Is religion inherently violent or does it manipulate members who are?

Moral: "A bad religion interpreted in a good way is still a bad religion.  The members are as irresponsible as those who try to stem a tidal wave with an umbrella."

The violence could be passive-aggressive, verbal or involve physical violence.

Human beings are inherently violent in the sense that they hope bad things will happen to others. The problem of evil religion is not the low percentage of terrorists or whatever. The problem is the percentage that is openly or secretly happy about the terrorism.

Many feel that religion is inherently violent. Many more feel that some forms of religion are inherently violent. And even if religion is not inherently violent it causes differences between people and nations and leaders and indirectly produces countless wars.

It could be directly inherently violent.

It could be indirectly inherently violent.

It could be a mixture.  If it is a mixture it will guarantee that some members will be caused to become violent or it could be that the poison is mixed so well with sweet nothings that it is hard to see the poison.

If a religion is made up of intrinsic sinners then it has to be intrinsically sinful or harmful as a religion.

A religion that is directly nasty is easier to diagnose. Anything else is far more dangerous and is a slow poison.

If religion is not inherently violent then what does that tell us? It tells us it is either inherently peaceful or neutral. If it is neutral then it does not matter if you a are religious or not. And as for neutral it means it is really both equally peaceful and equally warlike at the one time. There is still a dark side.

A growing number of people feel that religion in some way is inherently a supporter of violence.

Some answer that humankind is not the only species that goes to war. Even bees battle. So they say that war is not unique to us nor unique to religion. They point out bees are not religious and they are belligerent!

The argument that other species fight and kill each other without religion hardly proves religion’s innocence. We are different for we are prone to being religious and animals are not. Animals and humans are too different for the argument to have any force. And when man goes to war, each side that fights thinks it will win. That is magical and unrealistic thinking. It is indirectly religious. Maybe animals think that way too. So it only a matter of opinion that animals do not behave religiously.

It is argued that there are no non-religious societies historically so we cannot know if such societies would be peaceful or less violent than very religious societies. The answer to that is that religion is just an artificial label, an umbrella label, and that in reality each member is his or her own religion. There are too many differences between persons for them all to be the same religion. It does not matter if say Catholicism is a religion or an umbrella. It is still guilty at least by association for what its bad members do. An umbrella that lies that it is a religion or imagines it is hardly to be trusted if it boasts it is about peace. It is even less to be trusted if it boasts it is inherently peaceful. That would be a disgraceful lie. How could an umbrella have the magic power to forge only peace? Also an umbrella or religion that refuses to see each member as her own religion is showing it does not like to think of others as individuals but as members. It sees them as less than human unless they are really members of the religion or religious umbrella. And then we wonder why it hates outsiders?

Believers who say there have been no truly secular societies or atheist ones so that we cannot argue that secular societies or atheist ones will be more peace loving than religious ones nevertheless point to officially (allegedly) secular or atheist societies which did terrible things to people and butchered them when they could. So they should say then that it could be that secular societies will be the best for peace but that officially secular ones could be as bad or worse than religious ones. But read what they are saying. A secular society is one that wants to be secular and is united in secularism. An officially secular one could be one that does not relate to the people and thus forces itself and its ethos on them. Not all officially secular societies would do that. Forcing would not be secular at all.

Some argue that if religion is inherently violent then why don’t we often see stabbings during Church on Sunday or Catholics blowing up the nearby Protestant Church with the worshipers in it? There is no small-scale violence. But there is lot of it when the religion gets big enough and when it gets its members into parliament to sway things its way. Religion that becomes inherently violent when it gets powerful enough is still inherently violent. Jack the Ripper would have been inherently violent even if he could not get out on the streets to kill prostitutes.

Religion boasts that some religions encourage violence and other ones do not and may even advocate pacifism. But pacifism is only you letting others do the violence. It is not truly peaceful. It only acts peaceful. The argument that religion may inspire you to be violent or non-violent is odd. You could say the same thing about having a non-religion!!! So what is the point of religion then? It is nothing special.

A religion’s members in the government wage war so it is foolish to blame the government and not the religion for it. Both are to blame. If religion is able to be an excuse for war then there is something wrong with religion inherently. It can be an excuse and that is bad when organised super-religion is not needed. If religion were needed surely little religions, little clusters would do? Big religion gets dangerous and stores dangerous information. It knows who to be dangerous. If religion is inherently dangerous then the worse religions will be the biggest ones.

Each war is about the wish for the nation to determine its own needs and rules and enjoy prestige. If it does not wage war to force others to convert to its biggest and most influential religion it certainly has religion at the back of its mind

People try to exonerate religious doctrine from causing religious wars. But if doctrine is good it does not follow that religion is good. If maths is good it does not follow that any mathematicians are good.

Christians are told to love God totally with all their hearts and their neighbours as themselves. The latter however is supposed to be about acting in a helpful way to the neighbour. In fact, what you have is people helping others solely because it pleases God. I have a problem with that. What kind of person would help a sick baby for God and not for the sake of the baby? The order in the ten commandments is pro-god while any benefit to humanity is just collateral. They start off with putting God first and then the code for human behaviour given is just shoved in after as if it is of lesser importance.

The core of atheism is that one has no reason to believe in God so one can assume there is none. The atheism that says there is actually evidence against God is the next optional step. Atheism at its core cannot lead to violence like religion can. That atheism has no content. It is not the rejection of belief in God.

All agree that anybody can create a system to draw people into war. Some say Communism was such a system. But if you can set up a secular system to do evil then why not a religious one?

Do not forget that most wars of religion are verbal and may involve the fists not the guns. And if religious people would kill the unbeliever only they think God would punish them for it then they are false people. They spare lives not out of respect but out of fear of punishment. That is an inherently violent outlook and only a miracle can stop it from getting physical. If they doubt or get desensitised to violence then their enemies are in huge trouble.

Don't forget there is more to terrorism than just terrorism. What about the enablers? Christianity thinks it has the right to pretend that the god endorsed violence in its Bible is not there. Islam thinks it has the right to call itself a religion of peace despite revering a violent book as God's dictated word. There is no true peace unless violence is decisively repudiated and no approval of it is granted. Politics and religion are notorious for hypocrisy when it comes to being soft on at least some violence.  The enablers are a bigger problem than the terrorists.  Nobody has an excuse in a free world for letting their name be on the list in a Church or mosque or membership roll.

Believers in anything thought to be important feel compelled to be right but they too often let that compulsion lead them into false truth. We tend to think the same things as most other people around us say they think. Thus we end up being collectively compelled and exert an influence on each other that is very compelling. And a lot of it is because we cannot do the research or don't have the time.  Religion is the biggest culprit for making people feel duty bound to believe what it says and they feel forced at some level and that makes religion inherently toxic.

Church stresses strong religious unity because it knows that religious division even if only in matters of faith is very dangerous.  And two sects can have the same faith but a separate leadership and even that lead to trouble for faith and religion need leaders and having leaders tends to draw people into worshipping the leaders or being loyal to them that bit too much.

Religion gives several clues that it is aware of its inherent respect for violence and we should respect ourselves and give it no money or no children to indoctrinate or manipulate.