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mor·al (môr"…l,
mĽr"-)
adj. 1.
Of or concerned with the judgment of the goodness or badness of human
action and character: moral scrutiny; a moral quandary.
2. Teaching or exhibiting goodness
or correctness of character and behavior: a moral lesson.
3. Conforming to standards of what
is right or just in behavior; virtuous: a moral life.
4. Arising from conscience or the
sense of right and wrong: a moral obligation.
5. Having psychological rather
than physical or tangible effects: a moral victory; moral support.
6. Based on strong likelihood or
firm conviction, rather than on the actual evidence: a moral certainty.
--mor·al n.
1. The lesson or principle
contained in or taught by a fable, a story, or an event.
2. A concisely expressed precept
or general truth; a maxim. 3.
morals.
Rules or habits of conduct, especially of sexual conduct, with reference
to standards of right and wrong: a person of loose morals; a decline in
the public morals. [Middle English, from Old French, from Latin m˝rłlis,
from m˝s,
m˝r-,
custom. See m¶-1
below.] --mor"al·ly
adv.
The accusation
about our immorality finds accommodation in the minds of the many atheists
who consider morality to be a religious concern, and so agree that they
have no interest in it, and are, therefore, amoral; that is, to be without
moral sensibilities. That is an entirely wrong notion on their own part,
perhaps fostered by a lack of interest having led to their failing to gain
an understanding of the subject. The threat of constant counter-productive
harassment by theists will often lead to an avoidance of all materials
deemed to be religious. "Gag me with your nonexistent spoon."
Morality is about right and
wrong. Atheists are fully aware of their own ideas on that subject, and
(for most of us) our concern about that is what has led us beyond all the
claims religions have staked out, to become atheists at the outset. We
wanted truth, and no religions could show us that on our own rigorous
terms. We wanted testable knowledge, and no religion could give us that.
We wanted autonomy, and religions sought always to take that away from us.
We perceived all that to be wrong, and that perception, by all correct
definitions, showed us that religion is inherently immoral. |
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Atheists commonly also regard good and evil to be strictly
religious materials, and err also in that. Good, we all know, is the
candy we find in life. Evil is the
word that gives most atheists fits, and yet it gets defined as a secular
interest in my dictionaries. How can that be so?
e·vil
(¶"v…l)
adj. e·vil·er,
e·vil·est.
1. Morally bad or wrong; wicked:
an evil tyrant. See Synonyms at bad1.
2. Causing ruin, injury, or pain;
harmful: the evil effects of a poor diet.
3. Characterized by or indicating
future misfortune; ominous: evil omens.
4. Bad or blameworthy by report;
infamous: an evil reputation. 5.
Characterized by anger or spite; malicious: an evil temper.
--e·vil n.
1. The quality of being morally
bad or wrong; wickedness. 2.
That which causes harm, misfortune, or destruction: a leader's power to
do both good and evil. 3.
An evil force, power, or personification. 4.
Something that is a cause or source of suffering, injury, or destruction:
the social evils of poverty and injustice.
--e·vil adv. Archaic. In an
evil manner.
Where, in all of that, do you see a religious
interpretation? Perhaps in the one word, 'morally'? (See above). As
an adverb or an adjective, evil is a secular word, and adequately
describes the way atheists typically regard religions to operate. Atheists
typically recognize the definitions given above to be true, and willingly
accept everything about them but the word itself. Demanding others to use
synonyms is the secular equivalent of saying 'screw' when we mean 'fuck',
when both words elicit identical pictures in people's minds.
Religions' tendency to reify, or hypostatize, the concept of evil leads
atheists to reject it. As a noun, it is a name for something, as in
"Evil is what evil does." Evil, as a thing, does not exist, but it
does describe the nature of many things. As an adjective (in the
definitions) and an adverb, evil is a powerful word that ought to be in
our vocabularies. Why?
How best to describe the overall effects of religion in the world? Surely,
there have been great works of art sponsored by religions—all to the
glorification of the sponsoring religions. Surely, there have been helping
hands extended to those in need by the world's many religions. That, too,
could be seen as astute promotion done by the religious enterprises, even
though I suspect that religion is inhabited by the many good folks who
would do good on their own, but find their efforts to be more effective as
a part of an organization whose large pools of tax-free money (donated by
said good folks) enable large scale efforts of which they become small
parts. In that, religion ends up being moral.
But, that is where their morality ends, and immorality takes over.
Atheists are atheists because they dislike lying to themselves, and
religions are perceived by them to be based entirely on lies and upheld by
people trained to lie to themselves and believe their own stories.
Most
theists have been trained into their religion, immersed into it while they
remained gullible infants, or changed from one branch of it to another
without really abdicating their early inoculation of memes.
After generations of humans have come and gone under the religions'
influence and domination, the apparent source of the stories, the one that
mama and daddy believed when their parents and grandparents poured it into
their ears and soaked it into their information-hungry minds, has reached
an incredible aura of credence while the circumstances of its creation has
evaporated behind the scenes. The neighbors all believed some version of
it, for all the same reasons. Who was there to dare attempting to
discredit it?
To be sure, all atheists do not start out life in the same manner.
People
arive at atheism in all sorts of ways different from the way people adopt
theism. Although
the highest percentage of us started out with our heads dominated
by religions' high-anxiety stories,
atheists may be anybody from someone with
a simple realization that no gods exist, to someone who has arrived at it
after decades of study. Between the long expanse that extends to both
extremes will be all sorts of people, from common drunks and murderers,
drug addicts, to highly educated and erudite scientists and researchers.
Unlike theists, the knowledge atheists hold about atheism in general will
be as wide as the gamut of their backgrounds, accomplishments and
failures. Luckily, we are opposite of theists in that their greatest
numbers are at the low end, while ours are at the high. As a result, no
honest assessment about atheism will ever present a one description fits
all picture of atheists.
That we do not share a common origin for our philosophies
renders us susceptible to attacks by those bent on playing mind games and
doing battle by acting as aggressors against us. The lack of commonality
breeds into secularism a diverse pool of individualists who share no
common view of existence, that has fostered a growth of scientific
knowledge over the past century and a half as a result of sharing the one
feature we hold in common, a deep respect for the
scientific method. It
is adoption of that by which we maintain our atheistic views, and by which
religions' attempts to maneuver us into corners end in failure; there are
no corners in circular arguments.
No moral values can be demonstrated and upheld as valid by any method that
cannot demonstrate workable truth. Only the secular approach followed by
diverse atheists leads to common views. Where science has fully developed,
atheists achieve invincible agreement; where science has yet to finalize
its theories into substantial statements, atheists philosophize according
to their own knowledge and experience, and the diversity continues.
Tangible truth supports atheism, and the morally-inspired search for, and
acquisition of, that kind of truth elevates all secular people above the
religious.
Who are they to judge us?
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