As the number of non-believers grows yearly, there is hope that someday organised religion will simply be eradicated, to be replaced with either the comfort of life as it is or personal spirituality, away from the constraints of any dogma.

Removing religion is like removing a parasite or virtual virus, corrupting one’s internal system. The damage, however, seems to be deeper, if pondered on sincerely. Religious thinking causes errors in one’s judgement, as well as fears and tendencies one may very well live with for life, if learned early enough.

 

Naivety before figures of authority (“who am I to question”)

It sounds strange, but the priest says it so it must be true. Who am I to know better?

It’s in the Bible; it can’t be wrong. I’m probably too limited to understand it.

The Pope is infallible; what he says goes.

The same can apply later to a non-believer supporting a political leader or party, or employing this mechanism on a personal level to shy away from the lies or potential errors of those they respect.

Moreover, many have difficulty accepting that what an authority figure says may be completely false, seeking to deliberately mislead them. Apparently, they just “wouldn’t do that”.

It applies when it comes to authority figures in the atheist community as well; some are convinced those people can never be wrong on any issue, because the core of what they say makes sense. People are individuals,  not the embodiment of a movement or ideology; their ideas are influenced by personal limits and biases.

Of course giving credence to someone deemed an expert in a certain domain, based on objective criteria, is much better than believing “experts” in bogus fields such as religion, but still.

Setting people up to be ideologues 

Related to other points made below in more detail, religion teaches kids how to practise apologetics when contrary evidence is presented, and sound convinced of their views, even if they have no evidence of their own.

It teaches them to dismiss interlocutors outright and seek to rhetorically win when engaging in a challenging conversation, as opposed to considering the other person’s arguments.

We can see this across the board in debates on any subject, when people whose arguments hold no water confidently present them before others as truths, simply because they believe them.

Denying reality to suit a narrative

Whilst an infinity of opinions and nuances can be formulated around facts, “alternative facts” don’t exist. Religion, meanwhile, teaches people to work their way around reality, even when it stares them in the face (when there is definite proof of it and no proof for their beliefs whatsoever).

From early childhood, people are not taught to accept the observable and value objectivity, but to distort it in any way that suits their desired outcomes. Abstractions based on their wishes take precedence over what they can see with their own eyes.

Fossils were placed in the ground by god to test our faith.

It doesn’t matter that Moses never existed; the Bible is accurate.

Jesus was the real deal, even if his attributes were all borrowed from prior gods.

The Earth is 6000 years old.

The same mechanism is employed by those who claim the following:

The Holocaust never happened because I don’t want to believe it.

The US invades countries to bring them democracy.

Asylum seekers are invading hoards seeking to obliterate the white race, not people in an obviously desperate situation.

An eight-month-old “foetus” is a clump of cells.

Billionaires are trying to improve the lives of the poor by passing laws to make themselves richer.

 

Holy wars; black and white thinking (“we are inherently good; they are inherently evil”)

The divisiveness and fierceness on the political scene at the moment is one of battling extremes, with little nuance conducive to compromises. The other side isn’t just wrong; it’s the devil incarnate and the certain perdition of humanity. Catastrophic scenarios are pushed by pundits on a daily basis, should “the enemy” win. Granted that certain factions have very destructive intentions, but most people are not of a burn-it-all-down mindset.

Apocalyptic scenarios, needless to say, originate from religion; so does dividing people into purely good and purely evil, with the mandate of defeating the latter by any means.

Principles initially held can be put on a back burner when one is engaged enough in “the good fight”. One can easily notice the trajectory of a group from one set of principles to another, in the feverish desire to win at all cost.

Seeking absolute truths or outcomes to uphold (“our way is the only way”)

Once I’ve found the truth/the optimal way, I’ll fight to the death to propagate it.

The issue is there are many sets of ideas claimed to be “the truth”, all with their armies of unquestioning “believers”, ranging from the alien origin of our species to political systems such as communism. They are considered to be the alpha and omega; what every person should strive for and the solution to the world’s questions or problems.

This need arises from a strange combination of insecurity (thinking one is unable to craft a personalised worldview, needing to follow one established by another person or group) and arrogance (dismissing those with opposing views as having an inferior intellect).

Every dictatorship has started this way.

Humility is necessary in accepting that some problems are so complicated a simple answer can’t be found overnight, and that no one should take it upon themselves to impose theirs on others, especially at gunpoint. Daily life is full of compromises, and there’s no reason why abstract issues wouldn’t be.

Proselytism and the thought police (“I must convert you; I must get inside your head”)

We have to convert everyone to our brand of Christianity.

We need to get everyone to accept that the Earth is flat.

We must eradicate the way people think about gender.

Religion infringes on the most private space a person holds, which is their mind, making threats of eternal damnation for wrongful thinking.

Increasingly, aside from wanting to impose political agendas, people seem overly preoccupied with how others think and feel on any given matter, as opposed to how they behave, which could result in actual consequences. Presumably, it’s always been that way, only now, by connecting with so many people’s opinions online, exposure to both proselytism and demonisation for “wrong-think” is more prevalent.

A view held at one point in time, when not manifested through concrete actions which affect others, means nothing at the end of the day.

Of course the same could be claimed in terms of non-believers being preoccupied with the beliefs of the religious; however, those beliefs are being taught is schools and influence lawmaking, and therefore affect everyone when seeking to dominate.

Devotion to a person or cause (the need for messiahs)

Aside from blindly obeying a figure of authority simply because they are in that position, deservedly or not, people develop fanatical devotion towards public figures all the time; it could be as simple as fandoms, often battling with ridiculous fierceness.

Unlike those “ratified” by broader society through titles and exposure, the latter are chosen on an emotional basis through something they provide their followers with, consciously or not. They might even be rejected by the mainstream and held in high regards by their devotees only.

Some become messianic figures, thought to possess the answers to fundamental questions, disregarding obvious “side issues” such as monetary interests or political agendas.

Cognitive dissonance and double standards

 God loves us so much he has single-handedly designed hell for most of us to burn in eternally.

God has pre-determined my fate, but it’s worth praying and trying to change it.

Believing in a loving god imposing the cruellest torments for transgressions is only one facet of the many, many contradictions religious people have to live with daily; processing them would result in apostasy, as they cannot be reconciled.

This habit of holding opposing ideas in different compartments of the mind, never feeling the need to make connections and use logic in order to reduce errors, enables people to do so in perpetuity, in any aspect of life.

Take those who are pro-life but simultaneously pro war and capital punishment. Or those who preach tolerance and manifest intolerance when relating to others.

What we often see now in political skirmishes is moral outrage when “the other side” engages in a certain action, and swift justification when one’s own side does the exact same. One good example is the whole sexual misconduct allegations saga; when employed by the left against a right-winger people are encouraged to “always believe the accuser”, but not the other way around, and vice-versa.

The same fairness and objectivity should apply to everyone, and when someone is questioned regarding conflicting ideas they should be able to process them. But in practice, that fails to happen.

Impossible standards (“I’m not perfect but I’m trying, therefore so should you”)

Believers are perpetually fighting their own nature (unless they are frauds to begin with) and are convinced everyone else should have the same preoccupation. They sin, confess, sin again, repent, confess, and on the cycle of neurosis goes.

They also tend to emphasise their greatest virtues (those areas where they have managed not to fail the standards imposed on them). To compensate for their otherwise (unavoidably) sinful lives, they draw attention to those falling short on those particular aspects.

Priding oneself in an aspect considered a virtue is omnipresent and exceeds the boundaries of religion. It gives people a chance to judge and feel superior based on something vague, that they likely haven’t upheld their entire lives anyway. Hence the virtue signalling and puritanism of the far left, deeming a joke in poor taste the equivalent of committing blasphemy, on the religious side.