Religion: Unifier or Divider?

Is religion an agent of unification or division? That is the hottest question that is being asked today and throughout the course of history. With the rise of global terrorism, this very question emerges ever more frequently in both the media and within one's mind. Many had been 'brain-washed' by the 21st century media to believe that religions are the medium for philantrophic morals, but that is just half the truth. In reality, religions are one of the world's largest contributor to conflict in history whether it would be used as an incentive to fight of the tools to do so.

It is apparent that religions lead to conflicts, and it had been that way since the dawn of mankind. Religion had been the backbone of early human civilization for it is their only hope in contending with natures wrath and eking out their lives in the mist of hostility. Hence, the bond between people and their belief systems became unbreakable as elements of religion seeps into every aspect of their lives. The bond between the people and their God have made them gullible and blindly loyal to their religion's cause. The advent of more sophisticated religions such as Christianity, Buddhism and Islam had formalized such concepts into versatile texts that can be transmuted to any society they settled in and had distributed in throughout the world. When religion became their identity, it is apparent that nationalism and patriotism will be integrated with the belief system thus making religion a cause to fight for.

Jihadis brandishing their Ak-47's and their Koran. Note the use of religious text to incite violence.

Utmost loyalty to one's religion and the fear of the divine being had driven people in history from all walks of life to conduct untold atrocious deeds. The Crusades was one of such actions in history where Christian knights in Medieval Europe campaigned to the Middle East to claim to Holy Land (Jerusalem) from the Muslims. The bloodshed was all in vain and the last of the crusaders was driven back and slaughtered in Malta. But why are the Christians came into conflict with people that they have never known to claim a piece of land that is smack in the middle of a barely habitable desert locale? To those rational, this campaign is total none sense. However, young men had sacrificed their lives because of their gullibility to their religious leader's cause.

An image depicting the siege of Malta by the Ottomans in 1565, which was the last stand of the crusading knights order.

Then, another action came to mind: What guided such outrageous actions?

It is the religious texts that have guided those who had become gullible through their religious faith. Without sufficient moral guidance, people may blindly follow their holy scriptures, disregarding modern conformities, this is called fundamentalism and when it meet radical verses of a religious text such as these...

"Therefore, when ye meet the Unbelievers (in fight), smite at their necks; At length, when ye have thoroughly subdued them, bind a bond firmly (on them): thereafter (is the time for) either generosity or ransom: Until the war lays down its burdens. Thus (are ye commanded): but if it had been Allah's Will, He could certainly have exacted retribution from them (Himself); but (He lets you fight) in order to test you, some with others. But those who are slain in the Way of Allah,- He will never let their deeds be lost."                                                                                                -Surah 47:5, The Koran It became apparent why fundamentalists have cause a miserable headache to the government and the society alike. To an extent, fundamentalists like the Talibans and the Al-Quaida had resorted to terrorism to fulfill their twisted beliefs, most notably in the event of 9/11. The image of the 9/11 incident where a terrorist commandeered  commercial jet rammed the World Trade Center. In addition, the legitimacy of Holy Scriptures and those of modern law came into conflict, especially   in terms of terretorial conflict that is most prominent in the Arab-Israeli conflict and the Southern Thailand Insurgency. The Arab-Israeli conflict began with the sovereignty of the Jewish state of Israel in the middle of the Muslim Middle East after the second world war. Tensions increase as the Muslims pushes towards removing the Jews from Israel, which ended up in the Six Day War where Egypt, Syria and Jordan was crushed by the superior Israeli army, therefore, Israel carved a large chunk of Palestinian territory of West Bank, including Jerusalem, the holy land. There, the Jewish Torah in the book of Joshua, claimed that the Jews own that piece of land, whereas the Palestinian's Koran claimed the very same thing for Muslims. Jewish newcomers and the Palestinian majority clashed in a religious struggle that had claimed the lives of Muslim and Jewish leaders alike. In the far east, Thailand is experiencing a similar debacle in the Southern provinces bordering Malaysia where Muslims eked out there lives in a devout Buddhist nation of Thailand. Despite Thailand's political borders that had stretched beyond these provinces, the Muslim separatists in the South wanted to break off and restore what was once the Muslim Patani Sultanate that once occupied the region before the Thai King Naresuan have annexed them with what is to be the modern day Thailand. The Buddhist Thais had became oppressive in their rule of the Muslims by enforcing Buddhist teachings and the Thai language in a Malayan Muslim region, reinforced by the threat of brutal punishments. This gave rise to the use of terrorism for the separatists in the South that have claimed thousands of lives, which is retaliated by the Kru Sae Mosque massacre by the Thaksin administration. The aftermath of a separatist car bomb in Narathiwas province of Thailand, one of the three southern border provinces (the other two provinces: Yala, Pattani) As proven in this rather lengthy compilation of reasons, religions are indeed 'dividers' of the world that spurred conflicts since their foundation. Although it is true that religions unite people through their common faiths, one could not simply omit the blood that was shed in the name of religion. In fact, elements of tribalism still exists due to religious conflicts and the tensions between governments and religious authorities have never been higher. Religions are in direct correlation with the violence. Proving this is simple: just tune in to the evening news and you will be supped by the sheer amount of casualties accounted in the name of God.

A series of video concerning the threat of Islamic radicals and how they have contributed in the global terrorism against the west.

The 11th Amendment

It's the 1980's, America is at war, not with other nations, but with crime. The crime rate expanded in the 80's with homicide rising exponentially and drugs are traded liberally. Looters ran wild and urban gunslingers roamed free, robbing the cites blind. Armies of gangs have wreaked havoc in every settlement in the US, including the world's economic epicenter, New York City. During that time, many would bet that the crime rates would continue to rise, but they were mistaken, by the coming of the new millennium crime rate magically declined. Experts rose to the podium to explain such a miraculous phenomenon, some say it is the reform the police department, some said increased gun control, the economy, and the list goes on. These explanations proved to be valid, but they only contributed a minuscule fraction to the decline in crime, if so, what is the causation of this event? The answer is indeed the Roe V. Wade case.

The Roe V. Wade case is a supreme court case that legalized abortion in all US states in any circumstances. The case began with a Texan woman who falsely claimed as being "raped" and demanded an abortion. As the case gathers its legitimacy, the woman's claim of being "raped" was omitted and the case made its way to the supreme court. The supreme court supported the attorney's claim and that made abortion legal in the premises of the United States. This act spurred the controversy between conservative Americans who denounces abortion or the "pro lifers" and those who supported the woman's choice of abortion or the "pro choice", which these ideas collide in an eternal debate. The significance of this act is that it enabled woman, for the first time in history to have a choice whether to keep her child or not. If thoroughly thought through, Roe V. Wade is a rational idea indeed. Picture this: when a child is born when the parents are not ready to raise them, the child would often and will be mistreated. Without the will or the funding to raise a child, the parents often neglected the child, thus making their childhood a nightmare. Lacking proper education, care and to an extent, food, these children had no future and had to resort in committing crimes to prolong their utterly miserable lives. If they haven't been born, innocent lives will be not lost, money will not be stolen and the crime rate will obviously decrease. With less to spend on law enforcement and hooligan welfare, the government can divert its budget elsewhere in areas such as education, the economy, defense...the possibilities are endless. Hence, this would benefit the people from all walks of life and the nation as a whole.

Two decades after Roe V. Wade was passed, the policy have come to fruition. As the new generation of people consisting of only 'wanted' child populated the 1990's, the crime rate in major cities such as NYC was halved and similar statistics could be seen in the US. Unlike Romania or other third world countries under insane despots (including Thailand in most of its history as a "democratic" nation) that still retained its archaic "pro-life" beliefs, the war against crime in the US became a mere article in history books.

Today, despite the phenomenal success of the Roe V. Wade, there are those who protested against it. Christian fundamentalists in the US are the main culprit for their firm beliefs in the religion had driven them to do so, not of reason. They believed that in the contemporary era, the US had veered off from its original Christian foundation, and it is their duty to restore the nation back to its former glory. In contrary, the US is never a devout Christian nation, but in fact, America's founding principal is freedom in all manners from the freedom of speech to the freedom of worship. So why should people be constrained to the idealisms of Christianity in the land of the free?