Every day, another religious mouth breather with a keyboard attempts to find a way to argue the atheistic worldview is antithetical to the welfare of society. It’s so painful to read these articles specifically because at no time do any of these morons ever come close to making a valid point. The latest frustration to hit my peepers is an article entitled “Atheists Get Religion All Wrong“. This unidentified author tries to argue that as non-believers, we don’t really “get” the purpose of religion:
Let’s say those religions do disappear, even this very afternoon…Will all the problems of the world cease – would wars, terrorism, sexual molestation of children, discrimination, jealously, theft, just stop…Would peace and goodwill descend on Earth?
Of course not.
Well, we already know for a fact countless conflicts around the globe, the systematic cover-up of sex abuse by various faiths, the spread of AIDS in Africa and the murder of children due to dangerous superstitions would be severely reduced. While the whole world wouldn’t suddenly be holding hands and singing songs together, why does the end outcome have to be perfect anyway? No atheist has ever argued the world without religion would achieve perfect amenity; it would just get a hell of a lot better, that’s all.
If one wants to make the intellectual effort to understand religions one should look at the whole and not just the part. No one has to, of course, it’s all entertainment anyway. But still, maybe there is a reason why religions endure.
Tuberculosis may “endure”, but it isn’t because of some benign reason. Superstition is the same; our brains may be wired to jump to irrational conclusions when faced with few facts about the world (which is why filling it with facts is so corrosive to faith), but this doesn’t suddenly mean this is a desirable mental state. It was just a very practical one at the time. As for “understanding religion” more, do you get the immediate impression the author of this article only really understands faith from a Christian perspective? It certainly smacks of it when making broad statements that all religions are concerned about sins, or “fallen” people. Anyone who believes these are the primary concerns of most world religions throughout history has obviously never truly studied them.
The news remains: people do bad things and would be better off if they did the right things. The funny thing about this religious idea is that it is based on a fact. It is scientifically without exception verifiable that every single naughty, wrong, bad, evil is done by people. This fact preceded and gave rise to the religions.
How is “you’re better off doing something good rather than bad” a religious idea? Only a person indoctrinated with the nonsense of faith could even begin to believe that’s true. Animals in nature obey their own form of the “Golden Rule” and yet require no sermons nor holy books to accomplish this. The author is right: the golden rule is a fact, but it’s better understood as a mathematical principle than the revealed word of God.
If atheists want to dismantle religions they need to dismantle this verifiable fact and the belief that things could be better.
It’s ironic a person who has a literal belief a God will someday come and wipe out the whole of humanity in a holy war could even accuse others of failing to believe in a better tomorrow. Only a mind so steeped in religious nonsense could even stand that degree of cognitive dissonance. The largest religious denomination in North America is a death-cult obsessed with the end of days, a product of the embarrassing death of their messiah. This version of a “better tomorrow” involves rivers of blood, plagues, disasters and death. How is any of this dangerous nonsense needed to believe in a future more just, prosperous and peaceful?