Man stabs six at gay pride parade in Jerusalem, critically wounding one

[HoodedRat]

Sigh I do long for the day when the toxic religions of Abraham can be left in the dung pile of history.

This will not happen as long as those oh-so-obviously-man-made-humanity-hating-religions still serve some primitive purpose as a crude means of social control.

 

[Vitamin]

This will not happen as long as those oh-so-obviously-man-made-humanity-hating-religions still serve some primitive purpose as a crude means of social control.

I concur. I blame Constantine for all of it.

 

[Brian Smith]

This will not happen as long as those oh-so-obviously-man-made-humanity-hating-religions still serve some primitive purpose as a crude means of social control.

They do no such thing, though. More religious countries tend to be infested with crime, and they grievously neglect the poor.

I think the reasons for people being religious is simply as a reaction to helplessness, which is more likely in impoverished and politically unstable countries. I guess that's a chicken/egg sort of nitpick, but I really see it more as a consequence than as a cause.

The reason I'm not religious myself, though, is that, if I actually believed in any deity, you really wouldn't like the one that I picked, and the hymns would be discordant and creepy. I have a dark streak in my nature you wouldn't believe, and it is kept just barely contained by my devotion to rationalism. You really don't want to go there. When I am not laboring to keep these circuits cool, I get scary.

 

[Alnitak]

They do no such thing, though. More religious countries tend to be infested with crime, and they grievously neglect the poor.

I think the reasons for people being religious is simply as a reaction to helplessness, which is more likely in impoverished and politically unstable countries. I guess that's a chicken/egg sort of nitpick, but I really see it more as a consequence than as a cause.

The reason I'm not religious myself, though, is that, if I actually believed in any deity, you really wouldn't like the one that I picked, and the hymns would be discordant and creepy. I have a dark streak in my nature you wouldn't believe, and it is kept just barely contained by my devotion to rationalism. You really don't want to go there. When I am not laboring to keep these circuits cool, I get scary.

Religious communities reinforce themselves, which is why you don't see major religions evenly distributed around the world. There are relatively few people who feel personally compelled to be religious. Herd behavior and upbringing account for the majority of religious identity. It may be that theism is a natural human inclination, but dogma is very much contrived and tends to take advantage of that proclivity. Seeing as deism would take control in an enlightened and educated society, it perfectly reasons why Western Society is becoming increasingly ietistic, atheistic, or agnostic.