The Root Of All Evil
Jan. 10th, 2006 01:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
poliphiloIt's refreshing that militant Darwinist Richard Dawkins has been given the opportunity to attack religion- all religion- in his new TV series The Root Of All Evil.
On the other hand there's something a bit stringy and gristly about his case.
While it's quite true that the worldwide revival of fundamentalist religion- Islamic, Christian, Hindu- is one of the scariest developments of recent years, it's quite false to argue that religion has been behind all that is bad in human history.
The greatest atrocities of the 20th century were committed by atheist or areligious regimes- Nazi Germany, Communist Russia, Communist China, Communist Cambodia. The First World War had little to do with religion and everything to do with nationalism.
Human beings like to believe. They like to believe en masse. It keeps them warm. But they don't particularly need to believe in God. Any ideology will do.
And Dawkins igonores the good that religion can accomplish. It was evangelical Christians, as I wrote the other day, who broke the slave trade. And- on a different tack- recent research has shown that, as a matter of statistics, believers are more likely to be happy and fulfilled than unbelievers.
Religion is a stalk, a branch, a tendril- not a root.
On the other hand there's something a bit stringy and gristly about his case.
While it's quite true that the worldwide revival of fundamentalist religion- Islamic, Christian, Hindu- is one of the scariest developments of recent years, it's quite false to argue that religion has been behind all that is bad in human history.
The greatest atrocities of the 20th century were committed by atheist or areligious regimes- Nazi Germany, Communist Russia, Communist China, Communist Cambodia. The First World War had little to do with religion and everything to do with nationalism.
Human beings like to believe. They like to believe en masse. It keeps them warm. But they don't particularly need to believe in God. Any ideology will do.
And Dawkins igonores the good that religion can accomplish. It was evangelical Christians, as I wrote the other day, who broke the slave trade. And- on a different tack- recent research has shown that, as a matter of statistics, believers are more likely to be happy and fulfilled than unbelievers.
Religion is a stalk, a branch, a tendril- not a root.
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no subject
Date: 2006-01-10 08:20 am (UTC)Another thing I think makes statistics of happiness in general a bit pointless is (and this is a huge generalisation) that asked by a researcher or something, "Are you happy?", an intelligent person will think about it, and think about the world and things that are important to them, and answer in regard to a lot of things, whereas a less intelligent person will maybe just think about the moment and go "Yeah, Man U won the match, I'm totally chuffed" or whatever.
no subject
Date: 2006-01-11 10:12 am (UTC)I remember, from the time I was a charismatic Christian, how very, very pressurized we all were to keep on smiling.
If you weren't happy all the time there had to be something wrong with you. Maybe you hadn't been Born Again after all.
Oh the anxiety, the continual repressed anxiety!