No Good Religion
Many moderate atheists believe that some forms of religion are acceptable. If the beliefs are mild, and the adherents keep to themselves, how bad can it be? They often point to Buddhism as an example of a faith that’s “under control” and rational. For the most part, Buddhism doesn’t actively seek influence or converts. Buddhists aren’t out to hurt anyone. We have a picture of peaceful monasteries full of monks who have turned away from the petty affairs of the wider world.
We don’t normally picture Buddhist monks marching on parliament, trying to seize religious control over a government. Well, that’s what happened on Monday in Bangkok. “Over 100 monks and 500 laypeople marched outside the parliament…, calling on the government to make Buddhism Thailand’s official national religion.” On its own, this behavior seem truly bizarre for Buddhism. However, you need to understand the political climate in Thailand to see exactly how bad this is.
Thailand has been dealing with a new wave of Muslim insurgency in the southern provinces since 2001. While Muslims are only 5.5% of Thailand’s population, they make up over 75% of the population in four provinces. The last five years have brought terrorist attacks, assassinations and guerilla conflicts. Just to make things more interesting, this region is a global hot spot for trafficking in illegal drugs and small arms. The criminals and the insurgents are getting along just fine. I don’t think it’s an overstatement to say that Thailand is facing a genuine risk of civil war. The Buddhists are throwing wood on the fire by heightening religious tension even further.
As I have said before, IF it were possible for mild religion to exist alone forever without mutating into dangerous, extremist, oppressive forms, I would be content to let it do so. However, this story is a good illustration of how that is just not possible.
~I AM~
June 22nd, 2005 at at 2:59 am
“Many moderate atheists…” This somehow sounds ironic. What exactly is a moderate atheist? Is he/she between a weak and a strong atheist?
This situation happening in Bangkok sounds somewhat similar to what atheists are having a problem with here. Atheists (I assume) would defend themselves, but would not literally attack the Christians. But where do we draw the line?
June 22nd, 2005 at at 4:11 am
I am aware that there are many variants of Buddhism, but my experiences with Buddhists lead me to believe that in general, Buddhists are peaceful people. Buddhism is essentially non-supernatural and so they actually are atheists. That said, I believe that many Thai Buddhists are superstitious to some degree.
While I understand the point of this post- that religion is dogmatic by nature and that dogmatism leads to lack of rational thinking, but I think Buddhism is the religion that comes closest to being sensible besides the pure atheist ones like humanism.
I think the point that the Buddhists were making with a demonstration is that Islam is not welcome there because it brings violence. To my mind, the Buddhists were simply expressing a dislike for the invasion of Islam. I am with them, really. How can Islam coinhabit Thailand without damaging the Buddhist culture?
I am not approaching this from the point of view of cultural relativism. I am approaching it with the point of view that this is basically an invasion of Thailand with memes that I strongly dislike.
June 22nd, 2005 at at 4:12 am
Oh- I forgot to mention that I am definitely a strong atheist by any measure.
June 22nd, 2005 at at 10:20 am
I’d definitely agree that buddhism is the least of the world’s religious problems right now. With muslims and christians both trying to turn the world into a giant theocracy and christians wishing to bring about the end of days, buddhism’s stance does look pretty harmless. However, if islam and christianity weren’t around any longer, buddhism wouldn’t have these giants to compare it to and I would probably be active against it. Even if people hold the beliefs to themselves, it still wastes natural resources building temples and human brainpower thinking about things that have no evidence for them.
June 22nd, 2005 at at 10:59 am
Budhism, like any religion (or any group allowed total power), will abuse power when given free reign. Any group given complete control over a nation-state without being answerable to the population will naturally abuse that power.
Look at Tibet during the rule of the Dali Lama. Tibet was a theocratic state in which the budhist monk were the ruling class and the only other class being peasants. The peasant were there only to serve the monks. During this time, the ruling monks employed torture, repressed free expression, and controlled every facet of daily life.
I’m not defending China being in Tibet, but the budhist monks who ran Tibet were simply concerned with retaining their previliged place in society. The supernatural or spiritual should never be allowed a strong voice in running a nation. Reason and proof should be employed by those running a nation and the people of that state should always be given the opportunity to remove their leaders when it is necessary.
As Christopher Hitchens said, “The Dali Lama says he’s a god and a hereditary god at that. A double affront to reason.”
Check out some of Christopher Hitchens writings for more info, and Penn & Teller’s ‘Bullshit’ (program on showtime) recently did an episode that dealt with this issue (and others).
June 22nd, 2005 at at 11:20 am
“…but my experiences with Buddhists lead me to believe that in general, Buddhists are peaceful people.”
Well, my experiences with people lead me to believe that in general, people are peaceful. But religion is pretty high on the list of things that cause them to act in a non peaceful manner.
Actually, its not even that. I can live with the odd fanatic (religious or otherwise) who goes crazy and starts killing people. I obviously don’t like it, but there will always be mentally unbalanced individuals, and they’ll find an excuse to act out. The much bigger problem is when large swaths of the population are so used to blindly accepting dogma that they have a hard time differentiating between the preacher who’s telling them lies (intentionally or not) to encourage them to live a “good” life, and the zealot who is telling them lies to further his own goals, through whatever means necessary.
June 22nd, 2005 at at 11:29 am
“Well, that’s what happened on Monday in Bangkok.”
Classic! And I thought Buddhists werent supposed to have desires…
June 22nd, 2005 at at 3:15 pm
http://religioscope.info/article_261.shtml
If find that all religions potentially lead to violence, since they are based on absolutist faiths. Their truth claims cannot be verified and this prevents progress through the generations.
June 22nd, 2005 at at 3:43 pm
My deal with the “if it doesn’t affect anyone, it’s okay” defense of religion is that no matter how individual one’s religion is, one would still be contributing to the force of the religion as a whole. The actual extremists can still “give credit” to one when they commit crimes on behalf of the religion; that is, they can claim that they were killing people to protect/avenge all of Islam, all of Christianity, or all of Judaism (etc). And if nobody practices those religions, then the potential wrongdoers won’t have anyone to fight for!
June 22nd, 2005 at at 4:23 pm
I am an atheist yet i disagree that all religons are bad and cause violence.
so there are some groups who justify violence with religon. If atheists were a significant percent of the population there would be some who would justify violence with atheism like Nietzche did. There will be a few extremists in any groups regardless of their beliefs or lack of them.
June 22nd, 2005 at at 5:28 pm
Voice of Reason, I used to agree that it wasn’t necessarily that the religion was corrupt, it was just the bad individual. And I still think there are those bad individuals that will ruin it for the rest;hence, even in a society of 100 % atheists (what a utopia that would be), there would still be a few dickheads walking around. But now I think that overall any religion is bad for the individual. I can’t stop thinking of the multitude of people who are not thinking clearly because of the dogmatic beliefs of their religion. Pick a religion, any religion. They can all be abused. While I’m fond of saying good people would be good without religion, it works the other way too. Your basic dickhead is still a dickhead with religion. He/she just has more ammunition.
June 22nd, 2005 at at 5:37 pm
Voice of Reason,
I disagree with you. I think that all religions are bad. Religions can be bad even though some may be against violence; there are many ways to be bad for humanity without being violent.
So far I think your statement is too vague. Can you please provide a specific example of a religion that is NOT bad for humanity?
Buddhism is bad because it promotes self-immolation and the denial of desires, and of course we all know that desire is the driving force behind all human progress. Unitarians are bad because they say all religions are valid. Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) are bad for obvious reasons.
In my blog, Kill The Afterlife, I argue that any religion which has afterlife/beforelife/reincarnation belief is immoral and inhumane.
I imagine, Voice of Reason, that if you were to provide an example of a religion that isnt bad for humanity, the closest thing you could get to (and it still wouldnt quite pass the test) would be, ironically, Satanism, as described in The Satanic Bible.
So care to give an example?
June 22nd, 2005 at at 5:38 pm
I would like to add I believe it is easier to corrupt a good person than to educate a fool.
June 22nd, 2005 at at 5:41 pm
Violence isnt bad a priori. For example, defensive violence is not bad. Religions arent bad based exclusively on their violence content. Rather, they are bad based on their assigning primacy of consciousness (usually a God or Gods) over reality and their assigning of primacy of a realm other than this one (afterlife) and their answering of mysteries with other mysteries and their assigning of primacy of immaterialism over materialism.
June 22nd, 2005 at at 5:43 pm
Voice of Reason,
I agree with you. There will always be a certain proportion of any population that does bad things, including violence, no matter what the prevailing, or their personal belief system is. I always laugh when the evangelical theists come to my door telling me what a utopia it will be when everyone would just accept the good news or whatever they’re peddling. Those people have some serious delusions about human nature. But I digress.
I’m not convinced that religion is the problem for those lone fanatics. They sometimes use it as an excuse, but if it wasn’t handy, they’d probably just find another excuse.
I think the bigger problem is what I mentioned above, when a large number of otherwise wonderful people lend their implicit or explicit support to things done in the name of religion. I’m reminded of a Monty Python line,
“Supreme executive power is derived by a mandate from the masses, not from some farsical aquatic ceremony!”
Without the mandate from the masses supplied by all the good people who believe in a religion, the leaders of the religion have no power to cause harm. Where harm can be anything from starting holy wars to trying to keep Kansas schoolchildren from learning science.
The difference between a crazy cult and a respected religion is the number of people who believe.
This is why religious belief by anybody, even if they’re a model citizen, is dangerous.
June 22nd, 2005 at at 6:09 pm
I find it very amusing, how almost all the atheists I know are Monty Python fans.
[Re-enacts “Constitutional Peasant” scene from the Holy Grail]
June 22nd, 2005 at at 6:28 pm
Isn’t it awfully nice to have a penis?
Isn’t it frightfully good to have a dong?
It’s swell to have a stiffy,
it’s divine to have a dick
From the tiniest little tagger,
to the world’s biggest prrrick!
So three cheers for your willy!
Hoorrray for your one-eyed trouser snake!
Your piece of pork,
your wife’s best friend,
your percy or your cock.
You can wrap it up in ribbens,
you can slip it in your sock.
But don’t take it out in public or they will stick you in the dock.
and you won’t come back!
Oh, thankyou very much…
June 22nd, 2005 at at 6:35 pm
I particularly like Sit On My Face, but we’re getting off topic….as great as the new topic may be.
June 22nd, 2005 at at 7:02 pm
You know Seth, there may be something to that. Maybe its the irreverant humor that appeals to the atheist in the same was as bucking the religious majority does.
Or maybe we’re just smarter than everyone else :).
Here’s a thread from a political blog with tons of Monty Python quotes (so we don’t have to clutter up this one):
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_06/006408.php
June 22nd, 2005 at at 8:01 pm
Maybe more atheists like such humor because they aren’t as offended by it as theists…Monty Python does have a lot of religion-oriented jokes. Or maybe it’s because MP is a different kind of humor, and atheists are more appreciative of things that are off the mark…from what I know, that is.
June 22nd, 2005 at at 11:57 pm
I’m not sure if some forms of religions are acceptable. If people could keep their religion to themselves and not “force” it on others, then sure. But people aren’t like that.
And really, when you think about it, why should a lie be acceptable?? There is no god or gods. So why would any form of religion ever be acceptable??
And yes, Monty Python fan here as well.
June 23rd, 2005 at at 12:49 am
Well, you know they say every sperm is sacred… especially the atheist ones.
June 23rd, 2005 at at 10:59 am
I started a Monty Python thread over on AtheismOnline.com.
August 30th, 2005 at at 4:00 pm
The difference between a crazy cult and a respected religion is the number of people who believe.
THAT is the bottom line on any discussion of the societal value of religion.
January 30th, 2007 at at 10:07 am
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October 30th, 2007 at at 4:11 am
the kentucky derby odds…
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