Mastodawn

Dav09 Sep 19, 2025

Difference.

mfed1122 Sep 19, 2025

I’ve been thinking about this and this is really the fundamental problem about religion. People can say oh religion atheism it’s both kind of the same, you know ultimately people have things that they want and things that they think are right or wrong, etc etc.

The difference is religion has an intrinsically built-in mandate that you can’t just think that this is right or wrong for you, but right or wrong for everyone. This intrinsically leads to the conclusion that others must be forced to comply with your standards, even if it doesn’t affect you. Religion can never become pacified or progressive enough for this not to be a problem, as it comes from the fact that religion posits an absolute external morality. If you have a religious group and an atheist group, the atheist group could conceivably leave the religious group in peace to do what they want to do forever (although let’s be honest that isn’t very likely either because people are people). But the only way that a religious group could leave some other group whether atheist or not in peace to do what they want forever, would only be if they never realized the mandate that is logically implied by their belief system. Essentially, the most harmless religious group is one that hasn’t thought too hard about it yet. A religious group, by it’s very nature, cannot be content with leaving others alone to live differently from them.

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Makeshift

This sounds like an explanation on why I can’t fully hate on people trying to convert others to their religion.

Because if they truly believe their religion, then they are honestly trying to “save” other peoples’ souls with conversion. They really believe they’re doing a good thing.

I can laugh because it’s a silly notion and the odds of them convincing me of a real life deity is slim. But to them it’s real and altruistic to spend time trying to “save” others.

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mfed1122 Sep 19, 2025

I agree it does make them more sympathetic than just a garden-variety asshole who like, knows stealing your wallet isn’t good, but does it anyways. But honestly…a couple snacks for thought here. Even someone who’s stealing your wallet probably has a rationalization that allows him to think that it’s not that bad. Like for instance you have more money than them. They really need money, etc. in a similar vein… How many people are there on Earth that do bad things and actually think that they’re doing a bad thing? I would guess that 90% of “bad” acts are perpetrated by someone who thinks that they’re doing a good act. If we give people a pass for thinking they’re doing the right thing, then almost everybody gets a pass. There are even people who think there’s nothing wrong with raping someone, and even if they truly believe they’re not doing anything wrong - well, that actually makes them even more repulsive.

I’m reminded of this great quote from Steven Weinberg: “With or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil - that takes religion.”

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Tlaloc_Temporal Sep 20, 2025

I don’t think 90% of people think they’re doing good when doing bad things. I think there’s a lot of lesser evil stuff happening, probably the majority of petty crime. There’s also people who don’t think that deeply about what they’re doing, and probably many who refuse to think about it.

I do think the vast majority of people have the capacity to tell between right and wrong, but those values can be nuanced and twisted, and not examining the reasons for your values is the heart of ignorance.

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TeamAssimilation Sep 19, 2025

I don’t sympathize with them, not because of their sincerity, but for their unwillingness to question themselves about how they came to embrace that their instructions are The Truth.

Most won’t have a better reason than “the adults told me when I was a child”, and IMO that isn’t enough reason to impose your beliefs on others when you’ve become a adult yourself.