I thought this was worthy of a separate thread:

[R1Geezer]

Keyplus Said below:
"Now let me ask you a question, "Would you like all the religious people to give up religion completely and start thinking as you do, Simple Yes or No would do. "

"YES" is my inequivocal answer, if we ould expunge all the different brands of fairy tale I'm certain the world would be a better, more peaceful place. Would it? your thoughts please..

[Bbbananas]

See you Jimmy............!

[youngmafbog]

I have no poblem with anyone who is unable to think things through for themselves having religion. the very thought of what happens after death is a big problem for some.

BUT, religion must be kept out of politics and law. All religions. and no one should be able to use a Religion to bend rules either.

[LeMarchand]

1) "be good to on another?? Unless they happen to disagree with my views.....right oh! "

2) "yes relgious people are very happy because they have found a way that they are allowed to do bad things in the name of god/allah/buddh/pinochio etc etc and therefore are doing the work of said diety and as such are in fact good. "

3) it takes religion to make good people do bad things

1) No, only the fanatics are like that - most religious people are quite laissez faire, but don't get the publicity. Hey, even the Jehovahs who occasionally come around in the vain hope of converting me (maybe they think they have a chance because I don't slam the door in their faces!) leave after a spot of theological discussion without promising be eternal damnation.

2) So the little old dears on "Songs of Praise" are happy because they've been committing all sorts of evil off camera?

3) Rwanda: non-religious genocide. How do you explain "normal" people chopping up their neighbours with machetes?

[Kromovaracun]

Well, my response to Keyplus' original question would be that if everyone thought like Geezer the world wouldn't last 2 weeks.

Violence - and any other kind of evil (if evil it is) - in humans is far too complicated to be boiled down simply to religion. Plus, if you get rid of religion then people invariably find something else. I think there's a lot of truth to the observation that in the parts of the world where religion has declined, a lot of people have reverted to a similarly dogmatic and ignorant blind reverence of the 'scientific method'.

Religions are, however, essentially a bit like ideologies. I agree with a lot of the comments on separation of church/state - I find faith schools a bit distasteful in the same way I'd find, say, Communist schools, or Neoliberal schools distasteful.

[rov1200]

As religion or RI is taught in schools at a very early age it would be hard to escape it.

I wonder if the world would have been a happier place before the building of churches and mosques and synogogues. The solution is to pull them all down. Also make the teaching of religion a criminal offence. Russia went some way towards this with the banning of Bibles and they had to be smuggled in.

[Ankou]

"I wonder if the world would have been a happier place before the building of churches and mosques and synogogues"

if that is as far back as your grasp of world history knowledge strectes, then what hope for our children. honestly.

[naomi24]

When the question of all the appalling restrictions and rituals that religion demands of its followers is raised, eg the banning of condoms particularly in Aids-torn Africa, horrendous genital mutilation of females, the attitude towards homosexuality, and the subjugation of women, the religious always say 'It isn't MY religion that does that', but the fact is someone's religion does it. As for peace, imagine if there had been no 'chosen people' and no 'promised land'. It would have saved the world a lot of problems. God did us no favours there - and apparently he knew what would happen. Shame on him! Religion is a blight on humanity.

[Ankou]

It would have saved the world a lot of problems

you have no evidence to support that statement just a ..... belief.

[naomi24]

It's rather silly to expect factual evidence of the outcome of a hypothetical situation, isn't it. Quite simply, if there is nothing to fight over, there is no fight.

[Ankou]

so you are assuming that through the course of the history to which you refer, religion was the only cause of fighting ? that seems a bit of a silly belief.

[naomi24]

Nope, not at all.

[Ankou]

hmm, and you always claim (often) to be so learned.

[naomi24]

You're arguing for argument's sake again and it's boring. Just stick to the question.

[jno]

most wars are over land and power. Even the crusades, to a considerable extent, were to do with the weakening of Byzantine authority in the Middle East. England would have fought off the Spanish Armada just as vigorously if Spain had been Protestant/Muslim/animist. Even the various Irish troubles, often seen as religion-based, were more to do with social discrimination and nationalism. Soldiers may hope their god will protect them, but they're seldom actually fighting on his behalf.

[tigerlily11]

No. People are people. Not all wars are religion motivated. WWII certainly wasn't.
People will argue and fight over anything. Removing religion just takes away one excuse.
But I suspect the suicide rate would rise.

[keyplus90]

Yes Ankou- She is the most learned....................At least according to her. But as usual there is an old saying where I am from.

"the one who thinks that he/she knows about everything, in fact knows about nothing"

Geezer- Your unequivocal Yes in response to my question (in your words) shows that you are no different. You believe that everyone should think as you do. In other words if everyone else would start expecting people to think as they do then just imagine how many different standards of thinking would be there. How many individuals are there in this world? In that regard I would rather stick to religion at least there would still be more than few people with similar belief and thinking.

[tamborine]

some people like to follow - like sheep, baa baa

[naomi24]

Keyplus, Once again I'll overlook your rudeness.

You to Geezer: //You believe that everyone should think as you do. //

And you don't? After reading your posts for the past two years, that's really funny.

Incidentally, you have quite a selection of old sayings where you come from, all of which appear to apply to you. Think about it.

Night all.