This Week in Atheism, Religion and Scepticism – 21/04/2013

Been a while since I worked on a consistent weekly segment for this blog, so I thought it was high time I got something started up again.

My idea for the 'Sunday News Round-Up' is for it to pretty much do what it says on the tin: every Sunday I'll post links to some news articles relevant to topics this blog covers, along with a bit of analysis and discussion from me. I'll break them down by topic, articles relating to atheism and religion in one, articles relating to scepticism in the other.

Right then, let's get this show on the road.

THIS WEEK IN ATHEISM AND RELIGION...

Shirley Chaplin, Gary McFarlane and Lillian Ladele are back in the news this week, as they're appealing the decision made by the European Court earlier this year. You might recall these three as the guys who complained that their employers were discriminating against them on religious grounds; Mrs Chaplin is a nurse forbidden to wear a cross at work, whilst Mr McFarlane and Miss Ladele are a relationship and marriage counsellor respectively who refused to work with homosexual couples. The former lost his job over it, whilst the latter is claiming that her employers making her work with gay couples would be discrimination.

All the rulings against them were held up in the European Court of Appeals, but now they're back decrying unfair treatment, double-standards and further discrimination against Christians. I do feel a bit sorry for Mrs Chaplin, I must admit; she had been wearing her cross (not exactly a big deal) for thirty years when she was asked to remove it on health and safety grounds, and she did actually offer to modify it so it did not only for this to be refused. The other two I have no sympathy for, however. We're reaching the stage were gay couples are finally starting to gain the right straight couples have solely enjoyed for far too long, and these kind of people can scream that they're not homophobes until Hell freezes over: if you are refusing to work with such couples based solely on their being gay, that's actual discrimination based upon sexual orientation.

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A health and physical education teacher in Columbus, Ohio has been fired after the principal learned she was gay. Would it surprise you overly to learn that this school is Catholic?

Yeah, me neither.

Carla Hale, who had worked at Bishop Watterson High School for nineteen years, had her post terminated because her homosexuality is “a violation of moral law”. No, seriously. That's apparently their reasoning for this bullshit move. I never cease to be astounded by the fact that these people still think they can get away with this sort of thing still. Either way, a shitstorm is brewing, the school is under heavy scrutiny and Hale, who very kindly says that all she wants is her job back, is nonetheless pursuing legal action against the school for it's blatant discrimination against her. She's going to win, there's no doubt about it; the school diocese has no justification for the stunt it's pulled.

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And finally for this section some news closer to home for me: a poll in Scotland by the Sunday Times and Real Radio Scotland shows a sizeable decrease in the number of people saying they belong to the Christian faith. This stands in stark contrast to an earlier poll in 2001, which had 65% of respondents saying they were Christian; in this new poll it's dropped to 55%, and those stating that they have no belief in god has risen from just 28% to 39%. Good news all round, by my standards. The National Secular Society, whose analysis of these numbers I'm politely pinching, points out that many people tend to overstate their religious tendencies in these polls, so for all we know the changes might be even larger.

The poll results are available online; you can check them out here.

THIS WEEK IN SCEPTICISM...

Anyone remember Andrew Wakefield? The former doctor who kicked off the whole MMR vaccine controversy with his fraudulent 1998 paper that linked the vaccine to autism? Who was using his paper to try and trick the government into using a medical test he had the patent for?

Yeah, well the asshole's back in the news again this week.

In the wake of the reports about Measles spreading in south Wales this month, Wakefield is using this outbreak as an excuse to remind us all that he sadly hasn't stopped breathing and to blame the British government for the whole thing. Yup, the man partly responsible for the deaths of untold numbers of infants because he scared their parents away from vaccines is once again trying to redirect the blame on everyone but himself. Professor Andrew Finn, a specialist in childhood vaccines and an actually credible source of information on these matters, has denounced Wakefield's statements as, and I do quote, “balderdash”:

“His proposal for single vaccines was not based on any observations in his published paper. It came straight out of his head. There has never been any evidence it would have made any difference.”

Wakefield has been struck from the medical record and has fled to the USA, where he continues to perpetrate his particularly noxious brand of bullshit.

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If you follow vjack's blog Atheist Revolution, you might remember a post about how you should really reconsider using the Huffington Post as a reliable source of information. Well, please allow me to further stress this point by looking at another article in which HuffPo gives credence to pseudoscience and nonsense over critical thinking.

Specifically this one, in which it gives a soapbox to a group led by New Age woo-peddlar Deepak Chopra who are complaining about TEDx removing pseudoscientific videos from its blog.

Please note that TEDx is not the actual Technology, Entertainment and Design conference; parapsychologists like Rupert Sheldrake, the removal of whose talk Chopra and his friends are protesting, would never manage to get a platform there, due to them actually having standards. TEDx conferences are third-party conferences that license the TED brand in order to gain more attention, but they often don't have the standard of entry their parent group does. Nonetheless, the misuse of the brand can have negative effects on the parent company, and nothing damages ones credibility as a solid source for science than allowing a herd of quantum woo-types to use your name to add much-needed credibility to their ideas.

Thus TED, a private organisation that is free to add or remove whatever it wishes from its blogs, removed their links to several videos of such talks from their site. The videos are still available; they've not been wiped from the internet, so any claims of censorship or a cover-up is nonsense. Chopra and his ilk just seem to get upset when people try to hold their claims up to the same standards as everyone else in the scientific community, and Ariana Huffington is only too happy to offer him a highly visible spot to complain about it from.

That's this week in Atheism, Religion and Scepticism, folks. See you next time.

Religious Themes in Video Games: Dante's Inferno

And here we are for part three in this series on video games that discuss religious themes. You probably know the drill by now; head's up about potential spoilers and so on.

So let's get stuck in.

Dante's Inferno

Publishers don't often like to take risks with their big-budget releases; the amount of money that goes into a Triple-A title means that there's a lot to lose if sales don't go to plan, so often they prefer to stick to what they know works. Electronic Arts is particularly guilty for this approach, along with numerous other shitty business practices which have earned it the dubious title of 'Worst Company in America' in 2012 (and they're all set to retake their title again this year).

This is why it still surprises me that EA actually published Visceral Game's 2010 game, Dante's Inferno.

If that name sounds familiar, that's because it is; Dante's Inferno is a re-imaging of the first part of Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy. Visceral have taken a few liberties with the story, admittedly; Dante is no longer a poet, instead depicted as a Templar knight who's sins during the Third Crusade have damned his beloved Beatrice to Hell, forcing him to descend into the many circles to save her

as a Templar knight who's sins during the Third Crusade have damned his beloved Beatrice to Hell, forcing him to descend into the many circles to save her.

Many critics of the time wrote this game off as a "God of War ripoff", and whilst this seems a little overly dismissive one can see where they're coming from; Dante's Inferno takes a lot of it's cues from the popular hack and slash title, and I'm by no means trying to claim that it's a great game.

What it most certainly is, however, is interesting, largely through the design and style Visceral imbued it with.

Dante's Inferno offers an unflinching and brutal look at the Catholic interpretation of Hell, and the art department behind this game deserve all their dues for not pulling any punches with it. Each circle is given its own uniquely fucked up aesthetic, and each is populated by a variety of infernal creatures that live up to the name of the circle they exist within. Blood, bile despair and all manner of messed up things are ever-present in this game, which really drives home the idea of the Christian Hell as a vicious and terrifying place.

Video games have the ability to bring to life some of the disturbing aspects of religion, and Dante's Inferno demonstrates this well.

As I said, however, there are still flaws to this particular depiction of religion. There's little discussion of the subject matter, no commentary; Dante simply hacks and slashes his way further down into the Circles of Hell, and whilst visually impressive it's a shame that more thought was not put into it.

A note to developers and publishers; when advertising a video game that covers religious themes, don't do this.

Publishing a game about the descent into Hell is a serious undertaking and requires a considerable amount of tact and maturity, things that EA sadly was incapable of supplying. Their marketing department's decision to run ridiculous hoaxes like fake religious protests about the game are baffling; I'm not sure whether 'juvenile', 'idiotic' or 'outright offensive' summarises the whole thing best, but whoever dreamed this stupidity up is in dire need of a slapping.

Nonetheless, Dante's Inferno remains an interesting game, willing to dive head first into subject matter most developers avoid like the plague. Visceral deserve praise for being willing to make such a game, and EA deserves credit for taking the risk of publishing it.

Religious Themes in Video Games: BioShock

And we're back for round two of this series on video games that discuss religious themes, chums. Just as a reminder these posts do contain some spoilers, so if you're not wanting anything revealed about these games I would recommend not reading further.

Otherwise, let's get started.

BioShock

BioShock is widely considered to be one of the greatest games of the last decade or so, and easily ranks up there as one of the best games period. A claustrophobic, creepy and extremely clever first-person shooter, it's a game that isn't afraid to be about something, to tackle big themes and issues in a mature, thoughtful and fascinating way that only an interactive experience can provide.

For those of you who've not heard of it, BioShock is for the most part a thinly-veiled satire and criticism of Ayn Rand's 'Objectivist' philosophy, which means that, for the most part, it's a game about philosophy and politics. Set in the Atlantic Ocean during 1960, it takes place in an underwater city created by a man named Andrew Ryan (like I said, thinly-veiled) as an Objectivist paradise. Ryan pursued this dream to the letter, aiming for a city where “the great would not be constrained by the small.”

All good on paper, but by the time the player arrives in this city, it's all gone to shit.

Oh, and the city is called 'Rapture'. Here's where religious elements come into play.

BioShock covers the topic of religion on several levels. On the surface there's the usual name-dropping and references; the name of the city itself is an obvious one, and the Biblical creation myth is referenced with ADAM, a plasmid that allows the residents of Rapture to perform superhuman feats... but is also highly addictive and the cause of many being transformed into monstrous beings called 'Splicers'. These Splicers, in addition to being creepy as all hell, can often be heard reciting biblical passages and singing hymns as they stalk the flooded halls of the dying city.

But this is just surface-level commentary, and BioShock isn't content just to stop there. It seeks an active, deeper discussion about religion and its many aspects, something one rarely finds in video games. Andrew Ryan is an atheist who seeks an Objectivist utopia, and it is made clear that he considers religion, particularly organised religion, an obstacle to this; in his introduction to Rapture he names the Vatican specifically as an enemy of his cause, depicting it as a thieving entity out to steal the toils of hard-working men in the name of god.

As such, religion is an unwelcome concept in Rapture, with holy books like the Bible banned. Yet despite its lofty ambitions, things don't quite go to plan; a two-tiered society begins to emerge in Rapture, the privileged with access to the incredible discoveries found below the sea, free to pursue their dreams and ambitions without oversight or restraint, and the less-privileged; the underclass who toil away to ensure the city continues to function, and who are repeatedly fucked over by Ryan's laissez-faire attitudes and desire for a society resembling an individualist's wet dream.

Blocked from gaining access to many commodities through legal means, a culture of smuggling flourishes amongst Rapture's underclass, and it becomes apparent that one of the items most commonly smuggled into the city are bibles; one can find them strewn around the city, particularly in the slum regions, and several audio recordings discuss them being brought in illegally. Ryan, naturally, is incensed, bringing in the death penalty against such smugglers whilst declaring that “any contact with the surface exposes Rapture to the very Parasites we fled from”, once again showing his vitriol towards religion and the religious institutions existing on the surface above (amongst other things, admittedly; Ryan has a major bone to pick with the US government and also the Soviets).

Here we see the game discussing issues such as religious persecution, and there's some deeper sub-text to all this that we can interpret. In Rapture, Andrew Ryan and his cohorts sought to create their vision of a perfect society, free from oppression and religion. In this, they failed; faith and religion found a way into the city despite their best efforts, as it provided solace and meaning to an underclass of the population they had failed. Attempts to stop this spread led to Ryan becoming the architect of religious persecution, executing those who smuggled Bibles and other religious idols into the city.

What this game has to say about religion, then, is that it is an intrinsic aspect of society whether one likes it or not; you can take it out of society, but you cannot take away some members of society's need for it.

I consider BioShock to be one of the best games I've ever had the chance to play through, ranking right up there with things like the Half Life series (give us Episode 3, Gabe), and if anything that I've just written sounds at all intriguing to you I urge you to pick up a copy and play it. It's easily acquired for a small price these days, what with two sequels on the market as well now, and I've only scratched the surface with this post in terms of what this game has to say.

It never ceases to amaze me that the game we shall be looking at next was ever even attempted, never mind published. A re-interpretation of a classic religious text, it's by no means the best game in the world but it certainly can be considered interesting.

Until next time, folks.

Religious Themes in Video Games: The Binding of Isaac

Okay, dissertation is over, a few more essays and exams to go, and then I'm finally finished with University. Which means my excuses to continue not updating this blog are now thinner than the evidence for Creationism (cheeky wee religion joke for you there, you're welcome), so I figure it's high time I got back on this horse.

So let's start with a subject that, as has previously been established, I'm a big fan of.

Let's talk about the discussion of religion in video games.

The idea for this post is owed in no small part to the awesome guys at Extra Credits, whose insightful analysis of video games and the video game industry is something I've been a fan of for a long while. A series of episodes they posted a while back covered a similar topic, and found that all too often religion is something video games shy away from covering or discussing.

Understandable, really, given how games tend to court controversy without attempting to ascend Mount Controversial by discussing faith and religion.

There are exceptions, however. And those exceptions are what I'd like to discuss here and in several other posts.

Before we get stuck in, I'd like to explain why I've selected the games I'm going to discuss. A lot of games have religion in them, gods and deities and their worshipers, all that shenanigans. That's been written about before, and whilst it is indeed an interesting topic it's not what I wish to cover here. In this series I'm hoping to discuss games that actually discuss religion and its many aspects, good or bad. Games that have something to say about religion, not just games that mention it.

Let me also flag up a spoiler warning; I'm going to try and avoid major, major spoilers but I will be discussing some aspects of these games that could reveal things you'd rather find out on your own. So yeah, just a heads up.

NOW LET'S DO THIS.

The Binding of Isaac

Edmund McMillen makes fucked up games. But with The Binding of Isaac, he really outdid himself.

Connoisseurs of Old Testament mythology might see where this is going already, but this game is a retelling of the biblical figure Isaac, who's father Abraham was commanded by God to sacrifice his son to prove his devotion. Good, clean biblical family fun, the sort of thing the Old Testament does so well.

The Binding of Isaac (TboI) embraces the rather messed up elements of this myth, telling the story of the titular young boy Isaac whose mother believes she's heard the voice of god ordering her to murder her son. Chased down into the basement, thinks take a further turn for the disturbing as Isaac has to fight his way through a variety of Biblical-inspired monsters to ultimately free himself from his mother's murderous wrath.

The Four Horsemen show up as boss characters riding toy horses and are out to ruin your day. The Seven Deadly Sins are in the basement somewhere too, and they really live up to that 'deadly' part. Isaac can find items and weapons to help him stay alive, which range from things like the Bible to a crown of thorns. There are other elements and references in amongst all of this, don't get me wrong, but religion and the Old Testament are big focuses of this game.

This is a game that's unafraid to shy away from the disturbing aspects of many religious myths, and McMillen's ostensibly cutesy, cartoony art-style masks some really, really fucked up designs. Gameplay lends itself well to the themes TBoI seeks to discuss as well (namely religion and child abuse), because this game is brutally hard. Rogue-like elements ensure that if Isaac should die during his descent into the depths below his house (and he will die, a whole fucking lot), there are no save-points and no extra lives. If you're killed, you're going right back to the start.

TBoI's punishing difficulty and gruesome aesthetic means that not everyone will enjoy it, but given that you can grab both the main game and it's expansion, the Wrath of the Lamb, for just £6 (and it'll be even cheaper during Steam sales), there's much worse things to spend your money on.

Stay tuned, friends. Next post we shall be talking about a favourite game of mine. Rather than waffle about how great it is, I'll let it's introduction speak for itself...

Monday Morning Musings #6

[This isn’t going up on Monday, sadly, but since I did technically start writing this post Monday afternoon I guess it can count at a stretch. Plus I really can’t be assed coming up with a creative title for this sort of post going up on a Tuesday. A most lazy non-believer, I am.]

I’ve heard Catholic apologists for the child sex abuse scandals use a lot of bizarre and utterly reprehensible defences, but the prize (if you can call it that; 'Badge of Shame' might be better) for the worst offender so far goes to Father Benedict Groeschel; he’s elected to go for the ‘blame the victim’ approach, claiming that in many cases it’s the child’s fault for being sexually abused. He’s since attempted to retract the comments (surprise surprise), claiming that he “did not intend to blame the victim”, but you don’t let an article reach publication unless you really do think like that.

‘beentrueandfaithful’ has uploaded a very interesting little article to /r/atheism about his experiences as a Mormon Missionary. Turns out some of them might dislike having to try and talk to you about the word of Jesus Christ even more than you dislike being talked to about it.

There was all that noise about Bruce Willis planning to sue Apple today, only for it to be revealed that the story was actually nonsense. Once again media sources forget that scepticism about a story can often be useful in preventing your paper/website/blog from looking extremely fucking silly before a national audience.

On a related note, I am aware of what a delicious irony it would be if the above story does subsequently turn out to be true. However, it was a story first reported by the Daily Mail; I think I'm safe.

Oh, and I’ve decided I’m going to drop an image at the bottom of these posts every week, since that’s always fun and totally makes these posts seem larger than they usually are.

Having One's Cake And Eating It: The Catholic Education Service Is At It Again

You would honestly have a point if you were to say that Catholics across the globe seem to genuinely enjoy courting controversy.

Just a few days ago the Vatican promised to “crack down” on “radical feminist” nuns in America.[1] How are they being radical, you might ask? Oh, you know, just suggesting that homosexuality is actually okay.[2] ‘Radical’ things like that. And last month you had the Pope declaring that Marxism “no longer corresponds to reality”.[3] This from a man in a dress and a hat who talks to imaginary men in the sky; the irony is almost palpable.

But here in the UK the local Catholics seem to think that they cannot let the Vatican have all the fun. At least that is what I think is the Catholic Education Services’ reasoning behind encouraging children attending faith schools in England and Wales to sign a petition against gay marriage.[4] Specifically, this petition, one that as of writing has 469,121 signatures and which claims that:

“Throughout history and in virtually all human societies marriage has always been the union of a man and a woman. Marriage reflects the complementary natures of men and women. Although death and divorce may prevent it, the evidence shows that children do best with a married mother and a father.”[5]

We’re talking about a petition with some serious logical fallacies on the go here, people. Throughout history people also kept slaves. And burned witches. I suppose we should start a petition to encourage everyone to hold to those timeless classics as well.

The backers of this petition are using the same outdated, flawed dogmas those who would see homosexuals relegated to second-class citizenship always use, wherever they are in the world. Step up to the plate Bigot-Robe-Dudes (aka. Archbishops) Vincent Nichols and Peter Smith as our example of such silly attitudes and ideas, who state in their letter to faith schools:

“A change in the law would gradually and inevitably transform society’s understanding of the purpose of marriage. It would reduce it just to the commitment of the two people involved.”[6]

Oh look everyone, it’s our old friend the Slippery Slope Fallacy. Gay marriage would cause some catastrophic shift away from the ‘sanctity of marriage’? Where have I heard this one before? At least Nichols and Smith do not claim that gay marriage would lead to people marrying their dogs/children/toasters like some of their fellows on the anti-gay side of the fence do. Case and point Lisa Severine Nolland of Core Issues Trust, the group you may remember trying to get Ex-Gay propaganda smeared across London buses earlier this month.[7]

The reaction from the other side of the fence (my side of the fence, if that was not abundantly clear already) has been swift; the British Humanist Association has condemned the move by the CES and argued that it violates several sections of the 1996 Education Act. The Welsh Government has also stepped up to the plate, promising an investigation into the whole debacle and urging Westminster to do the same.[8] Go on yourselves, Wales.

The CES (and by extension the Catholic Church) and their meddling in the lives of schoolchildren is a very serious issue. It may be faith schools that they are taking advantage of, but do not forget that many of these schools receive government funding.[9] Your taxes are going to help fund schools that allow celibate priests to tell children to campaign against homosexuality.

And yes, that is what they are doing. Let’s make that clear. This is an anti-gay campaign, no matter what spin the CES try to put on it. And spin they are indeed trying to generate; one of their spokeswomen has already said that:

“We said that schools might like to consider using this [letter] in assemblies or in class teaching. We said people might want to consider asking pupils and parents if they might want to sign the petition. It's really important that no school discriminates against any member of the school community.”[10]

Oh, okay then. That makes it totally fine. You’re just suggesting that the schools use the letter. You’re just suggesting that those children sign the homophobic petition. You still totally respect everyone’s’ rights and feelings, and aren’t targeting any one group for discrimination.

Well, alright then. Two can play at this game. Suppose that I merely suggest that the Catholic Church is a horrific, monolithic religious entity that is a great source of hatred and abuse in this world, responsible for untold suffering in Africa and guilty of covering up more child abusers than we will probably ever know about? Suppose that I merely suggest that faith schools have no place in modern society, and should immediately be banned?

That’s not an anti-Catholic statement by your logic, so you cannot get offended.

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[1] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-17766615

[2] http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2012/04/catholicism-america

[3] http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/03/23/us-cuba-pope-idUSBRE82M0KT20120323

[4] http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/apr/25/catholic-church-schools-gay-marriage

[5] http://c4m.org.uk/

[6] http://www.catholic-ew.org.uk/Home/News-Releases/January-March/Archbishops-Letter-on-Marriage

[7] http://www.core-issues.org/index.php?mact=News,cntnt01,detail,0&cntnt01articleid=51&cntnt01returnid=15

[8] http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2012/04/26/government-to-investigate-pinknews-expose-of-catholic-schools-urging-children-to-sign-anti-gay-marriage-petition/

[9] http://www.diversityanddialogue.org.uk/files/faith_schools.pdf

[10] http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/apr/25/catholic-church-schools-gay-marriage