Islamic antics going too far: a look into our reaction to their reaction

[BikerDude]

There are plenty of choices for muslims other than public declarations of atheism. Good choices require good judgement.

And if they choose Islam as they have been taught since birth?
does that mean they are "bad" or "evil"?

[Boston Rockbury]

They are responsible for their actions. But in ultimate moral terms I agree with Marianne Williamson that "there are no sins only mistakes".

[Hominid]

There are plenty of choices for muslims other than public declarations of atheism. Good choices require good judgement.

She's an activist. Such people willingly put themselves in harm's way so others can follow.  She's a hero in my eyes...

[Hominid]

They are responsible for their actions. But in ultimate moral terms I agree with Marianne Williamson that "there are no sins only mistakes".

Semantics.

Blowing up innocent people is wrong.  It's not a "mistake", sorry.  Any Ideology that says it's OK is sick.

[Boston Rockbury]

But if everybody is at the mercy of their upbringing - who is responsible?

[BikerDude]

But if everybody is at the mercy of their upbringing - who is responsible?

Everyone.
But the amount that we are successful at it is a matter of our upbringing.

I don't really even see this as any psycological or philosophical thing.
It's numbers.
It wasn't like there was something in the water that made people bigoted assholes in the south. it was culture and christianity. The numbers bear out the effects.
It's not like some virus swept the mid east and made them suicide bombers.
It is simply a fact that for every person the force that our upbringing has, (especially religious upbringing) is huge and looking at how uncommon it is for people to buck the trend nearly insurmountable.
It's not that there are just areas of genetically evil people in certain places. It's culture and religion.

In the end we are all responsible for our actions but we all are informed by our culture and upbringing in how we choose those actions and judge the actions of ourselves and others.

So as I have said

All things being equal good people do good things bad people do bad things but it takes religion to make good people do bad things.

I'd include culture in there also.

[BikerDude]

They are responsible for their actions. But in ultimate moral terms I agree with Marianne Williamson that "there are no sins only mistakes".

Semantics.

Blowing up innocent people is wrong.  It's not a "mistake", sorry.  Any Ideology that says it's OK is sick.

Exactly it's the ideology.
And the people who are following the ideology don't believe it's evil because that is what the religion says.

[Boston Rockbury]

In the case of Nazi Germany did it take religion to make good people do bad things?

[BikerDude]

In the case of Nazi Germany did it take religion to make good people do bad things?

It's a generality.
It's a quote. But it has merit.
Religion is not the only thing.
Culture as I've said and a lot of other things can.
Hell poverty can. The difference is that desperation and poverty make people do things that they KNOW are wrong.
Religion makes people do bad things that they believe are good.

[BikerDude]

In the case of Nazi Germany did it take religion to make good people do bad things?

Oh and please lets not go down the road about Hitler being an atheist.
He wasn't by his account and even if he was the more pertinent issue was that he was a lunatic. The 2 are unrelated.

[Boston Rockbury]

So the quote should be "it takes religion, nazis, stalin, culture, poverty or a lot of other things to make good people do bad things".

Loosing a bit of it's punch now.

[BikerDude]

So the quote should be "it takes religion, nazis, stalin, culture, poverty or a lot of other things to make good people do bad things".

Loosing a bit of it's punch now.

I still think it has lots of punch.
there is clearly abundant evidence of the religious argument.
Suicide bombing, abortion doctor murder, slavery etc etc on through the ages.
And it is clearly religion.
It's not the only thing that can make people do evil but it's the heavy weight champion.

[Boston Rockbury]

It takes science to make good farmers do bad factory farming.

What are we going to do - get rid of science?

[BikerDude]

It takes science to make good farmers do bad factory farming.

What are we going to do - get rid of science?

It takes genetically altered crops not science.
Science does a lot of good things.
Religion does not.

[Boston Rockbury]

Religion does many things.

For example the form of therapy widely used for depression called 'mindfulness' comes directly from Buddhism.
Good article about it in this months 'Kindred Spirit' magazine, featuring Ruby Wax (interviewed by Boston Rockbury).