I saw a newspaper article today with Baroness Warsi wanting to fight against “militant secularists” and for religion to feature more strongly in government and society. Coyne has his own thoughts on this:
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Religion is a force for control, for suppression, and for barbarity, clothed in dogmas and rituals which the religious hope is mistaken for civility and progress, shielded by the mock claims of “offence” and “racism”. I am tolerant of religion (I don’t go around threatening people for a start) and adults can believe in whatever fairy-tales they wish (and I will judge their competency on rationality accordingly) but I am against those fairy-tales if the religious enforce indoctrinations onto children, when they threaten liberty and free speech, when they threaten and commit violence, and when they encourage a closed-mind view. Religion will abuse, it has a proven track record.
It seems to me that Warsi wants to extend religion’s special privileges where none is warranted. She wants a safe harbour for religious indoctrination to thrive. She wants irrationality to become ubiquitous. She stands for all that is backwards and medieval in thinking and outlook. It is perhaps the religious like her that are the real danger to civilisation.
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I will criticise all religions and the religious where they come into conflict with ideals such as reason, rationality, freedom, equality and justice. History has shown that religions will suppress such ideals through use and abuse of whatever powers and controls they have.
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It’s quite simple. The religious are not at all comfortable in their delusions and instinctively lash out at those that expose the irrationality and fragility of the religious mind. So much for turning the other cheek!
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Religion needs people to be uneducated, to be unquestioning, to be stupid and credulous. This is how religion exerts itself and how it continues to enslave people into backwards thinking. Jerry Coyne explains this quite clearly in the recent “Be stupid” command from Pope Benedict XVI of the Roman Catholic Church.
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Religion is institutionalised delusion, a social grouping mechanism for the irrational. But for those within this group who dare to explore with open minds, with the tools of critical thinking, there is hope of a life free from the prisons and poisons of religion.
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Religion, contrary to the naivety expressed by some, cannot lay claim to morality. Religion is a source of enslavement, a source of inequality, a source of barbarity. Humans, as a community-based species, have derived morality from within itself, from within the community, influenced by the social interactions that takes place. And morality changes, progresses, as communities advance. But religion stakes a claim on morality, claims itself as a source of morality, and distorts it for its own means. Here we are, in the 21st century, with the inhumanity and unreason of religion exposed by advances in science and by application of critical thinking. Religion has not only passed its sell-by-date but was defective when conceived and manufactured. Let’s move on and free ourselves.
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Science is the search for truth. It is a rational mechanism that uses logic, evidence and other facts to formulate theories to arrive at the truth. Religion is at odds with this rationality and thus those who advocate religion are deluded. And those scientists who claim compatibly of religion with truth in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary must do a pretty good job of compartmentalising the irrationality of religion from their rational thoughts. But, then, humans are not always consistent or rational in what they do which makes the scientific process an absolutely critical method to progress.
Religion is not compatible with truth. Religion is an intellectual prison, a method of control, a method of suppression and repression, which blinds the religious to the truth. It’s about time humanity broke free of its shackles, to experience the truth, to experience the excitement, wonders and mysteries of this planet and the universe.
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…religion does not deserve any special privileges; it is not immune to criticism and I will object to any laws or “politically correct” influences that seek to protect religion or not cause “offence”. Any “offences” that religious people feel, I think, may be the result of a deep split within their personalities where their rational-self is trying to get to the surface but is pushed back down by the irrational-self. This battle probably goes unnoticed by the person but if they really thought about it they may perhaps know that there’s something not quite right. And rather than explore and understand and admit that they are wrong they, instead, lash out at the external, the rationalists, the critical thinkers. They want this nice, cosy world that they’ve built around themselves and are afraid to venture out, afraid to grow-up, afraid to confront reality.
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…religion is used as the canvas and as the brush to paint a veil of terror
Article by Kulvinder Singh Matharu – 2012