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What I don't like is when people point to this as a reason why all religion is bad. These are con artists, plain and simple. It would be like if someone on QVC

• AlexTWithBeard 7y ago
  This is normal. Everything has its dark sides: religion, science and even software engineering. My personal problem is the lack of convincing arguments that religion is good.
  • challenger22 7y ago
    Religious people are happier than non-religious people. This replicates fairly well across many countries. This should be a fairly convincing argument all on its own. It is entirely possible to be religious without rejecting rationalism, as well, if you accept God as a metaphorical construct. Religious people are also more charitable. If you break down the numbers, this increased charity is not just benefitting the church. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/01/31/are-religious-people-happier-healthier-our-new-global-study-explores-this-question/ https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/01/31/are-religio... https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/oct/30/religious-people-more-likely-give-charity-study/ https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/oct/30/religious-p... https://www.philanthropy.com/article/Religious-Americans-Give-More/153973 https://www.philanthropy.com/article/Religious-Americans-Giv...
    • AlexTWithBeard 7y ago
      Religious people are happier than non-religious people. Interestingly, when we start talking about countries, not individual people, the trend reverses: atheistic countries are the happiest. https://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2018/03/20/the-2018-un-world-happiness-report-most-atheistic-and-socially-well-off-countries-are-the-happiest-while-religious-countries-are-poor-and-unhappy/ https://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2018/03/20/the-2018...
      • vekker 7y ago
        Obviously there are many other factors for happiness. To say anything about the effect of religion on happiness, ideally you would compare people in the same region, in similar circumstances.
      • arethuza 7y ago
        Certainly as a Scot I would not naturally associate "religion" and "happiness".... Edit: I'm talking about my experience of religion in Scotland, which is a bit grim and dour, not the rather cheerful kind that they seem to have in the US :-)
      • challenger22 7y ago
        >Of course correlations are not causation, and the negative correlation that I expect between religiosity and happiness does not mean that atheism makes people happier, or religion unhappier. What it means—and this is supported by several sociological studies (see here for one)—is likely that people either turn to religion or maintain their religion when their social situation is so dire that they’re unhappy. When conditions are good, and there’s lots of social support, including help for sick people, old people, free medical care, and so on, then there’s no need to be religious, no need to supplicate a god for what your society can’t provide. When you’re well off, your country gradually loses religion, the thesis of Norris and Inglehart in the preceding link. >In short, what makes people happy is not religion, but material well being and the assurance of material aid. That’s supported by the study’s finding that immigrants, including Muslims from the Middle East, quickly gain the happiness of their new country, while (I suspect), still keeping their religion, though perhaps in an attenuated form. This does not contradict my point- if you live in rural Appalachia, there's a good chance you have a pretty hardscrabble life. Religion is adaptive in this circumstance, and you can become happier by becoming religious. The author of the article you linked also goes on to quote Marx, saying that abolishing religion is curing the masses of their opium addiction, and curing them of their delusions. I would argue that irreligious people are just as delusional, but with different failure modes. Apathy, nihilism, and lack of a sense of self dominate the irreligious; moral absolutism dominates the religious.
    • TheOtherHobbes 7y ago
      Churches label themselves as charities, so by this reckoning donations that swell a property portfolio and a pastor's impressive lifestyle are considering "charitable". (Never mind that some churches lean heavily towards barely-disguised political activism.) The amount of money spent on genuine good works is rather lower. I'm sure genuinely giving people exist in religions, and they may even be encouraged by belonging to them. But the standard rhetorical implication is that all religious people are like this and all non-profit spending falls into this category - when the reality is very different.
      • pnongrata 7y ago
        It's also important to note that you don't need religion to be charitable or help other people. There isn't a single "good" that church does to other people that couldn't be done by secular means.
        • challenger22 7y ago
          On average, religious people are more charitable than non-religious people, even when you discount the money they give to the church. This is a good outcome and is evidence that religion is good.
          • dylan604 7y ago
            Seeing as how most religions require a minimum 10% tithe, their followers would of course seem to be charitable. But is it really charity if it is a requirement? I’d call it a tax.
            • umvi 7y ago
              > But is it really charity if it is a requirement? I’d call it a tax. It's not a tax. You can't get your passport revoked if you don't pay tithing. You won't go to jail for tax evasion, either. In fact, probably nothing will happen. You can continue to go to church every Sunday without paying tithing and most congregations would still welcome you with open arms. Ecclesiastical leaders might remind you that tithing requires faith and that you would receive more blessings if you paid your tithe, but as long as said leaders do not profit from said tithes, I don't see a problem with it as there is no conflict of interest.
    • Jedd 7y ago
      > Religious people are happier than non-religious people. Dumb people are happier than smart people -- pick your own causality. > This replicates fairly well across many countries. In some countries you'll likely be killed if you express your non-religiosity. In (as far as I know) no countries would you be killed by atheists if you're non-atheist. > This should be a fairly convincing argument all on its own. Of what, pray tell? > It is entirely possible to be religious without rejecting rationalism ... This is clearly not true, even if (as you suggest) attempt to morph capital-G god into a metaphor. > Religious people are also more charitable. I believe this has been debunked, but in any case if the motivation is 'not spend an eternity being tortured' it suggests it's self-interest, not altruism at play.
      • kcmastrpc 7y ago
        > In some countries you'll likely be killed if you express your non-religiosity. This is a half-truth, those same countries you'll be killed for expressing non-belief or belief in a different accepted religion. This is extremism and shouldn't be linked to what the vast majority of the rest of world practices.
        • Jedd 7y ago
          Absolutely. If we agree that everyone believes in either 0 or 1 religion, then we'd agree that everyone disbelieves in n or (n-1) religions, where n is several thousand (depending how you slice and dice the various sects and cults). I'm not sure what the vast majority practice, though Pew [1] has done some good research on beliefs amongst the second most popular religion. Attitudes towards the execution of apostates is especially interesting reading. In any case, if you live in almost any of the countries listed in that section you'll definitely be happier (and probably healthier / less likely to die) if you're religious than if you're not. https://www.pewforum.org/2013/04/30/the-worlds-muslims-religion-politics-society-beliefs-about-sharia/ https://www.pewforum.org/2013/04/30/the-worlds-muslims-relig...
      • AlexTWithBeard 7y ago
        In (as far as I know) no countries would you be killed by atheists if you're non-atheist. To be fair, Russia in 1920-1930s was pretty close to that. One surely may argue that communism is also a religion, so they were simply getting rid of the competition.
    • ykevinator 7y ago
      Drunk people are happier than sober people
      • jorangreef 7y ago
        Drunk people (as opposed to those who enjoy a glass now and then) may be happier, or sadder, but only for the moment. But then I'm sure you knew that already! Who has woe? Who has sorrow? Who has strife? Who has complaining? Who has wounds without cause? Who has redness of eyes? Those who tarry long over wine; those who go to try mixed wine. Do not look at wine when it is red, when it sparkles in the cup and goes down smoothly. In the end it bites like a serpent and stings like an adder. Your eyes will see strange things, and your heart utter perverse things. You will be like one who lies down in the midst of the sea, like one who lies on the top of a mast. “They struck me,” you will say, “but I was not hurt; they beat me, but I did not feel it. When shall I awake? I must have another drink.”
  • nostalgk 7y ago
    Spoken as a non-religious person, religion gives a lot of people something to rely on and a base foundation of ethics and morals from an early age. It also opens many people to reading and philosophy, and can create a great sense of community in healthy environments.
    • arethuza 7y ago
      When I was a wee boy here in Scotland our primary school teacher for our class of 12 was an ex WW2 Spitfire pilot - we read the bible every day. For some odd reason we only ever read the old testament and generally the bits where people are being rather beastly to one another. I do believe that dear old Mr C might have been trying to teach us a lesson about the reality of religious beliefs. [NB I grew up in a small quite religious community where things like cycling, playing football, hanging out clothes to dry (and probably humour) were effectively banned on Sundays].
      • Fellshard 7y ago
        If you read a book on the Third Reich, would you suppose it was being raised as a positive example? In a similar way, a great deal of the Old Testament is presenting history, not condoning those beastly actions (and, indeed, often directly and straightforwardly condemning them). Context is vital.
        • arethuza 7y ago
          Well, that was rather my point - I suspect he was condemning them. Certainly he never usually mentioned anything to do with his service in WW2 or anything like that - he was a conspicuously decent guy.
          • Fellshard 7y ago
            Fair enough, and good to hear about. Others use that to condemn the book as barbaric as a whole, which misses the point. Couldn't tell which you were implying.
    • 7y ago
  • galangalalgol 7y ago
    In "virus of the mind" one of Dawkins' students argues religion is more like a symbiote with both benefits and burdens on the host. His arguments seemed reasonable when I read it but I have forgotten them.
  • jorangreef 7y ago
    I think your point is genuine, but would it be fair to rephrase your personal problem as the lack of convincing arguments... as far as you are aware? Also, just to point out something you take for granted: You use the word "good" in your argument. What is your standard of "good"ness? Is it an objective, universal, absolute standard of good and evil? Or is it whatever the loudest voice in the room demands it to be?
    • username90 7y ago
      Religion is not philosophy. We can have a concept of moral and good without belief in a god or something supernatural. For humans, everyone agrees that society is nicer to live in when people are nice to each other. So teaching people to be nice to each other lies in everyone's interests, a God serves no purpose here. Note that there are Christian and Buddhist philosophy etc which is useful. However, that is philosophy and not religion. You can believe in the golden rule without being christian. You can agree with the teachings of Jesus without believing that he is the son of God. You can read the Bible without thinking that it is anything more than ancient pop-culture. Also, you can believe that some things are "good" without believing in a god. So as far as we know Religion is no better than snake oil. The main purpose of snake oil is to redistribute resources from naive people to conmen. Snake oil might have some positive placebo benefits, and maybe snake oil inspired some people to pursue medicine and help people for real, but snake oil is still just snake oil.
      • jorangreef 7y ago
        "We can have a concept of moral and good without belief in a god" Sure, but how would that be an objective, universal, absolute standard of good and evil? You claim philosophy, and yet this is an age-old philosophical problem. For example, see Hume's guillotine, i.e. Hume's is-ought distinction. "teaching people to be nice to each other lies in everyone's interests, a God serves no purpose here." Is truth determined by fact and reason, or merely by the purpose it serves?
  • francisofascii 7y ago
    Religion offers an alternative to a life based on self interest. To love others, feed the hungry, shelter the homeless, give to the poor, care for prisoners, the elderly, the addicts, etc.
• Jedd 7y ago
  Totally agree - it's a poor explanation to explain why religion is bad, especially as there's so many other, better explanations.
• SmellyGeekBoy 7y ago
  > What I don't like is when people point to this as a reason why all religion is bad. Agreed - it's a pretty weak argument compared to some of the others (terrorism, pedophilia, genocide etc.)
• fredley 7y ago
  Atheists are not immune from scams, this is just a scam that targets Christians. It also happens to operate with the implicit approval of TV networks, and the law/state in general. I don't think the article casts religion as a whole as bad at any point.
  • humanrebar 7y ago
    The rest of this thread on the other hand.... I think the commenter here was right to get out in front of the ire and proselytizing.
• Ensorceled 7y ago
  You see similar, but less egregious, behaviour in other religious contexts. In the small, poorish town where I grew up there were 10 churches for a town of 1300 people. The town of 400 that was ten miles down the road had 3 churches. This was a huge, one might say parasitic, drain on a town made up of farmers, railway workers, assorted stores, failing restaurants, etc. As attendance fell, the churches started demanding more and more money from their congregations to make up the shortfall. My former church, a Catholic Church, is one of the worst. There are still 7 churches operating in that town.
  • jacobush 7y ago
    Maybe you could argue that they provided a better service to the community when they had better representation. Now they are in a recession and people flight to put it in economic terms.
  • euroclydon 7y ago
    Churches have a legacy of being the focal point in a community. It's no more surprising that a small town would have that many churches than it is that they would have bars or community centers. Society is changing. Small towns are getting smaller as kids move away. Also, church attendance is down as people go to Starbucks instead. It will balance out over time.
    • Ensorceled 7y ago
      That's not how small towns work. When I was a kid there was 1 bar, 2 restaurants, 4 community centers (arena, legion, golden age home, library), 2 schools and 10 churches. The largest building the town was the middle school. The next 3 by size were churches.
• StreamBright 7y ago
  Well you can think about it as a simple market. There is a demand for salvation and there is a supply provided by the con artists. The price is set based on market dynamics. This is why a particular religion hates psychologists, they do not like competition.
• nathan_long 7y ago
  Exactly. Evangelical Christians have also denounced this kind of con many times. Eg via a documentary: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/american-gospel-blows-hole-prosperity-gospel/ https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/american-gospel-b... A sermon clip with more than a million views: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTc_FoELt8s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTc_FoELt8s A rap which drew a lot of attention when published: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pl4WevY-GPU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pl4WevY-GPU An explainer article: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/what-you-should-know-about-the-prosperity-gospel/ https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/what-you-should-k... A church journal issue dedicated to the subject: https://www.9marks.org/journal/prosperity-gospel/ https://www.9marks.org/journal/prosperity-gospel/ An article by the nephew of one of these con artists, explaining why he left the racket: https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2017/october/benny-hinn-costi-uncle-prosperity-preaching-testimony.html https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2017/october/benny-hinn... And the list goes on and on. There are many ongoing efforts to combat this kind of false teaching. Jesus' own teaching and that of his first followers were quite clear on the point that greed is sinful and dangerous, and that love and generosity to the needy, not wealth and success, should characterize Christians. [Luk 12:15, 33-34 ESV] 15 And he said to them, "Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions." ... 33 Sell your possessions, and give to the needy. Provide yourselves with moneybags that do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys. 34 For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. [1Ti 6:9-10 ESV] But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs. [Eph 4:28 ESV] 28 Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need. [Phl 2:3-4 ESV] 3 Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. 4 Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. [Jas 1:27 ESV] 27 Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world. [1Jo 3:16-18 ESV] 16 By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. 17 But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him? 18 Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth. Prosperity teaching sells a parody of Christianity. It preys on those whose faith and knowledge of scripture is too shallow to tell the difference.
• nvarsj 7y ago
  All religion isn’t bad. But it’s the perfect vehicle for con artists. The government even encourages it by making religious based cons tax free.
• hoseja 7y ago
  Religious upbringing installs backdoors that these scammers exploit.
• hawkesnest 7y ago
  Religion is "bad" in the eyes of many for completely legitimate reasons, not just because of the opportunity for fraud.
  • kcmastrpc 7y ago
    Not legitimate at all, they're just as dogmatic and disillusioned as those they purport to despise.
    • hawkesnest 7y ago
      Despise? Maybe some, but probably as many religious folks who despise nonbelievers. What are nonbelievers dogmatic and disillusioned about, exactly?
• maxxxxx 7y ago
  One thing that bothers me is that churches still get special status. When you look at the Catholic Church it’s pretty much guaranteed that any other organization would have been shut down a long time ago if it had shown the same behavior in light of child abuse. Churches should be treated like any other organization but I think there is still a lot of reluctance to do so.
  • kcmastrpc 7y ago
    The vast majority of churches are net positives for their communities, this applies to _all_ churches. Are you saying the local Islamic centre, or protestant church should suffer because of the corruption in the Catholic organization?
    • ones_and_zeros 7y ago
      May be just a personal opinion but I don't consider paying taxes on vast amounts of wealth or the land you own in support of a community to be suffering.
      • harimau777 7y ago
        Would requirement to pay these taxes also apply to secular non-profits?
    • maxxxxx 7y ago
      No. What I am saying is that the Catholic Church should have been shut down or forced to clean up their act. And other churches who do bad stuff should be treated like secular organizations who do bad stuff. Right now if you call yourself a “church” you can get away with things other organizations can’t.
      • kcmastrpc 7y ago
        Tell that to the branch davidians.
• Zigurd 7y ago
  Don't excuse "established religion" so quickly. With the accumulation of prestige and power comes even greater crimes: https://buffalonews.com/2019/05/19/why-buffalos-child-molesting-priests-werent-arrested/ https://buffalonews.com/2019/05/19/why-buffalos-child-molest...
  • umvi 7y ago
    Oh, I know. I am religious, but I do not agree with all religions. I think some are better than others and even think some religious organizations are evil (like Scientology). But, I feel religion has given me enormous benefits in life - it's helped me focus less on myself, it's given me a profound sense of identity and purpose in life. I don't feel that it has hindered my career or love of learning/science/engineering at all. I think it could help a lot of people who struggle with lack of sense of purpose/identity/community, etc. So I don't like it when all religion is condemned because of bad actors in some religions. To use an imperfect analogy, I don't like it when people use logic like this: "All projects on GitHub are bad. Look at all these poorly written packages: X, Y, Z. Look at all these bigoted project maintainers. Did you know X project was a front for human trafficking? There is no reason for me to explore and contribute to projects on GitHub when there are so many compelling reasons to the contrary."
    • tasuki 7y ago
      It appears to me you believe in belief. https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Belief_in_belief https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Belief_in_belief
    • socks 7y ago
      Having grown up religious, I used to think this way. In my family, I now see people coming up against real hardship, and because their purpose in life is so deeply rooted in religion, they don't know how to cope with things emotionally (instead, trying to defer the emotional toll of those things, believing that their god will handle it)... and they make strange decisions, things go horribly, they are left struggling to comprehend. They live as if they are on a rollercoaster of hope, anticipation, crisis, disappointment, recovery, hope. In my own experience, having your self worth and sense of identity attached to religion is a fragile existence, especially if you are logically inclined.
• deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
• Bakary 7y ago
  The problem is that, as "edgy" as this statement might sound, it's genuinely hard to draw the line between the con and the real thing. This doesn't appear to be qualitatively different from the Church's system of indulgences, to name one example. Religious organizations have a clear incentive to generate money. At least with science, you can point to actual inventions and innovations that have a measurable and noticeable impact. Religion can and does have a beneficial impact especially in poor regions, but it does so independently of whether its teachings have any particular truth to them. If the world were reset somehow, you'd end up with a completely different set of religious beliefs that would nonetheless have a similar role as a social bonding agent, whereas you would have a decent chance of the same research being done again if the scientific method does end up being developed in the world.
  • umvi 7y ago
    > If the world were reset somehow, you'd end up with a completely different set of religious beliefs that would nonetheless have a similar role as a social bonding agent, whereas you would have a decent chance of the same research being done again if the scientific method does end up being developed in the world. This statement is made from the assumption that God doesn't exist and that all religions are equally false. From my perspective, I would argue that if you reset the world, yes, purely man-made religions would disappear and be replaced by different (man-made) ones, but ultimately God's true religion would always re-emerge. For example, in my completely biased opinion, religions like Scientology and Buddism would disappear on world reset to possibly be replaced with some roughly equivalent man-made belief systems under different names (or not). But Christianity (insert the "true" religion here) would persist on world reset (perhaps even under the same name), and the entire Abrahamic-family of religions would re-emerge under different names. They might not be known as "Judaism" or "Islam" or "Protestantism" but basically God would call Abraham-esque prophets to establish his religion, the religion would go off the rails, false prophets would emerge, people would try to restore the church to it's previous state, God would re-establish with new prophets, etc., and you would be left with hundreds of similar prophet-based religions all in the same family of religions, all worshiping the same God, all acknowledging a common set of scripture (which would have the same core religious beliefs as the pre-reset world did), all acknowledging a common set of (ancient) prophets, but with varying dogmatic differences due to aforementioned corruptions.
• gameswithgo 7y ago
  You don't need to appeal to anything like this to see why religion is bad. Its just straight up crazy. I spend decades of my life trying to have deep arguments about this with people on the internet and elsewhere before it occurred to me that its so obviously crazy that trying to have deep discussions about it are a waste of time. Imagine trying to convince someone that Thor isn't real. That is how crazy it is no matter what religion you are talking about.
• mikeash 7y ago
  The difference is that science trains people to be skeptical and challenge all claims, whereas religion leaves people ripe for being taken advantage of by training people to believe weird and unverifiable claims from people with the right title.