Sorry Panoptic, I completely missed that excellent post earlier.
@Baal. Here is my basic assessment.
What you say as a description is completely correct. If someone clings onto a religion they do so for a reason that proves, as you put it, is of service to them. But I'm not saying the problem is assumed rationality, as such. The problem is that you are being circular thus far. What you need to do to develop your observation into a theory of religion is to give it a consistency by which it can provide a totality of explanation.
My theory does not apply on the religion or the belief itself, it applies on the human. My theory can be used on capitalism and socialism and nationalism as well. It is always a balance between perceived threats and perceived services. And any ideology, will have built-in mechanisms to provide a perceived service (often by actually providing a real service, sometimes by providing a racket), and mechanisms to provide a perceived threat (often by emphasizing on an existing threat).
Is the theory circular? I can not see the circle and I am trying hard (please identify the circle). I can see that my theory is too generic, but so is the assumption that, if we are to make some good arguments against pedophilia, then we will 'win' when arguing with a muslim.
That may be religion in relation to other 'ideologies' but then it needs refining to deploy itself to that extent. So far it has to -rely- on psychology - so it cannot account for things in the way psychology does, even if that psychology may itself make for a superficial representation of actual interests, which I admit it can.
I covered the relation of psychology to my theory in the previous post before I saw this post I am replying to. Yes, Psychology can be used to account and for reprogramming. Psychology is to be used to define what services a certain person want and/or need. It can also be used to define what threats the person perceives.
i.e.: Psychology: Tom invested (through Rackets to collect resources from followers) too much into the mormon church that now he is getting back the prestige (service) here on earth and hopefully the after-life reward. He does not not care much for the after-life, but the prestige on Earth is very important to his personality type.
In a generaliseable way it could actually be a totalising theory (at least within a dominant-type famework, such as memetics). The merit is that makes religion an open-ended source of services to individual interests it is to that extent a collective investment as much as it as individual one. So it could be more nuanced.
Trying to relate services and rackets to memes. A good idea, will give it a try.
That patriarchy harms men and doesn't just benefit them is also a very good point. Unfortunately a rare one.
Yep, psychology will tell us if this point should be used, or whether we are facing a certain type of fathers and then just telling him how patriarchy will harm his daughter might be enough.
Topic: The Psychological Effects of Leaving Islam