Two different wafers. Webster Cook made a mild judgment mistake, naively palming a wafer to show his friend. He got death threats, and he was a subject of national news because of this.
PZ Myers, reacting to the unbelievable overreaction to this news story, was sent a wafer by someone, and “desecrated” it to make a point that we don’t have to share your reverence for a little piece of bread. The reaction to this was even more over-the-top than the reaction to Cook’s taking the original wafer.
Sure, Myers’ action was rude, but it’s OK to use rudeness to combat threats of violence IMHO.
I still don’t get the ripping up the Quran to protest something done by Catholics.
I assume based on your response that you applauded the government of Iran’s decision to start publishing anti-Semitic cartoons in response to the Muhammad cartoons controversy.
Did you hear applause? Did you read any such statement coming from CurtC? Is it possible to disagree with someone without putting words in their mouth to make them look like fanatics?
If I were aware of evidence that such gestures in fact had the effect of reducing misunderstanding, intolerance, threats and violence, I’d agree with you.
I assume it is based on the notion that the hated “other” is infinitely fungible. Bigots everywhere work on this principle - it may even be said to be characteristic of the type.
Just like death threats made (assumedly) by some Catholics means all Catholics are guilty, thus making it ‘okay’ to commit desecration in “response”, it also means all religious people everywhere are equally responsible - thus insulting Muslims also makes sense.
You see this at work in anti-Muslim bigotry all the time (bad actions by some Muslims mean Muslims in general are bad).
He wasn’t protesting Catholics per se, but trying to make a more general statement about the irrationality of sanctifying inanimate objects and commenting on how that leads to violence.
And I’m not sure if this played into it, but it’s also a very common and predicable trope for Christian religionists to accuse atheists (who they equate with “liberals”) of not being willing to criticize Islam. I would bet a sizable amount of money that if Myers had not included a Qu’ran, he would have received responses saying, “you would never do that with a Qu’ran.” Including a Qu’ran and a copy of The God Delusion (though I think the last choice was probably a little tongue in cheek) preempts accusations that he was singling out Christians.
Could you please explain what Myers actually did to any Catholics. “Desecrate” is a religious word with no real, physical meaning. Myers didn’t go to a church, disturbed no ceremony, interefered with no free practice of religion and no one had to see his blog unless they wanted to. Do you think that putting a hole in the communion wafer truly had some kind of metaphysical consequence or meaning?
Hindus think that cows are sacred. Are people who eat hamburgers “desecrating” sacred objects?
PZ wasn’t making a point about Catholics per se but about the very idea of scared objects. Why is this point so hard for you guys to fathom? It’s not about a particular religion but the potential consequences of believing in anything without sufficient evidence.
On edit or what DotC said almost word for word, I need to preview…
None of which is responsive to the point. We’ve hashed out “desecration” and “insult” about a hundred times - your points are not more persuasive for repetition.
It is obvious that Myers fully intended to insult Catholics, and that he also understood that he was insulting Muslims. the fact that he, and you, do not think desecration of other people’s symbols has any meaning doesn’t make it not have meaning to them, and that ordinary humans have some empathy for that - you don’t need to be a Catholic and a Muslim to understand that desecration is wrong and insulting (and in fact, I’m neither the one nor the other). If I was to visit a New Guinean, I’d not piss on his ancestor’s graves, even though I don’t believe in Ghosts or life after death - and I’d be surprised if you would. Or would you? After all, it is not like anyone or anything is actually harmed by pissing on a grave, right? What’s a little piss in some dirt?
However, that’s all beside the point. The point is that he childishly responded to bad behaviour by some of his hated bete noir by imputing that bad behaviour to all of them - Catholics and Muslims, too. Ibn Warraq pointed out the silliness of including Muslims in this exercise; I’m adding to that by pointing out the silliness of addressing that exercise to all Catholics.
I don’t understand why “desecration” is wrong. I think that’s something that exsists only in the imagination. I see the physical action only. Anyone else who wants to imbue a harmless action with some kind of imagined magical consequences is free to do so, but the person doing the action is not actually “desecrating” anything.
You didn’t answer my question about eating cows. Is that a desecration or not?
Lemmie get this straight - if someone was to piss on the grave of someone elses’ loved one, and publicly brag about it, perhaps make a movie of it and post it on their blog, you see no problem with this? It isn’t in any way insulting, and anyone who thinks it is, is just wrong?
You sticking with that answer?
As for cows -if I was to go to India and kill a sacred cow, I’d see that as wrong. Eating cow in NA, no. Nor do I understand that Hindus in general feel it is a “desecration” that non-Hindus in NA are eating cows.
Edit: none of which is, of course, responsive to the point I made. I assume because there is no response.
I know this wasn’t directed at me but I’ll answer anyway - nope piss where you like as long as it’s legal why should I care? Some liquid is put on some dirt, big deal.
That’s nonsense. As you yourself noted, adding some Dawkins pages was “tounge in cheek”. No-one asserts that atheists find damaging the works of Dawkins in any way desecration.
It is equivalent to pissing on the grave of someone’s mom, and then pissing into the ocean, to demonstrate you are even-handedly insulting that guy and environmentalists.
As I said - lack of empathy for feelings of others.
Just because you don’t see it as insulting, can you not understand that they might? That their subjective feelings have validity, just as yours do?
Analogously speaking, he convinced someone to steal an Indian’s sacred cow for him, send him the meat, and ate it. Then boasted about it.
PS: still no response to the actual point made above.
I addressed that by saying that’s only true if yiu think he was also imputing bad behavior to atheists.
His statement was about that spefic bad behavipour. It was inpsired by a particular incident, but its purpose was to make a more general statement about the myth (and danger in Myers’ mind) of “sanctifying” inanimate objects.
You might wish to read other’s posts reading before insulting me and accusing me of “putting words in their mouths to make them look like fanatics”.
Sorry, but when you say “it’s OK” it’s pretty obvious that he approves of Myers decision, though he has yet to explain how burning a Quran is “giving the finger to bigots”.
Anyway, as I said, I assume that CurtC felt that it was perfectly appropriate for the government of Iran to sponsor anti-Semitic cartoons(or at least cartoons deemed anti-Semitic) in response to some Christians printing cartoons the government of Iran deemed anti-Muslim(the Muhammad cartoons).
Similarly, I assume when he heard of European countries jailing and prosecuting people for denying the Holocaust, he thought we should start publishing essays and cartoons denying the Shoah and, for good measure, claiming the Armenian Holocaust was a myth as well.