Thread: Why can't all religions/lack thereof just get ALONG?!

I literally ask myself the same question everyday.

Originally Posted by ThePreserver

Can anyone answer this question?

And I mean aside from occasional specific instances in religious dogma that says "non-_____ are wrong." For the most part, all religions preach compassion and kindness and loving other people. Where did all of THAT go?

It's upsetting to me...

You can say that this applies to every other thing that a lot of people get involved with. Politics, sports, video games, and even countries. In all of them there are people that constantly compare, bash, or accept each others ideas. In all of these situations mentioned, the conflict gets the most attention. A perfect example of this would be Pluto.

I never learned much about Pluto until the whole "it's not a planet" thing came about. Imagine turning on the news, and not hearing about murders, kidnappings, robbings, and what not. Now think about turning on the news, and hearing about some major riot breaking out, and it's only one city away. The world, and everything in it, is based on competition. This competition creates, shapes, and ultimately destroys us.

Most religious people don't really understand their religion and follow it through blind faith. When people present them with logical arguments they can not refute it, it upsets them, because its like saying their entire world view is wrong, and that can be troubling to people. That can be true of anything though, and people take their views really personally.

Religion tends to stir up peoples' sense of righteousness, and nothing is worse than that. It makes people feel that any act is justified and can be carried out with extreme hatred and impunity, and that it makes them right about everything.

Easy solution, people that have negative feelings about Religion here should just stay out of R/S. Or, create an additional sub-forum for just atheist. Let atheist play there and religious people play in the religion sub-forum and keep the two opposing parties away from each other by setting up some protocols. If people who are not atheist have questions for atheist, there are other forums for such things and vice-versa.

If I'm not mistaken, I don't think the OP simply meant theists vs atheists. I think he also meant disputes between various religions as well. On that note, it makes 'logic vs. faith' a moot point.

Originally Posted by Auron

I think he also meant disputes between various religions as well.

I've never actually seen this the 5 years I've been here and if so, it must be extremely subtle. It's probably nothing close to how atheist and theist bump heads.

Look to the middle east...

I don't think the thread is referring only to this message board or online, but real world scenarios as well.

Not to mention people like me who disagree with theists and atheists.

I think it comes down to fundamentalism. People can't apply rules to themselves so they make up for it by applying them on other people.

Originally Posted by Darkmatters

Look to the middle east...

I don't think the thread is referring only to this message board or online, but real world scenarios as well.

ah .. my apologies.

Auron and Darkmatters got what I meant. I don't see much on this forum other than Atheism vs. Theism. I mean in GENERAL... Palestine and Israel, Zionism vs. Non-Zionism, Hindus vs. Muslims (in India), Evangelicals vs. Mormons, the list can go on and on.

The righteousness that was mentioned not ONLY occurs in theists, but I'm seeing it more and more in atheists lately (not on DV but in general.) One of my friends, atheist, got into an argument with ANOTHER one of my friends, theist, "How can you SERIOUSLY believe that shit? You must be an absolute idiot!" That's a little self-righteous "I'm better than you." But then the theists usually snap back with their own self-righteousness "I'm better than you."

Ahhhh... I think we should all just be nice to eachother, and use hugs and smiles as a second currency.

That's what happens when your way of life is absolutely and universally true as ordained by an infallible, almighty god.

Originally Posted by ♥Mark

That's what happens when your way of life is absolutely and universally true as ordained by an infallible, almighty god.

But that only explains fundamentalists, not the majority of people. You'd think the majority of people would be more understanding... (I, for one, completely understand why someone would be atheist. I also totally get why someone would want the sense of community provided by a place of worship.) It's just frustrating.

But I guess it's human nature to feel like you're "right" and others are "wrong." (I find myself guilty of that often.)

It doesn't explain only fundamentalists. It explains anyone who's convinced that they know what their god(s) want(s) excepting the cases where they believe their god wants them to be accepting and considerate and recognize the limits of their intellect but this is unfortunately not always the case.

Originally Posted by ♥Mark

It doesn't explain only fundamentalists. It explains anyone who's convinced that they know what their god(s) want(s)

In my experience, the only people who DO think this way are fundamentalists (including fundamentalist atheists). Those are atheists that are atheist because THEY believe that you have to be a fundamentalist to be a part of a religion. Basically "atheists by dissociation/disbelief of fundamentalism."

I'm sure there are some people who aren't fundies that believe they have intimate knowledge of their God, but I haven't met any yet... Most are agnostics that practice a religion in my personal experience.

It's really not. Try asking some religious people about god and they'll probably have quite a bit to tell you. "god wants this, god said that, etc." It doesn't matter if such beliefs come from the literal word of the Bible or are somehow abstractly inferred.


For example, you'll hear a lot of "homosexuality is wrong because it is unnatural. Clearly that's not the way humans were designed, so obviously it's against god's will." This reasoning is far from unique to fundamentalists. Even non-religious people make the same comments minus the part about god. The main difference there, though is that the one who believes in god is essentially speaking on behalf of god. It's a pretty powerful (and usually presumptuous) statement when you say something is against god's will. Now you're no longer talking about you and your personal beliefs, but rather something which is universally true of everyone. Something which not you have decided, but the ALL POWERFUL LORD OF THE UNIVERSE has decided. This kind of thinking is almost unavoidable by most religion's claims.

Originally Posted by ♥Mark

It's really not. Try asking some religious people about god and they'll probably have quite a bit to tell you. "god wants this, god said that, etc." It doesn't matter if such beliefs come from the literal word of the Bible or are somehow abstractly inferred.


For example, you'll hear a lot of "homosexuality is wrong because it is unnatural. Clearly that's not the way humans were designed, so obviously it's against god's will." This reasoning is far from unique to fundamentalists. Even non-religious people make the same comments minus the part about god. The main difference there, though is that the one who believes in god is essentially speaking on behalf of god. It's a pretty powerful (and usually presumptuous) statement when you say something is against god's will. Now you're no longer talking about you and your personal beliefs, but rather something which is universally true of everyone. Something which not you have decided, but the ALL POWERFUL LORD OF THE UNIVERSE has decided. This kind of thinking is almost unavoidable by most religion's claims.

Well said, though I must confess that in the liberal area in which I live (hint: it starts with a "New" and ends with an "England"), I barely ever meet a non-fundamentalist who acts in any way different from an atheist on a practical level. So while the fundies will be all like, "Jesus said so it must be", the more open minded chaps on both the atheist and theist sides only butt heads when it's consented to and the people are in a genuine discussion or debate on the more theology-oriented theological issues, like "is there a god" or "which god is it" as opposed to the less theology-based theological issues, like "is abortion murder?"

As a whole, human beings are the most intelligent species alive but still have animal tendencies. Many aggrandize religion and fight about because it is so easy to do; few pursue the universal wisdom for its own sake.

On a smaller scale, do you think even a small group of human beings are guaranteed to get along? Religion is not the decider. The question is really asking for world peace.

Religions have used force and coercion to control people. People are pisssssssssssed.

Pretty much.

Most atheists are sick of the religious trying to impose their ideals on others. Beliefs, I don't think most atheists care about, but it's when they try to impose their ideals on others that we get annoyed. Like trying to get religion in to children's science classes.

Religions tend to get annoyed just because of the beliefs themselves from a differing religion being imposed on them.

The only way we will all get along is if we're all Pastafarians. So if you are sick of it, make sure you spread the word of His Noodly Appendage.

jk, but seriously it will only ever end if we're all atheists. Because it is the only definite thing regarding this. Religions are not definite, as you can see evidenced by the fact that religious people fight with people of the same religion. Or religions which are basically identical with different names (christians/catholics and muslims).

My beef is on a few levels. I'd say the biggest, most important level is that religious dogma should have absolutely NOTHING to do with politics, and we MUST fight it. In the US, the religious right has been trying to push their sickening agenda of "intelligent design" and "abstinence-only sex ed" and whatever other idiotic drivel there is for a long time, and it's really doing nothing more than harm our progress as a society. Some people would love to live in a theocracy like they have in certain locations today, and that's a frightening thought.

You could argue that, if you ignore that (which no sane person should), you're left with "religions preach compassion and caring about one another" - except compassion and caring are _NOT_ religious concepts at all! I cannot stand the cheapening of basic human virtues by saying "they had help from god" - to me, that's just as bad as when some charlatan cheapens the achievements of ancient civilizations (e.g. building the pyramids) by saying, "oh, they must have had help from aliens." No they didn't! Humans can be pretty awesome, give them some damn credit sometimes!

Finally, when you succumb to faith, of the "belief without evidence, and don't ask questions" kind, you close your eyes to the REAL beauty of the world. That's just your choice, and I have a problem respecting that. Like they say, I respect people's right to have whatever beliefs they want, but I don't respect some of the beliefs. There's no reason to respect woo-woo beliefs.

Originally Posted by ♥Mark

It's really not. Try asking some religious people about god and they'll probably have quite a bit to tell you. "god wants this, god said that, etc." It doesn't matter if such beliefs come from the literal word of the Bible or are somehow abstractly inferred.


For example, you'll hear a lot of "homosexuality is wrong because it is unnatural. Clearly that's not the way humans were designed, so obviously it's against god's will." This reasoning is far from unique to fundamentalists. Even non-religious people make the same comments minus the part about god. The main difference there, though is that the one who believes in god is essentially speaking on behalf of god. It's a pretty powerful (and usually presumptuous) statement when you say something is against god's will. Now you're no longer talking about you and your personal beliefs, but rather something which is universally true of everyone. Something which not you have decided, but the ALL POWERFUL LORD OF THE UNIVERSE has decided. This kind of thinking is almost unavoidable by most religion's claims.

I don't have any fundamentalist friends except one, and she's very understanding and open to other's opinions anyways. I'm in an extremely... I guess "moderate" town, religiously open but politically red. It's an odd combination, but I rarely hear people who AREN'T fundamentalists saying that homosexuality is bad. Must be location more than belief.

Some of my upset feelings come from Islamophobia. It took YEARS for a good friend to be convinced that Muslims are people, too, and his hatred for them wasn't even based on his religious beliefs, it was based on the media demonizing Muslims. The same thing happens often for Mormons, even if a Mormon has done NOTHING wrong, has donated to charity, volunteers every week, and has never tried to convert anyone, they are seen as "idiots" or "bigots" or "polygamists" (the most untrue of all stereotypes of Mormons) simply because they are members of a different church.

I completely understand why someone would dislike another religious group when they DO something that harms someone else, but when they choose to be a part of a religious group? That's not OK with me.

Originally Posted by ThePreserver

Can anyone answer this question?

And I mean aside from occasional specific instances in religious dogma that says "non-_____ are wrong." For the most part, all religions preach compassion and kindness and loving other people. Where did all of THAT go?

It's upsetting to me...

They do get along for the most part, in the West.

Because of fear of difference, I suppose.