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From: rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen)
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: The Power of (Organized) Religion
Message-ID: <1981@pyuxd.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 29-Oct-85 23:21:37 EST
Article-I.D.: pyuxd.1981
Posted: Tue Oct 29 23:21:37 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 3-Nov-85 10:02:31 EST
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Organization: Whatever we're calling ourselves this week
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>>> It is much more accurate to say that these things are being done IN THE
>>> NAME OF RELIGION.  There simply is no justification for the statement that 
>>> religion invariably gives rise to such things.  [WINGATE]

>> Gee, I guess it's OK when religionists judge people in general as all
>> horribly evil (often based solely on their own low self-opinion) and
>> justify it based on history, yet doing the same sort of historical
>> justification to show the horrors of religion is somehow "wrong". [WINGATE]

> Rich's first statement is merely a speculation, and in any case one could
> better argue that it is those who see themselves as totally morally
> justified who are the deluded ones, since it is difficult to justify
> blindness, however mitigated, over sight, however poor.

Have you recanted Christianity then?

> And in fact the
> historical justification shows merely that these sins are associated with
> religion, which any honest person (myself included) will admit.

Odd that you should accuse YOURSELF of HAVING BEEN DIShonest here, since you
had denied this very thing in the past.

> But what does this prove?  Hitler took an atheistic (sort of) philosopher and
> used the religious power invoked by that person to his own perverted ends.

And more than once (more than TEN times) I have heard this uttered as
justification for berating Nietzsche (AND Darwin!).  Odd...

> Various Christian communities have plucked a verse out of Leviticus (I
> think) and used it to justify their own desire to murder.

Did THEY (like Hitler) take the writings of philosophers and scientists,
mixing them in with his own PRESUMPTIONS, to "get" to a desired conclusion?
Or did they acquire the presumption RIGHT FROM THAT TEXT ITSELF?  Hitler's
evil was not in whom he chose to read, it was in his unfounded hateful
presumptions and the way he twisted their words to "prove" them (only if
you made HIS assumptions, and of course he used assumptions shared by
many of the people, and of course was a master of persuasion and rhetoric).
The evil of religion is right there in that passage (and the rest of the
superiority tenets) of various religions.

> Stalin used a mere opinion of Karl Marx's (and that opinion, I might add,
> speaks volumes about the perceived power of religion) and used it to justify
> his bloody supression of Jew and Christian alike.

And of course Communism is essentially no different from religion, except
in that it doesn't have a supernatural god to worship.  But in its
presumptiveness, it is no better (no different) than religion.  Stalin was
one of YOU, Chuck.  Religionists.

> All these things are perversions, deliberate abuse of the power of religion;
> but all that they tell us is that religion is indeed powerful.

And they also tell us something of the hate engendered by some of these
religious notions.

>>While the sort of religion you have represented here, with its acceptance
>>of psychological abuse of children for the purpose of converting them, with
>>its rigid intolerance of groups it simply doesn't like, represents "good"
>>religion?

> Which Christianity is this?

The one you (the non-Falwellite) have presented here in the past.

> And on what grounds can Rich justify indoctrinating young children against
> religion?

Ah, this is cute.  Does anyone recall my supporting the notion of
"indoctrinating children against religion"?  Hardly, if anything, what I
have supported is encouraging children to think for themselves, to notice
when erroneous assumptions are being made, to analyze obejctively when
reasoning.  Charles has just referred to this as "indoctrinating children
against religion".  And, effectively, teaching children to think rationally
might just do that.  Not by intent, but as a consequence.  Note that this
is what religionists are complaining about when they demand the removal
of the dreaded "humanism" from the schools.  They are scared shitless that
teaching children to think will (it has already) lead to children questioning,
rejecting religious assumption.  Sorry, Charlie, if that's how it works out.

> Rich's religion holds no less power than any other, after all.

Which religion is that?  If there's any "religion" at all, it is that
associated with objective reasoning and rational thinking, and, yes, that
does indeed have more "power" than any other, power in the sense of force
of reasoning.  Which is why it should be taught in schools more than it is.

>>> Rich has conveniently ignored the Marxists and a host of other morally and
>>> intellectually dubious movements to arrive at his conclusions.  He seems
>>> conveniently to have forgotten the wanton destruction wrought by Pol Pot
>>> and his kind in Cambodia and Laos.  The terror that is (depressingly) quite
>>> common in Africa has little to do with religion.

>> Except in that they fit into the very category I already described, that of
>> those who have seen how religion has indoctrinated and controlled, and who
>> follow the lead of religion in trying to do the same thing.  Why would you
>> call that "ignoring" them?

> Pol Pot certainly wasn't anything but an atheist, so Rich can hardly hang
> "Religion" around his neck-- unless of course he intends to offer his own
> neck as a hanging peg too.

Charles ignored what I had said so completely in his quest for my neck.
I said that modern Communism (as with other totalitarian) make use of the
same premises that permeate certain religions---superiority, "god" is
on our side, etc., and it uses the indoctrinative methods of religion to
condition their subjects.

> And Rich's claims about Africa simply aren't
> true; tribal forces, Marxist ideology, and racism are far more important
> forces than religion.  In South Africa, in fact, we have large organized
> churches clearly squared off on both sides of the issue (or have people
> forgotten that Tutu is the Anglican bishop of Johannesburg?).

So?  What's your point?  (And I don't recall mentioning Africa.)
-- 
"Meanwhile, I was still thinking..."
				Rich Rosen  ihnp4!pyuxd!rlr