- Jan 12, 2005
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We are told ad nauseam about how - without God, without religion - humankind wouldn't have morality. And as long as we atheists accept that "moral behavior" can include rape and murder, I guess we have no basis to disagree.
This point is brought home (yet again, as if we need so many reminders) by an incident from India.
It seems that a calf went missing in a village, and a man from the village was rumored (in the village temple - because of course that's where morality is disseminated) to have brought meat from the calf to his home, to feed his family. (Wow, pretty outrageous stuff.) Anyway, whether the rumor was true or not, a mob descended on the man's home and beat the man to death. One of the man's sons was also beaten, and is near death. The mob - inflamed with the spirit of moral righteousness - also attempted to molest the man's daughter (hey, when you know you're on the right side of God, almost anything you do is "moral;" that's one of the great things about religion).
Not that it actually matters, but I'm absolutely certain that if it's proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that there was not a speck of beef in the man's home, the members of the mob will surely turn themselves in and freely admit their guilt. They won't hem and haw and pretend it was anyone but themselves who did the righteous deeds. Because when God's morality is your guide, you just know what the right thing to do is.
This point is brought home (yet again, as if we need so many reminders) by an incident from India.
It seems that a calf went missing in a village, and a man from the village was rumored (in the village temple - because of course that's where morality is disseminated) to have brought meat from the calf to his home, to feed his family. (Wow, pretty outrageous stuff.) Anyway, whether the rumor was true or not, a mob descended on the man's home and beat the man to death. One of the man's sons was also beaten, and is near death. The mob - inflamed with the spirit of moral righteousness - also attempted to molest the man's daughter (hey, when you know you're on the right side of God, almost anything you do is "moral;" that's one of the great things about religion).
Not that it actually matters, but I'm absolutely certain that if it's proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that there was not a speck of beef in the man's home, the members of the mob will surely turn themselves in and freely admit their guilt. They won't hem and haw and pretend it was anyone but themselves who did the righteous deeds. Because when God's morality is your guide, you just know what the right thing to do is.
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