Another little pet peeve in language!

One of the things that vexes me most when getting into discussions about religion is how many religious people will totally ignore that 3/4ths of the world's population belongs to three religions (Christianity, Islam and Hinduism), and talk about how small to fringe religions are as socially meaningful and important as the big three.

It drives me nuts! Yes, I know that Baha'i people aren't particularly crazy as religious people go. Too bad there are only about six million of them. I know that Unitarian Universalists aren't whack jobs. Too bad there are so few of them, then! To act as though these small, politically impotent and socially irrelevant faiths (sorry, all you Baha'i and UU people out there, it's . . . true) are the normal way religion gets done in the world, or America, is nuts. Absolutely nuts.

It is also this total conversation stopper! Because, well, if I was Baha'i or a UU member, I'd be clear in distinguishing how my religion is different from those other crazy people religions out there. I would say, "Well, while it is true that currently religions are parochial and close-minded in large, that does not have to be the case" or something like that. I wouldn't defend religion generally by pretending my tiny minority religion somehow represented religion overall.

But it one of my linguistic pet peeves. How religious people defend the whole of religion by acting like mainstream Christianity, Islam and Hinduism don't exist or aren't particularly meaningful to general discussions about religion. It is a dirty trick that decontextualizes discussions about religion in absurd ways.

All Religion is Politics

I think that the distinction between politics and religion is false. Those of us in democratic republics in the modern mold generally feel that it is possible to have this distinction between church and state. We go on all the time about it, at least here in America. But it occurred to me some time ago that this distinction is false. All religion is politics.

Religions are organizations that give orders to their congregations. They tell their congregations what to do, how to do it, they give orders on who to fuck, how to do it, with whom it is acceptable to fuck. Or marry. They dictate to their congregations how to behave in social situations. They give orders, often, on what is acceptable to eat, or wear. They enforce obedience to their orders through the most brutal of threats -- eternal torture or being born as a worm or what have you for most of them -- and often by ostracizing people who are sufficiently disobedient from their community (such in the case of a conservative Christian who refuses to "give up" homosexuality, or the formality of excommunication).

Think about all of that for a second. Religions exercise way more authority, or attempt to do so, than any modern democratic republic. If the government tried to order a person that they couldn't marry someone of the "wrong religion" they'd be accused (appropriately!) of tyranny. If the government tried to regulate a person's speech the way religions do, they'd be accused of tyranny. But religions routinely do these things. They routinely order these things.

And they do their dead level best to compel obedience. In modern democracies, they are wisely kept from physically enforcing their laws, but they would if they could, and they definitely do all they can to compel obedience. They invent the most cruel tortures for non-believers or heretics they can and threaten their congregations (and, indeed, the whole world) -- and for believers it is vital to keep in mind that these threats are real. They believe in the hells invented for non-believers and heretics. The threat, in the mind of the believer, is very real, as real as if I were to threaten you with pulling out your teeth with pliers. Worse. Eventually you'd run out of teeth, whereas religious threatens torment without end. If I was to physically threaten someone with torture, I'd be a criminal. Religions threaten their congregations with far worse threats but we sort of shrug and let them. We let them do this to children, to people who are literally mentally ill, we let them do these things! If I was raising a child and consistently threatening the child with, say, skinning the child alive and boiling the child in oil to compel obedience I'd be correctly accused of child abuse. Religions? Nope. It's okay for them to threaten people, to threaten them in ways that they accept as real, to compel obedience.

The government isn't allowed to do that! In modern democracies, cruel and unusual punishment is unacceptable, but religions aren't held to that standard.

What I'm saying here is that religions are political. They create laws, they enforce them, they collect taxes. They do everything that governments do. While they can't do some of the things that governments do, they also do things that governments can't.

The only defense of this is that it's voluntary. But is it? I don't think so. Religions threaten people who try to leave the church with eternal damnation. Because the religious people believe these threats, it is no different than me threatening someone with violence to remain in a relationship. It's no different than if I was to tell my wife I'd cut her arms and legs off if she dared to leave me -- it is duress. So even the voluntary argument doesn't really hold up to those who believe. To leave a religion is to be, in their own minds, condemned to a fate worse than death.

As such, I think that something should be done about this. No joke. I think that the same standards we apply to other groups need to be applied to religions. I think they should be forbidden to threaten people, just like any other organization in a modern democracy! Additionally, I think that people need to be aware that all religious activity is political with leaders, laws, taxes and enforcement, and that religions challenge the sovereignty of the government . . . and they should be treated appropriately, and forbidden to have the character of a government in the lives of the people of that religion (though, admittedly, stopping religions from threatening their congregations might be sufficient to do that -- without duress, people would be free to leave religions).

But those are my thoughts for today. That religions should be held to the same standards as every other organization and be absolutely forbidden from using tactics and fear and intimidation on people.

PS: I was thinking about what this means for my interaction with religion. What is it that really bothers me about religion. Sure, I think that people who believe in spirits and gods are wrong. But I generally don't have that much of a problem with people being merely wrong about something.

What bothers me about religion is their actions. And the more I think about it the more I'm seeing one of the key things that bothers me about religion is the overt intimidation involved in religion. So I went to see how common threats are in the big world religions. I consulted the power of Google and found some information about religions.

Here are the top 22 religions, by numbers of adherents:

# Christianity: 2.1 billion
# Islam: 1.3 billion
# Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist: 1.1 billion
# Hinduism: 900 million
# Chinese traditional religion: 394 million
# Buddhism: 376 million
# primal-indigenous: 300 million
# African Traditional & Diasporic: 100 million
# Sikhism: 23 million
# Juche: 19 million
# Spiritism: 15 million
# Judaism: 14 million
# Baha'i: 7 million
# Jainism: 4.2 million
# Shinto: 4 million
# Cao Dai: 4 million
# Zoroastrianism: 2.6 million
# Tenrikyo: 2 million
# Neo-Paganism: 1 million
# Unitarian-Universalism: 800 thousand
# Rastafarianism: 600 thousand
# Scientology: 500 thousand

Christianity, Islam, Chinese traditional religions, Sikhism and Zoroastrianism all have at least one hell. Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, Cao Dai and Tenrikyo have beliefs where people who violate their religion are punished through being born again into a worst state. So, most religions and all the biggest ones include intimidation as a part of normal doctrine.

Juche, the state cult of North Korea, does not have a hell or offers punishment to anyone who "strays". However, it is part and parcel with Kimiljungism which is creepy in it's own right.

African traditional and diaspora religions . . . well, there are a whole bunch of them. I know that many of them have various concepts of "hell", but it might be a mixed bag considering how many religions they actually are. The same is true of "primal-indigenous" and, er, Judaism -- there is no unified view of a Jewish afterlife.

The religions that have no system of intimidation built into them are Baha'i, Shinto (tho' it is deeply entwined with Japanese Buddhism), Rastafarianism, neo-paganism and Unitarian Universalism -- with some African traditional and diaspora religions, some Jews and some primal indigenous religions. I feel that these, then, are the outside limits of the religions I would be willing to deal with. They're the religions that systematically make it policy not to intimidate people with threats of eternal punishment for non-belief or disobedience. I know that there are sects of the other religions that also do not coerce people, and I'd be willing to deal with them, as well. I think that lack of intimidation and coercion might be my standard for dealing with a given religion, politically or socially. Because without the threat behind it, religion is just a choice.

A Little More About Religious Child Abuse - Personal Experience and a Plea

In my recent video I said what I've said here, recently, that the way that religion is taught is tantamount to child abuse because it teaches that disobedience is punished by eternal suffering. Someone cruised by and asked if I'd really been taught, as a child, by my parents, if I would go to hell if I disobeyed.

The answer is, well, yes. As a full disclosure, I don't recall my mother saying it, but I was raised in large part by my grandmother and it was one of the tactics she used to control me as a youth.

But there was more to it than that. I was taught that in my Sunday school classes. Which were approved, at least ostensibly, by not only the parish priest but also my parents. I can, to this day, recall everything about the Sunday school teacher who taught me these things. He was a middle aged, slightly portly man with glasses and bald on top, with short hair otherwise, clean shaven. He always wore button down shirts, slacks and a tie to church -- perhaps he had a sports jacket, but I never saw it in Sunday school class. He would teach Bible study with a tremendous glee. He would reinforce that we were good Christian children, so we had nothing to fear, but he was equally clear that unbelievers would go to Hell. It is in the Bible. It is Christian dogma. Unbelievers burn. He would read passages from the Bible where the penalties for flouting the Christian god are revealed. You deny the holy spirit? You go to Hell. You disobey your parents? You're wicked in the eyes of the Lord, and you to Hell. The same was true, of course, for lying, stealing, etc., unless you begged Jesus for forgiveness.

This is the thing I remember most clearly. We were being taught Revelations. It was being taught as if it was right around the corner. The teacher was painfully clear. Armageddon was in Israel. Russian and American forces would fight in the Holy Land. The blood would be up to the fenders of the tanks. He took various passages as alluding to nuclear war.

This fucked me up for years. I lived from around 9 to 14 absolutely sure that global thermonuclear war was around the corner. I fully expected to be alive for the End of the World. Because I had all sorts of disobediences and sins that I did hide from the church, I was equally sure that I would not be saved in any Rapture and that I'd live to see the dragon of the Apocalypse and the Whore of Babylon and the last Anti-christ. When I was about twelve, I remember talking to my mother about it, tears down my face, saying that I knew that the "end" was coming, and she said there was nothing I could do about it, but never denied it.

With the narcissism of youth, I am not sure how many children were in the class. I would guess about forty, but it could be half that, or double. With most of them, of course, I have no idea what was taught in their households. Even with my own friends, I'm not sure what was taught in their churches, since we were not of the same denomination. But I do know with that church it was commonplace for children to be taught, with glee, that non-believers and disobedient children would burn in Hell.

This was in my pre-pubescent days. By the time I was a teenager and going through confirmation, we were expected to be able to know that sort of thing by heart. By then, I was going to a different church. Of course, teenagers are still children. It was more of the same. End time crap, absolute vicious fear-mongering. And we were old enough that no attempt was made to shield up from the absolute ugliness in the Bible. We were encouraged to read and discuss the most disturbing things, from Lot being raped by his daughters, Jael nailing her husband's head to the floor and, of course, that favorite horror story, again, Revelations.

I do not think that my religious education was particularly severe. My family was not fundamentalist. They were pretty liberal Christians. But at the end of the day, what are you to teach about the wages of sin? The Bible is extremely clear. The Lord is a wrathful sonofabitch. Unless you're in some church that carefully and deliberately hides the gruesome parts of the Bible -- which means ignoring about 99% of it -- it is normal to teach children that disobedience to Christian doctrine is punished by an eternity of flames.

I find the idea that it is not the case that is normal for Christians to be frank about the fate of disobedience to Christian doctrine massively suspect. But I'll listen. Spread this around to religious people, right? Am I wrong? Is it normal for Christians to forgo teaching children the consequences of sin, being hellfire? If so, when are they introduced to the concept of eternal damnation that awaits everyone who isn't a Christian? Do you wait until they're . . . 10? 13? 15? Is it normal for Christians to wait until their co-religionists are eighteen, and legally adults, before subjecting them to the violent pornography that is much of the Bible (Old Testament and New)? In my experience, it is not the case. In no church I have ever attended was it hidden from children the consequences of sinful disobedience to religious doctrine (gussied up as the word of their god).

But I'd love to hear otherwise.

P.S.: And what about Muslims? When do they start to teach their kids about Hell? And what about Hindus? When do they teach the consequences of defying their dharma? This isn't addressed to just Christians -- most religions use virulent intimidation to enforce their religious doctrines. They all teach child abuse, IMO.

Religion vs. Another Religion vs. Atheism

It all starts off with Pascal's Wager. You know it! The notion that atheism is a bad bet because the atheist loses nothing and potentially gains immortal life. It has been criticized from the very beginning because it is, in fact, such bad reasoning. Still, it gets trotted out with almost mind numbing regularity, and nowadays it seems to be given life as a general critique of religion over non-religion, ignoring the mutually incompatible nature of most religions.

Which happens to me almost constantly, nowadays -- people will argue for religion generally, when in truth they're all actually promoting a specific form of a specific religion. It's a deeply insulting argument! Like I don't know that these very Christians that can't tell me why I should prefer Christianity to Islam, or why people who "open their heart to god" sometimes choose wrong in their own view . . . like I don't know that these very people aren't equally condemning most religious people on earth to eternal torment. That it is not religion in some sort of abstract sense that they're promoting, but very specific forms of religion.

We're not talking Buddhism or Taoism, here. We're not talking about the rights of aboriginal people to maintain their lifestyle. Uh-uh. The people who are talking to me are uniformly evangelical Christians. So, they go from talking to me about the rights of "religion" to condemning other religions for their various faults, condemning them all to hell!

Of course, the biggest group of people who do this in America are intelligent design supporters. You want to find out how religious intelligent design fans are, just try suggesting that the designers are gay aliens from the Dog Star. It's like they think we're too stupid to see that the people who advance ID are all fundamentalist Christian nutjobs.

This dishonesty annoys me. So, I'm going to be trying a new technique. Rather than focus on the concept of religion vs. atheism, I will focus on the differences between religions. Rather than trying to prove that religion, in some abstract, is foolish, I'll try to get them to tell me why I should accept their religion over someone else's. Really twist in them that it isn't choosing "god" over choosing atheism, it's choosing a specific god, a specific religion. That the issue is not, and has never been, choosing generic belief in god over atheism, but exact faiths. I think that by focusing generically on religion vs. atheism we're giving these people a pass -- religious people hate each other at least as much as they hate us, condemning each other to various hells. I'm gonna try focusing on that when people try to convert me or argue from a position of generic religion.

And, as a bonus, a story from my youth!

Dalit's and Conversion

I know that people here mostly do believe me when I say a given thing, even though I don't do too many links. (I decided not to because, really, I'd just cherry pick the links, anyway, which I find to be slightly dishonest. I fully expect -- indeed, encourage -- people who doubt what I say to check for themselves!) But recently I mentioned Hinduism as being of a piece with Christianity and Islam in terms of backwardsness.

It seems that today the the BBC has a story about that very backwardsness, and people's attempts to get out from under it. What you've got is a bunch of Dalits -- casteless Hindus -- that are about to convert en masse to Buddhism to try to escape the oppression of the caste system.

The article mentions a few things I will bring up here without too much comment. The first is that right-wing Hindus want to make laws to restrict conversion (and have in several states that are controlled by the BJP, which is basically the Hindu Nazi Party, and I say that full well knowing what I say). The second is that conversion doesn't really protect former Dalits -- Hindus still regard them as Dalits, even after the conversion. And, three, Christians trying to convert people in India face the real possibility of physical violence.

Religion and Child Abuse

Now, I'm very close to being a libertarian. Albeit of the socialist variety. So, by and large, I don't care what people do in the privacy of their own homes. You want to smoke pot? Not my business. You want to have sex with people of your own gender? Your call. You want to worship a sky pixie? Whatever. So long as it stays out of my life, I'll be happy to stay out of your personal decisions.

However, this only applies to adults. Children, particular young ones, are different. As a society, we are in fact beholden to protect them. They lack the wisdom, experience and sense of self to make all sorts of decisions. I think that anyone who says otherwise -- and there are some people who have -- is definitely daft and probably has no children. (Shulamith Firestone, I'm looking at you.) One of the things that we forbid parents to do is abuse their children. One of the forms of abuse that is forbidden is psychological abuse.

I generally don't quote Wikipedia, but their definition of psychological abuse is so concise I trust you'll forgive me:

Psychological abuse can take the form of physical intimidation, controlling through scare tactics and oppression . . . Any situation in which the repeated and extreme impact of a situation affects a person's emotional and rational thinking, in such a way as to adversely impact their later lives, could be termed as psychological abuse at some level.

Now, to my mind, this is precisely what happens when adults indoctrinate their children in a particular religion. This is true of the three big world religions: Christianity, Islam and Hinduism.

Both Christianity and Islam teach, and they do teach this to their children, that unless they obey the dictates of religion that they will suffer forever. I, myself, cannot remember a time in my life when I didn't know that the bad people went to Hell. In Hinduism, they take a slightly different approach -- that disobedience to religion is punished by being born into a worse position, perhaps as an animal or bug or worm. In both cases, threats of unimaginable suffering are used to compel obedience.

Undeniably, this intimidation affects their emotional and rational thinking, and I think it fairly demonstrably does so in ways that negative effect their lives later on. How many women have submitted to pregnancies they don't want, or gay people have hated themselves, of people tortured emotionally because they have dared to fall in love with someone of another faith? And what about the committed religious person's inability to meaningfully analyze scientific data -- meaning that, today, right now, religiously motivated people are trying to dismantle science even when humans are facing massive climate change, during which we'll need all the scientific prowess that we can muster? And I'm not even talking about those faiths that withhold medicines from their children and the other truly crazy things that religions sometimes do.

If I, as an atheist, said that if they used birth control I'd come over and boil them in oil, no one in their right mind would doubt I was psychologically abusing the child. Child services would snatch that kid away from me in a heartbeat -- and they'd be right to do it. But with religion, you can do precisely that. You can tell a child that unless they obey, they'll be tortured. Forever.

This isn't even close to the line, people! This is child abuse. If we evaluated religion with the same values that we evaluate all other behavior, it would be illegal to teach children most religions. But because of some ancient privilege of religion, we don't do what would otherwise be obvious -- forbid the teaching of religion to children. But because of stupid traditions, we allow religious people to perpetrate child abuse!

Response to Peter

This is a discussion that was started on YouTube in the comments section of this video. It's about the appropriateness of attacking religion. The person with whom I am talking, Peter, is a rather nice fellow who has the position, roughly speaking, that you'll catch more flies with sugar than vinegar -- that aggression against theists doesn't do anything or is, worse, counterproductive. My position is, roughly, attack, attack and when in doubt, attack again. I'm responding here rather than in the YouTube comments section because you can only posts posts that are 500 characters or less, and by now everyone who reads my blog knows I can do that in a single sentence. ;)

So, Peter, hello! For some background, one of the reasons I am obsessing about religion is because I'm writing a deeply blasphemous novel called Simon Peter, which is written about Jesus from the point of view of the leader of the disciples, Simon Peter. My take on the story is that Jesus is not some legitimate religious figure or social reformer but an insane charlatan. If you want to read a short story that I've written in the style of Simon Peter, I have Immaculate Conception. You could probably read it in 20 minutes, and I'll put my usual caveat that it isn't for the weak of stomach -- it has a lot of violence in it. That said, here's the actual response to your posts. ;)

Thanks so much for this. I think I was aware of the diffs between Europe and the US, but your video reinforces my awareness of that. I totally understand your anger, given the context! Isn't one MAJOR reason for that the low general level of BASIC education in the US? (Of course I'm not talking about college-educated people).

There are places in the US where al-Qaida would be welcome, if they trimmed their beards and bleached their skin. The only think that stops some Christians from turning the US into some medieval hellhole is the separation of church and state, so, ramen for that.

I would suspect one of the reasons why religious people are ignorant of their own faith in the US is linked to the generally poor education, but I think there's more than that. I think the culprit that informs both religious ignorance and the dismal status of basic education in the US is a deep anti-intellectualism. (I think that anti-intellectualism has been created and nurtured by religions in America to quite consciously make it easier for them to bamboozle their constituencies.) These people can read, and could read the Bible. But so many Americans hold reading in contempt, the very idea of being educated unless it has a direct monetary connection (and, even then, not enough Americans hold even that limited view of the use of education, as we continue to important educated people to fill necessary jobs on all levels of our economy), and I think that's what holds them off from learning about Christianity. It'd take reading. And reading is icky.

It's must be IMMENSELY frustrating that in your country fundamentalist religion is so powerful. Anger is a natural response and can even be useful I think. But I think we also need to channel it into putting our rational arguments as calmly and forcefully as possible as there are reasonable theists, and even some doubters we can sway, even in the US! I'm convinced the tide will turn.

Yes, it is frustrating, but there's more to it than my personal frustration. Oh, so much more!

I am unsure at the power of cool, rational arguments to win debates. When I was in college, I did speech and debate tournaments for a year and I was pretty good at it. One of the things that I was told, time and again, to overcome was the urge merely to prove I was factually correct. While being factually correct was important, even more important was meaningfully engaging a person's emotions. I was told not to make them angry not because it would be unsuccessful in getting them to think about what I said, but because I would not win tournaments -- getting people angry, it seems, is a great way to get them to think about something. They can't get it out of their head. And this is comes from communications theory! This is a material scientific rationalist point of view.

In short, it is easy to dismiss a calm, rational argument. Not with logic, but with the emotional sleight-of-hand you've already noticed! Something that is not seen to be believed passionately is believed to be a trivial belief. A person charged up with the emotional hallucination of religious belief isn't anywhere near caring about carefully nuanced arguments, I think.

Additionally, I don't think we all need to do the same thing. I'm quite willing to play good cop, bad cop with theists. I suspect this multi-faceted approach would be more useful than us just calmly repeating ourselves over and over without any variation. I think that after I get in their face, having someone else come along and say, "Well, that was harsh, but there is some truth to that position" is useful.

Also, I think that it is useful to show theists the emotional consequences of their actions. To show them that what they do makes people, other real people, hurt and angry. Many theists, IMO, feel that they do nothing but good and simply do not understand the real consequences of their actions. I think it is fair to show them.

I am also somewhat critical of the "reasonable theist" argument. To me, and perhaps this is a distinctly American perspective, but it's really the only one I've got with any force, moderate religious people will defend the rights of the fundamentalists to be fundamentalist. Time and again I've talked to Christians about taking to task those people who call themselves Christian and who are racist, sexist, homophobic, classist warmongering bigots. I can, pretty easily, get them to agree that they should theoretically take them to task, but when I start to mention specific groups, the Pat Robertsons and Fred Phelps of the American religious scene, they start to defend them in a variety of ways, or find reasons not to take specific people and groups to task. So, I become increasingly forced to conclude that most Americans who call themselves moderate Christians are actually screening and defending the more radical and fundamentalist groups. And as far as I can tell, this is equally true with Islam and Hinduism.

I am also convinced the tide will turn. Even in America, the fastest growing religion is lack of religion. But I think that American Christians can do a lot of harm before this has run its course.

ps interesting you heard about that study published in "Le monde des religions". The study concerned the 51% of French people who define themselves as Catholics. On the existence of God, here's the precise breakdown: 26%: it's certain He exists; 26% likely; 10% unlikely; 7% doesn't exist(!); 30% no idea; 1% no opinion.

Just as interesting was the reasons people gave for being a Catholic: 55% "because born in Catholic family"; 21% "because have faith"; 14% "because attached to Catholic values"; 10% other/no reasons. This shows that belief is partly about identity, and that its intellectual base is often not questioned.

I have my sources! :)

Most of my online friends are European. Which might say something about me, but I don't know what. I am hoping my wife gets to do her post-doctoral work in France, though.

But, yes, I interpreted the information given as meaning that a fair number of people in France and culturally Catholic. Again, I must emphasize that in the US it isn't like that. There are more people who believe in god than are actively religious, here. We aren't culturally Christian, at least not yet, but are actively and often viciously Christian.

But I would bet that even less ANGLICANS believe in God!! Religion is often just a form of sociability, and also that we need to take this fact into account when challenging believers. We need to propose alternative forms of sociability and community.

This is very true. And I agree whole heartedly. Do you have any suggestions or examples of this?

Feel free to comment here! There are no character limits, Peter.

Notes on Other Religions

I was requested to talk about religions other than Christianity. It is pretty hard to do, for me! There are reasons - and I think they're good reasons - why I devote most of my religious talk to Christianity. Christianity is the dominate religion in the United States, and amounts to a state religion, here. I mean, we get off several of the major Christian holidays like Easter and Christmas and do not give the same level of regard for any other religion. The second big reason is that, globally, Christianity is the most powerful religion, with fully 1 in 3 people at last nominally Christian. Additionally, when you look at the powerful, wealthy nations of the world, they are dominated by at least nominally Christian nations. So, locally, nationally and globally, there are a lot of good reasons for me to talk about Christianity.

I admit a certain hesitation with talking about Islam, to avoid the appearance of racism. Oh, I think that Islam is at least as bad as Christianity. Is the organized, industrialized viciousness of Christianity better or worse than the Islamic suicide bombing terrorism? That's a moral question that's too thorny for me to answer, but I am certain that both religions, even in their more moderate forms, constitute support structures for the militaristic factions that are doing their dead level best to plunge the whole world into murderous chaos. However, from about the Battle of Lepanto onwards (that was in 1571), the onus of exploitation has largely gone from Christian nations into Muslim nations, and certain from the time of Peter the Great and the Great Northern War (say, 1700) it has been almost entirely one way. In the past century or so, the US has been a prime player in the exploitation of Islamic nations, through colonial and capitalist imperialism. On whole, unless you want to start talking about events that happened before the 16th century, Islamic nations and people have been largely subject to all manner of imperialism from Christian countries.

That makes me hesitant, as a member of the Christian country that is most involved with imperialism in the Middle East at the present time, to take an unnuanced a view of Islam, rather than criticizing specific events, people, governments, etc. That said, I think that Islam is at least as filthy a religion as Christianity, at least as oppressive (though Muslims tend to oppress their own people far more than Christian nations do - Christians tend to export their exploitation, often to Muslim nations), murderous and altogether as stupid.

I don't talk about Hinduism because it's a hard beast to cage. I am not knowledgeable enough about Hinduism to meaningfully talk theologically about it on this blog, I feel. From what I know, however, maybe I should talk more about it. Unknown to most people, in India there is essentially a low level civil war going on between militant Muslims and at least equally militant Hindus. There's a kind of Hindu extremism that is flatly as fascist as anything that the West has ever produced. We're talking about Dr. Strangelove levels of whackiness: Bharatiya Janata Party vice-president Jana Krishanmurthy blithely dismissed war with Pakistan as being able winnable because, at most, 20 million Indians would die whereas Pakistan would be destroyed! Krishamurthy was, unknowingly, quoting General Turgidson! "No more than ten to twenty million killed, tops!"

This low level conflict in India fairly regularly has riots in which thousands are killed, often with the support of the largely Hindu police departments.

Additionally, there is a second low level religious conflict going on in India. About twenty percent of the Indian population are technically Hindu but casteless, or outcastes, called Dalits. In rural areas, the oppression of Dalits can be truly savage with Dalits forbidden to come within 64 or 128 paces of upper caste people (warriors and priests, shocker that, right?) on penalty of death. It is sometimes enforced - even on whole Dalit communities! Dalits are often forced to use different wells and springs that caste Hindus, and, believe me, they do not share equal water rights. Unsurprisingly, the Dalits don't like this, and there are occasional armed clashes where, sometimes, thousands can be killed. There is also a lot of hard to document low level violence between Dalits and caste Hindus. In Bihar, for instance, there's this group, Ranvir Sena, that uses organized violence to repress Dalits. The Dalits have responded with the creation of groups like the Dalit Panthers Movement which attack upper caste members.

In eastern India, the Dalits often make up the bulk of Maoist organizations, some of which are also engaged in low level civil warfare against various Indian states. Maoism's atheism appeals to people who have been brutally oppressed as a people on religious grounds for thousands of years.

I should also note in all of this there is a large racial component. Members of the upper castes tend to be, uh, whiter than lower caste Indians. The upper castes were populated the Aryan invaders thousands of years ago. The lower castes and especially the Dalits tend to be the black skilled Dravidian peoples that the Aryans conquered.

Which is to say that Hinduism is pretty fucked up, too.

There are religions, old ones, even, that I don't have any problems with. Buddhism and Taoism (and I account myself a philosophical Taoist) are almost entirely absent the sort of racist, nationalist murderousness of most religions - indeed, many people consider them to be philosophical systems rather than religions, because of their lack of things like an organized priestly hierarchy and absence of religious dogma. My view is that to some people both Buddhism and Taoism are certainly religions, but they also have a large number of people who are philosophical adherents. But even at the most religious, neither Buddhism nor Taoism systematically supported mass murder, conversion through violence, or even the "enforcement" of doctrine on co-religionists in any meaningful capacity. Oh, sure, Buddhists and Taoists might argue with each other, but it very rarely comes to blows. So that's pretty cool.

In general, however, my feeling about religion is that I don't care what adults believe in privacy. I am only concerned with the effects of those religious sentiments when they're brought into the social and political sphere - when people, on the grounds of their private religion, start making special status claims for the articles of their religious faith. When they start to force their religion on others. In the biggest religions in the world, they've all been doing this centuries and them doing it is literally ingrained in culture. They've been doing it so long they expect to be able to continue doing it. Indeed, it's been this way for so long that many agnostics and atheists support the special cultural status of religion! They attack anyone who dares to challenge religion as merely a social, economic and political entity, no different from a major corporation or government! Which is absurd. Freedom of speech and conscience, as well as the separation of church and state, demands that religion be treated identically to any other human created institution, that it be measured on the same grounds and with the same tools as we use to measure any other institution. This is true of all religions, so virtually everything I say about Christianity applies to any religion whose adherents generally claim special status on religious grounds - which is the religion of almost all people everywhere.