Converting a creationist: worth the bother?

[RedImperator]

My sister is a bright young woman, but her speciality is English literature, not science, and thanks to a long high school relationship with a Jehova's Witness, she's been attending their meetings and listening to their theology for long enough to start buying into some of it. This has horrified her Catholic mother and deeply bothers her Deist brother (me). One of the things she's swallowed whole-heartedly is creationism. Mr. Bean, I believe, is experiencing a similar problem with a friend or family member of his.

So here's the question: given that I could lay a full blown Triple Backhand Bitch Slap (TM) on any creationist argument she could bring forward to defend her views (thanks, Talk.Origins and Lord Wong!), and she IS smart enough to start doubting beliefs if someone points out their absurdidy forcefully enough, should I bother trying to educate her, or should I just throw up my hands and let her believe whatever nonsense she likes, so long as it's not going to cost her (or me) any money and she doesn't start making noise about teaching creationism in biology class? Those of you who have tried to convert creationists in the past, is it worth the trouble, especally considering she's family and not some newsgroup troll or some misguided editor at a conservative college newspaper conference (yes, they exist, and they have open bars)?

[Gil Hamilton]

<Doctor Hibbert>Fire! And lots of it!</Doctor Hibbert>
Seriously, it may not be worth the bother. She isn't hurting anyone and since you said she is a bright woman, she will figure things out on her own, so I wouldn't press the issue. BUT! I'm certain that she will no doubt seek acceptance of for her new-found beliefs from her friends and family, and that is when you can point out the silliness of creationism as she brings it up. Don't like ram her face in it, that will just make her dig her heels, but if you are casual and logically shoot it down and leave it at that, she'll think about it. I saw a bumper sticker that said "Fundementalism stops a thinking mind." if she starts thinking about it, she'll move away from it.

[Mr. B]

You should encourage her to find her own way, BUT show her how much more logical evolution is than creationism.

[Meghel]

Hmm, this is a difficult one.

You said that your sister is a smart young woman, who can make her own mind.
I suggest you watch closely from the borderline and discuss with her daily occurences, like the news and life and all
If she stays the same person (smart, caring, your sister ), then there is no problem.

The problems will arise when she gets indoctrinated.
If you find that she is changing for the worse (fundamentalist, irrational or just strange), I would suggest you try to set her straight.


Question; you said that your mother is a catholic. Does she follow the catholic faith as well or is she not following a faith?

Meghel


PS: if it were my sister, I would immediately intervene, but that is because I am Christian and so is my sister.

[Peregrin Toker]

Personally, I have no problem with those creationists (such as theRaëlian Movement) who are quite open-minded....

The Jehovah's Witnesses, on the other hand...

[Wicked Pilot]

Bitchslap her JW boyfriend immediately.

Seriousily, being a JW is a hazard to your health. Would you want your sister do die because she refuses a blood transfusion after an otherwise non life threatening car accident? Would you want your sister to be shuned if she ever later left the order? Do you know how many exJWs have committed suicide after leaving?

Want a second opinion, read this http://www.valleyskeptic.com/jw%7E1.htm

[Darth Wong]

The JW's are a harmful cult, by every definition of the term. Your response should be identical to that if she were to join the Branch Davidians or any other wacko nutjob cult.

As for converting creationists, it can and has been done. Hardcore fundies are utterly useless wastes of flesh; arguing with a hardcore fundie is like trying to talk to a cat. However, fence-sitters who are easily swayed by "moderate" arguments such as "intelligent design" can also be swayed back by cold, hard logic. At the very least, you put doubt into their minds, and doubt may eventually blossom into full-fledged rejection.

I've lost count of the number of E-mails I've gotten from my "creationism vs science" website which say something like "your arguments are very convincing; I still believe there's something out there, but you've given me a lot to think about." People like that are people who still believe in God, but are smart enough to realize that creationism is an intellectual dead-end street.

[RedImperator]

So it's not really the creationism thing I should worry about, it's the fact she's a borderline JW. Great. Though she IS leaving for college in two weeks, and she'll be several hundred miles away from her church, or study group, or whatever the hell they call it. I think her problem is that, unlike the rest of her family, she's got a spiritual side. The Roman Catholic Church is a 2000 year old bureaucracy and about as spiritually fulfilling, and the local Protestant congregations are of the sort of dull sensible shoes denominations that turn 13 year old girls into Wiccans. Actually, she played around with that a little bit, too, but gave up when she realized she didn't actually have any magic powers, and neither does anyone else. And I'm hardly an example for her to follow: my faith can be summed up as, "God has the entire universe to worry about, do you think he's going to take special notice of you?"

I'll lay off the creationism argument. She's sorta pissed at me for winning an argument about marijuana legalization, so I'll let that slide. Frankly, I've been suspicious of the JW's ever since she got involved with them (and my mother is furious at the boyfriend's parents for taking her to their meetings without even consulting us--imagine the reaction if we'd taken their son to a Catholic service), and the stuff Mike and USAF Ace said just confirmed it. I haven't the slightest idea how I'm supposed to go about this (my sister is the type that if you push her hard enough, she'll do the exact opposite of what you want her to do). For now, I'll wait and see what happens with her at school.

Bah. Give me the cold, soulless embrace of athiesm any day. Thanks for the advice, guys.

[LordShaithis]

I can't abide such nonsense. I say lay the smackdown on her mythology.

[IDMR]

I can't abide such nonsense. I say lay the smackdown on her mythology.

Given that we are trying to help Red here convince his sister, a confrontation of such nature, or 'smack down' as you so colourfully described it, may not be entirely appropriate at this juncture.

[Wicked Pilot]

Given that we are trying to help Red here convince his sister, a confrontation of such nature, or 'smack down' as you so colourfully described it, may not be entirely appropriate at this juncture.

No, you smackdown the boyfriend. Just ask him what date the JWs are now predicting to be the end of the world, seeing that in 1914 and 1975 the world obvisiousily didn't end.

Then (RedImperator listen closely) ask him in front of your sister; "if my sister was injured from a car wreck, and desperately needed a blood transfusion, but was unconsious and unable to make any decisions, would you insist that the paramedics not save her?"

If that doesn't work, you could always dress up like a Smurf. Smurfs scare the living shit out of JWs.

[SirNitram]

I find a few AD&D books on hand is enough to spook the JW away.

[RedImperator]

The blood transfusion thing is something I never considered. She's not technically a member of the church, so she's not specifically forbidden to recieve blood. But from the boyfriend's point of view, it's a grave sin for her to recieve a transfusion. And if she's gravely injured, she could die and be judged, with or without the transfusion. So from his point of view, it's in her best interest to lie to the paramedics and say she's a Jehova's Witness and try to prevent the transfusion.

Just for the record, I know a few paramedics at school. From what I've seen, in the above situation, they'd have the cops haul the BF away, give her the transfusion, and if she lives, she can make her own peace with God on her own time. But this is a question of philosophy, not practical consequences.

Great. Now I've got an image of my sister dying on the side of the road while her idiot boyfriend tries to talk the paramedics into letting her die. Why couldn't she have found a nice, fire-and-brimstone Presbyterian congregation?

[Crossover_Maniac]

So here's the question: given that I could lay a full blown Triple Backhand Bitch Slap (TM) on any creationist argument she could bring forward to defend her views (thanks, Talk.Origins and Lord Wong!), and she IS smart enough to start doubting beliefs if someone points out their absurdidy forcefully enough, should I bother trying to educate her, or should I just throw up my hands and let her believe whatever nonsense she likes, so long as it's not going to cost her (or me) any money and she doesn't start making noise about teaching creationism in biology class?

The world isn't going to spontaneously combust or the gravitational constant of the universe isn't going to spike up and collapse everything into a blackhole because your sister believes the earth is 10,000 years old. Let her believe what she wants, and don't lose any sleep over it. Whether she believes the earth is 10,000 or 5 billion years old isn't going to make her a better or worse person.

[LordShaithis]

I've never been one for tact regarding such matters. Let the smack be laid upon her silly beliefs, and a knee dropped upon her boyfriend's spleen.

[Sea Skimmer]

<Doctor Hibbert>Fire! And lots of it!</Doctor Hibbert>

Its fire, and PLEANTY of it!

[IDMR]

The world isn't going to spontaneously combust or the gravitational constant of the universe isn't going to spike up and collapse everything into a blackhole because your sister believes the earth is 10,000 years old.

<snip>

If those are to be the criterion as to whether one should act, then there is no point in almost any human endeavour.

[IDMR]

<Doctor Hibbert>Fire! And lots of it!</Doctor Hibbert>

Its fire, and PLEANTY of it!

Don't you mean 'plenty' of it?

[Nick]

Great. Now I've got an image of my sister dying on the side of the road while her idiot boyfriend tries to talk the paramedics into letting her die. Why couldn't she have found a nice, fire-and-brimstone Presbyterian congregation?

As a couple of people have already said, if you piss her off to the extent that she refuses to talk to you, then that's the end of it. If she won't listen to you, then you won't have any chance to get her to open her eyes.

Similarly, if you overtly antagonise the boyfriend, she may choose to take his side, at which point your relationship with her might become overly adversarial as well. After all, nothing improves cohesion more than a common enemy. Even attacking JW's or creationists in general around her may be dangerous - if she identifies sufficiently with those groups to take your views as personal attacks, then you stand a fair chance of making her unwilling to listen to you.

The trick is to encourage her to find her own way out of the JW's, rather than trying to push her out, drag her out, or whatever. My suggestion is to stop talking. Don't argue with her, don't question what she says she believes. Just listen. Find out why she is attracted to the JW's (and the idea of creationism). Is it just because of her boyfriend? Does she feel there is something 'missing'?

When you know more about what she actually believes, as well as the things she's willing to accept because of the sense of belonging the JW's (presumably) give her, then you're in a position to try to gently lead her away from it. Depending on what she genuinely believes, you might be able to point out that the things she likes about the JW's are the things they have in common with other religions. Something else you might be able to do is to get her to seriously ponder some of the major flaws in JW beliefs. Don't start attacking them yourself. Just try to ask the occasional pointed question about key beliefs, and then see if she follows through on it. Hell, you might even find out that you've been worried over nothing, and she's well-aware of the problems with JW beliefs (although it sounds like that possibility is somewhat unlikely).

Obviously, the details are going to be highly dependent on you, your sister, and your relationship - you may be able to get away with being somewhat aggressive, and still have her want to talk to you. She may be suspicious of any sudden changes in attitude on your part. But I suspect that, if you want to influence her beliefs, your best bet is to be just as accepting and welcoming of her as her JW associates are (more so, in fact, since you don't consider her a heathen witch. . .). If she starts perceiving you as an enemy, then you've lost your principle means for affecting the course of these events.

One other thing - you'll probably have a lot more luck trying to bring her back to an actual Christian religion rather than trying to get her to try and deal with the issues associated with atheism at the same time. Liberal Christianity is a perfectly reasonable point of view - and an infinite improvement over the point of view of a Jehovah's Witness. . .

I hope that at leat gives you a few ideas :>

[Crossover_Maniac]

The world isn't going to spontaneously combust or the gravitational constant of the universe isn't going to spike up and collapse everything into a blackhole because your sister believes the earth is 10,000 years old.

<snip>

If those are to be the criterion as to whether one should act, then there is no point in almost any human endeavour.

Uh, you know I was exaggerating, right. Quite frankly, it's just a philosophical debate with no real importance. I don't see how knowing the evolutionary family tree on man and what ape he evolved from really matters in daily life. It's not important enough to squabble over with your sister. If your sister was doing something to hurt herself, yeah, I'd make a big deal out of it. But this creationalist/evolution thing isn't what I'd a big priority.

[Ender]

Why bother trying to remove the ignorance from hard core fanatical believers (Note that this is coming from a dedicated Catholic)? Just convince them that mowing your lawn and washing your car will bring them closer to God.

[RedImperator]

Thanks guys for all your thoughts. I talked to her a little bit today. I get the feeling she knows somewhere that the stuff the JW's are feeding her is bullshit, and she's just playing along out of sheer intertia at this point. Still, I'll keep my eyes open.

[LordShaithis]

Hire a drifter to kill her boyfriend.

[XaLEv]

No, effectorize the fucker.

[Mr. B]

Hire a drifter to kill her boyfriend.

Hell I'll do it for free.