HOW THE RELIGIOUS SUFFER

They lie, they cheat, they dominate, they discriminate, they persecute, they are intolerant, they are superstitious, they are self-centred, they are self-righteous, they look down on those not of their faith, they are corrupt — in fact, they demonstrate all the characteristics of Satan.

NO HOLDS BARRED

Raja Petra Kamarudin

Even before Malaysia can resolve the Allah word ownership tug-of-war, the country explodes into a Sunni-Shia skirmish. And just when we thought there could not possibly be any more religious conflicts, we now have the battle between the pro-Hadith and anti-Hadith Muslims.

Religionists are by nature and upbringing very confrontational animals. If they cannot fight with someone from another religion they will fight with someone from their own religion. And the reason religionists are very confrontational and like to fight is because they have this very arrogant streak brought on by the belief that they are right and everyone else is wrong.

It is most interesting to note that the more religious a society is the more confrontational they become and the higher the poverty and/or illiteracy rate is. This might not quite work based on the rule-of-thumb but this would certainly be true in most of the cases, even in the very ‘advanced’ United States.

One million babies die on the first day of their lives due to a bad healthcare system (READ HERE). And where do you think this happens if not in the poorer regions? Poor healthcare is the result of corruption, poverty, wars, etc., and if you were to analyse that particular society you will also discover that they are extremely religious as well.

The religionists have classified some societies as godless. People no longer believe in God or pray. And it is in these societies where you do not find the ills suffered by those from the more religious societies.

Is it safe to assume that less religion means less conflict, less disagreements, less wars, less poverty, less corruption, less infant deaths, less ignorance, less superstition, less intolerance, and whatnot? Hence, can we also assume then that the more religious a society is the more misery that society faces?

If we follow President Bush’s adage that the proof of the pudding is in the eating then the case for religion would fail the test. The higher up the religion scale you go the higher the misery rate as well. And the higher up the godless scale you go the higher the peace and happiness rate as well.

So how do we ‘sell’ religion when the end product of being religious is misery? And we find that people who enjoy quarrelling and fighting would also be the people who are highly religious.

They lie, they cheat, they dominate, they discriminate, they persecute, they are intolerant, they are superstitious, they are self-centred, they are self-righteous, they look down on those not of their faith, they are corrupt — in fact, they demonstrate all the characteristics of Satan.

In short, they are everything they say we should not be.

The most evil of all crimes that religionists commit is they distort the truth. They tell us lies. They lie to us that such-and-such is what God said and they use these so-called words of God to perpetuate their evil deeds. And because what they do is supposed to be commands from God there will be no resistance and they can get away with that they do.

If we were to say something we would be required to show proof to support what we say. But when they say something it is based on faith so no proof is required and we must believe what they say or else suffer the wrath of God. And since they are God’s legal representatives on earth they can punish us on behalf of God and there is nothing we can do about it.