"Alex Nixon" <unitcancellation at hotmail.com> writes: > First, I believe the part of the Bible you're thinking of is the Old > Testament, which largely becomes useless in Christian thinking after > the arrival of the New Testament. I'm also not convinced that ALL > religions calls for the harm of others. So your point, IMHO, is > ignorant, prejudiced, and slightly offensive. Try telling a "hellfire and brimstone" preacher that the OT is largely useless. Or the pope. Or much of anybody in between. Some of them may be too polite to laugh, possibly. > It's a little like blaming the violence on TV for the increase in > violence among children. The argument doesn't take. Or, as Joss > Whedon once wrote, "That's crazy troll logic." Religion is much deeper, in most societies, than TV is. Furthermore, religion is identified, both by itself and by civil society, as claiming to teach people how to behave properly on earth. Whereas TV drama is identified as fiction. > Furthermore, I'd argue that religion, like art, philosophy, sports and > science, tends to respond to current human thought. Thus, in > religion's case, it can become more or less violent according to the > beliefs of the times. Thus demonstrating how little of it is *really* about revealed truth. > Post Script: Christ David, you really despise religion in all of its > forms. I have one question: Where you beaten up as a child by a group > consisting of Christians, Buddhists, and Greco-Roman Pagans? 'Cause > this really is a whole lot of hate over something that's easy to > ignore. Easy to ignore? You must not live in the US. When I was in school, the day began with the pledge of allegiance, including the phrase "under god". On wednesdays, most of the students were released from school for a few hours for religious instruction. Liquor stores and, when I was younger, most other stores, were closed on Sunday. Birth control information and technology was available only with a doctor's prescription, at medically-inflated prices. Congress has a chaplain, and opens each session with a prayer. The procedure for "swearing in a witness" in court involves use of the bible. Same for all high government officials. Some people get very upset if you "take the lord's name in vain". Churches ring bells loudly on Sunday morning, when decent people are trying to sleep. The laws on marriage put the power of the state behind the restrictions of the christian church. Gambling and drinking are heavily regulated. Anything having to do with sex is difficult and legally dangerous. And in more backwards parts of the country, and only a *few* years before I can remember, it was much worse. I've had religion thrown in my face multiple times *every single day* for 48 years by now. My tolerance for it has been decreasing fairly consistently. -- David Dyer-Bennet, dd-b at dd-b.net / http://www.dd-b.net/dd-b/ John Dyer-Bennet 1915-2002 Memorial Site http://john.dyer-bennet.net Dragaera mailing lists, see http://dragaera.info