Just in time for Christmas, Hollywood has released The Golden Compass, a film based on the first book of a trilogy of children's novels written by atheist Philip Pullman. Pullman is not a fan of his fellow childrens' writers J.R.R. Tolkien or C.S. Lewis. He denounced the Lord of the Rings trilogy as "infantile" and absolutely hated the Chronicles of Narnia, calling it "morally loathsome" and "one of the most ugly and poisonous things I've ever read."
This is downright weird.
Some critics have objected to the overdrawn contrast between the forces of light and the forces of darkness in Christian fiction, but Pullman's trilogy is no less Manichean. The only difference is that in Pullman's world the evil regime is run by God Himself. Pullman pictures a kind of Calvinist moral structure, run by a kind of Catholic network called the Magisterium, and behind the whole oppressive system is a tyrannical God. As Pullman envisions it, the church kidnaps and tortures children and subjects them to hideous experiments in which their bodies are separated fro their souls and the children are turned into zombies who are then left to die. Pullman's trilogy finally ends with God being killed, the collapse of the Calvinist moral rules, and the emergence of sexual freedom.
Profoundly stupid stuff. I was not surprised to discover that Pullman is a big fan of atheist Richard Dawkins. Pullman speaks of religion in terms that could be lifted directly from The God Delusion. Pullman has been quoted saying it is not even possible for God to exist. "Every single religion," he says, "that has a monotheistic God ends up by persecuting other people and killing them because they don't accept him." Actually this is flatly untrue of Judaism and Hindusim and only in a very qualified sense true of Islam and Christianity. It would be more accurate to say that every atheist regime, from Communism to the Nazi regime in Germany, has systematically persecuted and killed its opponents for practicing traditional religion and for not accepting their secular race and class-based ideologies.
Certainly Pullman knows that there is nothing oppressive or murderous in today's Anglicanism. He is free in his native London to believe or not to believe. What is it then about religion that he's so strongly opposed to? For Pullman, as for many atheists, the problem with Christianity seems mostly to focus on sexual freedom. Reviewing Pullman's work in The Atlantic Monthly, Hanna Rosin writes, "The most curious aspect of Pullman's theology is the primacy he places on teen sexuality...the whole series builds up to a celebration of losing your virginity." So here is Pullman's case against religion. Basically, religion is what asks you to pull your pants up. This may be termed Pelvic Atheism.
True to form, Hollywood has stripped Pullman's movie of its overt anti-religiosity. The evil guys in the Hollywood version are not God's minions but a kind of amorphous Nazi-type dictatorship. Pullman can take solace, however, in the fact that the movie will probably lead a lot of people to read his books. Aren't we fortunate to have an atheist children's novelist whose main objective seems to be to corrupt the minds and morals of the young?
Reader Comments ( Page 3 of 35)
31. meanwhile the atheist die and go to their decay along with them they had no reason to live. atheism has never had an original thought
______________
Now that was funny! That Benjamin Franklin, James Madison, Johann Wolfgang Goethe, Lord Byron, Arthur Schopenhauer, Charles Darwin, Edgar Allen Poe, Walt Whitman, Thomas Henry Huxley, Andrew Carnegie, Mark Twain, Thomas Edison, Friedrich Nietzsche, Marie Curie, Robert Frost, Albert Einstein, Virginia Woolf, Arthur Rubenstein, and Ernest Hemingway (all self-proclaimed atheists or agnostics) never had an original thought then?
And with the legacy they have eft behind, they had no reason to live?
Well then, brian, it's a good thing we have you and all the original thought you have provided to make this world a better place!
emma at 11:17AM on Dec 17th 2007
32. Chemdad @ 24 -
Being able to use a thesaurus does not a genius make.
"I love the term "Pelvic Atheism," as it succintly describes one of my generation's (Baby Boomers)many negative contributions to contemporary culture: the notion that personal fulfillment is found through wanton recreational use of our genitalia."
Um, is it not arrogant to think that because you can't get any, that no one else gets "fulfillment" from sex? I had great premartial sex last night, WITH anti-baby protection. It's not a "notion," it's a fact. I love making love, especially with my wonderful boyfriend of 3 years. I'm not hurting you, so why don't you just butt out and stop making general accusations about people you don't know? I guess without sex, you have to do something to pass the time, but just leave me out of it.
Break Time at 11:18AM on Dec 17th 2007
33. What's wrong with Pullmans arguement for a point of view.I'snt God (WHATEVER THAT MAY BE) running both a good and evil universe? or does that thought require too many of your grey cells.Leave your books of Christian fiction behind and come into 2008 not ooo8.Get your pajamas on D'souza and hide your pelvic theism.There's too much sound comming from that region.
Kevin at 11:19AM on Dec 17th 2007
34. Women, girls (say some)------
are something to be used, to be enslaved, to be exploited on the Net (see many daily AOL stories here), to be rented out to make someone money in Thailand (for instance) where (apparently) the local faith does not seem to care if one rents out one's daughter...-
THE TWO MAIN GROUPS TO EXPLOIT GIRLS, WOMEN.in worldwide slavery here or elsewhere...tHOSE PEOPLE WHO...
1. has a weak religion - which does NOT value ALL humans, especially women (SUCH AS THAILAND WHERE LOTS OF $$$ ISTO BE MADE BY RENTING A DAUGHTER TO RICH EUROPEANS/AMERICAN MEN WHO WANT TO LEGALLY ABUSE AN UNDERAGE GIRL)
2. has a MILITANT "go for it" practical unbelief that any deity will hold them ACCOUNTABLE - whether they have come out as atheist or not - where the mitigating influences of past Christian / Jewish training have been PURGED> and then they look around (wearing their best "Will to Power" aftershave cologne) for WHOM they can dominate, abuse...
THE STRONG THINK (WITH JUDAISM/CHRISTIANITY PURGED) THAT THEY CAN THEN DOMINATE AND ENSLAVE OTHERS...INCLUDING TEEN GIRLS (BOYS). IT'S THE P IMP MENTALITY...
DNA - a great design at 11:21AM on Dec 17th 2007
35. Might it be worth asking why sexual freedom is such a bad thing? Why is religion asking us to pull our pants up, hate our physical bodies, and long for something that comes after we die?
Dinesh just assumes that sex is an impure thing. I wonder if he felt like that when he was dating Ann Coulter.
AndrewV at 11:31AM on Dec 17th 2007
36. Somber
Amazingly truthful post. I appreciate your insight and perspective.
mincpa at 11:22AM on Dec 17th 2007
37. This is, um... weird... and fastidiously manipulative. Well, thank you for inventing a new breed of atheist. Hey all, Potter 5 is out on DVD! Let's conjure curses! Let Uncle Frankey teach you a new word today, kiddos ... R-E-L-A-X.
Mokele-Mbembe at 11:25AM on Dec 17th 2007
38. God has brought judgement down on the priesthood...they are no longer getting away with their crimes...and those that thought they did, are being brought forward as well...the Bible speaks of judgement beginning in the house of the Lord first!, once HIS house(the church as a whole) is judged, look out, the world will be judged...God always, in the past, used the elements of the earth to judge...for example, look at the Pharisee who would not let God's people go when they were in slavery in Egypt...God sent Moses to free them...it took the elements of the earth and plagues, and the death of the Pharisee's son, to finally convince the Pharisee to free those in bondage to Egypt...and still, after letting them go, the Pharisee went after them to imprison them once again, but God would not allow it...No matter how much people want to kick against the pricks, as the Pharisee did, God is still Sovereign
Bridget at 11:28AM on Dec 17th 2007
39. Dinesh....Dinesh...Dinesh...
So it's okay for you to berate atheists....but it's not okay for any one to criticize christianity (intentional little c)?
Jeez....
From the tone of your writing, you are firing up the faithful for a holy war on atheists the world over.....why? What did atheists ever do to anyone? Sure point out the familiar tired, cliche, (but alas, untrue) arguments of Hitler and Stalin....but Hitler was a twisted Christian at best.....blaming the jews for killing his savior....and Stalin was first and foremost a ruthless dictator ...one would have to doubt he would have behaved any differently had he pulled on the christian jersey.
The only thing atheists have done is bring up logical arguments against all faiths....not just your vaunted chritianity. Atheists call into question ALL superstitions and supernatural cults and strange beliefs....We are not organized....we are not indoctrinated as children by being frightened of eternal hell and damnation. We are using our survival weapon of reason.....to identify things that prevent us, as the human race, from reaching higher existences during this life and prevent us from surviving.
Christianity is just one of the symptoms of this strange mass paranoia that has gripped this world for eons. Please stop making atheists out as evil people bent on Christianity's destruction. We are NOT necessarily ANTI-RELIGION as much as pro-freedom of thought. We havethe inalieble right to believe or think as we choose...including A-theism....freedom from "theism", freedom from religion and freedom from dogma and persecution. We are trulythe brave ones. Unafraid of the past, unafraid of the accusing and disapproving opinions of those around us and most of humanity, we reject "because that's the way it's always been" as an argument and dare to think for ourselves...instead of behaving as blind obedient sheep being oh so easily led because it's just so easy to believe without questioning.
So Dinesh, why are you persecuting atheists? What did we, as a group, ever do to persecute any other religion? All we do is question....all we do is seek the truth.
And Truth frightens you.
Larry D. Davis at 11:30AM on Dec 17th 2007
40. Bridget,
And Elvis is still KING!
brandon at 11:31AM on Dec 17th 2007
41. linda,
care to expound on the infinite inbetweens? i am not sure of your meaning?
brandon, come to think of it my comment about your bathroom where your primodial stench originated does have a shakespearan ring!! glad you got your jolly's going!!!
brian at 11:33AM on Dec 17th 2007
42. brian is a dipshit if there ever was one.
danny at 11:33AM on Dec 17th 2007
43. danny,
thanks so much!! this is brian the christian. are you referring to the cesspool from which came ye and your atheistic crudity? atheism-no original thought.
brian at 11:35AM on Dec 17th 2007
44. andrewv,
this may be difficult to grasp but there is no sexual freedom. it all has its price
brian at 11:37AM on Dec 17th 2007
45. I am a christian you dipshit.
danny at 11:37AM on Dec 17th 2007