[…Deconstructing the Transforming Melbourne document – continued from here. This is the longest post, but also contains the nastiest material. Charitable Christians? Not in this town.]

Their [atheists’] control of major media outlets means they can daily run a crusade for their faith,

Atheists control major media outlets? Wow. That’s news to me. I really wish it were so, but sadly that isn’t the case. And a crusade? Do you even know the root of that word, Mr Isaachsen?

[French croisade and Spanish cruzada, both ultimately from Latin crux, cruc-, cross.]

Any of the military expeditions undertaken by European Christians in the 11th, 12th, and 13th centuries to recover the Holy Land from the Muslims.

Methinks this is a pot-calling-the-kettle-black situation you’ve got going there. I guess you’d have phrased that a little differently if you’d spent more than a nano-second of spittle-flecked-ranting-thought on it.

I’m tired of saying it, but it obviously just doesn’t sink in with people whose brains are ‘wired’ for religion: atheism is NOT A FAITH. It’s not ABOUT faith. It has nothing to do with faith. You can keep on trying to paint it that way, but none of us see it like that. It is a measure of your great failure to understand what we’re talking about that you continue to attempt to portray us as being just like you.

Atheism has become a new “evangelistic religion”, seeking to gain converts and stir opposition to Christianity.

No, it hasn’t. Atheists don’t ‘seek to gain converts’. Atheists seek the freedom to let people decide for themselves how the world works without influencing them with superstition. If you had real faith that what you believe is right, Mr Isaachsen, surely this shouldn’t concern you quite so much.

This new religion calls for adherents to a level of faith to believe that there is no meaning in life, there is no God, and that the only “real” things are those you can touch or prove. To believe anything else would be illogical (what they do about proving or disproving “love” is a mystery).

OK, well, now it’s obvious that he’s just raving. Atheism, as I keep saying, is not a religion and does not involve faith. And it certainly isn’t new, any way you want to look at it. And notice how he folds a whole lot of puerile and simplistic assertions up together and presents them as if they are one wholistic fact. Although atheists don’t feel the need to believe in a supernatural being that takes a personal interest in our affairs (we don’t believe in God – fact), I don’t know a single atheist or humanist who says that ‘there is no meaning in life’, or that ‘the only real things are those you can touch or prove.’ These are gross misrepresentations of an atheist viewpoint, and Mr Isaachsen undertakes them out of wilful malice or ignorance. I am inclined toward the former, given the tone of his tract.

I won’t even bother with his silly faux puzzlement about ‘proving’ or ‘disproving’ love. I can’t even fathom a brain that thinks with such superficial banality.

The promoters of this “religion” are strong on seeking to undermine Christianity and religion, and are engaged in widespread attempts to have the core values of our society removed.

While Mr Isaachsen is very happy to promote atheism as a religion here, I wonder how keen he’d be to see it get the kinds of tax breaks that his Church does? Not very, I wager. Like many religious people, especially Christian religious people, he seems to see atheism as some kind of anarchistic form of Satanism. No atheist in my sphere of knowledge is attempting to ‘have the core values of our society removed’. It’s fearful and hyperbolic language designed to frighten people who don’t know better. You see, what he’s doing here is saying that Christianity has some kind of monopoly on all the things we consider good and valuable in our society, and that those kinds of values simply can’t come from anywhere else. Any reasonable person would realise, after a moment of reflection, that many, many societies through history have managed to have very decent lives without even having heard of the Christian religion. This frightening hubris is extraordinary, given the widely promoted emphasis on meekness and humility within Christian philosophy. This idea that Christianity is the be-all and end-all of how to live a life is far from meek or humble. ((The exhortations of meekness and humility are of course just rhetoric. Christians throughout history have displayed arrogance, aggression and hubris in staggering quantities whenever it suited their purposes. The Catholic Church – meek and humble? Give me a break!))

An example is their moves to undermine the traditional nature of family based of the marriage of a man and a woman and the children they bear and raise, which is the core of a healthy society.

Ah, there we have it. Where is that Christian tolerance now? Since you’re bashing gays, Mr Isaachsen, why not throw in a couple of stonings and a sacrifice? They come from the same part of the Bible. Or can you, like so many Christians, somehow manage to live your life by the bits of the Bible that suit you and ignore the rest?

They are strong on their style of intellectualism and highly intentional at gaining influence and pulling down religion (and especially Christian faith). It is noticeable that there is little mention of promoting positive contribution to society or of any initiatives or encouragement towards the welfare of our society. (It is recently rumored that atheists have started an overseas child sponsorship programme – perhaps to be able to say they have an interest in welfare programmes.)

I really find it hard to believe that this man is quite as stupid or malicious as he appears. What is that last sentence? A condescending attempt to give an impression there is only ONE non-religious charity out there?! Is he really that small-minded? (That’s mostly a rhetorical question, because I actually think he is.)

The Atheists claim they focus on pursuing the truth, however in publicly attacking the Chaplaincy in schools programme as being negative and for preaching and brainwashing children they deliberately or otherwise deny the truth, and certainly do not reveal how highly valued chaplains are by principals and school that work with them, and the growing number of principals applying to have a chaplain at their school.

OK. Well. That’s incoherent.

On receiving the Australian Foundation of Atheists “Australian Humanist of the Year” award, Dr Leslie Cannold urged her audience to organise and fight back against religious fundamentalists who take advantage of Australia’s acceptance of religious freedom to push their ”violently intolerant ideologies’

Oh right, so what you’re saying then, Mr Isaachsen, is that we should condone religious fundamentalists? Like the ones who flew planes into the World Trade Center, perhaps? And you, by chance, advocating violently tolerant ideologies? Because it sure sounds that way…

She went on to make the extraordinary claim that “Christianity is a greater threat to society that militant Islam”.

No, she did not (evidently Christians have no compunction about lying as part of their modus operandi, just as I inferred last post). What Dr Cannold said, in fact, was:

My point here is not to suggest that [proselytizing] is not morally repugnant and a real cause for alarm – it is – but to point out that in Australia the risks it poses emanate primarily from evangelical Christian fundamentalists, not jihadist Muslims.

… which is a very different proposition entirely. She is saying, in case I need to make it clear, that religious proselytizing by evangelical Christian fundamentalists is of greater concern in Australia than proselytizing from fundamentalist Muslims. I’m pretty sure that a great number of Australians would agree with that statement.

Mr Isaachsen either didn’t read Dr Cannold’s speech, or he is intentionally altering its meaning to suit his purpose. Either way he is being deceitful. ((It is possible that he just wasn’t capable of understanding what she was talking about. It wouldn’t surprise me.))

Where would it lead if they had their way?

“The attempt to eradicate religion only leads to it reappearing in grotesque and degraded forms. A credulous belief in world revolution, universal democracy or the occult powers of mobile phones is more offensive to reason than the mysteries of religion, and less likely to survive in years to come.” ~ ‘Evangelical atheism, secular Christianity’ By John Gray – Emeritus Professor of European Thought at the London School of Economics

That has to be the lamest quote in support of an argument that I’ve heard in a very long time. Mr Isaachsen conveniently forgets that Christian history is littered with its (often successful) efforts to eradicate religions with which it has come into conflict. Didn’t seem to be much of a problem when the Christians were hell bent on doing it. As usual, the double standard is in play, bolstered by the haughty Christian conviction that they have the monopoly on a superior morality and spirituality. Mr Isaachsen seems oblivious of the fact that Professor Gray’s quip says, in effect, that ANY religion is better than no religion at all. Christians (including Rob Isaachsen if this tract is an accurate representation of his stance) quite plainly are only prepared to tolerate ONE religion: their own.

It seems clear that if they were to succeed with the atheist’s intentions, the society based on their philosophy would lead to a collapse of much of what we know and enjoy, what is valued by the majority of the population, and what sustains much of the community.

It doesn’t seem at all clear to any thinking person that this apocalyptic scenario would unfold, Mr Isaachsen. You seem once again to have gotten your atheists confused with your anarchists (or perhaps with your Satanists). And once again you seem to think that Christianity is responsible for everything good about our lives and ‘much of what we know and enjoy’. That’s plain bunk. Personally speaking, I have a very enjoyable, love-filled, friend-rich, family-oriented life full of wonder, and inspiration and satisfaction. And, as much as this seems an impossible thing for you to grasp, not one little bit of it is due to Christianity. Or ANY religion. That is purely a conceit of your limited world view.

CONCLUSION
Secularisation involves doing churchy things in a churchy way by non-churchy people, and while this has resulted in decades of marginalization of the church, it is now recognized that a very obvious partner for governments in the church-type activities is the church itself.

Wow. That ace came off the bottom of the deck so fast that I wonder how many of you saw it? Rob Isaachsen just tried to claim all the commendable acts in the world in the name of the Church! Apparently he believes that there can be no kind of admirable morality without it being somehow the responsibility of religion! How offensive is that? Every doctor in Médecins Sans Frontières, every volunteer for Amnesty International, every one of you who has done something out of human compassion or altruism is just doing a ‘churchy thing’. In fact, your churchy thing, dear Acowlyte, was a lesser deed because it didn’t involve Jesus. What a mean-spirited and selfish philosophy this man holds. If this thinking represents the thoughts of most Christians, then they have every reason in the world to be afraid of atheists and humanists because their shallow morality must inevitably unravel in the face of people who really care.

I’m going to finish this up here, faithful Cowpokes. The Transforming Melbourne diatribe goes on for a while more, but I am sincerely offended, no – disgusted, by the imperious self-righteousness that saturates it, and I don’t care to dismantle it any further. Since I left the Christian Church 35 years ago as a teenager, I have never really been fond of its myopic and outmoded approach, but this new evangelism, fuelled as it is by fear and desperation, stinks of a witch hunt. Which, after all, is a pursuit with which Christianity is very familiar.

Atheists are the most hated minority group in America. From About.com:

Lead researcher of the University of Minnesota Study on American Attitudes Towards Atheists & Atheism, Penny Edgell said that she was surprised by this [result]: “We thought that in the wake of 9/11, people would target Muslims. Frankly, we expected atheists to be a throwaway group.” Nevertheless, the numbers are so extreme that she was led to conclude that they are “a glaring exception to the rule of increasing tolerance over the last 30 years…

“Given the relatively low number of atheists in America, and the even lower number who are public about their atheism, Americans can’t have come to their beliefs about atheists through personal experience and hard evidence about what atheists are really like.”

Although it’s unlikely that Australians are quite as polarized as Americans, I imagine Professor Edgell’s speculation in that last paragraph still holds for us. Because, when all’s said and done, this is the sum of The Terrifying Atheist Agenda:

OK, well, as I hinted in the first part of my examination of Transforming Melbourne‘s hysterical Christian diatribe, I’ve saved the most misleading and offensive portion of it until last. As I’ve been writing, I’ve realised that it was getting rather longer than I like, so I’m going to break my analysis up into chunks, and intersperse them with other funnier stuff. See how much I love you all?

Shall we resume?

After making some valid points about the current role of religion in Australian society, ((Contrary to what Rob Isaachsen and his fellow Transformers think, rational people like myself can see that various Churches have done good things for Australian society. What we question is not the charitable acts, but the motivations behind them.)) Mr Isaachsen eventually says what is on his mind. And what an enlightening glimpse into the thinking of a religious person it is:

SOCIETY UNDER ATHEISM
Atheists have a very powerful voice in the media in Australia, frequently broadcasting biased opinions about the importance of rejecting all religion (especially Christianity) claiming it is of no value to society, is non-rational and a deception to the population. They have staged major conferences (including with government assistance) to promote atheism and denigrate religion and are calling on governments to end to the opportunity for any Christian content to be allowed in state schools and certainly to cease any funding for such!

Whoa. I’m almost tempted to laugh here, so hyperbolic does this document become in such a short few sentences. Atheists have a very powerful voice in the Australian media? Really? That comes as a big surprise to me, and I am pretty tuned in to such things. I think what is most upsetting for Mr Isaachsen and his Church is that atheists are actually voicing any opinion at all. He makes it sound like atheists are in control of the airwaves in Australia and that is very far from the truth. If there is anything surprising at all about atheist voices in the Australian media, it is that they have mostly been conspicuous by their absence until recent times. Atheist opinions are significantly challenging for the Church, which has for most of Australian history, had a kind of carte blanche – an unspoken imprimatur, even – to do be the sole arbiter of morality and ethics in Australian life. They really don’t like having that status quo questioned. And the pointed addition of ‘They have staged major conferences (including with government assistance)’ is spectacularly petty. Any assistance given to humanist, rationalist or atheist movements, as Mr Isaachsen must clearly be aware, is a piss in the ocean compared to the kind of government benefits accrued by religions in Australia. Is he trying to get Christians annoyed that some of their tax dollar is going to atheists? Well, sir, welcome to our grievance.

Mr Isaachsen accuses atheists of having biased opinions – a self-evident proposition if ever there was one. They’re hardly going to be unbiased when dealing with the enormous self-righteousness of Christians. He probably believes his bias is superior because he’s got God on his side…

In a vast and incorrect generalization he blankly states that atheists claim that religion ‘is of no value to society’. I doubt you’d find many atheists who would be that extreme and that declamatory. Religion quite evidently has brought value to society, but the question is how much currency that value now has, what that value actually is, and how important or relevant is the religious component of that value? This is a big problem for religion, and for Christians in particular, because their morality and their charity is so caught up in the edict of Jesus to evangelize that they simply can’t understand that good deeds can be, and are, done without an agenda imposed by a supernatural agency.

For example, earlier in the Transforming Melbourne tract, Mr Isaachsen has gone to great pains to point out all the wonderful things that Christian charities have achieved, and the heavy implication is that without them, non-religious people would commit no charitable acts of any kind, ever. He neglects to mention that huge compassionate non-profit organizations like Amnesty International, Médecins Sans Frontières, Malaria No More, Humanist Charities, the Red Cross and many, many others operate without having heeded ‘Jesus’ call to compassion and justice’. What’s more, these organizations can easily be argued to be more selfless than any of Mr Isaachsen’s examples of Christian charity, for the simple reason that they act out of human compassion and human compassion alone. They are not acting on a command to be good, or being goaded on by the Big Carrot of Heaven or the Big Stick of Hell.

Rob Isaachsen is trying to paint a picture that says an atheist can have no compassion, no care, no charity, no love, no human empathy. And yet it is a trivial task to show he is wrong. He might do well to reflect on the fact that one sincere act of atheist kindness makes nonsense of his whole religion.

[…to be continued…]

Researchers at the Cornell Creative Machine Lab came up with the brilliant idea of getting Cleverbot, their ‘intelligent’ chat program, to engage with its own doppelganger.

Clever Clogs: meet Clever Clogs.

Awesome.

OK, as I said a couple of days back, in this post, and possibly the next, I’m going to take a critical look at the Transforming Melbourne document entitled ‘The Vital Role of the Church and Christian Faith in Our Society’ by Rob Isaachsen. The pdf is long and rambling, so I’m just going to lift out the more egregious and offensive portions for examination. Just so you know that I’m not taking anything out of context, though, I urge you to read it for yourself.

I’ll start with the soft stuff:

Our City and Nation depend on the Church
The contribution of Christian faith to every level of our society, its history, laws, institutions, culture, values, community support, welfare services and overseas aid is far in excess of any other movement.

It may indeed be true that there is dependency on the Church for some things. But in my view, that’s exactly the kind of situation we should be addressing. To claim that the contribution of the Christian faith to our society is ‘far in excess of any other movement’ is an exaggeration and a straw man. The assertion conveniently excludes the greater umbrella of secular contribution to society, which is not a ‘movement’ as such, but is just the way we live. Indeed, it is an enhancement of this secular contribution that Humanists and atheists seek.

Church, Government and Society are largely ignorant of the vital place of the Church
It is only because society is ignorant of this, that society contemplates restricting Christian influence.

No, our society contemplates restriction of Christian influence because Christian ideals are in conflict with the ideals of our society. It is only Christians who think that the medieval morality of their Church is ‘vital’. Other people, like me, think it has an agenda that is overly influential. We are not in any way ignorant of what’s going on here – we know, and we object.

Correlation between Christian heritage and strong nationhood
“Christianity, and nothing else, is the ultimate foundation of liberty, conscience, human rights, and democracy, the benchmarks of Western civilisation. To this day we have no other options [to Christianity”.

Oh for Pete’s sake. Now the rhetoric starts. This, of course, is complete and utter bullshit. First of all it makes the conceited assumption that ‘Western civilization’ is better than any other way of living. What utter racist gall. ((Rather shabby argument too, considering that as we will see in a bit, Christians pride themselves on their tolerance and lack of racism.)) This statement is demeaning to every culture on the planet that does not have a Christian heritage. As usual, Christians are putting themselves on the top of the pile, and somehow don’t find it hypocritical that they target atheists and others as ‘arrogant’.

In addition, I don’t think I need to point out to anyone with even a little bit of history and philosophy that Christians can hardly take the credit for ‘liberty, conscience, human rights, and democracy’. They seem to have forgotten that the Ancient Greeks and Romans were doing pretty well on that score before Jesus came along. Not to mention that they conveniently ignore some of the appalling subjugation of those ideals by Christianity through the ages (God, according to his own Word, is certainly not too fussy about ANY of those things).

Individual Influence of Christian Faith
“If you are a church-goer you are more likely to take the opinions of other people seriously, more determined to make a contribution to society, more inclined to think that life is meaningful, less likely to violate property rights or to harm other people, cheat on your taxes, avoid paying train fares or to take sickies. (“The Religious Factor in Australian Life” by Melbourne sociologists, Beverly Dixon and Gary Bouma 1983)

I’d be inclined to laugh at this if I wasn’t so angry. The Dixon and Bouma conclusions (which I don’t even really need to point out are 30 years old) are taken from information accumulated by the 1983 Australian Values Study, a self-reported survey carried out by the Roy Morgan Research Centre.

What’s happening here is something with which you should be very familiar if you’re a regular reader of The Cow. It’s a common tactic of a people who are being dishonest about what they are telling you: opinions are being touted as facts. The Australian Values Study shows us data about what people say they do. This is manifestly not the same as what people actually do. Being ‘more determined’ to make a contribution to society is not the same as actually making a contribution. Just because Christians say that they are less likely to violate property rights, harm other people, cheat on their taxes or evade train fares is not evidence that they act that way. In fact, an equally valid explanation for the statistical over-representation of Christians as being ‘morally superior’ is that they lied more about these things than other people on the survey. Unless some kind of evidence is put forward, the Dixon/Bouma statement – presented quite clearly here as ‘fact’ – is merely conjecture based on biased opinion.

I’m going to skip a few paragraphs here ((I can deflate most of the intervening rubbish as easily as I have done above, but it’s kind of tedious.)) and go on to something that really peeves me, before, in the next post, we look at the really offensive material.

Christian Schools
44% of secondary and 34% of all primary students in Victoria attend Catholic or independent (mainly Christian or Church-run) schools in Greater Melbourne (2006 Census). The percentage of students enrolling at state schools is falling and to independent (Christian) schools is rising – generally because parents see these schools give priority to Christian values or the style of education provided by them.

Wow – a fact! Yes, the enrollment rate in religious schools in Victoria is rising (indeed, VT & I send our own kids to a Christian school). ((It is the least doctrinal of all the Melbourne religious schools, as far as I can tell.)) But it’s not because ‘parents see these schools give priority to Christian values or the style of education provided by them’. It’s because the religious schools have better teachers. Why do they have better teachers? Because they are attracted by better wages than they can earn at a government school. Why can religious schools afford to pay teachers better? Because they have the triple benefit of their historically deep pockets, an ability to attract wealthier parents who will pay substantial fees, ((This happens through a kind of bootstrapping effect – a little bit more operating money than governments schools -> better teachers -> better education -> parents wanting the best for their kids -> higher fees -> a little bit more operating money -> better teachers… Not hard to see how it works. I don’t like participating in that scheme, but I also want my kids to have the best chance they can. And it has to be said, their school is very good. But it has NOTHING to do with religion.)) AND government support in the form of stipends and tax breaks! Why are there no atheist or Humanist private schools? Because they would not be eligible for any kind of government assistance! ((It is a sad state of affairs that government schooling in Australia does not get the kind of priority that it should. But it is a fact that private religious schools – which are money-making enterprises – have an effect on the budget that is allocated to government schools. Private religious schools, in my opinion, should be independent of government subsidy. The Christian church – for nearly all private schools in Australia are Christian – are REALLY afraid of this happening, because then they would need to survive on their assertion that ‘parents give priority to Christian values’ and would thus be prepared to pay an even greater premium for that privilege. Any sensible person knows how that scenario would play out. Indeed, if government schools could afford to pay better teachers – which might be possible if they had money that was being siphoned off by private schools – I think we could confidently predict a rapid decline in the enrollment numbers of private religious schools.))

And why, Faithful Acowlytes, would they not be eligible for government assistance? Because they are not RELIGIONS. Keep that thought in mind, because in a little bit you will see how Mr Isaachsen’s rhetoric causes him to be hoist with his own petard…

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