Excerpt #20 from my book, Religion, An Obstacle to Human Progress
“The stronger the supernatural beliefs, the worse the inhumanity.” – James A. Haught
Through the years, many bloody wars, genocide, crusades, missionary atrocities, and persecutions took place in the name of religion.
In the Americas alone, from the time of Christopher Columbus’s arrival to later European Christian invaders, aboriginal people from the Canadian Arctic to South America were systematically murdered.
The invaders used warfare, death marches, forced relocation to barren lands, destruction of their main food supply — the buffalo — and poisoning.
Oppression continued into the 20th century, through actions by governments and religious organizations which systematically destroyed Indigenous cultures and religious heritages.
The genocide against American Indigenous peoples was one of the most massive, and longest lasting genocidal campaigns in human history.
It started, like all genocides, with the oppressor treating the victims as sub-humans.
It continued until almost all Natives were wiped off the face of the earth, along with much of their language, culture, and religions.
“If we believe absurdities, we shall commit atrocities.” – Gore Vidal
Intelligent people find these occurrences and religious justifications to be repulsive.
Author Quentin Crisp noted that, “When I told people of Northern Ireland that I am an atheist, a woman in the audience stood up and said, ‘Yes, but is it the god of the Catholics or the god of the Protestants in whom you don’t believe?’”
Religions Thrive and Halt Progress
We kill each other over these belief systems.
And, despite their decline, ample religions thrive and continue to halt human progression.
“Religion is based, I think, primarily and mainly upon fear. It is partly the terror of the unknown, and partly the wish to feel that you have a kind of elder brother who will stand by you in all your troubles and disputes. Fear is the basis of the whole thing – fear of the mysterious, fear of defeat, fear of death. Fear is the parent of cruelty, and therefore it is no wonder if cruelty and religion have gone hand in hand . . . . My own view on religion is that of Lucretius. I regard it as a disease born of fear and as a source of untold misery to the human race.” – Philosopher Bertrand Russell
“Religion should have nothing to do with a fear of living or a fear of death, but should instead be a striving after rational knowledge.” – Einstein