Why the hell do we need relgion ?.

[Shusha]

“When you call yourself an Indian or a Muslim or a Christian or a European, or anything else, you are being violent. Do you see why it is violent? Because you are separating yourself from the rest of mankind. When you separate yourself by belief, by nationality, by tradition, it breeds violence. So a man who is seeking to understand violence does not belong to any country, to any religion, to any political party or partial system; he is concerned with the total understanding of mankind.”
― Jiddu Krishnamurti

What, so any point of individuation is not only negative, but constitutes violence against others? This makes no sense. There are points of connection and points of divergence in all people. I like pizza. I love dogs. I practice martial arts. I love to cook. I'm vegetarian. I hate whipped cream. I love to drive a manual transmission. I love Outlander and The Walking Dead. I hate bananas. I read at least one book a week. I own 35 pairs of shoes. My favourite movie is the Princess Bride. I love playing MTG and Munchkin. I'm Jewish. I'm Canadian.

These things will create points of resonance or dissonance with everyone who reads this. But points of divergence are not the cause of violence. "Othernness" is not the cause of violence.

Violence is the rejection and the repression of someone else's "otherness". If we just accepted each other's "otherness", there would be no need for violence.

 

[psychoslice]

What, so any point of individuation is not only negative, but constitutes violence against others? This makes no sense. There are points of connection and points of divergence in all people. I like pizza. I love dogs. I practice martial arts. I love to cook. I'm vegetarian. I hate whipped cream. I love to drive a manual transmission. I love Outlander and The Walking Dead. I hate bananas. I read at least one book a week. I own 35 pairs of shoes. My favourite movie is the Princess Bride. I love playing MTG and Munchkin. I'm Jewish. I'm Canadian.

These things will create points of resonance or dissonance with everyone who reads this. But points of divergence are not the cause of violence. "Othernness" is not the cause of violence.

Violence is the rejection and the repression of someone else's "otherness". If we just accepted each other's "otherness", there would be no need for violence.

That's fine if you want to label yourself as whatever, but it becomes a problem when we believe our labels are better than yours or mine, and this also goes with whatever culture we are in, its no more than a label, nothing to get excited about, its just our beliefs, and nothing else.

 

[Shusha]

... but it becomes a problem when we believe our labels are better than yours or mine....

Sure. And that is exactly what is problematic with the premise given in the OP.

 

[psychoslice]

Sure. And that is exactly what is problematic with the premise given in the OP.

Exactly.

 

[Shusha]

Allow me to elaborate...

The OP makes a number of value judgments about people who believe in some sort of religious faith -- associating them with stupidity, lack of morality, egoism, addictions and nightmares.

So I agree with you that believing yourself better than others is problematic. But you are creating a false correlation between having religious faith and thinking oneself better than others. You are also failing to distinguish between different faiths and different faith beliefs. And you have neglected to point out that those with no religious faith can also believe themselves better than others.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

My favourite movie is the Princess Bride.

That's because it is the best movie ever. What martial arts?

 

[psychoslice]

Allow me to elaborate...

The OP makes a number of value judgments about people who believe in some sort of religious faith -- associating them with stupidity, lack of morality, egoism, addictions and nightmares.

So I agree with you that believing yourself better than others is problematic. But you are creating a false correlation between having religious faith and thinking oneself better than others. You are also failing to distinguish between different faiths and different faith beliefs. And you have neglected to point out that those with no religious faith can also believe themselves better than others.

Take what you want form what I have said, interpret your way, that's Ok, that's all you can do.

 

[Shusha]

That's because it is the best movie ever. What martial arts?

Taekwon-Do ITF.