religion does NOT poison society

SAM said:
My own experience with religion has always been one of joy, celebration, community ties and happiness. My association with atheism has shown me only that atheists are, without exception, cynical and restless, seeking escapism in their life pursuits.
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But I have seen you attribute non-cynical, stable, community oriented atheistic religion and philosophy to supposed hidden or "traditional" theistic influences.

I have seen you confuse atheism with "materialism", absence of religion, absence of morality, cynicism, obnoxiousness, anger, etc.

And I have seen you attribute overtly and flagrantly religion-motivated, even overtly theistic-religion-motivated, riots and atrocities and horrors to a variety of other causes.

So I don't necessarily believe you - or most theistic believers - are aware, even, of all your "associations" with atheism. Nor do I believe you capable of accurately attributing events to "association with atheism" vs "association with theism". The victim blaming you see easily in others seems to be invisible to you within your own theistic beliefs.

So when you say your experience with religion has always been one of community ties and happiness, I can only attribute this to reverse editing of your experience - you can't have missed out on all the experiences with religion that the rest of us have had, surely ? You can't be completely rewriting the news of the day and the histories of so many peoples and places to fit such an indefensible framework of analysis ?

You start by confusing, consistently and throughout, theism with religion. You then attribute all morality to religion, and thus immorality to other influences - thus, all good to theistic influence, and bad to atheistic influence, given your identification of theism with religion and vice versa.

That is not reasonable.

You have had no more experience with religion than most older atheists here. You have had far less exposure to atheistic thought and approach than most atheists here of any age, and even less to areligious worldviews. You seem to believe that theistic religion is and has been the universal base of all human morality, as a matter of fact.

That is not reasonable.

And you end by throwing quite different approaches into one mislabeled "atheist" box - several of the atheists on this forum easily grant the value of religion to a community, for example.

PS: took your cynic quizzes - scored identically to you.
 
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If society didn't have religion, there would have been no holocaust, no Israel, no Palestinians, no Jews, no slaughter in Rawanda, no atrocities in Tibet against the monks... It sure does poison everything.
 
iceaura said:
But I have seen you attribute non-cynical, stable, community oriented atheistic religion and philosophy to supposed hidden or "traditional" theistic influences.
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Hidden? Do you mean Mo Tzu?

His own writings bear him out. His idea of tian or heaven for example is very close to Islam (based on meritocracy rather than background, for example with a rrahmani rrahim deity).

And the rest is my opinion based on atheists I have associated with; my religious experiences are my own and I have expostulated them at length for dissection, it is my belief (there I go again) that your own expectations colour your experiences and people will treat you accordingly. In practice, I have worked with the extremely conservative and the extremely liberal and been myself on all occasions. I have given others the same allowances I expect for myself and have never been turned down, except by (some) atheists. This leads me to conclude that of all belief systems, atheism is the least assimilative. Does that make any sense?:)
 
SAM said:
Hidden? Do you mean Mo Tzu?

- - His idea of tian or heaven for example is very close to Islam (based on meritocracy rather than background, for example with a rrahmani rrahim deity).
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Beyond demonstrating that one can even have a heaven without a deity, so what ?

He founded an atheistic system of morality with "love your neighbor" as a major feature. He provides an example of an atheist belief system. We can use that one, the Taoist one, the Confucian one, the Buddhist one, the Maoist one, and so forth, to evaluate statements made about atheist belief systems.

SAM said:
This leads me to conclude that of all belief systems, atheism is the least assimilative. Does that make any sense
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Nope.

There is no such "belief system". Your experience with even Western atheists is limited and biased, and I do not trust your evaluation of it (based on your reactions on this forum), but beyond that no atheist represents "the" atheist belief system.

So when discussing the pros and cons of religion in a society, we might want to leave atheism and theism - as general categories or issues - aside.
 
iceaura said:
Beyond demonstrating that one can even have a heaven without a deity, so what ?

He founded an atheistic system of morality with "love your neighbor" as a major feature. He provides an example of an atheist belief system. We can use that one, the Taoist one, the Confucian one, the Buddhist one, the Maoist one, and so forth, to evaluate statements made about atheist belief systems.
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On the assumption that the belief systems he was exposed to him had no influence on his thinking at all?:confused:

As an atheist yourself, can you say that about yourself?


Nope.

There is no such "belief system". Your experience with even Western atheists is limited and biased, and I do not trust your evaluation of it (based on your reactions on this forum), but beyond that no atheist represents "the" atheist belief system.

So when discussing the pros and cons of religion in a society, we might want to leave atheism and theism - as general categories or issues - aside.
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I will say that I find the perspective of western atheists as narrow and self-obsessed as that of the western theists. Apparently this is a common phenomenon.

Regardless, atheists on this forum, if they do not represent atheists in society, do represent atheism per se.

Whether they like it or not. :)
 
Norsefire said:
While true that an extreme dose of it might, I say religion is healthy for society.

let me say:

1) Religious people are less likely to commit crimes
2) it gives people faith and culture


Athiests are usually the people that have no respect for others, they curse, they do drugs......athiests.

I think religion is good for society.
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I heard something on the news that said religion was good for women's mental health and bad for men's mental health.

No time to look it up, but it may explain a few people around here :p
 
No he merely proved my claims about atheists on this forum :)

ie. they still presume to speak for theists' experiences and assume that their experiences speak for ours.
 
owned mistyped.

I disagree that religion doesn't necessary poison society. I think it really depends on the belief/ideology. For example, take a look at how Islam is practiced in the KSA or Iran or take a look at the Juche ideology of north Korea.

All screwed up,
Michael
 
Michael said:
owned mistyped.

I disagree that religion doesn't necessary poison society. I think it really depends on the belief/ideology. For example, take a look at how Islam is practiced in the KSA or Iran or take a look at the Juche ideology of north Korea.

All screwed up,
Michael
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Ah compared to how democracy is practised by the colonialists.:cool:
 
Colonization by war was and is wrong. In my mind anyway.

democracy is practiced by the colonialists?
Where?

The Japanese could be considered the descendants of colonists. As the Ainu were living on the archipelago's first. The Ainu have been discriminated against and as Japan is a democracy I take it this is your example???
 
Michael said:
Colonization by war was and is wrong. In my mind anyway.

democracy is practiced by the colonialists?
Where?

The Japanese could be considered the descendants of colonists. As the Ainu were living on the archipelago's first. The Ainu have been discriminated against and as Japan is a democracy I take it this is your example???
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You know, the ones that do not recognise the original inhabitants of the land they have occupied by force.:rolleyes:
 
Oh? I have never in my life heard of people not being recognized. They are recognized as conquered people and then subjugated by their conqueror's to various degrees - taxed, tuned into slaves, hounded, etc... have you ever heard of a people that have been conquered that then lived .. .. oh wait, oh ho, oh ho ho - yeeeah, I forgot except when Muslims were doing the colonizing. Yes that's it - then it's all good.


Anyway, back on topic. Sure sometimes religion does not poison society but sometimes it does. I all depends on who is in charge of the superstition and how they are using it to control the masses.
 
Michael said:
Oh? I have never in my life heard of people not being recognized. They are recognized as conquered people and then subjugated by their conqueror's to various degrees - taxed, tuned into slaves, hounded, etc... have you ever heard of a people that have been conquered that then lived .. .. oh wait, oh ho, oh ho ho - yeeeah, I forgot except when Muslims were doing the colonizing. Yes that's it - then it's all good.
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Compared to how good the native Americans and Australian aborigines have it, I suppose.
Anyway, back on topic. Sure sometimes religion does not poison society but sometimes it does. I all depends on who is in charge of the superstition and how they are using it to control the masses.
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Or how you define democracy, legal right to land and ownership of a country.
 
Bottom line as far as i can see it is this. 911 and terrorism that has been happening the last decades has turned many off to religion. The Atheists are disgusted, thats the real discussion here.
 
Anyway, the main thing is religion can be a negative influence on society.
Just as any idiotic ideology can be. I don't see what's the argument here????

I didn't say it couldn't be a good thing as well. If in moderation and not taken too seriously I think most religions are probably pretty harmless.
 
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