I was rereading the previous post, which included that quote, from the diaries of Patricia Highsmith, and it called to mind a subject I blogged 2 weeks ago.
John McWhorter has a new book — "WOKE RACISM/How a New Religion Has Betrayed Black America" — premised on the idea that wokeism is a religion:
"I do not mean that these people’s ideology is ‘like’ a religion. I seek no rhetorical snap in this comparison. I mean that it actually is a religion. An anthropologist would see no difference in type between Pentecostalism and this new form of antiracism."In my post about that, I quote Bob Dylan: "To her, death is quite romantic/She wears an iron vest/Her profession’s her religion/Her sin is her lifelessness."
So now I had 3 statements — sex is a religion, a political ideology is a religion, and a profession (prostitution?) is a religion. Looking for more things that fit this set, I googled "X is my religion." I landed on a Know Your Meme entry, "What's Your Religion?"
What's Your Religion is an exploitable image series featuring a screenshot of a text message conversation in which a bizarre image in sent in response to the question "What's your religion?," leading the recipient to say "I'm interested."...
On August 31st, 2016, Redditor cortexer submitted a screenshot of a text message conversation in which a person asks "Are you religious? I'd like to introduce you to my religion" followed by a picture of a Teletubby doll hung on a crucifix and the reply "I'm interested"...Later, on Reddit, there's a discussion of whether this really is a meme, and somebody says it's "never been used widely enough to be normified" — the test of whether something's a meme? — and somebody else says "No, its too offensive for the normies to use." It doesn't strike me as offensive at all. It's silly, and it's a way to be playful about saying that you're not serious about real religion.
When someone says "What's your religion?," they are introducing the subject of religion. They're surprised by a response that isn't religion at all. It doesn't have to be a "bizarre image." Texted "What's your religion?," if you are not traditionally religious, you could reply with a photograph of your children or of delicious food or the sunrise.
But in the 3 examples above — Highsmith, McWhorter, and Dylan — no one wanted to talk about real religion. Everyone wanted to name something other than religion and to elevate and intensify its importance from the perspective of the person who is dedicated to it.
One reason to have a religion is to put religion in the place in your psyche that could otherwise get filled with something unworthy of that kind of devotion. But perhaps you want to live dangerously, leaving that place gapingly open, capable of getting filled with something profane.
Posts
26 comments:
To me a necessary, though not sufficient, element of a religion is belief in a soul/spirit that is somehow more durable than one’s body. Whether in the idea that dead ancestors are watching, or in Thetans, or in being reincarnated as a caterpillar, or in the idea of eternal souls in paradise, hell, etc.
no one wanted to talk about real religion.
1st) for believers, Wokeism IS a real religion . . . Real in EVERY WAY
2nd) i know a LOT of people;
The Happiest, Most Content; are those that have taken Christ as their personal savior
So, there's real, and then there is Real
Religions are poeticizations of ethincs. Wokeism is literal.
It fails to be religion the same way that literalists fail to be serious within a religion. They're the woke of the religion, who fail by failing to have a religion.
Abortion is a religion and Climate Crisis or change or warming or cooling or whatever the hell they call it today is a religion.
That was a lot of words about the definition of another word.
A useful meaningful definition of religion is: "a set of unevidenced superstitious beliefs which include one or more magical beings", which is pretty close to regular dictionary definitions.
sex is a religion, a political ideology is a religion, and a profession (prostitution?) is a religion.
None of those are a religion. The closest is wokeness, because wokeness is based on superstitious ideas, but there are no magical beings.
One reason to have a religion is to put religion in the place in your psyche that could otherwise get filled with something unworthy of that kind of devotion.
I have to disagree here. I think you're confusing religion and idolatry. Idolatry is placing (literally) anything in a higher priority than God. Golden statues, spouses, children, dogs, money, sex, whatever. Religion, by contrast, is a set of actions the purpose of which is devotion to God (or whatever the object of the religion might be). It comes to us from Cicero, relegere, or re-read. It's the objects of devotion that are "in the place in your psyche," not the devotion itself.
So sex could be a religion, if sex were a means of, for instance, finding a connection to God (or the Gods, or whatever). But sex as a preoccupation and primary good is simply an idol.
---But perhaps you want to live dangerously, leaving that place gapingly open, capable of getting filled with something profane.
Althouse writes as though it were a matter of conscious choice. The adoption of these non-spiritual "religions" like AGW and "liberalism" comes from the huge vacuum the idolater feels where faith could have been. That is why they hunt for heretics to destroy. They are desperate to sustain this "creed" so as to avoid having to face that chasm in their identity again.
I think McWhorter absolutely wants to talk about real religion. His whole point is that this is exactly what these losers have as their actual religion.
Fredandethelstein: White trans beings and white ivy league female npr hosts with vocal fry are the wokeism deities.
I prefer paganism because you are required to make that shit up ad hoc as needed on the fly depending on the situation. It's how Vikings created modern White Male Privilege.
One reason to have a religion is to put religion in the place in your psyche that could otherwise get filled with something unworthy of that kind of devotion.
To extend the metaphor, in it's natural state that place in your psyche is a vacuum. It will be filled by something. You can fill it carefully or you can fill it carelessly, but it will be filled and whatever you fill it with will become a significant part of how you relate to the world.
"...sex could be a religion, if sex were a means of, for instance, finding a connection to God..."
No, that would simply make it a sacrament of a religion, which is, in fact, what it is in relation to Christianity for devout married couples.
@Fernandinande
It's just a question of defining your terms. Do you use a broad or narrow definition? Your choice of definition probably has more to do with what you're trying to achieve through rhetoric than on some objective understanding of what the word really means.
In the Religion and the Constitution course (which I taught for a decade), one topic is "What is religion?" The key cases have to do with applying the conscientious objector statute, and the Supreme Court, for various reasons, developed the idea of "belief that is sincere and meaningful [because it] occupies a place in the life of its possessor parallel to that filled by the orthodox belief in God."
When I write on this subject, I'm usually thinking about that idea — that each person has a place in their mind that would be filled by a standard religion if they subscribed to a standard religion.
That's pretty broad, and the Court was trying to avoid favoring one religion over another and even favoring religion over nonreligion. That's what the conscientious objector statute seemed to be doing, but the broad idea was useful in protecting the whole conscientious objector program from a constitutional attack.
By the same token, Highsmith, McWhorter, and Dylan are all doing things with language. They have their moves. I recommend speculating about their motivation. So, for example, I'd guess that Highsmith was either reveling in the awesomeness of her sex life or longing for sex that opened doors of meaning and ecstasy. I think Dylan was sneering at a woman or pitying her for a misconception of the meaning of life. And I think McWhorter is putting down the people he disagrees with by portraying them as irrational and dangerous.
A word means anything people want it to mean.
Strip out everything else about "anti-racism" and just describe what they are actually doing:
One tribe asserting moral superiority over another tribe because of some abstract concept and actively persecuting the other tribe.
That is as close a definition to religious war as it gets.
wendybar said...
Abortion is a religion and Climate Crisis or change or warming or cooling or whatever the hell they call it today is a religion.
Be clear. There are always multiple cults in these factional wars.
Abortion has 2 cults fighting over it. There is little actual non-religious behavior in this conflict.
With climate change the skeptics are being ascribed cult status by an actual cult. But the scientific method is based on skepticism.
The only real difference between a cult/religion and rational presence is the existence of skepticism.
In the Religion and the Constitution course (which I taught for a decade), one topic is "What is religion?"
Just use a dictionary. The fact that politicians and judges have different definitions and typically think that standard religions are better than no religion is irrelevant. I see no correlation or connection between religious beliefs and conscientiousness except that a conscientious belief NOT based on superstition should be taken more seriously than one that is based on superstitions.
the Supreme Court, for various reasons, developed the idea of "belief that is sincere and meaningful [because it] occupies a place in the life of its possessor parallel to that filled by the orthodox belief in God."
which, EXACTLY describes
Global Warmingism
Gaiaism
Wokeism
CRTism
and
major league sports
McWhorter like many athiests said he stopped believing in God as a Young child. Ron Reagan Jnr. said something similar, he became an athiest at age 8. So, for some there's no reason to fill that gap where religion should be, because it never existed for them.
Then there's the Dalai Lama:
'My religion is kindness'
[Like all religions, it is a constructed thing.]
I taught world religions for a while. On the first day of class, I asked students to give a simple definition of religion. A lot of answers. On the last day, I asked the same question. No one wanted to try. After studying religions, it's clear there's not a single answer (except in contexts where there's only one kind of religion).
For me, there's really two parts of what makes a religion a religion. One has to do with what Rudolf Otto was trying to get at. I disagree with some of what he said but his insight that humanity had a problem with the wholly other--whether that is God, gods, eternity, meaning, etc--and needed some way of navigating this chasm. Religion is the system that is designed to help us maintain perspective in the face of the Holy or, from Kierkegaard's insight, despair. This doesn't need a spiritual or supernatural component.
Indeed, though a Christian myself, there's good evolutionary way of understanding this too. Our brains are crazy good at analysis and adaptation, our consciousness is an emergent reflection of this, but our analysis is bigger than our ability to navigate it, so we enter into questions and concerns beyond our scope of coping. The big questions of life, meaning, everything and our place in it.
The other side of a religion is as an orienting philosophy. This can be considered ethics, but it's much more than that. It's a way of organizing our sense of self and our trajectory in life, what to do, what not to do, how to use our resources, who to approve, who to reject. Not always or even often a coherent philosophy, but still a way of providing a sense of self and our place and calling in this world.
Formal religions package these two together nicely, in ways that history shows are capable (whether any are true are besides the point for a sense of coherence and success).
Jettison the formal religions, we're not left free and unburdened by those categories. We still have to navigate those realities that are much bigger than us and navigate our journey through this world. Most people these days don't call their answers to these concerns religion, but they entirely fill the same space as religions do, but are generally less coherent and substantive in actually providing satisfying help.
---So, for some there's no reason to fill that gap where religion should be, because it never existed for them. [rcocean]
I agree, on the basis that so many seem blase about the subject. And yet -- can man really live without that search for meaning? I think it's easier to skip the religious aspects of living if your material needs are satisfied. And, in this country, a long period of more or less peacetime has made it easier for many to ignore them, too.
But if your life is threatened.... or if your living circumstances are challenged.... would you rediscover that need for, that hope for, that all-important connection to something greater than ourselves?
I don't think a god is required for religion to exist. Religion is the set of rules about which one orders ones life to serve a higher purpose than the self (though I suppose serving the self could also be the higher purpose.) I think that is the test necessary for Constitutional muster. An Athiest should still be able to get conscientious objector status. I mean, if you believe that you only have this life, you could be very loathe to permanently end someone's only existence. It would have as much moral weight as anything but there is explicitly a denial of a god.
When I was in college we distinguished faith from religion by saying faith is the belief, religion is the practice. (I eschew the traditional use of faith now, which is why I reference it in the past.) Thus religion was being used as the forms and practices, regardless on the belief.
Traditionally, "religious wars" refer to strong ideological beliefs that one holds so strongly they they are willing to fight those who do not hold to them. So religion seems to have a very non-theological use in culture. Wasn't Gulliver's travels referencing just that?
In terms of our three writers, I am not sure me definition includes all of them. I don't have the requisite chops to interpret Dylan. His song is so full of allusion and metaphor that one could read many interpretations, but I can't see it is anything but a metaphor and not a statement that prostitution is a religion. I'm not seeing it Highsmith either.
McWhorter might work, though. There is a supposed higher call and a demand for acts to support that higher call, so woke works as a religion in common use.
OK, I have to speak up:
I was woke in the '90s - and I'm an atheist. Got out of it without assistance, too.
John McWhorter is full of shit, as usual.
With all of religion's strict taboos, adhering to it is a tough slog.
Better to make hashish or anal sex or belittling people your religion - you know, fun devotions.
rcocean said...
McWhorter like many athiests said he stopped believing in God as a Young child. Ron Reagan Jnr. said something similar, he became an athiest at age 8. So, for some there's no reason to fill that gap where religion should be, because it never existed for them.
Everyone has this hole inside them.
It just bothers some more than others.
The only exceptions are psychotics and similarly deranged individuals.
Some light on the subject:
The Second Vatican Council declared that "the human person has a right to religious freedom. This freedom means that all men are to be immune from coercion on the part of individuals or of social groups and of any human power, in such wise that no one is to be forced to act in a manner contrary to his own beliefs, whether privately or publicly, whether alone or in association with others, within due limits.
"The Council further declares that the right to religious freedom has its foundation in the very dignity of the human person as this dignity is known through the revealed word of God and by reason itself. This right of the human person to religious freedom is to be recognized in the constitutional law whereby society is governed and thus it is to become a civil right....
"Wherefore every man has the duty, and therefore the right, to seek the truth in matters religious in order that he may with prudence form for himself right and true judgments of conscience, under use of all suitable means.
"Truth, however, is to be sought after in a manner proper to the dignity of the human person and his social nature. The inquiry is to be free, carried on with the aid of teaching or instruction, communication and dialogue, in the course of which men explain to one another the truth they have discovered, or think they have discovered, in order thus to assist one another in the quest for truth....
"The exercise of religion, of its very nature, consists before all else in those internal, voluntary and free acts whereby man sets the course of his life directly toward God....There is a further consideration. The religious acts whereby men, in private and in public and out of a sense of personal conviction, direct their lives to God transcend by their very nature the order of terrestrial and temporal affairs."
-- Dignitatis Humanae, 2-3.
John McWhorter is a white hero because he always stands in opposition to other blacks.
He's no hero to blacks - or the truth.
Post a Comment