In the April/May 2005 issue of Free Inquiry, Shadia B. Dury writes in her article “Why Biblical Religions are an Obstacle to Freedom”:
In a society that places freedom above virtue in its hierarchy of ends, there will always be some individuals who will abuse their freedom. But if a society is to be free, it must have some tolerance for private vice — vice that does not involve harming others. Religious fundamentalists — Jewish, Christian, and Islamic — have zero tolerance for private vice. They prefer a society in which virtue, not freedom, is the supreme value.
Tolerance of private vice means accepting that people will not always be virtuous according to your standards and will, in fact, deliberately engage in what you consider vice without thinking that there is anything wrong with it. Such behavior is not criminalized, though, because your particular standards of vice and virtue are not treated as though they are binding on everyone.
Christians, Jews, and Muslims are certainly capable of such tolerance — the fact that America has existed this long without enshrining into law many religious standards is a testament to that. At the same time, though, there are many religious believers who are not capable of such tolerance. American history is filled with examples of religious groups attempting to have their beliefs placed into law and rather than slowing down, there are reasons to believe that this process may be speeding up a bit.
It’s not merely a difference of temperament between various Christians, though. There is something about Christianity, Judaism, and Islam which makes tolerating vice very difficult:
Aquinas was true to Jesus when he said that “unbelief is the greatest of sins.” This assumption has been the source of untold wickedness in the history of the Church. It explains the profound intolerance that has led Christians to persecute others, not for doing harm, but simply for being unbelievers or for harboring what Christian authorities thought were false beliefs....
A person who engages in vice isn’t simply violating a religious prohibition, but is acting like that prohibition doesn’t exist and/or doesn’t matter. A person who commits the sin of a vice also effectively commits a second and perhaps more egregious sin of “practical atheism”: they act like God doesn’t exist and/or hasn’t specifically prohibited the acts committed.
When virtue becomes the supreme value in society, the result is the criminalization of “sin” as defined by the sacred texts — and as these texts are interpreted by the powerful. You end up with a society that resembles the reign of the English Puritans in seventeenth-century England — they abolished Christmas because it was too much fun and there was too much pleasure and indulgence associated with it.
Or you end up with a society that resembles the reign of the Taliban in Afghanistan of recent memory: no music; no dancing; no kite flying; no films; no female voices singing on the radio; no female voices broadcasting the news; and no female arms, ankles, or faces seen in public. All these harmless freedoms and pleasures are supposedly too obscene — unlike public executions, stoning, burning witches, or tormenting Jews.
Dury’s note that the vices which are criminalized are those defined by how the “powerful” interpret scripture is very important. Scripture doesn’t speak for itself, despite what some fundamentalists may imagine or claim. Instead, scripture must be interpreted — and every interpretation is informed by one’s language, assumptions, culture, education, ambitions, etc.
There is a disturbing pattern in American history in which the vices of the upper and middle classes tends to be given a free pass while the vices of the lower classes, immigrants, racial minorities, etc. are singled out for extra political attention. As just one recent example, drugs used by inner city blacks (crack) and poor rural whites (crystal meth) are an epidemic and need to be stopped by the harshest methods. Drugs used by middle class youth (ecstasy) are a problem, but don’t attract nearly the same media or political hype.
There are no examples of a society which has criminalized vice and made “virtue” a social necessity which was also free and which was very appealing. Afghanistan under the Taliban may be one of the worst examples of such a society, but it’s not like there are any good examples to choose from.
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