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Politics : Sharks in the Septic Tank -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Poet who wrote (28366)	9/19/2001 1:43:13 PM
From: Michael M	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 82486

Have you read any since high school?

To: Poet who wrote (28366)	9/19/2001 4:58:36 PM
From: Michael M	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 82486

I read a great deal of history. Now will you tell my why you think religion was the basis of events I listed?

To: Poet who wrote (28366)	9/19/2001 6:19:51 PM
From: cosmicforce	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 82486

In any conflict, where there is a winner and a loser, isn't God ALWAYS on one of their sides? Doesn't EVERY victor claim this? Best to leave God out of it, IMO, because I don't think this level of righteousness is necessary.

To: Poet who wrote (28366)	9/20/2001 6:38:10 AM
From: Solon	Respond to of 82486

I agree with you, Poet. However. I think ALL religions (I.E supernatural beliefs held with certainty) are equally dangerous. As in every arena, the mpost powerful have done the most damage, but Christianity is not the only religion that soaks the world in blood. "Anything that divides people breeds inhumanity. Religion serves that ugly purpose" This article gives a quick overview of some of the horrors inflicted by religion. As it is ten years old, you will note that he has left out the Serb/Croat religious conflict and several others. BTW, I agree with ST Bill that religion is the motivator for the sacrificial victims, but that the real cause of war has always been land, resources, power, control, etc. After all, converting people does not necessitate the taking of land, the enslavery of the rival work force, etc. etc. etc. But the spilled blood to satify these popes and all the others... Incredible. infidels.org A tiny sample of the article: "...-- The lovely island nation of Sri Lanka has been turned hellish by ambushes and massacres between Buddhist Sinhalese and Hindu Tamils. -- In 1983 a revered Muslim leader, Mufti Sheikh Sa'ad e-Din el'Alami of Jerusalem, issued a fatwa (an order of divine deliverance) promising an eternal place in paradise to any Muslim assassin who would kill President Hafiz al-Assad of Syria. -- Sikhs want to create a separate theocracy, Khalistan (Land of the Pure), in the Punjab region of India. Many heed the late extremist preacher Jarnail Bhindranwale, who taught his followers that they have a "religious duty to send opponents to hell." Throughout the 1980s they sporadically murdered Hindus to accomplish this goal. In 1984, after Sikh guards riddled prime minister Indira Gandhi with 50 bullets, Hindus went on a rampage that killed 5,000 Sikhs in three days. Mobs dragged Sikhs from homes, stores, buses and trains, chopping and pounding them to death. Some were burned alive; boys were castrated. -- In 1984 Shi'ite fanatics who killed and tortured Americans on a hijacked Kuwaiti airliner at Tehran Airport said they did it "for the pleasure of God." Obviously, people who think religion is a force for good are looking only at Dr. Jekyll and ignoring Mr. Hyde. They don't see the superstitious savagery pervading both history and current events. During the past three centuries, religion gradually lost its power over life in Europe and America, and church horrors ended in the West. But the poison lingered. The Nazi Holocaust was rooted in centuries of religious hate. Historian Dagobert Runes said the long era of church persecution killed three and a half million Jews -- and Hitler's Final Solution was a secular continuation. Meanwhile, faith remains potent in the Third World, where it still produces familiar results. It's fashionable among thinking people to say that religion isn't the real cause of today's strife in Lebanon, Sri Lanka, Northern Ireland, India and Iran -- that sects merely provide labels for combatants. Not so. Religion keeps the groups in hostile camps. Without it, divisions would blur with passing generations; children would adapt to new times, mingle, intermarry, forget ancient wounds. But religion keeps them alien to one another. Anything that divides people breeds inhumanity. Religion serves that ugly purpose. ..."