Are countries without the influence of religion in their politics far more liberal and fair to all?
That was the enlightenment argument, unfortunately the facts belie the argument. It is possible to point to many examples where religion has been used to justify the most bestial behaviour; a fairly recent example would be the extermination of the North American indians in the name of “manifest destiny”. Essentially, the settler vermin argued that the extermination was part of God’s plan. However, two of the worst examples of intolerance, oppression & mass murder occurred in countries that were officially atheist: namely Stalinist Russia & Mao’s China. The problem is to be blamed neither on religion nor on the lack of religion. Rather, the problem is that humanity, despite pretensions to the contrary, has advanced little, if at all, beyond the status of savage beast.
