God, these people annoy me
Sunday, February 21st, 2010
The British scientist Richard Dawkins has gotten famous by bashing religion as benighted superstition. In this week’s audio commentary, Chris Satullo takes Dawkins and his ilk to task by telling them they’re the ignorant bigots.
Listen:
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It was too perfect. There I was, sitting at a light in the People's Republic of Mount Airy, looking at a bumper sticker. On a green Volvo, no less.
The sticker read: "The last time we mixed religion and politics, they burned people at the stake." How could I not take that as a sign from God?
You see, I'd been mulling a commentary on secular liberals, and how annoyed I get at the arrogant, wrong-headed take they seek to impose on all discussions of church and state.
I’d just read a piece about Harvard University, where some faculty fought to banish all study of religion, as unworthy of such a great temple to Reason.
You want to know where that Tea Party anger comes from? It comes in part from decades of listening to ill-informed secular snobs lecture the rest of us about what benighted superstition our religious faith is.
Back to that clueless bumper sticker. Let me rewrite it in ways that have a greater basis in American history:
"The last time we mixed religion and politics, we got Dr. Martin Luther King Jr."
Or: "One time when we mixed religion and politics, we got Abraham Lincoln."
Or Harriet Beecher Stowe. Or Dorothy Day. Or Sister Mary Scullion.
Religion has done just as much to bring moral courage and a passion for social justice to a nasty, selfish public square as it has to screw things up.
Haters love to cherry-pick from history. How many wars really were caused by religion, vs. being mayhem where good ol' human bloodlust merely used religion as a cover?
Human reason gets held up as the enlightened counterweight to superstitious, intolerant faith. Did you happen to notice that when reason got its chance to run the show in the 20th century, the results were less than spectacular?
"The last time we mixed faith in reason and politics, we got Pol Pot. And the Cultural Revolution. And the Gulag."
Sound harsh? No worse than the glib, faith-bashing gibes about the 30 Years War that believers such as myself have had to endure for years.
Ignorant? At Harvard, some people apparently think that one can be an educated person without having read St. Thomas Aquinas, Cardinal John Henry Newman, or theologian Reinhold Niebuhr.
Now, THAT is ignorance. And I, for one, am sick of tolerating such highly degreed bigotry in silence.
Religion – you can choose to believe anything, usually according to the faith of your parents, and worship any version of a magical man in the sky, and behave according to the precepts of that faith within the bounds of secular law. (can't shoot abortion doctors)
Science – you cannot choose what to believe, you can challenge any assertion, which is how science works. We have peer review which can be quite vicious (remember cold fusion, careers impacted!)Evolution, climate change, age of earth, etc. are things supported with years of research and data, and are subject to revision only with sufficient evidence to the contrary.
The Issue – public policy making today needs to be informed by the latter not the former.
So, the author insults a portion of the audience, then insults them again, saying that they just don't get his point?
Never have I imagined that I would pull my support for a public radio station. I guess there's a first time for everything.
I’ve just successfully navigated the Ph.D. at a large public research university. Because my topic included an examination of the role of faith in international development I experienced first-hand the kind of anti-religious bias that Mr. Satullo references. In spite of research and practice’s testimony to the important role religion plays in the developing world, more often than not the very mention of it in the academy aroused suspicion among faculty colleagues and compromised collegiality. While educators are normally among the most open-minded folks in any room, I learned that when it comes to matters of faith, different rules apply for far too many of us. I wish I knew who coined the phrase, “don’t confuse me with the facts, my mind is made up,” because that sums up how we often respond to the mere mention of the word.
Before Mr. Satullo mentioned Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., my mind was already there, along with several of the others he mentioned. There are many well-reasoned, faith-filled people he could have added: Mohandas Ghandi; Desmond Tutu; the Dalai Lama. For them, transformative faith befot actions that transformed (or continue to transform) society. How about William Wilberforce and how his reasoned faith and political activism doomed the British slave-trade industry? Who can forget how the Quakers so faithfully argued against UK big business while their US-based siblings provided sanctuary for runaway slaves and way stations on the Underground Railroad?
Recent scholarship tells similar stories, testifying to how religious-based NGOs are often best prepared to deliver aid because they tend to be the ones whose presence on the ground predate crises, and they are those who can be found laboring among the poorest of the poor and advocating for justice long after the crises are deemed newsworthy. Hardly a day goes by when Haiti doesn’t provide corroborating evidence to what social science has discovered.
But unfortunately, on the other side of too many social conflicts lie other religious folks with strong convictions and impressive intellects. For me, it’s when we separate the faith and reason from justice that this is most likely to occur. The pages of the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures are full of examples when justice was forgotten. The prophets’ called us to a better (“more excellent”) way. They knew that justice lends a focus to both faith and reason that includes concern for the welfare of our neighbors. Justice also serves as protection over against the faith or reason that in isolation (or the hands of the powerful few) can all too often be used to bludgeon others.
This circles us back around to the bumper sticker. As a Volvo owner, social progressive, committed Christian and multiple decade fan and supporter of public radio (even when I disagree with it), I appreciate this dialogue. While I wish it could be less accusatory, the real value for all of us is in having the conversation.
Kudos to WHYY’s Executive Director for News and Civic Dialogue Chris Satullo’s poignant and insightful comments about secular elitism. I am excited about the future possibilities for the sleepy WHYY FM news department. In this era of “political correctness”, Chris may be just the right person to forge deeper and provocative news coverage to the Delaware Valley. Having been UN inspired for the last 10 years or so since the departure of Bill Simmering and the end of 91 Report, I have not renewed my membership to WHYY. I am now considering personal financial support once again! Thank you again Chris, you made my day!
"While educators are normally among the most open-minded folks in any room, I learned that when it comes to matters of faith, different rules apply for far too many of us."
That is so ironic. Try asking religious people what you demand from atheists: "While religious people are normally among the most open-minded folks in any room, I learned that when it comes to matters of denying superstition, different rules apply for far too many of us."
If you want to appeal to those of us who believe in logic and reasoning, you have to give up appeals to religious faith and superstition.
Be honest. Admit that when you elect to hold a religious faith you do so because you give up logic and reasoning.
You may have your religious faith. Grab it, hold it, love it. Be very happy that in America if it is a Christian faith belief and not a VooDoo faith belief, you have massive public support. But please, don't be annoyed that you can't get me to say you have logic and reasoning on your side.
Be annoyed with me.
But don't be hypocritical about why you are annoyed. You are annoyed because you want both faith and reasoning on your side. I know I can't have both. Why can't you know that you can't have both? Religious faith literally means you know something without having proof. When you don't have proof, you don't have logic and reasoning.
I'm sorry. I don't know why infringing into the territory of logic and reasoning means so much to you. Why is it that your religious belief isn't comfort enough for you?
I know why it doesn't comfort me. But why doesn't it give you comfort?
Are you suggesting that King, Ghandi and Tutu lacked logic and reason just because their faith informed their politics? I'm guessing most social scientists would ascribe to them brilliance versus irrationality.
Would you also suggest that National Institutes of Health and Human Genome Project director, Francis Collins, lacks logic and reason because he too is an avowed person of faith? Surely you are not also prepared to go there.
What superstitious idea does Collins have that helps him in his job?
It has to be based ONLY on superstition. It has to be an belief that can only be based on superstition–not on something a moral atheist wouldn't also believe.
Same goes for King, Ghandi, Tutu and anybody else you admire.
What did they do to change the world in a positive way that is ONLY based on superstitious belief?
I don't believe you can give a coherent response. This is the only reason I am an atheist.
Please explain to me again the value in this? It was a bigoted, thumb in the eye attack on non-believers of organized religion. There is no value in this discussion because each side has experienced attacks from the other side. The attacks from religious groups have always been disproportionate against Humanists and Reason, not only now but also, throughout human history. Only 13% of the U.S. citizens are not members of an organized religion.
Satullo accused Humanists of cherry picking the facts. I say this is false and the facts speak for themselves. There have been hundreds of years of atrocities committed in the name of religion. In modern times, we have had: Bosnia, Israel / Palestine conflict, Sudanese Civil war, Sri Lankan Civil War, Pakistan / India wars. The current war in Afghanistan and Iraq could be considered by the Muslim World as another Crusade from Western Civilizations (basically Christian Countries). The United States also supports Israel (Jewish) and Saudi Arabia (Sunni) against Iran (Shiite). Currently, there are approximately 184,000 troops in these two countries that surround Iran. I might even speculate that our presence in the Middle East has driven Iran towards nuclear armament. The U.S. would not tolerate 184,000 armed and equipped troops off our shores in Cuba! We would view it as a threat as we did in the Cuban Missile Crisis.
(As an aside, the 911 Attack in the U.S. resulted in 2,819 deaths of U.S. civilians and $105 billion in economic damages. To date, approximately 870,000 civilians have been killed in these two countries with, an estimated cost of these wars at $3 trillion dollars, and now the second longest war in U.S. history. The response seems disproportionate to the initial attack.)
Satullo and Sandy Smith want extreme Secularists/Humanists to understand how they sound and to get a dose of their own medicine, yet they turn a deaf ear to cacophony created by their own extremists. Satullo and Smith want to all Humanists to hear his diatribe as if we are all extreme Humanist. I am pretty sure the majority of the WHYY Humanist does not make it their daily tasks to go about attacking the Christian Religion, or any other religion for that matter. Satullo and Smith also want to “cherry pick” about the good Christian NGO’s do without acknowledging Humanists NGO’s. You can go on-line to the NGO Network to verify this.
Again, I submit that if you are secure in your faith and religion, your will all be marching contently though the “Pearly Gates of Heaven”. It really shouldn’t matter to you what a small minority of Humanist do! However, the progress of science, using the Scientific Method, and reason, will continue it’s march into the future, which will probably generate a new set of fears for the Religious Community, as it has always done.
Sandy, I'm not proposing that 'reason', any more than religious emotion and sentiment, can begin to grasp the immensity. (Here in 2010 any attempt to do so would seem a poor usage of energy). Yet, as science-medicine-technology moves further and further into understanding the evolved brain–the instrument by which reason, after all, is made possible)–more of the mind-brain's capacity for brilliance/creativity/universality will likely be expressed. It's all about the evolutionary process. In-depth caring for one's self is, in the end, inseparable from caring for the whole. No superstitiousness required. No polarization via systems of belief. Impassioned reasoning stands on its own.
By definition, 'higher rationality' (as contrasted with, say, the Founding Father's great–yet slave sanctioning–insight) is non-reactionary and inclusive. Inclusivity and rational concern for the whole are reason's natural allies. Paschal erred in declaring reason as corrupt. Clearly, his broad conclusion–'tis better to'–cannot be separated from the fact of his having been a socially conditioned, practicing christian of his time (mid-1600). More to the point, his 'reasons' to believe in a creator preceded Darwin's discoveries by two centuries.
That much said, preoccupation with religious dogma/doctrine/superstition is an effective distraction/avoidance of the hard work of creating a just world. Fervent salvationist religion, almost without fail, leads to an unjust exclusivity of others and, by extension, a myopic, childish sense of specialness, whether the myopia is that of ordained bishops or secular tyrants. As to the former, belief in fantastical ideas of self-survival beyond the grave is childishness in the extreme. Such beliefs are but a conveyance for fears arising from the foreknowledge that life passes. Needless to add, playing on this fact of life is how religious organizations get and keep their adherents. Isn't it time to grow up?
Alan Watts, the Anglican priest-turned-Zen Buddhist, wrote: "Our sense of separateness from the unified field of the universe is a conceptual artifact." Meaning, there is no separation ultimately; only in thought are such polarizing notions created and sustained. Watts offers an artfully condensed statement of fact–a crisp, sober face slap to the psyche–pointing directly to humankind's predicament. In a way the advice is, 'stop, look, listen'. And while we're at it, no more petitioning for deliverance, no more howling upward to sky gods. And no climbing on board Paschal's row boat !
yeah, I turned the radio off early on, after the first couple of sentences. Know thy audience, Mr. Satullo. And then I'd suggest you move over to the oldies station.
Sorry, bub. You lost me at "tea party." I can't take your complaints seriously if that's the type of group you associate yourself with.
After slogging through all the responses, reasoned, thoughtful, civil, and otherwise, to the original commentary, I can only come to one conclusion:
Sarcasm is highly combustible and should only be used by trained professionals.
My response may be colored by the fact that I am an Episcopalian, like Satullo; Harvard-educated, like some who read this or heard it; and black, unlike him. But I took the point of Satullo's original comment to be this: "Do some of the more extreme secular humanists realize how they sound? Perhaps a dose of their own medicine might help."
Such medicine always tastes bitter, and this dose was no exception. I hope Mr. Satullo wasn't surprised at the adverse reaction many who swallowed it displayed. And I can't say that the criticism about someone in charge of promoting "civic dialogue" contributing to its coarsening is completely unwarranted. But I think his main point holds: Religion and reason have both produced great triumphs — the abolitionists based their arguments in the same faith as that of the slaveholders — and great horrors — the official atheism of the Marxists played no small role in their suffocating of human freedom. It is as ill-advised for those who believe in no god to claim virtue, and ascribe all vice to the opposite side, as it is for those who believe in one (or more) to do so.
Pity his point got lost in his style.
P.S. Hi, John!
Sandy says, "It is as ill-advised for those who believe in no god to claim virtue, and ascribe all vice to the opposite side."
Actually that is just what separation of church and state means. If religious people want their idea put into law, they must convince all other religions and all nonbelievers that their idea is based on moral good ('virture")and not based solely on religious dogma and supersition ("all vice" to government).
Do religious ideas and virture overlap? Yes, of course, most of the time, but religious people can't tell when it doesn't overlap, and that's where other religions and nonbelievers can be of great assistance to a free society.
But since Sandy is sure this piece by Chris was satire/sarcasm, then Chris knows all this and agrees that separation of church and state is a must in a free society.
Satire is hard. Just ask Sarah Palin.
Well, not being able to occupy Chris Satullo's mind, I cannot be *sure* that he was being satirical or sarcastic, but that was how I *interpreted* his commentary, as I said above ("I took the point…to be…")
And I think it should be clear from the paragraph proceeding that whatever it was, it misfired.
And separation of church and state is indeed a must in a free society. But as the First Amendment also forbids the government from "prohibiting the free exercise" of religion, then I believe we should also be tolerant of believers professing their beliefs in the public square, and even trying to persuade those who do not share them that they should. *And vice versa* — you will note that the passage of mine you quoted was a parallel construction. The "wall of separation" Jefferson wrote about wasn't meant to be a cell enclosure.
I think I quoted you in full.
What is your problem with a cell enclosure?
No one has charged that atheists are demanding religions during their services give equal time to atheism.
Perhaps I am missing your point.
Chris, I see you've been taking it on the chin for stating, with religious fervor, your
anti-atheist convictions. You have my understanding in that I am reminded how
unswerving were my own convictions, decades ago. But then, somehow I found
my way to a layman's grasp of elementary astronomy. From there I began pondering
notions my religious mentors never put to me … and perhaps never to themselves.
Listening to your radio essay I get the sense that in your willingness to embrace religion/myth/doctrine, you are absent any need to acknowledge, much less include, cosmological depth in your reasoning. To wit, every atom of our minuscule planet, together with every life form therein has issued, factually, from our home star–the Sun as we say. It is 4.6 billion years old and 120,000 light years in diameter. As well, this star (average in size) along with its orbiting planets is positioned on the outer spiral arm of an average size galaxy comprised of at least 200,000,000,000 (billion) suns. And that, within the 'currently' observable universe there exists, conservatively, 170,000,000,000 additional galaxies most of them comprised of hundreds of billions of stars. Equally amazing, it is estimated that there exist at least 10,000,000,000 planets capable of supporting 'life', many within the Milky Way itself.
Do the math, Chris, so that you won't be quick to assign ultimate importance–as Abrahamic mythology does–to this treasured small speck we call Earth.
Again, one cannot escape the math nor its implications. It is 2010 !! Why demean one's intelligence by abiding psychologically in religious explanations formulated in pre-scientific times? Flash! — Sweet John Paul II was given to whipping himself. "WTF!" Give me an Albert E. any day.
Lastly, 3 notions to ponder when contemplating the Immensity:
1. Personally, life is at times a bitch; cosmically, nothing deep down is skewed.
2. History hasn't an end, and that's okay.
3. All things considered, the one thing more mysterious than 'God' is … if there is no God.
Regarding point 3, Pascal placed a wager that I stil consider a pretty sound one.
The central dilemma is this: While most
oops: problem with my keyboard. Continuing:
…While most religious creation stories have been shown by science to be wildly fantastic at worst and metaphorical at best, we still cannot grasp or comprehend that Immensity that lies at the origin of everything — call it Big Bang, call it God, call it what you will. As of now, the best religion AND science can do is approximate understanding, and that may be the best they can ever do.
In which case, what's the problem with taking Blaise Pascal up on his bet?
Only one problem, all the religions tell you you're going to suffer if you don't believe theirs, so which one do you believe?
Because Pascal could have been more honest and said that it is equally likely that the Devil is calling the shots. Why not follow Him just in case?
Why not? Because you have a brain and can think for yourself and decide what is moral.
You shouldn't need a supernatural thing to tell you how to behave.
It's a bet against humanity.
LOGICAL FALLACIES
The foolish and misguided attempt to ban religious studies is not related to the spearation of church and state.
Abraham Lincoln made advances in the human condition despite a professed belief in a Bible that informed him that not only was slavery okay but here's how to do it properly.
Separation of Church and state does NOT mean that religious people can't paractice their religion. It just means that any law a religious legislator passes must not JUST be based on his or her religious ideas. You get to practice your religion; you just cannot compell me to practice your religion.
To Chris Satullo:
Just as your first Op-ed piece was ill conceived and poorly written, your response to all the e-mail complaints was no different. Your comments were mean spirited and you attacked the audience of WHYY because of “Mr. Richard Dawkins and his Ilk”. The audience of WHYY has done nothing to offend you, yet you deemed it necessary to lash out at a section of this audience that is Liberal and non-believers in Christianity. You offered no apology, only a defense of your positions, and one regret about the aired piece. You stated: “Some of my best friends are from Mt. Airy” (meaning Liberal). This is like a white person saying to a black person who they meet for the first time ‘some of my best friends are black’. Besides, you are not my friend and I’ve never met you before.
You seem to suffer from a paranoid mentality, by mentioning all the slings and arrows, and offense that you have had to put up with, over the years, from co-workers, personal contacts, and in particular secularists such as “Richard Dawkins and his Ilk”. I ask you honestly: Has anyone at WHYY attacked you personally? To me listening to them on the air they always seem like a pleasant group of people. Has any of the audience member come out personally and attacked you? In all my years of watching Public Television and listening to Public Radio, since it’s inception, I have never heard anyone, on the air, attack or demean, in anyway, Christianity or any other religion. If you have an issue with Richard Dawkins, then I suggest you contact him about his ideas instead of lashing out at the WHYY audience. For myself, I am very sensitive to a person’s belief and never would say anything to offend them, except many years ago, in college, when I engaged in sophomoric debates about religion.
For some reason you are upset with and feel threatened by a small group of Liberal-Secularist. According to the 2004 U.S. Census approximately 13% of the citizens did not list themselves as members of any organized religion. Yet your Op-Ed response to this small section of American society was way out of proportion to reality of the situation! Just from shear proportion of religious to non-religious people (of which I consider myself), we have probably suffered more attacks from the religious community than the other way around. All I have to do is turn on some religious channel, and listen to some rabid preacher go on-and-on about the godless, debauched, evil sinners, who don’t believe in Christianity. If the subject of Darwin and Evolution comes up with conservative religious groups the din gets louder and even more frenzied. Personally, I feel that if you are truly devout and certain about your faith and religion, secularist and non-believers shouldn’t bother you at all! This group of people must somehow unsettle your faith so that you become upset and defensive. You state in your reply: “It really stinks to have things you deeply believe caricatured, mocked and dismissed this way, does in not? It is in fact, “offensive”.
If you somehow feel besieged at WHYY, maybe you should work for the Fox News Channel or some other religious organization where you won’t be subjected to any more attacks, and you can have your religious beliefs re-enforced. It might make you more content in the long run. One of my main concerns is that you state: “I’ve come to conclude that the journalistic stance of “objectivity” is a false promise to the public.” If you have come to this conclusion that your beliefs and values should color your reporting then I think you should resign your position at WHYY as Executive Director of News and Civic Dialogue. If you are going to have an agenda in reporting the news at WHYY then I believe what I hear will no longer be “fair and balanced”, which will be a great loss for this station. WHYY will then become just another circus show to entertain and appease that select group of people who only wants to hear what you have to say. This station can then join the list of other stations engaged in one-sided reporting, as many of the current television and radio programs do in order to pander to a select group of listeners. It’s sad to say that you feel that Walter Cronkite and Edward R. Morrow are now passé!
As a final note, you try to make “rant” synonymous for an “opinion with which I disagree”. The definition of rant is: to talk in a noisy, excited or declamatory manner; to scold vehemently. This is exactly what you did in your Op-Ed piece. It doesn’t matter that it was only 390 words and/or 2 minutes long. It was still a rant and not a reasoned, thoughtful opinion! At a minimum, WHYY should no longer allow you pose your views on this station in the future!
Problem with this religion thing is it's all about belief in the face of evidence to the contrary. It's big and powerful – after all, it claims to offer an antidote to death. So far it appears that you can't be alive and dead at the same time. It does work to protect scoundrels such as centuries of pedophiles who got away with it, no consequences for their crimes. It does not stop war or oppression. It empowers the powerful and has since the idiotic pyramids. Presently its radical adherents have turned the Supreme Court into a branch of the 'military-industrial complex' it seems. Obviously Dawkins & Hitchens are confronting the Islamist brand of religious extremism at close range, no wonder they're sick of it.
It appears to be just something that people love or hate or disregard, like an athletic team or a type of music. It certainly didn't teach Mr. Satullo much about turning the other cheek or loving thy neighbor. On the other hand it's true, some hospitals & other good works have been done by religious people. A real mixed bag!
Mr. Satullo:
We are a diverse country. From diversity comes strength. This diversity takes all forms, from morphology to beliefs.
The price of such diversity is that people will differ, and that these differences will invariably lead to conflict.
How we deal with this conflict is the measure of our empathy.
I am a devout atheist. I preach to those receptive to my way of thinking. I largely keep my thoughts to myself with regards to my beliefs. This does not stop me from having a dinosaur eating a fish emblazoned on the rear of my car. I have a right to express my beliefs where I see fit just as those who practice religion do.
I respect everyone's right to believe what they want. This does not mean I have to respect the beliefs themselves.
The jews were looking for someone to save them from roman oppression 2000 years ago. They found someone who preached peace and love, and they crowned him as a savior. The romans killed him as a perceived threat in an attempt to quell the movement. Books were written about him over the next several hundred years, and some of these books were organized into what we now know as the "New Testament". Some people believe that these books represent what actually happened. I believe that these books are a mere subset of the writings of cultists desperate to extricate themselves from roman domination and their corrupt religious authorities who served as a puppet theocracy under roman rule. These cultists wanted to reinstitute what Jesus called the "Kingdom of God". The many books of Paul espousing what christianity was in the early years reinforce this belief for me.
My words may annoy you Mr. Satullo, characterizing your beliefs as the fallout from an ancient cult. Such is the price of diversity.
In my opinion, the last time we mixed religion and politics, we elected George W. Bush to two terms, tortured people, entered into an unnecessary war in Iraq, and cost us trillions of dollars and thousands of American soldier's lives. This is a direct result of religion, as the fundamentalist christian base of the republican party was highly motivated to elect and reelect this man. Had religion not been a factor in these elections, I suspect the outcome and our present collective situation would likely be much different.
Such is the cost of faith.
I have read many interesting comments regarding Mr. Satullo's supposed "rant" against separation of church and state. Yet after reading his commentary several times over, I have not identified where he addressed this issue.
The idea of religion in the public square is a far cry from a state church. This seemingly obvious distinction (at least to the founding fathers) may be lost on this generation. Unfortunately it also sidetracked many from addressing the real point of this commentary.
The lead into this piece used the term "ilk". My ears perked up. I presume that Chris wrote the lead using that word to set the stage for what seemed to me more a passionate, personal plea, perhaps desperate, than a reasoned defense of belief. He could not use ilk in the piece as it could be considered insulting; against policy.
Regardless of the forces arrayed on each side, the slow but steady march away from organized religion in the US and Europe will continue. And many bright people will be educated without having read Aquinas or Niebuhr. Oh, they already have been. I wonder who is the narrow thoughted person; the one who believes you need to read them to avoid ignorance or the one who thinks that they can be passed by on the reading list?
Perhaps this is one of those pieces that should have been placed in a drawer for a week before being read.
I've been forced to leave Mt Airy because of the lack of Green values. The Community groups and leadership promoted the development of a known contaminated site, the former Anastasi Masonry site adjacent the R7. Many people knew and know of the history of chemical dumping at that site. East Mt Airy Neighbors, local investors and Council Woman Miller promoted the project which broke ground in 2006 and then released many poisonous vapors. I live nearest the site and became very ill to the point of ER visits and doctors saying DO NOT live there. These doctors notes were given and known to everyone involved yet instead of helping or acting like Green Activists as people in Northern Liberties would have done, the community turned on me like a witch hunt. Instead of attacking the problems with the project which were endless and ended up in bankruptcy, I was attacked and continuously under medical care and displaced. Many environmental and civil rights laws were broken. Even today when I went to survey the damage of a broken water main, a new group of construction workers were there sawing away at taking down the outer walls of the project, a few feet from my home. The extensive damage to my health and respiratory system can not bear the additional flying particles. Then I'm assaulted by the toxic soup caused by the flood from the water main break. I find my nebulizer in the muddy goo left from the flood. My house is cracked and bent from illegal demolition and I've been like a refugee for four years going from house to house to escape the health hazard caused by the illegal handling of this project and the Environmental injustices. No one, not one single person in MT Airy ever did anything to stop the madness and protect me except for a few exceptional people who gave me shelter, but many did a lot to cover it up and attack me. I have finally been able to deliver much evidence and witness list to a Federal Criminal Agency. I hope this will bring the truth to light. Tonight I pay the mortgage on a house I have not been able to safely live in for 4 years. My lung are tight and hurt from spending part of the day in the ongoing project that never ends. Last week I found yet another witness who knew all about the chemical dumping at the Anastasi site and who said everybody knew and no one was going to help me because Philadelphia was corrupt and always corrupt and apparently Mt Airy is too. It's more than Ironic that Green Mt Airy is likely to get busted for Environmental crimes and civil rights issues and malicious and deliberate cause of bodily harm by environmental hazards. I'm glad I'm not there anymore and really pray that somehow my possessions that have not been already stolen or destroyed will be able to get safely out of the house and close to where I live now so I can start the long healing process to regain my health and faith in humanity.
So – just to be clear, the point here is not to receive a response from
Mr. Satullo that is every bit as unfocused and smugly annoying as his
original small minded and woefully inappropriate tirade. The point here is
to hear from Mr. Satullo's employer about why it seems like a good idea to
entrust someone so clearly and thoroughly unqualified with the job of
generating responsible, thought provoking commentary. Satullo is clearly not
up to the task.
I was so astounded yesterday when I hard Chris Satullo's piece which he apparently thought was a long-overdue defense of the views of people of religious faith, that I had to listen more carefully this morning. Yup, there it was. I closed my eyes and I was back in my large Roman Catholic high school in the 1950s, listening to boys with exaggerated self-esteem deliver themselves of various opinions just about as closely reasoned, that were nurtured in them in that environment. And I say "in them" advisedly; the reality of life for girls in that school was that Aquinas' views about women were alive and well.
I would like to add my voice to those of listeners who found this editorial shockingly sophomoric and deeply offensive. Like many of the other writers, I am scrupulously aware that my lack of religious faith puts me in a very small minority, and I make it a point not to comment on the faiths of others. I have no interest in entering into dispute with people of faith, and none in offending them, either. However, aside from its tone, which was indeed worthy of the seedier side of the blogosphere, this rant also missed the basis of the concerns of people like me about the intrusion of organized religion into government.
In the United States currently, Mr. Satullo is well within his right to worship as he chooses, just as I am not to worship at all. I want our Constitution to remain in force, so that those rights endure. Mr. Satullo's confusion seems to be that he conflates two things: the defense of science against attempts of religions of every stripe to suppress it (and the last administration gave us plenty of examples of this); and the recruitment of secular power by organized religion or vice versa to oppress whatever class, gender, race, nation they oppose. The two are not the same, but a failure to insulate secular power from religious power has historically led to calamity. One word of present example: Iran (though certainly they embrace science when it suits a bellicose interest).
It has certainly not been my experience in the past 30 or so years in this country that people of faith need to keep quiet in the public square. For example, there is a "prayer breakfast" every winter in Washington, DC, sponsored by The Family, a secretive and problematic Christian organization, and the president of the United States shows up every year. It's arguable, in my view, that this nation is so much in the thrall of religion, usually read as Christianity in some form, that we should all be concerned that the voices and intent of the Founding Fathers regarding the separation of church and state have been shouted down in our time.
Someone with the title Executive Director of News and Civic Dialogue needs to understand the difference between contributing to a legitimate "marketplace of ideas", and the use of a media megaphone, public media at that, to deliver himself of a nasty, hastily concocted and ill-thought-out editorial like this. His position at WHYY does not give him license to promote the manifestly false notion that people of faith are somehow endangered in this country and this time. And it certainly doesn't give him right to take such a juvenile tone while directing invective in a scattershot way at all those he decrees to be effete and pretentious and liberal.
No, Mr. Satullo, I don't believe that you are in an oppressed minority–you are in the mainstream, the overwhelming majority, in this country. Your job description surely requires that you be able to reflect before you write, fact check before you assert, and consider your position before you deliver gratuitous insult.
First of all, let me say that some of the comments are pretty scary. My complaint is that you took a rather reasoned bumper sticker…OK maybe it would have been better put that the last time we mixed dogma and government, bad things happened. But, what about all the anti-evolution and you're going to hell because you don't share my belief bumper stickers – they're the ones to be afraid of. We non – believers are a small minority living an a religious environment and we are among the last groups it's OK to hate. That's what bothers us. True, in the academic world our views are common, but in the larger society they aren't. Many newspapers have religion columns and it is rare to see an article critical of religion in any mainstream publication. Your own station carries a religious, or at least faith based program.
Pick on someone your own size.
The last time we successfully separated church and state in a reasoned, rational way, we got the Constitution of the United States. Our Founding Fathers came from pioneers who fled European religious persecution. Does Chris Satullo want our country to risk that atmosphere?
I was offended, and would be if the hateful diatribe were on ANY side of the arguement. This is not why I listen to WHYY. If I hear more of this, I will withdraw my support until Chris Satullo (and anyone else spewing such hate) is reined in.
P.S. Thanks to Chris Satullo for his response to everyone here (which apparently he posted simultaneous with my comment). I wish his original broadcast had sounded this reasoned.
Dear friends,
Thank you all for taking the time to write your thoughts in response to the piece.
Let me first state my one regret about the piece as aired. Some of my best friends are from Mount Airy; really. In fact, a high percentage of them are. And I'm used to joshing with them about the pluperfect progressivism of the place, using that phrase as a gentle joke that uniformly gets a knowing laugh.
However, given that the piece later went on to refer to the gulag etc, it would have been better to leave the joke out. It gets in the way. I'll grant you that.
Besides that, I'm kind of depressed – but no longer surprised – that people react with threats to withdraw support or demands that someone be fired just because they heard a viewpoint they don't like. Obviously, in a robust marketplace of ideas, which is what public media are supposed to be, you should frequently hear things with which you disagree or which unsettle your assumptions.
That's how we all get smarter and kinder, right?
But, I guess that anger speaks to how a number of the commenters – as sincere and serious as they are – seem to be missing the whole point of the piece.
Which is this: When you (and by "you" I mean those of my cherished fellow citizens who are aggressive agnostics/atheists (not all are)) talk about religion, this is exactly how you sound to the ears of those of your educated, sincere fellow citizens who happen to believe in God.
If the piece had not used hyperbolic and cherry-picking argumentation to make the case against a straw man called "Reason," it would not have done what it intended: to provide a mirror image of the hyperpolic and cherry-picking argumentation vs. religion that I've listened to on a daily basis in the media and in my workplaces for many, many years.
It really stinks to have things you deeply believe caricatured, mocked and dimissed this way, does it not?
It is, in fact, "offensive."
So, perhaps, next time you'll hesitate before unburdening yourself of contemptuous opinions about those who believe.
(The whole First Amendment issue is for another time; but anyone who thinks it means that people with religious views are free to have them but should keep them quiet in the public square is simply wrong on the law and the history.)
In the way of the world, where anger is often quick and public, appreciation quiet and personal, although the public comments here have been mostly critical, I've received a number of private emails from religious folk saying things like Bravo, Finally and Thank you.
I'd also like to mention that I'm an Episcopalian, for crying out loud, not a follower of L. Ron Hubbard.
I think if one actually reads the piece calmly, you'll see that I say that reducing all religion to the stereotype of the crusades, inquisition and the suicide bombers is the equivalent of saying that the crimes of Pol Pot etc. prove that human reason is worthless.
I wasn't making the Pol Pot argument vs. Reason as a serious proposition. I was saying if you think that's reductive, weak argument, then you should realize that many diatribes vs. religion are equally flawed.
So let's stop making them.
Perhaps, if you think about it, you might see that it's difficult to have, yes, a civil dialogue with people whose opening bid is: "Sure, I'm willing to have a discussion, if you can agree from the get go that your beliefs are pathetic superstitition while mine are a triumph of human reason."
Too many years of hearing just that proposition I guess did make my tone a little cranky in this piece.
To the person who cherrypicked from Aquinas: Almost everyone famous, as an artist or thinker, has said things that seem moronic or offensive from our "enlightened" perspective of the present. The question is whether it's a useful standard that we will ban from a liberal education everyone who ever said anything we now find benighted or offensive.
To the person who thinks the existence of L. Ron Hubbard destroys the value that Dietrich Bonhoeffer or Paul Tillich offer to the life well lived, that is equivalent to saying that the existence of Lyndon LaRouche means that John Locke, John Stuart Mill and John Dewey have nothing useful to say.
To the person who claims that somehow I'm on the side of the superrich: Seriously? Since when?
Finally, to the people who raise the entirely legitimate question about opinion and news:
I've been a journalist 35 years; in that time, I've come to conclude that the journalistic stance of "objectivity" is a false promise to the public. Some journalists I deeply respect disagree and hold onto the old standard.
I'm persuaded by a more late-arriving view, that it's better to be honest with the public about what values and views inform your journalism. (And the one commenter's notion that having religious faith disqualifies one from journalism … wow!) The job of the journalist is to be honest and transparent about those mental frameworks (which are there whether you admit them or not), and to use professional discipline to keep your news work as honest, comprehensive, accurate, fair and free of unexamined bias as humanly possible. The public is better equipped, I suspect, to judge the worth of news reports done by an organization if it knows a bit about how the people there think – as opposed to being asked to trust that they have superhuman powers to shut off the opinion and feeling part of their brains while they report.
It's a tough topic, to be sure. I know some will disagree. They could be right.
One more "finally," on the topic of "rant" – frequently that is used as a synonymn for "opinion with which I disagree." These commentaries are 2 minutues, 390 words; that is the form. Exaggeration, blunt language and the like can be useful tools to achieve impact in such a brief form. I'm not claiming I wielded them perfectly. But to complain that a columnist was opinionated is a little bit like saying that a candy maker used sugar. It comes with the territory.
And some of the comments that took me to task for not doing a deep exploration of Richard Dawkins' work were in fact longer than the commentary itself. (He is by the way, a brilliant man and a great scientist, who does himself a disservice with his "rants" vs. religion. Chris Hitchens, another deft anti-God ranter who ticks me off no end, is one of the journalists I most admire in the world. Any man who would submit to waterboarding so that he could write with authority on that topic is man to be respected. Doesn't mean I have to agree with what he says on the topic of God; in fact a writer who wields blunt candor as beautifully as Hitch probably would not have any problem with someone coming back at him with equal bluntness.
Again, thanks to all for taking the time to listen and write with such energy and passion.
Chris
Mr. Satullo:
Thank you for your response. While it was quite long, I found exactly what I was looking for in the first few lines where you wrote:
"Which is this: When you (and by "you" I mean those of my cherished fellow citizens who are aggressive agnostics/atheists (not all are)) talk about religion, this is exactly how you sound to the ears of those of your educated, sincere fellow citizens who happen to believe in God."
Here's why I'm so upset: I didn't get on the radio this morning and talk about by beliefs in the validity of religion. In fact, not only would I not do such a thing on the radio, if given the opportunity, but I wouldn't do it in a small group, or even one-on-one with someone who I didn't know already shared the same belief. The reason I wouldn't do this is because I wouldn't want to offend people who had caused no such offense to me.
You, on the other hand did. You treated everyone of a view opposite to yours, who had the fortune/misfortune of hearing you this morning, as someone who would someone who had offended you. Worse, you subscribed to the juvenile belief that "two wrongs make a right". As I noted in my original entry, you disregarded a supposedly important Judeo-Christian precept – that of the "Golden Rule".
Does it stink to have things you believe in mocked? Sure it does. Does that give you the right to mock/dismiss/caricature others on the radio? I don't think so. But that's exactly what you did, and worse you don't even have the ability to see what you did wrong, which indicates the depth of your self-involvement with your feelings and religious beliefs, and why I question your fitness for your position.
If you really had a problem with that person's bumper sticker, then leave them a note on their windshield. If you have a problem with Christopher Hitchens, then write an editorial about Christopher Hitchens. But to mock a group of people for their lack of belief in a God or a religion reduces you to the level of those who mock you. I'm happy to say that level is far below me and those of us who treat people with respect in the public forum – regardless of their belief system.
You were more than just cranky in your piece. You were mean to people who never did a thing to you, just so that you could vent your spleen. I get better behavior out of my 3 year old. You really should be ashamed of what you did today, and moreso for not recognizing, at your age, and with your breadth of experience, where you went wrong.
Mr. Blackman, I think you are unfair to critisize Mr. Satullo's editorial. you wrote:
"I didn't get on the radio this morning and talk about by beliefs in the validity of religion. In fact, not only would I not do such a thing on the radio, if given the opportunity, but I wouldn't do it in a small group, or even one-on-one with someone who I didn't know already shared the same belief."
But people like Richard Dawkins often are given the opportunity to do just what you would not, and they run with it. Have you ever been inspired to criticize a media outlet for allowing someone like Richard Dawkins to rant against Religious belief?
Mr. Satullo's commentary was warranted, and many of the responses prove that, in that, even well reasoned comments often link words like 'Religion' and 'uneducated'. I think, in part, that is the sentiment that Mr. Satullo was commenting on.
A "warrant" is part of a logical argument. Dawkins uses logic and reasoning to make his point. Satullo didn't use any logic and reasoning. That's why his rant wasn't warranted.
What about the separation of church and state? Can we get back to the topic: the logic behind the bumper sticker and the petulant response to it by the author?
Have you anything thoughtful to say about that?
What are you talking about? You're really just making stuff up.
'You treated everyone of a view opposite to yours, who had the fortune/misfortune of hearing you this morning, as someone who would someone who had offended you.'
That's not true. It's not a matter of opposite viewpoint. It's a matter of lying about, ridiculing and generally trying to discount anyone who has a religious belief. There are people who do that. It seemed to me that he was talking about them, but you say you're not one of them. So I guess he wasn't talking about you. So I guess there isn't a problem.
'Perhaps, if you think about it, you might see that it's difficult to have, yes, a civil dialogue with people whose opening bid is: "Sure, I'm willing to have a discussion, if you can agree from the get go that your beliefs are pathetic superstitition while mine are a triumph of human reason."'
I thought that seemed pretty clear.
'In fact, not only would I not do such a thing on the radio, if given the opportunity, but I wouldn't do it in a small group, or even one-on-one with someone who I didn't know already shared the same belief. The reason I wouldn't do this is because I wouldn't want to offend people who had caused no such offense to me.'
Alright, there you have it. I guess he wasn't talking about you. But then again here you are seemingly defending the sort of behavior he was talking about.
"Sure, I'm willing to have a discussion, if you can agree from the get go that your beliefs are pathetic superstition while mine are a triumph of human reason."'
But this is true. Religious beliefs are superstitions.
Now don't respond in anger. Use logic to explain why religious faith is logical. You can't do it.
Mr. Satullo,
I believe some of the responses to your editorial to be over the top. I also believe that many of them have been reasoned, well-thought out and primarily in reaction to your tone as opposed to your substance.
However, your response to the responses has made me think twice about supporting a station that would employ you in a capacity to promote civil discourse. Your "response" is a passive aggressive pout with no acknowledgment that your editorial painted secularists with the same broad brush that you accuse secularists of using on those who adhere to a religion. Your reaction is a textbook example of being able to dish it out without being able to take it.
You have not once acknowledged that not all atheists or secularists are as aggressive as Mr. Dawkins or as insane as Mao.
And yes, your "gentle joke" about Mt. Airy did imply that it was a neighborhood of people who would support the mass arrests and executions of those with religious beliefs. Any educated person should have know that and should have recognized the poor taste of the joke. How would you feel if someone called your church "The Third Reich of St. Paul's" simply because some Episcopalians supported Hitler in the 1930s? And yet, your response does not apologize for your slight, it simply accuses those who were offended of not being able to take a joke.
You also defend yourself by saying you've received many private emails from religious people praising you. Congratulations. May I ask how many private emails you have gotten criticizing either the tone or content of your piece? Otherwise, the point is irrelevant.
For the record, I believe in a free society where the religious and non-religious should be free to debate each other in a civil manner. Unfortunately, nothing about your original editorial or your response to the criticism indicates to me that you are capable of engaging in such a conversation.
Mr. Satullo:
You asked me to inform you about when you started making your top priority enriching the affluent. I gave you one example in my original note. Clearly you favored the so-called "bailout" worth hundreds of billions of dollars.
For your information one percent of the population owns half of all private wealth, while eighty percent of the population owns no more than six percent. The lions share of any cash bailout by the government goes to the super-rich while about 49 million people don't have enough food to eat in this country.
You helped to organize a series of so-called public forums to discuss cutbacks in Philadelphia. You know that the city government has been literally dumping hundreds if millions of dollars on the affluent in terms of tax abatements, money for sports stadiums and the convention center, and on interest payments for municipal bonds. You refused to mention this in any of these meetings and prevented anyone from addressing these meetings who chose to give these facts. I know this from personal experience.
When you worked for the Inquirer that paper had a routine policy of hostility to unions and nearly uncritical reporting of the largest corporations in this country. I had a letter published criticizing the Inquirer's position of celebrating the layoffs of 20,000 auto workers.
If you feel that the money squandered by the city government is a lot, you need to look at the facts. We all need about eight different goods and services which include: food, clothing, housing, education, health care, transportation, communication, and exposure to cultural activities. Banks, insurance companies, and advertising agencies add absolutely no value to those goods and services we all need and want. Yet these enterprises absorb tens of trillions of dollars every year.
Understanding this you organize meetings to discuss cutbacks without informing people of the facts that there is a humongous amount of wealth which is squandered every year.
Facts are stubborn things. They don't change and they don't go away. As the economic crisis deepens large numbers of people will discover that the politics you represent is nothing more than a smokescreen for dumping enormous amounts of money on the super-rich.
When I listened to this editorial it was the first time I felt like I didn't want to contribute to WHYY.
I had to check the station number to make sure I wasn't listening to Glen Beck!
Frank
So it is fine to bash Scientologists? Your concept of tolerance is most peculiar.
"It really stinks to have things you deeply believe caricatured, mocked and dismissed this way, does it not?"
No, it only "stinks" when you don't have logic to support your rant. Intelligent religious people are annoyed by atheists because you are smart enough to know we have a point. That's what makes us so annoying.
Do your same rant about why religion should set laws but use reason. Try it.
The shrill tenor of Mr. Satullo's point defeats its validity. However, his article brings into question the state of American lucidity and the resulting balance between uninformed religious enthusiasts and those who reason. Reading the comments on his invective, I am encouraged to see that there are a good number of 'thinkers' to balance your many 'Solutos' in the media. We all deserve commentators who are well equipped intellectually. We all depend on America, even here in faraway New Zealand.
Mr Satullo, thank you, thank you, thank you. i applaud you for this well thought out and brave commentary. i have read some of the visceral comments it has engendered and, although predictable, they are still so disheartening.
While it is true that historically many atrocities have been committed in the name of religion, it is equally historically accurate to say that much of the world's progress has been done by the faithful as well. At least enough to "cancel out" this kind of attack on people of faith.
Most hospitals, most libraries, most institutions of higher education were founded by religious people who cared deeply about humanity and the human condition. They did their good works in a deep and abiding belief that they were doing God's work.
i cannot fathom the folks who have written in to say any less about your motives. Again, i applaud and commend you. i look forward to your next intelligent and challenging commentary. Keep up the good work.
It is precisely commentary like this from Mr. Satullo which drives the secular and the atheist communities to speak out against 'mixing' church and state. He is 'angry' and 'sick' of listening to ideas with which he disagrees.
I expect this from the ignorant and uneducated – not from one holding his job; one would hope that Mr. Satullo, in his position as Executive Director of News and Dialogue, does know how to – and does! – separate his personal, now public hateful bias from his job which is supposed to represent all the people in this area – and that includes the 'Mt. Airy pinkos' and the 'atheists' as well as those who belong to his church.
To disagree with the premises of atheism is one thing. To denigrate people as he did simply because they don't agree with him is really unconscionable.
I'm ashamed of you, sir, coming from a station I have supported for many long years.
I would like to add my voice to those who have objected to the tone and content of this piece. This is a tirade, and there is not one cogent, reasoned argument here. I am open to opposing views. I and many other secularists live with them every day. When we listen to WHYY, we expect to hear something a little more even-handed.
Chris Satullo's explanation of where tea party anger comes from reinforced what I suspected. It comes from name-callers like him. We "secular snobs" are not so ill-informed as he would have listeners believe.
Chris Satullo should relax, draw a deep breath and ask himself what is the source of his visceral, mouth-foaming hatred of anyone who doesn't share his belief in a certain set of Middle-East fairy tales.
First of all, equating reason with Pol Pot, Stalin etc. shows how vacuous and intellectually bankrupt his screed is. Stalinism, and whatever glorious leader ideology the Khmer Rouge followed, are as every bit as much religion as fundamentalist Islam or dominionist Christianity. Atheism is simply the lack of belief in a god or gods. Secularism, which is not the same thing as atheism, is the position that government should not establish a religion but should allow all citizens to believe or disbelieve as they see fit, provide they don't infringe the rights of others (e.g. by burning them at the stake.)
Secondly, so he is upset at seeing other points of view expressed. Boo hoo! Religion (and specifically Christianity in this country) has for centuries had a monopoly on public debate. Anyone who even hinted at disbelief in a god risked exile, imprisonment, torture or worse. Even today in most of the country, at the very least one risks being shunned and vilifed as an immoral and stupid person, losing one's job, vandalism against one's house or car, etc.
Only in the last few years have a handful of atheist authors been able to get a word in edgewise. The result has been a wildly disproportionate backlash, with people screaming that Richard Dawkins is as militant and fundamentalist as the 9/11 terrorists, etc. etc. It makes me wonder how secure people like Satullo really are in their faith, when they can't tolerate even the existence of unbelievers.
Even if Richard Dawkins is trying to destroy religion, so what? He is arguing with his words, his education and intelligence. It's a pretty worthless religion that can't stand up to that, and whines and demands unearned respect and special protection from scrutiny. Meanwhile, the other side is "arguing" with car bombs and beheadings, cruise missiles and depleted uranium. There's no question who the real fundamentalists are.
I'm sorry for Satullo that he is so thin-skinned and insecure in his faith that it is mortally threatened by a mere bumper sticker. But I get "the fool hath said in his heart there is no god" flung in my face all the time, not to mention having Satullo and his ilk call me "an elite ill-informed snob" because I dare to believe differently than him. His entire screed reeks of pettiness, immaturity and anti-intellectualism, not to mention the totally ludicrous persecution complex that Christians love to wallow in despite having a near-monopoly on political, legal and media power in this country. I am surprised that NPR would give publicity to such a petty and meritless rant.
Ray, well said. I also agree with N.D. Dean and Digby Dee below.
I believe it is ok for NPR/WHYY to air views different from mine. (I am an atheist who admires Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris and Bill Maher) What bothered me most about Mr. Satullo's piece is that he is employed as Executive Director of News and Civic Dialogue at WHYY which make me think he represents WHYY's position. Had he been just another religious nut, I would not have paid much mind to him. If he does represent WHYY in this manner, I'll send my money to other worthy intellectual outlets.
The real irony with Satullo's position is the title Executive Director of News and Civic Dialogue. There was no CIVIC/CIVIL DIALOGUE!
I think there wasn't any dialogue because it's an op-ed piece. Op-ed pieces generally preclude dialogue. So what is your point really?
John, your quibble over the word "dialogue" is a strawman. His point is about the word "civil."
Did you think the author was civil?
Sounds like Mr. Satullo desperately needed a topic for his audio column. Like the student writing a paper at the last minute his rant (yes it came across as a rant) was poorly reasoned and poorly argued. He actually seemed to make a case for the inanity of religious zealots. His own zealotry against anti-religious zealots and alleged "latte-drinking, sushi-eating Volvo-driving" residents of Mt. Airy speaks volumes about his inability to actually formulate a coherent thesis and argument.
Does Mr. Satullo really believe that everyone at Harvard or every resident of Mt. Airy has nothing better to do or think about than to promulgate atheism? I would venture to say that there are religious people at Harvard and in Mt. Airy who are personally spiritual but believe that government and religious dogma are incompatible. I would also venture to say that there are atheists/agnostics at Harvard and in Mr. Airy who believe that religion is a valid field of study.
Resorting to "Harvard bashing" and Mt. Airy stereotyping is so obviously sophomoric as to be laughable (no I did not attend Harvard nor do I live in Mt. Airy).
Please don't spare the energy to be offended by his foolish commentary. He is a silly provincial man with a dearth of thoughtful ideas. He sounds like he needs a good Harvard education so he can think and speak for himself.
The only type of person I hate is a hater. Mr. Satullo, you are a hater.
You hate the people of Mt. Airy, Volvo owners, and “secular liberals” which, according to you is anyone who doesn’t believe as you do. And yes, the bumper sticker was wrong and all one has to do to prove this is to watch “The 700 Club” or others of it’s ilk to see just how much what passes for “religion” these days is really just “Haters Gone Wild!”
Ahhh, and the first thing out of your mouth trying to show that politics and religion do mix is to bring up Dr. Martin Luther King, a black man who preached nonviolence and brotherly love and who died in 1968, but why not “The 700 Club” which spews it’s hate-filled rhetoric, cloaked by religion, on TV daily – speaking of “cherry-pick(ing) from history.” Curious. And what do black men have to do with your rant and the ranting of the tea party traitors (hold this thought)? Just that every single thing the tea party is ranting about was caused by white people that they (and, may I presume, you) voted for. Can you say “hypocrite?”
The deficits really got going during the Regan administration when he decided not to “tax and spend” but to “borrow and spend” us into oblivion instead. Where was the outrage then? Then came Bush the first with not only the continuation of “borrow and spend” and the continuing deficits they caused but also the savings and loan debacle which cost the taxpayers half-a-trillion dollars in 1988 money to fix and almost no one went to prison for anything related to the mess, especially not his son Neil Bush for his role in the Silverado Savings & Loan collapse. Where was all this outrage then? Then came Bill Clinton who put the deficit spending to rest (yippee!) all the while being hounded by a Republican “Congress Gone Wild” that never let up trying to prosecute him for a land deal that never made a profit and even though they prosecuted the Clintons for years and spent millions of taxpayers’ dollars in the process they couldn’t come up with squat. Oh, and then there was the extramarital affair that was none of congress’ business at all but landed him in “impeachment hell” for most of his second term nonetheless. Still not a peep from the tea party crowd. Now, I know that all these so called “birthers” are hyperventilating just at the thought that Barrack Obama might not have been born in the United States, but unfortunately for them there is a birth certificate that states that he was indeed born in Hawaii in 1961, two years after statehood, as well as two announcements of his birth in two local papers there. The “birthers”, on the other hand, have nada. Outrage? Dare I say hatred – especially when you consider that George W Bush had to have the vote-counting in Florida stopped by a radical Supreme Court that had no business interjecting themselves in the vote-counting, in order to “win” an election that he would have otherwise lost. Where oh where was all this outrage then? Then nine months into his term we had the attacks of September 11th. The Bush administration tried to pin the blame on the Clinton administration even though the Bush administration had been flat out warned of a high probability of a terrorist attack from al-Qaida. Can you just imagine what the tea party bunch would be saying if it had happened nine months into the Obama administration? Then instead of going after al-Qaida in Afghanistan and Pakistan, they wag the dog and start a new war going after oil in Iraq. This is exactly what the Texas Oil Mafia was intent on doing in the first place. Wasn’t it? Please tell me where all this outrage was then? So we’ve had five Republican presidential terms since Reagan – all accruing record-breaking deficits along the way. They’ve messed up almost every single thing they’ve touched, yet the present Democratic black president is being blamed for every problem caused by the people the tea party bunch helped vote into office. And they have the unmitigated gall to blame everyone else – exactly the same as you do.
So what’s the difference between the Republican white presidents running up record deficits while giving themselves and their cronies record tax breaks and profits all at the expense of the working class, and the Democratic black president trying to stabilize an economy that tanked because of the Republicans’ over indulgences? He’s a Democrat and he’s black and the tea party bunch hates both these things. There’s just no other explanation for a group of people who voted for all the ones who caused the mess we’re in today yet they point the finger at others who had nothing to do with causing it.
Getting back to religion for a minute, your statement, “Religion has done just as much to bring moral courage and a passion for social justice to a nasty, selfish public square as it has to screw things up,” is not exactly a ringing endorsement of religious morality, in fact it is a net zero on the subject if I’m reading it correctly. High praise for the ethical teachings of religion – NOT! And pardon me if I’m wrong but Abraham Lincoln was a spiritual man but not a church-going religious sort. In other words he didn’t wear his beliefs on his cuff nor did he try to ram them down other’s throats. And what’s to stop “good ol’ human bloodlust” from finding a happy home in religious intolerance anyway? They seem to go very well together, don’t you think? You give no explanation for your statement, "The last time we mixed faith in reason and politics, we got Pol Pot. And the Cultural Revolution. And the Gulag." – so are we just left to ask, “Why, because you say so?” I guess so.
Some of the statements by Satullo are way off base. Being a religious person who works for a cause does not mean you want government involved in religion.
RE Satullo statement: I’d just read a piece about Harvard University, where some faculty fought to banish all study of religion, as unworthy of such a great temple to Reason.
As a Harvard alum, I know this to be abject nonsense. Harvard began to for the express purpose of educating ministers, with the Divinity School the oldest, and still thriving. Harvard does not want to forward any one religious viewpoint as better than another, which is why the divinity school it not called a seminary (as in a Baptist seminary).
The term 'mixing' is part of the problem here. MLK,jr, along with all the other religious figures mentioned, were not attempting to create a religious platform for their causes. The point of keeping religion separate from government came from the founders experience of forced state religion, and religious intolerance, their concern was to secure freedom to believe, or not believe, as one's conscience dictates. WHYY or any other public media outlet should be about unbiased reporting of views, not a supporter of any. That is the only way all voices of the public have a fair playing field.
Shame on all you "Liberals" and "Progressives" who threaten to withhold your support as soon as someone says something you disagree with. You are the seeds of Fascism. I support Public Radio not because it only tells me what I want to hear but because it provides a voice to all segments of the public.
I've noticed that many of the liberals in this thread object to the substance of the commentary.
Many of those objecting to the commentators simply throw around the word "liberal" and accuse the commentators of hypocrisy.
I am not withholding my support of WHYY because of the substance of the commentary. I'm withholding it because he fatuously associated my neighborhood with Stalin, Pol Pot and Mao. I am also a liberal, and I am not an atheist. I simply did not feel there was a place for such an insult in a commentary from an organization I support.
You clearly should pick up a book (like a dictionary) and look up the meaning of the word 'fascism' as you're not using the term properly. Orwell highlighted the inaccurate use of the word 'fascism' in his 1944 article, "What is fascism?" (http://www.orwell.ru/library/articles/As_I_Please/english/efasc) where he wrote:
"It will be seen that, as used, the word ‘Fascism’ is almost entirely meaningless. In conversation, of course, it is used even more wildly than in print. I have heard it applied to farmers, shopkeepers, Social Credit, corporal punishment, fox-hunting, bull-fighting, the 1922 Committee, the 1941 Committee, Kipling, Gandhi, Chiang Kai-Shek, homosexuality, Priestley's broadcasts, Youth Hostels, astrology, women, dogs and I do not know what else."
Apparently after 65+ years, some people still have no idea what the word means.
Michael,
Can you summarize the reasons why Suttulo thinks religion should play a role in our government?
You can't do it because the piece contains no reasoning. That is why people don't want to support this radio station. They have been used to getting reasoned arguments.
Do you really equate reasoned speech with fascism?
The way to offend somebody is to call them Rational?? As opposed to what? Are you implying that being Religious is Irational.
Please stop defending Conservative part of this Great nation, as you just offended the Heck out of US.
This dialog starts with Bumper-Sticker?
The irony is that Bumper-Sticker is a label, and you used all the intelectual (if irrational) power you could muster to "put a label on a label". Good for you. This all sounds more like it is happening on Twitterr and not on NPR.
"New Low Every Day". How is that for Bumper-Sticker?
I was appalled to hear the blogosphere-style rant about the separation of church and state today by Mr. Satullo. I listen to and have supported WHYY to hear well reasoned and insightful commentary as well as the latest news. I have no objection to hearing opposing views to my own beliefs that are delivered in a calm and thoughtful manner. However, the one delivered by Mr. Satullo today did not meet that criteria. Please turn it down and provide us with the quality of insight and commentary we ask of public radio.
Dear Mr. Satullo,
*Thank you* for your commentary this morning.
I work in a scientific research environment and I hear jabs at Christian thought as being backward, oppressive, etc on a fairly regular basis. As a Christian, it's grating.
The hyperbolic commentary from other posters only goes to show how intolerant "liberal" secular humanism can really be.
How do your Christian beliefs (that aren't shared by atheists) helping you do science?
What purely Christian belief is not worthy of being labeled as backward and oppressive?
Can you name one?
Mr. Satullo, thank you for a well rationed, thoughtful commentary.
It was refreshing to have someone encapsulate what it is that drives movements like the Tea-Party. Movements that I personally find to be dangerous manifestations of the frustrations that so many people feel.
I did not believe that you were stereo-typing "liberal secularists", despite the reaction of many on this board. I would encourage each of those people to listen to the piece again, and to try to step outside of their own prejudice to really listen. There is a growing frustration among progressive, educated, religious people. It is a frustration that comes from institutions being driven by individuals to move ever further away from any mention of ideas that we treasure. While it is nice to say that personal views of religion should be kept personal, that is increasingly difficult in the world today. Open discussion, open expression, and mutual respect make all of us better.
Just because you happen to live in Mt. Airy, happen to own a Volvo, or whatever, doesn't mean you need to take these comments personally. Would you have been so offended if he had said "the Downingtown area", or referenced a Toyota? If not, then maybe you question your reaction.
I happen to be a liberal religious person, and I live in Mt. Airy. I took deep offense at my neighborhood being dismissed as an enclave of communists – associated with the likes of Mao, Stalin and Pol Pot. I'm not sure why anyone wouldn't take such a nasty insult personally.
I was not only offended for myself, but my many secular neighbors who have been utterly gracious about my beliefs.
When I originally listened to the piece I will admit I missed the "People's Republic" comment. I only caught it after looking at the transcript again.
As a recent transplant I have no idea where Mt. Airy is, but I can agree that it undermines what was an otherwise excellent piece.
I'm old enough to remember when liberals supported free speech. Sadly, judging by the reactions to this piece from people who I'm sure consider themselves liberal, that is no longer the case.
Appeals to "freedom of speech" are the weakest of arguments. Nobody is denying Mr. Satullo his right to speak. I am questioning whether or not it is appropriate for WHYY to give him the megaphone and the means by which to insult and offend so many people.
Free speech, like all rights and freedoms, comes with responsiblities and consequences. You still can't yell "fire" in a crowded movie theatre without consequences. Similarly, offensive speech on public airwaves has its consequences: public criticism, which is what we are engaging in right here.
WHYY is member supported. If the members are not happy with the editorial direction of the station that they contribute to, then they have a right to vote with their voices and their wallets. In no way, shape, or form, is the dissent expressed here a suppression of Mr. Satullo's freedom of speech. Quite the contrary – and to argue otherwise, I think, demonstrates a profound ignorance of one of the basic liberties of this country.
Actually calling for Mr. Satullo to be prohibited from providing such an editorial or suggesting that he should be fired for what he said is demanding limits on speech.
People who support free speech simply engage in thoughtful debate and reasonable disagreement. They do not call for their opponents to be silenced.
Ummm. Nobody is calling for him to be silenced or fired for holding certain views. That may be the way you view it through your red-tinted lenses, but I don't see anyone calling for him in prison to prevent him from speaking, or curtailing his personal right to speak. As far as I'm concerned, he can stand on a milk crate in Rittenhouse square and deride agnostics and atheists until he's blue in the face.
What's being questioned here, and I think legitimately so, is whether or not a.) his means of communicating was offensive, b.) whether or not his personal religious views may limit his ability to objectively represent the news, and c.) whether or not the members who financially support WHYY should have a say in the organization they're investing in.
With regard to 'c', there's a reason that I don't donate money to groups that support Prop 8, or groups that promote bigotray and hatred like the KKK. It's not a matter of trying to suppress anyone's speech. I'm just not going to have my effort (via money) support it. Lack of support does not equal supression/silencing, except in minds of zealots or paranoiacs.
QUOTE: "Human reason gets held up as the enlightened counterweight to superstitious, intolerant faith. Did you happen to notice that when reason got its chance to run the show in the 20th century, the results were less than spectacular?"
Is the author implying that the problem with Nazi Germany, Communist dictatorships, Pol Pot and Slobodan Milosevic was that they were too rational? A surplus of reasoned judgment and critical thinking were the issue here? Weak. Let's not forget that religious dogma is but one incarnation; dogma comes in quite a few flavors, including political, nationalistic, etc.
QUOTE: "Ignorant? At Harvard, some people apparently think that one can be an educated person without having read St. Thomas Aquinas, Cardinal John Henry Newman, or theologian Reinhold Niebuhr.
Now, THAT is ignorance."
And who can forget the essential works of Sylvia Browne, L. Ron Hubbard and Deepak Chopra? The author would understand his opponents much better if he realized that, to them, saying theologian is akin to saying astrologer. Theology is a valid discipline in the same way alchemy is.
Regarding Chris Tuppelo"s about an offending
bumper Sticker and Richard Dawkin, I have already
reponded directly.
The great philospher Immanuel Kant once pondered
in an essay which parents should do first; teach their children the great moral imperatives eg. though shalt not take another human life,thought shalt not steal or teach their childen the tenets
of their religion. I believe he decided it should
be the moral imperatives.
Although Martin Luther King was a Christian minister the course he took in fighting for Civil
Rights was the one used successfully by Mahatma
Ghandi who once exclames in exasperation " Why
aren't you Christians more like your Christ"
That comment could well have come after
those nice Christian Brits had slaughtered
hundreds of helpless men women and children at
Amritsa.
Maryann
For the record, Ghandi was an exceptional advocate of religion, a very religious person, and a prime example of religious dialogue with the public realm. He is most certainly not an example of secularism at work, unless you think that Christianity is the only religion around, and forget that India is one of the most religious nations on the planet.
"Richard Dawkins has gotten famous by bashing religion as benighted superstition."
Which of course it is. And that's all it is… And the point was???
And of course he's also famous for some excellent evolutionary and scientific thinking.
Chris:
What was the purpose of you opinion this morning? Did you want to alienate the atheists, agnostics and non-Christians by attacking "Dawkins and his Ilk"? It seems to me that in this cash strapped recession that you would keep your opinions to yourself, especially since you were just pleading for money because WHYY was in dire financial condition! I would think a significant portion of your audience are non-believers. I was half asleep, waking up, when I heard you rattle off a couple of good examples of things that were accomplished by religious people, meaning "Christian" , i.e.: Dr. Martin Luther King , and the extreme evils caused by Pol Pot. Your opinion implied that only "Christians" can do good in the world and while "non-believers" do evil!
You rattled off the 30 Years War as one example that non-believers use to "tar and feather" Christians for their beliefs. I think you left out a few wars and ills that were caused by religion:
The Crusades – this lasted 200 years
countless civil wars between Protestant and Catholics for hundreds of years throughout the British Isles and Europe
The Spanish Inquisition
The Spanish Conquistadors who massacred hundreds of thousands native Americans in the conquest of gold and converting the native populations
Islamic Wars
Indian Rebellion against the British in 1857
Irish Civil War
The countless number of wars where leaders and warriors from both sides plead to God for victory
Football players praying to god to help them win a football game. Do you really think God cares who wins a football game?
On a more personal note, I have a friend who is a devout Christian in Evansville, IN. A few years ago the city experienced a devastating tornado, in 2005, which destroyed a large part of the city and killed 25. He stated to me in a phone conversation that he was really "blessed and that God must have been watching over his family". Here is the hypocrisy: I'm sure there were equally devout Christians in the section of the city where people were killed and had their home destroy. Were they any less devout than my friend? Does God pick favorites? Or how about the minister at a local hospital I personally knew. He ministered to the sick and dying for many years. When he got cancer and was going to die he felt that God had abandoned him, and he couldn't believe that he had cancer and was going to die because of all the "good work" he tried to do! He thought God would have protected him somehow.
Your contempt of "Dawkins and his Ilk" really comes down to the fact that he believes in Evolution!!!! It's only the Christians that get into a frenzy when Darwin and Evolution are mentioned. I don't seem to hear Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, etc, going crazy when Darwin and Evolution are mentioned. Of course they are heathens anyway! It must be that Christians have the only true insight into origin of the Earth and man! If God wanted to play favorites, then why would God divulge any secrets of the universe to atheists and agnostics. If religious leaders had their way we would still believe that the world was flat and that the Earth was the center of the Universe. Galileo was sent to the Inquisition and excommunicated because of his Heliocentric beliefs of the Universe. I'm also pretty sure that if you lived in the times of the Inquisition that you would be right there torturing and burning non-believers. Hey, here's an novel idea: Maybe if the Christian populations gets big enough in the U.S., they can start a new Inquistion and burn at the stake all non-Christians and believers in Evolution.
If you were not happy that "Dawkins and his Ilk" were on WHYY, then you should work for Fox News, or maybe just start your own Christian Radio program.
In the future, please keep religious opinions off WHYY. I'm interested in the news, politics, and new ideas and discoveries, not in dogmatic, self righteous, religious opinions.
P.S. I happen to believe in a God just not organized religions.
I found this commentary by Chris Satullo utterly and absolutely offensive. I have been a supporter of WHYY, and a member, for more years then I can count, and unless a specific apology appears from Mr. Satullo my support and membership are at an end. This kind of ill conceived, poorly presented, superficially researched and amateurishly argued rant has no place on WHYY's air. I think mr. Satullo's presence on your staff is something you should seriously reconsider – this kind of badly informed pseudo-clever intolerant invective provides absolutely no positive value. No point was actually made in this piece, and the points that were essayed were supported by logic and reasoning so specious as to be laughable. Straighten up, WHYY -understand that this is not sound practice.
As a resident of Mt. Airy, I've noticed quite a few other bumper stickers around my diverse neighborhood: WHYY bumper stickers.
Mr. Satullo could have made his point, ironically about stereotyping people, without insulting an entire neighborhood as a bunch of smug, self-righteous communists.
I will certainly remember what Mr. Satullo thinks of my neighbors and myself next time I'm asked for a pledge.
I found Mr. Satullo's piece on the bashing of religion to be one more example of the mindless chatter he routinely engages in. One would think that if Mr. Satullo is against the bashing of religion he would support the First Amendment of the Constitution which is supposed to guarantee the right to freedom of speach. This is not the case.
In order to have the right to freely worship whatever religion anyone would choose, there are several preconditions. We all need to have thr right to have food to eat, the right to education so people can read religious texts, the right to travel to a house of worship, and the right to medical care.
No one, that I know of in government, supports any of these rights. Mr. Satullo has openly supported several politicians who are opposed to granting anyone these rights.
On the other hand, politicians in both parties have supported the so-called "bailout" that has given some of the most affluent people in the world hundreds of billions of dollars.
If Mr. Satullo was honest he would just say that his primary goal throughout his so-called career has been to enrich the super-rich at the expence of working people.
@Sam – thank you for the clarification, and your points are well taken. I guess this "rant" evokes different feelings depending on your point of view, and I am never one to agree with stereotypes and painting with a broad brush.
My deepest concern is this: secular vs. religious, liberal vs. conservative…..is there really any way we can coexist peacefully (I hope so) or is it futile? It often seems futile and it is depressing. When everyone *knows* they are right, nobody wins.
Until this morning I had never been offended by WHYY. I thought that the reporters on these air waves were respectful, objective, and open-minded; held to a higher standard than the likes of Fox News. I held these beliefs until I heard Chris Satullo’s story this morning. Like Mr. Blackman I am a liberal, secular humanist, and like Mr. Blackman I was personally offended by the comments made on the air today.
Mr. Blackman is more eloquent than I, and I couldn’t agree more with what he has said here. In my less-articulate way, I will suggest a few alternative bumper stickers as Satullo has done:
“The last time we mixed religion and politics, we got ‘Intelligent Design’ in public schools”
“The last time we mixed religion and politics, we got the Crusades”
“The last time we mixed religion and politics, we got September 11th”
“The last time we mixed religion and politics, we got discriminatory practices forbidding two consenting, loving adults from marriage and adoption”
Okay, the last one wasn’t very catchy, but you catch my drift.
If I can end on one note let it be this: Mr. Satullo, if you think that as an upper-middle class Christian, Caucasian male you have had to “endure” a “30 Year War,” you not only offend secular humanists, but women, minorities, and low SES individuals. Please don’t pretend that you have been oppressed in some way because you are White Christian man.
Just to clarify, my strong reaction to Satullo's piece was based on the way in which he criticized rationalists (secular humanists). Satullo's piece appears to be a reaction to a Newsweek article by Lisa Miller (http://www.newsweek.com/id/233413), which discussed an old controversy from 2006 around a course at Harvard called "Reason and Faith", and in my opinion, his comments demonstrates only a superficial understanding of the underlying issues. Miller's original Newsweek piece wasn't a news piece (unless reporting on a 4 year old report rates as "news" at Newsweek). Miller's piece was a commentary, making Mr. Satullo's piece unoriginal and derivative, at best.
Mr. Satullo refers twice in his essay to his own personal religious views, and then spends a good percentage of his "opinion" piece stereotyping rationalists as "haters" "ill-informed secular snobs" "glib, faith-bashing" ignorant bigots. This is not an editorial. It's a rant full of invective and disdain, and attempted to portray those who question the value of religion in society in the same negative light. It used inflammatory poorly-thought-out examples to attempt to smear, and it sounded like and read like a defensive piece written by someone who had their feelings badly hurt. Hardly what I'd expect out of a public radio outlet in a major metropolitan area.
My primary concern is about the judgement and objectivity of WHYY's Executive Director of News and Civic Dialogue, his willingness to offend in order to comment, his ability to maintain an objective focus on issues of religion when directing the news, and whether or not Satullo's views are reflection of his division's broader editorial policy.
I heard this piece on the way to work this morning, and I agree with Ed. Kudos to Sam for "keeping my personal opinions of others' personal views on religion (or lack thereof) to myself" and not stereotyping. However, Heaven forbid (no pun intended) that someone speak out against the vitriol and nearly constant derision coming from the secular zealots (not everyone) against those with religious beliefs.
What exactly is so "offensive" about this? And "Judeo-Christin (sic) value or tolerance" can only go so far. I don't think God or whatever "higher power" may exist intends for anyone to be incessantly pommeled and just take it lying down forever.
I find it offensive that Sam has to throw in there "remember who's funding you". Ok WHYY, don't allow any "wrongspeak" that might offend your base and make them close their wallets.
In criticizing the rationalists Satullo suggest reading Thomas Aquinas, among others, in support of religion. Well, I have read Aquinas, including:
"As regards the individual nature, woman is defective and misbegotten, for the active power of the male seed tends to the production of a perfect likeness in the masculine sex; while the production of a woman comes from defect in the active power."
and
"If forgers and malefactors are put to death by the secular power, there is much more reason for excommunicating and even putting to death one convicted of heresy."
So if one of the best exemplars of the benefits of religion is a mysoginst who wants to murder those who disagree with his orthodoxy, maybe the Pat Robertsons and Father Coughlins are more representative of religion that I had thought.
I would just like to quickly comment about Thomas Aquinas. First, I'd like to defend Satullo by saying that he did not assert Thomas' benefit being one of the exemplars of the benefits of religion. What he did say was that educated people read Thomas Aquinas. This is because Aquinas is an immensely important figure in the development of western thought and civilization. Thomas Aquinas did have many views relative to his time period, views that today are clearly morally bankrupt. It would be unfortunate if we erased from history every important writer, voice, political figure that we morally disagree with in modernity. Perhaps we should stop teaching Aristotle for advocating slavery and misogyny.
Calm down, Mr. Blackman. I think you take far too much personal umbrage at Chris Satullo's commentary. If religious bigots can, and should, be called out for their intolerance, the same should also be true of the other side. Simple matter of telling it like it is—forcefully!
Ed, do you hear your unintended irony? You want Mr. Blackman to calm down because he wants Mr. Satullo to calm down?
Should I now ask you to calm down?
Have you got anything to say about the separation of church and state?
While I typically let almost all of the editorial commentary that I hear or read pass by me without taking personal umbrage, this piece deserves an exception. I think that I can safely say that it was the one of the most unpleasant, derisive, personally offensive, and unprofessional uses of public radio that I've heard in a long while. If it was meant to be satirical or humorous in any way, shape, or form, that intent was quickly lost on me.
Let me first address the inherent hypocrisy of the piece: while defending religion against the "liberal
secularists" that Satullo claim to be sick of, he violates one of Christianity's supposedly favorite precepts ("Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them."). In an attempt to make his point and vent his own personal religious views, he chose to stereotype and mock groups of individuals because you were offended by one person's bumper sticker. He may not have
realized this, but his rant, makes, on a small scale, the point of liberal secularists regarding the dangers of religiously-fueled passions: to wit, a one-line bumper sticker commenting on the mixing of religion and politics triggers a hyperbolic rant against anyone he percieves as questioning the benefit of religion in society, which apparently includes educated citizens of my neighborhood.
As a resident of Mt. Airy, a very rational scientist, a former Volvo owner, a liberal progressive, and a very content secular humanist, I make my peace with the broader religious world in part by keeping my personal opinions of others' personal views on religion (or lack thereof) to myself, and I certainly make sure to avoid stereotyping individuals of faith as zealots or fanatics. These are basic concepts called civility and tact – ones that Satullo seem to have forgotten when composing this screed. Moreover when I do choose to engage or espouse on a particular issue, I do so by focusing on the issue, and not on the large and diverse group (or groups) of people who hold them. Despite the fact that I'm clearly much younger than he is, being only 41, I learned early that groups (including the group, institution, and neighborhood Satullo chose to mock this morning) are rarely homogeneous of monolithic in their beliefs. Even groups at the far extremes of religion or religious fundamentalism are heterogeneous in their members and the beliefs of those members. That is why I attempt to step very carefully when discussing matters of religion in public forums – I would never want to offend people of faith by stereotyping them as bigoted, intolerant, close-minded, or ignorant just because a minority are. It appears from his piece Satullo can't see or feel past his religious beliefs enough to painting secular humanists as "glib, faith-bashing" "ill-informed … snobs".
Apparently, despite being a religiously-oriented person, Satullo either lacks the Judeo-Christin value or tolerance, has misplaced it, or was so discombobulated by one bumper sticker on one car that he forgot it when composing his editorial. He may have also forgotten who your audience (and fund-raising base is).
Finally, holding up the Khmer Rouge and Stanin's purges as examples of policy based on "human reason" simply because those regimes were anti-religion is an amateurish strawman argument that rates at the high school level at best. Satullo's willingness to offend, to conflate, and to demonstrate such intolerance makes me question the judgement of WHYY in giving him this forum, and more damningly, his objectivity when it comes to potentially supervising the reporting of issues regarding religion. It is seems to me that his personal beliefs cloud his ability be objective and rational on this topic.
The reaction to Mr. Satullo's piece is ridiculous. Had someone written a piece with the identical tone, making points about the pernicious role that religion has played in history, or the sometimes fantastical ideas that underlie some religious beliefs, not a peep would have been heard from the Mt. Airy crowd. What a bunch of thin-skinned babies. And had anyone complained about an analogous piece about religion, you would have all flooded the website with vitriolic and self-righteous defenses: Freedom of speech! Don't tell us we can't criticize religion! Thought control!
Why did Mr. Satullo’s piece strike such a nerve? Was it really that offensive? Read it again. He simply points out what anyone who is alive can see: intolerance and simplistic generalizations can exist on both sides of the political spectrum, and on both sides of the religious debate, despite our protests to the contrary. We don’t like having to face that all those bad things we accuse the other side of exist in ourselves as well. No, we’re good; they’re bad. We’re pure; they’re evil. How comfortable.
Yes, he did use a broad brush to paint Mt. Airy and its many good citizens. Oh, the horror! How many of you have not used a similarly broad brush to paint Republicans, conservatives, Christian fundamentalists, free-marketers, etc? Not one of you? Sure. Go ahead – stop giving to WHYY, get worked up, huff around with outrage. Let’s see if the world notices.
Yes, it's true. Humans can be guilty of bad logic to defend their psoitions.
However, if you despise the use of bad logic, then don't be guilty of it yourself (unless you're being satirical which is not the case here).
Can we agree, at least, on that?