One reason that religious rhetoric in politics is on the rise these days is because of the uncertain economic outlook. When people are fearful of their future, they tend to lash out and seek others to blame and it is easy for politicians to direct their attention to scapegoats. Blaming economic and social problems as being due to god’s dissatisfaction with our behavior has always been popular trope for a certain segment of the public, going back to biblical times. It is easy for politicians to take advantage of the vanity of people thinking that they have a good idea of what their god wants, which always conveniently happens to coincide with what they themselves want. But working against them is the general decline of religion itself. As I explained in my series Why atheism in winning, the signs of decline of religion are unmistakable and I strongly suspect that religious leaders know this and are desperately seeking ways to at least slow down the process.

The most telling sign is that surveys show that people are leaving religion in significant numbers, with the greatest drop being among young people. This is why the stakes have been raised, in a desperate attempt by religious leaders to regain ground by making hysterical claims that the lack of religion is causing America’s problems. While they point to general moral decay that is supposedly bringing about god’s wrath, one of their key signs is the increasing acceptance of gay people as deserving of the same rights enjoyed by others, including marriage.

The irony is that the more religious leaders decry the increasing acceptance of homosexuals, the more they alienate young people, the very group that they need to secure their future. As Adam Lee points out:

Over the last few decades, society in general, and young people in particular, have become increasingly tolerant of gays and other minorities. For the most part, this is a predictable result of familiarity: people who’ve grown up in an increasingly multicultural society see less problem with interracial relationships (89% of Generation Nexters approve of interracial marriage, compared to 70% of older age groups) and same-sex marriage (47% in favor among Nexters, compared to 30% in older groups). When it comes to issues like whether gays and lesbians should be protected from job discrimination or allowed to adopt, the age gap in support is even more dramatic (71% vs. 59% and 61% vs. 44%, respectively).

But while American society is moving forward on all these fronts, many churches not only refuse to go along, they’re actively moving backward. Most large Christian sects, both Catholic and Protestant, have made fighting against gay rights and women’s rights their all-consuming crusade. And young people have gotten this message loud and clear: polls find that the most common impressions of Christianity are that it’s hostile, judgmental and hypocritical. In particular, an incredible 91% of young non-Christians say that Christianity is “anti-homosexual”, and significant majorities say that Christianity treats being gay as a bigger sin than anything else.

This rise is similar to the way that acceptance of interracial dating and marriage among the young increased with time as more and more young people did not see any problems with it. Currently 86% of people approve of interracial marriages, up from just 4% in 1958. Again, young people are more accepting than old people, with senior citizens with 66% approval being the lowest group.

Many religious people and groups are locked into an anti-gay stance that they cannot free themselves from. While some are trying to soften their message with variations of the ‘hate the sin, love the sinner’ circumlocution of the Catholic church, this is widely seen as a sham. Most religious institutions simply cannot escape being seen as intolerant and hateful.

So instead of religion defeating homosexuality, the increasing acceptance of equal rights for gays will accelerate the decline of religion.

Reader Jeff at Have Coffee Will Write sent me this link to a Australian TV show that seems to have as its premise asking advertising agencies to come up with campaigns for extreme ideas. They usually get a good response but when they asked for campaigns to ban all religions, for the first time ad agencies declined to take part, even though earlier suggestions such as ‘Invade New Zealand’ or ‘Bring back child labor’ or ‘Euthanize everyone over eighty’ had not dissuaded them.

One of the questions that opponents of same-sex marriage never satisfactorily answer is why it matters to them if gay couples have the same rights as heterosexual couples. Why do they care? What harm do they suffer? It is not as if marriage is some limited resource that allowing more people access to would reduce the general availability.

As far as I can see, the opposition to same-sex marriage seems to be almost entirely based on ancient religious texts and their associated homophobia but of course few, other than the religious nutters, want to concede that for fear of being seen as religious bigots. (That distancing from religion is a small sign of progress). Instead they dance around the issue with vague rationalizations that somehow marriage has always been between one man and one woman and has thus acquired the force of tradition or that the purpose of marriage is procreation or that changing the definition of marriage would open the door to polygamy, bestiality, or otherwise destroy civilization as we know it. Of course, none of these ‘arguments’ stand up to scrutiny but few people are willing to press opponents on this, usually out of the ‘respect for religion’ trope that assumes that people’s faith-based speech and actions should not be questioned. But the legal case involving Proposition 8 in California may finally force them to put up or shut up.

If you recall, in May 2008 the California Supreme Court ruled that same sex couples have, under the state constitution, a right to marry. Opponents then brought Proposition 8 that banned same-sex marriage as a ballot initiative and, heavily backed by the Catholic and the Mormon churches and using lies that allowing same-sex marriage would lead to gay indoctrination of children in schools, they managed to narrowly pass it in November 2008 by a margin of less than 5%.

The constitutionality of Proposition 8 was challenged under the state constitution and its validity was upheld. But it was also challenged under the US constitution and in August 2010, a US District judge ruled that it violated the due process and equal protection clauses of the 14th Amendment, but allowed the ban to stand while the case was appealed to the US Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

Normally the governor and the attorney general of the state are the people who have the obligation to enforce the laws of California and they have the unquestioned right to appeal any verdict nullifying the laws. But opponents of the ruling were stymied because the then-governor of California (Arnold Schwarzenegger) and the then-attorney general (and now governor) Jerry Brown refused to appeal the district court ruling.

Because of this vacuum, various private parties who had sponsored Proposition 8 then appealed the verdict but this raised the question of whether they had standing to do so. In order to prevent an explosion of third-party lawsuits, one has to show that one has standing to bring about a legal case and one of the means by which standing is established by a private party is that the party has to show that they are directly affected by a law or a court ruling and would suffer direct harm if it were carried out.

The US Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, in an unexpected move, ruled that before it could decide on the constitutionality of the issue, the issue of standing had to be resolved and they sent the case back to the California Supreme Court to rule on whether the challengers had standing. This has put the issue of what harm opponents of same-sex marriage suffer directly to the forefront. Ted Olson, one of the lead counsel opposing Proposition 8, puts the matters succinctly.

Olson will argue that to have legal standing the proponents have to show that they would suffer a direct harm if Prop. 8 is held to be unconstitutional.

“Here, the proponents were asked during the course of the trial, what damage would be done to heterosexual marriage if Proposition 8 was held to be unconstitutional and the lawyer for the Proposition 8 proponents said ‘I don’t know,'” Olson says. “You have to have a direct stake in the matter that’s being litigated.”

Court cases can very useful in clarifying issues because people have to answer specific questions that are narrowly focused and posed to them by people who have all the facts at their fingertips. They cannot make sweeping generalizations or filibuster or snow the listener the way they can in public debates or when answering reporters. This is what doomed so-called intelligent design. Its advocates managed to obfuscate the issue for quite some time but they came a cropper in 2005 in the US district court in Dover, PA because under cross-examination they were forced to admit many things they had tried to conceal, such as that under their definition of science, even astrology would have to be considered to be science.

So the question of standing that is going to be adjudicated by the California Supreme Court could be quite illuminating in pinning down exactly what harm opponents of same-sex marriage experience by allowing it. But unfortunately, unlike in lower courts where the merits of the case can be exhaustively examined, in superior courts the process is very brief and tends to be narrowly focused. At the hearing on Tuesday, the California Supreme Court judges seemed to be more concerned about allowing the governor and attorney general the sole right to decide what laws to defend rather than with the issue of what direct harm the sponsors of Proposition 8 suffer if same-sex marriage is allowed. Since they have ruled before that ballot initiative sponsors have the right to defend them in court, that seems likely to be the verdict here too, that they will be granted standing by virtue of being sponsors of the initiative rather than because they would suffer direct harm if same-sex marriage were allowed. You can see the full video of the hearing here.

It seems likely that both aspects of this case, the issue of standing as well as the constitutionality of same-sex marriage itself, will go all the way to the US Supreme Court.

But even if the opponents of same-sex marriage win this legal battle, they have lost the public relations war. It is only a matter of time, perhaps five years, before gay people win equal rights.

In more samosa-related news, I learned from the latest issue of The New Humanist (with its provocative cover photo of comedian Ricky Gervais) that the Islamist group known as al-Shabaab has banned samosas in the regions of Somalia controlled by it.

Why, you ask? Because they feel that its triangular shape is suggestive of the Christian doctrine of the Holy Trinity.

So there you have it. An Islamist group suspects that a food item originating in a Hindu culture is secretly promoting Christianity.

Who knew that people involved in a civil war in a country facing a famine still had time to ponder the subliminal religious messages embedded in food snacks?

Some entrepreneur should take advantage of this snack vacuum to make crescent-shaped samosas.

Samosas are a triangular shaped Indian pastry that can have any filling but usually consists of a spicy mixture of potatoes, peas, and other vegetables. Quite improbably, they became the focus of a recent legal case in New Jersey.

As part of an India Day celebration in 2009, the plaintiffs placed an order at the Indo-Pak restaurant for vegetarian samosas, informing the restaurant that the food was being purchased for a group of strict vegetarians. The restaurant filled the order and assured the plaintiffs that the food did not contain meat. After consuming some of the samosas, the plaintiffs returned the remaining samosas to the restaurant and were advised that the food was, in fact, filled with meat. As a result, the plaintiffs claimed spiritual damage and asserted a number of causes of action against the restaurant, including product liability and breach of express warranty.

A lower court judge ruled against the vegetarians on all counts but an appellate court reversed part of that decision, saying that the restaurant had in fact violated a warranty. But they rejected the claim that the diners, by unwittingly eating meat, had experienced “negligent infliction of emotional distress” and “become involved in the sinful cycle of pain, injury and death on God’s creatures, and that it affects the karma and dharma, or purity of the soul. Hindu scriptures teach that the souls of those who eat meat can never go to God after death, which is the ultimate goal for Hindus. The Hindu religion does not excuse accidental consumption of meat products. One who commits the religious violation of eating meat, knowingly or unknowingly, is required to participate in a religious ceremony at a site located along the Ganges River in Haridwar, Uttranchal, India, to purify himself. The damages sought by plaintiffs included compensation for the emotional distress they suffered, as well as economic damages they would incur by virtue of having to participate in the required religious cleansing ceremony in India.”

The court ruled that they did “not find any evidence of an ascertainable loss on plaintiffs’ part”. The court said that while they may have not got what they asked for, the product itself was “safe, edible, and fit for human consumption.”

This case raises some interesting points. One is how a restaurant that caters to an Indian clientele could make such a mistake, since vegetarian samosas are the norm. The answer to that was that on that same day there had been another order specifically for meat samosas and the two orders had got switched.

The more interesting one is whether one should be eligible for damages because of the harm that one believes one has done to one’s soul. I have some sympathy for the diners because I know plenty of people who have strong religious proscriptions against certain foods and would be very upset if a similar thing had happened to them. But the court’s ruling made some good arguments as to why the spiritual damage claim was unwarranted.

In the present matter, plaintiffs have not pled or provided evidence of any “loss of moneys or property.” Indeed, it would be difficult for them to do so, since unrefuted evidence demonstrates that, following recognition by the restaurant of its mistake, Moghul Express furnished an order of conforming samosas to plaintiffs without cost.

Plaintiffs claim that they have sufficiently plead ascertainable loss by seeking damages in the amount of the cost of a trip to India to undergo a purification ritual. However, what they are seeking is the cost of cure for an alleged spiritual injury that cannot be categorized as either a loss of moneys or property.
…
Here, an underlying loss of the value of property cannot be demonstrated.

The court said that violations of religious dietary laws did not rise to the standard needed to meet the claim of serious emotional injury, which requires that there must be “an especial likelihood of genuine and serious mental distress, arising from special circumstances, which serves as a guarantee that the claim is not spurious.”

How far should we go to accommodate people’s religious beliefs? Should we take seriously the claims of religious people that their immortal souls have received damage and that as a result they will not go to heaven?

I don’t think so. After all, there is no evidence to suggest that there is such a thing as an immortal soul let alone a heaven for it to go to or any consensus on what standards should be met to gain entry.

I am not denying the fact that the people who strongly believe in these kinds of dietary proscriptions may feel a deep sense of anguish at having broken them even inadvertently. But it seems to me that their beef (if you’ll pardon the expression) is with god. The ultimate issue here is whether it is fair for god to punish them for such an infraction. If such people wish, they should plead their case in the heavenly courts or set up religious courts where they can argue their case before theologians and priests, and not use the secular ones which, rightly, have little use for evidence-free claims.

What happens if you get two Artificial Intelligence chatbots to talk to each other? Cornell Creative Machines Lab tried it out and a theological discussion broke out.

David Silverman, president of American Atheists, was brought on to some Fox news show to address this question in the context of hurricane Irene. His advice to everyone: Act like atheists and prepare, without wasting your time appealing to some deity to save you.

In the process he showed up the host and one other guest as total idiots.

Way to go, David!

(Via Pharyngula)

It looks like Judaism has its own share of anti-gay crazies who claim that there is a direct connection between earthquakes (like the one last week that touched DC) and homosexuality. That is the message from a rabbi named Yehuda Levin who quotes god saying in the Talmud thusly: “You have shaken your male member in a place where it doesn’t belong. I too, will shake the earth.”

Really? The Talmud has our old buddy Yahweh actually saying things like that?

I wonder what nifty quote he will dig out to explain Hurricane Irene, especially since it is hitting New York City, home to many ultra-Orthodox communities.

I still don’t get why god metes out these crude and indiscriminate punishments that affect gays and non-gays alike. God seems to be somewhat scatterbrained and lack focus. Why not simply send in some divine drones to kill just the people he hates?

Catholic theologians tend to be a pretty sophisticated bunch. How can they possibly reconcile themselves to their church when the Vatican does things like this?

A vial containing the late pope John Paul II’s blood will soon be winging its way to Mexico in a bid to help bring down crimes rates in the largely Catholic country, Vatican Radio reported Wednesday.
…
Several vials of blood were taken from Pope John Paul II during the last days of his life in 2005. They have since taken on the aura of holy relics, with Catholic faithful invited to venerate them.

That’s not all. The Vatican is also going to display vials of his blood for people to venerate.

There’s something truly creepy about the Catholic church’s obsession with the actual flesh and blood of dead people.

Sharia law is a system of justice based on Islam as defined in that religion’s sacred texts. Like any system of justice based on religion, it is intolerant, cruel, obsessed with sex, and incompatible with our modern understanding of what makes for a humane society. For example, “Within Sharia law, there are a group of “Haram” offenses which carry severe punishments. These include pre-marital sexual intercourse, sex by divorced persons, post-marital sex, adultery, false accusation of unlawful intercourse, drinking alcohol, theft, and highway robbery. Haram sexual offenses can carry a sentence of stoning to death or severe flogging.”

There has been some hysteria in the US about the creeping threat of Sharia law being imposed in the US, and the claims that Barack Obama may be a secret Muslim are part of this paranoia. Twelve states have even proposed legislation to ban it, although the First Amendment would make these superfluous since it would rule out any laws that seek to advance the interests of any one religion.

But despite this anti-Sharia feeling, what people may not be aware of is that Sharia law is what the US used to enable CIA agent Ray Davis to escape trial and punishment for murder in Pakistan.

You may recall the case in which Davis was captured after gunning down two men in a crowded city. The US demanded that he be released immediately while the Pakistan government said that he had no alternative but to go through the legal process. The US government and the media kept the public in the dark about the facts of the case.

Then to everyone’s surprise, Davis was suddenly released and quickly spirited out of the country. How did that happen? Because the US took advantage of Sharia law in which a person accused of a murder can be released if the family members of the victim pardon him in exchange for ‘blood money’, which is what happened in the Davis case. The Pakistani government has confirmed this.

Shaukat Qadir, a retired senior Pakistani military officer, explains the deal that was struck.

It appears, therefore, that the deal struck between the military leadership included a shut down of CIA’s HUMINT operations in Pakistan, retaining only ELINT, Davis would ‘sing’, within limits, of course, and only then could Blood Money be negotiated for his release. And the US would be bled in that final deal also so as to ensure the safety and the future of the immediate families of both Davis’s victims.

At the height of the debate on the question of Raymond Davis’ immunity from trial for murder, this writer emphasized that Pakistan could not release him without a trial. A trial took duly place and, in accordance with prevalent law in Pakistan, the next of kin of the deceased young men, pardoned Davis in return for ‘Blood Money’. However outlandish this law might seem to those peoples whose countries have their based on Anglo-Saxon principles, such is the law in Pakistan and so there was nothing underhand in what transpired.

Alexander Cockburn says that reports have emerged that “a price tag of about $1.5 million per family was been paid, with US citizenship for a dozen or more members of each family, with job guarantees for those of age and education opportunities guaranteed for children – more than they could ever dream of and sufficiently tempting for them to pardon Davis. Money in sufficient quantity rarely loses its persuasive powers.”

So there you have it. Sharia law was used by the US government to enable Ray Davis to escape punishment for his crime. But don’t expect the wingnuts to make a fuss about it.