Those Who Should Not Have Been Born

It is a tremendously grievous thing to say that someone should not have been born. In this claim is contained many layers of depth that each spell out a horrible insult to the person about which this claim is made. Firstly, there is the level which says that the net result that person had on this world is negative; that, because this person lived, the world is worse off. This alone is a great insult, simply because it is so difficult to determine. Who can measure another’s impact on the world as a whole? Who is to say some hidden goodness separated by time and space cannot trace its origins back to this person? To say they should not have been born is to claim such a knowledge of this person so as to already know the outcome of such an extensive analysis. It says, “No good that may ever come from you can outweigh the wrong you’ve done.” But then there is a deeper level, the level of choice. Because at some point, even the vilest of people made a choice to do something that made them vile. But to wish that this person had never been born is far worse than to wish they had never made that choice. One could easily say “It would be better if you had never made that choice, or those choices.” But in saying “It would be better if you had never been born,” a much deeper insult is made. This statement says not only that the offender made the wrong choice, but that they cannot and should not ever be trusted with that choice at all. It not only says “You made this world worse”, but it goes one further: “You made this world worse, and you should never be trusted to do anything else.” Either the consequences of their wrong choices were so horrific that such a choice should never be risked at any odds, or that the person is so horrible that they should never be trusted with any choice or with the gift of free will and life itself. In either case, this is a very bold, very strong, and very serious claim made about the person or group of people.

What follows is my attempt to identify such a group of people.

Everyone has some sort of “world view”, some belief through which they approach the world. For many people, it is a religion. For some, it is atheism, which often comes in tandem (although not exclusively) with a scientific world-view. For some, their world view may even consist of agnosticism or a simple lack of judgment one way or another on such debates. But the point of my using the term “world-view” is that it is all encompassing. You cannot perceive and interact with this world without having a world view, thus in using this term (rather than more loaded words like “belief”, “faith”, or “religion”), I have excluded no one.

The natural question is, then, with so many different world views, which one is right? I dare not tackle this question at the moment. Rather, I would like to look at a consequence of this question. In theory, one of these world-views must be the “correct” view. Admittedly, it may not be a view that any one person holds, but one of them must be objectively true. And if one of them is true, then the others are necessarily not true. Thus, we are left with one objectively correct world view and a whole slew of objectively wrong world views.

Now, in an effort to make sure I don’t leave anyone behind, let me pause to pick up the stragglers. To the relativists and those who claim that there either is no objective truth or that all these various views simply see parts of the same truth (a la the elephant metaphor): that belief is, itself, a world view. And regardless of how all-encompassing you may think it seems, the fact is that if you believe that, and yet someone else believes that their world-view is the only thing that is true, then by definition only one of you can be right, even if your view “includes” theirs. For if yours is right, then theirs, in limiting itself to only itself, is technically wrong. In the language of the elephant metaphor, all of the five men are wrong. The objective truth is that it is an elephant. My point is, even relativism is an exclusive world view.

To the best of my ability, I have tried not to say anything that would preclude anyone from agreeing with me. But now we have a problem: if only one world view is true, then where did all of these wrong world views come from? On the surface, it’s not a difficult question to answer. People constantly look for explanations for things they don’t understand, and in their attempt to answer these difficult questions, they must often make assumptions or simplifications and often get things wrong. But there is a sinister side to this. What this means is that, for every wrong world view that exists, somewhere along the line, some person, individual, or group of individuals simply made it up! They knowingly began spreading information that they had no reason to suspect was actually correct!

Let me give a few examples. Christians believe in the things written in the Bible, particularly the parts concerning Jesus written by men such as Matthew, John, Peter, and Paul. These things may be true. I am not presently concerned with actually assessing the validity of any world view. But if these things are not true, that would imply that these men knowingly wrote and spread completely ridiculous stories, deliberately deceiving hundred of thousands of people throughout history! Or consider Scientology. Once again, it is possible that their beliefs are, in fact, correct. But if not, then L Ron Hubbard has purposefully led thousands of people away from the truth! The same can be said for Joseph Smith and the Latter Day Saints, Muhammad (peace be upon him) and the followers of Islam, Abraham and the Jews, and a whole slew of others. Once again, I am not deciding whether or not any of these world views are true or not. What I am saying is that, if these world views are not true, then these founding individuals have knowingly, horribly, hurtfully deceived millions of people.

“Aha!” says the free-thinker, “I have not been deceived like those of you who blindly adhere to a religion! All of my beliefs are the product of my own reason and observation!” Well, slow down there Dawkins. Let’s consider what I am actually saying. I am saying that, should you end up being wrong, somewhere along the line you were deceived. For example, suppose any one of the theistic religions turn out to be correct, and that deities or higher beings of some kind really do exist. How could atheism possibly arise except as the deliberate attempt by an individual or group of individuals to consciously reject the truth of theism and instead spread a lie that the gods do not exist?

I suppose it is conceivable that some of these founders actually believed what they told people. Perhaps Joseph Smith truly believed he saw an angel even if he actually did not, or perhaps the first atheist was so blind and deaf so as not to notice the existence of deities when they actually did exist. Firstly, this requires a very extreme and depressing assumption about the nature of those who willingly followed a person who is essentially insane and delusional. Given the extremity of this assumption, it is unlikely that this is the case for many of the faulty world views. Thus, we are still left with a very large number of perfectly sane deliberate deceivers who founded world views, knowing full well that they were incorrect.

The bottom line of all of this is one terrifying yet inescapable conclusion: that, given the vast number of views that are necessarily incorrect, these types of deceptive founders must necessarily exist. That among the ranks of humanity stand individuals and groups of individuals who have purposefully deceived, tricked, and misled millions upon millions of people across time and space. Of all criminals and evildoers, I find these to be the worst. Luke 17:2 says “Things that cause people to stumble are bound to come, but woe to anyone through whom they come. It would be better for them to be thrown into the sea with a millstone tied around their neck than to cause one of these little ones to stumble.” These people have brought damnation on others for no conceivable reason. They are deceivers, false prophets, liars, manipulators, sirens, con-artists, thieves, usurpers, and destroyers. They are those who should not have been born.