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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Webinar between Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Kathleen Stock today

21 replies

RoyalCorgi · 17/10/2023 13:56

I think this is 3.30pm UK time. I can't make it, but it looks interesting. You can register here:

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/3016952218516/WN_4loqeBftRZGMihhuQzeUAw#/registration

Welcome! You are invited to join a webinar: Breaking the Silence: Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Kathleen Stock Discuss Cancellations and Free Speech in Navigating the Youth Gender Crisis. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the...

Welcome! You are invited to join a webinar: Breaking the Silence: Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Kathleen Stock Discuss Cancellations and Free Speech in Navigating the Youth Gender Crisis. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the...

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/3016952218516/WN_4loqeBftRZGMihhuQzeUAw#/registration

OP posts:
ArabellaScott · 17/10/2023 16:27

Oh, bugger, I missed it! It did indeed look interesting. I wonder if it was recorded?

RoyalCorgi · 17/10/2023 17:27

It is recorded, apparently, so hopefully we'll be able to watch it.

OP posts:
ArabellaScott · 17/10/2023 21:03

Brilliant, thanks.

BettyFilous · 18/10/2023 08:25

Ayaan Hirsi Ali has a great interview with Megan Phelps Roper, formerly of Westboro Baptist Church, on her podcast. It’s not recent so you may have to search for it. It was a fascinating conversation between women who had left stifling religious communities and what they’d learned on that journey.

I will definitely listen to this one.

ArabellaScott · 20/11/2023 07:40

Fucksake; Richard. Leave her alone and stop trying to tell her what she thinks and feels, you weirdo!

TempestTost · 20/11/2023 10:50

He doesn't seem to have actually read what she said, has he?

But I have always thought it was odd that he seems to have no cognizance of the fact that the Enlightenment is not some totally separate thing from the rest of the history of western thought. It didn't spring forth from nothing.

Augarden · 20/11/2023 13:30

He's right: she doesn't talk about coming to believe that Jesus is the son of God. She's treating Christianity like a football team. All the best to her in any case.

PorcelinaV · 20/11/2023 16:12

Augarden · 20/11/2023 13:30

He's right: she doesn't talk about coming to believe that Jesus is the son of God. She's treating Christianity like a football team. All the best to her in any case.

Well she certainly didn't make a good case for Christianity, and we don't even know what she believes.

But a couple of things in play, (1) I think she admits she may have accepted atheism too fast for non rational reasons, (2) she doesn't find secularism to be satisfying, in the sense of having a spiritual need beyond it.

And while those things aren't a "case for Christianity", they do give you reasonable grounds to explore and reconsider your position.

TempestTost · 20/11/2023 16:21

She has said more in other places, but I don't think she saw the personal stuff as what she wanted to talk about in the essay.

Which is not so much about her personal beliefs, but a realization that what we might consider modern, secular western values very much depend on certain presuppositions that are rooted in Christian metaphysics and ethics, and that secular humanism attempts to retain the values and beliefs around things like rationality, while severing the metaphysical roots of that. And not really replacing it with anything.

Where she went, personally, from there isn't so relevant to that essay, which is really meant to be a warning that the chickens are starting to come home to roost as far as those roots are concerned. (Which is a terrible mixed metaphor, sorry!) Where people go from there as individuals isn't really what she wanted to talk about.

ArabellaScott · 20/11/2023 19:17

TempestTost · 20/11/2023 10:50

He doesn't seem to have actually read what she said, has he?

But I have always thought it was odd that he seems to have no cognizance of the fact that the Enlightenment is not some totally separate thing from the rest of the history of western thought. It didn't spring forth from nothing.

I haven't read what she said; the point was he is very presumptuous in trying to insist that he knows what someone else believes better than they do.

TempestTost · 21/11/2023 00:06

Yes, he certainly was presumptuous.

His ideas about belief being the important thing were kind of interesting too, and shows maybe why he struggles with these discussions. There is a lot more to religion than just belief, and in some religions it's not even a particularly important point.

HorseFaced · 21/11/2023 07:40

ArabellaScott · 20/11/2023 07:40

Fucksake; Richard. Leave her alone and stop trying to tell her what she thinks and feels, you weirdo!

I am assuming they are good enough friends he can write that note.

I (god help me) basically agree with him. The ‘thing’ that makes someone a Christian is a belief in the risen Christ.
Acting ‘like a Christian’ doesn’t make you one.

TempestTost · 21/11/2023 10:39

A friend might write you a note, but I would be seriously pissed if they made it public.

PorcelinaV · 21/11/2023 11:06

There are liberal forms of religion where you can get away with believing whatever, but a liberal form of Christianity arguably wouldn't be useful in the way wanted, to defend Western civilisation.

HorseFaced · 21/11/2023 11:19

TempestTost · 21/11/2023 10:39

A friend might write you a note, but I would be seriously pissed if they made it public.

Maybe if you (and you hypothetical friend) were both Public Intellectuals you might feel otherwise.

He may even have run it past her. I wouldn’t fall out with someone over it.

duc748 · 21/11/2023 11:53

Dawkins always strikes me as one of those people who, even when you're agreeing with them (which is actually most of the time), you're still irritated by them.

PorcelinaV · 21/11/2023 12:08

@TempestTost

Which is not so much about her personal beliefs, but a realization that what we might consider modern, secular western values very much depend on certain presuppositions that are rooted in Christian metaphysics and ethics, and that secular humanism attempts to retain the values and beliefs around things like rationality, while severing the metaphysical roots of that. And not really replacing it with anything.

Interesting questions, although I'm not sure how much Western civilisation values really depend on Christianity.

I do think it's an issue that where we as a society lose our traditional spiritual foundation (however flawed, or basically false, Christianity may be as a religion) we may not be going down the path of "reason" and "secular humanist values" as if it's some march to progress and we may actually instead be destabilising our society.

On the theoretical level, while I think it's difficult for anyone to ground ethics whether that is under theism or philosophical naturalism, I do think that there is a strong case that atheism leads to moral nihilism. For example, if naturalism can't support free will then that presumably destroys both moral responsibility and moral duty.

I'm talking theoretical here. Of course in practice many atheists may continue to be well behaved and think ethical behaviour is very important. But if you take away the better foundation for morality (very arguably in certain ways), you don't know if it's just a theoretical thing, or if it starts having an impact on society. So there is the underlying grounding of ethics in play, and also as a society you no longer have that unified story and approach to ethics with which you raise the next generations. (Obviously Christians will disagree over doctrine and ethics all the time, but somewhat unified approach anyway.)

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