Religion - The New Racial Divide?

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Religion - The New Racial Divide?
OP - August 20, 2013, 09:41 AM

This is something I've wondered in some form or another for a while now. In Europe as a whole people are becoming less and less religious. I've PMed with people on this site struggling with their lack of faith telling me that everyone or nearly everyone in their family/community believe in god but not that many (or none) of their white friends do. On other internet sites, I've seen people say religion is pretty much dead in Europe, and that no one really believes in god anymore (well except for muslims).

It's something I've observed that seems to be a prevalent theme. By no means universal to every individual it does seem to be more and more the case in Europe that white people are not religious, brown people are. It's also true in my own experience. I can count on one hand the number of white people I know who are religious and have fingers left to spare. The same can't be said about brown people I know or have known over the years. At times it almost seems to be the expected thing. So this is my question.

Based on your own experience/observations, is religion the new racial divide?

`But I don't want to go among mad people,' Alice remarked.
`Oh, you can't help that,' said the Cat: `we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad.'
`How do you know I'm mad?' said Alice.
`You must be,' said the Cat, `or you wouldn't have come here.'
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Religion - The New Racial Divide?
Reply #1 - August 20, 2013, 09:50 AM

Identity politics.

That was less true in the 60s/70s. People in the middle east and Asia used to wear miniskirts and listen to the Beatles, for crying out loud! OK, islam was still a backbone of their identity, but it was on the road to being dissolved. Far from moving forward we've moved 10 steps back.

The funny thing is that islamic fundamentalists had to rub shoulder-to-shoulder with left-wing students as there was simply no concept of revolution in Arabic afaik. I'm not sure as to the veracity of al-thora.

So yeah, these fundies are more influenced by Lenin and Rousseau than they would like to admit — a cursory glance of Milestones should prove this.
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Reply #2 - August 20, 2013, 10:33 AM

So you think it's less actually believing in god and more about personal/community identity? A way to establish yourself and your roots?

`But I don't want to go among mad people,' Alice remarked.
`Oh, you can't help that,' said the Cat: `we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad.'
`How do you know I'm mad?' said Alice.
`You must be,' said the Cat, `or you wouldn't have come here.'
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Religion - The New Racial Divide?
Reply #3 - August 20, 2013, 10:56 AM

To an extent, but I think hell and tawheed maintain islam's dominance to a certain degree as well.
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Reply #4 - August 20, 2013, 11:09 AM

If I understand the word correctly, tawheed means oneness of god right? I'm not 100% sure how relevant that is specifically for islam when you could make the same argument for christianity which shockingly is even starting to fall in Ireland.

`But I don't want to go among mad people,' Alice remarked.
`Oh, you can't help that,' said the Cat: `we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad.'
`How do you know I'm mad?' said Alice.
`You must be,' said the Cat, `or you wouldn't have come here.'
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Religion - The New Racial Divide?
Reply #5 - August 20, 2013, 11:19 AM

I addressed this in the Reza Aslan thread.

Even so, the Christian God is incoherent.
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Religion - The New Racial Divide?
Reply #6 - August 21, 2013, 02:54 AM

I think it's more an identity thing. White people in Europe I assume don't rely on religion as an identity whereas Muslims do because of a lack of proper integration.

Also in Western culture we don't give accolades for piety, whereas Islamic cultures pride themselves on religious piety. So of course in the West if you're not being rewarded for being the perfect Christian you're going to go off and pursue other things likes like the arts and science . Which is why Christianity is fizzling out. But in many Islamic cultures, Zakir (whatever the fuck his name is) is going to get higher celebrity status than the Muslims who pursue science and the arts.

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Religion - The New Racial Divide?
Reply #7 - August 21, 2013, 04:51 AM

Zakir Naik? The dawahgandist from India with the chin pubes?

Atheism is a non-prophet organization.

The sleeper has awakened - Dune

Give a man a fish, and you'll feed him for a day Give him a religion, and he'll starve to death while praying for a fish!
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Religion - The New Racial Divide?
Reply #8 - August 21, 2013, 05:04 AM

Coming from the states where people tend to be more religious on a whole I definitely noticed the difference in Europe where the native populations are definitely less religious than their American counterparts. We also have a policy of integration where immigrants are expected to become active members of society and to interact with people outside their communities. Albeit, Pakistanis still tend to keep to themselves. My Pakistani friends in California who consider me part of their family (even though I don't practice Islam anymore) got so much crap from other Pakistanis for fraternizing with a "gori" that they just cut off ties with them.

I would like to hope that Americans, especially WASPs will become more secular in the future but with the evangelism of the South especially and those obnoxious born-again xtians I think it will be a while yet before we are as secular minded as Europe. We are a secular nation on paper but in practice, it is a different story.

I am glad, however that because of the spread out nature of our country Muslims find it harder to ghettoize themselves here.

Atheism is a non-prophet organization.

The sleeper has awakened - Dune

Give a man a fish, and you'll feed him for a day Give him a religion, and he'll starve to death while praying for a fish!
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