Archive for the ‘definitions’ Category

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The “religious freedom” question, again…

Wednesday, November 12th, 2008

Seen on Salad is Slaughter: Catholic bishops will fight Obama on abortion. The best bit:

The nation’s Roman Catholic bishops vowed Tuesday to forcefully confront the Obama administration over its support for abortion rights, saying the church and religious freedom could be under attack in the new presidential administration.

Say that again? “Religious freedom”?

Yes, it’s that distortion again. Do these people even know what “freedom” means? When you’re deciding on something that affects mainly others, it’s not “freedom”, it’s power. The power over others, to dictate on what they can and cannot do.

“Religious freedom” is being able to have the religion you want – even if it’s “none”. It’s being able to act according to those beliefs, as long as it doesn’t infringe the rights of others. It’s not being persecuted (as in “jailed” or “fed to large felines”) for your beliefs. That’s it.

“Religious freedom” has nothing to do with being able to oppress others, force your beliefs on them, or dictate their actions by turning your religious commandments into the law of your country, affecting everyone – even those who don’t share your beliefs. All of those are a matter of power – of having power over other people.

If you don’t have that power – even if, historically, you are used to having it it – your “freedom” is never in question. You can still do what you want. But so can others… and that’s what you can’t accept, isn’t it?

Posted in definitions, religion | 4 Comments »

California’s Proposition 8: Freedom and Power

Saturday, November 8th, 2008

Reading the comments on Hemant’s Questions for Anyone Who Voted for Proposition 8, I found, naturally (considering the blog), that most people supported equality, but there were a couple of people who thought that they were acting morally when trying to ban gay marriage. One comment included the following:

I do believe that legalizing gay marriage would directly affect religious freedoms–all in the guise of “equal rights”.

Am I a bigot for supporting what I feel to be morally right?

I do believe that passing this amendment protects religious freedom.

However, that person, though possibly unaware of the fact, has a problem with definitions. Because it’s not about (his) freedom at all, but about (his) power.

I think it was Richard Stallman who once wrote that the difference between a freedom and a power is that the former is being able to decide something which affects mostly yourself, and a power is to be able to decide something that affects mainly others. Now, when you, a religious heterosexual, can (and do) decide what others (gays) can and cannot do, which is the case? It takes an especially convulted and twisted mind — not to mention incredibly selfish and egocentric — to claim that whether gays can marry or not affects you more than it does them1. To decide that they can’t marry is not a question of your freedom, but of you having power over their freedoms.

Also, losing a power you once had does not constitute a “loss of your freedom”, because none of the latter was affected. Christians love to claim that their “religious freedom” is being attacked, but no such thing has ever happened (unless, possibly, in Muslim theocracies), because their freedoms are unaffected; what they are losing is the power they’re used to having — and which they always had, through history, unjustly, and often through physical force.

  1. e.g. “not oppressing them hurts my feelings, so whether to oppress them or not is all about me.” [↩]

Posted in bigotry, definitions, gay rights, religion | 4 Comments »

Natural Selection and Eugenics

Monday, April 21st, 2008

Richard Dawkins has posted an open reply to a letter from a Jew deceived by Expelled, who believed the propaganda movie’s absurd claims without any fact checking. I suggest you read Dawkins’ reply in full, of course, but the subject of this post is this part in particular:

Hitler did attempt eugenic breeding of humans, and this is sometimes misrepresented as an attempt to apply Darwinian principles to humans. But this interpretation gets it historically backwards, as PZ Myers has pointed out. Darwin’s great achievement was to look at the familiar practice of domestic livestock breeding by artificial selection, and realize that the same principle might apply in NATURE, thereby explaining the evolution of the whole of life: “natural selection”, the “survival of the fittest”. Hitler didn’t apply NATURAL selection to humans. He was probably even more ignorant of natural selection than Ben Stein evidently is. Hitler tried to apply ARTIFICIAL selection to humans, and there is nothing specifically Darwinian about artificial selection. It has been familiar to farmers, gardeners, horse trainers, dog breeders, pigeon fanciers and many others for centuries, even millennia. Everybody knew about artificial selection, and Hitler was no exception. What was unique about Darwin was his idea of NATURAL selection; and Hitler’s eugenic policies had nothing to do with natural selection.

This, in retrospect, is obvious, but I hadn’t seen it explained so succinctly and clearly before. Eugenics has nothing to do with Darwinian evolution! Animal (and even plant) breeders have known about selective breeding for millennia (indeed, I think it’s even mentioned in the Christian Bible), ages before Darwin or the concept of the evolution of species. Anyone who breeds dogs, horses, birds, etc. knows perfectly well that you can cross specimens with particular characteristics to achieve desired results (say, a new hair or plumage color, or a bigger or smaller animal, or one with other specific characteristics). This can be seen as artificial selection.

Darwin’s new idea was: what if something like this also happens in nature, without intervention? And what if that is how the species in the world today have came to be? In other words: evolution, by natural selection.

Eugenics (the attempt to “perfect” the human race according to one’s beliefs or preferences) has nothing to do with natural selection. It’s simply an attempt to apply the ages old selective breeding of animals to humans.

Of course, I’m not even considering blaming animal breeders from thousands of years ago for the Holocaust. That would simply be ridiculous. But blaming something completely unrelated (Darwinian evolution) for it is even more ridiculous. Eugenics is a disgusting distortion of selective breeding (which is itself blameless for eugenics); it’s completely unrelated to evolution / natural selection.

And, when you should know better than to say such an absurdity (as some filmmakers do), it’s also a dangerous, evil lie.

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Posted in definitions, evolution | 12 Comments »

A shocking new way of answering Republican mudslinging

Tuesday, February 26th, 2008

Imagine a likely situation: a conservative accuses a liberal politician of “lack of patriotism” because, of all things, he wasn’t wearing an American flag lapel pin.

Which of the following responses by the liberal do you think more likely?

  1. “Wait, I’m patriotic too!” <rushes to buy a lapel pin>
  2. “A party that presided over a war in which our troops did not get the body armor they needed, or were sending troops over who were untrained because of poor planning, or are not fulfilling the veterans’ benefits that these troops need when they come home, or are undermining our Constitution with warrantless wiretaps that are unnecessary? That is a debate I am very happy to have. We’ll see what the American people think is the true definition of patriotism.”

The first answer is, of course, the more likely one. It’s what Democrats have been doing since 2001. Every time Dems criticized the Bush administration, the latter knew it could stop the former in their tracks and make them scurry back to their holes simply by questioning their “patriotism”. How many times have you heard “Why do you hate America?”… and how many times did you see such a dishonest, disgusting question (much like “when did you stop beating your wife?”) actually work?

This is why Obama’s reply (which number 2, above, is) is so impressive. Not because it was genius, or because it took a lot of guts, but simply because it was virtually unprecedented in this decade. When have Democrats last stood up to Republican bullies? I don’t even remember. When did a Democrat last refuse to accept such warped definitions? What is “patriotism”, anyway: defending the Constitution and the American ideals… or wearing a flag and calling those who don’t “unpatriotic” and “un-American”?

Republicans — especially the neocon thugs — love to redefine the meanings of words to their advantage, and, sadly, Democrats tend to fall for it. Oppose the Patriot Act? You’re unpatriotic — never mind that it’s them who’re violating the Constitution of the United States. Oppose the so-called “War on Terror”? You’re a terrorist-supporter. Disagree with the Iraq war? You hate the military and America. Oppose taking away liberties in the name of “freedom”? You hate freedom.

And nobody ever calls them on it. Until now, apparently.

I’m betting every other Democrat politician is in shock right now… “you mean we don’t have to accept their definitions and their rules?!? I’ve never thought of that before…” :)

Thanks to: Dangerous Intersection, Salon.com

Posted in definitions, politics | 6 Comments »

Pro-Forced Maternity

Friday, May 25th, 2007

A little more than a year ago, I wrote a post called “Letting the Bad Guys Name Things“, warning about an increasingly common tactic: name something bad after something uncontestably positive, and your opponents will be reticent to speak against it, even if they realize how badly named it is. For instance, pass a law removing freedoms from people, but call it “Freedom Something”, and everyone will stay silent, because nobody want to be seen as “anti-freedom”. A well-known example is the Patriot Act.

But this post is about another one: “pro-life”. It’s a misleading label, of course, since what they are really about is banning sex outside of marriage, for religious reasons. (Either that, or they haven’t really thought about it, and just go with what feels good: “we’re saving lives!”). Still, it’s a well-chosen one (in marketing terms). After all, who wants to be seen as “anti-life”? That sounds almost like a murderer, or something…

The “antidote” to this problem is to refuse to use their misleading terms, and, instead, call things what they really are. I could give many examples here about the Bush administration, the “war on terror”, the invasion of Iraq, the fact that abortion clinic bombers aren’t called “Christian terrorists”, and so on. But what this post is really about is a term the author of No More Hornets came up with: Pro-Forced Maternity.

I believe this term is infinitely more honest and accurate than “pro-life”. It’s describes what they really want, what they really are about. Not “life”, but control. To force others. And, so, I think we atheists / humanists / secularists ought to spread it. Refuse to use their misleading terms, and describe things as they really are.

So, please, if you agree with this, help spreading the word. Write / blog about this, start using “pro-forced maternity” in conversations, and correct others when they use the common, misleading term (much like the Patriot Act isn’t really about “patriotism”). If this ever reaches the mainstream media (which is perfectly possible), even if they try to “denounce” it as evil secularist propaganda, it could make a lot of people think about this for the first time, and see the “pro-lifers” pro-forced maternity people for what they really are: anti-life, and anti-individual freedom.

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Posted in definitions, freedom, morality, religion, society | 51 Comments »

"True atheists" and redefining words

Thursday, April 26th, 2007

On Bligbi, there is a recent post called On true atheists, about the fact that some “atheists” attempt to set what “true atheists” must be like.

I agree with KC on this, of course; atheism is simply the lack of belief in gods, nothing more. To say “you are not a true atheist” for any reason other than “well, you do believe in a god” is an obvious example of the No true Scotsman fallacy.

It is, indeed, something I’ve mentioned in the past: how some people, for varied reasons, redefine words to mean something other than the accepted definintion, up to a point where you can’t have a useful conversation with them.

Some do it to escape from a negative association. E.g. “yes, the Inquisition was horrible, but those were not true Christians.”

Others, like the ones mentioned in the Bligbi post, do so to make the term fit with their own view. “I consider myself an atheist, and I like X, therefore true atheists must also like X.”

And some people are weirder. :) They make something up, but are not self-confident enough to admit their own originality, so they “steal” an accepted term and use it for what they just came up with. For instance, inventing a really weird set of beliefs — today — and calling it “Christianity”. For bonus points, say that it’s the only “true” Christianity, and that people have been wrong (see, Jesus was actually an alien, and to be saved you must worship pink things… while standing on one foot) for 2000 years. :)

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Posted in atheism, definitions, logic | 7 Comments »

The Evil Label Applier of Doom!

Wednesday, March 28th, 2007

I find variants of the following conversation quite annoying and tiresome:

Person: (talks about a concept that (s)he thinks is pretty new and original, but in fact isn’t.)
Me: Ah, that’s (commonly accepted term for that concept).
Person: See, that’s what I mean! Why do you have to apply labels to everything!? It’s impossible to have a conversation with you!

I’m sure that, by “labels”, those people mean “words in the dictionary”… but why do they always have to use that argument? Do they find the fact that the other person insists on using English (or any other language) too “limiting” for their “vast, open, non-prejudiced” minds?

Sigh…
Sorry for the rant. Never mind that.

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Posted in definitions | 1 Comment »

Ayn Rand was NOT a conservative

Thursday, August 10th, 2006

Ayn Rand, one of my favorite authors, is seen by many conservatives as “one of them”, as their “champion”, because she was totally opposed (and rightly so) to socialism and collectivism, supposed characteristics of “liberals” (at least in the American definition of the term).

However, conservatives have “stolen” Ayn Rand in pretty much the same way that Charles Manson “stole” Helter Skelter, a very good song by the Beatles. The song became associated with a repulsive murderer, while its creators never intended such a thing.

Like I said, it’s the same thing. I can’t say I love Rand’s books and philosophy without being seen as “conservative”. And yet…

  1. Ayn Rand was an atheist. Conservatives are mostly Christian (and usually pretty fanatical about it).
  2. Ayn Rand had no use for tradition. Conservatives worship tradition.
  3. Ayn Rand said that reason should be man’s only absolute. To conservatives, reason is irrelevant; what matters is faith, obedience, duty, tradition (again), etc..
  4. Ayn Rand believed in a minimal government. Conservatives like to convince themselves of the same, but in fact they want their governments to legislate morality, outlawing anything they believe to be “wicked” – even if done by consenting adults. (edit: if you don’t see what I mean here, read the 2nd comment)
  5. Ayn Rand believed in the heroic. Conservatives have no use for it.
  6. Ayn Rand believed that man’s own happiness is the moral purpose of his life. Conservatives believe in sacrifice to “the country” (much like socialists believe in sacrifice to “the people” – see, they aren’t so different after all), and servitude to God.
  7. Ayn Rand believed in progress (though not in the sense that socialists say “progressive”), and in improving our lives. Conservatives do everything in their power to return to “better times”, or, at least, to keep everything as it is.
  8. Ayn Rand believed that only rational beings have rights. Conservatives have no problem with killing people in a war (they’re foreigners, anyway), but believe embryos, which aren’t sentient and don’t even feel pain, are “sacred”, and can’t be harmed, even if it means sacrificing living people with diseases.
  9. Ayn Rand said that morality comes from rational principles. Conservatives believe it comes from God, that there is no rational reason to be “good” except that God wills it.
  10. Ayn Rand believed in the non-initiation of force. Conservatives invaded Iraq for no reason at all.
  11. Ayn Rand believed in freedom. Conservatives believe in freedom to agree with them.

And I could go on.

Dear conservatives: please stop trying to steal one of my favorite thinkers for yourselves. She wasn’t like you at all, and you are only showing that you never understood what she wrote (or never read it at all) in the first place. Thank you.

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Posted in definitions, objectivism | 15 Comments »

Honesty and the Iraq war: calling things what they are

Wednesday, August 9th, 2006

Two posts ago, I wrote:

Let’s hope this is but the beginning of a wave of people finding out where their balls are.

And I’d really like to see it happening, though I’m not too optimistic.

For instance, take U.S. Democrats. While they criticize the Bush administration, they always say things like “mismanagement of the war”, “faulty intelligence on WMDs”, “negligence”, and so on.

Where is the politician (Democrat or Republican) with the courage to say that Bush lied? That the war was, and is, all based on deceit? Is it political suicide to say the truth, these days? Is it barely acceptable to say that the war wasn’t handled very well, but not to say that it was wrong from the start? That there never were any WMDs there, or a connection to 9/11, or any kind of threat to the U.S.?

How many politicians supported the war because they didn’t want to be seen as “weak”? Were they all deceived by the administration’s lies? I doubt it. They simply went along with the lies, because they’d lose influence if they spoke up – they’d be seen as “weak on terrorism”, as (perish the thought) “liberals”.

The Iraq war isn’t being “mismanaged”, it’s going exactly like the Bush administration wants: never-ending. Why, if the war ever came to an end, people might want their lost civil liberties back… or believe that it was OK to criticize the president again without being “unpatriotic”… or notice the state of the economy… and we don’t want that, do we?

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Posted in courage, definitions, honesty, truth | 1 Comment »

Socialists and "liberals"

Tuesday, August 8th, 2006

A weird thing about Americans (I’m European) is that they call socialists “liberals”. And they use the latter term as if it was a dirty word.

You see, I’m far from a socialist – I’d say I’m something akin to a libertarian, although there’s no libertarian-like party around here. However, I do consider myself a liberal – because, around here, “liberal” means someone who cherishes individual freedom (real freedom, not just “freedom to agree with me”), and who opposes any kind of authoritarism. It has nothing to do with socialism or collectivism or “big government” or social security or the “welfare state” or all those meanings they ascribe to the term; instead, its meaning comes from the origin of the word “liberal”: liberty.

But Americans, as I said, use it like a dirty word.

Strange country. :)

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Posted in definitions, politics | 1 Comment »

Liberals and Conservatives, part 2

Tuesday, March 28th, 2006

In part 1, I’ve described how both sides seem to view the other one. But what are they, really?

If you go by the meaning of the words, “liberal” comes from liberty, a.k.a. freedom. “conservative” comes from conserve, keep, maintain.

I think most people would agree that, from that definitions, liberals would be “better”, right? Freedom is good (though some would argue against “too much” freedom, as that’s unpatriotic) , and “conserving” usually means “holding back”.

Of course, we’ve seen before that things can be misnamed. Still, we don’t usually see conservatives saying that so-called “liberals” aren’t liberal at all, nor do we see the opposite, so it’s my guess that the terms have mostly been accepted, and that people usually don’t think about what the words actually mean.

Still, my point remains: in my opinion, at least, and in the opinion of any who value freedom and in moving towards a better world, rather than staying as we are (or even as we supposedly were, in some golden age), the meaning of “liberal” is much, much better than the meaning of “conservative”.

Again: I’m talking, here, about the meaning of the words, not about what liberals and conservatives really are.

By the way, I do not consider myself a “liberal”. Or a “conservative”. I’d say I’m mostly a libertarian (with a lot of Ayn Rand influences), though there is no libertarian(ish) party in Portugal (so I tend to vote against people I despise).

More to come…

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Posted in definitions, politics | 3 Comments »

Liberals and Conservatives, part 1

Tuesday, March 7th, 2006

Gee, scary title. :)

I’ll try to make this post shorter by making it just the first of a series of posts about this theme.

“Liberals” and “conservatives” are two terms used in some of the most intense discussions and flamewars on the Internet. This has happened for decades. But what do they mean, really? I don’t believe that they mean the same to everyone – independently of what one’s own position is.

Let’s start by trying to come to some definitions, then.

(more…)

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Posted in definitions, politics | 4 Comments »

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