That’s not an alternative. You’re just framing it as one.
It absolutely is an alternative. You do realize that not every part of the world believed in Abrahamic religions, right? Alternatives have always existed, some better and some worse.
Of what fucking value is the truth if it cannot set you free?
Why is a lie that keeps you enslaved a good thing? The truth is always better, because the lie will always eventually run into reality and cause harm and destruction. Do you think the idea that God would eventually fix everything and that therefore the environment doesn't matter has been a harmless lie?
Do you think people were set free when they were told that their dead unbaptised child was in hell? Or that their loved one who committed suicide was being tortured for eternity? What about the women accused of being witches and burned at the stake? The LGBT people? The women who needed abortions? The pagans executed because they would not convert? Or do you think these people being unjustly persecuted for millennia is worth it because it meant the majority didn't feel bad about being oppressed?
You’ve never needed a lie to sustain you, so you can’t understand why they would do it.
Seriously, fuck you. I was a devout Evangelical until I was 26, I don't want to hear any bullshit about me never needing Christianity. It was my life.
Marx doesn’t call it “the sigh of the oppressed creature” for nothing.
Marx was explaining why religion existed, not saying it was good.
You’re essentially getting mad at people for not being more miserable, for being subject to a brutal condition.
I'm getting mad at you for saying a lie made to justify oppression and keep the enslaved from resisting their slavery was a good thing. I understand the reasons why people embraced Christianity and I don't (necessarily) judge them for it. But just because many people embraced a shitty idea because they couldn't stand the truth does not mean that idea was somehow good.
It absolutely is an alternative. You do realize that not every part of the world believed in Abrahamic religions, right? Alternatives have always existed, some better and some worse.
Why is a lie that keeps you enslaved a good thing? The truth is always better, because the lie will always eventually run into reality and cause harm and destruction. Do you think the idea that God would eventually fix everything and that therefore the environment doesn't matter has been a harmless lie?
Do you think people were set free when they were told that their dead unbaptised child was in hell? Or that their loved one who committed suicide was being tortured for eternity? What about the women accused of being witches and burned at the stake? The LGBT people? The women who needed abortions? The pagans executed because they would not convert? Or do you think these people being unjustly persecuted for millennia is worth it because it meant the majority didn't feel bad about being oppressed?
Seriously, fuck you. I was a devout Evangelical until I was 26, I don't want to hear any bullshit about me never needing Christianity. It was my life.
Marx was explaining why religion existed, not saying it was good.
I'm getting mad at you for saying a lie made to justify oppression and keep the enslaved from resisting their slavery was a good thing. I understand the reasons why people embraced Christianity and I don't (necessarily) judge them for it. But just because many people embraced a shitty idea because they couldn't stand the truth does not mean that idea was somehow good.