Secularism - Is it a blessing or a curse?

[Jack Haywood]

What do you think about the increasing irreligiosity in the Western world? And in any other culture/group of cultures where people are abandoning religion?

Do you consider it progress? Or a loss of something important to humanity?

 

[AF 802]

Nice bait, m'lady.

 

[Draza]

Who gives a fuck. The world is still a shitty place regardless.

 

[A Useless Fish]

Get rid of religion, people will just replace it with something else to sperg about, like marxism.

 

[DN 420]

This is far too broad a question. There are plenty of people that differentiate spiritualism from religion, and are still spiritual in spite of not being religious.

Also your poll sucks.

 

[AF 802]

Get rid of religion, people will just replace it with something else to sperg about, like marxism.

That already goes on, though, with the DSA becoming exceptionally big.

 

[Red Hood]

Haha. Crom laughs at your secularism. He laughs from his mountain!

 

[IV 445]

Depends on what ideas you’re trying to keep out

 

[Creep3r]

Get rid of religion, people will just replace it with something else to sperg about, like marxism.

Or sports. People can literally go into a violent and tribal ape-like rage over fucking soccer. People are too easily pissed off, but even more so now where people are losing their fucking minds over social media.

 

[A Useless Fish]

People are too easily pissed off, but even more so now where people are losing their fucking minds over social media.

Social media is quite possibly one of the worst things to ever happen to humanity as a species.

 

[Creep3r]

Social media is quite possibly one of the worst things to ever happen to humanity as a species.

True dat...

 

[Rand /pol/]

Compare places where Religion is in high regard to places where it isn't. Do you think San Francisco or Salt Lake City has less crime.

 

[ES 148]

Religion is a Jewish myth.

 

[Hellbound Hellhound]

Compare places where Religion is in high regard to places where it isn't. Do you think San Francisco or Salt Lake City has less crime.

How about we compare Japan to Afghanistan.

 

[Khayyam]

It's essential.

Certainly, people can and have done bizzare things for reasons entirely unrelated to belief in tradition, but when it comes to the supernatural it makes compromise or reasoned discussion impossible. Anything that quashes that is a step in the right direction.

There's at least the potential for movement with someone who has a different political ideology to you, even if they're resistant to accepting evidence. How do you reason with someone who believes in invisible magic beings who demand appeasement or else?

 

[ICametoLurk]

Or sports. People can literally go into a violent and tribal ape-like rage over fucking soccer. People are too easily pissed off, but even more so now where people are losing their fucking minds over social media.

We need to bring back the Aztec way, the loser in sports will be sacrificed to the Sun God.

 

[Creep3r]

We need to bring back the Aztec way, the loser in sports will be sacrificed to the Sun God.

Go, Cubs, go
Go, Cubs, go
Hey, Chicago, what do you say
The Cubs are gonna win today

Certainly, people can and have done bizzare things for reasons entirely unrelated to belief in tradition, but when it comes to the supernatural it makes compromise or reasoned discussion impossible. Anything that quashes that is a step in the right direction.

There's at least the potential for movement with someone who has a different political ideology to you, even if they're resistant to accepting evidence. How do you reason with someone who believes in invisible magic beings who demand appeasement or else?

Pardon my bluntness, but how much experience do you have with people of differing views or social norms? You do realize people make such compromises every day, right? Unless of course you came from a particularly hostile background that discriminated you based on your lifestyle, then I'm sorry for that, but personal experiences don't have to define your perception of the population on a global scale. Its like 8/pol/'s backwards logic that dictates that blacks will always be "stupid nogs" because they only want to expect the worst in them due to their own personal grievances. And you do realize the fact that people, regardless of what politics, sports, views, etc, can be unbending about their opinions and views as it all comes down to the personality of the individual and whether they have a dogmatic stance on the things they love/support, right? Or that people everyday of all views have to compromise or keep quiet about their views for the sake of social activities and/or occupations?

There are people of different faiths or lack of faiths who are friends, family, marry and can get along far better than those with differing political views. There are even a religious few in the gay community who compromise their beliefs for the sake of their lifestyles. Just meet people outside of echo chambers and you'll realize the world is not so black and white. Because honestly, the only time I can see someone being as "uncompromising" as you think is if you're actively trying to get them to reject their beliefs. Secularism as a whole should be about keeping religion within its own subject rather than bringing about its elimination and practice. Much like how one shouldn't start bringing up anime out of nowhere in subjects about agriculture but you don't want anyone to stop enjoying weeb crap.

 

[Rand /pol/]

How about we compare Japan to Afghanistan.

The Japanese and whatever the hell Afghanis are are nothing alike.

 

[Autopsy]

Religions exist for reasons,
they're probably not the reasons you'd guess in 5 minutes with smug self-confidence and a half baked polisci degree,
figure out what the reasons are and then you don't need religions.
It's an ongoing process but secularization seems to be faster than the people actually picking religiosity apart and you can tell by societal growing pains; while criminality is going down with open enforcement and raw qol is improving from capitalist surplus, recent generations have complained of persistent unhappiness and mental degradation that wouldn't make sense from a purely material perspective- you'll see things like this fight to pin it on a bunch of seemingly reasonable explanations that are everything but a core pillar of modern society being ripped out at the roots, and that should probably be the first place to look.
A common argument involves 'naturally atheistic societies' in the east but an even slightly closer look reveals great parallels in these issues there, it's just that the populace is utterly apathetic to them as 'problems'; they often also have a rigorous superstitious structure or strong religious undertones in how they structure their immediate surroundings, the Chinese especially. It's also worth noting that the more secular societies tend to have been that way for centuries and there might be reasons for that, too.
There was a really great quote from someone or another talking about how they were ostensibly religious because it meant their neighbors - who might be taking it seriously - would be more polite, strangers - much the same - would be less likely to rob him, and his wife - curiously still a true believer - would be less likely to cheat on him. I couldn't find it, but these things do seem to be true on some level.

 

[Hellbound Hellhound]

The Japanese and whatever the hell Afghanis are are nothing alike.

That's precisely the point. Using levels of religiosity to explain the prevalence of criminality is facile due to it's statistical insignificance when weighted against other factors.