Republican Evolution

At a Republican primary debate in 2007, John McCain was asked to give a yes-or-no answer to the question of whether he believed in evolution.

“Yes,” he said, without hesitation. 

The remaining candidates were then asked to raise a hand if they disagreed and did not believe in evolution. Several hands went right up. Mike Huckabee, Sam Brownback and Tom Tancredo identified themselves as proud creationists who did not accept the scientific theory of evolution. (Later, Ron Paul explained that he too denied evolution. He would have raised his hand but he didn’t hear the question correctly).

It was a depressing display. I’m not a Republican but I took no pleasure in this backward race to the bottom - a sordid competition to see which candidate could go the furthest spouting nonsense and pandering to the ignorant. I'm old fashioned enough to actually think that we are best served as citizens when the respective parties actually put forth the best and more capable candidates. But I could take solace in the fact that four years ago, the majority of the leading Republican candidates actually kept their hands down. John McCain, Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani and Fred Thompson were not about to declare that they reject basic science or the foundation of modern biology. Presumably, it’s because they don’t.

Four years later, it’s déjà vu all over again. Except this time around, it’s not just a few fringe Republican candidates who are boasting of their scientific backwardness and stupidity. It’s the entire top-tier.

The winner of last week’s Iowa Straw Poll, was Michelle Bachmann who wants creationism (i.e. “intelligent design”) to be taught in public schools. According to Bachmann, “Evolution is a belief…not a fact.”

Ron Paul finished second in the poll. He does not accept evolution.

Tim Pawlentey finished third and he also supports the teaching of creationism in public schools. (He has since dropped out of the race).

Finishing fourth in the Iowa poll was conservative culture warrior Rick Santorum. Santorum has been cagey on this issue, (possibly because his own church, the Roman Catholic Church, accepts evolution, whereas his political base does not). Santorum has previously stated that so-called Intelligent Design is a “legitimate scientific theory that should be taught in the classroom.” He doesn’t explicitly reject evolution but he refers to it pejoratively as an “ideology” and he has urged schools to “teach the controversy” (whatever that means).

Former CEO of Godfather’s Pizza, Herman Cain (5th place), has avoided the topic, but Texas Governor, Rick Perry (6th place), dismisses evolution as “a theory that’s out there.” In response to a young teenager's question, he said, “In Texas we teach both creationism and evolution because I figure you're smart enough to figure out which one is right."

Sure, it’s embarrassing. But does any of it really matter? We’ve got big economic problems, high unemployment, tens of thousands of troops in harm’s way and serious global unrest. Why is it important to know where a Presidential candidate stands on evolution? Should we also test them with questions about geology or algebra? It has even been suggested that asking about evolution is an inappropriate inquiry into a candidate’s religious faith. Well let’s address that last charge first because the constitutional proscription against a religious test for public office is one that we ought to take seriously. But asking a candidate about his or her understanding or acceptance of evolution is NOT a religious test – it’s a test of scientific literacy. And scientific literacy matters.  For one thing, our economic future and competitiveness depends on it.

Yes, we have other challenges and many other problems. But a Presidential candidate who does not accept evolution, the unifying principle of modern biological science, is not fit for the office. For starters, it’s a mark of astonishing ignorance that ought to give any voter pause. It is also suggestive of a lack of commitment to scientific education and scientific achievement. At a time when our nation is lagging behind and is no longer the global leader in research and technological innovation that it once was, we can ill afford a leader who rejects basic science and scientific inquiry. And finally, it suggests a willingness to pander the worst elements of America's right wing Christian fundamentalists.  Such theocratic dominionists don't represent most Christians in the U.S. and they have already had far too much influence for far too long. Being a scientific ignoramus is bad enough. But rejecting basic biology and instead teaching creationism (a religious doctrine not a scientific theory) in our public schools, not only stunts the education of our nation’s children, it plainly violates the First Amendment to our Constitution.

One of the GOP candidates who has intrigued and even impressed me is Jon Huntsman, Jr., the former Governor of Utah and, until recently, the U.S. ambassador to China. Last week, Huntsman tweeted the following  response to Rick Perry’s dismissal of evolution and climate change: “To be clear, I believe in evolution and trust scientists on global warming. Call me crazy."

This tweet was the opposite of crazy. It was refreshingly sane.  But from someone who is seeking the Republican nomination for President in 2012, it may also have been political suicide. I hope I’m wrong.

_____________________________________________________

Philadelphia, Paris and Cairo: A Tale of Three Cities

As events unfold on the streets of Cairo, many of us still don’t know what to think. Should we be feeling wonder or trepidation? Mubarak’s days are numbered but what comes next? Liberal democracy? Not likely, but perhaps a step in that direction? Is democracy merely the handmaiden for Islamist theocracy? Will the army have the final say? Does one strong-armed autocrat replace another? We don’t know. Political revolutions take on a life of their own. The drama is real and the stakes are enormous.

Historical examples of other nations can only teach us so much but they might teach us something. I’ve been reading a book called Cosmopolitan Patriots by Philipp Ziesche. It’s about the French Revolution as seen through the eyes of Americans who were living in Paris and witnessing the momentous events firsthand, from the storming of the Bastille in 1789 to the seizure of power by Napoleon Bonaparte a decade later, and the great political upheaval in between. These Americans – including Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, Gouverneur Morris, James Monroe – had their own ideas about revolution and nation-building. In 1789, the ink on the U.S. Constitution wasn’t even dry.

In the beginning, the Americans in Paris embraced the French Revolution wholeheartedly. They saw it as an extension of their own revolutionary experiment in self-government, but they had no way of knowing how things would turn out. Even Jefferson, probably the most fervent American supporter of revolution in France, didn’t initially hope for more than a constitutional monarchy. These cosmopolitan American ambassadors did not support anything like “democracy” as we understand the term today. Democracy was understood as mob rule and chaos. It was equated with a breakdown in the social and moral order.

When Jefferson returned to the newly formed United States in late 1789, he was practically giddy about the prospects for revolution in France. But then, Jefferson had seen none of the violence. His replacement, the new U.S. minister to France was the well-heeled New Yorker, Gouverneur Morris, surely one of the more underrated Founding Fathers. Morris is most famous for his role in drafting the Constitution and, in particular, for adding the phrase “We the People.” Even the conservative Morris clearly understood that sovereignty, the very authority to govern, resided in the People.

By 1792, the streets of Paris turned bloody and heads began to roll, literally. (Thomas Paine almost lost his own.) In the first two weeks of September, more than a thousand prisoners were massacred by Jacobin radicals. Morris witnessed these events and, in a letter to Jefferson, he described the killing of a noblewoman, Madame de Lamballe, by a Parisian mob. He noted that her head and entrails were paraded through the street on pikes and her body was dragged after them. (Power to the people? Sounds fine. But THOSE people? On second thought…) Seeing a revolution up close can have a way of cooling the passions for change.

Last week, the demonstrations in Cairo took a bloody turn. The blame is generally placed on Mubarak who evidently didn’t get the memo announcing: The tides of history are against you! Please step down so that an orderly transition of power can be arranged! By cracking down on the demonstrations and the media’s coverage of them, Mubarak and his supporters are only delaying the inevitable. What’s more, they showed the world what many Egyptians have experienced for years – the blunt inclination of an autocrat to crush dissent. How could Mubarak be so foolish? So tone-deaf?  That’s what it is to be a dictator. But sometimes the devil that you know is better than the one that you don’t. Imperfect order is preferable to perfect chaos. That’s the argument in defense of Mubarak. It’s credible to a point, but it isn’t nearly enough. Events have pushed things too far.

Cairo, 2011 is not like Paris, 1789 or, for that matter, Berlin, 1989. The forces of revolution and reaction aren’t truly comparable. Could this be like Tehran in 1979? Yesterday happened to mark the 32nd anniversary of Iran’s Islamic revolution. Superficially at least, the Iranian example seems instructive – a secular autocrat, backed by the West, overthrown by a popular movement. But there’s good reason to think that Tehran isn’t the right example either. For one thing, Egypt is not Iran. While there is a long history of Islamist activity within Egypt, there is no galvanizing clerical figure in Egypt comparable to the Ayatollah Khomeini. Perhaps more importantly, 2011 is not 1979. Unlike the Iranians of 1979, Egyptians have the Internet (or at least they did before Mubarak’s crackdown). Facebook, Twitter, smartphones and satellite television mean that authority figures can’t control or filter information the way they once did. The revolution will not only be televised – it will be tweeted.

These communication technologies can have a democratizing effect but democracy is no guarantee of a liberal government or good result. One of the greatest foreign policy mistakes the U.S. has made in recent years was to promote “democracy” without adequately supporting the architecture that enables democracy to safeguard basic human rights. As if the mere holding of elections will somehow change what’s broken in a corrupt and backward political and economic system.

Here, the lessons of the U.S. founders are instructive. They created the United States as a constitutional republic and not as a democracy.  The distinction meant a great deal to them. Democracy amounts to elections and majority rule – it is two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner. But a republic includes constitutional protections, rights for minorities, an independent judiciary and a balance of power. The word “republic” seems quaint now. For many years, we referred to the free nations of the west as liberal democracies. The adjective "liberal" signalled a certain kind of democracy - one with constitutional provisions and a commitment to the political ideals of the Enlightenment.  But now the word has been swallowed up by partisan politics and is most often used either defensively or as a pejorative. Meaning becomes diluted. Now we hear “democracy” and we decide that’s a good thing but we don’t bother to make the distinctions that were so important to the founders.

The fear is that Egypt will go radical and the Muslim Brotherhood, the ideological forbearers of both Al-Qaeda and Hamas, will rise to power. Or that chaos will reign, resulting in a much bloodier crackdown and Egypt will end up exactly where it was – with a strongman ruling the nation by force. We will be reminded that Mubarak, for all of his faults, at least kept the Muslim Brotherhood from the levers of power. Of course he did this by outlawing the Brotherhood, torturing their leaders and tossing their members in prison. But he tosses lots of other people in jail for the crime of political dissent. Those jailed have included Saad Eddin Ibrahim, Egypt’s leading human rights advocate and Ayman Nour, a political opponent who champions a democratic movement that is neither Islamist nor autocratic. In the U.S., we often hear politicians and commentators ask “Why are there so few moderates in the Islamic world?” Well, it’s worth considering that at least some of them have been rotting in Mubarak’s jails.

Students of political science and European history learn that there are different theories of the social contract, that famous principle of the Enlightenment which explains government's legitimacy. Government authority comes from the consent of the governed. The concept was popularized by Thomas Hobbes in the 17th century, but his particular version provided the justification for monarchy and absolute rule. Another variation on the social contract was devised a century later by Jean-Jacques Rousseau, although the populism inherent within his version is blamed for the excesses of the French Revolution. In the United States, it has been the social contract theory of John Locke that is most often celebrated because of its emphasis on natural rights and individual liberty.

How does social contract theory apply to Egypt and the Muslim world? Does it apply? Reformers and critics alike have noted that the Islamic world has not experienced anything like a philosophical or cultural movement like Europe’s Enlightenment. Whether this is because of the severity of Islam’s religious doctrine or because of other political or cultural developments within the Islamic world is a favorite subject of historical debate. But it is fair to say that in Islam, government authority does NOT come from the consent of the governed, but only from Allah. This poses quite a challenge for Islamic reformers and legal scholars, like UCLA professor Khaled Abou El Fadl, who strive to reconcile Islamic faith with individual rights and popular sovereignty.

There are skeptics who don’t think meaningful democracy can succeed in the Islamic world. There are still others who don’t want it to. But what is widely agreed upon – by critics and supporters alike – is that what the Islamic world needs is a reformation on a large scale. Given the reality of terrorism in the nuclear age and the threat that failed states pose to the global order, we need this reformation too. What if THIS is it? Sure, political revolution is a risky proposition. If it goes badly, it might fuel terrorism, pose a threat to Israel, spread chaos throughout the region and crush the hopes of millions of Egyptians. But what is the alternative? To support a regime that denies basic human rights? Can we rationalize the fixed elections and suppression of free expression by telling ourselves that the worst of the Islamist radicals are held in check? (Is that even true?) Shall we make the condescending excuse that the people of Egypt cannot handle freedom? What is the price for supporting the status quo? What is the cost of being on the wrong side of history? Talk about risky.

But the reality is that we are bystanders. President Obama and other world leaders have called for Mubarak to step down. They seek an orderly transition of power, but do they have the ability to shape events on the streets of Cairo? The likely successor, Vice President Omar Suleiman, is seen by some Egyptians as just another Mubarak. He is also the commander of Egypt’s military. Mubarak, who was expected to resign, announced yesterday that he wasn’t ready to do so. Victory celebrations in Tahrir Square turned to demonstrations of outrage.

Cairo, the city of a thousand minarets, is a massive place. Each day now there are many peaceful protests and great showings of solidarity. There is also anger and tension, clashes with police and roving gangs of looters in the streets. Tanks and armored military vehicles are on stand-by. Today, millions have gathered in Tahrir Square to answer the Friday call for prayer. One suspects that this is still the beginning. The world holds its breath.

______________________________________________

To Hell with Blasphemy

___________________________________________

“It is clear that blasphemy, which is a sin committed directly against God, is more grave than murder" - Thomas Aquinas

I just finished watching the first season of The Tudors on DVD. It has some problems. For one thing, it’s a trashy bodice-buster (the series could have been called, Kings Behaving Badly). It also suffers from historical inaccuracy and too many of its characters are paper-thin. But if you like a dramatic period piece, there’s enough to maintain interest. They do a nice job of weaving the historical events of Europe with the personal ambitions of the characters, most notably in the connection between the Protestant Reformation and Henry VIII’s passion for Anne Boleyn. Anne is a bit like Helen of Troy. Instead of launching a thousand ships, she, by arousing Henry’s lust, launches England into its break with the Catholic Church, changing forever the course of European (and American) history. What I find most interesting about The Tudors is its portrayal of religion at this pivotal moment in 16th century England.

In the last episode, the newly-appointed Lord Chancellor, Thomas More, announces that he will vigorously defend the true faith from the growing Lutheran heresy. In a powerful and disturbing scene, More (played by Jeremy Northam) watches as a heretic condemned for blasphemy is burned alive at the stake. More stares intently as the flames consume the screaming man as if he is fascinated by the chemistry experiment, the combination of flame and human flesh. That he is carrying out God’s justice is never in doubt. Years later, Thomas More, would be venerated by the Church for his own martyrdom, and he was regarded as a learned, principled and compassionate man even in his own day. It says a lot about how far we’ve come. Back then, even a “humanist” would have no hesitation in concluding that a person who believed the wrong thing about God deserved to die in flames. For what is the agony of one man when compared to the eternal torment of the multitudes who might be infected by such heresy?

But have we really come so far? On the same day I watched this entertaining television program, I learned about the civil unrest in Pakistan over its blasphemy laws. In Pakistan, the world’s largest Islamic nation, an insult to Islam or defamation of the Holy Prophet may be punishable by death. This isn’t simply the case of an anachronistic law remaining on the books in a traditional society (like a law which criminalizes adultery in Virginia).  Blasphemy has been in the news because in November, Asia Bibi, a 45-year-old Christian woman, an agricultural worker, had been sentenced to death for blasphemy. Unlike the heretics convicted in Thomas More’s England, this woman published no incendiary pamphlets, preached no doctrine and criticized no religious authority. Her particular offense was the touching of a drinking bowl that was being used by Muslim co-workers. Judging by the reaction, you’d think she drew a cartoon.

Reformers and human rights activists, embarrassed and outraged by the harshness of such laws, have been trying to repeal or change them for some time now, but with no success. Although judicial convictions for blasphemy have not resulted in any state executions (in Pakistan, at least), the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan has documented dozens of cases where the mere accusation of blasphemy has led to murder and false arrests of Christians and more often, members of minority sects within Islam. The Asia Bibi case has drawn considerable international attention and there has been pressure both within Pakistan and without to free the woman and to amend the laws. Pope Benedict XVI has weighed in and called for authorities to free the Christian woman. A reform bill was brought before Pakistan's Parliament. The bill did not call for the repeal of the blasphemy law, but it did eliminate the death penalty and called for some procedural safeguards against miscarriages of justice. It looked as if the reformers finally had some momentum.

What followed in Pakistan on Friday, December 31st was remarkable and every bit as disturbing as the burning of heretics by zealous inquisitors. Thousands of Pakistanis took the streets to protest any possible change to the nation’s blasphemy laws. Religious leaders called for a general strike, forcing businesses to close. Rallies were staged in Islamabad, Lahore, Karachi, Peshawar and Quetta. Karachi, a city of 13 million people was brought to a standstill and the police fired tear gas to stop protesters from marching on a residence of President Asif Ali Zadari. One Sunni cleric in Islamabad warned in his Friday sermon that any change to the blasphemy law would happen "over our dead bodies." To some religious Muslims, it is THAT important that such insults be punishable by death.

Does this kind of bullying and street politics on the part of religious extremists actually work? You bet it does. Within hours of the rallies, government officials were already distancing themselves from any bill or proposal to change the blasphemy laws. I imagine they'll figure out a way to pardon this poor woman and allow her to flee Pakistan to a place where, if she’s careful and sufficiently obscure, she should be able to handle as many water bowls as she likes. But don’t expect changes anytime soon to Pakistan’s blasphemy laws or to the culture of terror and intimidation that such laws engender.

Do these radical Islamists constitute a majority in Pakistan? Surely not, but their numbers and influence are sufficient that they can hijack the majority and get their way in an already unstable political regime. This time, the extremists left nothing to chance. One of their enemies and a prominent advocate for changing the law was Salman Taseer the Governor of Punjab, Pakistan’s largest province. In November, Taseer said: "The blasphemy law is not a God-made law. It's a man-made law," he said. "... It's a law that gives an excuse to extremists and reactionaries to target weak people and minorities.” Yesterday, Taseer was shot to death by his own security guard.

Why did the guard do it? Because, he told the police while in custody, Taseer "did blasphemy of the Prophet Mohammed." Let’s consider the mentality here. To express an incorrect religious view or to offend Islam is to defame the Holy Prophet.  This is a crime punishable by the state and punishable by death. And to propose any change to this law is also to insult the Holy Prophet. How does one combat such a mentality?

In the West, people tend to agree that criminalizing attitudes about religion is a bad idea. In the United States of America we go even further to protect freedom of conscience. Under our Constitution, the state can play no role in the establishment or endorsement of any religion or religious view. Any law seeking to criminalize blasphemy violates our First Amendment. This secular formula has fostered both freedom and prosperity. We didn’t arrive at this moment overnight. It was a long struggle and, as any look at European history will tell you, it was a bloody one.

It is often said that what the Islamic world needs is its own Reformation and its own Enlightenment. But the theology of Islam and the present conditions of the Islamic world make it difficult to identify potential catalysts for that kind of sweeping change. We don’t see a Martin Luther, a Henry VIII or an Anne Boleyn (maybe in a burka?)  And we can’t readily identify the sort of Enlightenment figures who would play the role of Montesquieu, John Locke or John Stuart Mill. These observations may cause us to simply throw up our hands, ignore world events and take smug comfort in the superiority of the West. We shouldn’t.

For one thing, the killing of the Governor of Punjab serves as a reminder that there are indeed individuals (and Muslims at that) willing to risk their lives for change and reform within Islamic society. Following the assassination of Taseer, Pakistan’s Federal Minister for Minorities, Shahbaz Bhatti told CNN. "I will campaign for this... these fanatics cannot stop me from moving any further steps against the misuse of (the) blasphemy law." When asked if he feared for his own life, Bhatti acknowledged that he has received many threats, but he said “I am ready to sacrifice my life for the principled stand I have taken because the people of Pakistan are being victimized under the pretense of blasphemy law." This is courage. As a nation that purports to champion freedom, we ought to acknowledge it and support it.*

We should also not make the mistake of thinking that this stuff is none of our business. If 9/11 has taught us anything, it taught us that the world is a much smaller place than we might wish it to be. Political instability and religious fanaticism in central Asia impacts our security, our interests, our good relations with other nations and it directly affects our ability to combat global terrorism. And blasphemy laws aren’t confined to “backwards” nations from those scary parts of the world.  Blasphemy is a criminal offense in Ireland. No, you won’t be sentenced to death, but you may be slapped with a hefty fine for taking the Lord’s name in vain or for other “blasphemous material.” This is defined as material "grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters held sacred by any religion” and it is criminal when the intent and result is "outrage among a substantial number of the adherents of that religion." Asia Bibi would not be safe in Ireland. The law is an embarrassment to any civilized person.

Of course in Ireland, you are at least free to protest such a silly law and can probably do so without fear of being lynched or gunned down. Still, such anti-freedom measures can only serve to embolden the theocratic instincts of others. Recently, a coalition of Muslim nations introduced an anti-blasphemy law before the General Assembly of the United Nations. The law, if passed, would make the “vilification of religion” a crime internationally. This proposed law makes no mention of Islam or the Holy Prophet. Indeed it is dressed up in the harmonious language of religious ecumenism, but let’s not be fooled. It is an attempt to both criminalize speech, and to utilize laws and the power of the state to coerce the “correct” views about religion. It is an offense to human dignity and a blow to freedom.


*Update -- On March 2, 2011, Shahbaz Bhatti was assassinated in Islambad. In response,Pakistan's delegate to the United Nation's Human Rights Council said that freedom of speech does not justify blasphemy. 
_____________________________________

Bonfires and Bloomberg

“Where they have burned books, they will end in burning human beings."

                               -- Heinrich Heine

 
 
I  first encountered this quote by Heinrich Heine when I was in elementary school learning about the Holocaust. I recall a black and white photograph of uniformed men wearing caps and swastika armbands, their faces glowing in the light of the flames as they tossed stacks of books onto a bonfire. The most grotesque thing about the picture wasn’t the fire or the physical destruction of books, our treasured symbols of civilization. It was the joyful carnival-like atmosphere of the scene. Alongside the photograph appeared Heine’s famous quotation.
 
As a humanist writing in the 19th century, Heine understood something of the dark potential lurking within the rise of German nationalism. It’s easy enough to read his quote as a foretelling of the Nazi Holocaust. It may also be understood as a more general comment about liberty and free expression and how the path to barbarism is paved by a willingness to combat ideas with flames. What is less appreciated is the actual context of Heine’s words. The excerpt comes from a play, Almansor, written in 1821 about the cruelty and ignorance of the Spanish Inquisition. The book that is being burned is the Koran.

Perhaps it’s a stretch to link the poetry and prescience of Heine with the nonsensical story that dominated last week’s news, the threat of a Koran Burning Day promoted by an idiot pastor in Gainesville, Florida. After all, the pastor may be a hateful moron but he's not acting under the authority of the State. He’s a lone extremist with a congregation of about 50 people. He does not represent Christianity or the United States of America or the people of Gainesville.  Clearly the whole thing was a sordid bit of sensationalism.  And yet, look how easy it is for a single actor, threatening to commit a single act of desecration, to dominate the headlines and create an international incident requiring a response from the President and Commander in Chief, the Secretary of Defense and General David Petraeus, the Commander of U.S. Forces Afghanistan. I'm guessing that they have better things to do.

I’m not sure which is worse, the moral sickness of the pastor or the fact that such idiocy really is capable of provoking actual violence in the world. Perhaps the sorriest commentary of all is the role our media plays in creating and giving attention to such a nonsensical story. Rather than informing citizens or stimulating meaningful discourse, the media essentially supplies the fuel for the bonfire. Conflagration sells.

Strangely, some have accused New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg of also stoking the flames of controversy but, actually, he’s been a refreshing voice of reason. "I happen to think that it is distasteful,” Bloomberg said last week, “But the First Amendment protects everybody, and you can't say that we're going to apply the First Amendment to only those cases where we are in agreement."

Exactly right. Some might have preferred a stronger condemnation of the burning act itself but that’s our job as citizens. His is to uphold laws and protect rights. New York’s billionaire mayor is nobody’s idea of a great orator and he's surely an unlikely candidate for praise as a defender of individual freedom, but on the all-important issues of rights and freedom, he’s been nearly pitch perfect just as he was when defending the right to build the Park51 Islamic Cultural Center.

“We may not always agree with every one of our neighbors,” Bloomberg stated then in his gruff tone, looking bored as usual at the podium. “That’s life. And it’s part of living in such a diverse and dense city. But we also recognize that part of being a New Yorker is living with your neighbors in mutual respect and tolerance. It was exactly that spirit of openness and acceptance that was attacked on 9/11.”

Not bad for a Bostonian. His statement was perfect because it went beyond the necessary affirmation of rights (there is no right to be respected by your neighbors) and eloquently captured the ethos of New York City and civil society itself. That should have been the end of things. Instead, we saw an absurd controversy  descend into an insulting display of emotional incoherence, civic ignorance and political demagoguery Regarding the furor over the Islamic Center, Bloomberg observed, "This is a political thing. It all came up in two months, and it's going to go away on November 4th."

Or even sooner if the media can find something else that’s flammable.
____________________________________________________

Mosque on the Hudson

What about the proposed mosque near Ground Zero?


On one hand, that roguish enemy of religion, Christopher Hitchens, is perfectly correct – what we are witnessing here is an alarmingly stupid debate, driven almost entirely by emotional incoherence and the lowest form of political demagoguery. But if the controversy is really so stupid, then why did Hitchens see fit to comment? Why did President Obama? Why are so many of us drawn to it? There’s something truly fascinating about the ferocity of emotion unleashed by this issue.

So why all the fuss? As a matter of rights and Constitutional Law, there’s no issue at all. In the United States of America, folks have the right to practice their religion even if you and I don’t like that religion or are offended by the beliefs that particular religion propagates. Freedom of religion includes the freedom to purchase land and operate a house of worship. To not know that is to not know the essentials of America’s history, the Constitution, or our founding principles. But enough Civics 101. Even Sarah Palin acknowledges that the Muslims behind the Park 51 Cordoba Initiative have the right to build a mosque (or more accurately here, an Islamic community center which includes a mosque). The question, Palin insists, is whether they should build it. That at least settles the practical aspect of the debate. If the organizers have a right to build it, what legitimate grounds are there for asking New York City (much less President Obama) to deny them that right? I’ve never heard a straight answer from Palin or anyone else.

But why do they have to build it there? This seems to be the question most often asked, though I’m never quite certain to whom this question is really being directed. The President? Mayor Bloomberg? NYC’s Landmark Preservation Committee? Feisal Abdul Rauf?

If you were to sort out the various comments made by those in opposition to the mosque – Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich, the Anti-Defamation League’s Abe Foxman, Sunday morning talking heads and any number of bloggers and Facebook posters, you might have heard (or imagined) an exchange along the following lines:

A: Look, I’m not saying they shouldn’t build a mosque, I’m just saying they shouldn’t build it there, at Ground Zero


B: But it’s not at Ground Zero. It’s on Park Place about half a mile away.


A: That’s still very close.


B: Is proximity the issue? There’s already a mosque roughly the same distance from Ground Zero (Masjid Manhattan on Warren Street). That mosque and another one in lower Manhattan (Masjid al-Farah on West Broadway), routinely turn away worshippers because they are overcrowded. Should we object to those mosques too?


A: Those mosques aren’t 13 stories high.


B: True. But what’s been proposed by the Cordoba Initiative is a multi-activity Islamic community center. Is it really the height that’s the problem?


A: Not just the height. But at that location, such a prominent Islamic building is an insult to the victims of 9/11.


B. Would a more modest architecture be less insulting? Should the President get involved and insist on some different building size or design in order to minimize insult?

What are we really talking about here?

Among civil people, the usual answer is: Sensitivity toward the victims of 9/11 and their families. That’s what we’re talking about. OK. At least we know what we’re dealing with. Sensitivity. But it’s amazing how many people suddenly feel qualified to speak for the 9/11 victims and the feelings of their families.

I don’t claim that right. I am not qualified to speak on behalf of the victims or their families, but I am fairly certain of this:  Neither are Sarah Palin or Newt Gingrich.  Unlike many of those claiming outrage, I do call myself a New Yorker. I lost a childhood friend on 9/11 and I lived close enough to Ground Zero that the sickening smell of burning flesh and rubble pervaded my nostrils for weeks and will remain in my memory forever. I don’t know what percentage of 9/11 family members really are offended by the Cordoba Initiative. I also don’t know what percentage is just as offended by the cynical exploitation of 9/11 by opportunistic politicians, especially those who don’t otherwise care much for New York City. But we do have some sense of how the community feels about the issue. The Local Community board for the actual neighborhood involved, including Ground Zero, voted 29 to 1 in favor of allowing the proposal.

But clearly some number of 9/11 family members are deeply hurt and offended - fairly, or not. Reasons are beside the point. This is raw stuff here. It’s not my place to tell any of them that they shouldn’t feel offended. But I will tell anyone that in a free society, offense is never sufficient grounds for denying others the right to practice their religion. But take heart, this freedom has a flip side. We should never allow offense to serve as a basis for stifling criticism either. That includes criticism of religion (a favorite point of Christopher Hitchens). Because if we are so willing to constrain our Constitutional freedoms, to kowtow to those who cry about hurt feelings, even in the name of “tolerance” or “hallowed ground,” we are practicing a corrosive form of capitulation that any free and decent society ought to resist.

We can at least acknowledge that an emotional response on the part of 9/11 family members is sincere and not calculated or ill-intentioned. Not so for the politicians. Florida’s gubernatorial candidate, Rick Scott provided a particularly disgusting example of how emotion and fear can be put in the service of demagoguery. And it’s not just the GOP.  Harry Reid was equally cowardly and opportunistic. But probably the least coherent “rationale” for opposing the Cordoba Initiative came from Newt Gingrich. “There should be no mosque near Ground Zero in New York so long as there are no churches or synagogues in Saudi Arabia,” said Gingrich. Really? So our commitment to First Amendment freedom should be placed in the hands of Saudi Mullahs? In order to prove a point to those Muslims, we ought to debase our own society to the oppressive level of a theocratic dictatorship? Brilliant. Surely, THAT will show them. THAT will make us safe.

Gingrich may not be interested to know it, but the Imam behind the project, Feisal Abdul Rauf, is a Sufi Muslim. In Saudi Arabia, Sufis have traditionally been targets of discrimination and abuse. Their shrines have been destroyed, their literature banned and their leaders excommunicated. While we don’t know what shape the completed Cordoba Initiative on Park Place will ultimately take, it’s a safe bet that it won’t be the sort of establishment that would ever be allowed to exist in Saudi Arabia.

I don’t suggest that Feisal Abdul Rauf, simply by virtue of being a Sufi, is admirably moderate or a good candidate for a more liberal, pro-western brand of Islam. Hitchens, for one, is skeptical, noting several controversial and disappointing statements made by the Imam following 9/11. (Nothing terribly shocking - just the ordinary bit about how 9/11 was the result of American foreign policy, Bin Laden was made in the USA, etc. etc.) Former President George W. Bush, on the other hand, held a more favorable view of Rauf, deciding that the Imam was exactly the right kind of Muslim. He even asked Rauf to represent the administration as a diplomat to help build a bridge between the United States and the Islamic World. The foreign policy views, intentions, and associations of Rauf are indeed fair questions for the public. But they are not the point of the current debate. We don’t get to say that only those clerics whose views and friends meet with our approval are entitled to build houses of worship.

When I listen to the public mosque debate (if we can be generous and call it that) it seems to me that many defenders of the mosque don’t quite have it right either. Some champion the Mosque proposal on the grounds of “tolerance.”  They like to remind us that Islam didn’t attack New York City on 9/11. Al-Qaeda did, and Al-Qaeda doesn’t represent all, or even most, of Islam. That’s true enough but it’s not very satisfying, probably because it’s not complete. It is superficial to frame this as a battle of manners between those urging “sensitivity” on one hand, and “tolerance” on the other. For one thing, tolerance is an overrated virtue. To “tolerate” something is to put up with something we don’t like. We do it only when we have to. The value that matters most here isn’t “tolerance” but freedom.

And what of the victims of 9/11?  Do we really dishonor them by building an Islamic center within a few blocks of this hallowed ground?  Well, we certainly don’t honor them by exploiting fear and division, by straining and shouting just to prevent that building. And let’s remember what actually happened on 9/11. The U.S. wasn’t merely attacked. We were violently joined in a war that has been raging for decades. A large portion of the world, from Northern Africa to Southeast Asia, has been ravaged by a war within Islamic world. It’s a conflict that exists irrespective of any particular U.S. foreign policy decision (and would certainly be taking place regardless of whether Israel existed or not). What we learned on 9/11 - or what we should have learned - is that we have a great stake in the outcome that war. Let’s remember that the primary victims of Al-Qaida’s Jihad are Muslims. And it is Muslims, who pray in mosques, who have been doing most of the suffering and dying at the hands of murderous Islamist extremists. If we lose sight of that, we also lose sight of what we are fighting when we say we are fighting terrorism.

I am not arguing that Islam is a peaceful religion (a statement we hear often – it’s more meaningless than false). But today, the questions of how Islam should express itself and who gets to define it are hotly contested and have enormous consequences for us. Consider Iran, a nation of 70 million Muslims. Here is a theocratic regime and regional power. Yet bristling beneath the harsh clerical rule is a significant reform movement, sympathetic to the west, and hungry for civil rights. Millions of Muslims seek to redefine their society, their laws and the role of Islam in their lives. Yet they are believers in Islam. Shall we conclude that only Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the Shi’a clerics are entitled to decide what it means to be Muslim in Iran? Similarly, shall we declare that Al-Qaida is the legitimate and authoritative voice of Islam globally? Isn’t that what we are essentially doing when we associate all things Islamic with the murderous vision and deeds of Al-Qaeda – and worse, when we use this as an excuse for curbing religious freedom at home?

Like most Americans, I too would like to see ordinary Muslims as well as Islamic leaders do more to distance themselves from the barbaric conduct and totalitarian views of the Jihadists. But shouldn’t we be encouraging them? Instead, with these mosque protests, we seem to be sending the message that their rights don’t matter and that we don’t care about their views – except for the ones that offend us. They need not bother with reform, with assimilation, with civic virtues or with resisting the likes of Bin Laden - we’ve already decided that Bin Laden speaks for them. When we do this, we show how unserious we are about fighting terrorism. We are essentially handing Bin Laden a crucial victory.

By indulging in the ugliness of this Ground Zero mosque controversy, we are missing a key point. It’s not that we need to make nice with Muslims for the sake of tolerance. It’s that we need to be true to our own values and principles of freedom for our own sake.

__________________________________________

The New Atheism

I have a confession. I’m a fan of the New Atheism.

Of course there’s nothing “new” about atheism. Atheism, agnosticism, skepticism and godlessness are as old as belief itself. The new atheism isn’t all that new either, or different from earlier varieties. But it is more confident. Within the past 5 years, there has been an observable trend in book publishing, and in cultural attitudes at large, challenging religious orthodoxy and conventions of faith. It is a trend most clearly reflected in three books: The End of Faith by Sam Harris, The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins and God is Not Great by Christopher Hitchens. These three writers, Harris, Dawkins and Hitchens comprise a sort of Unholy Trinity. (When joined with philosopher Daniel Dennett, author of Breaking the Spell, they become the Four Horsemen.)

I like all three books, partly because they appeal to my own skepticism concerning religion and faith-based assertions, but also, because they are well-written, incisive and appropriately provocative. In raising consciousness about the nature of dogma and of evidence, these books are sorely needed in a society plagued by an assault on reason, and in a world where religion and its depredations have truly run amok.

All three books are polemical, bold, engaging and lots of fun even as they are deadly serious. Yes, they skewer religions’ easy targets - Al-Qaeda, Jihad, the Spanish Inquisition, Jerry Falwell, anti-Semitism, homophobia - but they don’t stop there. They insist that religious “moderates” are also part of the problem. We often hear it said that religion itself isn’t bad – the trouble starts when extremists carry things too far. Dawkins, Harris and Hitchens are having none of that. They argue that well-intentioned moderates contribute to religion’s toxicity because they provide cover for extreme fundamentalists and Jihadists by making a virtue of faith itself – as if believing something for which there is insufficient evidence can ever be a good thing.

Harris, Dawkins and Hitchens have been accused by their critics (including fellow atheists) of going too far in their hostility toward religion. It’s a charge that Hitchens, at least, would happily embrace. Each takes careful aim at his target, but goes after it in a slightly different way and with different emphasis. Dawkins, the scientist, sets out to address why religion’s claims are not true. Harris emphasizes why such beliefs are so dangerous. And Hitchens argues for why they are wicked. All three books challenge the presumption that entitles a person to a heightened degree of respect when a particular view they hold is said to be rooted in religion. We see this all the time. When a person says “oh well, but that’s my faith,” that person’s view of reality is immunized from the give-and-take and criticism that comes with expression of any other opinion or idea. Our Unholy Trinity says “Enough!” Believing nonsense has consequences, and we should be brave enough to say so.

I enjoyed Dawkin’s The God Delusion the best, probably because my own interest in this subject stems from my study of evolutionary biology. Learning about evolution in school piqued my interest in science and enhanced my sense of wonder about the natural world. I’ve never understood the fear, expressed by some religious believers, that Darwinian evolution degrades life by reducing all things to the cold calculus of materialism. I always felt that the opposite was true. It always seemed to me that science, and evolution in particular, heightens our appreciation of life by enriching our understanding and by offering us glimpses into the majesty of nature and its workings.

I’ve enjoyed Dawkins writing for years, having first encountered his work in college when I read The Blind Watchmaker, which explains how evolution produces an illusion of design, but not evidence for a process guided by the supernatural. Dawkins is the rare scientist who can effectively reach a popular audience writing about evolutionary biology. So why write about atheism? One reason is because he see first-hand how fervently religious forces push for Creationism (cynically packaged as “Intelligent Design”) to be taught in public schools. For anyone who cares about science and academic integrity, that would be toxic enough, but there is more. For Dawkins, the evidence of evolution and the belief in a supernatural creator who designed the world are incompatible. He struggles to comprehend how a renowned biologist like Francis Collins can be really be a faithful Christians. Intellectual consistency, Dawkins argues, requires agnosticism at a minimum. He even wonders if such Christian biologists really do believe all they claim to believe. He figures that whereas they may believe in a Creator and embrace the cultural values of their religion, they are unlikely to believe in the suspension of the natural order, Miracles? Virgin births? Talking snakes? Personally, I have no idea what percentage of theist scientists (or non-scientists) believe in such things. But even if religious faith seems like cognitive dissonance to Dawkins, I am far more hesitant to question the sincerity of those who profess to believe.

But Dawkins is on solid ground when he takes on the famous position advanced by the late Stephen Jay Gould (who was an atheist) that science and religion occupy different spheres of human experience (“non-overlapping magisteria”) and are therefore perfectly reconcilable. Gould’s proposition sounds nice and cozy, but it doesn’t work. Religion does not simply describe some separate compartment of reality to be labeled “spiritual.” Rather, religion constitutes a system of belief that makes all kinds of claims about the physical world. For example, there is the claim that living forms were purposefully designed by a supernatural intelligence that has special regard for humans (to say nothing of virgin births and talking snakes). These are not metaphysical abstractions. They are statements of the natural order. When such claims are treated like any other hypothesis, they simply don’t hold up. Dawkins effectively takes on the various talking points advanced by religion’s apologists (“The Universe is too finely-tuned”, “It couldn’t all come from nothing,” “Evolution can’t account for morality,” etc). While a tone of annoyance and intellectual superiority does sometimes emerge in his writing, so does the force of his argument as well as his love of science and reverence for the natural world.

In The End of Faith, Sam Harris examines the nature of faith itself and the dangers of surrendering to it. A philosopher and neuroscientist at Stanford, Harris is a rising star in this milieu, a clear thinker and a strong writer. He details how religious doctrines, incompatible with reality and with each other, have Balkanized the world and now threaten us with destruction. He has no use for political correctness and isn’t afraid to single out Islam as the monotheism that is most likely to get us all killed. He easily dispenses with the canard that that secularism, and faith’s decline, were responsible for the crimes of Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot. Were Auschwitz, the Gulag and the Killing Fields really the result of too much rational inquiry? Too much skepticism? Too much insistence on evidence? Hardly. These atrocities resulted from dogmartic ideologies which operated all too much like religion.

Harris is also interested in the possibility of transcendental experience and maintains that these are as available to the atheist as they are to any religious believer. But what seems to interest him most, is changing the nature of public discourse when we think and talk about things like faith and religion. As he observes in his follow-up work, Letters to a Christian Nation:

When considering the truth of a proposition, one is either engaged in an honest appraisal of the evidence and logical arguments, or one isn't. Religion is the one area of our lives where people imagine that some other standard of intellectual integrity applies.

Hitchens is the most scathing and mischievous of the three writers. Ever the iconoclast, his glee is palpable in God is Not Great as he pokes a stick in the eye of the faith-based establishment and calls on humanity to emancipate itself from the infantile crutch of religion. He insists that monotheism is inherently totalitarian since God is, by definition, a celestial dictator who supervises you around the clock and promises to punish you for your very thoughts. Hitchens is not above blasting the easy targets like child-molesting clergymen and you can almost discern his smirk while he suggests that the motto of the Church might well be “No Child’s Behind Left.” Too clever.

The more serious charge is also more forcefully argued – that religion’s fundamental teachings are not moral teachings. Like Harris, he observes that not all monotheisms are equal and indeed, the Al Qaeda attck on 9/11 was the impetus for his book. He reminds us that theocratic terror takes many forms. Hitchens is good friends with Salaman Rushdie, who dared blaspheme Islam’s Prophet more than 20 years ago in his novel, Satanic Verses. Rushdie still requires a security detail because of a Fatwa issued by Iran’s Ayatollah. Hitchens recalls the infamous Danish cartoon incident. The publication of a cartoon poking fun of Mohammed led to an international incident, a breach of diplomatic immunity and murderous riots by angry Muslims. Hitchens has no patience for those who make excuses for thugs and rioters or who call on cartoonists to be more “sensitive” about the offense that might be taken. He correctly calls it what it is: cowardice, capitulation and an erosion of freedom.

Judaism is not spared either. He blasts the zealotry of Israel’s Messianic settlers, the practice of circumcision (“genital mutilation”), the Old Testament’s warrant for sexism and genocide and the hideous lesson at the core of all Abrahamic monotheism - that a willingness to kill at God’s command should be seen as praiseworthy. (He does, however approve of the Jewish tradition of self-criticism, secularism and talent for atheism). But Hitchens is just getting warmed up as he moves to his next target: Christianity. Because as brutal as the Old Testament is, at least when you’re dead, your punishment is over. Only with the advent of Christianity and the teachings of the gentle Nazarene, are you threatened with eternal never-ending torture. Christianity also introduces the barbaric concept of vicarious redemption, the idea that you can be saved, absolved of your own wrongful conduct, by means of the brutal blood sacrifice of another, 2,000 years before you were born. Then there’s Original Sin, the Trinity and well…you get the picture.

Perhaps what offends Hitchens most is the notion that without some supervisory dictator calling the shots, humans would not know how to behave morally. Religion, he concludes, belongs to an earlier time when humanity lived in terror of nature, and understood little about disease, geology, astronomy, archaeology, physics, neuro-chemistry etc. We have far better explanations now. It is time to dispense with the superstitious wish-thinking, which insults our humanity and threatens our very survival.

Not surprisingly, given the success of these books, there has been something of a backlash. College campuses host debates on the existence of God, the blogosphere is alive with fury, and Christian Apologists have published screeds blasting the New Atheism for its militant tone, its unsparing naturalism and, predictably enough, for attempting to unhinge our moral underpinning as a nation. For Christian fundamentalists, the success of the New Atheists is simply the latest call to arms in the “Culture Wars.” For these right-wing holy warriors, this spate of atheism is part and parcel of the same godless secularism that seeks to separate church and state, supports gay marriage and teaches evil -ution. Of course this political effort to impose a fundamentalist Christian vision of America represents the very religious bullying that has given the New Atheism such traction and popularity.

More interesting are the objections posed by fellow secularists who insist that the New Atheists are too strident and aggressive for their own good. For these critics, many of whom are non-believers themselves, the New Atheism is like an unruly kid brother who speaks out of turn and must be instructed to tone it down in the presence of respectable company. Shhh! How can we expect to get public support for science if you are telling parents that science and religion are incompatible? And do you really think the Muslim world will be persuaded to curb its Jihadists and reform its society when you insist that the Koran is a fairy tale? These are valid points. But to the extent they are objections to the New Atheism, they are about tone and tactics – not propositions of truth.

Polls indicate that the percentage of Americans who are non-believers is on the rise in the U.S. To be sure, polls of this kind must always be taken with a grain of salt. So much is in the wording of the questions (asking “Do you identify yourself as an atheist” will produce a very different result than “Do you believe in the God of the bible?”). But the trend seems real enough. The New Atheist authors aren’t the cause of the trend, but it’s fair to say that their popularity is a reflection of it. Their arguments resonate with Americans who are tired of religious bullying at home and faith-based violence around the globe.

I don’t think that any of these books will actually persuade anyone, who isn’t already deeply skeptical of the divine, to suddenly become an atheist. But the books succeed on a more important level: They tear at the shroud of taboo that discourages people from thinking and speaking critically about articles of faith. They encourage a closer look at the consequences – intellectual, moral and geopolitical - of rejecting reason and evidence in favor of supernatural belief and religious authority. Finally, they invite us take part in the fullness of life’s experiences and celebrate the “awe of understanding” on human terms. On this point, I’ll leave the last word to Charles Darwin:

There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.

And on that note, Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and Happy New Year!

______________________________________________

On Liberty and the Ballpark

I am the sort of secular humanist who rolls his eyes at those public figures and politicians who feel they must constantly invoke God and proclaim, “God Bless America.” At best, it’s pandering. At worst, it hints at a disregard for separation of Church and State, a principle enshrined in our Constitution and the basis for our most cherished freedom, freedom of conscience. What’s more, it’s annoying.

But I must admit, I have always liked the song God Bless America. Musically, it is superior to both The Star Spangled Banner and America the Beautiful. The former is derived from a popular British drinking song and the latter is almost dirge-like, a plodding number (except, of course, when Ray Charles sings it). It manages to soar in its final verse but it doesn’t succeed nearly as well as the crescendo and finale of God Bless America. Lyrically too, Irving Berlin’s composition enjoys poetic simplicity and a feel that is contemporary, even timeless. It can’t match The Star Spangled Banner for historical authenticity or patriotic expression. (Francis Scott Key did not work on Tin Pan Alley, he really did write his poem aboard a prison ship with live ordinance exploding around him). But it is superior to America the Beautiful, a song weighed down by piety and stodgy phrases. (“and crown they good with brotherhood”).

The singing of “God Bless America” has long been connected with sporting events. There is the great tradition of Kate Smith singing before the home games of the Philadelphia Flyers. In 1980, when the U.S. hockey team upset the Russians in the Miracle on Ice at the Lake Placid Olympics, the fans in the arena burst into a spontaneous singing of “God Bless America.” It was remarkable. When patriotism wells up in our hearts, when America wants reach for something extra, this is the song that we go to.

And then 9/11. On the day of the tragedy, members of Congress sang God Bless America on the Capitol steps. When professional baseball resumed play, the song was added to the between-innings repertoire. Take Me Out the Ball Game seemed insufficient by itself, and at the same time, frivolous. How could we sing about peanuts and Cracker Jacks when the smoke was still rising from the rubble at Ground Zero? No, we needed something solemn but also uplifting. Something to make us feel good, strong and together. God Bless America seemed the perfect expression of what needed to be expressed. Who can forget the first time they heard the “singing policeman,” tenor, Daniel Rodriguez called upon to sing at Yankee Stadium? Even the most cynical atheist could not hear his soaring rendition and fail to get goose bumps.

Over time, the spontaneous becomes routine and the routine becomes ritual. I was at Citi-Field last month for my first baseball game in some time. The announcement came in the Seventh Inning. “Please stand at attention and remove your hats for the singing of God Bless America.” I found myself wondering, why are we doing this? Of course we’re still at war. The enemies who would destroy America are as threatening as ever. And sure, a baseball audience provides an opportunity for the expressions of national unity. But we’ve already saluted our nation and our flag during the singing of the National Anthem. We already gave cheers of thanks and appreciation for our troops stationed in Iraq and Afghanistan. But none of that is enough, it seems. We must also beseech God. It was the first time I ever heard the song that way and I found myself resenting, not so much the song, but the ritual that had been created for it.

Some will say I am overreacting. It’s just a song, not a prayer, right? It’s not as if Major League Baseball, much less the government, is establishing religion in the ballpark. Don’t we do this same thing, more or less, for the National Anthem? Well, not exactly. First of all, the song was indeed written as a prayer. Irving’s Berlin’s introductory lyrics make that clear (“as we raise our voices, in a solemn prayer.”) And when we remove our hats and stand at attention for the National Anthem, it is our nation’s flag, and its ideals, we are saluting. When we are asked to show the same reverence for God Bless America, who is it we are saluting? Clearly, it is not just a song. And if you happen to be one of the tens of millions of Americans who do not believe in God, (or even if you do, but don’t care to invoke his blessing to be bestowed on a single nation during the seventh inning stretch), the social pressure may be very real.

In John Stuart Mill’s famous essay On Liberty we are warned about the dangers of this form of social coercion:

Society can and does execute its own mandates; and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with which it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. Protection, therefore, against the tyranny of the magistrate is not enough; there needs protection also against the tyranny of the prevailing opinion and feeling, against the tendency of society to impose, by other means than civil penalties, its own ideas and practices as rules of conduct on those who dissent from them; to fetter the development and, if possible, prevent the formation of any individuality not in harmony with its ways, and compel all characters to fashion themselves upon the model of its own.

No, I am not accusing Major League Baseball or the New York Mets of instituting tyranny at the ballpark. Nobody is forced to stand at attention, or salute or sing, but there is an expectation of conformity, an expectation that grates against individual conscience. Now we all face pressure to conform in various aspects of our lives, but this here is not the routine sort of pressure we face when society chooses the fashions and tastes it prefers. Here, we are pressured to publically acknowledge God and beseech Him to bless the nation. It is the exact kind of social coercion that J.S. Mill described. One can easily imagine the social cost you’d pay if you dissented, if you failed to conform or actually sought to “disestablish” the singing of God Bless America. At a minimum, your patriotism would be questioned, your motives impugned.

In most ballparks, the singing of God Bless America is now an occasional feature rather than an everyday one, But that isn’t because ballparks were persuaded to honor freedom of conscience. It’s because they’ve decided to roll out their sacred number on Sundays and special occasions. To be fair, you do have the choice. You are not obligated invoke the Deity in the seventh inning. You can stay home or you can ignore the announcement, remain seated, leave your hat on, fold your arms and hope nobody notices or, if they do, that they respect your principles and in no way regard your choice as one that reflects poorly on your patriotism, your character or your standing in the community. But why bother? It’s so much easier to simply conform. It’s only a song. Just sing along or, alternatively, mouth the words and convince yourself that they have no meaning. What’s the harm? Peanuts and cracker jacks are just around the corner.