You're saying "it is as it is", I'm saying "we can do better". I don't see why should we let religion propagate ideas of conformity and false sense of security when human beings, both alone and in groups, have such a massive potential to change the world (hopefully, for the better). Humans believe they want security and comfort the most, when the reality is we want achievement, we want to leave a mark on the world, we want ourselves and others to prosper, not merely be content with shitty occupations and shitty relationships. How often religion propagates honesty and openness of one's feelings? How often does it say "be yourself and give no mind to what strangers think of you unless it resonates with you"?

We are looking at two different faces of the same cube of dice. You're thinking of terms in either or. Religion, like everything else, is one and both. Can religion offer simple mindedness and conformity? Yes. Tt can and sometimes it does and it's aggravating to see. Can it offer support, liberation, and encouragement? Yes. Yes. Yes. It does all of the time. Almost every religion that takes on a philosophical angle teaches us one way or another to not only get along with each other, but to get along with ourselves. If you want, give me a day and I can overwhelm you with so many religious quotes teaching us to be good people that I could fill up a page and then some.

What I see is pushing for conformity, for simple mind, because such a crowd is easier to control and reign in under a single banner. Simple answers give simple minds, and simple minds abstain from taking a good hard look at reality because it promises, without hesitation or chance of a miss, to break the bubble, and it's painful. Any parent will tell you: egos are hard to break, - but the process is necessary for the child to grow up into a mature, reasonable and emotionally healthy adult. Let me show you just one claim Western religion makes so often it's offensive to humanity.

"Homosexual behavior is to be punished because it's bad". Is that a good answer to "How should we deal with gays?"? No, it isn't, and it will never be. Because sexual orientation isn't a mark of God or of Devil: it's a trait of our mind and our body; we're born with it without a choice, like eye color or tastes for food. Because giving in to fears, especially as far as to be afraid to admit that it's scary because it's alien, not because some abstract man-made ideas oppose it, is not productive or helpful to anyone. Because gathering a crowd to punish homosexuals in whatever capacity - verbally, physically, sexually - is screaming "I'M AFRAID BECAUSE THEY'RE DIFFERENT AND I DON'T UNDERSTAND THEM". In animal fear people run away or run towards what they don't understand because, much like the half-human animals our ancestors were a long time ago, they believe that what they don't understand might kill them, or hurt them, or steal their babies, or something else people are afraid of.

I don't care if it's human behavior that makes us like that. Any institution that promotes punishing the alien for its alienness alone is not a good one. I'll blame people for following the doctrine of destruction towards what is considered "not us", but first of all I'll blame the institution that promotes and encourages such skewed, low, animalistic and crazy ideas. As animalistic as we all are, we have the higher brain functions, and there's no excuse not to use them in day-to-day life unless your day-to-day life is constant running away from sabertooth tigers or venomous snakes - and for most of the world, it isn't true.

Alright. So I'm going to be blunt here and I'm going to get this out of the way. Sometimes humanity sucks. British colonists treated Australian aborigines like shit. Nazis treated the Jews, Gypsies, and various other groups like shit. The American Government treated Native Americans like shit. There's the Rwandand Genocides. There's the Cambodian Killing Fields. There are the Soviet Gulags. You think religious organizations are the only ones who treat homosexuals wrongly? Look at Communist China. I'm just scratching the very surface of how ugly we can get, and trust me, when you want to look at it in depth, we get very, very ugly. In all honesty, I recommend you don't click on any of those links. I regret even searching for them.

You keep wanting to point to religion and say “Look! There's the boogeyman!” Religion isn't the boogeyman though. We are. We do awful, awful things to each other for all sorts of reasons. Sometimes religion gets involved because for a large part of humanity, religion is a part of our identity. Just like nationality (Nazis), race (American Slavery), and economic structures (European Colonialism) are all parts of our humanity. Using your logic, I can easily say we need to get rid of government, financial institutions, or what have you if we're to live in a truly just world.

Here's the deal though. People, as individuals, are quick to change. The way you and I view the world is different than the way our parents and grand parents view the world. Just look at us, you're Russian and I'm a white American from a low income bracket. We're talking to each other and having a conversation that is civil, entertaining, and enriching. Do you think, during the height of the Red Scare that I could say the same about my grandpa? No. Probably not. The problem is, institutions are a lot slower to change. It's the nature of the beast. They are changing though. Bringing back western religion and the treatment of homosexuals, here's a look at a handful of Gay Friendly Churches. Since we're talking about institutions and the treatment of the gay community, just last year the American Supreme Court made gay marriage a right. Just fifteen years ago the idea was almost unthinkable. Change happens. It's slow. It's painfully slow. But it's happening, faster, and faster, and faster.