# Respecting Religious Beliefs **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 25, 2009, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367 "2009-02-25T14:56:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 8:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/61 "2009-02-26T08:45:56Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > Seriously. Why should I take the beliefs of an atheist seriously or pretend to respect their views? What possible purpose could it serve? I don’t really care if you respect my views or not. However, most atheists make pretty sound logical arguments for our positions, and not taking these seriously makes it seem that you either don’t understand them or don’t have a response. That doesn’t mean that you have to agree with them. In the Aquinas thread, most of the responses took the argument quite seriously. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 9:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/62 "2009-02-26T09:42:58Z")
As far as religion being disrespected on the SDMB; this is a **discussion board**. Not lunch with your grandma. I have no obligation to spare your feelings by pretending respect. Theists sometimes say bad things about atheism; atheists sometimes say bad things about theism ( although not nearly enough IMHO ). Grow some skin; some people are going to think your beliefs stupid or wrong, no matter what they are, and they are allowed to say so. And frankly, the **real** reason the believers insist that everyone should respect their beliefs “just because”, is because they can’t possibly **earn** that respect. They simply have no evidence; no rational reason to believe they way they do. They get angry when someone mocks them with comments about the Flying Spaghetti Monster or the Invisible Pink Unicorn, because they can’t show their beliefs to be any more real than such icons of mockery. So instead of trying to earn respect, they demand it. ---
**Author:** ![tagos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@tagos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tagos)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 12:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/63 "2009-02-26T12:15:09Z")
> [@StGermain](#): > > You don’t have to respect my religious beliefs, you just have to keep your opinion to yourself. > StG Sure. So long as you don’t vote or otherwise interfere in the public process based on your superstitions. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 2:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/64 "2009-02-26T14:14:37Z")
> [@Fantome](#): > > Are you sure you’re not twisting his words here? I’d like a cite for this. If I may … [http://richarddawkins.net/article,118,Religions-Real-Child-Abuse,Richard-Dawkins](http://richarddawkins.net/article,118,Religions-Real-Child-Abuse,Richard-Dawkins) > [@](#): > > In the wake of the current scandal over child abuse by priests , I have had a letter from an American woman in her mid forties who was brought up Roman Catholic. She has two strong recollections from when she was seven. She was sexually abused by her parish priest in his car. And around the same time a little schoolfriend of hers, who had tragically died, went to hell because she was a Protestant. Or so my correspondent was led to believe by the then official doctrine of her church. Her view now is that, of these two examples of Roman Catholic child abuse, the one physical and the other mental, the second was by far the worst. She writes: > “Being fondled by the priest simply left the impression (from the mind of a 7 year old) as ‘yuchy’ while the memory of my friend going to hell was one of cold, immeasurable fear. I never lost sleep because of the priest ? but I spent many a night being terrified that the people I loved would go to Hell. It gave me nightmares.” > I am sure her experience is far from unique. And what if we assume a less altruistic child, worried about her own eternity rather than a friend’s? **Odious as the physical abuse of children by priests undoubtedly is, I suspect that it may do them less lasting damage than the mental abuse of bringing them up Catholic in the first place.** Emphasis added. To be precise - the statement is that he “suspects” that being brought up Catholic is worse (or does them more “lasting damage”) than being sexually abused. ---
**Author:** ![Neverender](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/848f3c/32.png) [@Neverender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Neverender)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/65 "2009-02-26T14:18:57Z")
> [@katannah](#): > > If you’re doing this with friends, you set your own limits within your little community. My pals and I have already established our mutual respect and know the boundaries, so we have no problem with this. > > However. If you don’t know me, and you start calling out my teams (say I’m wearing a jersey) or questioning my sexuality while you’re standing next to me on the subway, you’re gonna think how I feel about you mocking my religion is mild. You have established nothing with me that gives you the right to step into my space and be disrespectful, just because you think it’s funny. > > I think you’re applying a rule for your microcosm to the macrocosm and that is never a good idea. That’s a fair point, and to be honest I think you’re right. But what about in our little microcosms, in our friend groups or whatever, if you tease the football fan about his team it’s fine perhaps a little rude, depending on what exactly is said and to who and how they take it, but if you say something about the believers belief it’s somehow less **moral** to make that joke. I think that is what I’m trying to get at mostly. Especially in a society (more so in England than America, to be fair) where religion is losing it’s grasp on the majority. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/66 "2009-02-26T14:27:03Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > You and I think so, but I’m not sure someone brought up in that culture would. You can’t make judgments based on the rationality of the position, because how rational it is is the thing in dispute. > > I’m not sure conversations are all that different, except that there is no imbalance of power. Many years ago I took my daughter and a friend, whose mother was quite religious, out trick or treating. I think someone dressed as a devil passed by, and the friend was concerned, and I blurted out that there was no such thing as the devil - which was news to her. Then she said “but there is a god, right” and I said something that was easy for her to interpret as a yes. she was like 10 - but what if an adult said something similar? Would it behoove you to pretend that the devil existed to not challenge her belief system? Would it be disrespectful to state quite firmly that none does? When I did believe in God I was Jewish and didn’t believe in the devil. Don’t agree. You can easily make judgments based on the rationality of _behaviour_ (as in whether taking offence at perceived insults is justified, or on whether or not someone is being tactful or obnoxious) quite independently of the alleged rationality of the participants or their initial points of view. Even a lunatic can be polite! Someone who believes in God isn’t necessarily irrational in other respects, and someone who is an atheist isn’t necessarily always rational - look at Dawkins, whose premises (i.e., God does not have any existance) I mostly agree with but who is, in my opinion, completely wrong in approach - a textbook example of the “rationalist” who is on occasion quite _irrational_ in expression (see my cite above - being raised Catholic worse than being sexually molested by priests? I’m no Catholic, I have no particular love for Catholicism as a religion, but that is totally over the top). ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/67 "2009-02-26T15:10:22Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > being raised Catholic worse than being sexually molested by priests? I’m no Catholic, I have no particular love for Catholicism as a religion, but that is totally over the top). He said “less lasting damage”, which is probably true. Religion often largely defines a person their whole life; molestation usually does not. What you’re overlooking is that he regards being religious AS damage. ---
**Author:** ![Duke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e8c25b/32.png) [@Duke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duke)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/68 "2009-02-26T15:22:19Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Religion often largely defines a person their whole life; **molestation usually does not**. I don’t suppose you know any victims of child abuse, do you? ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/69 "2009-02-26T15:22:29Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > He said “less lasting damage”, which is probably true. Religion often largely defines a person their whole life; molestation usually does not. What you’re overlooking is that he regards being religious AS damage. I do not think “worse” is a bad paraphrase for “does less lasting damage”. I’m not “overlooking” that he happens to think religion is “damage”, I’m saying it is an absurd position to take. The article he cites with approval is, if anything, worse - in that the author (of which he approves) outright calls for parents to be prevented by the state from raising their children Catholic (or any similar religion). This is of course a quite logical progression from the notion that being raised religious is ‘worse’ than being raped - after all, people who rape kids get thrown in jail, so obviously we ought to throw Catholic parents in jail, too. ---
**Author:** ![suranyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@suranyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/suranyi)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/70 "2009-02-26T17:03:31Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > As far as religion being disrespected on the SDMB; this is a **discussion board**. Not lunch with your grandma. I have no obligation to spare your feelings by pretending respect. Theists sometimes say bad things about atheism; atheists sometimes say bad things about theism ( although not nearly enough IMHO ). Grow some skin; some people are going to think your beliefs stupid or wrong, no matter what they are, and they are allowed to say so. > > And frankly, the **real** reason the believers insist that everyone should respect their beliefs “just because”, is because they can’t possibly **earn** that respect. They simply have no evidence; no rational reason to believe they way they do. They get angry when someone mocks them with comments about the Flying Spaghetti Monster or the Invisible Pink Unicorn, because they can’t show their beliefs to be any more real than such icons of mockery. So instead of trying to earn respect, they demand it. But we’re not talking about challenging people in a message board. We’re talking about disrespecting people in real life. We’re exactly talking about, for example, lunch with your grandma. Or so I thought. Ed ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/71 "2009-02-26T17:42:53Z")
> [@suranyi](#): > > But we’re not talking about challenging people in a message board. We’re talking about disrespecting people in real life. We’re exactly talking about, for example, lunch with your grandma. > > Or so I thought. > > Ed Dunno about lunch with grandma, but when I lunch with mommy, she prays - as in, everybody be silent and still, and I’m going to pray out loud for the group. She started it. 😃 In this context, she considers it a deep personal insult if I roll my eyes. (No lie. Given that, sometimes I decide to get my money’s worth and make a dry disparaging comment under my breath, too.) Lately though, I’ve been using handy excuses to leave the room. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/72 "2009-02-26T17:48:19Z")
> [@begbert2](#): > > Dunno about lunch with grandma, but when I lunch with mommy, she prays - as in, everybody be silent and still, and I’m going to pray out loud for the group. > > She started it. 😃 > > In this context, she considers it a deep personal insult if I roll my eyes. (No lie. Given that, sometimes I decide to get my money’s worth and make a dry disparaging comment under my breath, too.) Lately though, I’ve been using handy excuses to leave the room. It IS a deeply personal insult if you roll your eyes. It costs you jack-diggly to allow her to say grace. It costs you jack-diggly plus 0.00001 to say nothing while she prays for your soul for 15 seconds. I’m not saying we should always submit to the beliefs and whims of the religiuos. I don’t accede to my father’s requests that I go to his church, and I refuse to go to a gathering which has as its sole purpose prayer; and if I am in the hospital, I am not going to allow him or his minister to put healing hands and olive oil on me or pray in my room. But you can wait another few seconds while she says grace, and if she mentions you by name, you can say in the privacy of your own brain “dear lord, while you’re at it, can you please teleport a naked & horny Natalie Portman/Taye Diggs into my bedroom tonight.” ---
**Author:** ![chowder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/977dab/32.png) [@chowder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chowder)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/73 "2009-02-26T17:51:28Z")
> [@acsenray](#): > > So what about religions that call on their adherents to proselytize? While I respect the right of anyone to hold whatever beliefs they choose, these people get on my tit. If I wanted your religion I’d ask you for advice about it, until then, stay of my bloody lawn ---
**Author:** ![hotflungwok](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/edb3f5/32.png) [@hotflungwok](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hotflungwok)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/74 "2009-02-26T17:57:21Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > I’m not saying we should always submit to the beliefs and whims of the religiuos. I don’t accede to my father’s requests that I go to his church, and I refuse to go to a gathering which has as its sole purpose prayer; and if I am in the hospital, I am not going to allow him or his minister to put healing hands and olive oil on me or pray in my room. But you can wait another few seconds while she says grace, and if she mentions you by name, you can say in the privacy of your own brain “dear lord, while you’re at it, can you please teleport a naked & horny Natalie Portman/Taye Diggs into my bedroom tonight.” So what if I ask them if, just this once, they don’t go to church? Don’t pray? Or don’t say grace? What if just this once, we followed my beliefs like you expect me to follow yours? What then? I’ll tell you what, they look at you like you just ask them if they wouldn’t mind too much if you urinated on their newborn child. Been there, done that, heard the screaming. In my experience, the religious have no problem expecting others to follow their beliefs, just once, but asking them the exactly same boon is unthinkable. Religion deserves no more inherent respect than any other idea. It deserves no special protection from examination, nor from ridicule. ---
**Author:** ![Ensign\_Edison](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7ab992/32.png) [@Ensign\_Edison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ensign_Edison)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/75 "2009-02-26T18:10:20Z")
I know it’s hard for some people to imagine how it’s possible to survive childhood sexual abuse and still feel there are experiences just as bad or worse in life, but people who were abused really can grow up and be normal people just like you. They may have some issues to work through, and a \* very small minority \* may remain deeply traumatized but this idea that nothing as bad can possibly ever happen to anyone is just silly. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/76 "2009-02-26T18:12:32Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > Don’t agree. You can easily make judgments based on the rationality of _behaviour_ (as in whether taking offence at perceived insults is justified, or on whether or not someone is being tactful or obnoxious) quite independently of the alleged rationality of the participants or their initial points of view. Even a lunatic can be polite! I’m not sure what irrational behavior is. Behavior can be rational or irrational based on circumstances and motives. Drawing and publishing comics is not irrational at heart - when Jack Chick does it those comics become irrational because he is. > [@](#): > > Someone who believes in God isn’t necessarily irrational in other respects, and someone who is an atheist isn’t necessarily always rational - look at Dawkins, whose premises (i.e., God does not have any existance) I mostly agree with but who is, in my opinion, completely wrong in approach - a textbook example of the “rationalist” who is on occasion quite _irrational_ in expression (see my cite above - being raised Catholic worse than being sexually molested by priests? I’m no Catholic, I have no particular love for Catholicism as a religion, but that is totally over the top). Exactly right about an irrational belief not implying that a person is fundamentally irrational - see my little dialog above. Atheists seldom imply that belief makes a person irrational, but theists usually get offended anyway. The Dawkins example is interesting. Maybe he overgeneralized - but he gives a specific example of a person more traumatized by the prospect of a friend being eternally damned than her own abuse. Which quite frankly is a rational response. Look, if we knew that people were going to be eternally tortured (video from hell) for not being Catholic, and we also knew that some priests were molesting some children, which would be the highest priority problem to fix? I think that you and most theists here, being rational, know full well that hell is a myth and so quite properly think that the abuse that is really happening has priority. But that show you don’t believe everything you are supposed to, or were supposed to given this girl’s training. I’m aware that Protestants don’t go to hell any more. I probably would still, for all kinds of reasons. ---
**Author:** ![Fantome](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9c0ed/32.png) [@Fantome](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fantome)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/77 "2009-02-26T18:15:44Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > If I may … > > > [@](#): > > > > In the wake of the current scandal over child abuse by priests , I have had a letter from an American woman in her mid forties who was brought up Roman Catholic. She has two strong recollections from when she was seven. She was sexually abused by her parish priest in his car. And around the same time a little schoolfriend of hers, who had tragically died, went to hell because she was a Protestant. Or so my correspondent was led to believe by the then official doctrine of her church. Her view now is that, of these two examples of Roman Catholic child abuse, the one physical and the other mental, the second was by far the worst. She writes: > > “Being fondled by the priest simply left the impression (from the mind of a 7 year old) as ‘yuchy’ while the memory of my friend going to hell was one of cold, immeasurable fear. I never lost sleep because of the priest ? but I spent many a night being terrified that the people I loved would go to Hell. It gave me nightmares.” > > I am sure her experience is far from unique. And what if we assume a less altruistic child, worried about her own eternity rather than a friend’s? **Odious as the physical abuse of children by priests undoubtedly is, I suspect that it may do them less lasting damage than the mental abuse of bringing them up Catholic in the first place.** > > [http://richarddawkins.net/article,118,Religions-Real-Child-Abuse,Richard-Dawkins](http://richarddawkins.net/article,118,Religions-Real-Child-Abuse,Richard-Dawkins) > > Emphasis added. > > To be precise - the statement is that he “suspects” that being brought up Catholic is worse (or does them more “lasting damage”) than being sexually abused. You’re not attempting to back up **ITR champion** ’s claim, are you? He claimed that Dawkins said “that believers in fairies are worse than child molesters.” That’s not at all what Dawkins said. Not even close. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/78 "2009-02-26T18:17:49Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > I do not think “worse” is a bad paraphrase for “does less lasting damage”. > > I’m not “overlooking” that he happens to think religion is “damage”, I’m saying it is an absurd position to take. Are you saying that there is no damage from the church telling a girl that her friends not in her club are going to be tortured (or in this case, are being tortured) forever? The way it disturbed her, it seems certain that she believed it. Get yourself out of the mindset of an adult who knows hell is bull and into the mindset of a young girl brought up to believe the priest and who knows no such thing. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/79 "2009-02-26T18:18:03Z")
> [@Ensign\_Edison](#): > > I know it’s hard for some people to imagine how it’s possible to survive childhood sexual abuse and still feel there are experiences just as bad or worse in life, but people who were abused really can grow up and be normal people just like you. They may have some issues to work through, and a \* very small minority \* may remain deeply traumatized but this idea that nothing as bad can possibly ever happen to anyone is just silly. Agreed. Good thing no-one is making that argument. The notion (even if coyly phrased as “I suspect”) that merely being brought up as a Catholic is _in general_ ‘worse’ than being sexually molested by priests is exponentially sillier. And unlike the ‘argument’ that “nothing as bad can possibly ever happen”, we have a well-known figure actually saying it - namely, Dawkins. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2009, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367/80 "2009-02-26T18:25:50Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > I’m not sure what irrational behavior is. Behavior can be rational or irrational based on circumstances and motives. Drawing and publishing comics is not irrational at heart - when Jack Chick does it those comics become irrational because he is. > > Exactly right about an irrational belief not implying that a person is fundamentally irrational - see my little dialog above. Atheists seldom imply that belief makes a person irrational, but theists usually get offended anyway. I’m not talking about what theists do, or do not, get offended by. I’m merely saying that the acts giving rise to offence - no matter who by - have an objective component to them; they are not merely subjective. If I call a Black man a “nigger”, not being Black myself and in a context where it is obviously not being used ironically, subversively or among joking friends, I am most likely going to cause offense. > [@](#): > > The Dawkins example is interesting. Maybe he overgeneralized - but he gives a specific example of a person more traumatized by the prospect of a friend being eternally damned than her own abuse. Which quite frankly is a rational response. Look, if we knew that people were going to be eternally tortured (video from hell) for not being Catholic, and we also knew that some priests were molesting some children, which would be the highest priority problem to fix? I think that you and most theists here, being rational, know full well that hell is a myth and so quite properly think that the abuse that is really happening has priority. But that show you don’t believe everything you are supposed to, or were supposed to given this girl’s training. I’m aware that Protestants don’t go to hell any more. I probably would still, for all kinds of reasons. “Maybe” he was overgeneralizing? Like just a bit? Are you also of the opinion that Catholic parents ought to be jailed? After all, that also follows “rationally”. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/respecting-religious-beliefs/487367.md?page=5)