re: #172 Anymouse 🌹🏡😷

People often believe what they want to believe, usually with stupid and evil results. But this can be done in both religious and non-religious contexts. E.g., there really isn’t anything more secular than a free market fundamentalist or a GOP apparatchik, although their thought patterns are as intrinsically disordered as the worst liars for Jesus.

IMO it’s a mistake to take all instances of people believing what they want to believe for stupid/evil ends and shoehorning that into a religious context.

It’s also true that there are religious believers who don’t use their religion as a crutch to support believing stupid/evil things that they want to believe, and it is severely insulting to deny this.

Atheists are a minority, and it is politically stupid for a minority to take a scorched-earth position in absolute opposition to all forms and manifestations of religion. E.g., we don’t get separation of church and state in the US unless it has respectable (near 50% or better) support from Christians.