"Absolute faith can blind you to the consequences of the actions you allow. It can tell you it's okay to drop bombs on another country, or that it's okay to hate a group of people such as homosexuals"
About this Quote
Denton’s line lands like a joke with the laugh removed: the setup is “faith,” the punchline is “bombs” and “hate,” and the whiplash is the point. As a comedian, he’s weaponizing juxtaposition to expose how moral certainty can make immoral acts feel hygienic. “Absolute” is doing heavy lifting here; he’s not taking a cheap swing at belief so much as at the psychological comfort of total conviction, the kind that turns messy ethical questions into obedience tests.
The phrasing “the actions you allow” is the quiet indictment. Denton isn’t only talking about perpetrators; he’s talking about enablers, voters, congregations, families - the people who outsource conscience to ideology and then call that surrender “virtue.” The sentence structure mirrors the mechanism he’s criticizing: faith “can tell you” - as if it’s an external authority whispering permissions. That ventriloquism is the subtext: when certainty speaks, accountability goes mute.
His examples are calibrated to collapse a false hierarchy. Dropping bombs and hating homosexuals sit on the same moral continuum, not because they’re identical, but because both can be justified through the same rhetorical shortcut: dehumanize, sanctify, proceed. It’s also a very Australian, post-9/11 liberal warning, reflecting a culture that has watched “values” language get drafted into war talk and culture-war policing.
Denton’s intent is provocation with a safeguard: he names homosexuality specifically to force listeners to notice how “faith” too often becomes a socially acceptable delivery system for prejudice. The line doesn’t ask you to abandon belief; it dares you to distrust any belief that feels too clean to question.
The phrasing “the actions you allow” is the quiet indictment. Denton isn’t only talking about perpetrators; he’s talking about enablers, voters, congregations, families - the people who outsource conscience to ideology and then call that surrender “virtue.” The sentence structure mirrors the mechanism he’s criticizing: faith “can tell you” - as if it’s an external authority whispering permissions. That ventriloquism is the subtext: when certainty speaks, accountability goes mute.
His examples are calibrated to collapse a false hierarchy. Dropping bombs and hating homosexuals sit on the same moral continuum, not because they’re identical, but because both can be justified through the same rhetorical shortcut: dehumanize, sanctify, proceed. It’s also a very Australian, post-9/11 liberal warning, reflecting a culture that has watched “values” language get drafted into war talk and culture-war policing.
Denton’s intent is provocation with a safeguard: he names homosexuality specifically to force listeners to notice how “faith” too often becomes a socially acceptable delivery system for prejudice. The line doesn’t ask you to abandon belief; it dares you to distrust any belief that feels too clean to question.
Quote Details
| Topic | Faith |
|---|
More Quotes by Andrew
Add to List
