NationStates Jolt Archive

I was thinking that Europe mostly is full of fairly secular societies that tolerate deviations from the norm that don't harm others depsite conflicting with rusty old dogmas. The religious zealotry that long infected Europe with violence and war is a thing of the past. The only stain on this are those goddamn Muslim fanatics who are flooding in. How should we go about secularising these people?

Now, before any of the trolls suggest anything stupid, I'm just going to throw out any suggestions of banning religions or killing adherents. The former is ineffective and they are both morally wrong.

That said, religion is not all bad. When Christianity was more prevalent in society, collective responsibility and community spirit also was.

I think there's a lot of unjustified claims in that thread (I also love how killing adherents is implicitly effective). It really depends what you mean, anyway, by 'better', and 'without'. I think you need to set your stall a little more clearly.

I was thinking that Europe mostly is full of fairly secular societies that tolerate deviations from the norm that don't harm others depsite conflicting with rusty old dogmas. The religious zealotry that long infected Europe with violence and war is a thing of the past. The only stain on this are those goddamn Muslim fanatics who are flooding in. How should we go about secularising these people?

Now, before any of the trolls suggest anything stupid, I'm just going to throw out any suggestions of banning religions or killing adherents. The former is ineffective and they are both morally wrong.

That said, religion is not all bad. When Christianity was more prevalent in society, collective responsibility and community spirit also was.

Depends on what you mean by "religion." If God exists, he exists. The presence or lack of a religion to properly worship him has nothing to do with that.

There's no way we'll know. Religion is the moral basis of our conduct. Who knows what kind of laws we would have had with out it?

Regardless of the validity of God, without religion, people have only earthly things to which to tune their selfish desires. If people within the current grasp of religious organisations were to change their preference from Eternal life or happiness on the next world to a quest for ultimate self satisfaction on this one, we'd all be screwed.

Depends on what you mean by "religion." If God exists, he exists. The presence or lack of a religion to properly worship him has nothing to do with that.

well put.

I think, education should be used to deter long-term problems stemming from religion. You gotta train those little pack mules not to hate their fellow beasts of burden.

I think, to calm the ongoing violence that we see everyday, someone has to kill their own ego and wave the white flag over yonder bunker there, and i can't see either side (muslim-fanatics or western-invaders, to make things clearer) bowing down and offering the peace pipe.

I think, in the long-term, education, propaganda and law will eclipse religion as the primary mind-controller, at least in westernized states (the number of which is increasing). Social taboos against crime will rise and I think I can see a lot of enmity towards certain criminal actions already. If we can focus this enmity into school systems and teach everyone to hate people who hate other religions, we can go a long way. I mean, if everyone thinks the same, and the thing they think is 'hate people who don't love', it'd be pretty effective, eh?

Love for all is a myth, very few people can be arsed to eradicate all the hate they keep bottled up within themselves. I think, they just need to refocus the hate onto haters, homophobes and other undesirables. i.e., fight fire with fire.

There's no way we'll know. Religion is the moral basis of our conduct. Who knows what kind of laws we would have had with out it?
No, I am not talking about erasing it from the past, but from the future.

Regardless of the validity of God, without religion, people have only earthly things to which to tune their selfish desires. If people within the current grasp of religious organisations were to change their preference from Eternal life or happiness on the next world to a quest for ultimate self satisfaction on this one, we'd all be screwed.

enter der ubermensch!

That said, religion is not all bad. When Christianity was more prevalent in society, collective responsibility and community spirit also was.
As was discrimination, hate and fear of those who were not Christian.

Now, before any of the trolls suggest anything stupid,


Now there's irony.

Extremsists of any moral code can be dangerous. There is nothing special about adding God to the mix.

But, there's a difference between saying 'Christians were sometimes nice, and sometimes not nice', and being able to predict with any degree of certainty the destabilising effect of removing something as intrinsic to so many societies as religion.

As was discrimination, hate and fear of those who were not Christian.

And before that came discrimination, hate and fear of those who were Christian. It's convenient to blame Christianity or "religion" (any religion) for all the world's problems, but in truth it only serves as an exuse for oppression of a particular group defined by their "difference", as well as justification for the powerful in society to keep their hold over others. The root cause isn't Pope ______ The Whatever and Pat Robertson, it is within ourselves. This makes the problem alternatively simple to fix (on an individual level) and difficult to identify.

But, there's a difference between saying 'Christians were sometimes nice, and sometimes not nice', and being able to predict with any degree of certainty the destabilising effect of removing something as intrinsic to so many societies as religion.
Secular Europe hasn't come crashing down because of it.

As was discrimination, hate and fear of those who were not Christian.
Fair point, there was good and bad and I think I acknowledged the negative aspects.

Now there's irony.
I am not a troll.

Extremsists of any moral code can be dangerous. There is nothing special about adding God to the mix.
Fair point, just look at Stalin.

Secular Europe hasn't come crashing down because of what? There's still religion in Europe (that man in the Vatican - not just a pretty face).

Let's just discriminate against those who discriminate. Yeah, hypocritical and seemingly paradoxical. But hey, it works towards an equal world.

Actually... who wants an egalitarian world anyway. Discrimination is good in most cases to the individual. I'd rather be rich and better than average and equal anyday.

I am an atheist. However, I have noticed that religion has made a lot of people I know into better people. There is a minority of people that are into it for the smiting and condemning, but I think they are outnumbered by the people who see it as something that commands them to be kinder and more responsible.

"Would we be better off without religion?"

Yes!

The way people are wired, even if religions somehow ceased, we'd still find excuses to get into wars and fight over stuff. The disharmony caused by religious zealots (or non-religious zealots, whatever the case may be) is a symptom of our nature, not the cause of our behavior.

I respect non-religion theists who do believe in god.. especially those who go up against the corruption of organized religion. I respect the freedom in god (even though I personally disagree). I however think organized religion causes a lot of suffering and destruction in this world. And what makes me even more furious is what makes christianity so much better then previous polytheistic religions like that of the greek or roman religions (before rome adopted christianity)? Christianity plunged Europe into the dark ages. I'm serious, this world would be so much better without any organized religion that stifles scientific, medical and social progress.

No, I am not talking about erasing it from the past, but from the future.I don't support anything of that kind. That would basically require a culture of intolerance towards any who believe. The Chinese, Russians, East Germans, and a lot of other Communist countries tried something like that and I find it deplorable. Faith won't go away on it's own and I don't really see any way of helping it along without violating my beliefs, if it were at all correct to "erase" anything.
I also find it wrong to want to get rid of religion as a whole. It serves more purposes than to give extremists like bin Laden or Coulter reasons to hate people.

We did to have a religion or religions everyone needs to be believers of some kind like me I believe in Jesus and I'm a Catholic.

We did to have a religion or religions everyone needs to be believers of some kind like me I believe in Jesus and I'm a Catholic.

I believe in myself. That's all I need.

Regardless of the validity of God, without religion, people have only earthly things to which to tune their selfish desires. If people within the current grasp of religious organisations were to change their preference from Eternal life or happiness on the next world to a quest for ultimate self satisfaction on this one, we'd all be screwed.

I must respectfully disagree with you on this issue. I am a secular humanist and do not need anything beyond this world to be a decent, ethical, and moral person--even extremely religious people can find no major fault in my behavior beyond a little bit of arrogance and a "smartass" mouth with my friends.

Indeed, many of the atheists I know are far kinder, more charitable, and more decent people than many of the Christians I know. Of course, that also works in reverse--I know many Christians (or members of other religions) who are more ethical, compassionate, and moral than some of the atheists I know.

In short, I don't think the population makeup of moral, decent people vs the immoral would change all that much if religion were to cease to play a role in society. That being said, I don't have a problem with religion continuing to exist either--though I do tend to see more evil commoning from religion than I do from attheism but that can be argued away by a sampling bias. So, for either side to claim a monopoly on morality, fairplay, good ethics, charity, and compassion is pure arrogance.

I agree with pracus. Kamski you make it sound like if people were to give up their religions that the world would go down the gutter. You make it sound like atheists are only interested in themselves and not anyone else. I also respectfully disagree. Religion didn't invent morals. People did.

To start i have to say that i am in no way religious. However, would the world be better off without religion? To answer the question is really to answer the question: Do religions cause problems in the world?

I would answer this by saying no. Not that this means that bad things are done in the name of religion but i believe that it is other things that cause problems such as inequality of wealth and access to power, ownership of land,water and resources etc, and that religion is used as a way of ideologically framing these problems.

For example if you look at the Palestine/ Isreal conflict is it really a fight between the Jewish and Muslim religions or over control of land, water and resources in the region. The leaders can make all sorts of claims of a holy mandate or whatever, but in realty Jews and Muslims lived side by side for thousands of years in relative peace. The conflict came when Zionist Jews wanted to carve out a seperate state for the exlusive use of Jewish people and the expulsion and destruction of Arab communities. Even these Zionists were devided between securalist and religious with the first Isreali Prime Minister being secular.

However, as the conflict has dragged on people have found solice in religious justifications for the conflict, note the rise of Hamas and Islamic Jihad as against the Secular PLO as well as the rise of the Christian Zionists and ultra nationalist Isreali's. Thus, religion is not the source of the world's problems but an excuss for them. Therefore, the world wouldn't be better off without religion.

I think we'd be better off without *Organized* religion, but it's not my place to force people to go atheist against their will.

There's no way we'll know. Religion is the moral basis of our conduct. Who knows what kind of laws we would have had with out it?

Holy cow....Crown this man and make him king. Qouteworthy material.

FYI, much of modern law is "morally based". Incest laws are actually Old Testament laws that have been carried on into modern day.

Holy cow....Crown this man and make him king. Qouteworthy material.

FYI, much of modern law is "morally based". Incest laws are actually Old Testament laws that have been carried on into modern day.

No. Many of these laws predate christianity. Morals are not based on religion.

Secular Europe hasn't come crashing down because of what? There's still religion in Europe (that man in the Vatican - not just a pretty face).

No, most definately not.

IMO, Religion (i.e. revealed religion vs. the belief in a non-human universal power/god), as pernicious as it may be, is a "good" thing... if only toshow the rest of the world what can happen when one rejects Reason for Doctrine, Logic for Passion, Science for Spells/Prayers.

Without the Yang of Revealed Religion, there could be no Yin of Progress.

No, we would be better off if people learned that your mind is like a parachute - it works best when you open it up. In other words, the world would be a lot safer if humankind (in general) were more tolerant to other things. It would be like this: ----> :fluffle:

How should we go about secularising these people?

sex, drugs, and rock and/or roll. at least then even the ones with a fanatical bent to them will propose revolutions that are at least somewhat appealing - none of this "back to the bad old days" crap.

Its hard to say … religion has made an awesome excuse to justify pushing through some amazing decisions that may not have had the backing to get pushed in the past

It has also been the source of amazing harm to others

It like any tool has an ability to be used for good or bad … I am not sure it is inherently good or bad it depends on the situation

If we could find a way to motivate ourselves more consistently without the tool we might be better off without it

I won't pretend to have all of the answers, but I do have an idea of what is working. First, consider where these Muslim "fanatics" are from. Most are from the Middle East and North Africa, areas that are so poor and backwards that religion is seen as the only way of getting what one wants in regards to material matters. Yet in a nation such as the US, many different religions exist, each with a string of deep adherents. Yet they do not kill eachother or other people. At worst, they jab eachother with harmless rhetoric.
France has a radical approach to its large Muslim minority that calls for, among other things, training imans, classifying mosques, and banning religious symbolism in some public areas. This makes Muslims feel that society is trying to destroy them, and in a certain respect, it is.
The best thing, I think, to do is to leave them alone, and watch individuals, not groups. Western culture is built around the tenet that one can get what they want without violence, and that it is actually more productive. They will come to see this in time.

its a tough cookie to soak in milk.

first of all, i feel it is impossible for everything, our world, the universe, etc to be random. i believe there was something, an architech, a creator, whatever, but i dont know if or what or why.

i was raised as a conservative catholic with liberal social ideologies. my father an irish-polish-american catholic, my mother a conservative-polish woman.

myself, a composite of the two...my dad never voted republican and my mom isnt a citizen b/c she thinks america is crazy and loony. but she tends to favor the democrats. moving on....

i believe devoutly in the core ideals of the catholic church. maybe not everythign that comes from the mouth of the clergy, but the core doctrinal orthodoxies. i know the church has corruption and problems, but it is a good religion to be in.

i think religion provides meaning for those who are weak and backwards, and thoughtful contemplation for those who wish to question.