Quote Originally Posted by Dogboy182
Yeah, you don't choose the religion you're born into and even if you disagree with a religion, there's no need to be so deeply offensive. If someone attacks your beliefs in such an outrageously offensive manner as has been displayed in this thread, you're more likely to believe it more rather than change your mind. This type of thing only polarizes opinion further and creates bad feeling.
What are you talking about? Anyone can believe whatever they want. You believe that just because someone is born somewhere automatically makes them brainwashed cyborgs to religion?

One of my teachers from Afghanistan told us about how he doesnt believe in Islam, and after going through school and being forced to read the koran he saw how it couldn't make sense and chose to be an athiest. This was in the 70's. When the USSR came into afghanistan in the 80's he moved to Rostov on don, and after the collapse of the USSR he moved to America.

Alot of people are weak(er) than others, thats why they turn to things like, Religion, or Emo to guide thier lives. Others think for themselves and make their own decisions
Well, I'd contend that if you look around at the world today you'll see there are rather a large number of brainwashed cyborgs to religion. Most people will follow the faith of their family and community, it's the default behaviour of humans. I don't like it myself and wish people could learn to think for themselves and not blindly follow the preachings of religious leaders or ancient religious texts. But for that to happen, people have to have access to other viewpoints, to books and information sources that challenge them to think critically about the beliefs they absorbed from their parents. I was fortunate enough to be born in a developed country with a very good educational system and to parents who didn't spend a huge amount of time trying to indoctrinate me to their beliefs (They rather naively thought if they were good Christians I would automatically follow their faith and they weren't obsessed with religion anyway). There were other factors as well which meant I had a lot of time to think about these things and developed an interest in them due to the particular environment I grew up in. Not everyone is as fortunate (although perhaps if you're religious you mightn't feel fortunate is the right word). So, it's rather simplistic to just say anyone can believe what they want. Often, it's not that easy. Some families can really do a good job of locking a kid's brain into a particular religious viewpoint in the early years of life. But everyone is different, there are some people who would think for themselves no matter what they were programmed to think. But I believe they are exceptional and are not representative of the vast majority of people.

And lastly, I'm not saying that all religious people are unthinking automatons. I might feel that a lot of their ideas don't add up or are very inconsistent but it doesn't mean I think they are wrong about everything. I have religious friends who can think very carefully about things and come to their own conclusions, and often see things much clearer than me about particular issues, but I still feel when it comes to the big questions of life they are uncomfortable about challenging their beliefs and are often content to believe unusual things on the basis of faith and faith alone.