Religion kills. (My thoughts on the events in Paris, etc.)

Ok. So…. I first saw the news of the Paris attacks on the evening of my wife’s 40th birthday.  We were out celebrating with 4 of her closest friends, having dinner and a smoke at a hookah bar in the French Quarter when we saw it on TV.  We didn’t talk much about it, as we were trying to make the most of our short time together and enjoy the moment.  But it’s been on the back burner of my brain, and now that the festivities are over and I’ve stewed on this a little bit I’m ready to spew my thoughts on the tragedy that occurred this weekend and a few related things. So brace yourself, and at the risk that the following words may offend you please know that if you are reading this, you probably already know that I do not see your personal beliefs in a negative light.  If you are someone I respect, I would never insult your religion, dogma or whatever you do in the privacy of your brain or home.  But on this topic, I will not hold back.  To me, this is everything that has ever been wrong with the world regarding the human race.  Religion. Race. Geography. Forgetting that we all come from the same place, biologically speaking.

Here’s my take on organized religion, in a nutshell: thousands of years ago, before we had science and knowledge to explain a very large part of how stuff works, our ancestors concocted mythical beings and events to make people feel not so confused and scared about the unknown.  Supposed answers to questions about life after death, the weather, the sun and moon and where did we come from and what’s it all about.  For some reason, certain humans are slightly more intelligent or at least more believable than others, and so the rest of the mostly hairless ape descendants just bought what they were selling and slept soundly.  Over time, there were obviously different versions to all of these stories, and eventually people started to segregate themselves over which version they found to be the most comforting and “sensible”.  Now, no disrespect to Americans (meaning “Native Americans”, or “Indians”… the ones who were here waaaay before whitey invaded) but for quite some time some of the indigenous peoples of North America believed that thunder was caused by a giant bird flapping its wings.  And we all now know that that’s completely ridiculous because a Thunderbird is either a really cool old car or a member of a very silly world saving secret organization comprised of marionette puppets with awesome vehicles.

So this, in my opinion, is what the root of the problem with religion is.  What one person sees as totally believable and life-affirming and all that, another sees as fantasy.  Silly, preposterous, dangerous, radical, scary…. see where I’m going?  And let’s not forget that the three major religions of the world all stem from the same place and the same man, Abraham. Just about every organized religion today is some super diluted, over translated version of the same damn belief system which was initially a bunch of fairytales made up to make humans believe that there’s a reason for all this.

Now I’m not saying there isn’t a reason.  In fact, I consider myself an agnostic, not an atheist.  I can’t help but think that there is something more than the physical. But I absolutely believe that our tiny minds are not capable of comprehending whatever there is beyond our five senses.  But let’s get back to Paris…

I guess that as far as we know right now, ISIS are claiming responsibility for the mayhem in Paris. Shocker.  But for all we know, it’s the French government killing its own civilians to justify a lucrative war against…. whoever.  And hey, why not?  The good ol’ U.S. of A. did that with fantastic results and many many dollars and deaths later, the majority of American citizens and countless service people are still wearing ribbons and visiting ground zero and think that Dubya was awesome and did the right thing and all that bullshit.  Damnit, I just realized that I’m getting away from my point entirely.  ISIS.  The “self proclaimed” Islamic State.  These dudes are clearly mad about something.  Not exactly sure what it is, but it seems like they’re mostly out to kill Westerners with more or less Christian beliefs.  Or whoever “The Infidel” is.  Right?  I don’t really know, and honestly I’m too lazy to read all of the information out there – nor do I have the energy to decide how much of it is believable.  All I know for sure is that all of this death is IN THE NAME OF RELIGION. And you know what?  Over the course of human history, religious belief and the disagreement over the countless interpretations of various versions of basically the same thing has been the cause of so much death, destruction and suffering that I have to ask: does this really make us sleep better at night?

I believe, as many non-religious people do, that you can absolutely have morality without spirituality. And you can have spirituality without organized religion. And I also feel that it is possible for people who follow different religions to respect each others’ beliefs or lack thereof. It’s that fucking simple. But when you add human selfishness and quite literally the tendency to feel “holier than thou”, mix in a few weapons and maybe a territorial dispute… you get death. Lots and lots of pointless death.

I don’t know or yet understand what exactly motivated the self-proclaimed ISIS attacks in Paris this weekend.  But I do know that it wasn’t because somebody was pissed off because they couldn’t get tickets to the concert, or that those concert goers had actually done anything to insult whatever version of Islam those perpetrators defend so violently.  All I know is that in those sick heads there is a god who tells them it’s okay to slaughter innocents in its name. And theirs isn’t the only god who says that.  Maybe the one that most “good Christians” follow doesn’t currently condone reckless violence, but some version or versions of that same god has most certainly been responsible for its fair share of death.  And yes, there are plenty of extremist “Christians” right here in ‘Murica who believe that homosexuals should be put to death. (The Bible also says that working on Sunday is punishable by death, fyi. Exodus 35:2)

Which brings me to today’s news that at least seven United States governors are calling for a halt to or at least intensive background checks on Syrian refugees coming to this country.  Allegedly some (or maybe just one?) of the attackers in Paris had a Syrian passport. But as I understand it, the vast majority of those fleeing Syria are doing so because of religion fueled violence. So once again we have so called “leaders” of our government forgetting that this country was built on religious freedom – in addition to genocide and slavery of course.
[Note to self: find out if Bobby Jindal’s parents had background checks.]

And it’s this kind of attitude that gets in the way of peace when these people need it the most.  “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free…”  Just not the dark-skinned ones who may have a very small chance of being a radical religious terrorist.  We have plenty of homegrown white ones, thanks.

According to some polls, younger generations are increasingly unsubscribed to any form of religion.  To me this is good news for the future of humanity.  Not that there aren’t several other problems such as global warming, overpopulation and economic disparity to be worried about.  But this rant is about religion, and if you haven’t stopped reading this by now, I’d like you to take a minute and think about a world where nobody’s belief system was considered “wrong” by anyone else. And think about how many conflicts would just disappear.  The human race will never agree on one god, but the more people choose to not pick one, the more we can get on with disagreeing about other things.

One last thing.  I, as many of my fellow humans do, wish peace to the families of those killed in Paris. I wish peace to anyone who has been affected by human conflict; past, present, or future.  And I wish there was a way to go far back in time and replace god with common sense.