According to Humanists International’s campaign website, Mubarak Bala, President of the Humanist Association of Nigeria, was arrested on April 28, 2020 following allegations that he insulted Islam’s Prophet Muhammad on social media. Bala’s current arrest is not his first experience of systemic faith-based oppression. In 2014, Bala was detained on the grounds that he was an atheist.
In his letter, Soyinka wrote, “As a child I remember living in a state of harmonious coexistence all but forgotten in the Nigeria of today, as the plague of religious extremism has encroached.” Throughout Soyinka’s life, he has been a leading voice opposing injustice and corruption in Nigerian Society. Following a military coup in 1966, Soyinka sought to avert a Nigerian civil war. This attempt to work toward peace resulted in Soyinka’s imprisonment for 22 months.
Soyinka continued in his letter to Mubarak, “When I accepted the International Humanist Award at the World Humanist Congress in 2014, I spoke of the conflict between Humanists and Religionists; one of enlightenment versus the chains of enslavement. Your arbitrary incommunicado detention over the last 100 days is the cruel reality of this conflict. All too often these chains of enslavement lead directly to the gallows or a prison cell.“
Harassment, imprisonment and other forms of violence and oppression by authoritarian ideological regimes is both an ancient and a contemporary theme. In recent years, one need only recall the cases of Raif Badawi, Noreen “Asia” Bibi, Avijit Roy and a long-list of others from nations around the world to recall that freedom of expression may be contained in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, but it is far from universally protected.
Mubarak’s legal team claims that they have been unable to access Mubarak and have asked Nigerian authorities to clarify where he’s being held.
Mubarak Bala
Humanists International has stated that their perspective that Bala is being targeted solely for exercising his rights of freedom of belief and freedom of expression, as contained in international and regional instruments to which Nigeria is a signatory as well as enshrined in the Nigerian Constitution.
Despite the modest media attention that Mubarak Bala’s case has created and may continue to receive, the plight of a Nigerian humanist and human rights activist is still quite far from the attention or concern for those who may currently be living in ideologically comfortable settings. Perhaps letting this situation slip one’s notice is a dangerous apathy. We may not be so very far removed from extreme embodiments of ideological cancel cultures as we would like to think.
Signing Humanists International’s statement regarding Mubarak Bala could be an excellent place to show support for global freedom of expression and opposition to all forms of ideological oppression.
The views, opinions and analyses expressed in the articles on Humanist Freedoms are those of the contributor(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of the publishers.
Featured Photo Courtesy ofHumanists International.
Version History: This article was originally published on August 8, 2020 and was updated on August 9, 2020.
Lydia Denworth is a Brooklyn-based science journalist whose work is supported by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. A contributing writer for Scientific American and Psychology Today, she has also written for the Atlantic and the New York Times.
Friendship: The Evolution, Biology and Extraordinary Power of Life’s Fundamental Bond was published by WW Norton & Company in 2020. Just under 300 pages in the hardcover, it fits snugly in the contemporary genre of popular science journalism. Denworth’s tone, like the book itself, is neither too-heavy nor too light.
The book’s introduction is titled “A New Science” – setting up Denworth’s stance for the book. Denworth asserts that science has, until recently, mostly ignored the question of friendship’s purpose. The book, Denworth states, is intended to “consider the visible and the invisible aspects of friendship.“
As is typical of popular science journalism, Denworth spends considerable time recounting the stories of scientists past and present and the studies that they’ve undertaken. That should not be taken as a criticism but as a compliment as the stories of researchers ought to be more-widely shared and discussed. Heroes are, after all built in the telling. In the first chapter of the book, titled “Fierce Attachment”, Denworth suggests that the new science of studying friendship was seeded in 1954 with the meeting of John Bowlby and Robert Hinde when they spoke at a meeting of the Royal Medico-Psychological Association. From the humanistfreedoms.com perspective – this is an excellent place to begin. Bowlby was an ethologist (ethology is the study of animal behaviour) whose final work (published posthumously) was a biography of Charles Darwin. Hinde was a developmental psychologist and zoologist who counted Jane Goodall as one of his students. Hinde had written that “‘it does not matter too much what you believe, for many different cultural beliefs bring meaning to believers’ lives (though differences in religious beliefs can lead to horrendous conflict). But what does matter is how people behave.”
Whether by intention or not, the influence of developmental psychology (and thereby the above-noted protagonists) is present throughout the book. The book’s chapters tend to progress through the developmental stages of life from newborns and infants early on to older adults at the back of the book. In the second chapter, Denworth introduces new work being completed to study the brains of babies and infants using fNIRS ( functional near-infrared spectroscopy) explaining that this technology uses light to study brain activity in people too young and sensitive to bombard in an MRI machine. Denworth’s exposure to this work leads her to the conclusion that human “experience matters on the order of minutes, not months.”
In the third chapter, Denworth explores the influence of friendship on health. In the healthcare setting, this concept may often be identified as social determinants of health and is an area that continues to see increased attention, particularly in elder care. Social determinants of health include a person’s social networks and engagement but there are humanist-oriented initiatives to widen that to consider the delivery of health-care itself. Consider The Gold Foundation’s Tell Me More program which attempts to build better connections and bonds between healthcare providers and their patients. Stated more simply – growing friendship between providers and patients.
The middle chapters deal with issues of youth and early adulthood. There’s a chapter titled “Middle School is about Lunch” and another “Digital Friendship”. Each chapter explores recent studies of friendship relevant to the stage of life. Chapter Five, “A Deep Wish for Friendship” includes noteworthy observations of primatology and animal friendship which acts as an interesting challenge to concepts of human exceptionalism. Yes, animals do have the capacity of friendship.
In the sixth chapter, “Digital Friendship”, Denworth reviews the work of “an affable Canadian who runs the Social Media Lab at Stanford“, Jeff Hancock. Hancock completed a meta-analysis of the effects of social media on measures of well-being from 226 papers over 12 years. Without giving away the plot, Hancock’s analysis resulted in six categories of effect: depression, anxiety, loneliness, eudemonic happiness, relationships and the delightfully final category of hedonic happiness (happiness of the moment).
Borrowing from Hancock’s categories, reading Friendship: The Evolution, Biology and Extraordinary Power of Life’s Fundamental Bond was a genuine hedonic happiness of its own. It is a reminder that friendship (and so many other experiences in a human life ) does not need to be a mystery. “Our social lives have a backstory,” Denworth writes, “and it’s time that story was told.”
The views, opinions and analyses expressed in the articles on Humanist Freedoms are those of the contributor(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of the publishers.
On July 14, 2020, the Psychology Today website featured an article by Michael Friedman, Ph.D. announcing a new podcast entitled Hardcore Humanism. Friedman states in the announcement: Each week, we will be celebrating, talking with, and learning from an outside-the-box thinker—musicians, artists, writers, activists, and entrepreneurs who challenged conventional norms, discovered their life’s purpose and dared to put that purpose into action.
As an interview-based podcast, it appears to support a particular variety of humanistic psychology as conceived by Dr. Friedman. At humanistfreedoms.com we are interested to explore forms of applied humanism – the ways that people use humanism as a starting point for engaging with life and all of its challenges and joys.The Hardcore Humanism Podcast is an example that we’ll be checking-in on from time to time.
You can find the Hardcore Humanism podcast/website at: https://www.hardcorehumanism.com/. According to the site, hardcore humanism is a life philosophy, therapeutic modality and life coaching program that brings together the compassionate holistic approach of humanistic psychology with the scientific rigor of behavioral therapy. Humanistic psychology promotes unconditional positive regard – a basic belief that all people are good and have value – as they strive to achieve their life’s purpose and best self.
With Hardcore Humanism, the Humanistic approach is optimized to include the hardcore work ethic and science-based approach of behavioral therapy. In other words, Hardcore Humanism means not only understanding and accepting yourself but also working in a methodical way to achieve your purpose and find fulfillment.
Hardcore Humanism was developed in part from Humanistic approaches to psychology and psychotherapy. While Hardcore Humanism overlaps with other forms of Humanism, e.g. Ethical Humanism, in our belief in the fundamental value and goodness of human beings and their ability to shape their own lives, Hardcore Humanism does not take a stance on the role of religion or spirituality in one’s life.
The views, opinions and analyses expressed in the articles on Humanist Freedoms are those of the contributor(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of the publishers.
When I was a schoolboy in British Columbia we began our day by reciting the Lord’s Prayer. I accepted this small duty as a normal ritual of the classroom. Then, two things happened. First, I asked one of my classmates to give me some evidence for the truth of stories in the Bible. He insisted they were true, but could offer no support for their veracity. Second, two members of the Jehovah’s Witnesses sect arrived at my home one Friday after school. I was home alone. These emissaries had a powerful story and I was willing to hear it.
Over the weekend, I plunged into the literature they had given me. I was caught up in the exhilarating evangelism that Jesus Christ supposedly taught and that his apostles practiced. On Monday, I returned home from school anxious to resume my religious reading. Perhaps five or six hours of secular boyhood, or an instinctive scepticism about most of what my elders told me, brought everything into focus. I came to the jolting decision that all I’d been told or read over the weekend was not believable.
Photo of Ray at Bishopsgate courtesy Ray Argyle.
Later, as I examined more closely religious practices around the world I also learned about Secularism, a practical system that fulfills the idea of separation of church and state by removing religious control of public institutions – the schools, courts, government, and all public endeavours.
While growing numbers in Western countries are content to live outside the church, most people of faith also support Secularism for its contribution to social order and its hands off attitude toward religion. But Secularism’s future, like the struggle to achieve it, is subject to the dynamics of public opinion and the pressures of social change. The most relentless opposition to Secularism stems from the polar opposites of Christian evangelism and Islamic extremism, one seeking to restore religious values to the public realm, the other engaged in terrorism to advance its interests. Mix these conflicting ingredients and the result is a contest of which no one can predict the outcome.
George Jacob Holyoake, a radical English social reformer and atheist, invented the word Secularism in 1851, propagandized its message, and struggled to raise the moral standards and material conditions of his countrymen. Yet for some unknowable reason, Holyoake has virtually vanished from history, unheard of by the public. There is no mention of his name in one of the most eminent of books on Secularism, Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age.
In order to bring Holyoake the recognition he deserves, I have written his first modern biography: INVENTING SECULARISM: The Radical Life of George Jacob Holyoake. It will be published in Spring 2021 by McFarland & Co., USA.
George Jacob Holyoake was born in Birmingham, England in 1817 and died in Brighton, England in 1906. Notwithstanding his origins in the nineteenth century, Holyoake was a man for the modern age. His vision encompassed ideals of social justice that would become universally accepted nearly two hundred years after he first expressed them. Through a long, controversial, and conflict-filled life, marked by as many mistakes as triumphs, he was in the vanguard of almost every struggle to improve the lives of ordinary people – public education, the co-operative movement, freedom of the press, trade unions, women’s rights, and universal suffrage. He was hailed after his death as “one of the men who fought for and won for Englishmen that freedom of speech which we take as a matter of course today.” For a man largely neglected in popular history, he played a transformative role in the evolution of modern life and the rise of democratic rule in Britain and the West.
Holyoake came to the idea of Secularism after enduring hardship, persecution, and imprisonment as a social missionary for capitalist turned reformer Robert Owen and his Socialist utopian movement, the Society of Rational Religionists. After a Christian upbringing, George Holyoake fell into atheism with the imprisonment of a friend for blasphemy and his own arrest for a speech in which he declared he no longer believed in such a thing as a God. Convicted of blasphemy, Holyoake reflected on the conditions of English life during his six months in the Gloucester County Gaol. He came out convinced of the need for a new social order that would release the individual from the grasp of enforced religious doctrine.
Upwards of one hundred countries now affirm support for Secularism. The United States has functioned as a largely secular state despite a continuing presence of religiosity in its public life; the United Kingdom, secular in many respects, retains an established church with appointed bishops in its House of Lords, religious schools, and a monarch who is head of both the church and the state.
Canada, nominally secular, recognizes “the supremacy of God” in its constitution and provides public funding for Roman Catholic schools. Quebec’s bans on the wearing of hijabs by public sector workers in positions of authority may go too far, in the opinion of many. British-controlled India adopted Secularism for its promise of harmony between Hindus and Muslims, a hope that has receded under the long-reigning Modi government.
Religious belief is in free fall everywhere in the West. People of no religion (the ‘nones’) account for 52 per cent of the population of England and Wales, and one-quarter of the population of the United States and Canada. Only 12 per cent of Britons are affiliated with the Church of England, down from 40 per cent in 1983. France is on the verge of becoming majority secularist, along with the Netherlands, New Zealand, and Australia. China pays lip service to Secularism but uses its atheist ethos to oversee its Christian citizenry and oppress its Muslim minority.
In contrast to these trends, Secularism finds itself in a state of siege in many countries. Christian evangelists in the United States are pushing to have their religious ideas enacted into public policy in fields as diverse as health, education, foreign aid, and law. President Trump‘s attorney general has openly declared war on Secularism and hundreds of millions of dollars of COVID aid have been transferred to churches, in violation of the U.S. Constitution. In Turkey, long the most secular Muslim country, the famed Hagia Sophia, a museum since 1935, was recently reestablished as a mosque. Three states that were once secular – Iran, Iraq, and Afghanistan – have enshrined Islam as their official religion.
Meanwhile, Islamic fundamentalism uses the blunt force of terrorism to attack rival faiths and the infidel idea of Secularism. Secular states must respond to the pressures of twenty-first century migrations and the accommodation of non-secular traditions.
George Holyoake looked beyond his own time, confident that “Secularist principles involve for mankind a future.” It would be a future of moral as well as material good, offering an infinite diversity of intellect with equality among humanity, and “all things – noble society, the treasures of art, and the riches of the world – to be had in common.” His was a vision of a Secularism that rises above sectarian differences or economic rivalries, and places universal opportunity, and individual freedom, in the hands of all who inhabit our rich and beautiful – but endangered – planet Earth. It is not too late for us to fulfill his vision.
Journalist, consultant, author and inveterate traveler — that sums up the busy life of Ray Argyle. He shows no signs of slowing down. Ray has worked as a journalist, publishing executive, and communications consultant. He’s the author of five biographies, two political histories, a memoir, and a novel of Victorian Canada.
Ray was born in Manitoba and educated in British Columbia. He pursued a career in journalism, working for newspapers, a wire service, and a radio station. He founded Argyle Communications Inc., a communications consulting firm, now merged with the Environics Group. Ray has served as a member of the Board of Trustees of the McMichael Canadian Art Collection, Kleinburg, Ont., and the Scarborough (Toronto) Board of Education. He is the only Canadian to have been elected a Fellow of the International Public Relations Association. He received the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal in recognition of his “contributions to Canadian life.” More at www.rayargyle.com
The views, opinions and analyses expressed in the articles on Humanist Freedoms are those of the contributor(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of the publishers.
Featured Photo Courtesy of Ray Argyle: Portrait of George Holyoake by Sarah Watson.
This article first appeared on www.nationalnewswatch.com on July 1, 2020 and is re-published with permission of the author.
The reason why #BlackLivesMatter exists, or the civil rights movement needed to take place, or the Underground Railroad was created, or for that matter, why racism in all of its forms has ever existed, is because billions of people have failed to learn and then teach the truth regarding the common descent of all human beings.
The truth, simply put, is this: We are all African. The scientific evidence for this claim is overwhelming. The evolutionary sciences have unequivocally demonstrated that every human on this planet descended from common ancestors in Africa. If you want proof – and I would expect that you would demand it – there’s an overwhelming amount of it.[1]
The truth of the fact that we are all indeed, African, is not open for choice; it is simply a scientific fact regarding the common ancestry of our human origins. If other beliefs, or feelings, or systems of belief stand in the way of accepting this scientific fact – whether they be religiously motivated or not – we need to recognize that such biases should have no direct affect regarding the fact that every human who has ever existed is related.
In 2005, I was fired from an Ontario university largely for teaching: “We are all African.” I had no idea those four words could get me in so much hot water in the academic communities. But they did. And they shouldn’t have. And it is because of the failings of our education systems at all levels, that the average person does not even know that we are, indeed, all African and hence, related. If we had taught critical thinking skills from kindergarten to grade 12, through all colleges and universities, and made it accessible to all businesses and professions, we would all know and accept this fact.
But we don’t teach critical thinking at these levels; and hence, here we are witnessing protests that need not happen had we all been better educated; for inherent within the critical thinking skill set is the understanding and application of scientific reasoning. Through the use of scientific reasoning, anyone can accept our African heritage as a fact. This, in turn, can allow us to better understand why racism is an extension of evolutionary traits involving xenophobia. The term xenophobia means ‘fear of foreignness or foreigners’. In biology, this translates to “better safe than sorry”. It creates a level of discrimination between species as to which other species might be considered predators or in any way harmful or detrimental to their survival and reproductive abilities. However, humans evolved with an emergent consciousness which allows us to better understand and function within complex social systems. Once levels of familiarity are reached between our species, the level of xenophobia or fear becomes reduced, and a peaceful level of cohabitation can occur. As a member of the mammalian animal species, humans have been naturally xenophobic and have been evolving from our primate ancestors for millions of years. Over that time, our conscious capacities have allowed us to move beyond basic survival strategies to develop complex societies. But again, to know this, requires humanity to be educated in the evolutionary sciences and to accept that we are the last surviving hominid lineage that originated in Africa and over tens of thousands of years, have populated this entire planet.
And now the hard part: Are we ready to accept these facts globally (or even nationally) and, as a consequence, understand their entailments?
For if we can accept our common heritage, then it becomes obvious that what we call ‘racism’ is not only a misnomer – for no races actually exist between humans – but that discrimination against any human on the basis of their physical or phenotypic traits is irrelevant in our attitudes and treatment of them. This is the type of information the entire world needs to know, understand, and accept. For if we can accept this information as true, then it reduces considerably the logic, the actuation, and the perpetuation of inequitable treatment based on such physical traits.
Can we all accept that every human on this planet is related and that all of our ancestors originally lived in Africa?
For if we can all accept this as true, then maybe it will become just a little more difficult to hate, to hurt, and to discriminate. Our education systems are failing us on a number of levels. But we can change this; and in so doing, we will deal far better with issues like racism because our youth will be far better informed.
If you want a better world – teach critical thinking.
Christopher DiCarlo is a philosopher, educator, and author. He often teaches in the Faculty of Philosophy at the University of Toronto (in Scarborough) and the Life Institute at Ryerson University in Toronto. He is also a lifetime member of Humanist Canada and an Expert Advisor for the Centre for Inquiry Canada.
Citations and References
Barnett, Bronwyn. 2003. ‘Genetics may help solve mysteries of human evolution’, in Stanford News Service, February 19.
Bar-Yosef, Ofer and Pilbeam, David eds. 2000. The Geography of Neandertals and Modern Humans in Europe and the Greater Mediterranean, Peabody Museum Bulletin 8, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA.
Bar-Yosef, Ofer, and Bernard Vandermeersch. 1993. Modern Humans in the Leviant. Scientific American, April, p. 64.
Dawkins, Richard. 1976. The Selfish Gene. Oxford: Oxford University Press. (See also revised ed., Dawkins 1989).
Deacon, Terrence W. 1997. The Symbolic Species: The Co-evolution of Language and the Brain, W.W. Norton and Co. New York.
de Waal, Franz. 2001. Tree of Origin: What Primate Behavior Can Tell Us about Human Social Evolution, Harvard University Press,
de Waal, Franz. 2000. Chimpanzee Politics: Power and Sex among Apes. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
DiCarlo, Christopher, 2010. “We are all African: Can Scientific Proof of our Commonality Save Us?” in Free Inquiry Vol. 30 No. 4 June/July 18-22.
2006 “We are all African: Four Words that can Change the World” in SIRS Enduring Issues: an eight-volume reference collection of the best articles and graphics of the year. A request for reprint from Proquest Information and Learning: the leading provider of microform and electronic information to school, academic, public, and government libraries around the world.
2006 “We are all African: Four Words that can Change the World” in Humanist Perspectives, Issue 156, Spring.
2004 “On the Naturalistic Fallacy: A Conceptual Basis for Evolutionary Ethics”, co-authored with John Teehan. Evolutionary Psychology: An International Journal of Evolutionary Approaches to Psychology and Behavior 2: 32-46, March.
2000 Critical Notice of Anthony O’Hear’s Beyond Evolution: Human Nature and the Limits of Evolutionary Explanation. Biology and Philosophy, Vol. 16, No. 1, 117-130.
2000 Abstract: “The Influence of Selection Pressures and Secondary Epigenetic Rules on the Cognitive Development of Specific Forms of Reasoning” in The Journal of Consciousness Studies: Consciousness Research Abstracts.
Dunbar, Robin. 1998. Grooming, Gossip and Language, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA.
Leakey, Richard. 1994. The Origin of Humankind, Basic Books, New York.
Lieberman, P. 1975. On the Origins of Language: An Introduction into the Evolution of Human Speech, New York: Macmillan.
1984.The Biology and Evolution of Language, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Lumsden, Charles L and Wilson, E.O. 1981. Genes, Mind and Culture by, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA.
Mithen, Steven. 1999. The Prehistory of the Mind. Thames and Hudson, London, UK.
Mithen, Steven. 2003. After the Ice: A Global Human History, 20,000-5,000 BC. Weidenfield and Nicolson, London, UK.
Ruse, Michael. 1998. Taking Darwin Seriously, Prometheus Books, Amherst, NY.
Sakai K, Passingham RE (2006) Prefrontal set activity predicts rule-specific neural activity during subsequent cognitive performance. J.Neurosci. 26, 1211-1218.
Tattersall, Ian. 2003a. ‘Once We Were Not Alone’, in Scientific American: New Look at Human Evolution, June: 20-27.
2003b ‘Out of Africa Again…and Again?’ in Scientific American: New Look at Human Evolution, June,: 38-45.
Becoming Human : Evolution and Human Uniqueness,
‘The Mind’s Big Bang’. 2002. From the series Evolution, WGBH: Boston.
Vincent, J.D. 1990. The Biology of Emotions. Cambridge, MA: Basil Blackwell.
Whiten, Andrew. ‘Social Complexity and Social Intelligence’ in Novartis Found Symp. 2000, 233:185-96.
Wilson, David Sloan. 2002. Darwin’s Cathedral. University of Chicago Press.
Wrangham, Jones, Laden, Pilbeam, Conklin-Brittain. 1999. ‘Cooking and the Ecology of Human Origins’, Current Anthropology, 40: 567-594.
The views, opinions and analyses expressed in the articles on Humanist Freedoms are those of the contributor(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of the publishers.
The website for Immortality or Bust boldly asks, “Do you want to live forever and become a cyborg?” If your answer to that question sits somewhere in the green-to-orange section of our ever-accurate approval rating system (shown below), then maybe you’re interested in transhumanism.
Photo credit: istockphoto.com
In the 2016 US Presidential election, Zoltan Istvan embarked on an impossible expedition to defeat aging and forever change the human being through science. Running for President as the Transhumanist Party nominee, Zoltan Istvan took his message to bio hacking labs, cryopreservation facilities, transhumanist churches, and ultimately, Washington DC.
Winner of the BREAKOUT AWARD at the 2019 Raw Science Film Festival, Immortality or Bust follows Zoltan on his improbable journey to its final, and revealing conclusion.
Immortality or Bust Trailer
According to the Immortality or Bust website, you can catch the film via a variety of online services beginning June 23, 2020. Meanwhile, Istvan’s political movement has moved-on to a new candidate.
The U.S. Transhumanist Party endorsed Charlie Kam to run for the office of President of the United States in the 2020 General Election. Mr. Kam was the USTP’s endorsed Vice-Presidential candidate from October 5, 2019, through June 11, 2020. By the rules of succession, and as confirmed by the USTP Officers, Mr. Kam has been endorsed to carry the USTP Presidential ticket forward for the remainder of the 2020 election season.
A Bit of History
According to research by Peter Harrison and Joseph Wolniak that
appeared in Notes and Queries (2015) , the term “transhumanism” was first used in 1940 by William Douw Lighthall, a Canadian philosopher. Lighthall published a paper entitled “The Law of Cosmic Evolutionary Adaptation: An Interpretation of Recent Thought” in a journal called Proceedings and Transactions. In it, Lighthall advances a view of cosmic, biological, and cultural evolution, a view he called “transhumanism.” Between his birth in 1857 and his death in 1954, Lighthall was a lawyer, poet, politician, novelist, historian, spouse and parent.
The Beliefs Podcast, a podcast of Religious News Service, promotes itself as an exploration of ideas behind the news of religion. On June 26, 2020, the podcast released an episode featuring Susan Jacoby. This episode appears to be a follow-on to a conversation from one year ago.
atheism in context of US politics, growth of non-religiously affiliated population in the US, ignorance and other issues of the past year. Notably, Jacoby argues that politics is not a substitute for religion.
“Attributing ethical qualities on the basis on religion or non-religion, I wouldn’t do….. Some humanists are atheists and some humanists are not. Some atheists are humanists are atheist and some atheists and some, like Ayn Rand, are not. Someone who is a humanist doesn’t think the question of whether there is a god or not is very important….or whether they make decisions based on that.”
In 1795, William Wordsworth met Samuel Taylor Coleridge. By 1798, the two poets produced Lyrical Ballads, a collection of poetry predicated on private between the two whether Wordsworth’s humanist and naturalist poetry would be received by the poetry-reading public as readily as Coleridge’s fantastic, super-naturalist work. It turned out that Wordsworth’s poetry was the more popular.
How does the poetical work of two eighteenth-century British poets relate to a Scandinavian dramatic film about euthanasia? Well, after mostly losing the bet of realism over fantasy, Coleridge eventually wrote his Biographica Literaria (1817) wherein he advocated that consumers of the arts should actively suppress their critical-thinking skills. He called it “suspension of disbelief”.
Coleridge was not the first to promote this concept, but his phrasing of it is extremely helpful when approaching Exit Plan. Suspending our disbelief allows us to approach things that are exaggerated, sensationalized, distorted or otherwise outside of actuality. Applied appropriately, Coleridge’s “suspension of disbelief” is a tool to understand the difference between documentary film and theatrical/popular film. Our global entertainment industries are founded upon “suspension of disbelief”. Documentary, on the other hand is oriented to engaging our critical thinking – even manipulating it – but not in disengaging it.
Exit Plan deals with subject matter of euthanasia – but it is founded upon “suspension of disbelief.” We must treat it appropriately.
Once we set aside our critical thinking…we are into fantasy-land. Anything is possible in fantasy-land. What is not real is temporarily accepted as real for the sake of the story. In this case, an insurance claims investigator, played by Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, chases down a mysterious death at a secretive hotel specializing in assisted suicide. Oooh….a dark drama exploring a taboo subject.
Controversial topic? Check. Name-brand actor? Check. Great title? Un-check.
The decision to go with “Exit Plan” as the English language title is questionable. The film’s Danish title, “Selvmordsturisten” indubitably has direct translations that would establish a more appropriately macabre and sinister veneer. Oooh. Dark drama.
If you’re thinking of spending 85 disbelief-suspended-minutes ooohing, aaahing and angsting over a dark drama, Exit Plan offers a story and some quite good videography.
Is setting aside one’s critical thinking skills particularly helpful in exploring a topic like euthanasia? Perhaps and perhaps not. Fiction, whether print, stage or film does let us approach difficult topics knowing that they aren’t real…and knowing the consequences of the fictions also aren’t real. Perhaps, if we are adequately reflective, we can consider our reactions to a film like Selvmordsturisten to recognize our biases when it comes to reality. Did we find it insulting? Boring? Challenging? Moving? Aggravating? Exciting?
An entertainment film like Exit Plan/Selvmordsturisten should give opportunities to reflect on our biases. But it should also drive us back to reality – get back to a humanist and naturalist position to explore difficult issues through facts and reality. We have to set aside the wild imaginings of “death tourism” and explore real issues of assisted death.
Equally valuable to establishing an understanding of the complex realities of assisted death is to engage the multi-disciplinary professionals and organizations that have expertise in the area. A few examples:
Pegasos Swiss Association is a voluntary assisted dying association that was created in 2019 . Based in Basel, Switzerland, the Pegasos team of professionals offers an assisted dying service to approved adults of sound mind, regardless of their country of origin/ residence. Pegasos enables a person to receive a peaceful, dignified and caring assisted death
The Pegasos website states that the organization was founded following the landmark death of 104-year old Australian ecologist Professor David Goodall.
Image Courtesy of Pegasos Swiss Association
Professor Goodall was not sick. At 104 years of age, he simply said he had had enough and now was the time to go. His eyesight was failing, his mobility was going. Most importantly, he could not do the fieldwork that had sustained and driven him all his life.
The death of Professor Goodall raised important issues for the right to die movement in general, and for the individuals who would become the founding professionals at Pegasos.
Firstly, it showed that a person’s desire for a dignified and peaceful assisted death is not solely dependent on terminal illness. Old age and a failing quality of life can also play a role.
Secondly, David Goodall’s experience showed that the Swiss law on assisted suicide is well placed to serve the needs of people who may not fit the traditional criteria used in other places in the world where assisted suicide is legal.
Are you a humanist who chooses to document your humanism through photography? You may be interested to learn more about grants provided by the W. Eugene Smith Fund. This New York-based organization focuses on photographers whose work follows the tradition of W. Eugene Smith’s 45-year career of humanistic photography and compassion. While the submission deadline for 2020 has recently passed, it is never too early to start thinking about future projects and opportunities.
The W. Eugene Smith Grant for Student Photographers is designed to encourage and support students whose photographic work renews the tradition of W. Eugene Smith’s humanistic and compassionate photography. Special consideration will be given to work that promotes social change and that embraces new technologies and image distribution, and that seeks to integrate the tradition of photography and social change with contemporary practice.
According to the organizers, the Judges of both grants will be looking for a photographers and projects that seem most likely to use exemplary and compelling photojournalism (possibly supplemented by or incorporating multi-media) to address an issue of import and impact related to the human condition; social change; humanitarian concern; armed conflict or interpersonal, psychological, cultural, social environmental, scientific medical and/or political significance, ideally expressing an underlying acknowledgement or our common humanity.
The 2020 timeline is as follows:
Call for entries open – January 2020
Submission deadline – 30 May 2020 at 11:59 pm EST.
Notification to all applicants – 15 July 2020
Recipient announcement to public – 14 October 2020
40th Annual W. Eugene Smith Grant Ceremony – 14 October 2020
The W. Eugene Smith Memorial Fund, Inc., a not-for-profit corporation qualified under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code, independently administers the grant program that provides photographers with the financial freedom to carry out or complete a major photographic essay. For 2020, the W. Eugene Smith Memorial Fund will award $10,000 to five photographers in response to the global pandemic. All awards will be presented in a ceremony held in New York City on October 14, 2020.
According to Humanists International, World Humanist Day began with chapters of American Humanist Association (AHA) in the 1980s. June 21 – the date that one of the two annual solstice events occurs – was eventually established by the two organizations as the date for WHD because “the solstice event has echoes of ancient communal gatherings, as well as reflecting humanity’s deepening scientific understanding of our world, and being an event that, by its nature, is shared globally at the same moment in the calendar.“
Humanists International recommends a variety of ways to celebrate World Humanist Day such as picnics and parties for informal gatherings or for those who wish to be more organized, hosting lectures, public proclamations and conferences.
As World Humanist Day 2020 approaches, we’re launching our first interactive polls. We want to know more about our visitors’ values and interests. We promise to retain individual confidentiality while making the overall data available to those who are interested.
For our poll regarding humanist values (below), you may choose up to five (5) options per vote. Not enough? You may submit as many votes as you wish.
Have an idea for a poll you’d like to see on our site? Let us know on our contact page.
![William Douw Lighthall . - [19-] - Archives de Montréal](https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Farchivesdemontreal.ica-atom.org%2Fuploads%2Fr%2Fville-de-montreal-section-des-archives%2Ff%2F3%2F8%2Ff389befdb34a0ad58cc0a66ceac91c33b9147c1a6464197b6864dfbfb59b24fb%2FBM1-5P1250.jpg&f=1&nofb=1)
Humanist Heritage Canada 