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Richard Dawkins says Christianity is "fundamentally decent," but Islam "is not"
(www.friendlyatheist.com)
this post was submitted on 03 Apr 2024
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Dawkins is a weird guy. And a troll.
He lost me years ago when he claimed being raped by someone you know is better than being raped by someone you don't know.
There was also this-
https://www.salon.com/2013/09/10/richard_dawkins_defends_mild_pedophilia_says_it_does_not_cause_lasting_harm/
Yikes.
Right? He says he can't judge pedophiles from his youth because it was another era and we can't judge them by today's standards.
I wasn't there at the time, but I'm pretty sure people didn't take kindly to pedophiles in the 1940s when he was born either.
In fact, I would be very surprised if there was any time within the past few centuries, if not longer, that no one would judge a school teacher sticking his hand down a pupil's pants and feeling him up. I'm guessing that's been a thing that is totally unacceptable for a very long time. I certainly don't remember reading about Mr. Darcy longing for his school days back when the masters played with his willie.
I mean if you go back marriage age was basically teenage years so I could see it. Don't have to go back very far for 16 or 17 to not be to uncommon. Now if he is talking 12 I don't think there is a historical period where that was cool although you could still be arranged at that point or such.
Outside of Spartan Greece, I don't know of a time period where it would have been acceptable for a grown man to sexually abuse a boy. It wasn't even acceptable for a grown man to do it to another grown man in general.
oh I was thinking just the age thing and what sexual maturity was considered. not so much the appropriateness of sex. But yeah usually it revolved around procreation and children and such.
Pretty sure he's talking age 8-12, I had a glance at his bio and that's how old he was when he attended the school in question.
Also, "young boy" normally means grade school age in British English not teenager.
yeah in the US to but nowadays im never sure especially when you don't know what slant folks may want to put on things. Wow. 12 on the high side!
Fair point.
Yup, 8 to 12 and he somehow thinks it was okay and that people back then were just fine with it.
It's sad that he rationalises being molested as a kid, but that's his prerogative if that's how he copes. But it's not okay for him to try to say everyone else should be cool with it too.
Like you say, he was at boarding school in UK 1949 and it was unacceptable then as well!!
It's pretty standard for aNoTheR ErA arguments to conveniently ignore the many people who weren't okay with whatever it was at the time either.
I agree, but I also think the "it was another era, you can't judge them" argument is bullshit no matter what era you're talking about. Rape is rape and slavery is slavery. I'm not going to excuse a rapist or a slave master because "it was another time." I absolutely judge those people.
I don't care what era you lived in. If you were hurting people, I'm going to judge you for it. Hurting people should never be something acceptable.
I agree with you. And it always turns out not everyone was onboard at the time.
There were always people who were anti slavery, anti rape etc. Even egregious stuff like, say, Colombus on Hispaniola, there were other people from his own civilisation who thought he was terrible.
In fact when hurting people is a systemic thing there’s consistently a system built around making people ok with it, including doing their part of the perpetration
Astute point, people have to be coerced/brainwashed into it.