Jul 10
31
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National Post – July 30, 2010
Yahweh for youngsters
By Peter Hitchens
It is notable that the work of my brother, Christopher Hitchens, and that of Richard Dawkins coincide closely on one striking point. My brother devotes a chapter in his 2007 book God Is Not Great to the question “Is religion child abuse?” Amid a multitude of fulminations about circumcision, masturbation and frightening children with stories of hell, he lets slip what I suspect is his actual point: “If religious instruction were not allowed until the child had attained the age of reason, we would be living in a quite different world.” This is perfectly true, as is his earlier statement that “the obsession with children, and with rigid control over their upbringing, has been part of every system of absolute authority.” There is a revealing assumption buried in these statements and also in the opening part of the chapter, in which he says, “We can be sure that religion has always hoped to practise upon the unformed and undefended minds of the young, and has gone to great lengths to make sure of this privilege by making alliances with secular powers in the material world.” Does he realize that he is here describing Soviet Communism?
In The God Delusion, Richard Dawkins too has a lengthy section on “Physical and Mental Abuse.” He recounts how “in the question time after a lecture in Dublin, I was asked what I thought about the widely publicized cases of sexual abuse by Catholic priests in Ireland. I replied that, horrible as sexual abuse no doubt was, the damage was arguably less than the long-term psychological damage inflicted by bringing the child up Catholic in the first place.”
The word “abuse” used here by both Richard Dawkins and my brother is far stronger than it first seems to be. In modern Britain and slightly less so in the United States, an accusation of “child abuse” is devastating to the accused. It is almost universally assumed to be true. Juries and the media are instantly prejudiced against the defendant before any evidence has been heard. To suggest that any person so charged may be innocent is to risk being accused of abuse oneself.
To use the expression “child abuse” in this context is to equate such education with a universally hated crime. If Professor Dawkins genuinely believes what he said to the Dublin audience, then he should logically believe that “bringing the child up Catholic” should be a criminal offence attracting a long term of imprisonment and public disgrace. If he does not mean this, what does he mean by the use of such wildly inflated language, and what is he trying to achieve by it?
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