The Root of All Things
People can’t help but want to control how other people live their lives.
That’s it. Think very hard about that. It pretty much applies to every conflict, prejudice, bigotry and hate. It applies to everyone of every belief (and non-belief) be it religious or political. People just can’t help but want to control what others believe, what others want, and how others behave. When it comes down to it, it doesn’t really affect their lives and it’s really none of their fucking business.
Let me give you a bunch of examples.
Homosexuality.
Early in my life I was a homophobe. I just couldn’t wrap my head around the idea of two men (or two women) being together and even get married. I mean, how are they going to have kids? They’re not biologically fit to procreate together. I thought it was wrong.
What made me feel that way? It was me wanting to control how gay people lived their lives. And for what reason? Because it offended my religious beliefs? Because it offended my sense of decency and morality? And that gave me the right to butt in their lives and dictate to them how they should they live and how they should behave? It’s really none of my business. Their life is not my life. What right and what business do I have to control them? None at all. NONE. AT. ALL. I don’t have that right. YOU don’t have that right.
Another example.
Atheism and Religion.
I believe in God. Although I’m a Catholic, I’ve recently become disappointed with it because of the actions of many of its representatives. I still believe in God strongly, of course. What I think of religion and God are two different things. Because God and religion ARE two different things.
Religions have been notorious in wanting to control how other people behave. This is the root of a lot of hate, and a lot heinous acts of violence have been perpetrated all in the name of God and religion. You know what I’m talking about. Fanatics have been known to stone and even kill those who don’t live up to their moral standards, those who don’t believe, and those who would even dare to insult them. I am ashamed and embarrassed that people who are supposed to believe in God and peace clearly believe the opposite. This is the absolute extreme of that urge to control how other people live their lives.
On the other end of the spectrum, many Atheists have also been guilty of wanting to control what other people believe. I see too many atheist posts on Facebook and Twitter ridiculing people of belief in general, casting aspersions on the believers’ level of intelligence, as if all people of belief are one and the same. They too want to control everyone and want people to let go of their beliefs and be atheists like them.
To the religious and the atheists I say this…. what business is it of yours what other people believe? It’s perfectly alright to pay notice to atrocities and condemn them, but to actively attack faith itself (and non faith) is nothing less than intolerant.
It is not religion that kills people, it is people with twisted views on God that kills people.
Religion, like any set of beliefs, including even atheism…. even political systems like democracy and communism, they’re simply tools by which people get by this world. None of them are inherently evil. Yes, I said it. NONE OF THEM ARE INHERENTLY EVIL.
It is humans and their inherent flaws that can either make these tools help the world or destroy it.
Religion can be a force for good and unfortunately, it can also be used as a force for evil. But it’s not religion’s fault. It’s man’s fault. Because as I said, man is inherently flawed and easily corruptible.
What does it matter to atheists anyway if other people have beliefs? Not all believers are war mongering, immorality condemning killers and zealots. Those are just the fanatics. By all means condemn the fanatics! Most religious people I know just want to be left alone to believe what they want to believe. That includes me.
A few atheists in the past have tried to convince me to let go of God because they feel it’s only a crutch. That I’m essentially a weak person because I need something to lean on in order to survive. I mean, what business is it of yours how I get by in life? If you truly don’t believe in a God, then WHAT I am leaning on? God? But you said God doesn’t exist, so I ask again, WHAT am I leaning on? As far as you’re concerned and based on your own beliefs, I’m actually leaning on nothing. Then by all intents and purposes, I’m leaning on myself. So what’s the problem here?
As long as people get by, as long as people do good things and are kind to others, what business is it of ours what they believe? What business is it of ours how people get by in life? Nothing. NOTHING. AT. ALL.
What is my point? My point is, the next time you post something that insults people’s beliefs (or non belief), think about what your’e doing. All you are doing is trying to control other people because their way of life and their system of beliefs is personally offensive to you. When it’s really none of your business.
Another example.
ART.
Oh yeah. ART.
As an artist I’m well aware of the issues that come with expressing oneself artistically in a country as conservative as this. I still remember the Anti-Obscenity Law that Senator Manny Villar tried to pass in the Senate a few years back. It sought to control what material adults are fit to see, read and hear. The most damning section of it was that nudity was not allowed “regardless of the intent of the author”.
Because what? Because he believed that if Filipinos see boobies they will go out and start raping women? Because for whatever reason, he thinks it’s personally offensive to him to see boobies and he wants to cover all our eyes so we won’t see them as well?
I’m not a child. I’m a thinking mature individual with a strong sense of personal morality. I don’t need old men with delusions of power wanting to control what I see, hear and read.
What I do, read, watch and listen to in the privacy of my own home is none of any senator’s business.
I can probably cite more examples, but you get the idea. I’ve thought long and hard about my own part in this, and why I felt the way I did. It came as quite as shock to me how much I had wanted to control other people when I had no business to. I cannot impose my own set of beliefs and morality on other people. I just can’t. And nobody should too.
