. Isn't that what any person of faith should do? WISE: Well, I would just say if you believe that, then you believe the people who flew the planes into the Twin Towers were doing God's work. Response to the statement by THE GRUBBY PASTOR ROBERTS: To compare us to terrorists is just absurd. The people that point fingers at this as the problem are pointing in the wrong direction. We are giving people -- we're giving people the answer.’ (1)Obviously this deplorable individual, whom in my opinion should be sued for child abuse, cannot differentiate between an ‘opinion’ and an ‘answer’. He also can’t seem to understand the connect between Christian dogma and/or Islamic dogma and violence.

What Is Psychological Trauma? - By Esther Giller - President and Director, The Sidran Foundation

The key to understanding traumatic events is that it refers to extreme stress that overwhelms a person's ability to cope. There are no clear divisions between stress which leads to trauma, which leads to adaptation. It is also important to keep in mind that stress reactions are clearly physiological as well. Different experts in the field define psychological trauma in different ways. What I want to emphasize is that it is an individual's subjective experience that determines whether an event is or is not traumatic. Psychological trauma is the unique individual experience of an event or enduring conditions, in which: The individual's ability to integrate his/her emotional experience is overwhelmed, or the individual experiences (subjectively) a threat to life, bodily integrity, or sanity. Thus, a traumatic event or situation creates psychological trauma when it overwhelms the individual's perceived ability to cope and leaves that person fearing death, annihilation, mutilation, or psychosis. The individual feels emotionally, cognitively, and physically overwhelmed. The circumstances of the event commonly include abuse of power, betrayal of trust, entrapment, helplessness, pain, confusion, and/or loss. (2)

Emotional abuse of children can range from a simple verbal insult to an extreme form of punishment. The following are a selected few examples of emotional child abuse: Yelling or screaming, threatening or frightening, negative comparisons to others, belittling; telling the child he or she is ‘no good’, ‘worthless’ or ‘bad’, shaming, humiliating, terrorizing a child and witnessing the physical abuse of others

Child abuse can have dire consequences, during both childhood and adulthood. Child abuse may result in: Impaired social behaviour, antisocial behaviour, difficulty establishing intimate personal relationships, alienation and withdrawal, depression, anxiety, low self-esteem, feelings of worthlessness, self-injury, suicidal tendencies, substance abuse and high levels of medical illness, eating disorders or drastic changes in appetite, problems in school or work, impaired psychological development; personality disorders, cognitive disorders, nightmares and bed wetting and on becoming adults abusive parenting or care giving (3)

Religious abuse or cult abuse is amongst other things, where the child is forced to accept the narrow, exclusive religious views of the parent or guardian to the exclusion of any other belief or possibility of any belief. (4) Religion-related abuse has significantly more negative implications for its victims' long-term psychological well-being. (5)

Coercive persuasion can be defined in the technological concept as the effective restraining, impairing, or compelling through the application of psychological forces. A coercive persuasion program is a behavioural change technology applied to cause the "learning" and "adoption" of a set of behaviours or an ideology under certain conditions. Over time, coercive persuasion, a psychological force akin in some ways to legal concepts of undue influence, can be even more effective than pain, torture, drugs, and use of physical force. (6)

Spreading the crap: Churches and youth groups have gobbled up Roberts' $299 production kit, which consists of a 300-page manual on how to put on Hell House, ranging from the creation of "Satan's throne room" to sound effects like thunderclaps. Roberts was youth pastor at Abundant Life Christian Center in Arvada when he decided to create a scripted production out of an older idea dating back to the 1970s, which used haunted-house, Halloween scare tactics to teach Christian morality. Roberts' production provoked a firestorm and also drew thousands of visitors. He's since founded his own church, [tax free profits perhaps?], New Destiny Christian Center, in Thornton. The church is mounting its own Hell House production. (7)

Christian Extortion At It's Worst, (B Phelps Reviewing the documentary DVD): “The most frightening part of this documentary is when young children, after being subjected to scenes that relentlessly hammer them with violent images, are psychologically coerced into going through a door "where there are people waiting to pray with you", or re-enter the secular world and risk damnation. As a psychotherapist, (another thing that evangelicals believe are of the devil) I can now fully understand why the majority of my most impaired clients come from fundamentalist backgrounds. Allowing young children to go through a Hell House is nothing short of child abuse, and at the very least Christian extortion.” (8)

Charge Pastor Keenan Roberts with child abuse - NOW

“Hey preacher… leave those kids alone!”

www.caliibre.com

Refs:
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0610/31/acd.01.html (1)
http://www.sidran.org/whatistrauma.html (2)
http://www.helpguide.org/mental/child_abuse_physical_emotional
_sexual_neglect.htm#definition (3)
http://www.bullyonline.org/related/abuse.htm (4)
http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=15917247 (5)
http://www.factnet.org/rancho1.htm (6)
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article/
0,1299,DRMN_15_5029091,00.html (7)
http://www.amazon.ca/Hell-House-George-Whittenburg-Ratliff
/dp/B000092T6A (8)

Wednesday, November 01, 2006

Muslims need to open both “I’s”

As a result of a comment I left on iFaqeer’s blog on the Pope’s now infamous comments and the growth of ‘Islamophobia’ he posted an interesting response.

Part of what iFaqeer said is as follows (you can see the full response at iFaqeer)...

“caliibre in my very humble opinion, there's another "I" word that you never hear about that is even more relevant and to most Muslims (or at least it used to be, till very recently), even more authoritative.”…“Ijtihad has, more often than not actually been number 4 on the list of what carries authority in matters Islamic.” The “third source [after the Qur'an, the Hadith] of authority on matters Islamic is none other than IJMA. Ijma is, simply, the majority opinion of the global Muslim community, the Ummah. Or, in a word, democracy.” “The word has the same root, J-M-A, as Jumuah, the day Muslims gather for congregational prayer. Or the word so many Islamist parties and groups around the world, ironically, use in their name: as in Jama'a Islamiyya’…’The [radical] Islamists will never talk about it [Ijma] because their ideology, their views are not in sync with the Ijma, the opinion, the democratic opinion of the global Muslim community, the Ummah’

‘So it is not that Muslims need to come up with something completely new. It is that ALL of us--you, me, Irshad Manji (author and Islamic refusenik), Usama bin Laden (embittered Saudi dissident and world wide terrorist), Daniel Pipes (American neoconservative, columnist, author, counter-terrorism analyst and scholar of Middle Eastern history) need to stop pretending that the Islamists of today represent the traditional understanding of Islam and try to go back and engage with Muslims as they have been and though the Islamists gain ground with every outrage they cause to others or claim against Muslims and start from there.’

I understand iFaqeer’s point and his obvious frustration at the apparent influence on world opinion that the more radical elements of his religious tradition are having, however… I don’t believe its up to the rest of us to solve the problem… that responsibility lays squarely on the shoulders of the greater Islamic community [the Ummah] itself. The current furore over of the shabby (grubby?) teachings of the Australian (Egyptian?) mufti is a great example. Here the Ummah needs to refute his stance and disassociate themselves from his ancient view and Dark Age lifestyle attitudes by having him physically removed from the leadership of their religious establishment. I think religion in itself creates more harm than good, however if some people need it, so be it… HOWEVER, seeing it as a lifestyle and a natural part of civic, educational, political and cultural trends in a modern free society IS JUST NOT ACCEPTABLE for many of us in the ‘free world’.

It is not just conservative Islam by the way, conservative Christian groups are just as distasteful and many of their attitudes, in my humble opinion, are also NOT ACCEPTABLE. As an example this morning I watched Anderson Cooper 360. A segment on “Hell Houses”, (depicting hell for abortionists, gays etc., including a viewing of the crimes), that are run by Christian groups was aired. This segment showed how wacko vicious ‘pious’ religious nutters go about scaring young children out of their wits to force them into religion. One young girl went in (with her dopey mother) expecting to see something about future adult life problems (in her words) and came out devastated and in tears. To my way of thinking the organisers of these activities should be sued for child abuse. The psychological effect on children that this crap induces can screw them up for the rest of their lives. Remember also that fundamentalism always has it roots in mainstream religious teaching (Prof Dawkins). Anyway I digress.

iFaqeer goes on…

”I am not saying the traditional practice and understanding of Islam by my parents' and grandparents' generations is right and appropriate for the 21st century. In fact, I am saying the exact opposite: that we need to go to sources of Islamic authority and engage them and mine them anew for principles and wisdom relevant for this new century.”

On this point I agree with him completely – again I call for Ijtihad - now.He again says…

”And Ijma--inclusive, democratic, decision-making is right up there in the top row of principles, most Muslims used to know and believe in it [Ijma], above the "I" word [Ijtihad) you hear so much about.”

This all sounds great however the Wikipedia says the following: “In reality, ijma referred only to the consensus of traditional Islamic scholars (Arabic ulema) on particular points of Islamic law. Various proponents of liberal movements within Islam criticize the traditional view that ijma' is only a consensus among traditional Islamic scholars (Arabic ulema). They claim that truly democratic consensus should involve the entire community rather than a small and conservative clerical class, especially since there is no hierarchical system in Islam.” (*)

If world religions cannot agree on a common set of 21st century world friendly rules of engagement and how they should deal with internal conflicts and each other (let alone how they deal with secular society) I doubt that any true progress through the ideal of Ijma is possible. This view is particularly relevant in the case of Islam … proof… ongoing unremitting sectarian violence.

By the way:

Quote: “A survey showed yesterday (Nov 12 2004) that many Indonesians support the implementation of strict Islamic law, with nearly 60 percent saying they want adulterers to be whipped and 40 percent backing cutting off a thief's hand.”

Quote: “One in 10 people polled (Indonesians - Sept/Oct 2006) say they support the actions of terrorist Imam Samudra, who's currently on death row for his role in the Bali bombings. Almost one in five back the terrorist group Jemaah Islamiah's use of violence to force the creation of an Islamic state.” (**)

You do the maths… 220mil X (85% Muslim pop percentage) x 60% = Y (whippings)
OK… I will help with the easier one in ten calculation… (220mil x 85%)/10 = 18.7 mil.

Just imagine that’s almost equal to the entire population of secular Australia and about 4.67 times the population of Singapore.

www.caliibre.com

Refs
http://ifaqeer.blogspot.com/2006/09/karen-armstrong-on-popes-speech.html
CNN – Anderson Cooper 360 Nov 1 2006
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ijma (*)
http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2006/s1766106.htm(**)

Sunday, October 29, 2006

The primary cause of the ‘East’ v’s ‘West’ collision, a mismatched “Moral Zeitgeist”

Prof Richard Dawkins in his book “The God Delusion” describes ‘how our morality has shifted through the centuries by what he calls a “moral zeitgeist”. [Zeitgeist he explains a German word meaning ‘spirit of the times’]. Dawkins states "We do not ground our morality in holy books, no matter what we may fondly imagine. We simply do not [now, in Christian tradition] kill people for adultery, working on the sabbath, or for many other [historical] biblical offences.” In the book he also mentions the current Zeitgeist or attitudes to slavery, incest, needless suffering, free speech, cheating and killing in general.’ ‘Instead [of a biblical guide] we use our senses, intelligence and new information to change our social condition by revising our outlook on racism, gender, and crime. We no longer believe in slavery. Women now have the right to vote. We simply don't need holy books to determine our moral status.’ (1)

In the article (ref 2 below) he says, “Religious apologists will try to persuade you that, without scriptural texts, we’d have no moral compass, no guidelines for what is right and what is wrong. Anybody who advocates basing our morals on the Bible has not read the Bible with sufficient attention. It is, of course, true that you can find verses of the Bible and the Koran, which we today might regard as moral, for example the Sermon on the Mount. You can also find verses suggesting that the worst thing you can do is make a graven image or break the sabbath. Both deserve the death penalty, as does cheeking your parents. The Bible is an ethical disaster area with islands of decent morality dotted about here and there.”

’When sceptics point to particularly nasty bits of the Old Testament – for example the disgusting story of Abraham almost sacrificing Isaac (or his other son Ishmael according to Muslim tradition), religious apologists are apt to reply in exasperation: “Yes of course, but we don’t believe that any more. We’ve moved on.” Theologians have moved on and have rejected the nasty verses (or written them off as ‘symbolic’ or ‘allegorical’ or ‘poetic’) while accepting the nice ones literally.’ He is again I assume referring to the western Christian perspective rather than today’s ‘total world’ reality. Perhaps it would have been more appropriate and accurate if he had of said SOME theologians.

He goes on…

”This is where the shifting moral Zeitgeist comes in. Public opinion moves in a mysteriously synchronous fashion, usually in the direction of becoming more liberal and gentle, although there are temporary reversals such as the United States is undergoing at the moment. The vanguard of opinion in one generation may lag behind the most reactionary and conservative representatives of a future generation.” He then uses the following example “Abraham Lincoln was far ahead of his time – but his time was the nineteenth century, when just about everybody was racist by today’s standards. Here is what Lincoln said in 1858:”

”I will say, then, that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races; that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say, in addition to this, that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and ­political equality. And in as much as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race.”

Again he goes on to say: “I don’t know why the Zeitgeist changes so consistently, but it does.” He continues: ‘this shift is witnessed by: newspaper editorials, books, political speeches, judges’ decisions, parliamentary or congressional debates, the patter of stand up comedians, soap opera scripts and dinner party and bar room conversations.’ What we can see from looking at these over time is a constant and mainly positive shift in what is acceptable in society as a whole. “Our rapidly decreasing tolerance of collateral damage in warfare is one manifestation and an important one”. (2)
In the book he also examples the moving Zeitgeist trend by listing the dates at which women were given the right to vote.

New Zealand 1893, Australia 1902, Finland 1906, Norway 1913, United States 1920, Britain 1928, France 1945, Belgium 1946, Switzerland 1971 and Finally Kuwait 2006.

This brings me to my main point. What most ‘enlightened’ individuals have against fundamentalist and repressive regimes and their ‘holy ordinances’, is that they are out of step with the modern worlds moral Zeitgeist. What is worse is that as well as being out of step they want the rest of us to regress to a point somewhere in the past which is not acceptable to any free thinking intelligent individual. To be fair Dawkins does say that the trend although progressive [in the sense of upward or ‘morally improving’] is a “sawtooth not a smooth improvement” and that “there have been some appalling reversals”. I put this proposition to a friend who has lived for some years in the Middle East to which she responded, ‘it’s not a matter of the west being at the point of the sawtooth and Islamic (Arab) countries being in the trough [bottom of the notch], Arab countries are a large number of notches back’.

Unfortunately this “Arab moral Zeitgeist” or perhaps “Islamic moral Zeitgeist” is being pushed on the rest of the world. A few examples from the Jakarta Post dated 27th and 28th of October 2006. Headline: “Iran veil obligation masks colourful diversity”; quote: ”By the end of August this year the Iranian police said they had handed out 64,000 warnings to women for poor wearing of the veil”. Headline: “Saudi youth bored in Islamic state”; quote: “Islamist hardliners or ‘forces of darkness’ as [young Saudi] Omran’s blog has dubbed them, have come out fighting against liberal trends in society, arguing their must be limits to change in the land where Islam was born and which contains its holiest shrines.” And in other parts of the world: Headline: ‘Iraqi, afghan and Somali women under attack - UN”; quote: “Women [in the headlined countries] are facing violence (even as targets for assassination), especially when they speak out for women’s rights a senior United Nations official [Noelene Heyzer] told the UN Security Council.’ Headline: “Australian mufti’s sermons suspended amid firestorm over women comments”; quote “he said in one of his religious speeches that immodestly dressed women [whom he stated were like uncovered meat] were inviting sexual attack. Headline: ”Polygamy issue arouses intense passions in Muslim Malaysia”; quote: “The issue of polygamy is being hotly debated in mainly-Muslim Malaysia, after the government proposed legislation that would make it easier to enter into multiple marriages – a practice some women’s group’s want banned. Muslim men here are allowed up to four wives, but activists say the practice is cruel and that it has been distorted from its original purpose during the days of the Prophet which was to protect widows and orphans.”

This leads me to the question: Is Prime Minister Badawi just another ‘Muslim Leader’ with a Skewed Anachronistic Worldview?

Abdullah Ahmad Badawi (AB-PM-Mal) - CNN Talk Asia transcript (edited for clarity and brevity, abridged excerpts) CNN - posted - October 23, 2006 - Anjali Rao (AR-Interviewer)

Excerpt of an AB UN Speech: "I am afraid the schism between the west and the Muslim world will grow even deeper unless the international community is prepared to accept certain facts as the truth!"

AR: I'd like to discuss with you is the role of Islam in the world at the moment. What is it that you think the non-Muslim world is missing?

AB: What they are missing is that Muslims have not been really able to portray faithfully in their country's development, and the development of Muslim xxxx??? [Ummah???] that reflect the true teaching of Islam. Through the activities of so-called Muslim terrorists, they have created bad name for Islam, and the Muslim. And today, there doesn't seem to be any kind of understanding, enough understanding, to create a better rapport, better relations between the two. And that to me, is the cause of what we are seeing today.

Ric (my, comment): With all due respect this is ‘a load of old goats knees’ and much of the teaching (or more correctly perhaps, the interpretations by later scholars) needs to be abandoned and as Dawkins explains in his book, ‘radicalism grows directly from mainstream teachings’ and unfortunately it also “teaches us not to change our minds”, even I guess in spite of new evidence or changing realities.

AR: You've also recently spoken of the humiliation that Muslims feel. Why is that an overriding emotion among the Islamic community and is it something that you yourself, as a Muslim feel?

AB: I do feel that way too. There's one thing that the west has failed to understand. That, to a Muslim, religion is very important. Religion to the Muslim is not kept at home. It is not a matter for the relatives. For the Muslim, religion is important. In the corporate sector, in his business, in the government, in whatever he does, he is very much dictated by the teachings of Islam. So really it is the interpretation of the Koran.

Ric: Exactly our (the ‘west’s’ point), we don’t want to go back to an era of non voting women and all the other crass and backward practices that many Islamic states practice today. Have the religion if you must, however don’t impose a Middle Ages lifestyle on the rest of the world or expect the rest of the world to condone your bad behaviour. You should feel humiliated, perhaps that’s a start to the process of thinking about whether as leaders (and followers) if your attitudes are appropriate for today or not.

AR: Speaking of violent reactions, there was, recently such a response to the comments made by the Pope. Are Muslims being over sensitive?

AB: Well when it comes to religion we are always very sensitive. Many people, when it comes to race, we are always very sensitive. Not just us, anybody else become very, very sensitive. The Pope need not bring it up! Why did he have to say it considering the present situation? Considering that between the Muslim group and non-Muslim group there is a state of tension, there's a state of perhaps, not perhaps, a state of unhappiness, a lack of trust and confidence. That's very important. So don't bring it up!

Ric: Surely the propensity for individuals to fly off the handle and go ‘wacky bananas’ at every adverse comment that is thrown at Muslims is a demonstration of the less than desirable levels of Emotional and Spiritual Intelligence much of the Ummah. Perhaps its time to educate the followers in a more adult (rather than a moralistic parent or fractious child) approach to life, i.e. recite less and understand more. By the way can you tell the city dwelling Arabs that they are not in the desert anymore and when they recklessly fire the guns in the air that “what goes up must come down” and they are risking the death of their neighbours and their children every time they do it… I mean how smart are these people! I don’t suppose this is covered in the Qur’an however I could be wrong.

AR: Prime Minister you recently met with George W Bush. One of the things I know you were talking with him about was the desire to really create global peace. But you said that your approaches to it differed. How important is it for heads of state to really be in step in order to achieve that?

AB: Well I think it's important, …if we want global peace, then it must be all of us, [we] must more or less have the same ideas of how to do it. If it's not exactly the same, the ideas must be compatible.

…When I was with him, I spoke as a Muslim, as a man from the East, a Malay, as a leader of a Muslim country, as the chairman of OIC. And I would like to reflect our feelings, our concerns and views on many things.

Ric: Please… I implore you, can you not just speak as a global human being and get the Ummah to move a bit further along the moral Zeitgeist… PLEASE

AR: Prime Minister, Lee Kuan Yew says that the Chinese population here is systematically marginalized. He's now sent you a letter explaining his comments. What do you want to hear from him? …and …Are you saying that his accusations are groundless?

AB: I will know what I can hear when I read his letter. But certainly I wouldn't want him to raise an issue like that [Marginalisation of the Chinese]. No, he doesn't have to. Yes, it's groundless. And it is an issue that can cause unhappiness to many people. Why? Some may even regard it as tantamount to interfering with what we are doing. The Chinese in Malaysia are doing well. They are better off than the indigenous people, than the Malays.

Ric: No criticism again, control the press… yes and the world I suggest will continue to interfere welcome to the 21st century, no man (or country) is an island etc…

AR: That's what he was saying though wasn't it, that because they're so successful that's why they're marginalized.

AB: No, they have been so successful because we give them opportunities to be successful. We allow their people, we allow their children to go to Chinese school, vocational school, to learn Mandarin. And they practice their cultures. Their Chinese New Year is celebrated not only by them, but also by the Malays, the Indians who are the Malays the Muslims, the Hindus. We have respect, mutual respect. That is growing in Malaysia, that's true.

Ric: Is PM Badawi inadvertently showing his true colours here when he refers to his own Chinese citizen’s as “their people” “ALLOW their children”, “their culture” and “them”? What a disgraceful thing for the leader of “Malaysia Truly Asia” to say and what terrible attitudes does it witness.

AR: You have said that freedom of press has its boundaries and that unbridled freedom could also lead to the chaos and suffering for everybody. (Yes it's true I still hold to that view.) In what sense? Why would there be such chaos and suffering?

AB: Because press can be irresponsible, can incite feelings, can also create mistrust, can also create a state of tension. What happens is, for example, you remember the caricature of Prophet Muhammad? Yes, nobody forgets about it, you see how the Muslims feel about it. If I have the same thing here in Malaysia, my god, you know what is going to happen!

Ric: Dear PM Badawi, the press doesn’t create tension, badly raised, backward and bigoted individuals of low moral and ethical standards carry the tension with them always… and what’s more, these individuals will use any excuse to lash out, particularly if they can get away with their anti-social behaviour in the name of god.

AR: But then where are you going to draw the line between freedom of expression and clamping down?

AB: The drawing of the line comes from an understanding of those people who are in the press, understanding of our society, of our sensitivities. That is very important, they understand the society, our cultures, our values, our sensitivities and political sensitivities. That's very, very important. If they understand, they'll know what to say and what not to say. And there are occasions when the press did something which many of us thought, oh my god what has happened? We have to deal with it. We have to deal with it, we have to cope with it, we have to understand but they cannot be doing that all the time. We can't, because I want to say there is no such thing as absolute freedom. The degree of freedom that one exercises varies from one country to another. This is the truth. (3)

Ric: Oh dear, oh dear… so disappointing and this from what is touted as worlds most shining example of what a Muslim nation can become.

Finally as writing this I heard on Australia Network – Insiders – Presented Barry Cassidy, a comment by one of his panellists that the area of where the Australian's, nasty, female “meat” hating, [Egyptian) mufti’s mosque is, Lakemba (Sydney), enjoys the lowest literacy rate, highest unemployment rate and the highest rate of violence in Australia… so I ask which is the chicken and which is the egg?

www.caliibre.com

Refs:
http://richarddawkins.net/article,230,Review-of-The-God-Delusion,
Jim-Walker--NoBeliefscom (1)
http://richarddawkins.net/article,180,Collateral-Damage-
Part-2,Richard-Dawkins(2)
http://edition.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/10/23
/talkasia.badawi.script/index.html (3)

The primary cause of the ‘East’ v’s ‘West’ collision, a mismatched “Moral Zeitgeist”

Prof Richard Dawkins in his book “The God Delusion” describes ‘how our morality has shifted through the centuries by what he calls a “moral zeitgeist”. [Zeitgeist he explains a German word meaning ‘spirit of the times’]. Dawkins states "We do not ground our morality in holy books, no matter what we may fondly imagine. We simply do not [now, in Christian tradition] kill people for adultery, working on the sabbath, or for many other [historical] biblical offences.” In the book he also mentions the current Zeitgeist or attitudes to slavery, incest, needless suffering, free speech, cheating and killing in general.’ ‘Instead [of a biblical guide] we use our senses, intelligence and new information to change our social condition by revising our outlook on racism, gender, and crime. We no longer believe in slavery. Women now have the right to vote. We simply don't need holy books to determine our moral status.’ (1)

In the article (ref 2 below) he says, “Religious apologists will try to persuade you that, without scriptural texts, we’d have no moral compass, no guidelines for what is right and what is wrong. Anybody who advocates basing our morals on the Bible has not read the Bible with sufficient attention. It is, of course, true that you can find verses of the Bible and the Koran, which we today might regard as moral, for example the Sermon on the Mount. You can also find verses suggesting that the worst thing you can do is make a graven image or break the sabbath. Both deserve the death penalty, as does cheeking your parents. The Bible is an ethical disaster area with islands of decent morality dotted about here and there.”

’When sceptics point to particularly nasty bits of the Old Testament – for example the disgusting story of Abraham almost sacrificing Isaac (or his other son Ishmael according to Muslim tradition), religious apologists are apt to reply in exasperation: “Yes of course, but we don’t believe that any more. We’ve moved on.” Theologians have moved on and have rejected the nasty verses (or written them off as ‘symbolic’ or ‘allegorical’ or ‘poetic’) while accepting the nice ones literally.’ He is again I assume referring to the western Christian perspective rather than today’s ‘total world’ reality. Perhaps it would have been more appropriate and accurate if he had of said SOME theologians.

He goes on…

”This is where the shifting moral Zeitgeist comes in. Public opinion moves in a mysteriously synchronous fashion, usually in the direction of becoming more liberal and gentle, although there are temporary reversals such as the United States is undergoing at the moment. The vanguard of opinion in one generation may lag behind the most reactionary and conservative representatives of a future generation.” He then uses the following example “Abraham Lincoln was far ahead of his time – but his time was the nineteenth century, when just about everybody was racist by today’s standards. Here is what Lincoln said in 1858:”

”I will say, then, that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races; that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say, in addition to this, that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and ­political equality. And in as much as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race.”

Again he goes on to say: “I don’t know why the Zeitgeist changes so consistently, but it does.” He continues: ‘this shift is witnessed by: newspaper editorials, books, political speeches, judges’ decisions, parliamentary or congressional debates, the patter of stand up comedians, soap opera scripts and dinner party and bar room conversations.’ What we can see from looking at these over time is a constant and mainly positive shift in what is acceptable in society as a whole. “Our rapidly decreasing tolerance of collateral damage in warfare is one manifestation and an important one”. (2)
In the book he also examples the moving Zeitgeist trend by listing the dates at which women were given the right to vote.

New Zealand 1893, Australia 1902, Finland 1906, Norway 1913, United States 1920, Britain 1928, France 1945, Belgium 1946, Switzerland 1971 and Finally Kuwait 2006.

This brings me to my main point. What most ‘enlightened’ individuals have against fundamentalist and repressive regimes and their ‘holy ordinances’, is that they are out of step with the modern worlds moral Zeitgeist. What is worse is that as well as being out of step they want the rest of us to regress to a point somewhere in the past which is not acceptable to any free thinking intelligent individual. To be fair Dawkins does say that the trend although progressive [in the sense of upward or ‘morally improving’] is a “sawtooth not a smooth improvement” and that “there have been some appalling reversals”. I put this proposition to a friend who has lived for some years in the Middle East to which she responded, ‘it’s not a matter of the west being at the point of the sawtooth and Islamic (Arab) countries being in the trough [bottom of the notch], Arab countries are a large number of notches back’.

Unfortunately this “Arab moral Zeitgeist” or perhaps “Islamic moral Zeitgeist” is being pushed on the rest of the world. A few examples from the Jakarta Post dated 27th and 28th of October 2006. Headline: “Iran veil obligation masks colourful diversity”; quote: ”By the end of August this year the Iranian police said they had handed out 64,000 warnings to women for poor wearing of the veil”. Headline: “Saudi youth bored in Islamic state”; quote: “Islamist hardliners or ‘forces of darkness’ as [young Saudi] Omran’s blog has dubbed them, have come out fighting against liberal trends in society, arguing their must be limits to change in the land where Islam was born and which contains its holiest shrines.” And in other parts of the world: Headline: ‘Iraqi, afghan and Somali women under attack - UN”; quote: “Women [in the headlined countries] are facing violence (even as targets for assassination), especially when they speak out for women’s rights a senior United Nations official [Noelene Heyzer] told the UN Security Council.’ Headline: “Australian mufti’s sermons suspended amid firestorm over women comments”; quote “he said in one of his religious speeches that immodestly dressed women [whom he stated were like uncovered meat] were inviting sexual attack. Headline: ”Polygamy issue arouses intense passions in Muslim Malaysia”; quote: “The issue of polygamy is being hotly debated in mainly-Muslim Malaysia, after the government proposed legislation that would make it easier to enter into multiple marriages – a practice some women’s group’s want banned. Muslim men here are allowed up to four wives, but activists say the practice is cruel and that it has been distorted from its original purpose during the days of the Prophet which was to protect widows and orphans.”

This leads me to the question: Is Prime Minister Badawi just another ‘Muslim Leader’ with a Skewed Anachronistic Worldview?

Abdullah Ahmad Badawi (AB-PM-Mal) - CNN Talk Asia transcript (edited for clarity and brevity, abridged excerpts) CNN - posted - October 23, 2006 - Anjali Rao (AR-Interviewer)

Excerpt of an AB UN Speech: "I am afraid the schism between the west and the Muslim world will grow even deeper unless the international community is prepared to accept certain facts as the truth!"

AR: I'd like to discuss with you is the role of Islam in the world at the moment. What is it that you think the non-Muslim world is missing?

AB: What they are missing is that Muslims have not been really able to portray faithfully in their country's development, and the development of Muslim xxxx??? [Ummah???] that reflect the true teaching of Islam. Through the activities of so-called Muslim terrorists, they have created bad name for Islam, and the Muslim. And today, there doesn't seem to be any kind of understanding, enough understanding, to create a better rapport, better relations between the two. And that to me, is the cause of what we are seeing today.

Ric (my, comment): With all due respect this is ‘a load of old goats knees’ and much of the teaching (or more correctly perhaps, the interpretations by later scholars) needs to be abandoned and as Dawkins explains in his book, ‘radicalism grows directly from mainstream teachings’ and unfortunately it also “teaches us not to change our minds”, even I guess in spite of new evidence or changing realities.

AR: You've also recently spoken of the humiliation that Muslims feel. Why is that an overriding emotion among the Islamic community and is it something that you yourself, as a Muslim feel?

AB: I do feel that way too. There's one thing that the west has failed to understand. That, to a Muslim, religion is very important. Religion to the Muslim is not kept at home. It is not a matter for the relatives. For the Muslim, religion is important. In the corporate sector, in his business, in the government, in whatever he does, he is very much dictated by the teachings of Islam. So really it is the interpretation of the Koran.

Ric: Exactly our (the ‘west’s’ point), we don’t want to go back to an era of non voting women and all the other crass and backward practices that many Islamic states practice today. Have the religion if you must, however don’t impose a Middle Ages lifestyle on the rest of the world or expect the rest of the world to condone your bad behaviour. You should feel humiliated, perhaps that’s a start to the process of thinking about whether as leaders (and followers) if your attitudes are appropriate for today or not.

AR: Speaking of violent reactions, there was, recently such a response to the comments made by the Pope. Are Muslims being over sensitive?

AB: Well when it comes to religion we are always very sensitive. Many people, when it comes to race, we are always very sensitive. Not just us, anybody else become very, very sensitive. The Pope need not bring it up! Why did he have to say it considering the present situation? Considering that between the Muslim group and non-Muslim group there is a state of tension, there's a state of perhaps, not perhaps, a state of unhappiness, a lack of trust and confidence. That's very important. So don't bring it up!

Ric: Surely the propensity for individuals to fly off the handle and go ‘wacky bananas’ at every adverse comment that is thrown at Muslims is a demonstration of the less than desirable levels of Emotional and Spiritual Intelligence much of the Ummah. Perhaps its time to educate the followers in a more adult (rather than a moralistic parent or fractious child) approach to life, i.e. recite less and understand more. By the way can you tell the city dwelling Arabs that they are not in the desert anymore and when they recklessly fire the guns in the air that “what goes up must come down” and they are risking the death of their neighbours and their children every time they do it… I mean how smart are these people! I don’t suppose this is covered in the Qur’an however I could be wrong.

AR: Prime Minister you recently met with George W Bush. One of the things I know you were talking with him about was the desire to really create global peace. But you said that your approaches to it differed. How important is it for heads of state to really be in step in order to achieve that?

AB: Well I think it's important, …if we want global peace, then it must be all of us, [we] must more or less have the same ideas of how to do it. If it's not exactly the same, the ideas must be compatible.

…When I was with him, I spoke as a Muslim, as a man from the East, a Malay, as a leader of a Muslim country, as the chairman of OIC. And I would like to reflect our feelings, our concerns and views on many things.

Ric: Please… I implore you, can you not just speak as a global human being and get the Ummah to move a bit further along the moral Zeitgeist… PLEASE

AR: Prime Minister, Lee Kuan Yew says that the Chinese population here is systematically marginalized. He's now sent you a letter explaining his comments. What do you want to hear from him? …and …Are you saying that his accusations are groundless?

AB: I will know what I can hear when I read his letter. But certainly I wouldn't want him to raise an issue like that [Marginalisation of the Chinese]. No, he doesn't have to. Yes, it's groundless. And it is an issue that can cause unhappiness to many people. Why? Some may even regard it as tantamount to interfering with what we are doing. The Chinese in Malaysia are doing well. They are better off than the indigenous people, than the Malays.

Ric: No criticism again, control the press… yes and the world I suggest will continue to interfere welcome to the 21st century, no man (or country) is an island etc…

AR: That's what he was saying though wasn't it, that because they're so successful that's why they're marginalized.

AB: No, they have been so successful because we give them opportunities to be successful. We allow their people, we allow their children to go to Chinese school, vocational school, to learn Mandarin. And they practice their cultures. Their Chinese New Year is celebrated not only by them, but also by the Malays, the Indians who are the Malays the Muslims, the Hindus. We have respect, mutual respect. That is growing in Malaysia, that's true.

Ric: Is PM Badawi inadvertently showing his true colours here when he refers to his own Chinese citizen’s as “their people” “ALLOW their children”, “their culture” and “them”? What a disgraceful thing for the leader of “Malaysia Truly Asia” to say and what terrible attitudes does it witness.

AR: You have said that freedom of press has its boundaries and that unbridled freedom could also lead to the chaos and suffering for everybody. (Yes it's true I still hold to that view.) In what sense? Why would there be such chaos and suffering?

AB: Because press can be irresponsible, can incite feelings, can also create mistrust, can also create a state of tension. What happens is, for example, you remember the caricature of Prophet Muhammad? Yes, nobody forgets about it, you see how the Muslims feel about it. If I have the same thing here in Malaysia, my god, you know what is going to happen!

Ric: Dear PM Badawi, the press doesn’t create tension, badly raised, backward and bigoted individuals of low moral and ethical standards carry the tension with them always… and what’s more, these individuals will use any excuse to lash out, particularly if they can get away with their anti-social behaviour in the name of god.

AR: But then where are you going to draw the line between freedom of expression and clamping down?

AB: The drawing of the line comes from an understanding of those people who are in the press, understanding of our society, of our sensitivities. That is very important, they understand the society, our cultures, our values, our sensitivities and political sensitivities. That's very, very important. If they understand, they'll know what to say and what not to say. And there are occasions when the press did something which many of us thought, oh my god what has happened? We have to deal with it. We have to deal with it, we have to cope with it, we have to understand but they cannot be doing that all the time. We can't, because I want to say there is no such thing as absolute freedom. The degree of freedom that one exercises varies from one country to another. This is the truth. (3)

Ric: Oh dear, oh dear… so disappointing and this from what is touted as worlds most shining example of what a Muslim nation can become.

Finally as writing this I heard on Australia Network – Insiders – Presented Barry Cassidy, a comment by one of his panellists that the area of where the Australian's, nasty, female “meat” hating, [Egyptian) mufti’s mosque is, Lakemba (Sydney), enjoys the lowest literacy rate, highest unemployment rate and the highest rate of violence in Australia… so I ask which is the chicken and which is the egg?

www.caliibre.com

Refs: http://richarddawkins.net/article,230,Review-of-The-God-Delusion,
Jim-Walker--NoBeliefscom(1)
http://richarddawkins.net/article,180,Collateral-Damage-
Part-2,Richard-Dawkins(2)
http://edition.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/10/23/talkasia.badawi.script/index.html(3)