“Dawkins can’t know how seriously the children mean it when they sing the carols, so he ought to assume the worst and oppose the practice.“
You can’t trust the little bastards, you know - they could be worshipping!
In a strange, Mohinder Suresh sort of way, I’m starting to enjoy Theo Hobson’s articles (”Ultimately you are either for or against Baby Jesus” deserves recognition, and possibly a parade of some description). His and sundry other heads incapable of holding a more complex idea than “I luvs me some Jesus” exploded after Richard Dawkins recently described himself as a cultural Christian.
The last chapter of Dan Dennett’s Darwin’s Dangerous Idea discusses this. The book opens with a song that Dennett sang as a child called Tell Me Why. The simple lyrics pose four questions and give ‘God’ as the answer to each, and Dennett reveals that the song still has the power to move him, and he hopes it will survive forever (don’t panic, that was just Theo’s head again) -
“I hope my grandson learns it and passes it on to his grandson, but at the same time I do not myself believe, and do not really want my grandson to believe, the doctrines that are so movingly expressed in that song.“
He describes it as a “beautiful part of our heritage, a treasure to be preserved”, and mentions the ‘Catholic atheist’ George Santayana, who had “a deep appreciation for all the formulae, ceremonies and trappings of his religious heritage, but lacking the faith”.
Theo presumably thinks all three of them are being inconsistent, but I really struggle to see why - what’s so outrageous about appreciating something for its beauty whilst not believing a word of the doctrine that informed it? And therefore teaching it to the next generation because it is culturally valuable, without presenting as fact the ideas that inspired it? Butterflies and Wheels has a collection of his quotes from the comments thread:
those of you atheists who say ‘who cares if children sing carols?’ are intellectually dishonest. For do you not think that it’s wrong to encourage children in harmful superstition?… It seems to be Dawkins’ view (judging from some of the comments realting to him) that carols are lovely, harmless, part of our heritage. Don’t you see that this makes him a big hypocrite? If he were logically consistent he would oppose them for their promotion of lies, but because they are popular, he doesn’t dare say this.
Ignoring that last, slightly loopy sentence (since when has Dawkins been worried about upsetting the masses?) and notice that there’s only ever two choices he offers - ban Christmas carols, or teach them with the whole Jesus Christ Superstar story bundled in as the unswerving truth. Isn’t there a really simple, third path - to keep our cultural heritage, but also to declaw it? To teach it as a valuable part of our history, but also highlight that it has no more claim to truth than any other religious myth? To sidestep the ‘promotion of lies’ by putting a whacking great disclaimer on them, rather like how The Lord of the Rings has ‘Fiction’ written on the back? Strangely enough, Hobson is actually pro-Halloween despite - I hope - not actually believing in witches and ghouls and suchlike. But Theo, you should oppose it for promoting the lies of witchcraft!
To answer Theo’s question - yes, I think it is wrong to encourage children in harmful superstition. Singing a fucking Christmas carol with them, however, doesn’t really qualify as that, unless you’ve also spent the previous 364 days crowbarring it into their trusting skulls that Jesus is watching them.
Update: He’s still at it. He’s made the same bloody argument and suggested it’s worth reflecting on, like 400-odd other comments haven’t done so and, having reflected, told him precisely where he’s going wrong.
