mother teresa is a cunt here is why

[robvalue]

I think she may be one of the most misrepresented people of all time, at least among the general public. Not deliberately so.

[Dystopia]

Mother Teresa is like Pope Francis, everyone thinks she's awesome but she's not. Really - She protested against the legalization of divorce in Ireland back in the 90's - Fuck domestic violence right? That's not it - She also protested against contraceptives in Africa, the continent with higher incidence of AIDS/HIV and excessive number of newborns.

[brewer]

Makes me wonder, do you think was she might have been a fan of self flagellation?

[Aoi Magi]

I really don't know much about her cause I was quite young when she passed away, but almost all of the adults around me at that time didn't like her cause they said she just wanted to spread her religion under the guise of helping people. I did meet her once on a school trip, and she just seemed like a sweet old lady to me. The one who took over after her howeber, Sister Nirmala, was a really bad, corrupt person...

[Exian]

Sister Nirmala was just bad at hiding it.

[ErGingerbreadMandude]

Dafaq?
I was always told that she was a sweet person that helped a lot of people.Maybe she had a twisted view of the world and a lot of crazy religious views but she did help people right?I mean,that has to count for something..

[TheRealJoeFish]

Since I've been, ahem, called out a bit here (I don't mind, I swear, although I don't understand why this couldn't have gone in the thread in which I made the comment), I think I should provide some background and explanation here.

This current thread, surely, refers a comment I made in another thread. In response to new member Shinagami's question:

Either clergy or just a person who is openly religious. I can think of a few but I'll let others post their favorites first.

I replied:

Yeah. I respect a lot of religious figures. Mother Teresa, the most recent incarnation of the Dalai Lama... not so many American public figures, but my parents' priest is a good guy.

I don't not respect them because they do good in the name of religion. That being said, it makes me sad to look at people like this and think how much better it would be if they did these things not because of religion but because of humanity, how much better it would be if this was a world where you could touch so many peoples' lives, inspire so many people to charity and love, become famous as a paragon of virtue without having to do it in the name of a god.

So, for one, I think it's important to note the full context of what I said.

So, now onto the substance of the disagreement with me and my explanation of my position.

First thing's first: when I saw this, I thought, wow, maybe she really was a bad person, not worthy of respect, and all I know is about the goody-goody catholic view of her. So, it was incumbent on me to learn more about what she did, what she didn't do, and why.

And, you know what? I'm not backing down on this. I do respect Mother Teresa. I strongly disagree with many of the things she believed, but I am certain she made the world a better place. I very much dislike the fact that she spoke loudly against abortion, divorce, and certain freedoms and liberties. She adhered to the christian party line, and, as Dystopia notes above, that hurt people. I very strongly wish she would've seen differently, would have believed differently, would have used what she did and what she created to spread freedoms around the world and to provide contraception to those who needed it.

But I see no reason at all why I shouldn't respect her. When natural disasters struck, she rushed to the front lines to provide care. In war zones, she used her status to secure the safety of innocent people. She created hospitals and charities that were sometimes substandard but usually better than the alternatives.

When it comes to human suffering, well, on this front she was a right cunt. "The poor should accept their lot," "the world is aided by the suffering of the poor"... despicable views. Attempts to convert the suffering person to christianity, to exploit them in their moment of weakness? Disgusting. But how do we weigh this against the lives she saved? Against the personal suffering she did ease, by providing morphine and hospice care in places where these things were unheard of?

If you read my original post and thought "clearly, Joe thinks Teresa was a perfect person," well, I'll take the fall for not explaining myself better. But I will continue to respect, and will always respect, those who help others, even if they do so for the wrong reasons, even if they hurt others not through malice but adherence to inconsistent, pathetic, delusional doctrine. Mother Teresa's humanitarianism was incomplete, inconsistent, and irrational, but it was there, and it did help people. And this goes back to what I originally wrote: Mother Teresa had the backing behind her, the drive, to actually revolutionize the world, in some real sense of that word revolutionize. But when she took 12 steps forward, she took from 11 to 13 steps back because of her religion. I hate the views she held, I praise her desire to help people, I respect her bravery, but, most of all, I weep for what could have been had she put all of the resources she amassed, all of the effort she mustered, to true humanitarianism rather than catholic ministration. The portion of the failing, of the suffering, of the inability to improve this world more is hers only in the proportion in which one person stands to the whole of the deceptive, stifling, harmful myth of theism.

I respect people like Mother Teresa for trying to help this world though they are shackled by myth, even as I disdain them for not desiring or trying harder to break their chains. But what I hate, curse, and cry out against are the people and ideas that put those chains there in the first place.

[ErGingerbreadMandude]

I feel bad that people would call her a cunt.
I just feel bad.Really really bad.
I know cunts and Mother Theresa is definitely not one of them.
She did lots of nice things and i will forever respect her for that!

Thank you,TRJF.

[Brian37]

Hitchens was not fond of her at all.

[TheRealJoeFish]

Hitchens was not fond of her at all.

I did notice this.  I very much want to read why this is so, because I'm rather fond of Hitchens myself.