Red Tory v.2.0
I think it depends on whether parents say "its is our way" vs "it is the only way" and that pretty much depends on which cult they are a member of.
Now when I called the 7th Day folks (or were they Jeh. Witness?) child abusers for dragging their kids around in dress up clothes to proselytize on a sunny summer morning - they never bothered me again.
Obviously, it's little comfort that both Catholics and Lutherans(?) have an "age of reason" at which youngsters participate in a greater way.
Evangelical protestants wait until the individual has made a personal commitment towards a personal relationship with Jesus and don't practice infant baptism.
But I guess it's impossible to do that properly when one's whole childhood life experience has been (properly, I might add) controlled by one's parents.
Its definitely abuse.
I remember being kicked out of religion class in grade 7 and being punished for daring to ask if adam and eve's children were incestuous because who else did they fornicate with, you know, being the only people there. I may have hit a nerve when I further asked if they married monkeys or did some other god have a genesis occurring somewhere else with which they could breed yet prevent deformities.
No answers, just punishment involving being strapped on the hands. Seems I injected to much known science into the faux debate.
Guess when I completely gave up any belief in a non-existent god.
Since then I have brought about 20 people to the sphere of reason. Just the weekend I converted a Christian and a Muslim. Its not hard, especially when they have an education and you only have to connect the dots for them.
Okhropir — Well, both the Catholic and Anglican creeds practice “confirmation” at a certain age, as do others I presume, but that still does little to mitigate the process of indoctrination that takes place from the earliest days of childhood amongst the truly devout. Obviously such people wouldn’t see the value in allowing their children’s minds to go untutored by the guidance of their divine “wisdom” or whatever they want to call it. To many disposed this way, the ethical component of religion is completely inseparable from all the other faith-based clap-trap that goes along with it. For some people, they're one and the same.
I’m really quite puzzled by this notion of the “whole childhood life experience …controlled by one's parents.” Yikes! I’m happy to say that certainly wasn’t the case in my family! My parents had surprisingly minimal influence over, or indeed involvement with, my childhood life experiences. I was pretty much left to go about my own business without any parental interference or apparent concern whatsoever after the age of about 8 (at which time, my father believed one was, for all intents and purposes, a responsible “adult”… which admittedly is a bit kooky in itself, but there you go… Although nowhere near that eccentric myself, I’d have to say that we exercised a pretty light touch when it came to influencing the eventual direction of our kids’ beliefs.
Ah, Jay… you incorrigible shit disturber, you.
Although never a believer, when I was a kid I didn’t see much point in questioning the teachings in Sunday school or taking issue with the little homilies we received every morning in class. To be honest, I quite enjoyed the whole thing and just took it at face value. It was actually rather charming… comforting even. Complete nonsense, of course, but still, rather entertaining. I mean, they could just as well have been reading Morte d'Arthur for all the difference it made.
RT,
By the time this occurred in religion class I had for the previous two years been going to arcades instead of sunday school and spending my donations more wisely on space invaders which is more liely than religion to have had anything to do with life on earth. My parents found out but did nothing as my dad had only been to church twice, christening and marriage. He actually gets physically ill when he goes to church. I have no idea why, but very convenient. Wish I had inherited it. It was my grandparents that insisted I go. Now my grandma moves from church to church if she does go because she doesn't like the music at the Catholic or Anglican churches anymore. Apparently she gets off on acoustic guitar at the United church.
I should note that both my parents are also now non-believers, thanks to me. My little sis I am still working on.
Jay — Hmmm. Funny thing, but I don’t actually know any “believers” personally. My father wasn’t religious at all, even though he was dutiful choirboy as a youngster and quite proud of that silly gig for some reason. In fact, I used to have his well-worn Bible around here someplace, signed by the actual Vicar of Wakefield no less! My mother took us to the local abbey in our little village every Sunday — as a matter of form, as much as anything else (not a big deal as it was right across the road) — but ceased that tiresome ritual after we moved to Canada. I’m not sure why. Perhaps she felt suddenly freed of the communal obligation. At the bitter end of things, it was revealed she was in fact an atheist who openly scoffed with some hilarity at the notion of receiving the “last rights” before she passed away — something she’d never admitted before, and a frank disclosure that still greatly amuses me; especially seeing as she’d spent the last 15 years or so of her life working in a funeral home dealing with the bereaved as the embodiment of benign sympathy, confidently assuring the aggrieved that their loved ones had passed on to the great Hereafter. Well, life certainly makes some perverse casting calls at times, doesn’t it?
Still, I’d be very reluctant about trying to actively disabuse anyone of their faith, although I might be sorely tempted to encourage them to question its foundation with a bit more rigorous skepticism and perhaps consider there are more curious and thoughtful ways of engaging the wonderful mysteries of life, the universe and everything.
But why stop here? It's pretty obvious that parents are screwing up big time when it comes to raising their children.
Let's have the state adopt all children upon their birth and raise them correctly according to the best scientific principles, free of the bigotry and biases and superstitious nonsense held by their parents. The birth parents can visit their child on regular occasions under the supervision of a government-trained attendant who will ensure the "parents" do not attempt any inappropriate indoctrination that might contaminate the child's thinking.
O brave new world that shall have such people in't!
But why stop here?
Because usually anything that follows from this question amounts to hyperbolic rhetoric built upon wildly outrageous assertions and silly conclusions that don't really relate in kind or degree to the discussion at hand.
It's pretty obvious that parents are screwing up big time when it comes to raising their children.
To wit.
Let's have the state adopt all children upon their birth and raise them correctly...
ibid.
Dave:
Please recommend a course of action where we can ensure that children are not indoctrinated by the ignorant superstitions of their parents.
I've made my suggestion. Now it's your turn.
Silly Rabbit… rhetorical tricks and political slippery slopes are for kids!
I am in no way proposing state intervention. Not even for a moment.
As both a pragmatist and a realist, it has to be accepted that the current state of affairs regarding religious indoctrination of the young is a fact of life in many cases. I would however, implore people, even though they may be devout believers of whatever religion, to convey a slight disclaimer to their children; specifically, that their wholly well-intentioned instruction may not be the ONLY way to truth and enlightenment. In other words, there may well be other paths towards the objective which they seek to attain. Furthermore, that it’s perhaps a part of life’s great and marvelous adventure to determine by one’s own experiences and empirical perceptions the particular route that can best satisfy their need for spiritual and intellectual fulfillment.
I should have perhaps been clearer. My comments were directed more at Narisetti's opinions, which are obviously more extreme than yours.
Once we have identified early religious training as "child abuse" then there is no going back. The state must step in and put a stop to it, for what conscienable person can tolerate child abuse?
Perhaps such a law might do some good in some cases. But it's potential to do damage is vast.
I was pretty much left to go about my own business without any parental interference or apparent concern whatsoever after the age of about 8
Hmmm...that explains a lot. 
My parents, both effectively atheists, sent me off to Sunday School each week, probably due to some kind of guilt trip.
Didn't really take.
Rabbit — Again… I’m not calling for “state intervention” or anything of the sort. This is an entirely personal matter that individuals, as parents, must come to terms with. How “the state” enters into the affair is entirely beyond me. I never suggested or even intimated in the slightest way this as being the “solution” to the problem (as I see it).
I happen to think it’s a form of “mental abuse” but that in no way necessitates intervention of “the state” into the matter. I might also regard spanking as a form of physical abuse, but likewise I wouldn’t dream of invoking the state to intervene unless there was some sort of catastrophic harm involved.
You seem to be unnecessarily politicizing this. I’m not trying to score cheap political points here at all. I just feel that parents would do well to present a more open-minded view of things so that their children can freely decide for themselves what makes sense to them.
Moebius — Yes, it does. One learns to be crafty, self-sufficient and imaginative. All to the good in my books. I’ll leave the parasitic welfare dependency to our so-called “conservative” friends, thank you very much.
Hmm, I can kind of see rabbit's provocatively posited point. To term religion child abuse begs the question as to why the state wouldn't step in as it does with sexual and physical abuse.
What I clumsily said earlier about "whole childhood life experience controlled by one's parents" I meant that parents are the most legitimate party to physically and emotionally care for a child. Ahead of and possibly to the exclusion of child services, the school board, and any religious community.
I'm sure, RT, that although your parents had a hands-off approach in some areas they provided with direct support you could've scarcely survived without.
I didn't think you were calling for state intervention.
Narisetti certainly seems to, since he wants the UN to declare early religious instruction to be a form of child abuse (last paragraph of his article).
This would encourage state intervention in at least two ways. First, Canadian courts have been know to take into consideration international conventions that Canada has agreed to, even when these conventions were considered to be "affirmational" by the politicians that signed them.
Second (to repeat a point), once early religious training is officially deemed "child abuse", there would be considerable pressure - by at least portion of the population - to bring the law to bear. Such a declaration would be a powerful lever.
Having said that, there is no way that religious training of children is going to be deemed "child abuse" by the UN. Religion is too powerful of a political force right now.
Okhropir — Well of course my folks provided all the means of support in the conventional sense of that expression, but otherwise they really weren’t involved at all. The emotional “caring” bit was quite incidental, cropping up from time to time for no apparent reason. I don’t pass judgment on that — it’s just the way it was. Maybe it’s an English thing…
Rabbit — My bad. I should have been clearer on my feelings vis-à-vis Narisetti’s position. I totally sympathize with his general sentiments, but disagree quite strongly with his prescriptions to remedy the problem.
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