[MF] MOQ: valuable or not?

[Muzikhed at aol.com]

A few posts back,
dmbuchanan wrote:
 
And the moderate secularist might say, "Well, if it 
makes you happy  and helps to hold your family together, then good for you. 
I'll just look  the other way and let you believe whatever you like." Harris 
points out that  there is really no other area of life where people are 
allowed to avoid  scrutiny and its gotta stop.




Ted says,
    David, thanks for the lengthy recent post.  I  guess you convinced me on 
this: if the theists want to join in the MoQ  Discussion groups, they should 
be welcome, but as equally open to probing of  their ideas in this context as 
everyone else.  Ideally, there should  be no taboo 'safety zones' where, for 
example, you can always go to always be  right.   
    I guess what pushed my buttons in your earlier post  (quoted above) was 
Harris's statement that the moderate secularists shouldn't  "look the other way 
and let you believe whatever you want."  Harris's  statement sounds like a 
call to arms - "it's gotta stop"  - as if...we  gotta get out there ... we gotta 
get up off the couch and stop those deluded  people who are "happy & holding 
their families together" ... which is quite  different than your 
very agreeable assertion that everyone who comes on the MD to discuss  
philosophy should be equally open to critique.
 
Certainly in the context of MoQ discussions, we all do each other  disservice 
by "looking the other way", letting each other off the  hook, etc.   But in 
Harris's presumed general case, I think  it's OK to let someone off the hook, 
and not jam them up with scrutiny...  unless it bears on some "relevant issue". 
 Perhaps there's the rub.   Being so broad, issues of faith can't help but 
touch on some relevant  issue to both the parties involved.  But, this seems 
vague.
Again, I guess I think of all sorts of neighbors,  inlaws and  octagenarians 
for whom I'm quite willing to 'look the other way," if the  alternative is 
varbal combat over entrenched delusions.   (If they  came to the MF, though, 
they'd be back on the hook!)
 
   What did Harris mean by the remark that "there is no  other area of life 
where people are allowed to avoid  scrutiny?"     Who is he referring to?     
Public figures?  Job Applicants?
Other than the MF/MD, (where everyone should come expecting to  be 
critiqued,) in what context do you (or Harris?) think we should stop  looking away?
I could go on, but I think you get my drift.
 
As for our specifics, here, I'm not so swift at argument & debate  
techniques, nor at sizing people up quickly, but I've come to believe that  Kevin Perez 
is sincere in his dealings, here... I don't know how  actively you've been 
lurking...  at first, there was a mutual  suspicion between us, but we are past 
that,  now.    Now the difference between us seems like the  Grand Canyon.  I 
don't think either one of us will ever cross it.  
 
Kevin's caveat:
> The caveat is that, as a man who maintains a love relationship  with
> Jesus, I may use language that would tend to inflame other  people's
> sensibilities. If this becomes a problem then I'll have to bow  out of the
> conversation
 
dmb said:
 
> It could
> be seen as an announcement that you're simply not  going to respond
> to those who might have a problem with what you're  saying or how
> you're saying it. It says, "Don't you dare." And that's  the kind of
> emotional blackmail Harris was talking about, the kind that  is used to
> protect beliefs from scrutiny.
 

 
I didn't take Kevin's caveat

as a threat to withdraw from the MF in spite if we don't make unfair  
exceptions for him.  I took it as an actual offer to sit out a specific  topic.  In 
other words, maybe it wasn't a debate tactic as you  suggest.    I can see it 
more clearly in Sam's case ("Just  remove me from your recipients if you don't 
like my input, (but I'm staying  here!)" )  but I thought Kevin's offer might 
be something  else.   I guess when I felt suspicious of Kevin's motives in the 
 past, I waited a bit to see where things would go, and then tried to post my 
 suspicions, rather than assuming the worst, and attacking  first.    And you 
know I have a boat-load of Christian baggage,  personally, and I do recognize 
and agree with your basic premise (there  should be no taboo safe-haven, 
"can't touch this" spots on the MoQ.)   

Since Kevin's caveat scenario has not played out - why not wait &  see what 
happens (?)
Or one could ask Kevin if that was his intent (to set up a future taboo  
zone) and see how he responds.  If Kevin also agrees there should be no  taboo 
zones, then don't you have him where you want him, in terms of debate  tactics, 
and fairness on the MF/MD ?
 
   
Ted