aren't people allowed to disagree anymore? or are we all expected to just keep our mouths shut and agree with you and your beliefs 100% without voicing our own? it's ok for you to talk about how great you think religion is, but it's not ok for us to talk about how bad we think it is? as someone that was raised from birth in protestant christianity i will never agree with people who raise their kids up that way. i don't feel my parents abused me but they did allow me to be brainwashed and it led me to be stunted and overly naive to the point where i ended up being hurt more in life because of my upbringing. that is fact for me, whether you like it or not. you may think you are helping make your kids better people, but years from now you may find that your kids don't feel the same way.
I don't really understand your cryptic contributions to this thread, but I hope nobody has offended you I was inviting suggestions of what religion has given us - I doubt it would've survived for so long and been so highly regarded and responsible for such great art and literature without having some redeeming qualities ... I was playing devil's advocate and hoping for a kind of Socratic dialogue. Would be interested to hear your thoughts, Dapster
I could be completely off base, but I get the impression maybe he is equating your comments about people that raise their children to only believe in one religion and that all others are wrong being the equivalent to child abuse as stating that he himself who raises his children in religion is thusly abusing his children. (and there maybe should have been more punctuation in that) I could again be completely misguided and way off kelter as far as that is concerned, but it seems to me the only logical reason for his cryptic comments. I also don't feel that you were ever intending to make it seem like Dappy or anyone else is actually abusing their children if they take them to church or religious meetings. I do think the dialogue is good however that a lot of harm can come from sheltering your kids too much and only telling them that a certain belief is the only right belief to have and all others are wrong. As far as religious training being abuse, I wouldn't really say that myself unless you are literally beating your child with the Bible/Koran/Torah/etc. I do think however that extremism can be a form of abuse. If your beliefs are so extreme that is and will harm the development of your child. For instance, one born-again family I knew growing up would ONLY let their kids play with other Christian children. Or say people who are Christian Scientists and don't allow their kids to receive proper medical care because they think doctors are of the devil. So, maybe the question shouldn't really even be whether or not to ban religion but whether we should ban extremism in any form. And, DaPablo, if there was anything I said that offended you personally I apologize. I know I don't always agree with you, but overall you seem like a nice enough fellow and I would hate to think that I said something that you took as a personal attack. I too have been looking forward to reading your input on this topic, but well so far you haven't really provided input just typed gobbeldy-gook. So, speak up and share your opinion too!
Yep, that's pretty much what I was talking about - bringing children up with fundamentalist views, indoctrinating them into the belief that only one way of looking at the world is the right one, taking them out of school lessons and telling them that the teachers are lying ... this is imposing a set of beliefs before the child has the ability to think critically, limiting and switching off their minds before they are even fully functional. This I would term a form of mental abuse. It is possible to have a rounded religious upbringing, but I would say it's a pre-requisite that children must be given the other side of the story and given the mental tools which will enable them to think for themselves and make these decisions for themselves later on in life. Unfortunately religions know that if you get them young, and you've generally got them for life, and they exploit this fact to replicate the faith through generations...
The thing is man needs a religion, weather it is sience, or christianity or whatever, man would have no soul, nothing would be sacred and our peace and love would be un cared for, man would become evn more power hungry than he is he would become a ruthless murderer with out any kind of laws, if we tried our religion would become fashism! Also it is impossable, there are 6 billion poeple in the world, banning religion would mean killing evry over zelous religius person also pople like monks and guru's and people who belive, HIPPIES will have to got o there grave under a highly fashist organization. BANNING SOMEONE FROM BELIVING WHAT THEY BELIVE IS RIGHT IS PURE EVIL, LET PEOPLE BELIVE WHAT THEY WANT AND DON'T CAUSE A WAR! If someone is to obsessed with a religion then it can be dangerous, people shouldn't let it absolutley consume them, that causes them to do evil as well But banning religion is horrable and fashist
