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Eugine_Nier comments on Thwarting a Catholic conversion? - Less Wrong Discussion
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Could you expend on what you mean by "bigotry", I've seen that word thrown around to shut down debates way too much.
For example, from the above post some might conclude that you are an anti-Catholic bigot, depending on the definition of "bigotry" being used they might well be right.
Well, the particular example I'm thinking of is when she invited a Catholic friend as a guest blogger to discuss what he considered to be the strongest arguments against same-sex marriage. He ended up arguing that not only same-sex marriage, but the normalization and even existence of same-sex attraction itself needs to be combated so as to prevent the possibility that romantic attraction would complicate same-sex friendships. Homosexuals shouldn't publicly express their desires, as this results in "sexualizing" public spaces. Strong suggestions that the state should participate in the enforcement of such non-expression.
If you want to say this "isn't bigotry," or that I'm being too loose with the concept, that's fine. I have no strong attachment to some particular understanding of the term. My substantive point was that these views struck me as so outlandish that to host a whole debate about them and repeatedly defend the author as honest and well-intentioned seemed surprising.
I think a little more context is in order, Jay. A quite conservative Catholic speaker was coming to our alma mater and people were protesting and staging a kiss-in + walk-out at his talk. But no one was spending much time rebutting his argument, and I feel pretty strongly if you're going to disrupt a talk, you owe the people who are coming a cogent explanation of why.
So I invited a friend to summarize and pitch the speaker's ideas on my blog and then I rebutted, so that there'd be a discussion and reference to go with the protest. And Gerken (my interlocutor) is intelligent and was writing with the best of intentions. I disagreed with a lot of his points (even within a Catholic framework) but that's not a refutation of his sincerity.
More outlandish than monkeys changing into humans?
Being honest and well-intentioned is a property of the arguments the author uses, not whether you like the conclusion.
I disagree. I think "being honest and well-intentioned" is a property of the person advancing the argument (and reducible, in principle, to brain states), not a property of the argument itself (that is to say, a particular set of propositions). People can produce deeply flawed (invalid or inductively weak) arguments while actually trying to produce the opposite (or at least, it feels like I can).
You are right, what is or is not "outlandish" depends heavily on large amounts of assumed background information. For instance, depending on the time period, it would be extremely "outlandish" to claim that disease is caused by "invisible animals", but moderns seem to be quite comfortable with the idea.
Good point.
I also noticed her persistent engagement with arguments against homosexuality itself, for a duration that seemed far out of proportion to the strength of these arguments and the attention they should merit. Given that the most she now says about Catholic teachings on homosexuality is that she's "confused" by them, I almost have to wonder if her extended search for any plausible arguments against homosexuality was actually just a way to make the open leap to Catholicism feel more palatable from her perspective.