Let’s face it religion is the worst invention in human history. It’s a business, plan and simple.
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Sure… far worse than actual weapons of war… /s
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Worse, it’s a system of control and power. When having a pantheon of gods and the ruler of Rome just one of them stopped working, the Christian religion got the nod when they offered an even better deal: one god, one ruler appointed by that god, and an absolute requirement of believers that they obey the civic power (‘Render unto Caesar . . .’ ) and subsume all followers’ desires, drives, and goals towards supporting the combined church and state. The church supported the state, and the state mandated the church. The only side that lost out was everyone else, and they didn’t count.
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I’m still going with slavery and genocide as my top two but you do you.
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What gets me about the “religion is the worst thing EVAH” argument is that it is highly ahistorical, and ignores the complicated history of religion. Has it been used as a tool of oppression - absolutely! But so has plenty of non-religious ideologies. And religion has also been historically used as a tool of liberation. Even if you just take the US and Christianity, saying that the only religion that mattered was the theology of the enslavers ignores the deep and rich history of how enslaved people used theology as a tool of liberation to great effect.
Almost any belief system can be used as a form of oppression. the problem is power, and how different ideologies are employed to further oppression.
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We’re gonna need a bigger hammer.
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Both are “endorsed” in various religious text.
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Slavery and genocide exist independently of religion, just like thousands of other practices mentioned in religious texts.
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Is there already a patron saint of omertà; or is that job still open?
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Saint Drogo, patron saint of mutes, is the closest I could find
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Prior to being shot, he WAS fairly modern and progressive (at least as Popes go).
AFTER being shot he turned in to an arch-conservative. Or maybe just stopped the pretense.
Right?
A very important thing people were supposed to learn from the Nazi years. “People will do horrible things to other people even when religion isn’t in play.”
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i’m starting to see a common denominator here… wait, don’t tell me… it’s people, isn’t it?
and, honestly, regardless of whether god is real, it’s still people who invented religion. it’s really people all the way down.
i think maybe the most dangerous idea is of placing any person above the rest of humanity as some paragon of virtue. and that can be religious or not. ( see also: the “founding fathers”, the police, and good guys with guns )
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I’d argue it’s people embracing ideology that they believe gives them power over others… Power, as I said, is the key here.
Maybe, but a cult of personality doesn’t have to come out of solely being a paragon of virtue - just a paragon of some ideal of humanity (manliness, intelligence, being a perfect physical specimen - whatever ideal).
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Pope John Paul II the Great (if you are paedophile). 
I think it is Intersectional.
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