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Marco van Hylckama Vlieg on web technology, design, life and everything

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• At 02 December '07 - 04:20 Simon wrote:

  

  Personally I’m not all that into religion as well. I respect people who do, and I keep my opinion quiet in front of them. However, I don’t think banning religion completely would solve all of our problems. Maybe I’m too pessimistic, but I think we would just come up with something else to disagree and fight about.

  
  

• At 02 December '07 - 08:49 Nate Klaiber wrote:

  

  I think you hit the nail on the head with:
  
  “The holy books speak of tolerance, yet too many followers preach intolerance. The holy books speak of love, yet religious nations (Western and Eastern) practice hatred.”
  
  I ask people: Do you really want to believe in a God like that? A God who is the definition of love (Agape), would willingly send people to a fiery pit of hell? A God who is the definition of love, would willingly reject his children? A God who is the definition of love, would willingly support killing others in his/her name?
  
  In all honesty, that isn’t a God I want to believe in.
  
  I think Religion, in and of itself, has its own agenda most of the time – and it is easier to say it is ‘in the name of God.’

  
  

• At 02 December '07 - 10:07 Rob Marsh, SJ wrote:

  

  Just for future reference the Eco ‘quote’ is actually from GK Chesterton. Eco has one of his characters in ‘Foucault’s Pendulum’ give Chesterton the credit.

  
  

• At 02 December '07 - 10:31 Jeff Byrnes wrote:

  

  Nate, you’ve got it. Religion is constantly hijacked by those who would use it for their own ends. I believe the word to describe these sorts of intelligent, but power-hungry individuals is demagogue. So, religion is not inherently evil, but misguided people who are either looking for worldly power or are so blinded by their faith that they reject tolerance of others is what makes religion evil. So, as we all know, there are evil people out there, and we can only hope to stop or contain them.

  
  

• At 02 December '07 - 10:37 Marco wrote:

  

  @Rob thanks for pointing that out. I corrected the post.

  
  

• At 02 December '07 - 13:31 Eric wrote:

  

  Very interesting and thought provoking post. I’ve asked questions along the same vein and have decided to think similarly to what G.K. Chesterton said in “What’s Wrong With The World?”, “The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult; and left untried.” Thus, when considering religions I try to compare based on the teachings of the founders and not the actions of the followers.

  
  

• At 02 December '07 - 14:23 Marco wrote:

  

  @Eric you’re right. I guess the majority of the people simply aren’t able to follow the teachings of the founders. I find this particularly true with Jesus.
  
  Regardless whether you believe Jesus is the son of God or whether you think He’s just an influential historical figure, the way of life that He stood for is a good one. A very good one even!
  
  Unfortunately there’s no such thing as a ‘Church of Jesus’. The ones that pretend to be such a church quite often breed zealots as I mentioned before. The kind of zealot that Jesus tried to fight during his life.
  
  I find it very strange that most Christian movements, especially in America, spread hatred and an intolerant mindset that Jesus truly despised. And it’s written down in their own book that they read daily. Maybe people only read what they want to read and ignore the rest?
  
  It’s all just …..... totally screwed up…
  
  I think you’re right. Religion isn’t inheritly bad. It’s just that humanity is unable to handle it right.

  
  

• At 03 January '08 - 20:03 David wrote:

  soon all religions wiil be band for God will put it in all human goverment’s the ruller’s of the world to hate and destoryit compleatly and nothing leaf of it.

  
  

• At 09 January '08 - 01:34 lordfrikk wrote:

  I’d ban all religions this very moment If I knew there wouldn’t be inevitable religon vs. rest of the world WWIII.

  
  

• At 22 January '08 - 03:57 Pelle wrote:

  

  Non-religious people always tend to enlarge the mistakes made in name of religion (or, in name of God / Allah / etc). Being a christian, this sometimes hurts, because I don’t recognize ‘religious zealotism’ in the life of many, many fellow-christians.
  
  I do agree that there is a lot of religious zealotism in this world; and I think this is a very bad thing. But only when the religion preaches intolerence and violence, the cause of this zealotism lies in the religion itself. But when the religion (like christianity) preaches love and peace, the cause of zealotism is NOT the religion. It’s not religion’s fault that people misinterpret it’s ideas.
  
  This is not only the case with religion, but with al kinds of things. Take soccer for example. I (and a lot of people worldwide) just loooooove soccer. But is it soccer’s fault that hooliganism exists? Should we forbid soccer because a tiny group of idiots likes to fight and trash everything they encounter in their rage?
  Every sociologist can tell you that belonging to a group is more important to most people than following the ideas and ideals of that group. If we ban soccer, the hooligans will find some other group to be part of, and continue with their vandalism.
  
  The final thing I’d like to say is that if you want to think about banning religion you should also consider the good things that are done in name of religion. I don’t know much about islam or budhism, so I’m going to focus only on christianity. Feel free to say something about those religions too if you know something about it ;)
  There are many, many humanitarian organisations based on christianity, with dedicated people working there for free. Churches help the poor and feed the hungry. I know several christians who gave up their job and went to Africa or South-America to help streetkids or people who suffer from Aids.
  Various studies show that christians in The Netherlands (and probably also outside my country) donate substantionaly more money (more than 5 times as much) to charitable causes, and do much more work on voluntary basis, than non-christians. The society benefits a lot from this.
  It would be nice to take these kind of things also into consideration before starting to think of banning all religion ;)

  
  

• At 23 January '08 - 07:51 Jeff Byrnes wrote:

  

  @pelle: While Christianity is most certainly a religion that espouses tolerance, brotherhood and kindness, if we examine it’s history, after it endured persecution and was accepted as the dominant religion of Europe, many of it’s practitioners abused the power the Church offered in a variety of ways, from leading Crusades to the abuses that led Martin Luther to tack his 99 Theses on the door of his church. It’s only now, towards the end of the 20th century that Christianity has really matured into what it was always meant to be.
  
  And while I agree with your statement about soccer, remember that those idiots were never sponsored by FIFA to go around bashing stuff (unlike, for example, the Crusaders of the Middle Ages.) Again though, Christianity as a whole has come a long way from the political

  
  

• At 31 January '08 - 11:47 bob wrote:

  i think its all about fear.if we all let go of our fears there will be no need for any religion we can all just get on with life its self.

  
  

• At 02 March '08 - 22:06 kymm wrote:

  

  i am heart broken when i see what a bunch of 2000 plus or minus year old superstitions are doing to us as a people, one just has to turn their attention to the “civilised” countries like the U.S. for example and the argument over teaching the religious ideal of creationism or intelligent design along side of and in some cases instead of the “SCIENTIFIC THEORY” of evolution. in a science class what makes more sense?, yes some out there will say creationism is a science, and my response as a student at university learning to become a science teacher is simply, no it is not a science, it is not even a theory in scientific terms as that requires testing, data, investigation. keep in mind that there are laws to apparently separate the church from the state, to even entertain the debate of creationism vs. evolution is against that law until anyone offers actual tangible proof of anything close to creationism. in closing i believe the simpsons put it best stating that organised religion has no place in the school, just like facts have no place within the church

  
  

• At 10 March '08 - 17:58 jimmy Simpson wrote:

  

  maybe it is time to stop calling people ‘‘religious’‘ and begin to call them by their proper name , fantasists , take away the fantasists ‘‘reason’‘ for committing various illogical acts in the name of their particular fantasy [ religion ] , lets see them for what they truly are [ actually it’s usually their parents fantasies foisted on to them ] unreasoning brain washed [ or self deluded ] fools .
  should we placate and mollycoddle the mad and deluded ? . time for this to stop i think ? .
  
  i could cry when i think of the time in human thinking and effort throughout history WASTED on our knees devoted to nothing but fantasy .
  
  what could we have solved with all this wasted time ? on our knees begging for eternal life , gardens of paradise , heavens ect…
  
  what could we have achieved with all this wasted time , that REALLY meant something to the human race ?.
  
  1 thing i have noticed is that while professing humility , the leaders of any religion have total power over their followers , some people love power and will resort to any tactic to retain it [ as long as they are not in danger of course , thats what followers are for ] .
  
  1 sect hating another for their ridiculous beliefs , while practising equally ridiculous and comical acts of worship to an imaginary being , which NO religion has ever offered ANY atom of proof , lets get real , lets call them by their real name FANTASISTS , deluded or what ever , would you allow special dispensation to me if i told you i worshipped the holy trinity ? batman , donald duck and popeye , if you did you would be humouring surely ? well don’t humour me put me straight tell me i am deluded , if i do not like you telling the truth to me , what can you do about some one who does not like the truth ? . i have to go now i can hear the priest of my religion calling me to church , of course i will have to put some money in to the church coffers , as we are saving up for a statue of popeye , batman and donald duck [ robins only a saint so does not qualify for statue ] good luck to all undeluded people , and to all deluded people grow up , you are too old for imaginery friends .

  
  

• At 11 March '08 - 15:29 jimmy Simpson wrote:

  

  remember it’s tough being a monkey

  
  

• At 11 March '08 - 15:32 jimmy Simpson wrote:

  

  remember it’s tough being a monkey , but try to not act like one

  
  

• At 11 March '08 - 16:04 Marco wrote:

  

  @jimmy Simpson
  
  I don’t think any of the posters nor myself would know about that but I’m glad you’re here speaking from experience. Thanks for your contribution.

  
  

• At 02 June '08 - 22:07 Adrian wrote:

  

  Well lets remember that it is called helping someone in my opinion to get rid of the belief in there head that their is some all powerful dude in the sky just chilling up there on his ass while all these problems on earth are happening

  
  

• At 23 June '08 - 22:21 Douglas Lee wrote:

  It was refreshing to run into your web log. I was raised in a modern Christian religion. In my early twenties I asked to be excommunicated. My request was granted but I was given 30 days to return. I knew early in my life that I had trouble believing in God. It was about the same time I had trouble believing in Santa Clause. Unfortunately it was a longer process to purge religion. I am satisfied with the results of life without religion. I look back and laugh at the marketing techniques of religion. I especially like the “time is running out” tactic. Only 30 days left or you will be without God

  
  

• At 24 June '08 - 18:03 James Simpson wrote:

  

  Now we have tackled the small lie [ god ] are we ready for the big one ?
  Lets see .
  most none religious people i have come across still cannot [ even though they understand the futility of worshipping a fantasy , IE god ] accept that the idea of a ‘‘soul’‘ [ the personality , living after death ] is the biggest fantasy of all and the source of all [ to my knowledge , which i admit is not all knowing , unlike god , hee hee ] of all religions ? .
  
  As far as we know , human beings [ according to all the science journals i have read ] , have been a thinking creature for many tens of thousands , if not hundreds of thousands of years , for me it is still hard to accept that a human being born 50,000 years ago could live and function in today’s society , but science has no reason to think that they had less brain power than what we now have , in other words our technology does not make us ‘’ better ‘’ thinkers than what they were . We today are an evolution of society [ many societies to be more accurate ] If i look back to how earlier humans lived and died [ very well documented and finding out more all the time ] , i can imagine why they created the fantasy of souls and gods .
  Most of humanity lived a short and brutal life on most places on the planet , right up into the middle of the 19th century [ western world , the east had it even harder ] so if you get right down to it , it was only the fantasy of living on after death that gave people the strength to carry on and have any chance of fullfillment . From there it all falls into place , the gods , the devils , the souls . Fantasies reinforcing fantasies .
  
  IE take some cultures in the world who believed after many genrations [ the originators being long dead ] that if they did not sacrifice [ human , animal ect…] to their gods the sun will not rise [ and of course they were right , did not the sun rise every morning after the sacrifice ? ] .
  
  What culture after many , many generations would be brave enough to take the chance and NOT sacrifice to their god , with priests and heads of church [ usually the king , how convienient , the guy who controlled the army and food supply having ultimate power of life and death over others ] having a vested interest in there being NO CHANGE [ anti evolution in other words ] .
  well thats me finished for tonight , if anyone needs me to clarify any of the above [ i’m not much of a letter writer ] please post and i will get back to you .
  would anyone reading this forum ? answer me a question .
  
  Does the head of any organised religion REALLY believe in god and would you want a fantasist at the head of an organization that has followers in the millions ?.
  goodluck to all none fantasists , to all fantasists you don’t need luck your god will look after you ? . Even though you are delusional , haha .
  
  PS , i would recommend all the people on this site to do yourself a favour and read richard dawkins THE GOD DELUSION , logical and knowledgeable and simple , genius .
  please excuse spellings and grammar tired now
  
  PPS , well done douglas lee , how is independent thought ? .
  delusion and comfort , truth fact and difficulty the choice is yours .

  
  

• At 09 October '08 - 23:04 MANOJ D. THAKUR wrote:

  

  One year ago I painted a message “BANISH RELIGION” on my T-shirt and I wear it twice a week while going to the gym. Yesterday I heard from a friend that someone has proposed to the UN that all religions should be banned and I really felt nice that I share the feelings of someone on the other part of the globe. I have learned the futility of religions and am trying to come out of it. I am born in a hindu family following lots of austerity and rituals and I am the one who is running away from all those practices just because I feel that these things are obsolete. They have become time barred, particularly after the industrial revoultion and advances in science and technology. The preachers and advocates of religion are the only ones who gain money and power by endorsing their religion, the practitioners are always exploited on one pretext of the other. Be it birth, marriage, death or any other ceremony the real beneficiaries are those doing religious rituals. Everyday in India truck loads of flowers are offered to IDOLS OF GOD in the major temples which are thrown into the dustbin within minutes of offering. If religion is altogether banished all the land under floriculture will be available for agriculture. Half the agricultural land under oil seeds can be used to grow fruits and vegitables because half of the edible oil produced is burned in oil lamps. I feel the death of millions of people by starvation can be avoided. Apart from deaths by starvation, millions are massacred due to religious fanaticism. Their is no surety of life just because of extremism of religion. Roads are blocked to offer prayers and bombs are exploded to show the might of their religion rather than proving merit. Banishing religion itself will be the biggest service or boon, not just for the mankind but to the entire living beings.

  
  

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