BY DINESH D'SOUZA
This article is adapted from What's So Great About Christianity, which is just published by Regnery. Find out more at dineshdsouza.com.
It seems atheists have developed a comprehensive strategy to win the minds of the next generation. The strategy can be described simply: let the religious people breed them, and we will educate them to despise their parents' beliefs. Many people think that the secularization of the minds of our young people is the inevitable consequence of learning and maturing. In fact, it is to a large degree orchestrated by teachers and professors to promote anti-religious agendas.
Consider a timely example. In recent years some parents and school boards have asked that public schools teach alternatives to Darwinian evolution. These efforts sparked a powerful outcry from the scientific and non-believing community. Defenders of evolution accuse parents and school boards of retarding the acquisition of scientific knowledge in the name of religion. The Economist editorialized that "Darwinism has enemies mostly because it is not compatible with a literal interpretation of the book of Genesis."
This is indeed so, but doesn't Darwinism have friends and supporters mostly for the same reason? Consider the alternative: the Darwinists are merely standing up for science. But surveys show that the vast majority of young people in America today are scientifically illiterate, widely ignorant of all aspects of science. How many high school graduates could tell you the meaning of Einstein's famous equation? Lots of young people don't have a clue about photosynthesis or Boyle's Law. So why isn't there a political movement to fight for the teaching of photosynthesis? Why isn't the ACLU filing lawsuits on behalf of Boyle's Law?
The answer is clear. For the defenders of Darwinism, no less than for its critics, religion is the issue. Just as some people oppose the theory of evolution because they believe it to be anti-religious, many others support it for the very same reason. This is why we have Darwinism but not Kepplerism; we encounter Darwinists but no one describes himself as an Einsteinian. Darwinism has become an ideology.
The well-organized movement to promote Darwinism and exclude alternatives is part of a larger educational project in today's public schools. I'll let the champions of this project describe it in their own words. "Faith is one of the world's great evils, comparable to the smallpox virus but harder to eradicate," writes Richard Dawkins, author of The God Delusion. "Religion is capable of driving people to such dangerous folly that faith seems to me to qualify as a kind of mental illness."
Christopher Hitchens, author of God Is Not Great, writes, "How can we ever know how many children had their psychological and physical lives irreparably maimed by the compulsory inculcation of faith?" Religion, he charges, has "always hoped to practice upon the unformed and undefended minds of the young." He wistfully concludes, "If religious instruction were not allowed until the child had attained the age of reason, we would be living in a quite different world."
If religion is so bad, what should be done about it? It should be eradicated. According to Sam Harris, author of The End of Faith, belief in Christianity is like belief in slavery. "I would be the first to admit that the prospects for eradicating religion in our time do not seem good. Still the same could have been said about efforts to abolish slavery at the end of the eighteenth century."
But how should religion be eliminated? Our atheist educators have a short answer: through the power of science. "I personally feel that the teaching of modern science is corrosive of religious belief, and I'm all for that," says physicist Steven Weinberg. If scientists can destroy the influence of religion on young people, "then I think it may be the most important contribution that we can make."
One way in which science can undermine the plausibility of religion, according to biologist E.O. Wilson, is by showing that the mind itself is the product of evolution and that free moral choice is an illusion. "If religion...can be systematically analyzed and explained as a product of the brain's evolution, its power as an external source of morality will be gone forever."
By abolishing all transcendent or supernatural truths, science can establish itself as the only source of truth, our only access to reality. The objective of science education, according to biologist Richard Lewontin, "is not to provide the public with knowledge of how far it is to the nearest star and what genes are made of." Rather, "the problem is to get them to reject irrational and supernatural explanations of the world, the demons that exist only in their imaginations, and to accept a social and intellectual apparatus, science, as the only begetter of truth."
What, then, happens to religion? Philosopher Daniel Dennett suggests that "our religious traditions should certainly be preserved, as should the languages, the art, the costumes, the rituals, the monuments. Zoos are now more or less seen as second class havens for endangered species, but at least they are havens, and what they preserve is irreplaceable."
How is all this to be achieved? The answer is simple: through indoctrination in the schools. In his book Breaking the Spell, Dennett urges that schools teach religion as a purely natural phenomenon. By this he means that religion should be taught as if it were untrue. Dennett argues that religion is like sports or cancer, "a human phenomenon composed of events, organisms, objects, structures, patterns." By studying religion on the premise that there is no supernatural truth underlying it, Dennett argues that young people will come to accept religion as a social creation pointing to nothing higher than human hopes and aspirations.
As for atheism, Sam Harris argues that it should be taught as a mere extension of science and logic. "Atheism is not a philosophy. It is not even a view of the world. It is simply an admission of the obvious....Atheism is nothing more than the noises reasonable people make in the presence of unjustified religious beliefs."
Of course, parents-especially Christian parents-might want to say something about all this. That's why the atheist educators are now raising the question of whether parents should have control over what their children learn. Dawkins asks, "How much do we regard children as being the property of their parents? It's one thing to say people should be free to believe whatever they like, but should they be free to impose their beliefs on their children? Is there something to be said for society stepping in? What about bringing up children to believe manifest falsehoods? Isn't it always a form of child abuse to label children as possessors of beliefs that they are too young to have thought out?"
Dennett remarks that "some children are raised in such an ideological prison that they willingly become their own jailers...forbidding themselves any contact with the liberating ideas that might well change their minds." The fault, he adds, lies with the parents who raised them. "Parents don't literally own their children the way slaveowners once owned slaves, but are, rather, their stewards and guardians and ought to be held accountable by outsiders for their guardianship, which does imply that outsiders have a right to interfere."
Psychologist Nicholas Humphrey argued in a recent lecture that just as Amnesty International works to liberate political prisoners around the world, secular teachers and professors should work to free children from the damaging influence of their parents' religious instruction. "Parents have no god-given license to enculturate their children in whatever ways they personally choose: no right to limit the horizons of their children's knowledge, to bring them up in an atmosphere of dogma and superstition, or to insist they follow the straight and narrow paths of their own faith."
Philosopher Richard Rorty argued that secular professors in the universities ought "to arrange things so that students who enter as bigoted, homophobic religious fundamentalists will leave college with views more like our own." Rorty noted that students are fortunate to find themselves under the control "of people like me, and to have escaped the grip of their frightening, vicious, dangerous parents." Indeed, parents who send their children to college should recognize that as professors "we are going to go right on trying to discredit you in the eyes of your children, trying to strip your fundamentalist religious community of dignity, trying to make your views seem silly rather than discussable."
This is how many secular teachers treat the traditional beliefs of students. The strategy is not to argue with religious views or to prove them wrong. Rather, it is to subject them to such scorn that they are pushed outside the bounds of acceptable debate. This strategy is effective because young people who go to good colleges are extremely eager to learn what it means to be an educated Harvard man or Stanford woman. Consequently their teachers can very easily steer them to think a certain way merely by making that point of view seem fashionable and enlightened. Similarly, teachers can pressure students to abandon what their parents taught them simply by labeling those positions as simplistic and unsophisticated.
Children spend the majority of their waking hours in school. Parents invest a good portion of their life savings in college education and entrust their offspring to people who are supposed to educate them. Isn't it wonderful that educators have figured out a way to make parents the instruments of their own undoing? Isn't it brilliant that they have persuaded Christian moms and dads to finance the destruction of their own beliefs and values? Who said atheists aren't clever?
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Reader Comments ( Page 11 of 12)
151. "God" isn't the answer, and the only people being deceived are the ones who believe that there is a god. Also, calling others "fools" is in violation of Matt 5:22, The Constitutionalist.
Knight_of_BAAWA at 10:46PM on Oct 16th 2007
152. I didn't turn to God until I was 25 and I have seen first hand God's work in my life since then. God is so real to me - I don't need physical proof. It is a shame some people won't give Him a chance. He told us in the bible over and over Christians will be persecuted but to persevere and we will be saved and blessed. What if all the atheists are wrong? Prayer is real, God is real, Jesus Christ is real. Matter of fact, Jesus Christ is the most famous person to ever walk the earth. I doubt Darwin will be even thought of in 2000 years... People call Christians narrow-minded but to tell the truth, people who don't believe are more narrow-minded and not willing to think outside of the world's views.
There once were a couple of scientists who just knew they could make a human with their hands. They told God they could do it, but when they went to get the dirt to start God said "Oh no - Get your own dirt!" I guess the gorillas made the dirt and the earth, too.
Teresa at 1:01AM on Oct 17th 2007
153. Michelle ...149
I was just saying that that seemed to be the strategy... to paint atheists black while disparaging evolution as simply a 'false' faith while claiming Deists(Einstein, Flew, and founding fathers) as Christians while disparaging pro-choicers as murderers while trying to inject I.D. into school science as a 'wedge' while claiming that the world is going to HELL in a handbasket while painting gays as freaks while buying and installing monuments which declare God to have declared himself real while Christian 'think-tanking' away that it is the atheists who have some strategy while throwing as much 'guilt by association', Stalinism, social darwinism etc. on atheists while claiming absolute TRUTH and LOGICAL PROOF while claiming no burden of proof ... lalala...
... isn't life a confusing nightmare... no... it's simple... you are born to be alive... and to reproduce... everything else is incidental.
Why don't we revert to a 'family feud', honour-bound, careless of life/others situation if we don't revere 'GOD'...
... revering(spelling) 'GOD' is not the answer... because that is EXACTLY how the arabs live... and if there is one thing that they do do ... better than the 'family feud', honour-bound, careless of life/others... it's revere 'ALLAH'... 'GOD'....
.... and that doesn't seem to be helping at all... now does it?
pboyfloyd at 1:04AM on Oct 17th 2007
154. Aha!!!
A couple of comments here seem to be hinting that even if scientists WERE able to create life out of non-living chemicals...
... that that will simply still 'not do'... you see... they are willing to 'retreat' even further...
... God 'created' all matter and energy... so the scientists must produce a living thing out of absolutely nothing at all... if the scientists are going to impress these commenters at all.
Not asking much really, just that any scientist now has to be the equivalent of their God to disprove their God... I wonder if these scientists would be more impressive yet if they appeared from a timeless/spaceless dimension first...
...or is that getting a tad ridiculous?
pboyfloyd at 1:13AM on Oct 17th 2007
155. If we as adults no longer believe in Santa Claus watching over us, why do we as adults believe in an all seeing, all knowing God watching over us every minute of our incredibly boring lives.
Wouldn't God have something better to do than watch billions of us on the toilet, in the shower, eating, driving to work, sleeping.
I would want my god to be something other than big brother, doing something other than watching me all the time, waiting for me to screw something up; that may be enough to drive a God insane.
I find it hard to believe in an all knowing, non-interventionist god that allows suffering, especially of children, that allows wars, disease, starvation.
Having the capability to help someone in pain and agony, yet not doing so, seems to be an extremely callous and heartless attitude, so why do people want to believe in a God that does such?
I also suggest reading some passages from the Old Testament, there you can read about the advocation of stoning, animal sacrifices, the killing of non-believers including family and children, vigilantism, slavery, torture, cash payments for rape. Deuteronomy, Exodus and Leviticus are a good place to start.
steve at 4:38AM on Oct 17th 2007
156. The truth of the matter is that christianity is dying, and the educated are abandoning it altogether.
As for Maurice's lie--well--what do you expect from a follower of a dying religion?
Knight_of_BAAWA at 9:06AM on Oct 17th 2007
157. What if you've chosen the wrong god, Teresa? You don't know that you're correct, so you'd better believe in every god, just in case.
Knight_of_BAAWA at 10:56AM on Oct 17th 2007
158. Pboy 152,
Theres a strategy when it comes to the ones who dont think, the ones who dont even know who is running for president. The poor truly simple minded. People who dont know better try to pigeonhole people with fear and fancy words. Or they just stammer. Depends what kind of stupid they are.
Michelle at 10:11PM on Oct 17th 2007
159. Gettin borin her again.
Michelle at 10:47PM on Oct 17th 2007
160. Knight - You're entitled to your own opinion but not your own facts. First you suggest that Hitler and Stalin were theists and then you continue to insist that Hitler didn't believe he was furthering evolution and advancing the "master race" by ridding the planet of "undesirables". It's not even arguable that Hitler used his understanding of the theory of evolution to justify his evil aims. That doesn't mean I think all evolutionists are killers.
And no, once again, I'm not "terrified of evolution". I'm comfortable enough to actually learn both sides of the evolution-creation debate. Nice try, though. And Hitler was an occultist who persecuted and murdered millions of Christians and Jews and others. Stalin was an atheistic Communist who murdered about 20 million and who also hated and killed people of faith.
Dave at 10:59PM on Oct 17th 2007
161. Dave,
You're entitled to your own opinion but not your own facts. Both Hitler and Stalin were theists, and Hitler did not use "Darwinism" or "evolution" in order to further his agenda. Social Darwinism != evolution. Social Darwinism != Darwinism.
Get that straight.
Knight_of_BAAWA at 8:37AM on Oct 18th 2007
162. 1. Science has nothing to say about God or Atheism. Neither is subject to scientific inquiry.
2. As to religious objections to science, there would be (and often is) a great outcry to the non-determinism of quantum mechanics. Unfortunately, most religious nuts don't understand enough to see the implications.
John Swindells at 3:21PM on Oct 18th 2007
163. Of course! Why didn't I see it before?
The answer was right there in daddy's bible. God breathed life into a pile of dust!
I really can be in heaven with Sparky, my dog from when I was a little kid. I can hang with my friends and family. And God really is looking down on me while I go to the bathroom and shower and (well that other stuff is private).
I wanna be a Christian now! Where do I sign up!
Smoking Gun Wtc7 at 10:43PM on Oct 18th 2007
164. Philip,
"Atheists like to say, and often smugly, that the existance of God cannot be proven."
Which atheists say that? Name them, please.
"Choosing to believe in God or not is a subjective, personal choice. It is some thing that their God, science, may never be able to prove one way or another."
And yet you were excoriating some atheists for saying something similar.
"Science is hardly the last word on truth and reality."
Pretty much is.
"Logic and rational are not reliable."
And yet you are using logic and reason.
"They are variable,"
No, they aren't.
" based on what you accept as the truth or not in the first place. If you believe the earth is flat and there's an edge out there to fall off of (which any scientist in Europe 500 years ago would have agreed to as the absolute and irrefutable truth)"
No, they would not.
"Atheists seem desparate to convince people that God doesn't exist to legitamize their own unproven and largely unsupportable position."
No, and it's actually theism which is unproven and wholly unsupportable.
" Why be so adamant? They're obviously not sure they're right about God."
Wow--talk about projection.
"They would like to be able to shove their attitude down the throats of children."
More projection.
"They want to educate the upcoming generations that God doesn't exist and to "despise" the beliefs of their parents."
Proof, please.
Knight_of_BAAWA at 11:51AM on Oct 19th 2007
165. Atheists and agnostics are hardly the monolithic forces you protray. I would guess they are even more fractured in their non belief than are christians.
Your rant is full of circular and false arguments. The reason that "Darwinists" go to court over the issue rather than for photosynthesis and Boyles Law is that people like you continually try to prohibit teaching Darwin's Theory. If you were trying to require the teaching of flat earth theory or that the universe revolved about the earth, that would be challenged also, because of it's lack of veracity.
These authors you mention clearly have their own fish to fry but, they don't speak for me or many others. While the 1st amendment prohibits the establishment of religion by government, it does not call for its eradication. We all have the right to believe or not and worship or not in our own ways.
Many people derive their moral compass from religious belief and there is certainly an enormous source of charity from believers. They also receive great emotional comfort in times of stress or trauma. I certainly would not advocate taking this from them.
While you generalize about assualts on faith by "atheists" you fail to recognize those movements in America to seek political dominance for their religious views to the exclusion of all others. There is a militant form of fundamentalism which seeks to compel a particular faith in the public square. It also seeks by the projection of its specific views as an expression of geopolitical power in the world.
You might recall that Jesus sought to spread his message by sermon and sacrifice rahter than compulsion of others.
Les Marshall at 12:22PM on Oct 19th 2007