DEBATE: Did Christianity Give Us Western Values? – Glen Scrivener vs Alex O’Connor
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– VIDEO NOTES
This debate was filmed on the 23rd of September 2025. It is a re-upload with the kind permission of @justinbrierley and Think Faith.
– LINKS
Get Glen’s book, “The Air We Breathe: How We All Came to Believe in Freedom, Kindness, Progress, and Equality”: https://amzn.to/3QitOe8
– TIMESTAMPS
0:00 Intros
3:30 Alex and Glen State Each Other’s Case
11:33 Is Christian Morality Unique?
18:53 Why is Dominion so Popular?
26:03 Did Christianity Give Us Compassion?
31:53 Jesus vs the Old Testament
41:51 Rights and Equality
56:40 Women, Feminism and Christianity
1:06:01 What is the True Origin of Rights?
1:17:06 Where Did Non-Christians Get Their Values?
1:29:19 What Would Falsify Glen’s Thesis?
1:39:31 Does Emotivism Make Sense?
1:44:47 Slavery and Christianity
2:16:00 Consent in the Bible
2:23:39 What Have Glen and Alex Learned From Each Other?
– CONNECT
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——————————————
@CosmicSkeptic
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
This is a repost with the kind permission of Justin Brierley and Think Faith, who own the original footage.
@micahdotwav
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
not one for hate comments, but this christian guy straight up sucks lmao
@videos2pick
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
Great talk. I really enjoyed it. Thank you Alex as always for clarifying complex issues.
@Reewnat
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
They seem to skip over the influence and role of the 700-900 years of Andalusia and Muslim Spain on religious pluralism and the intellectual, scientific, ethical, and spiritual impact on Europe
@ruffshenanigans9582
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
Alex wiped the floor and Glen with cotton mouth and stuttering finally ending the pain in his sweet spot – preaching
@jakenoyes4364
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
Wait… He's regulating things he hates instead of just condemning it? Or he's regulating things he condones?
@alittleflowerofLisiuex
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
From a conservative Catholic point of view, I found myself aligning with Alex O'Connor for most of the conversation.
Would a better argument be that the Church has done more to define, uphold, and defend the true spirit of Western values than anyone else?
@khazaddum6570
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
1:34:42 did he really just say that history and archeology are not sciences? Because "we cannot apply scientific methods when talking about the past" is just laughable
@fyradur
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
This discussion is stupid to begin with because you start with the false assumption power is what humans need to feel happy.
What humans need is purpose. Power and freedom without purpose leads to egoism and chaos.
Alex is assuming the feminist revolution was a good thing.
Today almost every teenage boy has seen more naked women than most emperors in history. And before it used to be a husband only saw his wife.
And for the majority of 40 year old single female corporate workers it doesn't take a genius to see 40 year old mothers in a secure family are much more happier.
People assume power, such as the right to vote is what people desire. But the right to vote is not only freedom but also obligation to die for your country.
The feminists made the misstake of thinking that if they don't have the right to vote then they don't have the same human dignity.
But we Christians understand the biggest honour is to be a slave for something greater. Our king kissed his desciples feet and died on a cross. That is our highest honour.
@jasonvance4801
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
Alex is right that Christianity didn’t imbue culture with the right of two people to freely engage in sex outside of marriage. But, he apparently doesn’t recognize the massive harm that “freedom” has wrought into Western Civilization.
As Christianity teaches that our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit, we are not to be sexually immoral or put substances into our bodies that are abusive.
@laratrenchev3975
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
Alex is too intelligent to be in this conversation tbh
@seankennedy4284
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
No one answers the OT 'Canaanite genocide' objection with Heiser's elegant + penetrating Nephilim bloodlines argument.
Embarrassing at this point.
Heiser's book "The Unseen Realm" dates back to 2015, after all.
@joannware6228
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
Alex is is so earnest!
@labelleyormilah7694
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
Haiti 🇭🇹
@ironic_username_04
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
This is the most bigoted thing you could possibly ever say. The implication just barely below the surface is that aside from Christianity, any other culture is innately barbaric, incapable of kindness, of basic decency, empathy, honesty…
Absolutely disgusting beyond measure. It makes me sick that we are all sitting around watching a 150 minute, soft-spoken, measured debate over a proposition that makes Hitler's rhetoric look mild.
@ethangonzalez8904
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
Hot take: if your god has a cosmic forever torture dungeon, your god is evil
@MaxRaldin
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
2:08:30
@MarkelBeverley
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
I would argue that the Enlightenment movement is anti-Christian. God grants us duties. The privileges (rights) are predicated on divine command. It's paradoxical but demonstrates that rights cannot exist in isolation from human duties, which contradicts the Enlightenment idea of inherent, inalienable rights.
@itsvisking6200
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
Sanatan
@ka8544
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
I’m so confused by literally all of this. For example, so many American Christians are taught and believe that poor people do NOT have a right to something like food. I can’t speak to Christian beliefs in other countries. So much of what is being presented as current western values are explicitly the opposite of what a huge number of American Christian belief systems teach. Same could be said of equality between men and women. Or equality among races. I think it’s incredibly inaccurate to portray these values as values that all western Christians agree on.
@Guayoc
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
They take half an hour and say nothing;
@ZbigniewKosior
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
For Atheists it's reasonable to think that Christianity might have been just another product of Western Civilization, and in return affected it back as any other revolutionary idea withing Wester Civilization. For Christians that explanation is impossible as religion comes from God. That's unfortunately also why all discussions with Christians need to be on their territory, weather they're trying to convince others or the other way around.
@liquidxan6698
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
Even if it was Christianity who sets our values, who’s to say these values are moral? There’s a lot of things we value and do everyday and if we want to attribute it to Christianity, fine. We also need to include the things we do not value as attributable to Christianity.
@DRKrust492
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
Well, the West had slavery into the 19th Century so it got that from their Bible.
Cultural genocide of colonized populations. Very Biblical.
Misogyny still today. Biblical.
Nothing to brag about there.
@MT-ln8xb
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
Well it was highly influential. That seems to be the widely accepted academic view.
@ZEROPARADIS
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
this is the first time since the dinesh debate that i’ve seen alex get legitimately agitated in a conversation lmao
@TheFaladorian
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
1:37:52 What does the Youth in Asia have to do with abortions?
@kindlifresser9484
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
I think its curious to intently imply that Christianity has a great modern effect when the practicing of it is so different from what it was at its height.
So many churchs are simply pancake breakfast and church camp. Obviously this is a generalization, but it feels like there's a point where there's an implicit faith in the older church folk's conviction and very little effort in making sure the youth get much more than coloring pages on sunday lmfao
@retyifourthree6929
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
the answer is no, lol. there’s really no debate to be had once you know about the greeks
@RustyShackleford9000
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
Glen is an idiot 😂
@scottbrowne-y9d
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
Scrivener saying young girls left in dumps taken by dogs unfortunate !!
@scottbrowne-y9d
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
Correction (right)
@scottbrowne-y9d
June 2, 2026 at 1:54 pm
Glen can’t even be honest about he say things in the bible are bracing to say the least – don’t you mean down tight evil and immoral!!!!
Comments are closed.