I love how Brown shifts the issue. Look, it would be great if there was some cosmic justice for children killed by fanatically zealots in the name of their God. But Brown would love to make that be the issue.
Probably because the other issue, the killing of children in the name of God, is so morally repugnant, only a zealot could defend it. That, and I’m sure the cognitive dissonance going on in his head must be nearly crippling.
hotshoesays
Is Andrew Brown always this stupid, or did someone hit him with the stupid stick just before he wrote that article ?
Andrew writes:
Let me illustrate this with reference to a real piece of ethnic cleansing.
Imagine a German mother in East Prussia in 1945, with an eight-year-old daughter. The Red Army arrives. They rape the daughter, in front of her, until she is dead. Then they do the same to the mother. Such things happened, and they happen still in the world today.
Either these are injustices which can never be put right, or they can be somewhere or somehow justified.
Yes, Andrew, do go on. Please explain how god ordering the Red Army to rape girls to death could somewhere or somehow be justified. Even if you think people can justify your reported victim’s hope of heaven – where she will find peace and witness justice in the form of her torturer going to hell – how does that extend to victims of the Canaanite genocide, victims not of the Red Army but of god directly.
Because in order for your “real piece of ethnic cleansing” to be comparable to what Dawkins objects to, you can’t have your example be one where flawed/sinful humans merely use their free will to voluntarily commit evil. Perhaps their victims in that case could indeed find justice or peace or restoration in heaven, who knows.
But according to so-called moral christians, we’re supposed to believe that a “good god” ordered his chosen people, Israelites, to overcome their free will and to commit heinous crimes that otherwise could have sickened even hardened soldiers. Moreover, the christians instruct us to see those crimes against humanity as good, not evil, nor even sad, precisely because they were ordered by that supposedly good god. (By the way, see Craig’s statement that the “real” victims were the Israelites who had to obey in spite of their soft human hearts). Then the mothers and children, raped and killed by god’s chosen instruments, have to spend eternity in heaven with their murderer-in-chief.
How can anyone have hope of such a heaven with whatever after-death brainwashing would be necessary for the victim to be happy in the constant presence of her torturer ?
Of course moral human beings like us object to genocide, army-sponsored rape and killing of innocents. And as socially empathetic beings, we wish that survivors of such horrors can find some hope or consolation which allows them to go on with their lives (even if that hope is a foolish hope of heaven) when earthly justice is insufficient. But the real point, that is Dawkin’s point, is that any genuinely moral human being would refuse to sit passively while an odious christian like WLC pretends that we humans can NOT object to genocide when it’s ordered by god. In any moral real world, we SHOULD object to genocide when it’s ordered by god.
To fail to object would be truly repulsive, and that’s what is truly repulsive about Craig and his defense of the genocide-loving god of his bible.
Aquariasays
Let me illustrate this with reference to a real piece of ethnic cleansing.
Imagine a German mother in East Prussia in 1945, with an eight-year-old daughter. The Red Army arrives. They rape the daughter, in front of her, until she is dead. Then they do the same to the mother. Such things happened, and they happen still in the world today.
Either these are injustices which can never be put right, or they can be somewhere or somehow justified.
I have a better one for you, Andrew:
Imagine a German mother in East Prussia in 1942, with an eight year old daughter. The German Army arrives. It takes one look at the gold stars of David on their clothes, loads the mother and the daughter into trains that it sends to a place called Danzig. Then they do the same to the fathers and all her sons and her mother and father, too. Such things happened in Nazi Germany, because scumbag Christards had spent literally centuries making up bullshit lies about Jews and demonizing them and murdering them until yet another genocidal scumbag decided to off them, but this time he had amazing technology at his fingertips to kill more people than ever before, more quickly and efficiently than ever.
Justify that, you disgusting piece of shit. Try to put that right. I fucking dare you.
Because that’s what religion actually does to people, you dishonest scumbag.
duck1887says
Nice efficient takedown, but the best part is the Carroll quote.
It’s probably about the 20th time I’ve used it. It can be so apt…
Zugswangsays
if we believe, as I do, that God’s grace is extended to those who die in infancy or as small children, the death of these children was actually their salvation.
Ah, so we’re cool with abortion, then? Great. I’m so glad we’ve come to an agreement that abortion isn’t morally reprehensible, because we’re sending them all to heaven.
Randomfactorsays
Ah, so we’re cool with abortion, then? Great.
Of course not. God’s opposed to abortion, even when it’s life-saving treatment for the mother. To SHOW that he’s a pro-lifer, he tortures both the mother and the fetus for eternity.
Because, you know, he’s moral and everything.
But at least they don’t have to spend eternity in the presence of such a “moral” being. That’s at least some comfort.
I love how Brown shifts the issue. Look, it would be great if there was some cosmic justice for children killed by fanatically zealots in the name of their God. But Brown would love to make that be the issue.
Probably because the other issue, the killing of children in the name of God, is so morally repugnant, only a zealot could defend it. That, and I’m sure the cognitive dissonance going on in his head must be nearly crippling.
Is Andrew Brown always this stupid, or did someone hit him with the stupid stick just before he wrote that article ?
Andrew writes:
Yes, Andrew, do go on. Please explain how god ordering the Red Army to rape girls to death could somewhere or somehow be justified. Even if you think people can justify your reported victim’s hope of heaven – where she will find peace and witness justice in the form of her torturer going to hell – how does that extend to victims of the Canaanite genocide, victims not of the Red Army but of god directly.
Because in order for your “real piece of ethnic cleansing” to be comparable to what Dawkins objects to, you can’t have your example be one where flawed/sinful humans merely use their free will to voluntarily commit evil. Perhaps their victims in that case could indeed find justice or peace or restoration in heaven, who knows.
But according to so-called moral christians, we’re supposed to believe that a “good god” ordered his chosen people, Israelites, to overcome their free will and to commit heinous crimes that otherwise could have sickened even hardened soldiers. Moreover, the christians instruct us to see those crimes against humanity as good, not evil, nor even sad, precisely because they were ordered by that supposedly good god. (By the way, see Craig’s statement that the “real” victims were the Israelites who had to obey in spite of their soft human hearts). Then the mothers and children, raped and killed by god’s chosen instruments, have to spend eternity in heaven with their murderer-in-chief.
How can anyone have hope of such a heaven with whatever after-death brainwashing would be necessary for the victim to be happy in the constant presence of her torturer ?
Of course moral human beings like us object to genocide, army-sponsored rape and killing of innocents. And as socially empathetic beings, we wish that survivors of such horrors can find some hope or consolation which allows them to go on with their lives (even if that hope is a foolish hope of heaven) when earthly justice is insufficient. But the real point, that is Dawkin’s point, is that any genuinely moral human being would refuse to sit passively while an odious christian like WLC pretends that we humans can NOT object to genocide when it’s ordered by god. In any moral real world, we SHOULD object to genocide when it’s ordered by god.
To fail to object would be truly repulsive, and that’s what is truly repulsive about Craig and his defense of the genocide-loving god of his bible.
Let me illustrate this with reference to a real piece of ethnic cleansing.
Imagine a German mother in East Prussia in 1945, with an eight-year-old daughter. The Red Army arrives. They rape the daughter, in front of her, until she is dead. Then they do the same to the mother. Such things happened, and they happen still in the world today.
Either these are injustices which can never be put right, or they can be somewhere or somehow justified.
I have a better one for you, Andrew:
Imagine a German mother in East Prussia in 1942, with an eight year old daughter. The German Army arrives. It takes one look at the gold stars of David on their clothes, loads the mother and the daughter into trains that it sends to a place called Danzig. Then they do the same to the fathers and all her sons and her mother and father, too. Such things happened in Nazi Germany, because scumbag Christards had spent literally centuries making up bullshit lies about Jews and demonizing them and murdering them until yet another genocidal scumbag decided to off them, but this time he had amazing technology at his fingertips to kill more people than ever before, more quickly and efficiently than ever.
Justify that, you disgusting piece of shit. Try to put that right. I fucking dare you.
Because that’s what religion actually does to people, you dishonest scumbag.
Nice efficient takedown, but the best part is the Carroll quote.
It’s probably about the 20th time I’ve used it. It can be so apt…
Ah, so we’re cool with abortion, then? Great. I’m so glad we’ve come to an agreement that abortion isn’t morally reprehensible, because we’re sending them all to heaven.
Ah, so we’re cool with abortion, then? Great.
Of course not. God’s opposed to abortion, even when it’s life-saving treatment for the mother. To SHOW that he’s a pro-lifer, he tortures both the mother and the fetus for eternity.
Because, you know, he’s moral and everything.
But at least they don’t have to spend eternity in the presence of such a “moral” being. That’s at least some comfort.