a brief primer on atheism and racism.

[kalmn]

as an atheist, and a new convert with all the requisite new convert zeal and all, i think your religion, yours, that one right there that you are so fond of, is full (if i am familiar with it) or is probably full (if i am not familiar with it) of sexist, racist, disablist, probably homophobic and transphobic crap and how did i almost forget classism, either in its core beliefs or in its general practice.


(you may or may not believe in those particular core beliefs, you may or may not follow the general practice. that's a whole different discussion, and as for what i think about *you*, i'm not willing to have that discussion over the internet.)

does this mean it's okay to point out the parts where religion leads to social injustices by focusing on the religions mostly followed by brown people?

NO. no it fucking well does not. in fact, it is racist to do so.

Comments

[kalmn]

i suspect both that you have not asked me what it is that i believe in this regard, as your statement above bears little resemblance to what i think, and that you are bound and determined to turn this into a discussion about your religion, despite my having said specifically, starting out, that that was not what i was interested in doing.

please stop doing both of those things, or at least stop doing them here.

[commodorified]

Well, no. It was not intended to be a hostile paraphrase, and I'm sorry it came out so. It did appear to me to be what you were saying. It's a sentiment I've heard expressed by a fair number of atheists.

I'm not overly interested in discussing - in the sens eof explaining or justifying - my religion at the best of times, though I don't undertake in any discussion of religiosity never to speak from my own experience; that was a sidebar to Whump, related to his comment.

I *am* interested in the issue of the degree to which religiosity and bigotry are or are not related. I don't, obviously, see them as intrinsically intertwined.

And I am interested, globally, in the question of what traditions, systems and institutions can be, from an anti-oppression standpoint, detoxified, and which cannot and have to be replaced.

I'm happy to talk about those things or not to talk about them.

(I am also, parenthetically, probably making more sense now. Turns out I should eat fairly regularly; who knew?)

[emceeaich]

Yes, failing at reading instructions today. Sorry about that. I moved things over to my journal.