He is from Brazil, I have had one class with him before and he likes to talk and ask a lot of questions. He told me he was 55 years old and his wife was 45. He was asking me about travelling about being independent and about prejudice.
It got me thinking about judgement and racism and prejudice.
I am not one of these people. I try and not hold any racism or prejudice against anyone. I would say my mind is more open than a lot of people. I'm by no means saying I'm some kind of Mother Theresa no way, I do still have some ideas about how things should be and often judge people for being what I consider moronic.
But there are a lot of racist people in this world. People who hate people because of their race, their skin color their religion. I hate these people.
Yes I complain about some of them, for example certain students from certain countries but not necessarily because I hate their culture or religion, mostly because they're just idiots.
This man however thought it was quite incredible how open I seem to be. How I lack these prejudices that I guess he assumed I would have. He doesn't really know me no and we have had two classes totally 80 minutes together. Hardly a life time of knowing someone.
He did strike something in me though. How many people do you know who blindly hate a religion for seemingly no reason at all? How many people do you know who call someone a 'paki' or a 'nigger' or some other derogatory name based on their skin color or home country?
I have done this before. Sure everyone has at one point or another whether they mean it menacingly or not. I think though the more you experience people of these races or religions the more you see the world is wrong. We are almost conditioned to hate anyone who is Muslim as a western race and vice versa.
I think it's wrong. There are good and bad all over the world. In every country and in every religion.
Extremism is wrong. This is my opinion. I'm talking about religion now. If you are extreme that's fine. You want to lock yourself up in a church and be a nun or a monk, go right ahead. That's your right as a human being. Don't project it onto me though and try and tell me I am living a life of sin. I am a good person. I try to live a good life, I don't steal, I don't kill people, I try and be kind to other people. I don't drink excessively, I don't take drugs and I don't try and force people to do anything they don't want. I'd like to help people, my family and friends more than my means allow for, so unfortunately I can't always do this. But I want to and I try.
Because I don't go to church every Sunday or I don't get down on my knees and pray to the East every morning does this mean I am going to hell?
I don't think so.
I believe we are all ignorant. We are uneducated about these things and we form opinions basically given to us by our parents or the media when really we have no idea what the hell we are talking about. In school I didn't learn a thing about Islam. I didn't know anything about Hinduism. I learnt about Jesus, and Christianity. Yes I am from a Christian country, so what can I do. I do think it's wrong though.
I know a lot of people now who have many different religions. Muslim, Christian, Hindu, Buddhist all varying degrees of faith.
My parents didn't have me christened. Something which a lot of people do in the UK, even though none of them ever go to church for the rest of their lives afterwards. They told me, 'if you find religion when you're older, that's great go for it' but they weren't about to inflict societies ideas of religion on us just because everyone else was.
I'm glad. I don't have a religion. I don't actually believe in religion. However I do believe in God. Or the creator, or evolution, or a higher energy power, whatever you want to call him/it. I don't think there is some guy in the sky looking down on us with a magnifying glass. I believe in science and I believe in karma and balance. I believe in yin and yang. As for religion, I feel like everyone has their own ideas but I like to believe they all pray and believe in the same thing, everyone around the world just has different names for it. Allah, Jesus, Mohammed, God, Rama, Krishna the list goes on.
That is not to say I don't respect you for having religion, for having your faith and believing in something different to me. If it makes you feel better, if it means you try and be a good person good for you.
“I believe in God, but not as one thing, not as an old man
in the sky. I believe that what people call God is something in all of us. I
believe that what Jesus and Mohammed and Buddha and all the rest said was
right. It's just that the translations have gone wrong.”
― John Lennon
I found this quote from John Lennon and I have to say I agree. The translations I believe he is talking about for me is what we as people have formed into religions. The people religion follows aren't necessarily wrong in their teachings, love one another, show kindness etc. But the whole drama of going to some place to pray sounds wrong.
“I cannot believe in a God who wants to be praised all the
time.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche
I don't believe if there was some man in the sky he would want people to be sat around screaming his name. I don't think he would particularly care if you used his name in vain. I don't believe it would be, entertaining for a god to sit and watch a group of people be perfect in 'his view of perfect'. Why else do we have free will to choose what is right to do. As long as we don't hurt anyone.
I don't believe there are 'gods' in the sky, who are all fighting for a place the way we down here fight against who's religion is right or better.
Hating each other for what we believe is wrong. Religion in itself I find very hypocritical. It's part of the reason I cannot believe in one religion.
So next time you blindly disregard someone because of their religion, or their race, take a second to remember that we are all humans, living and breathing, and we as long as no one is hurting you, why should you hate them?
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