the comment I received in relation to my original post, indicates that I am condemning the people of Israel for the behaviour of their government. This was not my intent.
At birth all humans are innocent of any bias and have no religious inclination. fortunately, religious belief is not hereditary but has to be taught. It is also fortunate that, although the majority of people belong to a religion they are not fanatical in their beliefs, this means that the majority of people don’t want to hurt others and certainly don’t want to kill them.
If you took an Israeli baby away from its parents at birth and placed it in the care of a Palestinian famil, it would grow up as a Palestinian and neither a rabbi or a iman would be able to detect that a swap had been made The Rabbi would probably willingly persecute the swapped infant whilst the Iman would welcome it with open arms.
I have found that most of the people that i have met in my travels are, as individuals willing to accept you as they perceive you and your religion has very little to do with their judgement. It is only when there are many of a group which contains a rabble rouser that they will do things as part of the group. In most cases when the group has broken up the ordinary people often feel great guilt for what they have done in a moment of haste.
Further more, it is necessary to train men and, now days, women to kill, it, to most, isn’t a natural instinct. Proof of this is that so many servicemen after wars or conflicts are over, need councelling and suffer mental illnesses. I would suggest that it would be easier for an ex-serviceman that has lost a limb to be rehabilitated than it would be for, say, the poor buggers that recently shot the children in Afghanistan, killing is soul destroying.
I think that the majority of people like to believe in a god just so that they can look forward to finally having justice. It’s like the people that were destoyed fanancially by Allan Bond looking forward to eventually being in a position where they can look down from their place in heaven and for eternity watch Allan stoking the fires of hell, but in our hearts we all know that he will die enjoying the riches that he has amassed by conning the people.
The point of this rant is that it is the fanatics in positions of power that make life so miserable for so many, and we should all think about things and make up our own minds as to what is right and should always ask ourselves the question, ” Would I like to be treated thus? ”
We should avoid this crap about being the super race or gods chosen etc, as I pointed out earlier, these religious leader and therefore the gods they represent, couldn’t even pickto whom you were born so if they judge wrongly they may be persecuting the super race and they wouldn’t know it.
I often despair of humans ever realizing that it is science that will save us and improve our lives, not gods, fairies, gnomes, trolls, etc, etc. It is hard to understand how so many can accept a belief in these fairy tales when there isn’t a skerrick of evidence that gods etc exist nor that they ever have existed.
Ah grandad, a well written piece, and seemingly a much less exterme standpoint (even though I realise you’re just correcting what you were trying to get across).
The problem I see is that you’re blaming everything on religion. The slavery thing back in the 1700′s had little to do with religion and a lot to do with skin colour. Soccer riots and beatings have little to do with race, religion, or anything important, and everything to do with which team you support. Us humans are geared to an “us vs them” attitude. It’s an evolutionary thing – our troupe to survive by protecting our own over them.
So religion is just another troupe that people associate with. The same pack mentality happens in soccer riots, and in the heat of the moment, someone gets bashed to death for supporting liverpool….
The only thing I can see is that somehow the promise of life after death, or eternal saviour up in heaven somehow aleviates guilt for taking life, thus making it more likely to occur.