“There is no such thing as a good Muslim or a bad Muslim, and a good Hindu or a bad Hindu; there are only good people and bad people”.
These lines are from the recent super hit Hindi film My Name is Khan starring Shah Rukh Khan, and were spoken by the mother of the lead character to him when he was young. These words have been hailed by moderates among Hindus and Muslims alike.
As a humanist and an atheist, I personally think this is a positive statement, and hopefully it will seep into the popular culture of India enough to unite moderates across the spectrum. After all, only when the moderates unite can the fanatic fringe be restrained.
However, this statement grossly simplifies a multifaceted issue. It is true that people are ‘good’ or ‘bad’, regardless of whether they are of one religion or the other, or of no religion at all. Atheists too can be ‘good’ and ‘bad’, for we are human beings too. In fact, one of the arguments that religious apologists often give is, “Mao and Lenin Were Atheists too, and they killed millions”.
Why then, do atheists criticize religion? Why do we propagate a society based on reason rather than faith? Aren’t there always going to be ‘good’ and ‘bad’ people, regardless of whether there is religion or not?
The System
The foremost reason why religion is detrimental to the society is that it creates a ‘system’ that enables the ‘bad’ amongst us to exploit the people above and beyond anything possible in a society based on freethought. To help you understand what I mean by this, allow me to illustrate how a ‘system’ can alter outcomes drastically, even though the mix of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ people remains unchanged. Read the full story
In the last week of 2009 I happened to visit a site where NREGS activities were being carried out, and I happened to talk to the workers employed there about the economic, social, and religious issues that impact them. 
