16 August 2008
Does religion deserve respect from atheists?
Check out a renewed discussion of PZ Myers' Crackergate stunt and the concept of showing respect for religion, over at Clashing Culture. Mike makes an interesting point about "respect" for Muhammad and Islam in the context of outrage over the desecration of a Eucharistic host, and I've responded with some scenarios aimed at distinguishing respect for religion from respect for other people. Please chime in!
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That post outlining scenarios was a good one.
Personally, I tend to judge offensive actions by what I think a person's motivations are. Of course that involves a fair amount of mindreading. Still, in many cases I think a good case can be made that only someone motivated by hatred or some other unpleasant motive would engage in offensive action X.
Take your two flagburning examples. I'm fairly leftwing and not offended by flagburning myself, and would probably sympathize with the political views of someone who would burn a flag in protest against US policy, but I'd never burn a flag in protest. In the more extreme scenario that you give, the person who goes to the funeral and burns a flag is surely motivated by hatred or something like it. How could they possibly hope to reach anyone not already in their camp with an action like that? If anything, they will drive people away. In your less extreme scenario, I think the people involved might have mostly good intentions, but their judgement is off. I'd oppose a Constitutional amendment that would ban flagburning, but at the same time I'd say this kind of symbol abuse is usually a bad idea. (One exception--when William Lloyd Garrison burned a copy of the Constitution as a pact with Hell, I think I would have applauded.)
With blasphemy against Islam, again it depends on motives. My impression is that it is rather difficult to engage in historical criticism of the Koran the way it's been done to the Bible because of the risks involved. If I'm right about that, then it's a ridiculous situation and scholars who find reason to cast doubt on the traditional understanding of how the Koran was written should be given every support.
But childish insults to Islam are like flagburning--it should be legal, but most of the time I don't think a well-intentioned person should engage in such behavior. Is it really helpful to the cause of liberalization in Muslim countries to have blasphemous cartoons published in Denmark? If someone could make a good case that it is, then I'd change my opinion. I suspect many Islam-bashers are little more than religious warmongers. The test is whether they acknowledge that Muslims have any--any at all--legitimate complaints to make about Western mistreatment of Muslims. If they always dismiss Muslim complaints about torture or anti-Muslim prejudice or the Palestinian situation, then I'd say that support for blasphemy is part of an ugly pattern.
None of that is to defend the Muslims who react violently to blasphemy. It's the PZ situation--PZ was wrong, but the violent reaction (or threats of violent reaction) is worse.
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