Do Religious Liberals Provide Cover for Religious Extremists?
Do Religious Liberals Provide Cover for Religious Extremists? Thursday March 22, 2007 One issue which has been drawing more conflict between irreligious atheists and religious believers is whether religious liberals and moderates provide “cover” for religious fundamentalists and extremists. Religious believers object to any such connection being made because they strongly oppose many of the beliefs and actions of extremists, so how could they possibly be held to blame for what extremists do? This sort of objection completely misses the point of atheists’ criticism, though. Atheists don’t deny that liberals and moderates argue against fundamentalists; the problem is, though, that liberals and moderates affirm many of the positions which extremists use as the basis for their extremism. Because extremism must be attacked at its foundations, extremism cannot be criticized without also criticizing the beliefs of liberals and moderates and they frequently object to this. When liberals and mo
