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Will Secularization Reduce Our Militarization?

Is the Christian ethic militaristic? Bertrand Russell in "Why I Am Not A Christian and other essays" said [A]s the Mohammedans first proved, belief in Paradise has considerable military value as reinforcing natural pugnacity. We should therefore admit that militarists are wise in encouraging the belief in immortality." Would we still be in so many wars if we were not a largely Christian nation?

Tags: military, wars

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Permalink Reply by Carl Pastor on September 1, 2011 at 12:41pm

actually, i'd like to discuss the topic, will secularization reduce our militarization.

yes sweden is secular, and yes they prolly have a powerful military for their size.

it seems to me that the number of troops that america has is small, considering our power and our military budget. the number of troops is important as is our economy. seems to me, whoever is in power, we will have a period of no military intervention after the present debacle is over

no i believe and hope that if we were a secular nation we wud not have gotten involved in iraq. we wouldn't have attacked granada or panama either, but we might have put troops in rwanda and bosnia to attempt to stop the genocide there, and who knows where that wud have led us.

on the other hand if we had been secular, when we attacked iraq the first time with good reason, we might have gone the whole way, and then once again, we are in the realm of speculation.

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Permalink Reply by TNT666 on September 1, 2011 at 12:50pm

Nice answer Carl, thanks for bringing this back on topic.

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Permalink Reply by Secular Forces 2013 on September 3, 2011 at 12:27am

'we'? i did not vote for jack ass in 2000. anyhow... Iraq was / is a vendetta with oil contract in there I'm sure. Rumsfeld had Tillman killed. Saudis and Bush had tons of tricks up their sleeves before any election... the cat's outta the bag in regards to populations allowing dictators or corporations run their lives... btw i had no idea (or i forgot that) ATT used to be ITT? and had a leader killed because he would not sell copper any cheaper to the giant multinational conglomerate.. oh yeah.. the military... guardians of the fossil fuels. it's a shame xtianity and islam are to this day tools of empire(s)... ?

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Permalink Reply by Carl Pastor on September 3, 2011 at 12:56am

voyager, actually if america is a democracy,(Which is debatable) no matter who you voted for, you bear responsibility for the actions of the government. that's how i read it antway.

ypur last sentence "its a shame xtianit and islam are to this day tools of empire" got me to thinking. i think empire is xtianity and islam, perhaps i shud qualify that by adding fundy to all three, but i'm not sure. i see no real difference.