AD HOMINEM, RELIGION AND ARGUMENTS AGAINST THE PERSON NOT WHAT THEY SAY

Religious rejection of ad hominem

Ad hominem is when you argue that a belief or opinion is wrong because the person expressing it is a hypocrite or something. It's an argument against the person making the argument and is not an argument against the argument.  But even if the person is dishonest and a charlatan and are the devil incarnate their belief or opinion could be right.  A belief being true or false has nothing at all to do with the kind of person the believer is. 

Another form of ad hominem, an ad hominem in reverse, is arguing that a religion is true/good because its members are above average good.  A less strong claim is that the religion may not be true/good but true/good enough.  Those who say that violent Muslims are not Muslims at all are presupposing that idea.  Thus their argument is arrogant and bad not to mention irrational to the level of being obviously absurd. 

And if being good makes your religion true then you have to admit that being bad makes it untrue.  The only fair and honest solution is that good or bad people both reflect on their religion.

No religion officially embraces ad hominem.  If their scriptures or God or doctrines endorse such thinking the religion would rather forget that.

Religion gives it so it must take it!

The not all bad is not applied when it comes to at least one other religion. You and your religion are not willing to be thought of like that but you should be when you are willing to do it to another. Christianity left Judaism instead of reasoning, “There are good Jews so we must stay in.” It did not reason that way at all and considered a new community necessary.

Christianity is based on the assumption that some sets of sinners are always doing wrong when they engage in some specific sin. For example, taking what does not belong to you is not a sin if you are starving to death but you must never have sex outside marriage.  You may be exempted from Sunday worship which is normally obligatory but you are never exempted from the duty to encourage others to repent their sins.  A faith that rejects, "Not all bad", in such cases in fairness has to ask us to maybe reject it in relation to itself.

Anyway "not all bad" is out for Christianity because,

The religion teaches that we are conceived tainted with sin.  Adam sinned and we sinned in him.  Whatever sinning in Adam means it means at the very least the Hebrew concept of corporate solidarity. This in no way need imply we are to blame for what Adam did.  It could but usually it is taken to argue we are not personally responsible but in some other way that is just as bad we are responsible.

It says that all people without exception are sinners

It says that it is never good for people to have sex outside marriage between a man and a woman

Never good to reject belief in God

Never good to say the Bible is evil

Never good to fail to warn against the possibility of Hell

Why does a person of faith take a global rather than individualist view of sin?  Why is every sin seen as something that brings evil to others no matter how secret it seems to be?  This outlook helps explain why something that someone does that seems harmless or none of your business can be bad.  It is how sin can be deceiving and a Pandora's box and does subtle changes to the sinner. Take homosexuality.  A lot of the religious condemnation of homosexuality is clearly about the notion that it is just bad to be an active gay person. For that reason, even the gay who would never touch a teenager is considered part of the problem when a gay man sleeps with somebody who is too young. The Church says that there is a problem if the kind of body you have does not matter when it comes to sex.  That is what the idea that only a man and woman in marriage is allowed to have sex is getting at.  You are considered to be opening a Pandora's box of evils even if you would not do the evils yourself.

You may subtly make another feel safe about doing evil and be even more to blame than he or she is when you help them feel they might as well do the bad thing for otherwise they are so good.  The not all bad thinking in relation to religion purposely denies that. To think that way proves your religion is all bad for its indirect or perhaps unrecognised role and not wanting to admit it makes it bad.

Equality means religion gets no special praise

How do we explain Christianity’s charity when the religion says that human beings are tainted by sin and can’t do good unless they find something godless or bad in it? It is an admission that the religion should get no more praise for doing good than any other entity should. Both it and the Communist Party stand together on that issue. Religion hates this suggestion as there are clearly movements we have the right to demand must be abolished and it is our right not to let them hide behind, “We do a lot of good too. Or give us a chance!”

When you say religion is good and any bad or violence is not religion you reach some odd conclusions.  It becomes, "Priests do not molest children.  Fr Smyth abused children therefore Smyth is not a priest."  It is a bad sign how religion wants people to talk such rubbish.  It is frightening that people would lie that way!  The argument objectifies the human person. Why say "religion is not religion when it hurts" and not, "It is human to be good.  John killed Jake so John is not human"?  The assertion is that the religious person has value but not as a human being.