Pointless

why would you do that?

are u serious?

yeah, I'm enjoying it.

don't understand why you'd delete it

ok, an example of what i mean and this is very close to home for yourself mate.

taking ww2 as a case in point, if religion hadnt existed during ww2 there wouldve been 6million less deaths during it.

are you seriously asking me, whether i'd delete it - thats what i meant. slow day today?

lol no offence ness but thats the most retarded thing I've heard all day... thats like saying there wouldn't be homophobia if homosexuals didn't exist.

I understand what youre saying; but the jews didn't slaughter millions, so it wasn't religion that was responsible for such tragic deaths... religion was the victim - not the cause.

All I'm asking for is one war that was caused by religion and religion alone... If religion does cause so many wars surely naming one war wouldn't be that hard?

haha no I'm asking you not to... I'm sad, old and boring... I find threads like this enjoyable

u still got the wrong end of the stick!

i MEANT did u seriously think i was going to? - which i wasn't!

or is it my slow day?

it keeps you 3 off the streets anyways....

hahaha sorry this thread has fried my brain

first off i'm not sayin it was the jews' fault for what happened however u have to see where i'm coming from here, religious difference fuels conflict. if there were no religion there would have been no victims. u say its a way of showing which side you're on, however, as with the case in iraq with sunnis and shias, there would be no sides (or a lot less teams anyway) there would always be the power struggle but the people fighting would be less inclined to take up arms if they were not fuelled by religion.

u asked for a religious war, how about the worst of all, the 30 year war between the protestant union and the catholic league? 14million died in the name of religion!

I can't see why the Jews and Palestinians couldn't live in peace without their religious differences on the same land.

I mean, you claim that worries over control of holy sites or whatever prevents your people from returning the land they captured, once you've accepted that religion is (almost certainly) nonsense, then there's no need to worry about them any more, beyond their value as architectural curiosities.

It's difficult to imagine an atheist suicide bomber, don't you think? I mean, some Islamic people are taught that if they marytr themselves, they go to heaven and get (is it 62 or something?) virgins to themselves. Incidently, you defend their right to believe this, and seem to attack my ridiculing such an idea. If you take the evidence based approach, that there is absolutelty no reason whatsoever to think that being dead is any different to being unborn, then suddenly your life here seems a lot more valuable - its all you've got. No virgins, no heaven, no God.....suddenly, there's rather less incentive to have a trim and climb on a bus in Jerusalem, or a train in London, or a plane over New York and pull the cord.

But difference has nothing to do with religion... If it weren't religion maybe Hitler would of slaughtered anyone with a J in their surname? The only solution to what your proposing is a population of clones

Also the holocaust was based on racial science, not religious... Hitler believed the Jews to be an inferior/superior race.

This is much better, religion was at the core of this war and I was hoping someone would cite something along these terms... While these wars were faught "in the name of religion", they were far from religious.

This was a power struggle in which some of the most powerful figures in Europe wore their religious affilition like a badge... There is nothing in the doctrine of either sects that would advocate such a war... This was the manipulation of religion to aid a power struggle.

Had christianity not existed the powers in question would of used something else to wear as a badge.

Just as science isn't to blame for the holocaust, religion isn't to blame for the "majority" of religious wars.... Man is.

Andy are you serious?

The initial Jewish settlements were free of religion, they were secular, socialist Jews who identified themselves as Jewish by ethnicity (the religious Jews supported the Palestinians)... Religion had nothing to do with the conflict.

The conflict is a result of two ethnic/national communities battling over their homelands... Both movements were secular nationalists, it wasn't until much later in the history of the conflict that religion was introduced to BOTH sides.

Religion perpetuates wars, by suggesting that it doesn't really matter if you die, and god controls it all anyway, so you shouldn't really think about whether or not to go over the precipice - if god wants you to live, you'll live

For an example of the terror of this, I urge someone to drive on an Indian road, it is one of the scariest things I've ever encountered.

It also provides justification for wars - almost every one I can think of actually - 'we're doing gods work......i prayed to god and he told me to..' etc. Remove religion, and you remove a justification.

Hitler on his cause, for example

And Joe, you have no reason to suppose that his Lord is any more likely to exist or be wrong than your G-d.

This isn't exclusive to religion, more people have died for nationalism/communism... Self-sacrifice isn't unique to religion from soldiers on the frontline to kamikazee pilots athiests ahve been sacrificing themselves since the dawn of athieism

I understand your point and it is valid... But it is not a cause for war.

Then how do explain Hitlers slaughter of the homosexuals?

Do we blame science for the holocaust? If you remove racial science from ww2 then Hitlers aryan movement wouldn't exist... Do we blame science for hiroshima? Without science hundreds of thousands wouldn't of died or been contaminated?

Religion is a powerful scapegoat and an even powerfuller agent to generate legitimacy for your cause... But it is nothing more... Any ideology/theology can be manipulated to suit a cause.

ok nick griffin :spangled:

Don't delete it!!!

I can see what ya saying here but i think my main gripe is that religion is the most powerful agent in generating conflict, and not only that but the whole concept of these people's religions is so improbable, the fact it drives them to kill others and themselves makes me believe we'd be better off without it.

bit harsh innit, he was only sayin that driving in india scares the shit out of him.

Oh...maybe I'm being slow as well!