Do you like Sam Harris?

[Lexicus]

No need to scare-quote, though. The pragmatism argument is a good one, as long as it's not based on bad statistics. They're not necessarily linked, and it's not fair to assume that someone is linking them until they signal or dog-whistle that they are. The reason why profiling is bad is not so much an argument that the stats are bad (they can always be improved); it's that a minority is being subjected to an injustice of which the majority is not aware ... and therefore both sympathy and empathy will not be present when the injustice crosses a line.

This is just utter nonsense. There is no pragmatic argument for racial or religious discrimination in law enforcement, period. And treating the position that we should profile Muslims as anything but racist trash is treading on highly dangerous territory.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

It's not about thumping his chest and proclaiming the herrenvolk. Dawkins is a liberal imperialist, with a general and unapologetic contempt for the non-Western. You may not find him saying anything specifically hostile to the Yazidis or Jains or Assyrians, but you'll find little to suggest he holds any sympathy for them, more than he does adherents of the Muslim, Catholic or Orthodox faiths.

Okay, I'm going to make this very simple: Has Dawkins ever expressed antipathy toward people whose skin color or eye shape differ from his own? Never mind religion. If he has, either provide a link or a citation in whichever book or article applies.

I have no idea what "herrenvolk" means.

"Chauvinist" in the sense of "national chauvinism". And what I mean is, Dawkins atheism is an expression of a very English and Protestant abhorrence of the Orient, which in practice means everything that isn't English and Protestant. History is for Dawkins a movement from the superstition of the ziggurat to the rationalism of the university, and his rejection of God, who is after all a sort of cosmic space-pope, is just another step in this direction.

Dawkins has made it clear that he has no problem with the bible as literature, since so much of our literature is based on it. His problem with the bible is when it's taken as history or a guide to morality.

 

[El_Machinae]

Your point is agreed to (well, except that profiling Muslims is 'racist', but that's semantics). The article under discussion is vastly more nuanced than 'we should profile based on race'.

But the idea that law enforcement shouldn't profile based on culture is just bad math. There are reasons not to. But the economics of it aren't one of them.

 

[Traitorfish]

Okay, I'm going to make this very simple: Has Dawkins ever expressed antipathy toward people whose skin color or eye shape differ from his own? Never mind religion. If he has, either provide a link or a citation in whichever book or article applies.

I mean, context is a thing. You can't argue for the superiority of Western culture and the virtue of "corrective" intervention in a world where that argument has historical been mired in a discourse of race and racism, and expect people to buy that you're starting from a position of detached and objective reason.

I have no idea what "herrenvolk" means.

"Master race". In German, like.

Dawkins has made it clear that he has no problem with the bible as literature, since so much of our literature is based on it. His problem with the bible is when it's taken as history or a guide to morality.

Naturally: it offers a view of history and of historical progress that conflicts with his own. Anglicans have long harboured a quiet contempt for the Bible, Dawkins simply makes it explicit.

 

[caketastydelish]

Islam is not a race so I'm not racist

Christianity is not a race so I'm not racist. Buddhism is not a race so I'm not racist. The Jedi people (or whatever they're called) is not a race so I'm not racist.

Why are we even having this conversation?

 

[caketastydelish]

I presume it is only possible to be racist against Muslims. Or was your point something else?

 

[Traitorfish]

Christianity is not a race so I'm not racist. Buddhism is not a race so I'm not racist. The Jedi people (or whatever they're called) is not a race so I'm not racist.

Why are we even having this conversation?

I mean, I'm going to assume that anyone with a real thing about Buddhists probably doesn't like Taoists, Shintoists or Tengerists, either.

Call me crazy.

 

[caketastydelish]

My understanding is that Buddhism actually stems out of Hinduism and nothing else. Although, correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[sophie]

My understanding is that Buddhism actually stems out of Hinduism and nothing else. Although, correct me if I'm wrong.

You're wrong.

 

[Traitorfish]

My understanding is that Buddhism actually stems out of Hinduism and nothing else. Although, correct me if I'm wrong.

We're dodging points like Neo in this thread.

 

[sophie]

We're dodging points like Neo in this thread.

Last bullet hit Neo though.

 

[Traitorfish]

I agree, let's keep trying.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

I mean, context is a thing. You can't argue for the superiority of Western culture and the virtue of "corrective" intervention in a world where that argument has historical been mired in a discourse of race and racism, and expect people to buy that you're starting from a position of detached and objective reason.

My question to you required a "yes" or "no" answer.

Has Dawkins EVER, in public - whether spoken or written - expressed antipathy toward people who are not white, regardless of their religion or lack of religion? I'll admit I haven't read much of what he has written, but I've never heard anything I would consider racist in his videos. Of course I haven't seen all his videos; maybe you can point me to the ones where you think he's expressed racist views.

"Master race". In German, like.

Oh, do excuse me for not being able to read German, like.

Naturally: it offers a view of history and of historical progress that conflicts with his own. Anglicans have long harboured a quiet contempt for the Bible, Dawkins simply makes it explicit.

It doesn't take an Anglican to have contempt for a book that gets so many things either flat-out wrong and is morally reprehensible by modern standards.

 

[Lexicus]

Has Dawkins EVER, in public - whether spoken or written - expressed antipathy toward people who are not white, regardless of their religion or lack of religion?

Yes.

 

[sophie]

My question to you required a "yes" or "no" answer.

Has Dawkins EVER, in public - whether spoken or written - expressed antipathy toward people who are not white, regardless of their religion or lack of religion? I'll admit I haven't read much of what he has written, but I've never heard anything I would consider racist in his videos. Of course I haven't seen all his videos; maybe you can point me to the ones where you think he's expressed racist views.

I mean, what do you do when there are two Neos? Are they collectively called Wot?

 

[Lexicus]

Christianity is not a race so I'm not racist. Buddhism is not a race so I'm not racist. The Jedi people (or whatever they're called) is not a race so I'm not racist.

Why are we even having this conversation?

Well cake, we're having this conversation because "black" and "white" and "Asian" aren't races either. So saying "it's not racist, because x isn't a race" is silly, because race isn't real.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Yes.

Link, please.

I mean, what do you do when there are two Neos? Are they collective called Wot?

What does this even mean?

 

[Traitorfish]

My question to you required a "yes" or "no" answer.

Has Dawkins EVER, in public - whether spoken or written - expressed antipathy toward people who are not white, regardless of their religion or lack of religion? I'll admit I haven't read much of what he has written, but I've never heard anything I would consider racist in his videos. Of course I haven't seen all his videos; maybe you can point me to the ones where you think he's expressed racist views.

Well, yes, in context. That's the point.

It doesn't take an Anglican to have contempt for a book that gets so many things either flat-out wrong and is morally reprehensible by modern standards.

It doesn't, no. But Dawkins' is is a peculiarly Anglican contempt. It's not so much that it's wrong, a lot of things are wrong, but that it's all just so... Foreign.

Well cake, we're having this conversation because "black" and "white" and "Asian" aren't races either. So saying "it's not racist, because x isn't a race" is silly, because race isn't real.

Eh, if you can insist that America is "at war with Islam" because it's bombing Syria, fully aware (one presumes) that Damascus is less than half as far from Rome as it is from Jakarta, anything is possible.

 

[El_Machinae]

Except that it is, if we're discussing the problems of racism. If race wasn't real, then my racism wouldn't be an issue, since you'd just think that I was this eccentric curmudgeon who randomly disparaged people for no apparent reason. But there really does have to be room in the discussion regarding Islam, because Islam is very much NOT a race. And so, if you're tempted to think someone's position on Islam is based on racism, then you have to be prepared to let them talk themselves out of the racist aspect of their position.

 

[Lexicus]

Except that it is, if we're discussing the problems of racism. If race wasn't real, then my racism wouldn't be an issue, since you'd just think that I was this eccentric curmudgeon who randomly disparaged people for no apparent reason. But there really does have to be room in the discussion regarding Islam, because Islam is very much NOT a race. And so, if you're tempted to think someone's position on Islam is based on racism, then you have to be prepared to let them talk themselves out of the racist aspect of their position.

I repeat, "white" and "black" are no more races than Islam is.
It is like quibbling that Jews are not a race when the salient point is that they're being exterminated. The salient issue is that Muslims are systematically discriminated against in Western society, not whether Islam is a race or not. And so responding to a charge of racism with "Islam isn't a race" is a way of side-stepping the fact that Islamophobia contributes to this real-world systematic discrimination against Muslims.