Wednesday, November 11, 2015

Judgemental jerks? I hope so

GetReligion Cites the press coverage of a survey supposed to show "religious" kids are "judgemental jerks"...

well, actually it doesn't show that at all, since there is no data about the ethnicity or or customs of the societies involved.
Some societies stress sharing with family, not strangers, but here the kids who took the stickers home to share with their siblings would be considered selfish. And of course, the Chinese kids who "share" because they fear punishment by the teacher would be considered non selfish.

As for the "judgmental jerk" part of the argument that the anti Christian press is pushing:

Well, yes. And I consider that a good thing.

In American "judgementalism" is evil, because it means you might judge a person who has 300 anonymous sexual encounters a year in a bath house as less moral than a faithful husband. Who am I to judge, we hear quoted in our faces all the time.

But judgmentalism also means judging the right or wrong when you see something done that is wrong.

In the countries cited in the survey (South Africa, Turkey, Jordan, China, Chicago), the real problem is toleration for corruption, not "judgmentalism".

So these "religious" and "judgemental" kids might actually grow up to be honest businessmen and honest politicians instead of doing things the usual way (i.e. bribes, kickbacks, sleeping with the staff, pushing illegal drugs, nepotism).

That is why China's gov't quietly supports Christianity (and Confucian ethics) as a way to fight corruption.


hmm...wonder if it would work in Chicago too?

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