For many religious people, raising their children in their faith is an important part of their religious practice. They might see getting their kids into heaven as one of the most important things they can do as parent. And certainly, adults should have the right to practice their religion freely, but children are impressionable and unlikely to realize that they are being indoctrinated into one religion out of the thousands that humans practice.
And many faith traditions have beliefs that are at odds with science or support bigoted worldviews. For example, a queer person being raised in the Catholic Church would be taught that they are inherently disordered and would likely be discouraged from being involved in LGBTQ support groups.
Where do you think the line is between practicing your own religion faithfully and unethically forcing your beliefs on someone else?
The fundamental difference between religion/spirituality and science/reason, as far as I’m concerned is this: religion demands that you accept something as an indisputable truth and that questioning it is not only discouraged but forbidden and will be met with an arbitrarily horrific punishment (eternal damnation, etc), with what the specific something is dependent on the teacher, their interpretations and their intentions. As a mental framework, I don’t think it’s healthy for either individuals or societies to unquestioningly accept - or be made to accept - that any ideas are defacto sacred.
I think that’s a very narrow view of religion though, albeit one that is true of a lot and I agree is toxic. Ironically since you’re a UK person, it’s a type of religion I associate with the US and the American right (though I also know through friends growing up that it can be fairly common in some Muslim and Hindi groups)
I think a lot of times religion is used as a kind of cultural link: ‘this is why we have these traditions, this is a moral we have that we can explain with this story’ etc. And with that context I think it can be fine, even helpful to raise someone within a religious tradition
I guess I broadly agree with you mostly, but I would say that religion can be coherent with critical thinking and open-mindedness: it’s cultural as much as its about fundamental belief
(and when it is about fundamental belief then yeah it’s often awful)
I’m with Terence McKenna here: Culture is not your friend
Imagine how different society would be if people weren’t introduced to religion until they were 18.
There probably wouldn’t be much religion, how nice that would be. Religion would mostly cease to exists if children were not indoctrinated before they developed critical thinking skills.
Religion relies on naive children being brought into the fold, and to a lesser degree damaged and desperate adults needing hope or something to believe in.
Same place america is with safe sex: it doesn’t solve any problems, just defers the issue of ignorance and learning until adulthood
What? Safe sex solves a significant amount of issues like sexually transmitted diseases and underage pregnancy. What In the world are you trying to say?
Yes, but people learn about it late (if at all), and we end up with lots of adolescents getting STIs/pregnant/etc.
What In the world are you trying to say?
America has a problem with sex ed because people don’t learn about safe sex; many still learn abstinence only. This doesn’t stop STIs nor teen pregnancies, it doesn’t stop SA, it doesn’t stop myths about men and womens reproductive systems from proliferating, it just defers the problem of educating people until later. Basically, America’s sex ed is to avoid teaching people about sex, then hope they suddenly know how to have safe sex when they’re 18 because they’re 18.
Likewise, deferring learning about cults until they’re 18 doesn’t stop people from getting indoctrinated, it just expects 18 year olds unfamiliar with cult tactics to suddenly be immune to cult tactics because they’re 18.
Are you really comparing learning about safe sex to indoctrination to cults?
No, i’m comparing learning about safe sex to learning about skepticism and critical thinking. Refusing firsthand experience with the cults that are ubiquitous won’t save people from those cults, it will just keep them from developing the skills necessary to cut thtough the bullshit until they’re suddenly thrown in the intellectual deep-end at 18.
It’s not ethical to train your child’s brain to believe fairytales. It’s like foot binding, forcing an unnatural form on their growth. They grow up handicapped.
No it’s not ethical. I say this as a queer man indoctrinated in Christianity. I was lucky to make it through childhood without killing myself. I tried several times. Religion is a cancer that should be exterminated.
I am a trans woman who was raised Catholic, so I feel similarly. I’ve had to do so much work in therapy just to get to a place where I can accept myself for who I am. A lot of those old beliefs were baked in deeper than I realized.
I carry a lot of resentment towards my (very devout) parents for raising me in the church, but I also recognize my experience is not emblematic of every person’s experience being raised in a religious household.
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Where do you think the line is between practicing your own religion faithfully and unethically forcing your beliefs on someone else?
That’s not just someone that’s a child, their child. So, the question should be: where do you think a parent should stop being a parent who has authority over their child? And where a child stop being a child (someone being taken care of and who is subject to the authority of their parents) to become a person (someone responsible for themselves).
Parents are responsible for their kids up until the child is reaching the ‘age of reason’ (sorry, not sure how to say that in English: when the is (legally) able to live and decide by themselves). How would anyone be able to raise (be responsible for) a child and make decision without pushing their own values on the kid? I mean, for me it’s almost impossible. You can give options, a lot of options, but there will still be limits. Heck, even the simplest ‘eat your veggies’, ‘brush your teeth’, or ‘you must do your homework before you can play your video game’ (or their exact opposites, aka ‘do whatever you want, I don’t care about you’) is already telling a lot about what values the parents are pushing onto their children.
My parents raised me as the atheists they were. That too is an ethical/philosophical/moral personal choice they pushed onto me without me being able to object anything, right? They never asked me if I was an atheist, or not.
The funny thing is that them being hardcore atheists did not prevent them to tweak the system so I could be send to a private catholic school because my father knew it was the best school. Another (unethical?) choice of them on which I had little to say as a child. And to be frank with you, now aged 50+ this is probably the second of only two reasons I feel gratitude towards my parents (the first one being that I had a roof and I was fed up until I was able to leave): the teaching there was demanding but it was also amazingly good.
Like mentioned already I would say: it’s the parent’s call. Because if christian or whatever else parents should not be allowed to share their faith with their own child, then logic mandates that no parent at all should be allowed to share no personal value at all with their child. Then, no parent should be allowed to raise their own child.
That may not be bad, though: Plato considered the idea in his Republic, suggesting kids should not be raised by parents but by city (the Ancient Greek ancestor of our modern States and Nations) operated and controlled institutions. But then, the question instantly becomes: who will decide what this city/state/nation controlled education should be about?
Real great question, with no simple answer I’m afraid.
My parents raised me as the atheists they were. That too is an ethical/philosophical/moral personal choice they pushed onto me without me being able to object anything, right? They never asked me if I was an atheist, or not.
How do you raise a kid to be atheist? Not teaching them faith based topics is not the same as teaching them to be religious. It’s just the default setting.
That’s the fundamental problem with your post, regardless of your personal experience with “hardcore atheists” which sounds to me as if they were likely to lean into the “anti religious” angle.
That’s the fundamental problem with your post,
If you say so. Thx for the useful insight.
That’s a pretty snarky tone for dodging the actual question.
That was an excellent and well-thought out response, thank you for sharing it! It’s a thorny question for sure, and I appreciate your nuanced view
Glad to know. Like I said, it’s a complex question but a very interesting one. Do not hesitate, if you want to discuss it further. I don’t know about you, but I’ve always considered it a huge boost, I was about to write ‘a blessing’ but that would certainly not have been a smart choice of words ;), the ability to have articulated discussions about even the most… delicate questions.
The difference between raising a child explicitly by religious doctrine and explicitly by scientific understanding of the world is, in fact, a huge difference. Yes, religious parents forcing their kid to believe in divine transmutation of water into wine and bread into the body of christ is detrimental to that child regardless of their parents dedication to their beliefs. That child is being lied to. The line is drawn where a child is being guided by falsehoods instead of factual, evidence based reality. Outsourcing your children’s supervision to a self imposed panopticon is child abuse.
Your parents did the opposite. Your parents not only raised you without imposing a religion on you but gave you access to religious schooling because of its benefits. Your parents not only recognized the benefits but were willing to risk the potential psychological harms that could come from subjecting you to a religious schools curriculum. That is something that you only get from thoughtful and capable parents, which Christians by and large tend not to be. I say this from experience with every single Christian family I’ve ever known.
You said you’re 50 years old. Imagine being 50 years old having spent every day of your life believing that an unknown deity you can never see or hear is aware of your every action and every thought in your head and that, if a single one of your thoughts or actions displeased that diety, you were going to be forced into an eternity of unknowable torment and punishment for offending your god. That is the life that Christian parents impose on their children. Convincing them, from babies, that everything they do and think is heard and judged. Fundamentally, that is wrong. Raising children in that way is not just wrong but psychologically traumatic. Even for those who “choose” to leave their faith this anxiety around being watched and judged is a permanent impediment. That’s wrong, and parents should not be allowed to impose that on a child simply because they were convinced of it in their childhood.
Your story unironically proves that atheist parents are far and away better parents than religious ones. Idk how you take that and say who’s to say if one’s better than the other. My parents were “religious” but didn’t force me into any of it. I chose to go to church with neighbors and decided it was lame so my parents never brought it up. That’s what good parents who are religious should be doing. Not teaching their children to do exactly as they do.
Idk how you take that and say who’s to say if one’s better than the other. (…) hat’s what good parents who are religious should be doing.
On a more general note, may I advise you to be more cautious with your use of certain words. I mean, ‘good parents’ is a very strong expression nobody should use solely based on a first impression, a few words read, and certainly not as a way to demonstrate a point in a discussion because… doing so you’re only projecting your own personal values and ideals regarding what good parents should do (which could be 100% correct, or not, that’s not the point) and, well, in that specific case I can assure you you do not know who my parents were. Or if they were any good.
I will tell you they looked real nice people and most people meeting them liked them a lot. I will also tell you they’re long gone and that I did not shed a single tear when they passed away. What does that say about them and what does that say about me? Maybe that’s telling what an ungrateful asshole I’m, and I may very well be that. Or maybe it’s telling how appearance can be misleading and how much better and how much more intimately I knew my parents than anybody else. Who am I to tell?
Your story unironically proves that atheist parents are far and away better parents than religious ones. Idk how you take that and say who’s to say if one’s better than the other. (…) hat’s what good parents who are religious should be doing. Not teaching their children to do exactly as they do.
I think it unironically shows what you believe in, which is fine by me and which is something I may even 100% agree with. That’s not the point.
My point was only this: my atheist parents (so you know: they both were sent to a religious school as kids too. Therefore, they did with me exactly like their parents did with them save that their own parents did not call themselves atheists) forced their own personal opinions onto me, without me being given any real choice.
My point was that the question should not be limited to spiritual or religious matters. And also being religious does not make someone an asshole more nor less than being an atheist would make them an asshole. It’s the person that’s the issue.
Then, I went back to the OP question, saying this was an interesting and very old question with no simple answer, referring to that Plato dude writing about raising children somewhere in the 4th or 3rd century before that other dude, Jesus, was even born. Why mentioning Plato? Maybe because that bearded Greek dude wearing a dress and sandals realized that families in his time were already pushing what he considered way too much personal values and crap, not just religious craps, onto their own child and that the only crap a child should be fed is the crap that the city (aka the Nation) has deemed good for… the city? I would encourage anyone to go read Plato.
So, where does that leave us?
We will all agree that thinking they hold onto some indisputable truth will concern many religious persons, right? Where I seemingly disagree with a few around here, is that I also think it concerns way too many so-called atheists who I think would be much more accurately described as ‘anti-religious’ (because ‘a-theism’ is the idea that there is no god, not that one should hate on god or religion). So, unlike those anti-religious persons, I don’t consider what they call atheism as a de facto smarter/better choice than being ‘theist’, or religious. That’s way too simple… like I was saying.
I appreciate the thoughtful response. My main takeaway, and what i wanted to make clear: the opinions your parents inbued to you were just that, opinions. You disagreed, you might not have liked your parents for any number of reasons. I certainly don’t like my parents, they abandoned me at 18 and became trump supporters. What they didn’t do is raise you with a belief in something for the purpose of controlling you from within and without. You are free to disagree with my opinions and observations, but this is something I can tell from the way you speak and your ability to characterize yourself and your experiences growing up. You were not raised to fear a god who demanded obedience. Your parents, while having been flawed as people, did not force their opinions on you without reason like theology would have to be. They might have lacked the capability to recognize the flaws in themselves but they did you a great service by allowing you the freedom to form your own opinions that disagreed with them. This simple fact is something that religious children of religious families struggle with their entire lives.
There are people 50 years old who hated their parents and rejected their opinions but still can’t fix the psychological damage that a faith based upbringing inflicted on them. Like, legitimately, I think you are experiencing a life that is completely and radically more liberated than someone raised in a religious household even if the two of you were identical in every other way. It’s not a bad thing. I’m happy for you, seriously. I’m just trying to make it clear how having a secular family gives you agency you can’t even percieve. It’s like privilege in that sense. To you, it is just being. It seems like the rational conclusion one would come to, but without understanding how religion shapes a young mind you can’t appreciate just how much freedom you possess simply by having not been exposed to religious doctrine early and frequently enough for it to manipulate your critical thinking into your adult life. That’s a privilege that most people don’t have, and those who don’t have to work tirelessly for years or even decades to overcome their learned biases to reach the same point you or I have been at or past for most of our lives.
I hope that clears up some of my first comment. My intent was not that I was trying to exalt your parents for being atheists, but to applaud the ability to allow you to see for yourself and come to your own conclusions. Conclusions which, seemingly, went against your parents beliefs. This is the thing I was praising. I wanted to point out how much of a benefit that is to you, even if it doesn’t feel like it. I hope you’re having a great weekend, and I’d be happy to chat in dms if you wanted to discuss more.
I appreciate the thoughtful response. My main takeaway, and what i wanted to make clear: the opinions your parents inbued to you were just that, opinions.
I would not have considered it like that back then, and maybe I would not even today but I completely understand your point of view. And that’s true. There is certainly a huge difference between the way I was raised by my parents, no matter the other issues, and the way I would have been raised in believing in… something so out of of reach and unquestionable I should fear and bow to.
Still, they were highly destructive in their own way and, my live getting closer to its end than to its beginning I still have not managed to overcome a few of the damages… without any god involved in the process of damaging those things in me. That’s what I think is key: it’s too easy to think that by not preaching some religion/faith or another one is a better person. That’s not as simple.
I hope that clears up some of my first comment.
It does. Thx a lot for taking the time.
This is the thing I was praising. I wanted to point out how much of a benefit that is to you, even if it doesn’t feel like it.
Agreed and make no mistake: I fully realize that (it’s part of the education I mentioned I received) and for that I’m deeply grateful to them. But my gratitude will end there. For all the rest, I’d rather express no feelings of any kind at all as they would uselessly and mostly be negative. That would serve no purpose.
I hope you’re having a great weekend, and I’d be happy to chat in dms if you wanted to discuss more.
The same to you. It sure feels great to have a quality exchange. It’s not my habit to reach out (mostly because I’m shy), but don’t hesitate to reach out if you ever want to discuss anything further.
Age of majority would be the English term for it.
This was an enjoyable read in a sea of militant atheist cringe lords. Thank you!
You’re welcome.
I wanted to bring a different point of view as I’m not a huge fan of over-simplification with such a complex question (no matter what I may or may not think about religions)
+1 because I see no reason for the downvotes, beside some people not liking what you say or think? To those persons: feel free to downvote me to oblivion if it helps you feel better and much ‘righter’ persons but do keep in mind that it may also not be the most efficient way to help me understand in what way you think I’m mistaken. Obviously, this matter only if you want to help me understand, not if you want to ‘punish’ me for disagreeing with you. But then, I would wonder in what way that is supposed to punish me? Have a nice day, whatever you decide.
I’d say yes, as long as they’re tolerant of their children questioning those beliefs and developing their own later on in life. Parents will always make an impression on their kids, that’s just what being a parent is. It can get more nuanced of course. Teaching your kids homophobia is unethical, but that’s regardless of whether it’s for religious or other reasons.
The problem with “faith” is its literal meaning: belief that is not based on evidence.
A society based on faith can only work is everybody has the same faith (think: Ancient Rome, theocracies, communist countries). The only reason modern Western democracies work is precisely that they are not based on faith but rather on evidence, on reason, on truth-seeking. This is the amazing and historically anomalous heritage of the enlightenment and it’s looking more fragile by the day.
Teaching kids fairytales and calling it truth is the reason religion exists. It’s the reason it’s so hard for adults to leave the religions they assimilated as children. And in a free society where we have to find a way to live together, it’s profoundly dangerous.
So my answer is: no.
think: Ancient Rome,
As far as I know, Ancient Rome (pre-christian) welcomed many and very different faiths.
That’s fair. Although I believe the Jewish minority was the only one that seriously dissented from the prevailing polytheism.
My main point is that secular liberalism is the only political system that has been shown to protect individual freedom and rights - i.e. without the need for a shared supernatural mythology or an iron fist. And this system relies on a shared commitment to evidence, reason, facts.
In this context, to inculcate irrational beliefs in children seems to me to be like playing with fire.
Although I believe the Jewish minority was the only one that seriously dissented from the prevailing polytheism.
Edit: There were the Christians, a little later on. But I wouldn’t know that all religions would be polytheist back then except Jews. I’m really not an expert.
In this context, to inculcate irrational beliefs in children seems to me to be like playing with fire.
It sure can be. But, talking irrational beliefs, wouldn’t you agree that telling a child they’re a unique and amazing person and that all they do is perfect and amazing too, that they should not have to get bad grades at school because it’s infuriating, that they should not have to do their homework because it’s tiresome, that they should be allowed to do whatever they fancy the moment they fancy doing it, is also like playing with fire? Still, despite it containing not a single mention of god, religion or spiritual beliefs it’s something hordes of parents are telling their own kids every single day.
I do sincerely wonder what will do more harm to those kids but, once again, I’m not pro religion nor am I against it. I’m only pro taking nothing for granted—beginning with our very own certainties if they can’t be demonstrated ;)
All fair points. There are definitely multiple ways of playing with fire.
I saw that article about illiterate college kids too. Worrying.
I saw that article about illiterate college kids too. Worrying.
Indeed. We have the same issues here in France, btw. It’s an absolute failure of our educational system (and of too many parents persisting in wanting that failure to be used) that will cost dear to all those kids, and then will cost to the society as a whole: that’s our future ‘elite’ that’s being uneducated.
I think the ethics mostly come into how you raise them, religion or not. It’s ethical to teach kindness and empathy. It’s ethical to allow your kids to explore while asking them questions that help that exploration. You can do those kinds of things no matter what faith (or non-faith) you practice.
Speaking as someone who was raised in an environment that gave lip service to kindness and empathy but was really very harsh, judgmental, and rigid, only one of my siblings kept something reasonably approximating my parents’ faith. The rest of us are mostly some variety of pagan. Each of us had a painful journey out of our parents’ faith to something. No matter how you raise your kids, they are their own people and will come to their own conclusions. You can make the path much more difficult than it needs to be or you can set them up for a much less traumatic journey.
Definitely think that kids should be explained different beliefs early on… plus they should be respected if they don’t want to follow the same beliefs, and be able to opt out of any traditions… though I suppose the faith I follow tends to be a lot less “damned to hecc” than some others, so to some parents if breaking a tradition means making their kid go to hell that’s probably a lot tougher of a thing than im imagining it to be
I think it’s important to teach children the cultural traditions of their family and religion can be a good tool to teach children the social contracts of ethical behavior. The abstract metaphysical elements of faith can be a good substitute until they’re old enough to understand the usefulness of moral behavior from a social contract perspective.
The line is crossed when religion is used as a tool to teach bigotry. But the world is made richer by cultural traditions and those should be carried on.
This would be true if religion were not so often used to suppress and hurt people.
It’s true that it’s unethical to raise children in a way that suppresses or hurts them or tells them to do that to others, but that isn’t a requirement of religion, even if it’s a trend of some. There exists an entire globe of different faiths and practitioners of varying levels of orthodoxy, to malign every last one of them as abusive and harmful isn’t just a gross over generalization, it simply isn’t a truthful representation of many many faith practitioners.
The history books are full of religions’ heinous crimes against humanity. Maybe there is some religion out there that is purely benevolent but I have never heard of it in the sea of counterexamples.
If you are currently trapped in a religion, I am here to tell you that you can escape. Once you do, a lot becomes much more clear.
It is also important to remember that religions are human organizational structures, but their basis of authority is “because I said so.” We see this structure arise over and over until it is eventually removed for something more based in reality.
I think this kinda gets closer to my point. Humans create these kinds of social organizational structures and have made various kinds throughout history. Both religious and non-religious structures get used in horrendously abusive ways. But to decry all religion as a harmful structure is throwing the baby out with the bathwater. I think it’s possible to maintain the cultural aspects of faith while removing the abuse and bigotry that often comes with it. And I think you can see that in many of the lives of practitioners that don’t make the history book and news. Though I’d never deny that religion frequently gets used as a tool of control, I just think it requires a lack of imagination to say that it always is. Or to say that removing religion from the world would create a world without communal tools of control and abuse.
You are like a younger me who refused to see the 10,000 year history of abuse and realize that any system based on “because I told you so” us unethical and harmful to human life.
I’m not arguing to say we should be basing any society on any religion, but rather that it isn’t unethical to teach children religion because it’s part of culture and culture should be carried on as long as it doesn’t teach intolerance or abuse. Those aren’t inherent to religion and any religion that does feature those can probably have them be removed without harming the cultural aspects.
Edit: I feel like your last sentence implies a huge misunderstanding of my point. I think religion has value as a cultural and communal institution, and absolutely not as a replacement for ethics and science
History is full of heinous things that should never be repeated and we have a moral imperative to teach younger generations about them, why they happened and why they must never be allowed to happen again and how to do your best to prevent them. A lot of them can be traced back to religion, but absolutely not all of them.
Religion is not the single source of bigotry and bigotry is the issue. There probably isn’t any faith that is purely benevolent, but there doesn’t need to be, it’s the actions of those who practice it that matter.
I can easily see the appeal to look at the past and say “we must end religion to prevent the horrors that arise from it” but I think it’s a lazy solution. Those horrors happen outside of religion as well and will continue to happen in an atheistic world if the issues causing them (e.g. inequality, injustice, bigotry, abuse of authority, etc.) continue. But by removing religion, you remove part of the many beautiful cultural traditions that make up who all the varied people on this planet are. And I don’t think it’s useful to destroy cultures.
Edit: of course, religion can’t be used as a replacement for a scientific understanding of the world and I think at some point it must be taught that the metaphysics of religion are based in myth, but I think there’s a great deal of value in the way religion is part of a culture and fosters community. The threat of religion comes in how that culture and community is used.
Lmao another edit because I thought a lot about this during the pandemic: I also used to think the world would be better off with no religion, but I think that’s an easier point to make when looking at the largest religions in the world and the terrible things they’ve been (and continue to be) weaponized to do. As a thought experiment, ask yourself if it would be ethical to gather every Catholic in the world and re-educate them to deny their faith. Now try again with the First Nation’s people, or smaller local faiths in Africa or South America. I won’t speak for you, but I think at some point it crosses a line where it stops being a call for rational thought and an end to the opiate of the masses but a vehicle through which cultures are irreparably harmed or erased.
it’s nice to have culture or whatever, but practicing a religion is inherently unethical as it is giving legitimacy to a scam and perpetuating objectively bad ideas
Not all religions are abrahamic
They are all unethical tho
religion itself is a categorically problematic approach
Their kid, their call up until the point the child’s safety is in danger.
I have no more right to tell them how to raise their kids than they have about my entirely hypothetical and undesired kids. I may not agree with their choices and they may not agree with mine, I may think they are raising their kids to be less moral, they may think the same with the added bonus that I’m condemning mine to an eternity of torment.
That’s life in a pluralistic society.
Their kid, their call up until the point the child’s safety is in danger.
You’re answering the legal question instead of OP’s ethical question. You’re not wrong in your legal answer, but that wasn’t what OP was asking.
I think that’s the ethical answer too.
We can’t know who is right, so I don’t see any ethical way to intervene.
I hate when I see parents giving their kids a screen instead of interacting with them or worse, ignoring their kid im favour of their phone. But again, I don’t feel it is ethical to interfere.
If a child is homosexual, I would argue its unethical to teach them they are freak of nature and they are wrong or broken. However, its not illegal.
It’s act vs rule ethics, what is ethical in a particular situation may not be broadly applicable to society.
Edit: And from the religious parents perspective, letting your beloved child suffer an eternity of torment is probably not super moral. I may disagree but that’s their perspective and there’s no arbiter make the call.
You’re citing Bentham Utilitarianism but you could make a stronger argument for your side if you cited Kant I would think.
Utilitarianism makes sense from first principles, Kant is just his opinions.
If it impacts someone else besides yourself.
Yes, it’s their familial culture and it’s up to the kid to decide whether to break out from that or not later
