Friday, April 19, 2013
No Equal Worth?
Nietzsche believes that if we realize there is no rational basis for believing in God than the notion of equal worth would dissolve. My problem with this claim is that often times religion is the cause of people feeling superior to others. They will have the attitude that they are better than someone else because they are Catholic, Muslim, ext. it seems as though the notion of all humans being equal is rooted in the fact that nobody would want to be treated worse than someone else. This can seem like a selfish concept, but if everyone wants to be treated at least as well as others, they would rather settle for equality, rather than failing to reach superiority and being treated as an inferior being. To me removing religion might enhance the idea of equal worth by removing the one way thinking of what it means to be a good person.
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You make an excellent point here. How many times have we seen religion used as an excuse to persecute and even kill others? The Catholic Inquisition, the Crusades, the subversion and destruction of pagan religions, the papal influence over the monarchs of the Middle Ages, the Friday the 13th massacre of the Knights Templar, the persecution of Jews during the Holocaust and in the current conflict in the Palestine-the list goes on. Religion has been one of the major fueling substances for conflict for centuries. Countless lives have been lost in the name of religion, whether it be Christianity, Judaism, Islam, or an older pagan tradition such as the dodekatheon of Greek gods in Ancient Greece, the Ancient Egyptian religious traditions, or the Ancient Mesoamerican traditions. However, the purpose of most religion, at least the religions we find in common practice today, center on morality and virtue. There are extremists in any religion, such as those who believe it necessary to injure or kill those of different beliefs; they have existed in the past and continue to do so today. Rather than remove religion altogether, it may be better to remove the elements of religion and the forces that mislead their followers to extremist and prejudiced beliefs and ideals.
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