1. Comment #163593 by Serdan on April 18, 2008 at 3:21 pm

Despicable.

I hate humans.

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2. Comment #163596 by Prankster on April 18, 2008 at 3:27 pm

Woeful and pitiful-this subject is a special bugbear of mine. Using children this way is despicable-makes me sick to be part of the same speices sometimes.....

These parents are total pondlife. First posting tonight on here and now I'm bummed out

Nighty night all

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3. Comment #163601 by lucascantor on April 18, 2008 at 3:41 pm

Ugh. Sad...

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4. Comment #163638 by Styrer- on April 18, 2008 at 5:04 pm

Richard's repeated condemnation of the religious indoctrination of children as child abuse is sometimes itself condemned as being too strong, too intolerant and too strident. I defy any thinking human to listen to this piece and not conclude that Richard can never go too far in his condemnation of the absolute cunts claiming to be parents who are destroying their children's lives in this way.

When will the fucking law step in, in cases like this, and take the children into care?

As for 'Bob Pull' (?) - on what possible ground can this faithhead really stake his claim that this kind of child abuse is wrong? Can he not see that he, as much as he may care for a child preacher's safety on the streets, is, like every other lily-livered, moderately pious faithnut, precisely part of the fucking problem from the outset?

And I certainly wonder what kind of 'devout atheist' the here-in mother must have been to hear the media-encouraged utterings about 'god' of her 4-year old daughter and to then stomp around hill and dale, from religion to religion, before being 'born again' as an atheist.

With parents like this, the poor little fuckers never stood a chance anyway.

This despicable shit cannot be permitted to continue.

Styrer

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5. Comment #163645 by black wolf on April 18, 2008 at 5:22 pm

I'm so glad that we have laws in Germany against this kind of child abuse, and I'm even more glad that church authorities agree with the law to prevent and to stop such parents.

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6. Comment #163649 by HourglassMemory on April 18, 2008 at 5:35 pm

I wonder if these kids, one day, will feel extremely threatned due to criticism and will begin to take insane action towards it.

All you need is to provoke. The seed is there, as you can sadly hear.
Then all they have to do is be passionate and do something stupid and inane.

Why do religious people look insane when they're passionate?

One thing you don't want to see "adapting" in evolutionary terms, is religion, to changing cultures. It just spreads the virus further.

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7. Comment #163654 by Jack Rawlinson on April 18, 2008 at 5:56 pm

See, this would work on me because whenever I need insight into the important issues of life, experience, reality and existence, an eight-year old child is definitely my first port of call.

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8. Comment #163661 by Santi Tafarella on April 18, 2008 at 6:15 pm

Styrer,

I am at a computer without a speaker, so I cannot (at this moment) hear the audio. I'll listen later tonight. But while I'm waiting, what rights do you think parents should have? What constitutes indoctrination, in your view? Can parents teach their children about hell--or is that abuse?

I think teaching a child about hell is abusive, but I wouldn't take children from parents who teach their children about hell--or threaten them with hell.

Would you?

Also, I may be jumping the gun on the audio before I've heard it, but I surmise that there are some parents turning their eight year olds into little fire-breathing preachers. Is that the gist? And if so, would you also prevent parents from putting their little girls in beauty contests ala "Little Miss Sunshine?"

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9. Comment #163662 by Son.of.God on April 18, 2008 at 6:17 pm

I want to be a preacher.

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10. Comment #163663 by akado on April 18, 2008 at 6:19 pm

around here in the south stuff like this isn't exactly abnormal,
it's actually common to have kids come u- and preach for an indivisual church and they believe pretty much everything the child says as uyoung as age 6 as far as I have seen. =P

getting to the kids with religion is one of the sickest, twisted, and pure idiotic move by any community or parent in this world.........

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11. Comment #163669 by Styrer- on April 18, 2008 at 6:36 pm

Comment #163661 by Santi Tafarella on April 18, 2008 at 6:15 pm

Styrer,

I am at a computer without a speaker, so I cannot (at this moment) hear the audio. I'll listen later tonight. But while I'm waiting, what rights do you think parents should have? What constitutes indoctrination, in your view? Can parents teach their children about hell--or is that abuse?

I think teaching a child about hell is abusive, but I wouldn't take children from parents who teach their children about hell--or threaten them with hell.

Would you?

Also, I may be jumping the gun on the audio before I've heard it, but I surmise that there are some parents turning their eight year olds into little fire-breathing preachers. Is that the gist? And if so, would you also prevent parents from putting their little girls in beauty contests ala "Little Miss Sunshine?"

Santi


Please confirm to me that you understand the huge difference between teaching a child about the concept of hell - which is not abuse - and teaching same child that s/he will suffer eternal agony in hell if certain codes are not followed, which certainly is.

The former is education, the latter indoctrination, and abuse.

Have a listen, when you can, to this piece and then decide for yourself.

Best,
Styrer

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12. Comment #163673 by Caracus on April 18, 2008 at 6:40 pm

Santi why bother posting if you haven't listened to the clip? Please listen to the audio. The contents of this report go far further than just scaring children with hell. The poor kids in this clip are right up there with the four year old Muslims shouting death to Jews (much like the Hitler youth in the 30's and 40s also indoctrinated by there parents). Basically these immature human beings have been convinced by the evil parents that they should take up the role of a firebrand preacher only shortly after they are able to read and write. I doing so the parents expose the children to actual physical danger (by picketing abortion clinics) and of course untold metal abuses in not letting them develop normally. Children should be allowed to be children. If you listen to the clip and still think the parents are fit to bring up children then I think you will find many people that would question your judgement should you be anywhere near children! Maybe calling them the 'c' word is a bit strong for your taste and it is a bit vulgar but these parents are truly wicked and it is only right to state that.

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13. Comment #163679 by Karlsson on April 18, 2008 at 6:58 pm

Who listens to a child preacher? God himself waited until he was 30 according to the bible...

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14. Comment #163685 by Styrer- on April 18, 2008 at 7:13 pm

Comment #163679 by Karlsson on April 18, 2008 at 6:58 pm

He was metaphorically 30, you goon.

Fuck's sake.

Best,
Styrer

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15. Comment #163688 by Russell Blackford on April 18, 2008 at 7:22 pm

Unfortunately, not all actions that I consider child abuse are amenable to criminalisation in a liberal society. In some cases, the state can't take a stance on whether I'm right or wrong without breaching the wall of separation between church and state. In those cases, we are left with consciousness raising.

But for the record, I do consider terrifying children with threats of hellfire to be abusive. I don't think Dawkins is being at all too strong or strident in saying this, or that he's being intolerant in any bad sense.

He quite explicitly is not asking that such actions be stopped by means of the coercive power of the state, so he's conforming with basic liberal tolerance. I see no reason to tolerate such abuse in any more generous sense than that. I think we should go on saying that it is serious child abuse, even it's not a form of abuse that's apt for legal prohibition.

To tolerate something something doesn't mean liking it; it means putting up with it even though you don't like it (and may even think it morally wrong). Liberal tolerance requires that the state put up with many things in the sense of not actually banning them, but that's not a reason for individual citizens to back off condemning those things in strong terms.

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16. Comment #163690 by markg on April 18, 2008 at 7:24 pm

Son.of.God

I want to be a preacher.

As I recall, you were a preacher, about 2008 years ago. Edit: Is old age getting the better of your memory?

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17. Comment #163702 by EvidenceOnly on April 18, 2008 at 8:13 pm

Child Abuse #1: All religions know that they need to steal the mind of people before they develop the skills of critical thinking that would prevent such indoctrination. We have evolved over millions of years to the point that we have the ability to think. It is ironic that religions who believe that a supernatural being created us that way do everything they can to prevent people from using these skills.

Child Abuse #2: What Christopher Hitchens calls the "No child's behind left" doctrine of the Catholic Church. The Pope is really the CEO of a world-wide day care center (where they keep young and old away from critical thinking). He and his organization have protected thousands and thousands of pedophile priests to protect the "assets" of the organization. If a school principal did this, he/she would get life without parole. This week, our "No Child Left Behind" leader welcomed the "No Child's Behind Left" leader with open arms. Despicable! A hypocritical apology is not sufficient.

We cannot be harsh enough against all forms of child abuse. Religion is not off limits in this.

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18. Comment #163703 by Quine on April 18, 2008 at 8:15 pm

Too sad for words.

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19. Comment #163704 by Styrer- on April 18, 2008 at 8:18 pm

Comment #163688 by Russell Blackford on April 18, 2008 at 7:22 pm

Russell

While I see your point, the US Child Protective Services body does have some legal recourse when it comes to 'psychological abuse' of children, though its range is limited (state-wise).

To include religion-invoked child abuse under its 'psychological abuse' remit may be a leap for such a body to make legally, but such leaps are the stuff of precedents.

We should, as you say, continue to condemn as much as possible as individual citizens, but I think the law may provide for rather more than you assume, if the issue were pushed by sufficiently adventurous counsel, prepared to argue that the establishment clause is in no way at odds with protecting children from religiously-invoked 'psychological abuse'.

The floodgates could, as they should, open.

Best,
Styrer

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20. Comment #163714 by Santi Tafarella on April 18, 2008 at 9:09 pm

Styrer,
Okay. I listened. My initial position on this--it's weird, but it ain't abuse. Their childhood is not being stolen from them. Maybe some of the things that the rest of you say in response will change my mind, but for the moment, hear me out.

First, the kids are probably engaging in this behavior no more than a couple of times a week--and what they are getting is actually quite extraordinary. They are learning the cadences of oral speech, and how to make rhythm with language, and to structure rhetorical arguments, and tell good stories. They're also cultivating their intuitions about how to persuade audiences. This is no worse than a set of skills you might learn from doing another childhood activity, such as learning to play a guitar.

And think of how much better their reading skills are than the average adult, and how their cultural literacy is enhanced by knowing the Bible so well at a young age. The Bible, afterall, is one of the great texts of Western Civilization, and they've absorbed it. When they're adults their views will mature, and they'll decide what to do with their childhood experiences (become a novelist, a preacher, a politician, a saleman, a rhetorician, an English professor).

The kids are also learning how to project a persona--the great innovation of Western culture.

Anyway, this is my initial position.
Rip away.

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21. Comment #163720 by Styrer- on April 18, 2008 at 9:41 pm

Comment #163714 by Santi Tafarella on April 18, 2008 at 9:09 pm

Santi

No confirmation that you understand the difference, then, despite the kind request to reply one way or the other?

Never mind.

As for your latest post:

Bizarre.

Thank you for playing.

(You may wish to re-think 'oral speech' as a human faculty, for future references.)

Best,
Styrer

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22. Comment #163724 by discipline on April 18, 2008 at 9:53 pm

Despicable indeed. I'm (once again) embarrassed to be an American... and a human being.

This psychological abuse is likely enforced with physical abuse. After all, US evangelicals like James Dobson advocate beating children into obedience (see his book "Dare to Discipline"). A perfect summation of the Christian worldview.

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23. Comment #163727 by Santi Tafarella on April 18, 2008 at 10:13 pm

Styrer,

Sorry for not responding directly to your question. I'll do so now. I do think it is yucky and abusive to scare children with damnation. It's a very ugly trip to put on anyone, young or old.

BUT I am of two minds as to whether the state should ever intervene on this level. I think we should exercise extreme caution with regard to interfering with the way parents raise their children--even if they raise them in ways that we surmise to be psychologically harmful.

I also think that children are more resilient than we tend to give them credit for, and that adolescents need foils to wrestle against to come to maturity. If one is raised in a strict fundamentalist home one has a very interesting language to wrestle with as an adult, and to work oneself out of. That process of struggle with one's parents will not go away when the state becomes the parent. Then young people will wrestle against the state. You've read Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground, I presume. Dostoevsky's underground man wrestles his way to freedom. It is the old Oedipal overcoming of one's parents, and nobody escapes this process unscathed. Jacob has to wrestle the angel.

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24. Comment #163732 by Styrer- on April 18, 2008 at 10:57 pm

Comment #163727 by Santi Tafarella on April 18, 2008 at 10:13 pm

Well, I thank you for finally supplying a reply.

I think you underestimate, in your view of things, the power the state already has to keep you from doing others harm, especially children. I think you also underestimate the enormous psychological damage that can result from pernicious doctrines being imposed on children, affecting the rest of their lives. I think you are entirely wrong to posit that they are 'more resilient than we tend to give them credit for'. They are not, and you have no right to grant them a strength which you wish them to have but which is entirely hope-based on your part.

You are completely underestimating the damage that 'faith', inculcated into children as something desirable, can have in deforming the rest of their lives. Your bizarre last post, citing all of the advantages you can see in being a 'child preacher', might as well have presented a list of orthopaedic and 'getting to know yourself' advantages happily resulting from being stretched, gradually and alone, on the fucking rack.

I urge you to think on, rapidly, before you completely marginalise yourself here.

Styrer

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25. Comment #163733 by robotaholic on April 18, 2008 at 11:05 pm

i think these kids and their parents are full of shit & they need to be deprogrammed

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26. Comment #163747 by irate_atheist on April 19, 2008 at 1:01 am

I tuned into this whilst driving to see a client yesterday. Damn near drove the car into a wall to escape the lunacy.

The best thing we can hope for, is that the children suddenly realise what's been done to them. Oh boy, I'd hate to be the parents when that happens. But I'd love to see the explosion of pure rage.

23. Comment #163727 by Santi Tafarella - You are, effectively, advocating child abuse as a method of upbringing. You are in danger of a 'tarding from me. Believe me - I'd hate to be on the receiving end of one of those. Before you descend any further into the pit, may I point out that Dostoevsky wrote fiction. I hope this trivial fact has not escaped your attention.

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27. Comment #163753 by action1976 on April 19, 2008 at 1:38 am

This is just like story of Marjoe Gortner a former evangelical minister who first gained a certain fame in the late 1940s and early to mid 1950s when he became the youngest ordained preacher at the age of four, and then outright notoriety in the 1970s when he starred in an Oscar-winning, behind-the-scenes documentary about the lucrative business of Pentecostal preaching. Hopefully these children when they grow will soon realise that they have been exploited by there parents and that they turn there backs on this lunacy.

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28. Comment #163772 by Geoff on April 19, 2008 at 2:29 am

I can't bring myself to listen to it, after being so revolted by "Baby Bible Bashers" when it was featured.

However, to address one of Santi's points:

And if so, would you also prevent parents from putting their little girls in beauty contests ala "Little Miss Sunshine?"

I haven't seen that film, but pre-teen beauty contests in general, yes, absolutely. I find few things as sickening as seeing little girls with full make-up and "sexy" clothes.

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29. Comment #163803 by Chris Jackson on April 19, 2008 at 4:31 am

There was a controversy recently when Argos (a British chain store) started marketing a "Lolita" range of furniture for young girls. No Joke.

It seems the more people scream about "pedofils", the more children are sexualised and trotted out in outfits that resemble a crude caricature of prostitution. Seemingly children's fashion is the new battleground of conservatism, and it feels odd to be on this side of the fence.

Returning to the article, I don't know whether my blood pressure could take listening to this if it's anything like "Jesus Camp".

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30. Comment #163827 by Santi Tafarella on April 19, 2008 at 5:58 am

I'm on weakest ground with regard to the abortion clinic boy. If I were a sheriff, would I take the child into protective custody? I'd have to think about that.

I think I'm on strong ground, however, when it comes to the teen artist girl who "talks to god" and makes religious art, and whose parents encourage her mystic visions. The British narrator/reporter, in his flat, persona-less affect, struck me as thoroughly obtuse when it came to her. It's startling to hear a BRIT talk about a young artist who talks to God as "weird"--as if he's never read BLAKE! This is where, in my view, atheism misses the forest for the trees. Artists, especially gifted ones, are going to always be drawn to the sacred archetypal--and see the ghost of a flea, and their brothers' spirit leave their bodies at death--and think that god talks to them. To call parents who encourage their artistically gifted children's mystic visions as child abuse is to exhibit a breathtaking ignorance of Western artistic tradition and persona.

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31. Comment #163834 by Santi Tafarella on April 19, 2008 at 6:12 am

As for the African American fourteen year old who preaches in his mother's church--I also think I'm on strong ground to say that this is not child abuse. Please keep in my mind that we do not live in a utopia, and that the "abuse" needs to be compared to its alternatives. I can imagine far worse fates for African American male teens than learning by practice the cadences of oratory within the confines of a black church.

Please recall that Western education once centered on rhetoric--going back to the Greeks and Romans. This young fellow is receiving an extraordinary classical education--learning how to craft messages and persuade audiences.

We end up sounding more ignorant than we imagine when we mock this genre of Western persona because it arrives in religious garb.

And please note the mother's aspiration for her child--that he might follow in the footsteps of King and Andrew Young--not Louis Farrakhan. And the evangelical hell message that the boy practices, I'd ask you to notice, is balanced with messages of love and community. When he matures, he may well abandon the harsher aspects of his religious upbringing and prove to be a real asset to his nation as a politician, an actor, or a professor with an engaging class instruction style.

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32. Comment #163837 by Santi Tafarella on April 19, 2008 at 6:21 am

And permit me to throw in one more quick thought. How is standing up in a church and giving a sermon different from standing up in a church and singing a couple of religious songs to a congregation?

What if the African American boy had an extraordinary singing voice, and started giving concerts at his church? Is this child abuse?

One of my favorite poets is Sharon Olds. She is caustic, sexually graphic, often implicitly anti-religious, and thoroughly secular, in her poetic orientation. But she attributes her gifts as a poet to the Watts hymnal and her saturation as a little girl in its quatrains. Were her parents abusing her by exposing her in church to all that heaven and hell Bible stuff in the hymnal at a young age?

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33. Comment #163840 by Santi Tafarella on April 19, 2008 at 6:42 am

Irate atheist,

Sorry for throwing out four posts in a row, but I feel I should respond to your comment about Dostoevsky as someone who was just writing "fiction."

I suppose you are trying to be funny, right? You don't seriously believe that great poets and novelists have nothing to add to our reflection upon the human condition--or do you?

Is Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" just a book?

Does Shakespeare's Caliban in "The Tempest" teach us nothing about how it feels, and what it means, to be an outsider?

And do Dostoevsky's meditations on freedom really offer us nothing nutritious for our minds to feed on?

Is it really your position that art and fiction cannot inform the sensibility?

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34. Comment #163842 by Santi Tafarella on April 19, 2008 at 6:54 am

Geoff,

One more quick thought, then I'll shut up and see what others have to say.

As to "Little Miss Sunshine," I wouldn't ban such competitions--even though I find them personally repugnant and would not put either of my daughters in a pageant.

I also wouldn't ban cheer leading classes--even though it reinforces sexual stereotypes.

I'm wondering to what degree you value cultural freedom--and how you would enforce bans on cultural practices. Would you jail parents who signed their kids up for a "Little Miss Sunshine" competition, or who taught their kids to fear hell?

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35. Comment #163845 by aquilacane on April 19, 2008 at 6:59 am

I've actually stood next to a child preacher in Georgia and started preaching evidence is our savior, evidence will set you free (I didn't even go atheist on him) as a joke for about 10 seconds. I was hit with the bible by the child and had my life threatened by the father who was hanging out back. The kid was a robot, no life in the eyes, just a machine. No one else cared that any of us were there, except the 5 or 6 drunk rugby players I was with. They just laughed at me. I felt sad for the kid after I sobered up a bit.

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36. Comment #163853 by Corylus on April 19, 2008 at 7:28 am

Santi Tafarella

It's startling to hear a BRIT talk about a young artist who talks to God as "weird"--as if he's never read BLAKE!

and

But she attributes her gifts as a poet to the Watts hymnal and her saturation as a little girl in its quatrains.

You know, it isn't commonly known, but much of Blake's Songs of Innocence and Experience are a response to; and a parody of; Issac Watt's vile Divine and Moral Songs for Children.

For example, Watts:
Praise for the Gospel
Lord, I ascribe it to thy grace,
And not to chance as others do,
That I was born of Christian race,
And not a heathen or a Jew

Then Blake:
Divine Image
And all must love the human form
In heathen Turk or Jew.
Where mercy, love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling too.

Were her parents abusing her by exposing her in church to all that heaven and hell Bible stuff in the hymnal at a young age?

If they were teaching it as fact YES. If they were teaching it to improve artistic sensibilities no, but they would have been way, way better off with Blake.

Art and poetry and amazing things, but to excuse child abuse, by saying that it increases artistic sensibilities is IMHO missing the point entirely. Art is an amazing thing that adds to our experience of life; but is not the reason for experience. It is not an excuse to impose suffering.

Also, there are poets and there are poets.

P.S. Have you considered the possibility that, if children are emotionally stunted and brought up in an atmosphere of fear instead of love, then becoming artists might just be one of many, many things that they then become incapable of?

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37. Comment #163857 by bentleyd on April 19, 2008 at 7:33 am

Perhaps if Professor Dawkins danced around the podium, gave his lectures in a sing-song higher octave, and added a "Ha" at the end of each breath, he might reach a wider audience.

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38. Comment #163858 by aquilacane on April 19, 2008 at 7:38 am

Santi wrote:
"would you also prevent parents from putting their little girls in beauty contests ala "Little Miss Sunshine?"

Why we wear the clothes, makeup, and other sexual attractants that we do is pretty much a basic social forms of sexual solicitation. It can only be said that a parent who dresses their 8 year old as a solicitor of sex is vile. When a women or man get dressed up and go out on the town they are displaying their sexual capability and readiness. There is only ever a problem when an unsuitable caller makes a call. Unfortunately he or she are merely responding to the advertisement as any interested person would. To put a child in the position of inviting interested parties is asinine. I puke each time I see it, and it's always the ugliest least promotable mothers doing the advertising.

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39. Comment #163860 by Santi Tafarella on April 19, 2008 at 7:46 am

Corylus,

Thank you so much for sharing that contrast between Blake and the Watts hymnal--that was a fascinating aspect to Blake's poetry that I've never heard before. I'll have to research that--I'm a big Blake fan. If you have a book to refer me to, I'd be much obliged.

As for the larger issue, doesn't the fact that Blake uses the Watts hymnal as a foil for his own creative genius make my point? Likewise, Sharon Olds?

In other words, aren't the bindings and loosings (to use Blakean language) of the circumstances of our birth and upbringing the way all of us generate persona? If there are no resistances, no threats to the psyche--how does one wrestle out an identity? In other words, Blake's Swedenborgianism was the foil for his development, as was the Watts hymnal for Olds, as is the black church for the boy featured in the audio.

I just question the presumption that the state can predict how a thought--such as hell--taught to a child, might play out in the development of the child. To remove a child from its parents on the grounds that "hell" is a bad concept to teach a child is, at least to me, dubious. Obviously, in Blake's case, the Watts hymnal and Christianity functioned to make Blake into an iconoclast, and in many senses an anti-Christian (see his proverbs from hell). We wouldn't be better off culturally, and Blake wouldn't have been better off in his development, if he were removed from the stresses of his religious environment.

I don't deny the damaging potential of religion to the psyche--what I question is the state's ability to direct culture in ways that result in better outcomes than the pluralistic free-for-all that we have in western democracies.

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40. Comment #163863 by mmurray on April 19, 2008 at 7:56 am

Perhaps if Professor Dawkins danced around the podium, gave his lectures in a sing-song higher octave, and added a "Ha" at the end of each breath, he might reach a wider audience.

Well maybe a bit of baptist preacher wouldn't hurt. What about

`I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, little children will be taught the true meaning of evolution.'

Michael

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41. Comment #163868 by Santi Tafarella on April 19, 2008 at 8:11 am

I'd like to offer a brief anecdote from my own childhood. My mother's side of the family lived in Kentucky, and I had an older cousin who used to teach me dirty jokes. I was about six years old, and when we were visiting my relatives, my grandmother propped me up on the kitchen sink, gathered my relatives around, and they uproariously howled and laughed as I entertained the adults with the most vile, filthy jokes you can imagine. In retrospect, it might seem like child abuse, but I don't remember it that way. I don't think it hurt me, and I liked the attention, and I liked to tell jokes. There was a circus freak quality to it--a little kid with a foul mouth. But I loved to tell stories, and cut up for an audience, and it had a role in my development of a persona. The content of the jokes proved less important than the skills and social interaction that facilitated the telling. I think that this is largely what is going on with the kiddie preachers/artists here.

Marjoe is another example. Marjoe was a cad as an adult, but there's no evidence that I know of that his childhood damaged him--he seemed like a pretty stable, sensible adult, with a gift for bullshitting and good old American salesmanship. He seems (at least in the documentary about him) to have been able to articulate his childhood experience well, without any particular resentment. And I think he actually became an actor. Didn't he have a role in the classic 70s disaster film, "Earthquake"?

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42. Comment #163884 by Corylus on April 19, 2008 at 8:46 am

Santa Tafarella

If you have a book to refer me to, I'd be much obliged.

There is a discussion of this in Studying Poetry by Stephen Matterson & Darryl Jones. Their discussion on Blake is only brief, but I would recommend this book anyway as it helped me understand some literary theory.

[Edit: not saying you don't - just that it helped me!]

As for the larger issue, doesn't the fact that Blake uses the Watts hymnal as a foil for his own creative genius make my point? Likewise, Sharon Olds?

If you are asking whether or not Blake would have written that quatrain without Watts, then no, of course he wouldn't. However, I don't think that this is the point that you are making.

In other words, aren't the bindings and loosings (to use Blakean language) of the circumstances of our birth and upbringing the way all of us generate persona?

Maybe. Overall I have to say, that I think you are being a bit inconsistent. In one breath you say that children are more resilient than we think, but you also appear to be seeing art as an envitable product of environment. You can't have it both ways :-)

Look, I do agree with you that art often comes out of suffering. The artist produces it to deal with suffering. Others read it to share another's experience and feel less alone.

However, there is a bigger issue at stake here.

We wouldn't be better off culturally, and Blake wouldn't have been better off in his development, if he were removed from the stresses of his religious environment.

That is like inventing a disease and giving it to people only to increase resistance to the new disease. You don't make people sick just to create antibodies.

Art is a treatment and a solace not an end in itself. You appear to be coming very close to advocating a form of secular theodicy. (Maybe I have misunderstood you though?)

I have enough problems with the religious version.

If we have enough sensitivity to understand art, then we should have enough sensitivity to do without it in a heartbeat, if it means that people (especially children) are saved from harm. I hope you agree with that.

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43. Comment #163892 by Podaar on April 19, 2008 at 8:56 am

Santi,

You claim children are more resilient than we give them credit for. You hold up compelling examples and personal anecdotes. Others on this site repeatedly do the same...which is fine.

Do you allow for the possibility there may be anecdotes and examples of where indoctriniating children was harmful? Do you think, if evidence was gathered, the majority of children would be harmed or helped?

I'm not saying I know the answer, only that my experience is the opposite of yours.

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44. Comment #163899 by Santi Tafarella on April 19, 2008 at 9:04 am

Corylus,

You said: "If we have enough sensitivity to understand art, then we should have enough sensitivity to do without it in a heartbeat, if it means that people (especially children) are saved from harm. I hope you agree with that."

You make a very good point--I'll have to think about that.

BUT I think that establishing harm here is very difficult, indeed. The mere fact that a thought might terrify a child might not constitute harm in the long run--and may actually lead a child into the contemplation of terror as such, and to a deeper understanding of parents, and the world, and the way the world works, as the child matures.

It's never pleasant to be conned or terrified--it is pleasant, indeed, to wake up to the nature of a con or terror, and to find oneself on the other shore.

Marjoe, for example, thought through his experience, and even married the hot actress Candy Clark. That's not a terrible way to land.

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45. Comment #163911 by Corylus on April 19, 2008 at 9:16 am

Santi

I'll have to think about that

.Great attitute :-)

Marjoe, for example, thought through his experience, and even married the hot actress Candy Clark. That's not a terrible way to land.

Well, I don't know who Candy Clark is, but I hope they are both happy!

Only thing I would say about this, is that we only seem to hear about success stories in the media, the stories we are told can be biased...

Anyway, interesting talking to you.

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46. Comment #163914 by Santi Tafarella on April 19, 2008 at 9:20 am

Podaar,

I think that indoctrinating children is overwhelmingly harmful--it injects a metaphorical poison into the child's bloodstream to which she has to process. Too much toxin might well kill somebody. That includes Blake, and Marjoe, and you and I.

Not to get too personal, but I lost my mom to leukemia when I was five--it was my grandmother who brought me to Kentucky to visit relatives when I was six--and where I put on the dirty-joke freak show. As a teenager, I got born again and went to church with friends. By the time I was twenty and in college I had dropped the religion-trip and had processed a great deal of psychological trauma--and survived it all. What I'm saying is that nobody escapes a similar tale of woe--if your parents don't "fuck you up" (as the Philip Larkin poem puts it), nature will, or a bad social institution will get you, at least for awhile. Innocence will be lost in some form through some fashion, and you'll have to wrestle your way into a clearing. The state cannot predict how the contingencies of each individual's life will play out, and so, in my view, the state should be extremely reluctant to interfere with the way a parent raises their children. I know there are extreme cases of abuse, and they have to be dealt with by the state, and I agree that child preachers--especially the kid at the abortion clinic--is drawing very close to an intolerable line. But Marjoe, and the African American teen, and the girl-artist described in the audio, for me, are just working with the contingencies of their peculiar existences.

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47. Comment #163920 by Santi Tafarella on April 19, 2008 at 9:33 am

Podaar,

To finish the thought from my previous post: I would not choose any of the contingencies of my existence (loss of mom, born-again hell trip at 15 etc.)--but they are part of the grist for the mill of constructing my persona. The loss of my mother has given me an acute lifelong sensibility of the transiency of existence, and I devoured the King James language of the Bible as a kid--which led me to Shakespeare, and poetry--and now I teach college English. Would I have, in retrospect, wanted the state to remove me from my religious encounter for my own good? Not on your life. I learned more about human nature, and terror, and culture, and rhetoric by being (briefly) an evangelical, than I could have ever learned from just reading about it. I know religion from the inside, and it deepened my humanity, and made me a bit less judgmental of religious people than I might otherwise have been. But I wouldn't want to go through it again.

By the way, I have two daughters who look to be close to your daughter's age--mine are 2 and 4.

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48. Comment #163929 by Podaar on April 19, 2008 at 9:50 am

Santi,

That little darlin' is my middle granddaughter Tessa. She's 4 and a quite a little shit :)

Thank you for assuming I'm young enough to have children that young. *blows a kiss* Most of my children are closer to 30.

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49. Comment #163932 by MPhil on April 19, 2008 at 10:01 am

Actually I just recently finished a paper where I argue that a liberal, egalitarian society must not (at least not completely) tolerate religious practices that i) have a high probability of causing considerable physical or psychological harm to children (because of the inviolacy of the person) or ii) when successful severely limit the child's ability to recognize fully and make reasonable use of their rights (particularly freedom of thought, liberty of conscience and from these two freedom of religion).

So far the paper I wrote - I didn't go into the possibility of legislature or in general what is to be done about it, just argued (the above is the extremely short version of the argument) that this cannot be completely tolerated.
(For anyone interested, it was specifically about the treatment of religion as a comprehensive doctrine in John Rawls' "Political Liberalism" - I might be able to put it online if someone is sincerely interested.)

But I have an opinion on this: I think i) warrants intervention by child services. Concerning physical abuse, children and parents may have to be separated, cocnerning psychological abuse (like what is being done to the Mississippi boy), a court might impose obligations for the parents, regularly to be checked by a competent, impartial official.
Concerning ii), which is the definition of religious indoctrination (as opposed of parents just living their religion in front of their children and educating them about it), I'm not sure any legal means would be just. But what is certainly possible is a general, mandatory education in schools about the basic rights and liberties - AND how to make use of them... ie teaching the children specifically that apostasy is not a crime and that they are free to embrace or reject any religion they want to... AND to teach them how to make use of their freedom of thought and liberty of conscience by teaching them how to think independently - ie how to make use of rationality.

Finally, black wolf - I am aware that in Germany children cannot become official preachers - but what laws do we have against a child being religiously indoctrinated by the parents and even preaching on the streets?

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50. Comment #163933 by Border Collie on April 19, 2008 at 10:01 am

Religious freak show ... 'scuse me while I go super glue my mind back together ...

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