@Dark Wind Summon the Bitches? Do I want to know? :p

No, and I'm not advocating that we should start eradicating the religious. I'm just contending that we might be much better off as a species if we could wave a secular wand and get rid of the whole sorry mess. It might be a bit easier for people to make rational decisions if they hadn't been brainwashed as children to think that God, or Allah or whomever wanted them to act a certain way.

meh. I think we come up with our own reasons for making irrational decisions, god or no god. We'll kill each other over an eight-ball of crank. Hell, last week a man strangled his wife over their wedding gifts. Going after religion is tribalism, pure and simple (no different from religious folks blaming everything on the damned atheists) -- which, I mean, is exactly what you'd expect to happen if I'm right, so it's not exactly evidence of that, but certainly consistent.

People are ignorant dicks.

People do a lot of great shit though -- and so does religion. And so does a lot of other stuff, which also sometimes goes crazy and shits all over the world, but that's life.

Relevant, I believe.

rofl I have a tab up with that exact vid. I was waiting for the opportune moment but it never came.

In my opinion, blaming religion for the violence/persecution of humanity is like blaming a car for a reckless driver. Should we just do away with cars? Religion is just an excuse. If there was never a religion, we'd have fought/killed one another for other reasons. We already know what it would be like to actively destroy religion. Stalinist Russia, and there was much more violence and persecution there than say, religious America.

@Penny



Lmao. Enjoy!

<Snipped quote by Dark Wind>

rofl I have a tab up with that exact vid. I was waiting for the opportune moment but it never came.

It was too good to pass up!

In my opinion, blaming religion for the violence/persecution of humanity is like blaming a car for a reckless driver. Should we just do away with cars? Religion is just an excuse. If there was never a religion, we'd have fought/killed one another for other reasons. We already know what it would be like to actively destroy religion. Stalinist Russia, and there was much more violence and persecution there than say, religious America.

That whole stretch of Lenin through Stalin was pretty goddamned dark.

EDIT: I agree btw.

@Dark Wind That is actually a rather interesting video. Speaking as one of the energetic and well educated people who opted to emigrate, I can see some of his points. Do people really conflate immigration and world poverty though? Also I really want a gumball now...

@Penny
Lmao. Enjoy!

*Giggle* turns out I did want to know!

@POOHEAD189 I'm not saying that people would stop killing each other all together if we could remove religion. People kill each other just fine for good old fashioned Nationalism, or for Geopolitics. I'm just contending that it has unequivocally been the source of countless horrors throughout the years.

The kind of thinking that allows any act to be justified in the name of religion allows people to commit any act. It is even arguable that part of the problem with Stalinist Russia is that they make the State a religion. Religion contends that their are truths that should never be questioned. That sort of thinking can be dangerous.

I'm also happy to concede that for most people religion isn't a source of violence or extremism. Great religious art exists, people can be motivated to do good because God says so but it is a mental shortcut which is always open for exploitation.

The kind of thinking that allows any act to be justified in the name of religion allows people to commit any act. It is even arguable that part of the problem with Stalinist Russia is that they make the State a religion. Religion contends that their are truths that should never be questioned. That sort of thinking can be dangerous.

If we apply that standard to environmentalism, an interesting thing occurs.....

Also I should point out that warfare and massacre are not the only issues.

Genital mutilation, Slavery, Treating women as second class citizens, stoning people to death, suppressing scientific inquiry, and on and on. It doesn't need to be war to be an abomination.

@mdk Exactly. Anything that you accept uncritically can become like religion.

@mdk Exactly. Anything that you accept uncritically can become like religion.

You just gained like 50 arbitrary respect points. Kudos for intellectual consistency.

I should add in widow burning and the caste system in India too, so as to give fair coverage.

You just gained like 50 arbitrary respect points. Kudos for intellectual consistency.

Thank you, I know it dosen't always look like it in this thread, but I'm really not an ideologue.

@Penny

With regard to my comment, it is fair to say there is a significant disproportion in just how many "crazy men" go on stabbings, often accompanied by the cry of "Allahu Akbar". The way it was carried out, the reaction, and the evacuation conducted held added interest. Either way, a point of concern and the way it was preformed - prior to a security checkpoint - tells me what I needed to know.

Everything else was answered from the get and confirmed later rather than remaining suspicion.

Well this is certainly interesting. Central European Countries, led by Hungary, are creating their own coalition basically to stop illegal immigration. More and more its looking like the EU is starting to fracture in pieces, a good portion of that credit going to the mass immigration policies the EU tried to force on all its members.

Polan saved Europe in 1683, it'll save it again now.

Well this is certainly interesting. Central European Countries, led by Hungary, are creating their own coalition basically to stop illegal immigration. More and more its looking like the EU is starting to fracture in pieces, a good portion of that credit going to the mass immigration policies the EU tried to force on all its members.

Is what I think is happening happening

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_von_Habsburg
Holy shit it might be