Why Satire?

Why satire? - why does people employ satire when dealing issues like religion? Why not to stand up and say out loud what we think about the subject? Why rather joke on it in a satirical way?
Can't a secular just step up and make a proclamation to all religious bodies to stop functioning in the name of reason and enlightenment? Sounds silly isn't it?
It is hard to define what is secularism defense mechanism against religion, other then the liberal idea, that religious belief should be only a personal concern in all level of biopolitics, not a public one. Still, in the case of a truce between religions and secular state the two has to say something about each other. And the seculars, atheist, non-believers seems to do this on a rather indirect, satirical way. Why?


Being satirical means that you are in a higher position then the one who is the subject of satire - in any terms. Higher in some term, but much more cautious on the other, as satire in never a direct statement: "stealthy critique" - Mark Twains definition on the genre. People employ satire if they have something to tell, but can't to it in a direct way, (just think in the rich heritage of political satire of the last few centuries), or when the direct way is too risk to take, mainly because of the possible retribution of the ones portrayed.
In the case of religious satire, the later might be not as relevant in a secular state, which has its own legal system to protect its citizens and the freedom of expression, so the previous one should be more relevant in this case.

Being critical - not against something, but rather give a critique on it in order to improve is something we can clearly associate with modern society, as being not against something, but rather analyze and understand it a highly secular position, in the really basic sense of the word secular. Being critical and being completely against something could be side by side each other, and this those not have to involve being satirical. Satire is employed in the case when being critical against something is not among the tools of what is opposed by the producers of the satire. In this case, the one who makes the satire also takes the superior position in moral terms by leaving multiple choices, by literally being secular... . Being satirical is a way to remain critical all the time, and do not go into the same discourse as the ones, who, by any notion, does not employ criticism.

To understand what I mean by being critical, satirical and not get involved into direct, legal action, (which is the responsibility of the secular state, not the particular individual) I would like to compare two very important work made in the last few weeks about the Church of the Scientology and its harsh opponent, the hacker group Anonymous.

Anonymous, the 'hacker group' have appeared just recently in public by launching a large internet campaign against the Church of Scientology in all possible platforms from live protest to the hacking the Churches databases and leaking important classified materials to the web or to make the web representation of the Scientology unavailable.
In this youtube video, Anonymous made a quite direct statement against the group, in a style which I would not describe to being critical, but rather offensive towards a certain organization.



Altrough this first message provoked a landslide of other messages, legal or illegal moves form both sides, what interests me, is rather a comment given by the pastafarian Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster (FSM), a secular mock religion intended to make satirical spoofs on non-secular parties.

In their response to Anonymous, (whose point on view on Scientology are share much in common with the FSM) - the FSM copies the very same aesthetics as the previous movie piece, in terms of sound, visuals and basic tone, even most parts of the text is similar, but there is a huge difference between the two. Satire.



FSM even discredits the enemies of a non-secular organization, for being non-secular/and or postsecular- and employing the same level of satire as the FSM successfully employs against any other group they are making joke of.