On burning the Koran.

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Politics, religion, psychology, economics. In other words: how the human world works and why it works as it does is what fascinates me. Sometimes I post about such ideas here. Often I expand on such ideas to suggest how I think the world should work and why I think so. Sometimes, however, I just post pretty, shiny content I've found while sifting through the internet. Ask me anything Submit

September 20, 2010

People have been getting uptight about Terry Jones’ proposed Koran burning. Some have come out and said that if he doesn’t burn it, they will. Others have come out and strongly condemned the idea that a man can burn a book he holds no reverence for. I find it bizarre that because a belief has religious roots and the person with such a belief has chosen to be offended by another’s action/s that many find it acceptable or at least partially justified for that person to then overreact greatly - e.g. with threats of violence and that the world will crumble. Such overreactions are encouraged by setting religion apart as sacrosanct. I would burn a Bible if I felt it served my purpose, but unless I had the property rights to the church in question (and doing so also served my purpose), I would not desecrate the church.

I and many others have deeply held beliefs which are not religious. They are not considered sacrosanct. A simple example: if I was a Marxist (a belief which could heavily inform my way of life both in action and thought) and somebody who had a problem with something some Marxists had done decided they wanted to burn the books of Marxist thought which I held in reverence, that would be much the same thing. However, there would not be the critcism or outrage over that and it would be unlikely to be argued that a person should not do that. Most would be more likely to argue that it’s just a book, not even one of my own (given Terry Jones is burning Korans he has purchased rather than taking them from people) and that I should just ignore him as a fringe irrelevance. In other words, there’s no point getting upset about another’s action which really doesn’t affect me and I can easily choose a responsible and mature response.

Religious belief should get exactly the same respect other beliefs do. I fundamentally disagree with Terry Jones burning the Koran in that I think his reasons for doing so are stupid, but there is no reason that him burning the Koran should get any more attention than him burning any other book. The only reason he has got the attention is that people feel somehow for some reason that religious belief should be premised above other forms of belief. The USA is a secular society, not a theocracy: religious belief should not be premised simply because it is religious and the religious should respond reasonably and maturely to that which they choose to take offence at.

If this truly was about belief, one would think that the religious would be able to let their god sort it out either through action on the temporal plane or through judgement after death, but it is not. This is about intimidation and gaining a special place for religion to be above criticism in society and for the religious to justify consistently overreacting to anything which they determine offends their religious sensibilities. If the human race is to progress, it is not going to be through stifling others thought and free expression with the creation of a climate of fear and acceptance of the creation of such a climate as legitimate.

Further reading
Blasphemy and forced reverence
Respect is not the same as obedience