Religious Intolerance? People & Ideas Should Not Be
Treated as Equals
By - Casper Rigsby
One of the biggest complaints I hear from theists is that I’m intolerant of
their religion. Quite often, these people act as if it’s a personal attack on
them specifically. I am indeed intolerant of religion, but it isn’t my fault that
these people can’t understand that there’s a difference between hating an
idea and hating the people who believe in that idea.
Ignorance IS NOT Bliss
I want you to think about something for a minute:
If you had cancer, would you simply tolerate it? Would you let it run
rampant and unchecked as it destroys your body? Would you say it has
every right to exist even as it robs you of your life? Your average person will
opt for treatment. They will choose to fight the disease that threatens them.
You don’t just accept it and go on as if it isn’t there, because the only
options are fight or die.
Religion is a cancer. It is a symbiotic parasite that feeds on the minds of
mankind. Much like HIV, this disease doesn’t kill on its own. What it does is
weaken the defenses of those who are infected and leaves them vulnerable
to infection by otherwise manageable maladies. A person who has a fear of
the unknown or things that are “different” may have a proclivity towards
racism or homophobia, and these issues are manageable on their own—but
then you add religion to the mix, things become more dangerously
entrenched. Instead of fighting this fear with knowledge, people like this will
embrace their fear because they’ve been given a justification for it. They
say, “It’s okay to tell homosexuals they’re unnatural and immoral, because
this book says that my chosen God agrees with me on the issue.” They see
nothing wrong with hating people because they believe that their God hates
these people too.
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