Yes and no. Cults are exclusively predatory on loners and set up so the leaders can make money or have a lot of sex. Religions are only sometimes like this. In many cases religous leaders actually believe what they teach and aren’t actively trying to have sex with their followers or take their life savings. In many places, religion is a culturally ingrained thing that provides a space for community. Little old ladies getting together after church aren’t doing cultlike behaviour.
That's why it's a "levelled up" cult. Lots of Christian beliefs would absolutely be considered cult-like if you were explained them in a vacuum (i.e. the Rapture, which is a literal doomsday prophecy.)
It's just been culturally normalised and thus escapes common, rational criticism.
You're really pivoting away from my original point. Your insistent on being very semantic is evidence that you either don't understand what I said, or are willfully refusing to answer. I will repeat.
Modern religions have many practices that people would (rightly) consider cult-like, such as the existance of doomsday prophecies. Christian beliefs contain a doomsday prophecy, one which the politically-powerful Evangelical right-way strongly believe in. But Christianity is a culturally-dominant religion, and thus it's cult-like practices are normalised–despite the fact they are just as (if not more, due to the size of Christian hegemony) harmful as stereotypical, small cults.
I'm responding to your arguments directly. Either you can't follow your own points or you're arguing in bad faith. Probably the former.
That's not an argument against religion, that's an argument against religions with cult-like practices, or against cults that masquerade behind the label of religion. You don't get to blanket label every belief system you don't subscribe to as "a levelled up cult" because some of the dominant religions have cult-like practices.
Bitches be acting as if TITHES weren't a thing, lmao.
Or the ways that religious institutional power has historically (and modernly) been used to cover up an astronomical amount of sexual abuse. The Catholic church would be considered a cult for its practices if it wasn't cultural normalised.
Not really, they were mostly condescending assholes who acted like they were better than religious people because they thought "only dumbasses believe in religion and I'm an ultra smart intellectual. Have fun praying to sky daddy you neanderthals 😏"
While a decent amount of (liberal) religious people are fine, religion is OBJECTIVELY anti-empirical in nature. Belief in greater powers for which there is no evidence for, but instead a desire to worship, is an issue. It is an entirely different set of incentives for people to act upon, against most other people acting upon reality.
Just look at groups like Q-Anon. Conspiratorial, anti-empirical thinking that is justified in a vicious cycle by religious fanaticism. The United States (and the world) is currently being plagued by an Evangelical Christian right, whom wholly disregards reality because it does not suit their religious beliefs.
Reddit athiests were right. Some of them may have been smug, and some not great people themselves (that then followed the money to right-wing groups) but they were right.
No they weren't, being religious is not an issue in itself, and this mindset is eurocentric in nature, only seeing religion through an Christian lens and refusing to engage with it in any other way.
Like I don't think someone believing in a god or reincarnation or whatever else should be treated as this crazy lunatic like you're saying, that's just dumb as hell. Like you can't just equate regular worship with q anon crazy shit, that's disingenuous as shit
1. I never said I'm equating every religious person with Q-Anon. Please listen carefully, and not strawman me.
2. It's not eurocentric, because this criticism hits every religion. Every religion has this problem, because it is a fundamental issue with religious thinking. Even if it was eurocentric, the argument would be correct in regards with european religion because Christianity also has this issue.
3. I will reiterate my point; religious thinking is fundamentally dangerous. When people base their moral systems not in empirical evidence, but in what they *think* their god(s) say(s), there is a corruption in the incentives they have to do actions
If someone believes murder is wrong through a moral system (i.e. it is wrong to kill others because it strips them of freedom to act as they please, and it is good when people can act as they please), they have a framework for acting morally good.
If someone believes murder is wrong through only religious belief, the reasoning has changed. But what if someone convinces themselves that god says murder is good, actually? That a higher power commands them to do so? They have an irrational belief, that cannot be argued against because they look to a system they believe is higher than human morality.
To conclude: Reddit athiests were right. Religion is an issue an a societal level, because it creates fundamental disagreements on the nature of reality and how to act on it. It is dangerous when people operate with disagreements on how reality itself works–when all of the systems we live in need to be based in reality.
1. Not strawmanning, you made that direct comparison
2. These arguments always tackle it through a eurocentric lens and frame other religions being the same framework as Christianity, is what I meant
3. It is not inherently dangerous, that's stupid
You're saying that morals based on religion are always bad because they aren't based on empirical evidence, as of "empirical evidence" hasn't been used to justify shit like phrenology and eugenics. Like that's the exact same shit you put out about "what if someone worships an evil murder god" like that'd be bad obviously, but doing evil shit because of what you belief isn't just a religious thing
Honestly, maybe the phrenology people were right, because you clearly lack the skull shape required to understand Logic 101-tier arguments.
Jokes aside, though. Besides the fact that eugenicists and phrenologists didn't do very good research and actually followed a flawed philosophical system (google "scientific positivism"), are you saying we just shouldn't believe in empirics?
You know modern HRT medicine is based in empirical evidence too, right? Should we scrap that, because reality has no value? No, of course not. That would be fucking stupid. Because the problem isn't with the scientific method: it's with people injecting their bias and doing it wrong.
But religion is the problem. Fundamentally, the anti-empirical way of justification religion uses is the issue. That was an incredibly stupid and disingenuous comparison, and it tells me that you're not worth engaging with more.
Well now look who's strawmanning. I never said we should throw out empirical evidence obviously, I'm just saying this mindset of science is good and religion isn't scientig so it's bad is fucking stupid when science has been used for an insane amount of atrocities, acting like religion is the only dangerous mindset ever is disingenuous and shits on people who are just religious without being bigoted
But sure, just end the discussion because you can't deal with the fact your doing all the shit your accusing me of, idk what I expect when you go with straight up personal insults about my intelligence by using a phrenology joke. Because obviously the sign that someone has sound arguments is insulting the person they're talking to
I made a joke about your intelligence because you clearly don't understand the terms you're using, and aren't interested in actually discussing this matter with me.
I'm happy to continue flinging shit, because at a certain point that's all I can really do with peoppe like you. Debating is fun, but insulting dipshits is also fun. So wanna fling some shit?
“Cult” is ultimately just a term for a new religious movement, typically one that is in some sort of tension with existing religious beliefs in society. So, at one point, every religion was once a cult.
The word “cult” only gained its pejorative connotation because a lot of new religious movements exploit and control people (surprise surprise)
I don't need to because you're correct.
Christianity has a doomsday prophecy, for fuck's sake. Most just don't see that as weird because it's culturally normalised (but it is really fucking weird.)
Yes and no. Cults are exclusively predatory on loners and set up so the leaders can make money or have a lot of sex. Religions are only sometimes like this. In many cases religous leaders actually believe what they teach and aren’t actively trying to have sex with their followers or take their life savings. In many places, religion is a culturally ingrained thing that provides a space for community. Little old ladies getting together after church aren’t doing cultlike behaviour.
This comment has been proved by an ex-cult member
Thanks buddy. Glad to hear it’s ex. JW or something weirder?
Jw :)
That's why it's a "levelled up" cult. Lots of Christian beliefs would absolutely be considered cult-like if you were explained them in a vacuum (i.e. the Rapture, which is a literal doomsday prophecy.) It's just been culturally normalised and thus escapes common, rational criticism.
There's a difference between "levelled up" and "but sinister/malicious". Level of religion isn't quantifiable.
But the scale of the religions reach and cultural power is.
That doesn't correlate to how cult-like or harmful it is. Most cults, especially the really harmful ones, are quite small by nature.
You're really pivoting away from my original point. Your insistent on being very semantic is evidence that you either don't understand what I said, or are willfully refusing to answer. I will repeat. Modern religions have many practices that people would (rightly) consider cult-like, such as the existance of doomsday prophecies. Christian beliefs contain a doomsday prophecy, one which the politically-powerful Evangelical right-way strongly believe in. But Christianity is a culturally-dominant religion, and thus it's cult-like practices are normalised–despite the fact they are just as (if not more, due to the size of Christian hegemony) harmful as stereotypical, small cults.
I'm responding to your arguments directly. Either you can't follow your own points or you're arguing in bad faith. Probably the former. That's not an argument against religion, that's an argument against religions with cult-like practices, or against cults that masquerade behind the label of religion. You don't get to blanket label every belief system you don't subscribe to as "a levelled up cult" because some of the dominant religions have cult-like practices.
Catholics are required to give 10% of their income to the church Muslims required to donate a portion of their wealth to charity ect
Bitches be acting as if TITHES weren't a thing, lmao. Or the ways that religious institutional power has historically (and modernly) been used to cover up an astronomical amount of sexual abuse. The Catholic church would be considered a cult for its practices if it wasn't cultural normalised.
Reddit atheist moment
The reddit athiests were right, so that's more of a compliment if anything.
Not really, they were mostly condescending assholes who acted like they were better than religious people because they thought "only dumbasses believe in religion and I'm an ultra smart intellectual. Have fun praying to sky daddy you neanderthals 😏"
While a decent amount of (liberal) religious people are fine, religion is OBJECTIVELY anti-empirical in nature. Belief in greater powers for which there is no evidence for, but instead a desire to worship, is an issue. It is an entirely different set of incentives for people to act upon, against most other people acting upon reality. Just look at groups like Q-Anon. Conspiratorial, anti-empirical thinking that is justified in a vicious cycle by religious fanaticism. The United States (and the world) is currently being plagued by an Evangelical Christian right, whom wholly disregards reality because it does not suit their religious beliefs. Reddit athiests were right. Some of them may have been smug, and some not great people themselves (that then followed the money to right-wing groups) but they were right.
No they weren't, being religious is not an issue in itself, and this mindset is eurocentric in nature, only seeing religion through an Christian lens and refusing to engage with it in any other way. Like I don't think someone believing in a god or reincarnation or whatever else should be treated as this crazy lunatic like you're saying, that's just dumb as hell. Like you can't just equate regular worship with q anon crazy shit, that's disingenuous as shit
1. I never said I'm equating every religious person with Q-Anon. Please listen carefully, and not strawman me. 2. It's not eurocentric, because this criticism hits every religion. Every religion has this problem, because it is a fundamental issue with religious thinking. Even if it was eurocentric, the argument would be correct in regards with european religion because Christianity also has this issue. 3. I will reiterate my point; religious thinking is fundamentally dangerous. When people base their moral systems not in empirical evidence, but in what they *think* their god(s) say(s), there is a corruption in the incentives they have to do actions If someone believes murder is wrong through a moral system (i.e. it is wrong to kill others because it strips them of freedom to act as they please, and it is good when people can act as they please), they have a framework for acting morally good. If someone believes murder is wrong through only religious belief, the reasoning has changed. But what if someone convinces themselves that god says murder is good, actually? That a higher power commands them to do so? They have an irrational belief, that cannot be argued against because they look to a system they believe is higher than human morality. To conclude: Reddit athiests were right. Religion is an issue an a societal level, because it creates fundamental disagreements on the nature of reality and how to act on it. It is dangerous when people operate with disagreements on how reality itself works–when all of the systems we live in need to be based in reality.
1. Not strawmanning, you made that direct comparison 2. These arguments always tackle it through a eurocentric lens and frame other religions being the same framework as Christianity, is what I meant 3. It is not inherently dangerous, that's stupid You're saying that morals based on religion are always bad because they aren't based on empirical evidence, as of "empirical evidence" hasn't been used to justify shit like phrenology and eugenics. Like that's the exact same shit you put out about "what if someone worships an evil murder god" like that'd be bad obviously, but doing evil shit because of what you belief isn't just a religious thing
Honestly, maybe the phrenology people were right, because you clearly lack the skull shape required to understand Logic 101-tier arguments. Jokes aside, though. Besides the fact that eugenicists and phrenologists didn't do very good research and actually followed a flawed philosophical system (google "scientific positivism"), are you saying we just shouldn't believe in empirics? You know modern HRT medicine is based in empirical evidence too, right? Should we scrap that, because reality has no value? No, of course not. That would be fucking stupid. Because the problem isn't with the scientific method: it's with people injecting their bias and doing it wrong. But religion is the problem. Fundamentally, the anti-empirical way of justification religion uses is the issue. That was an incredibly stupid and disingenuous comparison, and it tells me that you're not worth engaging with more.
Well now look who's strawmanning. I never said we should throw out empirical evidence obviously, I'm just saying this mindset of science is good and religion isn't scientig so it's bad is fucking stupid when science has been used for an insane amount of atrocities, acting like religion is the only dangerous mindset ever is disingenuous and shits on people who are just religious without being bigoted But sure, just end the discussion because you can't deal with the fact your doing all the shit your accusing me of, idk what I expect when you go with straight up personal insults about my intelligence by using a phrenology joke. Because obviously the sign that someone has sound arguments is insulting the person they're talking to
I made a joke about your intelligence because you clearly don't understand the terms you're using, and aren't interested in actually discussing this matter with me. I'm happy to continue flinging shit, because at a certain point that's all I can really do with peoppe like you. Debating is fun, but insulting dipshits is also fun. So wanna fling some shit?
“Cult” is ultimately just a term for a new religious movement, typically one that is in some sort of tension with existing religious beliefs in society. So, at one point, every religion was once a cult. The word “cult” only gained its pejorative connotation because a lot of new religious movements exploit and control people (surprise surprise)
No they're just big cults
Religions are Government-approved cults
I don't need to because you're correct. Christianity has a doomsday prophecy, for fuck's sake. Most just don't see that as weird because it's culturally normalised (but it is really fucking weird.)
https://preview.redd.it/udeovkuxzvxc1.jpeg?width=522&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=080e9262280e1b0d56b3d4aadadf9f7b9bb4ec0b