Why isn't this better known? The way the Tamils were treated is so pure a representation of evil that I can barely get through the Wikipedia page. This was the work of Buddhists, too! I've been taught that Buddhists were peaceful and non-violent by creed, but clearly not if the only Buddhist majority nation is capable of such abomination.
Westerners rarely associate Buddhism with extremism or violence, but Buddhist movements in Asia have often raised few qualms about the use of force. Buddhist authorities have, at times, justified violence against the faith’s enemies and supported authoritarian regimes.
* https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/myanmar-s-extr...
These links are just Myanmar.
We are still people.
I'm always shocked when Europeans or Americans single out Christianity as some uniquely malevolent force.
People are like this. We have always been like this. Being atheist, agnostic, Muslim, Christian, Buddhist, Hindu, pagan, heathen, etc -- it doesn't make you superhuman. We're all capable of this and the sooner everyone realizes this the sooner we can work to prevent tragedy.
I don't think there is clear cause and effect when it comes to religion and irrational behavior.
Having visited over a hundred churches (for thousands of services), they are the only place I've consistently seen people teach and accept things that what everyone can plainly see is false. Children are taught that fallacies are better than critical thinking, wherever it serves their belief system.
I’ve visited many, many churches, likely hundreds. I love their architecture. I have never been to a service and am an atheist.
Note that strictly speaking, atheism is just rejecting the existence of any god. That doesn't necessarily make magic out of the equation. Though certainly atheism is generally associated to the rejection of any superstitious belief.
But just believing that ZFC make a sound mathematical foundation doesn't make you an advanced flawless logician. People stay mere humans, whatever they believe might be the most relevant foundation to use their more or less weak reasoning ability.
IDK what ZFC is, so perhaps you can enlighten me?
Mathematics is seen a formally grown, logical system, that has features that are "discovered" rather than invented .. "Given some {X}, {Y} follows without question".
However it rests(?) on Axiomatic foundations ..
Most famously: https://www.sfu.ca/~swartz/euclid.htm
It is understood that one can tweak an axiom, the fifth posulate for example, and get a different logical ediface - a non Euclidean hyperbolic geometry in that case.
The ZFC "Axiom of Choice" has bearing on infinities and other things, including many proofs that depend on reduction by absurdity.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zermelo%E2%80%93Fraenkel_set_t...
History's arc is much longer than communism, and religion is tied to some pretty horrific events.
You can agree with their take on religion or not, but their motivation remains the same.
Even historically religious motives for "bad behaviours" were rare.
> Even historically religious motives for "bad behaviours" were rare.
Doubt. Still, even if that's accurate, my point was that raising people to be easily manipulated sheep doesn't produce a robust society. It just makes them easier to exploit. MLMs are common in predominantly Mormon communities for a reason.
You misunderstand what I said. I was refuting the idea that religion caused genocides, rather than claiming lack of religion caused genocides.
I think religion per se is too generic and varied to correlate with anything. Sometimes the lack of a particular religion or variant of a particular religion may either cause or oppose genocide - there is a reason, for example, that the Nazis wanted to replace Christianity with new religions, (Positive Christianity and new-paganism - both very different from the originals they drew on/pretended to be), consistent with their ideology.
This is the heart of the matter: any ill by an atheist is determined to be caused by something other than atheism. Meanwhile any motivation of an evil doer who professes a religion is pinned on that religion.
Who is "we" and why do they hear that?
Eg: Australia was colonised to take land possession ahead of the Dutch and the French, for finnancial gain, and to utilise the prisoners piling up in hulks on the river flats once the thirteen colonies in North America stopped taking them.
The thirteen US colonies were largely established as hard nosed business ventures with substantial private investments that looked for an eventual return.
The South and Central American colonies were pretty much all established to support plantations for sugar and other goods.
In these examples religion came along for the ride and provided a carrotof comfort in contrast to the sticks and guns of the military who also rode in.
Doesn't make it true though.
> Whereas actions of atheists are unable to be used against atheism
Why not, aside from the obvious observation that "atheists" are not as homogenuous in their belief as, say, "Catholics".
In general the actions of, say, Nazis, can be used against them (ie Nazis) but not against humans globally or atheists in Australia, that's nonsensical.
Only if people are doing something because they are Catholics.
Atheist polemicists often treat the actions of any (supposed, in many cases) Christian as an objection to Christianity in general, which is just as nonsensical. That is what is objectionable in their argument.
I'm sure some do .. I'll even grant that most online that engage in such arguments likely do.
I'd suggest the bulk of atheists don't spend much time pointlessly going around and around in such circles.
The "common tactics" of "Atheist polemicists" presented here so far are just daft - they're more the hallmark of obsessives that engage in oline forum textfests.
> Only if people are doing something because they are Catholics.
The statement I made was that "atheists" are not as homogeneous in their belief as, say, "Catholics".
I stand by it.
I would also suggest that Mormons are more homogeneous as a group than "atheists", the Greek Orthodox are more homogeneous as a group than "atheists", etc.
If people engage in activities under the organisational overwatch of the Catholic Church, eg: the Christian Brothers in Bindoon, then the Catholic Church bears responsibility for allowing those actions to proceed unchecked.
Its pretty common to do so.
For example, blaming the Spanish inquisition (an arm of the Spanish monarchy) on the Catholic Church, or people claiming that Hitler was a Catholic (without adding the important "as a child" qualifier).
> would also suggest that Mormons are more homogeneous as a group than "atheists", the Greek Orthodox are more homogeneous as a group than "atheists", etc.
Going back to what I said earlier, the original point was religion vs lack of religion - and I would argue that religious people (Christians, Hindus, pagans, ....) are a less homogenous group than atheists.
Of course, atheist compatible doctrines too can can be taken as reason to go kill those who dare to believe otherwise. But they can't pretend they have a book directly inspired by some super being that justify their actions. That is, one can also adulate Marx and kill random dudes because that's fair within their interpretation of das Kapital.
https://islam.stackexchange.com/questions/10768/death-penalt...
The external affair minister of India, Mr Jaishankar, recently excoriated a European politician over Indians handling of Ukraine. He said 'Europe needs to get past the mentality that Europe's problems are the world's problems, while the world's problems are not Europes problems '.
And this is where that attitude comes from
India has dealt with genocides at its borders in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, and yet most Europeans and Americans have no idea. The United States of America criticized India for helping Bangladesh during it's Pakistan sponsored genocide, and actually understood military action against India to protect Pakistan's ability to slaughter Bangladeshis.
Again, in Sri Lanka, no one cared
Yet the moment India undertakes it's strategic interests regarding cheap Russian oil, suddenly the whole world starts pointing fingers
There's a lot that goes on in Asia that is simply not reported. If you read American media it's almost like that part of the world doesn't exist
Mind you, I’m not saying deaths anywhere are good of course - but the reporting is terribly biased in a way that many may not even realize, especially if you live in one of those “western” countries and primarily consume English media/news. Heck, just look at what is commonly considered “core countries” [2]?
1 - https://www.reddit.com/r/funny/comments/4buox6/tragic_world_... 2 - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Core_countries
Like I get why people find it difficult to understand Mandarin. But this is English news we're talking about ...
There are a couple of Buddhist majority countries; Cambodia, Thailand, Mongolia, Laos and more. Also, judging a religion from its adherents worst atrocities is a mistake - for example, look at history. It is hard to rank them given the high level of sickening background brutality but if we're just commenting on religions not living up to their values the crusades (particularly #4) are difficult to top.
If you want to read a good non-fiction on the Sri Lankan civil war, check out "The Divided Island" by Samanth Subramaniam.