Forget the problem of evil, argues Matthew Hicks. Why aren’t we getting more het up about injustice and human suffering?
Last week saw a media storm over an interview with Stephen Fry. During the interview (embedded below), Fry was asked: ‘What if you’re wrong? What would you say to God if you found you were at the pearly gates?’ Fry said that he would ask this benevolent, compassionate, all-knowing God what bone cancer in children was all about before becoming reservedly enraged about the level of suffering on this planet against a backdrop of a supposedly benevolent, compassionate, all-powerful, and all-knowing being.
Fry’s response was by no means novel, but he articulated himself sufficiently well that people either identified with it or took disagreement with it strongly enough to result in millions of shares and retweets . What stuck out to me however, was not his articulacy or verbosity, but rather his rage at injustice and suffering in the world today, an emotion which was almost palpable.
The question posed to Fry was a narrow-minded, both philosophically and spiritually, and Fry very eloquently answered back in those same terms. But it was the narrowness of Fry’s response which has led to people from both ends of the belief spectrum rushing in to claim an intellectual or spiritual high ground.
With Fry’s rage about suffering so effectively bypassed by those responders, I would like to ask a question. If we are so concerned with the nature of this dilemma, and so many of those with faith or lack thereof are, then why can’t we find it in ourselves to stand alongside Fry in this rage regardless of our belief?
The realms of the supernatural and the rational can fight all they want, split verbal hairs and claim immaturity and narrow-mindedness on the other’s part. Any one of us can detail the insides of our navels over this issue and wait sneeringly for a response. If we do that however, and jump on the difference of opinion rather than share in the rage of injustice, then we are no different from an allegedly all-powerful, all-compassionate God who sits on his divine derrière.
We live in an age where we who have access to Fry’s interview (and the ability to share it) have a comprehension of the world and its affairs that is unprecedented in history. We are as close to an all-knowing animal as we can get right now! And through the Internet, we also now have the ability to change so much that which is unjust. We are not ourselves all-powerful but as men and women, we have countless opportunities to effect change through democratic activity.
‘For me the evil of inactivity is so much more malignant than the evil of difference of opinion.’
My point is that rage spent on attempting to reverse injustice and suffering is much more productive than rage spent on pointless debate. Are we not better off expending energy on real issues at stake in the world today through channels such as scientific research, foreign aid, and the promotion of human rights? Surely that is a more worthwhile display of our better human qualities than arguments which have no benefit except to fuel the ego of those arguing their point.
Whether there is a divine being is irrelevant to the point in hand. What Fry’s response encapsulates is a sense of anger that we all feel and identify with at some level regardless of belief. Of course highlighting our differences is so much easier than seeking common ground. To do the latter would open up a whole can of worms with regards our sense of responsibility toward our fellow humans. For me the evil of inactivity is so much more malignant than the evil of difference of opinion.
As Martin Niemoller said:
First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
Matt Hicks can be often found touring Devon with a bag full of songs and his ukulele. He blogs at The Wooden Duck.
I disagree; debate and argument are useful; isn’t that the lesson of Plato and Aristotle? But debate should include listening to the other; a good example took place decades ago on BBC television when the atheist Marghantita Laski held a series of discussions with Metropolitan Antony Bloom; they did, of course, find a lot of common ground. Of course, Stephen Fry was not debating with Gay Byrne, he was responding to a hypothetical question.But I think that the Laski/Bloom discussions are something missing today; but a group of humanists did meet with a group of Muslims under the aegis of the British Humanist Association for the purpose of mutual understanding.So, what is needed is both coming together over things which can unite us–anger at various types of suffering and abuse–and frank, respectful discussion of differences.
John, read the of again and you’ll see we come from a similar view. Debate is indeed useful and in fact essential but my article was a response to the people who responded to the interview rather than a response to the interview itself. The storm it caused amongst people smugly trying to get the intellectual high ground, missed the point that Fry was displaying a universal language. That of anger toward injustice. My point being that those with any integrity would have identified with that anger rather than trying to prove that God does or doesn’t exist.
I largely agree with you; but anger about bone cancer in children–Stephen Fry’s first example–though understandable, is not rational if you take an omnipotent god out of the equation; if you believe that this world is all there is, and that cancer is a product of that world, there is not anything to be angry with. I think that some people posed the question: Why is Fry so angry with a god he does not believe in? But I think that his anger was quite legitimate if directed, not at a non-existent god, but at the religious who promote their god as benign, and–my bugbear at the moment–the BBC, who reinforce this belief by giving believers an unchallenged platform in programs like “Thought for the Day” and “Sunday”; it is also legitimate to be angry at the privileges given to Christianity in our Constitution. Even the Independent on Sunday allowed Richard Harries a platform in which he promoted the view that the Bible teaches us that God hates cruelty above everything. I wrote to the paper challenging this view, but it was not published. We are still dominated by the respect agenda.
Matt, you say, “My point is that rage spent on attempting to reverse injustice and suffering is much more productive than rage spent on pointless debate”; but then, in reply to my first response, you say:”Debate is indeed useful”, which sounds a little contradictory. Of course we can find common ground, and people already do, in countless ways. As for Fry, he is not so much talking about man-made injustice as natural disasters which are not caused by us humans,
John,
I see your point. What I mean is that there are some debates which up against more pressing issues are pointless. Debate about God is not entirely pointless if it serves to clarify to the person what it is they think or need to revise. Smug clamoring for intellectual high ground when there are important matters we could be attending to is pointless. Does that make sense. I appreciate you bringing me to task John. Thank you.
Fry’s anger was directed, it seems to me, at the ludicrous notion of a compassionate God.
All but the shallowest of religious thinkers are bound to have some way of reconciling this obvious contradiction, at least to their satisfaction.
One that I often hear is that what may seem cruel suffering to us may be born of a greater wisdom, and is somehow for our own good (cruel to be kind so to speak).
To me that is still utter nonsense but I would guess it is the sort of challenge Fry is likely to have provoked.
At any rate if we criticize the respondents for the limited scope of their remarks then we could just as easily do so of Fry himself.
I couldn’t resist commenting. Well written!