The section in Dawkins book entitled "undeserved respect" claims that religious ideas receive too much respect and tend to be hands off as far as being criticized or even discussed. On this account, I agree with Dawkins. Religious ideas should be up to debate and scrutiny. That is why on this website we discuss and refute all manner of religious claims that are not consistent with the facts.
Richard Dawkins likes to pat himself on the back throughout the book. He quotes the late Douglas Adams, "...We are used to not challenging religious ideas but it's very interesting how much furore Richard [Dawkins] creates when he does it!... Such shameless self promotion does nothing to change his image as an angry man, who like you, are only interested in bashing religion to create controversy, instead engaging in intelligent debate.
Dawkins goes on to explain how religious conflicts are mislabeled under group or ethnic strife. He cites the conflict in Northern Ireland, where the parties are labeled Nationalists and Loyalists instead of Catholics and Protestants. Likewise, Dawkins complains that the conflict in Iraq between the Sunni and Shia Muslims has been called ethnic cleansing instead of a religious conflict. However, Dawkins fails to point out what part of these conflicts is truly religious in nature. Are these disputes over religious doctrines or principles or disagreements about the nature of God? If so, he should have pointed out exactly which parts of the conflicts were religious in nature. Of course these are not conflicts about religion. They are conflicts involving different religious groups, but as with most all conflicts, the disagreements are about power.
Mr. Dawkins seems to have forgotten his studies in psychology of human group dynamics. Groups of humans in power will oppress other groups, just based upon membership within each group. The membership could involve religion, language, or just geography. In fact, the cause could be as simple as labeling each group. Psychological studies of group behavior have shown that groups of people will become adversaries with others outside of their own group. Just watch your son's next football/soccer game. However, Richard Dawkins has only one daughter, so maybe he was never involved in sports.
Dawkins conveniently leaves out of the discussion the fact that non-Christians/Atheist (you know, I can't say for sure they were atheist but they had your attitude) have killed far more people than all religious conflicts combined. Joseph Stalin killed 20 million Soviet citizens between 1929 and 1939. Mao Tse-tung killed 34 to 62 million Chinese during the Chinese civil war of the 1930s and 1940s. Pol Pot, the leader of the Marxist regime in Cambodia, Kampuchea, in the 1970's killed 1.7 million of his own people. In fact, the Pol Pot regime specifically preached atheism and sought to exterminate all religious expression in Cambodia. And, since atheist-led states were largely unheard of before the 20th century, atheists have just begun to get in on the killing rampage.
This is your hero i'm talking about...My hero is looking pretty good..you can't see mine, and he still looks better than yours!
