Here is the
latest nanny state law:
DENVER – A new law requiring people to report elderly abuse will go into effect July 1. The elderly are often targets for physical and financial-exploitation crimes. ...
Starting July 1, it is mandatory for many people who work with or for the elderly to report abuse within 24 hours. The law defines elderly as anyone 70 years old or older.
Everyone has an opinion about what is or is not abuse. Here is Richard Dawkins', the world's most famous atheist scientist:
He was asked whether parents who instil in their children a belief in God are subjecting them to a form of child abuse.
Dawkins wouldn’t be drawn - he wouldn’t go that far.
'To call it testament to child abuse would be a bit strong, but when you tell a child to mind their Ps and Qs otherwise they’ll roast in hell then that is tantamount to child abuse,' he said.
However, last year Dawkins made the comparison of teaching religion without questioning was the same as child abuse.
He said he was against the 'indoctrination of religion' and teaching it as fact.
Professor Dawkins, a biologist who revolutionised the theory of evolution with his 1976 book The Selfish Gene, added that he thought it was still important to teach children about different faiths.
During his talk at the Cheltenham Science festival, he also shared memories from his prep school years which were dominated by bullying, cold showers and bruises.
He revealed that a master at the school once 'put a hand down his shorts.'
The atheist writer and intellectual has previously sparked fury by suggesting the recent spate of child sex abuse scandals has been overblown.
The 'God Delusion' author said that such incidents should not be judged by modern standards.
Religion is one area where parents are entitled to teach their beliefs to their kids, even if others say that those beliefs are fairy tales.
3 comments:
How could any real scientist not be an atheist ? You can't be objective if you truly believe in these religious fairy tales.
Maybe so, but Dawkins is a typical academic liberal who believes in intervening in peoples lives, and I would not want him deciding what is or is not "the same as child abuse."
I don't see the problem. Using the threat of eternal hell to manage occasional little annoyances is certainly abusive. That is - it's abusive when the parent routinely uses tis tactic. Just as it's abusive when bad parents routinely swat their kids about the head.
Horrible as it is to see children taught to believe in hell, it's not abuse when the parent believes it, when the parent is honestly trying to protect their kids from something they think is a terrible and real danger.
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