I've been writing a lot of "let's bash religion" posts recently. And while I'm usually a little put off by these types of posts initially, I just get really pissed off sometimes and I can't help myself (and with everything that's been happening in the news, there's a lot for me to be pissed off about). This is going to be one of those posts.
As people scream their heads off concerning the debate around the inaccurately titled "Ground Zero Mosque," there is a single theme I see that continuously pops up over and over and over again. The person who opposes the community center will often quote passages from the Koran, to emphasize how evil Islam truly is. The person who supports the community center will fire back by saying the Bible says many evil things as well. The exchange will go back and forth like this for a long time, and the debate will practically devolve into conversation about which religion is better than which. And both sides will ignore the most important point in the entire discussion, one that's staring at them right in the face: all religions are the exact same.
For every truly indescribable thing the Koran has to say, you can point to its equivalent in the Bible. For every beautiful and moral thing the Bible has to say, the Koran mirrors that as well. You could look at these facts and say that we should all tolerate each other's religions because we're more alike than we are different. And you would not be wrong in arguing this, because it's true.
But I'm not trying to argue in favor of religious thinking. It is precisely because all religions are similar, that we should be skeptical of them. One of the reasons why religion makes nonbelievers so uneasy is because they are based on faith. Faith is a slippery slope, and it is dangerous. If every religious person on the planet looked at every word in their holy book in the exact same light, if they treated every single passage with the same faith they treated all others, then the world would instantly erupt again into international holy wars. The Koran does say that nonbelievers should be killed. The Bible does as well. It is not faith that's stopping believers from doing these things, because if they really were 100% faithful they would be killing everyone who doesn't think like them. It's their own internal common sense stopping them from murdering bystanders, and if they would just listen to that voice a little more, faith wouldn't be necessary at all.
The fact of the matter is that all religions are equally wrong. Which is why watching things like this makes me so unbelievably sad. You have more strength than me if you can make it over halfway.
This is what faith does to people. America's middle class is becoming nonexistent, we're in the middle of two catastrophic wars, and we're suffering from the worst economic slump since the Great Depression. These people think the most important conversation we should be having right now is whether we need to believe in Harry Potter or Edward Cullen.
Every time atheists and agnostics see conversations like this happening, and how they are dominating the airwaves right now, it makes us hate humanity just a little bit more. When the national discussion is over things like where a Muslim community center should be placed, or whether or not a pastor should burn some paper and ink he doesn't like, or the outrage in the Muslim world directed towards said pastor, then other discussions are put on hold. And that's a shame, because there are a lot of important discussions we need to be having right now. We're devoting our time towards things that are completely irrelevant. When we treat religious disagreements like they're actually important, then the entire nation suffers. These conversations have already happened before. There is no point in having them at all because they are already settled: there is no solution for them. Every religion on the planet conflicts with one another. They will never be able to agree. We know this already. We are wasting time talking about things that don't need to be talked about, and we're stagnating progress.
Say what you want about George W. Bush being one of the worst presidents in the history of the country, but he was still extremely responsible in urging tolerance towards Islam:
"When we think of Islam we think of a faith that brings comfort to a billion people around the world. Billions of people find comfort and solace and peace. And that's made brothers and sisters out of every race -- out of every race. America counts millions of Muslims amongst our citizens, and Muslims make an incredibly valuable contribution to our country. Muslims are doctors, lawyers, law professors, members of the military, entrepreneurs, shopkeepers, moms and dads. And they need to be treated with respect. In our anger and emotion, our fellow Americans must treat each other with respect. Women who cover their heads in this country must feel comfortable going outside their homes. Moms who wear cover must be not intimidated in America. That's not the America I know. That's not the America I value."
Far right conservatives no longer have a leader like this holding them back, and their true colors are now being shown. As propaganda, many terrorist organizations claim that America's wars are Christian crusades against all of Islam. Conservatives in America are now making that a reality.
But just because it's easy to yell at insane Christian extremist shitheads, that doesn't mean we should let insane Muslim extremist shitheads off the hook. The Pew Research Center for People and the Press conducted a study in 2002 in which 38,000 people participated. This question was posed to Muslims all around the world:
Some people think that suicide bombing and other forms of violence against civilian targets are justified in order to defend Islam from its enemies. Other people believe that, no matter what the reason, this kind of violence is never justified. Do you personally feel that this kind of violence is often justified to defend Islam, sometimes justified, rarely justified, or never justified?
The margins of error range from 2 to 4 percent and not all percentages sum to 100.
These numbers are terrifying. And countries like Saudia Arabia, Yemen, Egypt, Iran, Sudan, Iraq, and Palestine weren't even included, for if they had been, it's safe to say that Lebanon probably wouldn't be in first place.
Yesterday, on the anniversary of 9/11, Muslims in London protested outside the U.S. embassy by burning American flags and shouting "Democracy, you will burn!" They also condemned the Constitution because "it represents the non-Islamic law." This was in London.
It is their religion that makes them this way. But every Christian on the planet behaved worse than this a thousand years ago, so we can't blame it specifically on Islam. We can blame it on religious behavior in general. Religious people don't have faith in a god, they have faith in men who tell them what they're supposed to think about that god. Western culture is generally peaceful, and so the opinions that religious people project onto their god are usually peaceful as well. Blame it on western intrusion or colonization or what-have-you, but the fact of the matter is that Arabic culture in 2010 can be very violent, and so that violence is justified with faith. Anything can be justified with faith, and that is why 9/11 had to happen.
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