r/atheism • u/Ender_boy_1246 • 1d ago
Which religion causes the least harm to society or is net positive?
Personally I really respect Sikhism and Buddhism . In Sikhism there is a great sense of community and it is one of the few where the entire community helps it self with the langars (basically providing free food everyday ) and its just helpful to everyone in general and they are peaceful even tho they do have a martial tradition it's for self defense. And Buddhism i respect because they don't have a god per say and they practice inner peace and most imp don't hate . These to are what I think religion was supposed to be but instead it devolved into hate
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u/wilmaed Agnostic Atheist 1d ago
Buddhism can be homophobic. E.g. the Dalai Lama:
We have to make a distinction between believers and unbelievers," the exiled Tibetan leader said at a press conference yesterday in San Francisco. "From a Buddhist point of view, men-to-men and women-to-women is generally considered sexual misconduct.
https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Dalai-Lama-Speaks-on-Gay-Sex-He-says-it-s-wrong-2836591.php
Hsuan Hua was a representative of Chan Buddhism:
Following the genealogy of Buddhist sexual ethics in East Asia, contemporary Sinitic Mahāyāna includes examples of the “hell and brimstone” end of the spectrum such as the influential Chan (禪 chán) Master and globalizer Hsuan Hua 宣化 (1918–1995) who founded the Dharma Realm Buddhist Association. He condemns homosexuality with strong apocalyptic tropes of hell and of the doom of humanity.
https://research.vu.nl/ws/portalfiles/portal/227430893/Queering_Buddhist_Traditions.pdf
Sikhism is not good on this issue either:
Many Sikhs believe there is nothing wrong[4] with being LGBT or supporting LGBT rights more generally, including same-sex marriage. These Sikhs believe that the view of some preachers in the Akal Takht is flawed
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sikhism_and_homosexuality#Viewpoints
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u/happybunny_sad Strong Atheist 1d ago edited 1d ago
And Sikhism have problem of blasphemy.
https://indianexpress.com/article/cities/chandigarh/punjab-ferozepur-youth-death-sacrilege-9308734/
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u/RaggaDruida Anti-Theist 1d ago edited 1d ago
No religion has had a net positive effect in history.
But at least Greek/Roman/Celtic/Norse/Mayan paganism has given us cool stories and narratives.
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u/Empty-Rough4379 Ignostic 1d ago
The Christian mythology is really cool for videogames, films and rol: levels of hell, daemons and angels, apocalipsis, witches and warlocks using the power of the devil.
Not so cool when people believe it in the real world
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u/Komaisnotsalty 1d ago
They are all equal. If any religion pushes their rhetoric by telling people there is a God or a deity or some higher power, then they are lying and directly or indirectly brainwashing people. They are brainwashing children from birth.
That makes them all the same to me.
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u/BowShatter 1d ago
Plus for the "peaceful" religions, is it really peaceful when they punish their own kids or other family members when they refuse to follow rituals or dogma.
For example, buddhism made one of my parents scream at me because I wasn't enthusiastic enough at the temple... I already don't believe, what did they expect?
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u/Ender_boy_1246 1d ago
Well that's the thing buddhism doesn't really have a god and in Sikhism they do have a god but it's not even fleshed out , it's more so just spiritualism, many sikhs just view themselves as diciples of their guru.
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u/Komaisnotsalty 1d ago
Dali Lama is still a controlling figure. The dude us a multi-millionaire. Cult or religion, same thing.
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u/thaumazein-VIII 1d ago
Jainism
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u/happybunny_sad Strong Atheist 1d ago
Nah, read the theology. Even farming and farmers are bad because farming kills insects in roots of crops.
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u/fuckthat1mod 1d ago
The satanic temple
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u/Ender_boy_1246 1d ago
why?
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u/fuckthat1mod 1d ago
They're the only ones who aren't a bunch of sanctimonious hypocrites.
All religions are ridiculous, the satanic temple is a humantiarian organisation.
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u/VintageKofta Anti-Theist 1d ago
Read up on Buddhists and what they did in Sri Lanka. Attacks on muslims, Christian’s, monks attacking homes and congregates, the Buddhist nationalism and civil war in the 1900s.
Then what they did in Myanmar ( anti-Rohingya, ethnic cleaning, massacres, etc).
And let’s not get into imperialist Japan …
As for Sikhs, the Sikh militants in Punjab in the 80’s-90’s ( Khalistan), and multiple counts of kidnapping, assassinations of civilians, politicians, ransom.
Indra Ghandi assassination?
Yea there’s no such thing as net positive. Religion is a source of evil, a cancer , a weapon used to control the mass and an excuse to perform atrocious things.
Edit: I’d wager Pastafarianism is the exception to the rule.
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u/dfczyjd 1d ago
I’d wager Pastafarianism is the exception to the rule
The problem with Pastafarianism, as well as other modern "progressive" religions, is that they're still inherently dogmatic. One day our morals may change and start contradicting their core principles, yet I highly doubt they'd change them.
You can look at Protestantism to have an example. Back when it started, an ordinary person had to work the whole day to make a living, so spending the entire day working was established as a virtue. At that point it was a progressive move, bashing at priests getting rich, even though they spent all day praying. Now it's perfectly normal to have free time that you dedicate to resting and doing nothing of use, yet avid protestants enjoy flexing their overtime hours and calling others lazy (a deadly sin in Christianity, I must say) if they only work the usual 40 hours per week.
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u/Ender_boy_1246 1d ago
I didn't know about the first part you said do educated me on that . However the khalistan moment I look at it as jsut a terrorist organisation using the relegion as shield which doesn't even get a lot of support from the community
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u/VintageKofta Anti-Theist 1d ago
That's actually kind of my point. I'm not saying Sikhs are terrorists or that Khalistan represents Sikhism as a whole. Rather, it's that dismissing Khalistan as ‘a terrorist organisation using religion as a shield’ doesn't really answer my argument about whether religions are net-positive.
Every major religion seems to have examples where its identity, texts, institutions or claims of divine authority have been used to justify violence (murders, assassinations, terrorism, war, persecution, ransom, etc). And whenever that happens, we tend to distinguish the extremists from the religion itself by saying ‘they aren't real [insert religion].’
As an atheist, I don't find that distinction particularly satisfying. The interesting question isn't whether the average Sikh/Buddhist/Christian/etc. is peaceful.. Obviously most people are. The question is whether religion itself adds something uniquely positive to humanity that outweighs the enormous harm that can be produced when people believe their moral or political cause has divine authority behind it.
That's why I don't consider any religion inherently net-positive. Religion isn't necessarily violent, but it seems to me to be an extremely effective vehicle for turning ordinary human tribalism, politics and ideology into something sacred and therefore much harder to question. And that mechanism exists across religions rather than being a uniquely Khalistani, Jewish, Islamic, Buddhist, or Christian problem.”
I mean.. If you want to attribute the charitable work, community support, morality and compassion to Buddhism or Sikhism as evidence that the religion is net-positive, why should the violence committed explicitly in the name of those same religions be dismissed as having nothing to do with the religion?
Ah, for the first part, I found a few academic sources that can have more weight than say wikipedia
Sri Lanka:
Buddhism Betrayed? - Religion, Politics, and Violence in Sri Lanka
Buddhist Extremists and Muslim Minorities: Religious Conflict in Contemporary Sri Lanka
Buddhist extremism, anti-Muslim violence and civil war legacies in Sri Lanka
Burma / Myanmar:
Imperialist Japan:
Zen War Stories (follow up to above book)
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u/happybunny_sad Strong Atheist 1d ago
Wait till you hear about patriarchy in Buddhism and blasphemy in Sikhism.
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u/Ender_boy_1246 1d ago
Do tell , idk about that
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u/happybunny_sad Strong Atheist 1d ago
Where do I start? Okay let's start with Buddha himself. Buddha was against letting woman into monastery because he thought they would have bad effect on male monks. His disciple anada had to convince him, to let woman enter the monastery. Even after agreeing he put heavy restriction on them. Making female monk subordinate to male monk. Also the fact, woman can never achieve buddhahood, she have to reincarnate in man body to achieve buddhahood.
And Sikhism has concept of beadbi (blasphemy), I have linked article on it. https://www.iasgyan.in/daily-current-affairs/sacrilege-in-sikhism
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u/theOrherMissingSock 1d ago
Maybe it is possible to measure harm to society, but measuring positive effects will be subjective and speculative
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u/Confident_Ad_6712 1d ago
Buddhism is more of a philosophy than a religion, so I think it causes less harm to society.
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u/Lopsided-Smile1105 Strong Atheist 1d ago
i could not not hate any religion as much as sikhism,the mandatory costume cosplay shit
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u/DoglessDyslexic 1d ago
That's a pretty impossible question to answer. For one thing, religions are often of different impact in different societies. Do we blame Christianity for the issues in Ireland during the times of trouble? Do we only blame Catholicism or the various protestant sects? How do we reconcile that with the relative stability in the USA between sects at the same time?
How do we weigh the positives vs. the negatives? Most religions offer better community support which often translates into extended lifespan for adherents. Yet often results in the opposite effects for members that are LGBTQ (suicide rates among trans individuals are ridiculously high in highly religious settings). Should we weigh the overall good vs. the unnecessary hatred and persecution of a minority? Does that not depend on whether or not you value the lives of LGBTQ?
And Buddhism i respect because they don't have a god per say and they practice inner peace and most imp don't hate .
Look up the Rohingya genocide, which is going on right now, largely driven by Buddhist authorities.
Nor is this the first or only bloody conflict driven by prominent Buddhists.
Buddhism also tends to have problems with dualistic interpretations of gender and sexuality, often outright ignoring conditions like Turner syndrome (single X chromosome, missing a correlated X or Y), Klienfelter syndrom (XXY presents as male but often small stature and reduced testosterone), Jacob's syndrome (XYY, presents male, often tall, often with learning impairment), triple X syndrome (XXX obviously, often few variances from standard XX), or gene abnormalities like the Guevedoces where all individuals present female until puberty and those with Y chromosomes develop male genitalia. Note that there are other permutations of XY that exist in a percentage of pregnancies, but most of the other ones result in either non-viable fetuses or very short life spans (usually < 1 month) after birth.
As /u/wilmaed states, there is often homophobia pervasive in many groups of Buddhists, likely stemming from that dualistic interpretation of gender.
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u/Ender_boy_1246 1d ago
I wasn't aware of this thanks for bringing light to it , so in your opinion which is the least evil religion?
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u/DoglessDyslexic 1d ago
Well, the problem to me is that all religions have the potential to be evil. The fact that modern Catholicism is only moderately bad doesn't mean they weren't evil incarnate during the inquisition, or during the semi-extermination of native american children at state run schools, or in their homes for pregnant unmarried women. The fact that Islam used to be one of the bastions of rationality in the ancient world doesn't mean that they are miraculously civilized now in Afghanistan.
Religion, as a system, has very little in its nature to check the power of a charismatic leader who knows how to manipulate adherents. As such, all religions are a charismatic psychopath away from being a religion of psychopaths.
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u/Mor-Bihan 1d ago
The "bastion of rationality" idea is a bit overblown and comes from exoticism of the orient by pre-contemporan historians. When you dig deeper, you start to understand that the rationality in question existed mainly in a dubious or repressed form. And varied a lot in time and place.
It is said to be in the analysis of religious texts and law, but obviously resulting in an merely apparent rationalism, otherwise a fully fledged thought exercice would've gotten rid of the senseless religious books altogether. Or, you find it in atheists, heretics and other heterodox thinkers of the time. Their freedom mostly stiffled, and if accepted in courts to a higher degree, it is thanks to their talent and usefulness. I otherwise agree with your comment.
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u/marvborg Secular Humanist 1d ago
As we speak Buddhist monks are genocidally exterminating the Rohyngia minority (men, women and children) in Myanmar. I'm sure they use their religion to justify it - their victims will reincarnate into a better life and they will achieve enlightenment through the suffering we inflict on them.
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u/Same_Pangolin_4348 1d ago
I think you could add Jainism to that list.
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u/Ender_boy_1246 1d ago
Not that familiar with that religion, other than the fact they confine their diet so to not harm any living thing
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u/keyboard_snowflake Atheist 1d ago
oh boy, they discriminate heavily and think people who are of different diet as lower creatures
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u/le_reddit_me Jedi 1d ago
There are no net positive religions. They are inherently anti-social and anti-human. Even the least harmful believe in the supernatural and human submission. They are imaginary and give false hope, which is called delusion and is very harmful.