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Inflicting religion on children is child abuse

Here we go. A secular humanist group has put forward a paper to a United Nations NGO detailing exactly how teaching religion to children is being abusive and violating their rights. If the NGO do decide that teaching children religion is abusive, look for a push to amend the UN Convention on Child to include religion as child abuse and remember many countries, such as NZ, are signatories.

Game on.
NEW YORK, June 18, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Religious education is a form of child abuse and violates the rights of children, contends a thesis to be considered by secular humanists at the Center for Inquiry's congress in Beijing this October.

The Center for Inquiry, an organisation recently awarded special consultative status as an NGO at the United Nations (UN) will consider the proposals of Innaiah Narisetti, the chairman of the Center for Inquiry's India chapter, that portend the next stage in the assault on the rights of parents to educate their children.

Nasiretti called the influence of religion a "severe shortcoming in the global campaign to protect children" and a contributor to child abuse saying, "In one form or another, all religions violate the rights of children."

"Such abuse begins with the involuntary involvement of children in religious practices from the time they are born," says Narisetti. "All religions, through ritual, preaching, and religious texts, seek to bring children into day-to-day religious practice."

"This gives holy books and scriptures, as well as those who teach them, an early grip on the developing minds of young people, leaving an indelible impression on them," said Narisetti, calling Sunday schools, madrassas, or Jewish or Hindu temples, centers of indoctrination for children.

Nasiretti's proposal would reject the long-recognized inherent rights of parents to educate and provide for their children's religious instruction in favor of regulating children's exposure to religious influence by world governments abiding by the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.

"The time has come to debate the participation of children in religious institutions," continues Narisetti. "While some might see it as a matter better left to parents, the negative influence of religion and its subsequent contribution to child abuse from religious beliefs and practices requires us to ask whether organized religion is an institution that needs limits set on how early it should have access to children."

The UN forum proposed by Narisetti would debate the "pros and cons" of religion on children and determine whether religion contributes to global child abuse.

"The UN must then take a clear stand on the issue of the forced involvement of children in religious practices; it must speak up for the rights of children and not the automatic right of parents and societies to pass on religious beliefs, and it must reexamine whether an organization like the Vatican should belong to the UN," stated Narisetti.

"Until this happens, millions of children worldwide will continue to be abused in the name of religion, and the efforts made by the UN will continue to address the symptoms but not the disease."
Related Link: Religious Education by Parents is "Child Abuse": Center for Inquiry Proposal

Comments

  1. These guys really believe that indoctrinating children with atheism is a better alternative.

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  2. Or just leave them to make their own choice in their own time? In The God Delusion Dawkins covers this issue and one can't help but feel he's right...its a form of child abuse to brainwash kids with ghost in the sky nonsense.Child molestation of the mind I would call it.But the alternative is the State stepping in to sort it out and that I am opposed to...Its really up to parents to make sure their children receive all the information and respect their right to make up their own minds.

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  3. The thing is, if children aren't going to learn about it from their parents then where? Every child has a right to choose; my parents brought us up in the Catholic faith but my sister decided that it wasn't for her. If my folks hadn't told her about our faith how would she have had the decision to join it or not?

    It should be up to parents to decide whether to pass on their faith and up to kids whether to decide to follow it. Is it brainwashing kids to have them believe in Santa and the tooth fairy as well? Perhaps we should stop telling them that too.

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  4. We are all born atheists. People can only become religious believers by indoctrination. Such indoctrination is a cultual matter.

    Once indoctrinated in the tenets of one faith, including the punishments for later denying that faith, how likely is free choice?

    Apostasy, anyone?

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  5. Fugley, we are all born innocent. We are all born unknowing. Life is about learning. Starting from a blank page doesn't make one an atheist. An atheist has made a decision on the existence of God. A child has not.

    People need to stop focusing on the religion, and instead focus on the values it teaches and promotes. If we think more on the values, we might find a lot more in common with each other, and a lot less fuss on how we arrived at those values.

    Having the State dictate the only approved path to a particular set of values is a dangerous road to tread.

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  6. "Having the State dictate the only approved path to a particular set of values is a dangerous road to tread"

    I agree. Just as having a religion dictate the only approved path to a particular set of values is equally dangerous. For example dictating that only hetrosexual relationships are right, and only hetrosexuals can be married...

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  7. "Starting from a blank page doesn't make one an atheist. An atheist has made a decision on the existence of God"

    A child never exposed to religion will never have to make that decision.

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  8. "The time has come to debate the participation of children in religious institutions..."blah blah

    I'm looking forward to when the time comes to debate the participation of idiots as accredited NGO's

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  9. So Fugley, if I understand you correctly, because Iran includes apostasy in it's list of capital crimes, you then believe that it ought to be illegal to educate your children in your own faith?

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  10. Maybe Fugley, but I don't think it would make them an atheist by default.

    But if religion was removed completely from our minds and mankind started again with a blank page, do you really think religions would not arise again?

    And if not, what damage would be done trying to eradicate religion? I'm not sure it could be done, let alone *should* be done.

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  11. "Fugley, we are all born innocent. We are all born unknowing. Life is about learning. Starting from a blank page doesn't make one an atheist. An atheist has made a decision on the existence of God. A child has not."

    Zen...an "A-theist is someone who lacks a belief in a God...which includes those who have never even encountered the concept of God which means all children born.You may call them "by default A-theists" if you like but A-theist they most surly are...

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  12. "Zen...an "A-theist is someone who lacks a belief in a God...which includes those who have never even encountered the concept of God which means all children born.You may call them "by default A-theists" if you like but A-theist they most surly are..."

    Nope

    You can start with this:

    http://tinyurl.com/2e9tb9

    JC

    JC

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  13. If there were no God, there would be no atheists ;)
    I think Chesterton said that.

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  14. Anon, it's not just religion that dictates what you said about homosexuals - nature does too. One of my favourite quotes is from a Joni Mitchell song -

    If you're smart or rich or lucky
    Maybe you'll beat the laws of man
    But the inner laws of spirit
    And the outer laws of nature
    No man can
    No--no man can


    She wasn't talking about the same issue but I think it says a lot.

    You can pretend that something is what it's not supposed to be, but the wanting doesn't change it and make it so.

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  15. Since we are posting the works of others:

    "…there is a real and serious difference between me and my religious friends, and the real and serious friends are sufficiently honest to admit it. I would be quite content to go to their children's bar mitzvahs, to marvel at their Gothic cathedrals, to "respect" their belief that the Koran was dictated, though exclusively in Arabic, to an illiterate merchant, or to interest myself in Wicca and Hindu and Jain consolations. And as it happens, I will continue to do this without insisting on the polite reciprocal condition—which is that they in turn leave me alone. But this, religion is ultimately incapable of doing. As I write these words, and as you read them, people of faith are in their different ways planning your and my destruction, and the destruction of all the hard-won human attainments that I have touched upon. Religion poisons everything."

    Christopher Hitchens, God Is Not Great.

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  16. As I read those words I can see that an atheist is busy poisoning people's minds with a very one-sided paranoid view. He's rather naive to suggest that religion has a monopoly on planning people's destruction, and rather stupid to forget all of the good people that do good work that have strong religious faith.

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  17. "eave them to make their own choice in their own time"

    I presume you take the same approach to mathematics, English and other curriculum matters as well then, don't teach them anything about it, let them decide for themselves whether they would like to know about it?

    Thought not. And the knowledge of Jesus Christ is far more important than all those put together.

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  18. fugley, and how is religion interfering with your life now?

    Yes, there have been some bad things done in the name of religion, but what would Calcutta be like today without the efforts of Mother Theresa and her sisters? What about Communism? The Wall would most likely still have been up if not for the efforts of Pope John Paul II. What about the influence of Christians like Abraham Lincoln and William Wilberforce in abolishing slavery.

    Like it or lump it, you're stuck with religion. I would posit that there are more people in this world who believe in some kind of God than those who do not. Every culture, no matter how civilized or cultured, accepts that there is something out there that is bigger than themselves.

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  19. Nope

    You can start with this:"

    Nice try JC but bollocks...nowhere in that article was there any proof that babies have a knowledge of a God.And spirituality and religion are not inseparable corollaries as faith heads seem to think...

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  20. Ragged Glory said...

    "eave them to make their own choice in their own time"

    I presume you take the same approach to mathematics, English and other curriculum matters as well then, don't teach them anything about it, let them decide for themselves whether they would like to know about it?"


    Those things exist and evidence can be shown that they do....and that they are objectively valuable to human beings to learn about and Jesus is still up for debate on even if he really existed at all..

    And children can still refuse to learn about them if they choose not to do so by a conscious decision.

    "Thought not. And the knowledge of Jesus Christ is far more important than all those put together"

    Not at all as he may not have even existed and if he did what he did and said was nothing special...by all means just teach your kids about Jesus and disregard the others but the result will be a stunted,illiterate half human who struggles through real life and dies earlier as a result...

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  21. Actually James, studies show that Christians live longer and recover from illness, surgery, and the mishaps of life quicker than other groups. I had a link last week to a list of studies but I've lost it for now. Will try to find it again.

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  22. ps, James, from looking and comparing posts on this and other blogs, I would say that the Christian bloggers are anything but stunted (I myself am 6 foot tall) and illiterate. In fact, they seem to be the most literate and capable posters who put forth well-thought-out ideas and arguments; so too, famous Christians down through history.

    I think you have it back-to-front.

    All you have to do is compare Simon Barnett and Sue Bradford. 'Nuff said...

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  23. "Nice try JC but bollocks...nowhere in that article was there any proof that babies have a knowledge of a God."

    Which wasn't the question. What the article shows is that from the blank state stage the kids are hard wired towards God and spirituality.

    JC

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  24. Actually James, studies show that Christians live longer and recover from illness, surgery, and the mishaps of life quicker than other groups. I had a link last week to a list of studies but I've lost it for now. Will try to find it again."

    In the States the opposite is true...and they are real believers over there.In the Red bible belt States the stats for crime,abortion,teenage pregnancy etc are worse than in the "liberal" blue States....but then low IQ and religious belief tend to go together in studies done..

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  25. And this quote from Sam Harris...

    "According to the United Nations’ Human Development Report (2005), the most atheistic societies—countries like Norway, Iceland, Australia, Canada, Sweden, Switzerland, Belgium, Japan, the Netherlands, Denmark, and the United Kingdom—are actually the healthiest, as indicated by measures of life expectancy, adult literacy, per-capita income, educational attainment, gender equality, homicide rate, and infant mortality. Conversely, the fifty nations now ranked lowest by the UN in terms of human development are unwaveringly religious. Of course, correlational data of this sort do not resolve questions of causality—belief in God may lead to societal dysfunction, societal dysfunction may foster a belief in God, each factor may enable the other, or both may spring from some deeper source of mischief. Leaving aside the issue of cause and effect, these facts prove that atheism is perfectly compatible with the basic aspirations of a civil society; they also prove, conclusively, that religious faith does nothing to ensure a society’s health."


    Well well...

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  26. James here's an article that came out only last Thursday - snippet below -

    According to the National Institute for Healthcare Research:

    •Active religious involvement increases the chance for living longer by 29 percent (about seven years), according to a review summarizing results of 42 studies involving nearly 126,000 people.

    •Patients are three times more likely to survive open-heart surgery if they depend on religious faith.

    •Hospital stays are nearly 2 1/2 times longer for older patients without a religious affiliation.

    •Over a 28-year study period, the risk of dying was almost 25 percent less for frequent religious service attendees, after controlling for health practices, social ties and well-being.

    •People who regularly attend church, pray individually and read the Bible have significantly lower diastolic blood pressure than the less religious. Those with the lowest blood pressure attend church and pray or study the Bible often.

    Hundreds of major studies by other researchers have produced similar findings. For example, religious hip-fracture patients recover faster than their nonreligious counterparts. Older people who attend religious services avoid disability significantly longer than their nonattending peers. After open-heart surgery, patients who find comfort in their religious faith are three times more likely to survive than nonreligious patients.

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  27. ps, you can download a .pdf of the whole 12 page report from the link in my last post. This is from the summary -

    Association Between Religious Involvement and All-Cause Mortality

    Despite such psychometric limitations, the meta-analysis indicated that the odds of survival for people who scored higher on
    such measures of religious involvement (after statistical control) were 129% of the odds of survival for people who scored lower on such measures

    An odds ratio of this size is equivalent to a tetrachoric correlation of .10 (Davidoff & Goheen, 1953). This
    effect size is considered small by Cohen's (1988) rules of
    thumb for the behavioral sciences. Nonetheless, the religious
    involvement-mortality association may have considerable practical significance given the importance of the criterion variable (i.e.,
    mortality) and the number of people in the population who are
    potentially exposed to religion (Rosenthal, 1990). Although the
    strength of the association varied as a function of several moder-
    ator variables, the basic finding was robust: Religious involvement
    is associated with higher odds of survival (or conversely, lower
    odds of death) during any specified follow-up period. These findings could not be attributed to publication bias.

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  28. The placebo effect...yes Dawkins covers this in TGD and points out that its still not proof for the existence of God...just maybe the power of positive thinking,a scientifically noted phenomenon that occurs across religious and secular people...

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  29. The placebo effect...yes Dawkins covers this in TGD and points out that its still not proof for the existence of God...just maybe the power of positive thinking,a scientifically noted phenomenon that occurs across religious and secular people...

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  30. Here is part one of a study done on the comparison between the 11 most religious states in the US and the 11 most "Liberal".Its a 6 part study but well worth a read....


    http://nogodzone.blogspot.com/2006/09/morality-lifes-blessing-an_115843505534559991.html

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  31. Whoop....add this to the end of the above link

    n_115843505534559991.html

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  32. Seems fairly flawed to me, James. He goes through States listing them as 'secular' when they are 37% Catholic etc, as though that makes them totally secular. This 'study' is one bloggers opinion, and not a study at all. AT least the study I quote is scientific.

    See 'larry's' comment underneath your bloggers post.

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  33. The placebo effect...yes Dawkins covers this in TGD and points out that its still not proof for the existence of God...just maybe the power of positive thinking,a scientifically noted phenomenon that occurs across religious and secular people...

    Well, existence of God was not the argument; we were debating whether 'Inflicting religion on children is child abuse'. Placebo or not, if it makes them live longer and recover faster then it's obviously to their benefit.

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  34. Seems fairly flawed to me, James. He goes through States listing them as 'secular' when they are 37% Catholic etc, as though that makes them totally secular. This 'study' is one bloggers opinion, and not a study at all. AT least the study I quote is scientific.'

    So are the sources that Godlesszone uses IMF....you would know that if you had paid attention.He explains his use of stats and how he qualified them and shoots poor old Larry down in the comments rather easily...As a professional Journalist and former baptist hes rather well placed to have conducted this study...which you won't examine in depth methinks...

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  35. James, you yourself know that you are lying. Yet you continue to do so.

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