So I done messed up.
I usually write posts for the coming week on the weekend. Except I spent this weekend (which is a long weekend – Monday is a holiday here in Canada) at the Washington Gorge in George, Washington (yes, that’s actually the name of the town). I got most of today’s post done, but then I forgot to finish it. Stupid me.
Anyway, today’s post will be late. To make up for it, I leave you with this video:
Mmm, that’s good Hitchslap.
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Love Hitch. The world is better off for having him in it — even if that time is now short.
I really hope his cancer treatment goes well for him.
Christopher Hitchens on hatred:
“I am absolutely convinced that the main source of hatred in the world is religion”
Christopher Hitchens’s hatred:
“And I think it should be, religion, treated with ridicule and hatred and contempt and I claim that right”
“my enemies are the theocratic fascists, I don’t love them, I want to destroy them”
Does this mean it’s okay to hate someone because they hate? If the Amalekites were religious, wasn’t it okay for the Israelites to destroy them, or should the Israelites have renounced their faith first? Maybe atheism is a religion?
If the Israelites had destroyed the Amalekites through a thorough verbal skewering of their beliefs, resulting in a major loss of influence and political power, then I’d be all for it. Considering that what they supposedly did do is genocide, I think even you can see the difference between what Hitchens is saying and what the Old Testament says. Maybe you can’t – you’ve insisted on making one of the oldest, laziest arguments out there: that atheism is a religion. Atheism is a response to a claim – it has no dogma, there are no required beliefs, there is no ritual, there are no holy books or prayers. I know you don’t think atheism is a religion, so I’m confused as to why you’d say something like that.
So, to clarify, you’re okay with thorough verbal skewering. If, for the sake of argument, I re-word the quotes from Hitchens as such:
“I am absolutely convinced that the main source of hatred in the world is Islam”
“And I think it should be, homosexuality, treated with ridicule and hatred and contempt and I claim that right”
“my enemies are the homosexual activists, I don’t love them, I want to destroy them”
You’re okay with them? I find both the above and Hitchen’s words offensive. Although I support the right to express them, they are derived of hatred. Hitchens is rather open about his hatred and the hypocrisy speaks volumes.
I hear your claim that atheism isn’t a religion. For an atheist that is indifferent to religion and just wants to live his/her life (worship of self) there may be a grain of truth, but those who are religiously anti-theist…I just don’t know.
Except all of those hypothetical statements are things that people actually say. And yes, I do defend their right to say them. I don’t agree, obviously, but provided they are not making threats of violence or encouraging others to do the same, then yes I would be ‘okay’ with that. And if you can’t see that there is a time and a place where hatred is entirely appropriate (for example, when discussing something that causes the deaths of millions of people every year and contributes to halting progress in alleviating the suffering of billions more), then you have made a very clear statement about your own morality.
Which simply proves that, despite your frequent appearance here (which I thought meant that you were actually reading, but it apparently doesn’t), you don’t understand the words ‘atheism’ or ‘religion’ at all. By your definition, any passionate defense of any position is a ‘religion’, which might make you feel less inferior for having an absurd belief system, but it doesn’t mesh at all with what anyone else means when they use that word. I won’t even stoop to dignify your assertion that atheism is the ‘worship of self’ with anything other than an admonishment to save your straw man arguments and revisionist lexicography for those who are too stupid to recognize such ploys as the pathetic and feeble excuses for argument that they are.
My thanks to Grassrute! I can now understand why I have always been drawn to ledges, stacked shop displays, warehouse storage and libraries. It is an innate ‘worship of shelf’. My most humble gratitude.