Not a response to the article but thought I'd add a comment to your blog with a response to this that made me laugh

Reply #8 By: Muggaz - 9/6/2004 12:35:51 AM I hate me too. Welcome to the club. BAM!!!

I can always count on you to make a lot of these ego cases (including myself) lighten up Muggaz.

Peace,
SuspeckTed

Good article Muggaz

If am wearing a Nike T-shirt and shoot someone in the face, does that mean i killed them on behalf of Nike? No

If i wear a Jewish skull cap* and shoot someone in the face, does that mean i killed them on behalf of my religion? No

* sorry i dont know the proper term

I can always count on you to make a lot of these ego cases (including myself) lighten up Muggaz.

Gee Damn, My intention was always to be percieved as a vitriolic hater of all things clean and pure... I guess I failed again

I disagree... Most people in any given religion (Christianity, Islam, even Atheism) are not forced to be part of that religion, but make that choice freely. ...And if you were born into a given religion, you can always convert to another, or lose your faith altogether...that alone is evidence of people's capability of independant thought.

Good point Event Horizon - personally, I am a Taoist - not religious, but spiritual - my mind and body is my temple, and I relish the freedom that living by the Tao gives me - we are all creatures of nature, and we must abide by the laws of nature, go with the flow if you will, and if your flow involves an organised religion, good for you, but you are the person that determines the course of your river - no one else.

BAM!!!

Very good article.

Those who is peaceful or supports peace may take interest strongly on the messages of peace or forgiving.

Those who is full of hate could ignore forgiveness message and go and read about parts that talk about their church as only "right" one, stories about wars, etc.


I guess it's same as weapons. Police uses guns to prevent killing by disabling the killer, and army uses guns to kill enemies. Is guns evil? No it's just a tool.

It's also true for techonlogy. People use internet as research tool. Hackers uses it to make war. Sickos uses it as perversion tool, such as porno, molesters finding children. Is Internet evil? No it's just a tool.

By Religion I mean the concept in general, not any certain one religion. People may want to invent a religion to help bring in peace. People could also create a religion to spread insanity. People could also create a religion of war to certain group of people. Lastly they could also create a religion of evilness.

Hmm I'm kind of waffling across this reply. Sorry about that.

Good post,
IMO, the problem with religioous beliefs is that it is giving a whole meaning to good or bad, because it is moral in essence. the big problem is human beings subjective and having different vision of good or bad. Ultimately, being a religious zealot means that you are so sure of your own truth that you disregarding anything else and anyone who is standing differently than you.
Not every religious is like this. And this behaviour cannot be found only into religious people. Generally, the big problem with belielf is that unlike knowledge it doesn't stand very well doubt... and that's what fanatical people are totally unable to see and accept.

good analogy muggaz.  religion is a tool that can be wielded a number of ways.  like any tool, it can do damage even when employed with the best of intents.  

americans--for example--who decry the dangers of muslim theocracy while enthusiastically supporting a president who equivocates belief in 'creationism' with science and advocates forcing 300 million of his citizens to comply with the precepts of his narrow faith-based view of human culture are fools in whose hands a butter knife is dangerous to all nearby...including themselves.

If i wear a Jewish skull cap* and shoot someone in the face, does that mean i killed them on behalf of my religion? No

But, the problem is that people have been and will continue to wage wars over the differences in religion, and when they do, it is because of the religious beliefs that they have which are different than anothers.  This is nothing new at all.  Just look at how long the Irish have waging wars amongst religions.  The Christian God is viewed differently than the Muslim God, and so there is hatred back and forth.  The same goes for Christians having problems with religions that don't believe in Jesus.  Heck, there is even intolerance for different Christian religions.  People are being blind if they can't see that historically religion has been the root of many hateful wars, and I doubt that it will stop any time soon.

PS- they are called Yarmulke or Kippah

Most people in any given religion (Christianity, Islam, even Atheism) are not forced to be part of that religion, but make that choice freely

Most people in any given religion are indoctrinated into it from birth by their parents. A few break free of that and make their own choice.

RELIGION IS MORALLY NEUTRAL

I don't understand how you can claim this when religion is the basis for all moral judgements. Religion is not like a knife that can be picked up and used at the wielder's whim. If religion is like a knife, it is like a knife that says to the wielder, "Use me! If you use me for purpose X, you will be rewarded! But if you use me for purpose Z, you will burn forever!"

The entire purpose of religion is to control peoples' behavior. Religion encourages certain activities (church-going, praying, charity, etc.) and discourages others (wanton slaying, theft, adultery, and so forth). If one religion encourages activities that another one discourages, then those two religions will be immoral in each others' eyes.

Now we as members of the First World have evolved from a religion-based ethos to our own code of behavior that is based in law, not religion. We outlaw murder, theft, robbery, swindling, etc. not because God has said it is wrong but because we have said it is wrong. This is the moral basis from which we operate. Religious activities must fall within the confines of secular law; and any religion that encourages behaviors that are against the law is immoral in that regard. (Of course many of our secular laws draw their inspiration from religious edicts, so there isn't much in the way of conflict if you're an adherent of a religion that our laws drew upon.)

Let me just repeat that last bit, though: Any religion that encourages behaviors that are against the law is immoral. If your religion tells you to kill a doctor because he performed an abortion, you are immoral in the eyes of the law if you follow that edict. If your religion tells you to kill your neighbor because he allowed unclean non-believers to drink from the town well, you are immoral if you do so. And your religion is immoral in both cases for encouraging you to act in defiance of the law.

And if we find that there is one particular religion whose members routinely and flagrantly violate the law in pursuit of their religion, or because their religion encouraged them to act in that fashion, we are justified in declaring that religion to be immoral.

'Religion' (if such a thing exists) may be morally neutral, but religions are not. Which is what makes them actually practiced forms of faith rather than neutered generalizations about God.

Neither Islam nor Christianity is morally neutral. Both are proselytizing teleological belief systems having a vision of the final good, and those visions are in opposition to each other.

Religion is not a kitchen utensil for cutting bread. It is a weapon meant for the butchering of its opponents and that has been the principle occupation of the adherents of both Islam and Christianity since they became aware of each other. Belief in Christ negates belief in Allah. Belief in Allah negates belief in Christ. True believers of either sect, in order to be true believers, cannot tolerate, will not tolerate, and ought not to tolerate such negation. Otherwise, they become hypocrites and liars.

Christians point the finger toward Muslims, because it makes them feel better about their ‘little’ hate crimes. No one denies there are bad Muslims in this world, if they did, they would be blind – yet by the same token – to hypothesise that there are no Christians as evil as these ‘non-terrorist’ Muslims is farcical.

There are bad Muslims and there are bad Christians. But what you consider to be 'badness' is actually fundamental to both Islam and Christianity as acts of faith. You misunderstand faith if you think that violence is alien to it or somehow inimical to its nature. It is not. As both Christian and Islamist zealots (zealots of any sect being that sect's true believers) will tell you, killing a believer of an opposing sect is a virtuous act.

When ‘Christians’ or ‘Muslims’ act on behalf of their religion, it’s up to their personal integrity as to whether they use the knife for making a sandwich or stabbing in the guts

Any true believer will always choose the latter over the former in order to be virtuous in the eyes of his God, which is a state far more highly valued by him than that of being a 'tolerant individual', for example.

There is no warm and fuzzy middle ground where religions can meet in a spirit of tolerance. Proselytizing religions spit on tolerance, as well as upon the dead bodies of those who oppose them.

Christians are just as adept at stabbing as Muslims… practice a little homemaking, and I think we will all be a little better off.

Again, you talk as if antagonistic proselytizing faiths have some common ground or mutual 'home'. You plainly do not understand such forms of faith. You live in a warm and cuddly Tao where we can all get along. Christians, Muslims and Jews, do not. Any true believer of any of the three sects mentioned would quite properly consider your Tao to be yet another godless heresy and be just as willing to butcher you as any other heretic.

Bitching about the violence and hate inherent in religion is as intelligent and useful a critique as complaining because rain is wet. Of course its wet. It has to be, because its composed of water.

You plainly do not understand such forms of faith. You live in a warm and cuddly Tao where we can all get along. Christians, Muslims and Jews, do not.

It is because I understand these faiths that I do live in my warm and cuddly Tao. I understand that they will never all get along, because according to the other, the others are wrong... etc...

Bitching about the violence and hate inherent in religion is as intelligent and useful a critique as complaining because rain is wet. Of course its wet. It has to be, because its composed of water.

Exactly, so why do people continue to slam Islam and it's backward policies rather than working with moderates in an attempt to see the good in the religion, and maybe entertain the idea of re-interpretation.

Thanks for your comments - they are all spot on.

And if we find that there is one particular religion whose members routinely and flagrantly violate the law in pursuit of their religion, or because their religion encouraged them to act in that fashion, we are justified in declaring that religion to be immoral.

So, by your logic, all Muslim's are the filth of the earth, based on the actions of radicals, and they should all be destroyed because they are all Immoral... riiiiiiiiigghhhhtt.....

BAM!!!