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> My dad, who hasn’t stepped foot in a mosque in decades was freaking out when my brother turned 30 without kids. Exactly, it's a cultural thing, not a religi

> My dad, who hasn’t stepped foot in a mosque in decades was freaking out when my brother turned 30 without kids. Exactly, it's a cultural thing, not a religious one. See, for example, how a lot of Hindu Indian parents would react similarly.

rayiner 3y ago
There’s no clear distinction between religion and culture. Both my parents are antagonistic to organized religion (because secularism is a class marker in Bangladesh) but they don’t eat pork. Their moral axioms are rooted in Islam, even if they don’t recognize it as such. The same is true for secular Americans. As an outsider, it’s quite obviously an outgrowth of mainline Protestant Christianity.
- catlover76 3y ago
  > There’s no clear distinction between religion and culture. While too many religious people let their cultural and other beliefs/values contaminate their religious practice, it is still pretty simple to draw a line, and it's silly to try to infer something about a religious group based on the attitudes of your irreligious parents. As a couple of us have pointed out, the same attitudes are exhibited by non-Muslim South Asians, so why are you still asserting their views reflect some vestige of their ancestral religion as opposed to the culture they come from?
  - rayiner 3y ago
    I’m talking about the other direction: religion influencing people’s culture. Religion and culture are deeply intertwined in a bi-directional exchange. Asia offers a good example of how religion makes a difference. The whole area has been the subject of extensive population control efforts. But the Muslim fertility rate in India is markedly higher than the Hindu rate. And the fertility rate for Indian Buddhists is much lower than either, and closer to East Asian countries with a strong Buddhist tradition.
    - selimthegrim 3y ago
      >But the Muslim fertility rate in India is markedly higher than the Hindu rate. Citation needed, they've been converging for a while now.

rayiner 3y ago

There’s no clear distinction between religion and culture. Both my parents are antagonistic to organized religion (because secularism is a class marker in Bangladesh) but they don’t eat pork. Their moral axioms are rooted in Islam, even if they don’t recognize it as such. The same is true for secular Americans. As an outsider, it’s quite obviously an outgrowth of mainline Protestant Christianity.

catlover76 3y ago
> There’s no clear distinction between religion and culture. While too many religious people let their cultural and other beliefs/values contaminate their religious practice, it is still pretty simple to draw a line, and it's silly to try to infer something about a religious group based on the attitudes of your irreligious parents. As a couple of us have pointed out, the same attitudes are exhibited by non-Muslim South Asians, so why are you still asserting their views reflect some vestige of their ancestral religion as opposed to the culture they come from?
- rayiner 3y ago
  I’m talking about the other direction: religion influencing people’s culture. Religion and culture are deeply intertwined in a bi-directional exchange. Asia offers a good example of how religion makes a difference. The whole area has been the subject of extensive population control efforts. But the Muslim fertility rate in India is markedly higher than the Hindu rate. And the fertility rate for Indian Buddhists is much lower than either, and closer to East Asian countries with a strong Buddhist tradition.
  - selimthegrim 3y ago
    >But the Muslim fertility rate in India is markedly higher than the Hindu rate. Citation needed, they've been converging for a while now.