Creationism is a threat to human rights

Ivanhoe · #1 (**permalink**) 10-08-2007, 10:28 PM

Is Creationism a Threat to Human Rights?

But that's not a problem. We are supposed to keep our values out of the secular arena anyway.

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s if the world needed another crazy development, the Council of Europe, the continent's central human rights body, last week declared creationism to be a threat to human rights. The group's Parliamentary Assembly approved a resolution stating that creationism is promoted by "forms of religious extremism."

As Reuters reported:

The Council, based in the eastern French city of Strasbourg, oversees human rights standards in member states and enforces decisions of the European Court of Human Rights.

The resolution, which passed 48 votes to 25 with 3 abstentions, is not binding on the Council's 47 member states but reflects widespread opposition among politicians to teaching creationism in science class.

Ivanhoe · #2 (**permalink**) 10-08-2007, 10:30 PM

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This body is seriously concerned that creationism is not only a threat to their secularized educational systems, but to democracy itself.

That statement is true as it stands. The Bible is a threat to democracy.

victorbravo · #3 (**permalink**) 10-08-2007, 11:00 PM

I wonder how they get human rights out of evolution???? They certainly can't be "right".

aleksanderpolo · #4 (**permalink**) 10-08-2007, 11:17 PM

Romans 1:22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools, 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things. 24 Therefore God gave them up...

Timothy William · #5 (**permalink**) 10-09-2007, 09:01 AM

The Council of Europe has created a nebulous "right to education" as a human right which supposedly every person in the EU enjoys. Apart from the obvious problem that no one can have an inherent "right" which obligates someone else to provide a service, it is undefined what exactly qualifies as education. Hence any teaching which contradicts a part of the (undefined) education that everyone has a right to could violate their human rights.

Southern Presbyterian · #6 (**permalink**) 10-09-2007, 09:12 AM

The more nebulous the rules the more important the government becomes as interpreter and enforcer. The main reason governments seek to dethrone God is so they can sit in His place.

Thank the Lord that He has shown us the ultimate folly of these schemes in Psalm 2.

Daniel Ritchie · #7 (**permalink**) 10-09-2007, 09:15 AM

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Originally Posted by victorbravo

I wonder how they get human rights out of evolution???? They certainly can't be "right".

How can beings evolved from pond-slime have rights? How can men have rights unless they are created in the image of God?

puritan lad · #8 (**permalink**) 10-09-2007, 09:35 AM

I guess the Declaration of Independence is a threat to human rights as well. Who would've thought?

caddy · #9 (**permalink**) 10-09-2007, 09:59 AM

The latest Breakpoint from Colson sheds some interesting light on the Old vs. the New Atheist:

One of the biggest obstacles facing what’s called the “New Atheism” is the issue of morality. Writers like Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, and Christopher Hitchens have to convince people that morals and values are possible in a society that does not believe in God.

It’s important to understand what is not in doubt: whether an individual atheist or agnostic can be a “good” person. Of course they can, just as a professing Christian can do bad things.
The issue is whether the secular worldview can provide a basis for a good society. Can it motivate and inspire people to be virtuous and generous?

Not surprisingly, Richard Dawkins offers a “yes”—grounded in Darwinism. According to him, natural selection has produced a moral sense that is shared by all people. While our genes may be, in his words “selfish,” there are times when cooperation with others is the selfish gene’s best interest. Thus, according to him, natural selection has produced what we call altruism.

Except, of course, that it is not altruism at all: It is, at most, enlightened self-interest. It might explain why “survival of the fittest” is not an endless war of all against all, but it offers no reason as to why someone might give up their lives or even their lifestyle for the benefit of others, especially those whom they do not even know.
Darwinist accounts of human morality bear such little resemblance to the way real people live their lives that the late philosopher Michael Stove, an atheist himself, called them a “slander against human beings.”

Being unable to account for human altruism is not enough for Sam Harris, author of Letter to a Christian Nation. In a recent debate with Rick Warren, he complained about Christians “contaminating” their altruistic deeds in places like Africa with “religious ideas” like “the divinity of Jesus.” Instead of rejoicing at the alleviation of suffering, he frets over someone hearing the Gospel.

In response, Warren pointed out the inconvenient (for Harris, that is) truth: You won’t find many atheists feeding the hungry and ministering to the sick in places like Africa or Mother Teresa’s Calcutta. It is precisely because people believe in the divinity of Jesus that they are willing to give up their lives (sometimes literally) in service to those whom Jesus calls “His brothers.” And that’s why my colleagues and I spend our lives ministering in prisons.
In contrast, the record of avowedly atheistic regimes is, shall we say, less than inspiring. Atheist regimes like the Soviet Union, Red China, and Cambodia killed tens of millions of people in an effort to establish an atheistic alternative to the City of God. For men like Stalin and Mao, people were expendable precisely because they were not created in the image of a personal God. Instead, they were objects being manipulated by impersonal historical forces.

One atheist understood the moral consequences of his unbelief: That was Nietzsche, who argued that God is dead, but acknowledged that without God there could be no binding and objective moral order.
Of course, the “New Atheists” deny this. Instead, they unconvincingly argue that you can have the benefits of an altruistic, Christian-like morality without God.

Nietzsche would laugh—and wonder why they don’t make atheists like they used to.

Link: Nietzsche Would Laugh - Prison Fellowship

bradofshaw · #10 (**permalink**) 10-09-2007, 10:04 AM

Hmmm... let's take a look at secularism's record on human rights

French Revolution: check
Nazi Germany: check
Stalin's Russia: check
Mao's Cultural Revolution: check

Well, I guess they all passed. Yes, creationism is definitely a threat to human rights.

Daniel Ritchie · #11 (**permalink**) 10-09-2007, 10:07 AM

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Originally Posted by bradofshaw

Hmmm... let's take a look at secularism's record on human rights

French Revolution: check
Nazi Germany: check
Stalin's Russia: check
Mao's Cultural Revolution: check

Well, I guess they all passed. Yes, creationism is definitely a threat to human rights.

Christians have such a poor record in comparison

Answerman · #12 (**permalink**) 10-09-2007, 11:40 AM

If it is a "human right" not to have any opposition to the secular humanist establishment, then yes, creationism is a threat to "human rights". But they certainly cannot be considered universal, objective, invariant and abstract rights since you will not find any two people that agree on what should be considered a body of human rights. Therefore, if you concede this construct of "human rights", then those who have the most fire-power gets to determine what our "human rights" are. What a scary thought.

But if human rights are endowed by our creator, then human rights can only be determined by Him.

caddy · #13 (**permalink**) 10-09-2007, 11:45 AM

^
Good Point David

BobVigneault · #14 (**permalink**) 10-09-2007, 11:46 AM

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For some people the Creation, as a matter of religious belief, gives a meaning to life. Nevertheless, the Parliamentary Assembly is worried about the possible ill-effects of the spread of creationist ideas within our education systems and about the consequences for our democracies. If we are not careful, creationism could become a threat to human rights which are a key concern of the Council of Europe.

That is mind boggling. That just defies all reason. How upside down can a society get????

DMcFadden · #15 (**permalink**) 10-09-2007, 11:53 AM

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Originally Posted by BobVigneault

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For some people the Creation, as a matter of religious belief, gives a meaning to life. Nevertheless, the Parliamentary Assembly is worried about the possible ill-effects of the spread of creationist ideas within our education systems and about the consequences for our democracies. If we are not careful, creationism could become a threat to human rights which are a key concern of the Council of Europe.

That is mind boggling. That just defies all reason. How upside down can a society get????

Pretty upside down. Try living in LA LA land on the left coast some time. BTW, did you have a holiday yesterday? We didn't. The school district didn't want to celebrate the imperialistic triumphalism of a genocidal racist and his rapacious conquest. I realized it was a holiday when no mail came.

Daniel Ritchie · #16 (**permalink**) 10-09-2007, 12:13 PM

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Originally Posted by BobVigneault

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For some people the Creation, as a matter of religious belief, gives a meaning to life. Nevertheless, the Parliamentary Assembly is worried about the possible ill-effects of the spread of creationist ideas within our education systems and about the consequences for our democracies. If we are not careful, creationism could become a threat to human rights which are a key concern of the Council of Europe.

That is mind boggling. That just defies all reason. How upside down can a society get????

Never mind the fact that evolution was used to justify the horrors of Nazism.

Answerman · #17 (**permalink**) 10-09-2007, 12:24 PM

It's more like a threat to their power structure, to which, I say teach creation all the more to our children, that's what I do. Eventually, my children are going to write research papers on many of the same subjects that Greg Bahnsen did. Oh how I relish that thought. Gates of hell, watch out!

lwadkins · #18 (**permalink**) 10-09-2007, 12:30 PM

You know, i am aware that i shouldn't be surprised, but i always am.

Daniel Ritchie · #19 (**permalink**) 10-09-2007, 12:38 PM

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Originally Posted by Answerman

It's more like a threat to their power structure, to which, I say teach creation all the more to our children, that's what I do. Eventually, my children are going to write research papers on many of the same subjects that Greg Bahnsen did. Oh how I relish that thought. Gates of hell, watch out!

Great!!!

Greg · #20 (**permalink**) 10-09-2007, 06:56 PM

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According to him, natural selection has produced a moral sense that is shared by all people.

According to him? Why is anyone under any obligation to buy into his subjective speculations? If in fact evolution has produced the sense of morality in people, as he states, and plainly not all people are morally the same or are on equal moral ground, by what authority do we condemn someone whose actions are the result of a "lesser" moral sense than our own, if in fact morality is merely the result of randomness and chance? Afterall, he's simply acting in accordance with the electro-chemical reactions within his brain...the result of blind chance. Whose to say he's wrong? To what binding universal standard for humanity does someone like Dawkins appeal to?

caddy · #21 (**permalink**) 10-09-2007, 07:19 PM

Want to hear more along this line...check out the Audio files from the Dawkins / Lennox Debate last week:

'Debate between Richard Dawkins and John Lennox' by Richard Dawkins, John Lennox - RichardDawkins.net

According to Dawkins, we humans have a lust to do good evolving from our small group cohabitation.

mm?

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Originally Posted by Greg

Quote:

According to him, natural selection has produced a moral sense that is shared by all people.

According to him? Why is anyone under any obligation to buy into his subjective speculations? If in fact evolution has produced the sense of morality in people, as he states, and plainly not all people are morally the same or are on equal moral ground, by what authority do we condemn someone whose actions are the result of a "lesser" moral sense than our own, if in fact morality is merely the result of randomness and chance? Afterall, he's simply acting in accordance with the electro-chemical reactions within his brain...the result of blind chance. Whose to say he's wrong? To what binding universal standard for humanity does someone like Dawkins appeal to?