One of my pet peeves with religion is the social pressure focused on thought crime. It’s an ugly aspect of repression normally associated with those I rail against. In fact, it was one of the things that drove me away from organized religion. I am sad to say that I see the concept working in the Atheist Movement by way of killing creativity and free expression. Hemanat Mehta recently launched a book idea via Kickstarter that was based on the premise the God is like an abuse boyfriend. People who had been in an abusive relationship complained, so Hemanat, caving to social pressure, killed the book project. When one is not allowed to be creative and explore the concept God as an abuse partner in a one-sided relationship, well… we all lose.
I get this a lot in the photography community. I like to take photos of homeless men and women. I feel it helps draw attention to their plight. A very vocal photography subgroup opposes photographing the homeless on the grounds that is exploitive and demeaning. If fact, they aggressively assert that I should stop my activities and choose other subjects, as long as those other subjects do not include kids, police, government buildings, pornography and, well just about anything you want to list. Even attempting to take these photos are objectionable. I listen to their concerns and assert my own position, a position that is often in conflict with a lots of other people. What I do with my camera helps shine a light on a part of society that is shunned or ignored by others. Good things have come of it. I am proud of my work.
What I’ve noticed is that because of the complaints of others, I’m constantly questioning myself and self editing. I ask myself, “Is this right?” Creativity is not a crime, nor is it wrong to explore that nature of religion via the metaphor of an abuse relationship.
Props to Atheist Revolution for getting me thinking about this subject. The sarcastic, Time for Reeducation Camps made my day.
Logging you in...
v1car 40p · 558 weeks ago
Mojoey 107p · 558 weeks ago
v1car 40p · 558 weeks ago
Hemant stopped the kickstarter because he didn't want to cause distress to victims of abusive relationships. You are saying "Hemant should have specifically ignored the victims because some of them issued their complaints in the form of a demand". Hemant may not have an obligation to be kind to victims, but he ALSO has no obligation to cause them distress, and he certainly has no obligation to deliberately cause distress to make a point about communications. Doing so would be counterproductive, given his stated goal of enticing people away from religion by pointing out that atheism is kinder.
(In fact, come to think of it, if you're publishing a book which suggests that religion is cruel, then it's an AMAZINGLY bad idea to use a metaphor which by its very nature causes extra distress to a bunch of people who are on your own side who have already suffered. You might as well name the book "I don't understand irony".)
Mojoey 107p · 558 weeks ago
As for me bing a troll. Shame on you. I hold a different opinion, that is not trolling.
v1car 40p · 558 weeks ago
1. "People who will find offense in his work no matter what he produces"? Really? You have any evidence for the claim that they were nit-picking for the fun of it? Or are you just saying "people complained about an issue which is very specific to the project he proposed, but the issue isn't important to me so I'm going to pretend that they would have made something up no matter what"?
2. Had he self-funded, he STILL would have been open to criticism. He gave up nothing he actually wanted by crowd funding — the only two differences of self-funding would have been that of surprise (meaning that people would have taken MORE offense, because he went to the effort and expense of doing something offensive) and the need to fully commit to the project in advance (which would have been a handicap to him if the project had been a failure because of the offense). Also worth noting is that Hemant didn't stop the project because Kickstarter received complaints and refused to permit him to continue, he stopped it because he saw the complaints and realized that the actual results of his idea were not the results he intended. He wasn't forced to do anything, other than decide whether he really wanted to be offensive. Since he has issued an actual apology — not a "notpology" — it seems that he didn't.
3. The project was not "a work of art" except in the loosest sense. It was intended as a piece of propaganda and, to a limited extent, a commercial enterprise. The fact that it was significantly offensive would ruin its utility as the former and severely limit its success at the latter.
4. "The metaphor of an abusive relationship is a beautiful one". Abusive relationships tend to involve physical abuse as well as mental. (That's how the mental abuse tends to roll: "do what I want or I'll hit you again".) Sorry, but no matter what you may think about religion, it isn't physically harming MOST of the people who have faith. (I only wish it DID — it would die out very quickly.) This is akin to saying "I was on my feet for 8 hours today at work — it's like I'm a SLAVE"; it invites debunking which makes the speaker sound like an entitled whiner.
5. "Now we will never know." So what? There are plenty of things we will never know — this is not, in itself, a bad thing. We'll never know what would have happened if the Cuban Missile Crisis had exploded into thermonuclear war. We'll never know what it would be like if the sun went supernova. We'll never know how it feels to have red-hot knitting needles shoved up the nose and through the brain. None of this keeps me up at night. I am perfectly happy not to know what it would be like if the world were a worse place.
6. A tone troll is someone who attempts to derail or stop an opinion with which they disagree by complaining not about the opinion but about the way in which the opinion is expressed. You certainly SEEMED to be doing that, by characterizing the complaints as demands.
Mojoey 107p · 558 weeks ago
2. Of course he would have been open for criticism, but then would he have put his work out publicly at an early stage? I doubt it. The result may have been different if people had a chance to see the work as a hole instead of criticizing the pieces.
3. So he produces propaganda? Are we really that kind of movement? What a horrible thought.
4. I'm not sure I see your point. Comparing a physically abusive relationship with a relationship with god does not make any sense. Comparing a mentally abusive relationship makes sense. Assuming all abusive relationship are physical is bullshit. Comparing the mental abuse seems reasonable.
5. We will never know if this book is the book that would have reached a generation of young Christian minds and helped turn them toward a healthy relationship with reality. It is an opportunity squandered.
6. I guess I would be happy with title if I were out engaging people on other blogs. I'm not. I offer my opinion here on my blog. Where I once agains assert that you and I have a difference of opinion. I am not asserting you are wrong and I am right. There is a huge difference.
v1car 40p · 558 weeks ago
2. So, in other words, you think people who found the concept offensive would have been LESS offended if there had been a whole book's worth of similar drawings, rather than just a handful for demonstration purposes? I like your universe; let's move there.
3. Propaganda does not cease to be propaganda merely because you happen to agree with the cause in question. The book was not going to be a treatise of logical arguments, it was going to be a series of drawings intended to incite an emotional response. A rose by any other name...
4. My point is that the metaphor does not apply to most religious people to an extent which justifies the emotional reaction the examples were trying to achieve, which means that the book would be easily dismissed by anyone trying to do so.
5. We will also never know — at least, I sincerely hope — if atheists arming themselves and shooting everyone who steps out of a church on Sunday would have reached a generation of young Christian minds and help them turn towards a healthy relationship with reality. (Hey, coercion has worked in the past, sometimes — it COULD work.) If we have to degrade ourselves by adopting offensive rhetoric which appeals to emotions in an unfair, unrealistic way in order to convert Christians, then I'm not sure it's worth it.
6. You're still performing the same actions; you're simply not doing it in someone else's comment section. When Richard Dawkins produces yet another Tweet dismissing rape victims and then turns around and pretends he's surprised when people are angry, he's still a troll.
Mojoey 107p · 558 weeks ago
v1car 40p · 558 weeks ago
Jack 119p · 558 weeks ago
I think the photography example is a good one. In both cases, the goal seems to be to stifle the art. This is unfortunate. I've always thought that good art is supposed to be offensive to many.
Mojoey 107p · 558 weeks ago
Art by its very nature is offensive to many. Take Piss Christ for example. It offends a lot of people, but that does not mean it should not have been created.
Don't take my pic · 558 weeks ago
Mojoey 107p · 558 weeks ago
filledwithhate 28p · 558 weeks ago
v1car 40p · 558 weeks ago
Hey, if you like, YOU can publish that book. Just look forward to everyone else distancing themselves from you afterwards because you come across as a jerk.