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Comment by NDlurker | Hacker News Reader

Religious extremism is a mental illness and has no place in government.

>Saudi Arabia is among the world's most prolific executioners. According to Amnesty, at least 175 people had been executed in the kingdom this year as of 5 October, most of them foreign nationals, including at least 94 people from more than 20 countries. It has no written penal code, leaving many offences and punishments to judges' interpretation of Sharia, and broad provisions in its counter-terrorism and cybercrime laws have been used to impose long sentences for social media posts.

This should be widely publicized. No foreigner is safe.

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Iran has executed at least 2,159 people in 2025. Apparently over 500 people this year ( https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20260827-iran-executes... ).

Saudi Arabia executed 356 people last year. Apparently a record.

Iraq, China, Egypt, Somalia... The list goes on. And unfortunately the USA is also on that wall of shame (47 in 2025).

The world is not in a great shape.

EDIT: In many Muslim countries blasphemy and apostasy are punishable by death. Not all of them enforce it though but it's still in the books.

Even where it isn’t the law it’s often the practice to lynch perceived blasphemers, and wouldn’t ya know… that leads to a lot of accusations of blasphemy against broadly disliked people.

I guess the bright side is that they’re less prepared to believe in criminal witchcraft than North Africans.

> Religious extremism is a mental illness and has no place in government.

I'd extend that to any religion based in supernatural beings being a mental illness in an adult. It's incredible how many adults can't realize that supernatural beings are an imagination exercise, and any control they allow to others based on this imaginary authority is a form of exploitation.

These people should not be making laws for the rest of us, use official media to disseminate religious messages, or act based on religious beliefs.

Based on original reading of the story though the man's comments were reported to Saudi Arabia by his fellow countrymen. Also Blasphemy law exists in many other Islamic countries like Pakistan etc.

Yeah, that's all disgusting human behavior. And it's even more disgusting that agents of the Saudi government will murder him over it.

> Also Blasphemy law exists in many other Islamic countries like Pakistan etc.

England and Wales isn't far off, some might claim. The blasphemy law was repealed only in 2008 but at the same time replaced with something not so severe, which got tested recently by a man burning convicted for burning a Quran, which got overturned on a high court appeal.

Not to mention the whole raft of hate/offence/communication crimes that can be used in a similar manner:

https://freespeechunion.org/fundraisers/blasphemy-fundraiser

I know balance must exist, especially when it approaches physical violence, but we must have an absolute right to discuss intolerance and violence and misogyny no matter what book it's in.

> I know balance must exist, especially when it approaches physical violence, but we must have an absolute right to discuss intolerance and violence and misogyny no matter what book it's in.

You mean when the islamic prophet mandates killing people for disagreements? Which is then countered by stating the quran does not directly demand it (and even that is a stretch, or shall we say "technically true", it merely strongly encourages it)

And let's just not discuss what happens when you tell a muslim "ok, brutally kidnapping and executing people for disagreeing with you is wrong, and certainly killing an entire tribe/village of people killing men, women and children all because one of them disagreed with you is VERY wrong, so then tell me the prophet was absolutely wrong for doing that".

If there exist any kind of moral issue that should be judged fully as black or white, this one would be the top of the list.

Just pointing out the problem by making a comment stating more exactly what the problem is. Just look what happens to this comment ...

A few things I'd challenge here:

- the US believes religion doesn't belong in government, a lot of the rest of the world does.

-I don't believe in executing people for what they say, however I do also believe in a countries right to self govern, but I also believe other countries should condemn certain behaviour - it's a fine line with, and a fuzzy one.

- I also believe in 'when in rome'. Eg I was a Catholic in Morocco, and you can bet your boots I didn't go anywhere near their (fairly impressive!) mosques (as I didn't have a good understanding of their requirements, and I wasn't around long enough to have the time to learn).

It's a joke. In the US you have to put your hand on a Bible or equivalent when testifying in court.

France is a country where religion is separated from government.

>In the US you have to put your hand on a Bible or equivalent when testifying in court.

No you don't. Why is this lie allowed to perpetuate?

I wonder if France becomes majority or plurality Muslim, will they keep that rule?

> the US believes religion doesn't belong in government, a lot of the rest of the world does.

Wait, did I step in a different timeline, one where there is not a major cultural battlefield in the US that’s centered around religion?

You might want to see your country from outside of its borders to have a more objective perspective on the matter. The US is on its way to becoming a Christian fundamentalist country in ways we haven’t seen since the middle ages in Europe, for example.

I guess it’s to be expected as all the religious weirdos fled Europe for the Americas, and they hold still a lot of power. I mean, you have “In God we trust” in your banknotes. Not very secular of you.

Freedom of religion is deeply intwined in the US's legal and political system, to the point where superficial pronouncements made by certain parties are not effective in changing that fact

I'm more referring to the colloquial 'separation of church and state', or formally "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof".

The US is a theocracy now too https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcysQmPQvbs

They are allies with the world bully whom no one can oppose. Nothing will change there as a result

> mental illness and has no place in government

People with mental illnesses should be in government though, this is a terrible argument.

Huh? People with mental illnesses should not be in government.

I would imagine that the idea is to have representation for mental illness in government, but stability and compassion are more important.

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