Spoiler alert
Religion is the source of all evil. That is pretty much Bill Maher's not surprising conclusion in his 2008 film “Religulous” which covers the presenter's world tour of self-assertive crusade against religion. Maher, a self-proclaimed anti-religionist, presents in the film some valid arguments against religion, some of which I – an agnostic – agree with. However, his choice of opponents suggests that he either lacks faith in his own intellect – those of you familiar with his work probably giggle just at the thought – or is on a mission to caricature religion by displaying some of its most unfortunate elements.
Neither a comedy not a documentary
During an interview with Larry King, Maher claimed that the film was not a documentary, but a comedy. However, in an out-take from the film, he explains some passers-by that he is making a documentary. That is one the film's problems. It tries – unsuccessfully – to balance between the two genres.
Cynical documentaries that make use of comedy have been seen before. Michael Moore for example is a prominent figure in that genre. But Moore's and Maher's productions have more in common than just genre: They both fall into the ethical pitfall of approaching their subjects under false pretence. Moore presents it in his films as a sophisticated way – and at times the only way – of getting honest answers from his antagonists. he shares his way of thinking and method of gathering information with the viewers, whereas Maher is more deceptive and does not inform the viewers that he actually presented the production to his subjects under the false title “A spiritual journey”, asking them to discuss “faith and conversion”. Yet, the fact that the director of Religulous is Larry Charles, the same director of films such as the ethically questionable comedies “Borat” and “Brüno”, might explain the difficulty Maher had in making Religulous a fair presentation. That is of course assuming he was even aiming at making it a fair presentation, an assumption that does not rest on any evidence so-whatever.
I enjoyed the film, in spite of its many weaknesses. The editing is at times simply fantastic. Maher himself is a sharp entertainer, even though his comments are often more clever and sophisticated than they are funny, and he has a good eye for discrepancies in his interviewees arguments. His own standpoint is, however, his blind spot.
Maher focuses not on religion as such, but on odd extremist fractions such as Yisroel Dovid Weiss, spokesman for the Jewish orthodox fraction of holocaust deniers Neturei Karta; cult leaders such as José Luis de Jesús Miranda who claims to be Jesus Christ returned and the Antichrist in one; a random congregation at a small road side truckers chapel; Reverend Ferre van Beveren of the Cannabis Ministry in Amsterdam and more...
Presenting those people as representatives of Religion, corresponds to presenting some ignorant red-necks who can't tell the difference between the policies of the Democratic Party and communism as representatives of the American model of capitalism. Unfortunate side-effects that are a result of bad administration of an idea can not and may not be used as an argument against the idea – only against the way in which it is being put to practice. Differentiating between an idea and its implementation in practice is crucial in this debate, and Maher does not even attempt to approach this issue. It will likewise be bad polemic to argue against atheism by using Maher as its representative.
The art of avoiding intellectual heavyweights
Maher chooses the easy way and ends up playing the man instead of the ball. On three occasions he makes half-hearted efforts to dodge this pitfall of ad hominem arguments, and for different reasons which I will now specify, he doesn't make it work.
First of all, an interview with Dr. Francis Collins, a leading physician-geneticist, who happens to be an Evangelical Christian, focuses more on Maher's questions than on Dr. Collins' answers and does not allow any serious elaboration from Dr. Collins.
Secondly, Later in the film Maher interviews Father George Coyne, a Jesuit Priest, astronomer and director of the Vatican Observatory. Coyne does not accept a fundamentalist interpretation of Catholicism. Rather than asking this prominent religious scientist about the biblical discrepancies with which he confronts his less knowledgeable interviewees, and which would be more relevant to ask a a man such as Coyne, Maher simply accepts Coyne's rejection of fundamentalism with a nod and a smile. Of all People, Father Coyne might be the one capable of altering Mahers preconception about the irrationality of religion. Maybe that explains Maher's choice not to take the interview in that direction.
Lastly, Maher interviews Father Reginald Foster – a Carmelite monk and the Vatican's chief Latin expert. Foster laughs at the idea that hell exists, at the technical details of the story of Jesus, such as the assertion that Jesus was born on the 25th of December, calling such believes “stories”. Rather than using this opportunity to enquire why these stories are being misrepresented to and by the general public, Maher does not make the slightest effort to enquire about Foster's ideas of how Catholicism is to be understood and administered.
Maher does not challenge Dr. Collins, Father Coyne or Fader Foster. One cannot help the feeling that this is out of fear of getting a sensible answer from intellectual superiors which he would not be able to counter. He is just as sharp when facing those, he presents as immune to common sense, as he is timid and shallow when facing those he does not feel he can measure up to.
Maher finds easier ways to establish the superiority of his views by choosing mainly minor intellectual challenges such as the badly articulated Arkansas Senator Mark Pryor; Aki Nawaz, a Muslim rapper who calls for freedom of speech and the right to dissent, but preaches to violence and supports the Iranian fatwa on Salman Rushdie, and a certain Steve Burg from the organisation of Ex-Jews for Jesus(?!) Maher indeed goes out of his way to find easy prey. The real intellectuals only appear in the film to the extent that their presence supports Mahers views. There is no doubt that his interpretation and frame of reference rip their words out of their original context and distorts their meaning.
The film shows Maher globe-trotting, and in many scenes he is in a car, travelling across the United States. This kind of presentation is obviously meant as a metaphor for the presenter's inner journey and quest for answers. The metaphor fails though, as Maher is not on a quest for answers, he is on a quest to prove a point. He does not travel from A to B. He never leaves A, he just tries to expand A and ridicule B. He claims that his religion is certainty in doubt, but he does not doubt. He rules out. In this respect he is no less religious than most of his interviewees.
Larry Charles recycles a successful concept one time too many
While resting the camera a second longer than necessary on those Maher thinks are making fools of themselves, in the serious and potentially thought provoking interviews – with Dr. Andrew Newberg, Dr. Francis Collins, Father George Coyne and Father Reginald Foster – it seems that the most important bits of the conversation have been left on the floor in the editing room together with the potential message of the film. Otherwise the editing of the film is original and entertaining. Maher uses the technique of on-screen arrows and signs to point out how inarticulate his interviewees are, mark discrepancies in their statements, and to tell different facts that he shares with the viewers (but not with the people he is facing). However, this legitimate and effective technique for comedy is misplaced in this film which in spite of its frivolous nature, does in fact address serious issues. Mocking involuntary participants in films like Borat and Brüno works to some extent, mainly because the main joke is the presenter himself. But in Religulous Maher takes himself very seriously, and that deprives this technique of its value as an instrument of comedy, and what is left is merely indecent conduct.
A well produced atheist propaganda that avoids dealing with the real issues
The bottom line is that the film's title is a spoiler, particularly to those who already know Maher and his view on religion. The beginning is the end, and after a hundred minutes that end in a melodramatic apocalyptic prophecy by Maher, the viewers realise they had just been walking around in circles among the unfortunate side effects of religion, becoming none the wiser.
Maher ignores – either deliberately or out of ignorance – some of the founding fathers of modern science like for example Galileo and Newton, who were more knowledgeable about science and religion than the dear Bill Maher, and did not see the two doctrines as irreconcilable - even though the leaders of the church thought differently. He also ignores the scores of religious winners of the Nobel Prize for physics, medicine, chemistry, literature and more. In his closing monologue he even ignores Father George Coyne, whom he'd interviewed for the film. There are indeed enough examples of people who administrate and unite their religious faith with modern scientific reasoning, and Maher cannot be unaware of their existence. The problem with those people is that they would most likely stain Maher's black and white view of the world with stains of grey that would ruin the whole point of his crusade.
Maher bases his apocalyptic prophecy on the assumption that “faith is making a virtue out of not thinking”. He even argues against the “moderately religious”. His prophecy draws extra dramatic authority from a sequence of pictures running on the screen in high tempo, presenting bombs going off, leaders at prayer and other images that give the illusion of chaos and doomsday. But more careful editing should have been practised in that scene, as two of the leaders presented – Muammar al-Gaddafi and Yasser Arafat – are not and never were religious. Another brief image that gives the wrong impression of a chaotic crowd is taken from a peaceful demonstration in Israel, where Jews and Arabs are holding signs in Hebrew and Arabic calling for peace between the people. The fact that those images have very little to do with religion, and one of them is a call for peace across ethnic boundaries, does not reduce their strong visual impact, and Maher takes himself the liberty to take these pictures out of context, and manipulated with them to suit his agenda. Just like the rest of the film, the closing monologue is entertaining, manipulative, self-important and embarrassingly shallow. Nevertheless, blind followers of different religions - be it Muslims, Jews, Christians or atheists - more recognised religions, might be fascinated by the film, each for their own reasons. some would clap their little hands at it while others would call their lawyers.
Instructor: Larry Charles
Runtime: 1:41
Land: USA
Maher and the ideology he stands for
Ideologically, Maher associates with fundamentalist atheists such as author and journalist Christopher Hitchens (author of God is Not Great) and ethologist and biologist Richard Dawkins (author of The God Delusion). The two are harsh critics of all religion, including agnosticism (but not of atheism). Whereas Maher claims to campaign for doubt (without actually doing so), Hitchens and Dawkins do not pretend to advocate for doubt. They explicitly campaign for certainty. Don't believe in god, they say, believe in science! If we leave matters in the hands of Maher, Hitchens and Dawkins, all the power that the priests of religion used to posses and abuse in ancient times will be handed over in its entirety to the priests of science.
The popular delusion about science is that it is an objective entity of absolute truths (just like god). Religion and science alike are two huge and enormously complex entities, which are impossible for most people to understand fully. For that reason alone, the popular assumption that priests and scientists represent their respective dogmas in an objective manner, is unavoidable. This fact places great power in the hands of priests and scientists. Power which should never again be allowed to be in the hands of representatives of only one dogma, or else it is bound to be misused in a catastrophic way. Think of the Church's conduct in the middle ages, and of the Third Reich's racial science. And do not delude yourselves that we have come a long way since. We haven't.
The sad reality though is that science and religion are not at all different from other aspects of life such as humour, fashion, gastronomy and hairstyle. They are all subjected to local temporary, political and subjective notions of political correctness. The priests of science can therefore be just as destructive and manipulative as the priests of religion, and there is no way of telling whether today's pseudo-science is not tomorrow's mainstream science.
No comments:
Post a Comment