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Bill Marr Religulous

Posted November 18th, 2009 by Ed Kelly
In Reference to:
Religulous: The Baby and the Bathwater

Ken correctly distinguishes between mythic religion and spirituality, but then goes on to critisize Marr for not taking a more balanced approach, and throwing the baby, spirituality that is free of mythic belief, out with the bathwater, fundamentalist religion. Having seen Religulous, Ken seems to be overstepping here, assuming that Marr is trashing both mythic religion and true spirituality. But Marr is focusing entirely on fundamentalist mythic religion in this film and is speaking to those who may still identify with one religion or another but who are ready to question the underlying belief structures that saturate those religions. Ken speaks of the childish nature of magic/mythic religion, so there is no disagreement here, and rightly points out that a large majority of people are at this developmental level. Marr is not directing his comments to that group but to those who are ready to be liberated. The criticism that Marr and other "New Atheists" don't understand human development and AQAL, isn't the issue. Whether they do or not, they serve to help people who are ready to wake up out of mythic religion. As Ken correctly points out fundamentalists will not be reached even with a more balanced approach. And if this group is not reachable, why worry about whether there religion is being seen in a more balanced way. We hope that more and more people will leave this behind as they do the fairy tales of their childhood. The spirituality that Ken speaks of have nothing to do with religion. Why do we need to continue to prop it up in any way?

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I disagree

Posted November 18th, 2009 by Robb Smith

Hi Ed, nice to see you weigh in, I hope to see you at ITC again this year.  I disagree with you here.  I think that films like Religulous really go out of their way as a form of entertainment to criticize fundamental religion with no discernment around the broader human spiritual project.   South Park certainly has done a great job of mocking religion and I don't have an overriding qualm with satire doing so, but for a documentary I expect more.  My fundamental dispute with your position is an integral one: that this film should, to the extent it provides a criticism of fundamentalism, also attempt to provide a healthy path through the fundamental life condition and into a rational faith epistemology.  It doesn't, likely because it doesn't recognize stages or how the healthy full-fillment of one gives a natural buoyancy to the next. 

The answer is that to move beyond fundamentalism we need better modeling, narrative and epistemic reasoning from within the mythic stage itself and well-crafted glimpses into a rational faith process.  Pure mockery for the purposes of entertainment may make for good business but it is hypocritical and low-minded to represent it as anything but childish schoolyard bully behavior writ large.  I accept that Maher does not know state-stage distinctions but I find the tone of his work worthy of cultural rebuke; it is acceptable for us to tell him we expect more of our commentators.  More sophistication, more integration, more research.

Finally, even if I were to allow for the film to be merely a pandering to the secular rational worldview with the entertaining mythic fringe as its whipping boy, I would still expect that it would at least convey a sophisticated reinterpretation of rational faith processes as a healthy alternative.  Read: I am not doing to Maher what he did to fundamentalism; I am saying he fails even from within the validity claims of his worldview.

This film was certainly funny at times.  It just wasn't smart enough for me.

Robb Smith