What’s wrong with this picture?
“I’ve never seen a more materialistic and carnal religion.”
There is that part, but there’s also the part that has “heaven” stocked with slaves.
Slaves. In heaven. Come on now. Heaven means heaven – a magical place that’s magically good in every possible way. There is no suffering in heaven, no pain, no sorrow, no boredom, no fatigue, no prison, no punishment, no force, no oppression.
So how can there possibly be slaves?
They really haven’t thought this through.
Hmm. The slaves must be the unbelievers, i.e., anyone who isn’t a Muslim. A primitive religion.
maddog1129:
What does that have to do with primitivity? I obviously am not fond of Islam (nor do I like any other religion, for that matter), but I don’t understand why its more distinct objectionnable elements get conflated with being primitive or medieval.
It’s a contemporary religion. It has a long history and is derived from anterior religions. Islam is clearly doing way more harm than e.g. the Unarius Academy but I don’t really see by what metric it would be more “primitive.”
And for all we know, primitive religions could have been egalitarian and emphasized moral codes we’d agree with. And humans’ awfulness is often not primitive at all; nuclear weapons are an obvious example. Again, I’m not condoning Islam – and I’m not really directing this at you, specifically – but I think we need to show some rigour in our criticisms, in no small part because not everyone opposes it for the right reasons, and there are far-right Evangelicals who will gladly take advantage of whatever they can to further their own aims.
I feel this is important to point out, but I emphasize that I do not mean it as an attack.
Mosnae, I would have to agree with maddog. I would also put Christianity, Hinduism, etc, as primitive religions. They pride themselves on being old religions, and while all of them have worked to update some of the more objectionable parts of the religion (even Islam, though like with Christianity and Hinduism, not everyone likes the modernization), but the core of the religious belief is primitive. They are tribal gods that got elevated into a position of being gods of global scope. But the basic elements are still there, and the dynamic is far from modern. And I find that if I scratch my liberal Christian friends too much, I find that they will stand up for the religion as fervently as any ‘true believer’, though they will reject the unpleasant parts of it, and insist that is a new manifestation, not something ages old.
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