Atheist Memes

Something fun to think about: English has a shit lexicon for talking about wrongdoing.

We have sin, which is wrongdoing against God (as informed by our ministries, hence why thinking sexy thoughts is sinful but war profiteering is not.)

We have crime which is wrongdoing against the state, which is why exposing embarrassments of the regime gets you more prison time than murder one.

When it comes to wrongdoing that doesn't involve church or state, we have to use a phrase that awkwardly fits:

• crime against humanity
• sin against nature

Our laws tend to function around sin and crime (yes, even here in the States, where there's an alleged wall of separation.) When there are victims, we first see to it the state is satisfied before we look to the well being of those affected. In many cases, the victims get no aid, no reparations, nothing.

Wrondoing can be neither crime nor sin, and still affect:

• other individuals
• the community
• a given demographic (black neighbors, gays in your community, women)
• the environment (including biodiversity / wildlife, entire ecosystems)
• the people of a region or a nation (independent of the entity of the state)
• the international community (international law and international courts exist, but they have very little power to enforce that law, hence why Putin and George W. Bush are both at large)

Most wrongdoing done by religious institutions are disregarded as sins. And most wrongdoing done by state agents are disregarded as crime. And then much wrongdoing is too complex for courts to understand or establish jurisdiction (The hedge-fund shenanigans resulting in the Subprime Mortgage Crisis of 2008 or the OxyContin lobbying / marketing campaign by Purdue pharma resulting in the current opioid epidemic).

So, in this case, newspeak is here, and when we have to sort out our own morality, it helps to be able to figure out who is affected, and who or what we're looking to safeguard when we're making a proscription.