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[personal profile] avevale_intelligencer
This, recommended by a tweeting [livejournal.com profile] telynor, is actually not a bad article on why America seems to have been governed for so long by people who don't seem to be that smart. Have a look and try and see where I almost gave up on it in disgust.

Religion does *not* make you stupid. That is a cheap shot almost unparalleled itself in its stupidity, and no-one who writes from a secularist point of view seems to be able to resist it. It's like saying that most American chocolate is disgusting because Americans have no taste. It's offensive and untrue all at the same time, and we know it, but it appeals to the meanness and smugness in our nature.

Religion does not make people stupid. *People* make people stupid. And the people who make people stupid are often themselves quite clever, and realise that (a) keeping people stupid means they (the smart ones) can do what they like, and (b) if they hide behind a religion, other smart people will see what they're doing and, rather than blaming the smart ones, will blame the stupid people for being stupid because they are religious.

It is staggeringly naïve to imagine that the Southern Baptist Convention supported slavery and segregation because its members actually thought it was God's will, and I don't think even the writer of the article believes that for one minute...and yet he can't resist taking a mean, smug little crack at religion on his way. If the American educational system fails, it is because it is made to fail. Fundamentalist religion is just one tool that is used to that end, and one of its functions is to be the scapegoat.

So how do apparently stupid people get into positions of power? Well, strangely enough, that isn't God's will either. This is where the writer finds his way back to common sense and makes some good points. There *is* an American myth that honesty and decency are fundamentally incompatible with intelligence, that "book-larnin'" is conducive to sneakiness and moral turpitude, that the path of honour is to stride down the middle of Main Street and face your enemy head-on, hands hovering over your holsters and brain in neutral, prepared to draw on the word of command and not one split-second earlier. It goes back much further than McCarthyism, I think, and has echoes in other cultures. We have our "play up, play up and play the game" ethos, or we used to, but while we never believed being clever was a requirement, I don't think we ever seriously made it into a bad thing.

But the myth is no more than a myth, as those early Americans could testify who practised the art of camouflage and took pot shots from cover at the Redcoats marching down the middle of the road in their silly uniforms. And when stupid people get into power, the place to look is just behind them, where lurk the smart people who are yanking their strings; who are keeping people stupid, making sure future generations grow up stupid, perpetuating the myth that makes them *proud* to be stupid, and holding up Christianity as a shield in the knowledge that other smart people, despite their smartness, will look no further in placing the blame.

If Obama wins the election, he will have a chance, as Roosevelt, Kennedy and Clinton did, to strike a blow against the pervasive myth--to prove that he is no figurehead--and also to live up to his promises in the field of education. If he can do this, it will be that much harder for the smart people who have hidden behind Bush for the last eight years, and hope to hide behind McCain and then Palin, to work their trick again. I do not think he will waste his time attacking religion; I certainly hope not. Because if we believe, as I think the writer of this article believes, that Barack Obama is an intelligent, educated, knowledgeable man, then that in itself is the ultimate crushing refutation of the smug, mean little canard that "religion makes you stupid."

Date: 2008-10-29 03:52 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] catsittingstill.livejournal.com
I don't think it is precisely true to say that religion makes people stupid, but it certainly can make people *behave stupidly*.

I mean, come on; people who throw rattlesnakes around their church to show that "the spirit is on them" who then say when they are bitten "I don't know why God allowed this to happen, but I know it's part of His plan."? Sure that's stupid. We all know exactly what happened; this person frightened a wild animal and gave it no way to escape, so it bit him; a mouse would have done as much and a six year old child would have seen it coming.

And this person did it specifically *because of his religion.* We're not talking about a snake lover who took religion as his excuse and cover to handle snakes; a snake lover would have done it properly, gripping the snake gently but firmly just behind the head to admire it before letting it escape into the bushes.

This is just one example, which I happened to see in a film in anthropology class many years ago, but we can all think of stupid behaviors prompted by religion. The Inquisition pops to mind. I can imagine a few sick people who want to torture, who take religion as their excuse and shield--but if religion didn't make the rest of that society behave stupidly, why would the normal people put up with it? People deny their children medical care, believing God will heal them if they just pray hard enough--can you imagine someone doing that without religion telling them they should?

Religion doesn't have to make people behave stupidly, but it seems to me that it certainly can, and that's something to worry about when religious people collect in large groups and accumulate temporal power.

Date: 2008-10-29 04:24 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] zanda-myrande.livejournal.com
I agree that following a particular religion can lead to stupid behaviour. So can football, musical theatre, mountains, gourmet food, science fiction, and the misuse of secular authority by anyone. The Inquisition, in its most popularly memorable and extreme form, was created as a tool of just such secular authority, and normal people put up with it because that authority told them they had to. That is generally the reason why people put up with bad things.

I can't speak for Christian Science, any more than I can for the Moonies or the followers of whoever Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh is this year. People have denied themselves and their children medical care because they simply don't trust doctors, because they can't afford to pay for it, because they prefer the herbal remedies their grannies used to supply, and for a host of other reasons. The fact that particular religions encourage stupidity (and it would be idle to deny that some, often for their own very secular reasons, do) still does not justify the remark.

For one thing, religion has also led to scientific discovery. We can both name people, from William of Ockham through to Mendel, who might not have become known as scientists if they had not been taught to read and to think by the religious orders to which they belonged. So religion can also make people be smart, if it is allowed to do so.

I do not believe that religious people (by which I mean people who are actually religious) have any interest in accumulating temporal power. I believe that people who have a consuming interest in accumulating temporal power find religion a useful and convenient means to do so. If religion were not there, they would find another. There is no shortage.

I understand what you're saying, but I don't see any reason for allowing that flip, nasty generalisation any room to lurk whatsoever. People can be stupid all on their own, and should take responsibility for it; saying that religion made them do it is letting them off far too easily. Not to mention the people in whose interest it is that they should be stupid.

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