A religious counterpart to Godwin's Law?

I'm sure we're all familiar with Godwin's Law, where comparing your opponent to the Nazis loses you the argument. We even have our own version called Tropers Law, about making comparisons with Wikipedia.

What I haven't seen, is a religious counterpart to Godwin's Law, where the first person to try to justify their position with religion loses the argument.

Why do I think this is needed? Well, like the Nazi comparison in Godwin's Law, claiming religious reasons for a viewpoint is lazy. If the position being held is valid, then those holding it should be able to provide a substantial secular justification for their position. Pulling the religion card is just being lazy and is as good as saying "I don't want to think about this, so I'm not going to, but I'm still right".

As an example, take the following scenario: you're in a discussion about gay marriage, and someone opposing it says that homosexuality is a sin or quotes The Bible. They've just invoked this law and lost the argument.

Discuss the idea.

If it doesn't already have a name, I propose we call it Thumper's Law.

Religion is a perfectly valid reason to hold a moral belief. God doesn't have to be right; we still have to obey whatever they throw at us.

(Which is why it's a good thing that most Western societies base their laws on something that can actually be argued; secularism rules.)

edited 14th Mar '11 3:44:02 AM by BestOf

Well, if that's why they oppose it, that's why they oppose it, and you can't criticise them holding that belief. It's not something you can use to convince others to your cause, but it is a reason.

But I'm also of the view that very little is wrong simply because 'GOD SAYS SO'. There will always be a deeper reason.

Godwin's law works because normally everyone, even the poster using it, would agree that it is absurd to compare every trivial thing to nazis, you are just pointing out the obvious.

As Godwin himself said: "Although deliberately framed as if it were a law of nature or of mathematics, its purpose has always been rhetorical and pedagogical: I wanted folks who glibly compared someone else to Hitler or to Nazis to think a bit harder about the Holocaust"

It's not supposed to tell "you are lazy", it is "what the hell, you just compared a guy on the internet with an opinion, to a genocidal dictator".

If you used it correctly, the other poster can't even reply that "well, but this guy is really like Hitler", just realize that he said something really stupid.

This suggestion of yours fails at that: belief systems are not logical fallacies. They can include logical fallacies, or even be based on logical fallacies, but then you would vave to find and successfully uncover all of these, to show why it is wrong, instead of just saying "Religion is wrong, so you just lost the argument".

Instead of ending the argument, it would just lead to further debates, whether or not religion is really wrong.

edited 14th Mar '11 4:23:48 AM by EternalSeptember

Well we already have Megans Law for the Catholics.

What is Megan's Law?

Apparently related to sex offenders' personal information or something in the court of law. Not quite seeing the connection here.

Me either, that's why I asked. A different law, obviously, unless someone is trying to make a bad joke about catholic priests.

Should not just declaring it as logical fallancy be enough?

That was my best guess too.

However, due to Acceptable Targets and the associated tropes, there will never be a religious counterpart to the Nazis because there's not nearly enough people in agreement about how much they hate a certain religious group. The Nazis were as evil as real life armies get, killing innocents just to prove white supremacy. No religion has ever been out on a such a large scale causing that much death recently, plus, most religions of that size typically push for peace.

How about this, You have to do more than just quote the Bible (Or any holy book), you must also get several major theologians arguments for your interpretation. that work?

: Would not work because it would require the opposites to find theologs who disagree.

True, leading to actual intelligent conversation, as opposed to "MY MAGIC BOOK IS BETTER THAN YOURS, HEATHEN SCUM" That so many arguments devolve into.

edited 14th Mar '11 6:53:51 AM by inane242

nvm, didn't read "recently", but hey, Nobody Expects The Spanish Inquisition.

edited 14th Mar '11 6:58:07 AM by SilentReverence

But they haven't lost the argument. They haven't won it either, but that's not the point.

The Spanish inquisition wasn't that bad. They used (Mostly) good investigative techniques and made sure they got their man. Even if their man wasn't guilty of anything we would nowadays define as a crime.

Spanish Inquisition wasn't all that bad, not compared to NAZIS, since they weren't trying to eradicate an entire subgroup or something on a massive scale. Plus, the Inquisition was selective about who they went after (compared to Jews, Gypsies, Lawyers, and anything that didn't fit the definition of "correct").

The Spanish Inquisition was originally founded to rid Spain of Muslims and Jews, so I think the original goals were even worse than what it ended up as.

But I wouldn't say it's "not too bad": they would torture their victim until confession or death, assuming that if they tortured an innocent, they'd still be right because now the innocent person got to Heaven sooner.

The point after which you could no longer be released was the point they arrested you, and this went on for a pretty long time.

Huh, really? That's quite a bit different from what I've read about them. Gotta wonder about information circulation anymore. Still, while their goals may have been worse, they're still lacking the massive effect that the Nazis have. To be the most evil, you got to be more in action, not concept.

The problem is the privilege. Actually, generally when discussing anything about religion, I think that's the statement you should keep in mind.

In our culture, we extend a certain privilege towards religion. They are our moral leaders, more or less. We're expected to respect and even accept their beliefs. Many a religious leader/group spend a lot of time/energy extending and reinforcing that privilege. That's the way polite society works, more or less. Because we extend that privilege, the problem with claiming religious reasons, is that it basically ends debate, or at best, takes it to a place that's pretty much pointless. (Theology)

There are two problems with this. The first, of course is when you see the religious stance as being wrong. But lets leave that aside for a second.

I think the more important problem, is that strictly religious stances...religion can tell us WHAT to do. What our goals should be, etc. What it generally doesn't do is tell us how. And that's a problem. Because how is often more important than what. And how is something that is strictly located in the secular realm.

The problem with the religious trump card (which is really what this "law" would be about) is that often it shuts down the real conversation and we never get to how. And that's the problem.

@Karmakin: Good point.

@OP: You've misunderstood the concept of Godwin's Law. Unless you're incredibly biased, in which case this is an even worse idea.

Hmm, how about

For anti-religion side: using witch burning, crusades and Westboro Baptist Church as a "proof" that religion is evil

For religion side: saying "you're going to hell!" or otherwise using direct or implied threat of divine retribution as an argument. Also, saying that you can't be a good person without religion.

edited 14th Mar '11 12:28:45 PM by Beholderess

Calvanism is actually a good example of the latter there. They hold that every single person born since the Original Sin was committed is a slave to it (their theory of Total Depravity) and that about one in every thirteen people will be permitted by God to reach Heaven. This is because who reaches Heaven is his choice alone, and while he could have decided to allow everyone to get to Heaven, he won't because the entire species is tained by sin.

Which meant that religious services were essentially a priest declaring that he was one of the chosen, and thus would be saved no matter what further sins he committed, and that his entire congregation, to the last man woman and child, even if they were as goodly as Mother Teresa, could do nothing whatsoever to avoid Hell.

Yeah, Calvanists are scary. On the anti-religious side, assuming every even slightly religious person is a Calvanist or similar would qualify.

If God is the one who makes the final decision—something I personally believe—how would the priest know what God's choice was?