Religion
Related: About this forumStudy: religious oppression rises despite Arab Spring
Lauren Markoe | Jun 20, 2013
WASHINGTON (RNS) People who hoped the Arab Spring would lead to greater religious freedom across the Middle East have been sorely disappointed, and a new Pew study confirms that the region has grown even more repressive for various religious groups.
“In 2011, when most of the political uprisings known as the Arab Spring occurred, the Middle East and North Africa experienced pronounced increases in social hostilities involving religion, while government restrictions on religion remained exceptionally high,” according to the report by the Pew Research Center.
The study shows the number of countries in the Middle East or North Africa with sectarian or communal violence between religious groups doubled from five to 10 during 2011, a year that coincided with most of the political uprisings of Arab Spring.
Among those groups most adversely affected were Egypt’s Coptic Christians, whose churches have been bombed and burned both before and after the February 2011 fall of former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.
http://www.religionnews.com/2013/06/20/study-religious-oppression-rises-despite-arab-spring/
http://www.pewforum.org/Government/arab-spring-restrictions-on-religion-findings.aspx
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msongs
(67,421 posts)
MellowDem
(5,018 posts)It will keep these countries in terrible condition for a while. They'll have to get to a point where they don't take religion seriously like in the West. They need an enlightenment of sorts. It's a good thing the Constitution was written by rather irreligious deists, some of whom thought the Bible was just silly. Made things a lot easier on us, and even then we still are faced with obstruction by the fundamentalists at every turn.
Igel
(35,323 posts)Tribal boundaries. Religion is but one.
After the USSR broke up, there was a lot of interethnic animosity.
After Jugoslavija broke up, there was a lot of interethnic animosity.
Same for Srbija.
With the loss of a strongman, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Romania, Estonia, Latvia, Bulgaria all saw an upsurge in ethnic tensions.
When everybody's oppressed and it's not clear that the spoils of state are enjoyed widely a member of one ethnicity, everybody's in the same boat. You find common cause in survival.
As soon as the lid's off, the old animosities, unless resolved, return. Most strongmen like to make sure that the animosities are retained, just in case they're needed. Saddam played to ethnic tensions. So did Stalin. Tito. And so on.
In Jugoslavija we like to focus on our personal target, religion. Muslim/Xian ties. But the Serb/Croatian hatred was rather large. Masked by a Catholic/Orthodox split, a lot of it went back to WWII when the Croatians were seen as Nazi sympathizers and the Serbs Nazi opponents. A nice myth, but France has done no better.
MellowDem
(5,018 posts)I never said there aren't other irrational belief systems out there that can block progress, you're arguing against a straw man.
cbayer
(146,218 posts)It's about how certain religious rights are being eroded and how they are being harassed and persecuted.
This has much more to do with those in power dominating others.
Religion is a huge hurdle to societal advancement? In what sense and backed up by what data?
What part of the West do you think doesn't take religion seriously? Oh, it must be those greatly advance societies you speak of.
Irreligious deists? What the hell is that? The founders were all over the map, religiously, but they held in common a belief that there should be state/religion separation both to protect religion from being intruded on by the state and the state from being intruded on by religion. They took religion very, very seriously.
MellowDem
(5,018 posts)And their religious texts advocate it in many ways.
Religion impedes progress, as it has throughout history, when reality contradicts religious dogma. The sun revolving around the Earth and the imprisonment of Galileo being one obvious example. Or denying GLBT rights primarily because of what the Bible says.
The countries where the least subscribe to theism, and even those that do don't know or care about the religions they say they subscribe to, and people rarely go to church, much less vote based on what the Bible says. Those don't take religion seriously.
Jefferson took religion so seriously he made a Bible without all the miracles in it. In other words, quite a few thought it was silly superstition. Can't imagine a present day politician doing that.
cbayer
(146,218 posts)Again, you make these broad statements without being able to back them up.
Sure religious belief has impeded the adoption of certain scientific discoveries, but many others have been made by inquiring religious minds. And then there is the architecture, music, art - but hey, what advanced society needs that junk.
While countries with less religion may base less of their politics on religions, some of them are the most repressive in the world. Go figure.
Jefferson did not think religion was a silly superstition, though he had very unique thoughts about it. He took religion very, very seriously.
I am seriously curious as to where you developed all these ideas.
You said you were raised in the church and perhaps you attended one that taught things just as you describe, but I would suggest that you may have had very limited exposure to the wide variety of religions and religious people out there.
Are broad generalizations about all religion and all religious people any different than, say, broad generalizations about all GLBT people?
MellowDem
(5,018 posts)though honestly, I tend to doubt it, considering it was wasn't a good idea not to be. Who knows though, it was irrelevant to my point that religion impedes progress when reality doesn't match religious dogma.
Thank goodness we don't have as many theocracies, but that doesn't stop churches from putting their weight behind policies in democracies and slowing down progress. Stem cell research, Proposition 8, abortion rights, etc. etc.
I can't name a theocracy that isn't pretty darn repressive. Which is to say, humans can be good or bad without it, but religion, as a way of thinking, brings nothing good to the table and only the rather large negative of a system of believing in things without questioning them.
Jefferson must have thought religions were not very believable to be a deist and write out all the miracles of the Bible, basically all the superstition. I don't doubt he understood that the concept of religion was a serious thing to address because it had so much power still at his time, but the system of belief itself was irrational.
Generalizations about belief systems and those who subscribe to those belief systems are nothing like generalizing GLBT people. Being GLBT isn't a choice. Religion, like politics, is a choice. I generalize about political ideologies all the time, as well as those who identify with them. A belief system is just another idea, one open to criticsm, as well as the people who voluntarily choose to hold them. I don't think any of my generalizations are beyond the pale. That is, they're used in a useful way to be able to talk about broad ideas and concepts, not to attack or disparage people. Some may take offense, but it's not the intent, it's just criticsm. I'm sure Republicans take offense at my criticism of them and their ideas.
cbayer
(146,218 posts)You know more about Galileo's religious beliefs than he did.
I will never argue that there are not religious organizations that slow the advance of science at times. It was be equally ridiculous to deny that there are many others that further it and support stem cell research, birth control, choice, GLBT rights, etc.
If you want to limit your comments to theocracy, I am right there with you. But when you say things like "religion brings nothing good to the system", you have lost all credibility, imo.
You fail to understand that one can be a theist or deist and see that much of religion is allegorical and not literal.
Who are you to say that being religious is a choice. Maybe it isn't for many people. Maybe they experience it as parts of themselves, pieces of their individual identity. Many feel strongly on one side or another, while many more fall somewhere in the middle.
I don't find your generalizations very useful. I find them off-putting and dogmatic and unlikely to lead to the kind of discussion you say you are seeking.
No, I didn't say I could read Galieo's mind, I said my opinion, which is the most one can do for historical figures. Saying he was a devout Catholic as fact is the assumption. Obviously, if he had been devout, he wouldn't have questioned the church despite reality being against it : )
The very definition of religion makes it a choice. No doubt some identify strongly with beliefs, political or otherwise, but its a choice.
I see modern theists do what the Mormons did day in and day out. That is, when part of your religion becomes inconvenient, explain it away with terrible apologetics and logic. That's all the "allegorical" arguments are. It's the height of intellectual fraud. There isn't a completely made up story a person couldn't constantly redefine and reinterpret to mean whatever they want it to mean. I don't believe that Mormons suddenly found out polygamy was bad and black people ok just as these positions were becoming untenable. It's so obviously disingenuous, and the same thing is happening now with gay marriage.
I understand completely that anyone can make themselves believe what they want to, I'm not arguing against that. I'm criticizing the grounds on which these beliefs rest, and the methods used to get to them.
cbayer
(146,218 posts)Your assumption that those who are devout don't question is at the root of your very faulty hypotheses about religious people. When you work from that premise, you are bound to get it all wrong.
Your definition of religion is also at the root of your faulty hypotheses. People used to say sexuality was a choice, too.
Many people, myself included, were brought up hearing bible stories as allegory - open to interpretation and questioning, guidelines for living. Being able to redefine and reinterpret them was part of the process. They speak differently to different people. You, like religious fundamentalists, take the position that it has to be taken literally or one is being intellectually dishonest. Another major problem at the root of your hypotheses.
You are not criticizing., imo. You are judging and judging harshly.
Were I to say anything remotely similar about atheists that you are saying about religious people, all hell would break loose.
And for good reason, I would be wrong, judgmental and deemed an anti-theist.
Warren Stupidity
(48,181 posts)The fact that the institution of the Catholic Church charged him with heresy for his scientific publications is the point and it is beyond dispute.
The case of Galileo is an obvious example of religion being an impediment to progress.
cbayer
(146,218 posts)But I will also argue that religious people have been some of the most curious and inspired scientists as well. I disagree that Galileo's devoutness is irrelevant.
It's the blanket generalizations that I object to.
Warren Stupidity
(48,181 posts)Although I suspect that is not what you meant, although it certainly appears to be true in this thread, where you attempted to argue non sequitur that galileo's religiosity was somehow relevant as a counter argument to the claim that his scientific work was impeded by the catholic church.
again "religious people have been inspired scientists" does not address the claim that religion has impeded progress. Galileo, again, is an example of just why your claim is irrelevant.
cbayer
(146,218 posts)part and try to make it say what I clearly did not mean.
Religion has impeded science. Religion has inspired science. As is true in many areas, it has been a two edged sword.
dimbear
(6,271 posts)Muslims take better care of themselves. Don't try drinking yourself to death like Kemal Ataturk, avoid whatever defect put Nasser in an early grave. Somehow manage to imitate the ayatollahs in their malign longevity.
