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Friends, this photograph from Al Jazeera graphically illustrates humanity’s greatest weakness, the one that will probably bring us undone as a species.
The photo shows a street scene in Jerusalem and it features two religious people walking past each other: one a Jew, one a Muslim. Notice that both have heads lowered and eyes downcast. Each one has a mind filled with deranged ideas about God and life after death, ideas which are in conflict. Each one hates the other.
It’s not only the ideas which are in conflict. The peoples of both these religions are engaged in a war. The vastly superior forces belonging to the man in the black hat, armed by Christian America, are occupying territory which belongs to the Palestinians. These forces are using military force and stealth to take more and more of East Jerusalem so that Israel can claim all of Jerusalem as their holy city regardless of the fact that Jerusalem is holy to Christians, Muslims and Jews.
Daily, Palestinian families are thrown out into the street and developers take over their homes, demolish them or renovate them and then move Jewish families into them thereby changing the demographics of Jerusalem for narrow political and religious reasons.
Daily, Jewish archeologists dig beneath East Jerusalem trying to find antiquities that will strengthen their claim to be the rightful owners of the whole city because their relatives were there eons ago.
How is it possible that ridiculous fantasies concocted thousands of years ago when humans were ignorant and primitive are still influencing the way modern humans think and act? How is it that in an age of space travel and the internet there are billions of people still worshiping ancient gods and fighting with those who believe in other gods?
How come people believe that a nuclear war will bring about Armageddon, that the graves of the world will open up and spew out their contents, that they will go to heaven without dying, that 72 virgins are waiting to be deflowered, that a God will appear, that angels will fly about, that selected people will join heavenly choirs…
It defies reason. It defies reality. It defies all scientific evidence. It suggests that most humans are born with a serious genetic deficiency, that they have a screw loose, several screws even.
The fact that humans have been warring with each other for thousands of years over religion and still are suggests to me that it’s just a matter of time before we start the war that will end all wars – and our world.
It will be an extreme irony that our planet, which was so fertile and beautiful, will end up barren and burned and lifeless because many humans couldn’t rid themselves of fanciful ancient superstitions about achieving life for ever and ever.
Then humans are greedy by nature. And conceited. And irrational.
They always want more than life can offer!
IMHO… All ‘theisms’ are evil. Agnosticism is the only logically defensible position.
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David G Reply:
June 27th, 2009 at 12:13 pm
Kvatch, agnosticism is like having a bet both ways. The only intelligent, rational position is that of atheism!
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Worldwide, the power hungry use and abuse religion. Whether it’s a “world” religion or a small village religion, the manipulators are in charge. Followers pay the price, fight their wars, enrich the “clergy”. Seems to be a genetic “defect” that most people love to follow their gurus to sacrifice themselves or share a morsel of the real power. The promise of an afterlife is quite a sham but most cannot face the fact that this is IT. Unfortunately, religion seems to be part of most humans’ drive. We need enemies and sinners as it makes us look better, more powerful, whatever. It’s so silly and one wishes that evolution would kick in and all these truth holders would kill each other off and leave the rest of the planet to rational people but I am afraid, another “ism” or religion would replace the older, more primitive religions we have now. Humans still get sacrificed, just not as openly as in the past. No more virgins fed to the beast or hearts ripped out to please the gods……Drones throw bombs on sheep herders, cough, terrorists!
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David, humans will probably destroy themselves and do inmense damage to life on Earth at the same time, but nature will recover. The remnants of whatever animal and plant species that are left will evolve into new and wonderful forms.
In a relatively short time Earth will be as beautiful and wild as it was before but there will be no humans to spoil it anymore.
I am deeply suspicious of agnostics. I think that they desperately want to believe in some supernatural being that will take care of them after death but they are too intelligent to believe in any of the religious dellusions in vogue at present.
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Margit, you are right: religion is silly! I mean, even children give up believing in Santa eventually.
Loz, I’m not so sure that our earth will survive a nuclear firestorm. I agree with your observation about agnostics. They want to hedge their bets.
The tragedy of religion is that its deranged adherents will take the rest of us more rational folk with them.
That’s unfair but, to the religious, it’s all about them! Other people just don’t count!
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Therese O'Grady Reply:
June 29th, 2009 at 4:50 am
Absolutely true, David G. Even the American Atheist Organization has been taken over by the Jews who claim not to be clerical (ha,ha) which must be causing its wise founder to turn over in her grave. There is no way to beat the religious and their aggression.
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Religion is about turning untested belief into unshakeable truth through the power of institutions and the passage of time.
- Richard Dawkins
It really doesn’t matter which religion and what manner of gods are involved.
One can only hope that human progress will be: polytheism -> monotheism -> atheism.
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JanSan, Richard should have added ‘…and making lots of money from it.’
I too keep hoping that your progression is correct but I’ve seen little evidence of it!
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A Homeland is very important to people. The Tibetans hope to get their beloved Tibet back; a piece of land that in large part gives them their unique identity. Same with the Native Americans and countless others. I do not deny the Jewish right to a homeland. I do reject the idea of kicking out, abusing and killing the Palestinians in order for the Jews to have a home. Wasn’t one of the biggest bombings in Israel done by an Israeli himself? Kind of their Oklahoma bombing; they wanted badly to blame it on an Islamic militant group, but it was just a bunch of local white boys. I see this same propaganda in Israel. I cannot believe that a single Jew believes in killing their neighbors, but that they must be subject to propaganda too. I have long questioned the “friendship” between the Israelis and the Fundamentalist Xtians. These “christian groups” are giving the money to build all these new settlements. they are actively bringing on Armageddon. Maybe the Israelis need to closely examine who their “friends” are. Maybe this whole mess could be worked out. I mean these are all basically racially the same people, they managed for thousands of years to be neighbors. What changed? – other than large numbers of transplanted people and the problem of where to put them; and US & Euro imperialistic designs. Come on (Israeli) people, nobody really wants to die.
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For sake of completion: The Palestinians deserve to have their Homeland just as much as a Jew, Tibetan or Native American and too many others to list. Ultimately we ALL have one Homeland: Planet Earth. If we humans keep carrying on like this, there will be NO HOMELAND FOR ANYBODY.
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Grace, people do need to belong be it to a family, a community, a state or a nation. However, what the Israelis are doing with their extreme racist society or the Americans with their Christian-Nationalistic hegemony is dangerous and divisive!
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I couldn’t stay away forever from reading the thoughts of some of the very few people I know (albeit only through electrical signals transformed into images on a screen, but I trust that you’re all real) who generally share my values – at least some of you and some of the values. This site provides me some solace in knowing I’m not crazy for knowing that most humans are crazy — but I still could care less about some totally ludicrous American television dance competition! What a total waste of anyone’s time! David, please don’t go there again!
Religion: people and their belief systems have been messing up the world and killing and maiming one another for tens of thousands of years. Everything onerous and regrettable in human history has had at its foundation some idiotic belief system. I agree with whomever suggested that religious belief must be a genetic defect — now perhaps genetic engineering isn’t such a bad idea, although the “sheep” gene transplants certainly went awry. Anyway, I was raised religious (and believing in the Easter Bunny, Santa, and the goodness of American politicians), yet I continued to question the foundations of religious doctrine, even as I explored other belief systems and religions. Once I saw the glaring hypocrisy, the use of religion to subjugate and repress, to dispossess and persecute, I realized that atheism was the only practice I could assume – except it’s not a practice at all. I just live according to what’s real and what’s in front of me, clearly manifested as physical truth and substance. The physical universe, most importantly the incredible miracles inherent in the continual evolution of life here on earth, are far more fulfilling to ponder and appreciate than any ludicrous and contrived myths that are all, ultimately, borne from ignorance and the desire to perpetuate that ignorance in order to exert power over others. You’d think by now we’d have the collective sense to live according to the physical laws of the universe. It’s quite discouraging to understand, much less accept, how many people would prefer to live in a world of delusion instead of using our rationality to live with the vast opportunities the real world provides. Religion must truly be the greatest, most despicably self-destructive insanity ever created by humans. The aliens from the next galaxy must be laughing hysterically at us.
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David G Reply:
July 1st, 2009 at 8:23 am
An interesting comment, Peter.
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David, Thank you for the pithy response. What, in your opinion, makes my comment “interesting?”
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David G Reply:
July 2nd, 2009 at 8:54 am
Peter, it’s interesting because your progression through life has more or less copied mine and your conclusions are similar to mine.
Why the bulk of humanity prefer fantasies to reality is not that hard to understand however. Life can be pretty brutal and ugly!
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Hi David. Thanks for the great article, as usual.
Btw, you forgot to mention that the Jewish settler here, like all other Jewish settlers in Palestine, is armed though the photo does not show his gun.
On the other hand, the Palestinian guy does not appear to be religious. But I agree with you that religion should not be brought into this conflict. The real issue is that Palestine, the land of the Palestinians, has been occupied by strangers who happened to be Jews and who used to carry the nationalities of countries like US, Ukraine, Poland and the Soviet Union. They left their countries of origin and came to occupy this land by force and in what has been rightly described as the most notorious theft of the 20th century. Before they came to Palestine, the Jews had destroyed their original passports and citizenship documents, an act that was punishable in many communist countries by death at that time. But to their good luck and to the bad luck of the poor Palestinians, they survived and managed to do a lot of killing and murder before they were able to establish their blood-soaked entity, Israel, on the ruins of the historical land of Palestine.
Yes, religion has nothing to do with this conflict. But we should not forget the fact that Israel was founded on religious myths and superstitions.
On their part, the Palestinians turn to their religion not to fabricate myths and lies, but as an inspiration to resist their occupiers and adhere to their land in the face the Nazi Zionist ideology.
Thanks.
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Hear this there is no known link genetically for the modern so called jewish people to the land of israel .the palestenians are the decendants of the ancient hebrews .this claim only goes as far as a belief .the same as christians here in north america claimed conquest over this continent. David u refer sometimes to primitive peoples but i say some of the more earth centered beliefs of which we all descend were in some cases superior to the beliefs of modern times .to cooperate with others takes an understanding of psycology an understanding of the ecology i contend that a person in tribal societies had a vast array of practical knowledge.To suggest primitive means u would be cowering somewhere over every clap of thunder or natural phenom is an over simplication of the past societies .and me personally am comfortable in believeing a spiritual force that gives the universe life it doesnt promise me an afterlife or anything like that it only encourages taking the high road in life think of others not just people the planet itself the water the land etc.well i am far from being a writerbut i hope i got this point across Thanks David i like how u think and always learn something here .cheers and be well all -Jeff
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