Brilliant Quotes From Teenagers About Acceptance

In the week and a half leading up to our much-needed spring break, I came up with an assignment for my freshmen Honors Geography students. It was called Suppression or Liberation: Islam, Hijab, and Modern Society, and my aim was to have them explore the religion of Islam, the hijab (and niqab, burqa, and other garments) and the reasons Muslim women wear them, and finally their own opinion on the issue. There exist two chief viewpoints on the modest dress of Muslim women:

1. Forcing women to wear such confining clothing is oppressive and solidifies their place beneath men in society.
2. Such clothing is actually liberating because women are now only judged based on their character, personality, intelligence, and competence, not their looks, as so many women in the West are judged.

I was excited about this assignment for a few reasons:

– First of all, one of my core beliefs is that education is the cure for all that ails the world (the first step, at least). I knew at the beginning of this assignment my students would have many preconceived notions about Muslims, with most of them being negative. I was confident that by doing extensive research on the religion itself, many of those negative stereotypes would be disproven. Hopefully now that the assignment is done and their papers are written, many of them realize that most Muslims are not terrorists.
– Secondly, based on my three years in education thus far, teenagers are pretty interested in human rights and social justice. I knew this topic would be very interesting for them as a way to learn about a culture that is very different from their own.
– Finally, tying back to the first reason, education is what changes and corrects misconceptions. My students are now informed about a controversial religion and region of the world. My hope is that they are now more accepting and tolerant, at least to some degree. Also, they were able to explore the two main opinions on the topic of the hijab, formulate their own opinions, and simultaneously reflect on our own culture and our views on women's dress and modesty. It was fun for me to teach because, as some of you might know, I'm not particularly fond of religion, but I enjoyed the challenge of staying very neutral. I also played some great Arabic music and showed some images of Islamic art and architecture, which is all really remarkable.

I'm writing this post because as I was reading their papers, I was pleased to see so many great comments by these ninth graders. I'm including some of the quotes that stood out to me as very insightful, respectful, accepting, or just intelligent. Note: I fixed any spelling, grammatical, or punctuation mistakes for the purposes of professionalism, but changed none of the words they used.

Lebanese singer Nancy Ajram.

– "Some of the people that I look up to always tell me that to be you is to be everything."
– "The Muslim religion has many stereotypes, and it's important for people to first of all be educated enough to understand that they are all different too. We all have stereotypes made about what we choose to do in our daily lives or simply things that we can't change, such as our cultural history and our race. An open mind never hurt anyone."
– "People need to stop being so close-minded. You should not go around judging people because they don't look like the average American because in all honesty that's something only uneducated people would do."
– "Think about the Muslim woman. She doesn't seek anyone's approval but god's and that's why she wears her hijab without caring what people think of her. She has so much faith in her religion she wears her hijab proudly with her head up. Can a girl in a bikini do that? Can she say she's wearing it as a symbol of her faith? Is that even a symbol of anything?"
– "I am confused about how the West fears the Arab World. Christians in general have done many more worse things to the Arab World in the form of the Crusades, and the various interventions that the West has done. It's way worse that any terrorist attack."
– "In the West people tend to dress based on what the social order says is normal, so it's not that different from the Arab World."
– "If the hijab is truly going to be freeing, it must be a choice – a decision made by the woman, not her husband or her country."
– "It's good that we know more about other cultures because it gives us a chance to see their struggles and their beliefs. It just gives me a chance to think how important it actually is, and how it can affect us."
– "Does a scarf around your head really change them [Muslims] to something dangerous?"
– "I don't want to be judged by the way I look, but by my character, and I believe that Muslim people want this too."
– "Sometimes, it takes some research and dedication in order to find out more over someone's real intentions rather than believing a wrong statement for a long time."
– "Without knowledge of all that has happened, one may assume all the wrong facts about a certain culture."
– "Wearing [a] hijab doesn't make a person less intelligent, affectionate, critical, and it certainly doesn't make anyone look less beautiful. Wearing a hijab simply allows one to see inner beauty rather than what's outside."
– "[A person's] color, hair, [or] face doesn't determine how someone is, and clothing shouldn't be the difference."

The Wonderful World of Religion

As I see it, the number-one problem with religion is that it allows people who don't have all the answers to believe that they do have all the answers. The second main problem with religion is that it creates hate.

If you are feeling up to reading this post, remember this: You are not your beliefs. You are a complex person with many beliefs. Therefore, even if you disagree with something I say or find it offensive, it is not a direct insult to you. It may be the exact opposite of what you believe, but intellectual discourse should challenge your thinking. If everyone in the world thought the same thing, we might as well be robots. Furthermore, I do not think I am better than any believer of any religion, and I know that I certainly don't have all the answers... but then again, no one does.

"The tendency to turn human judgments into divine commands makes religion one of the most dangerous forces in the world." - Georgia Harkness 

For years now, religion has been a big topic of contemplation for me. Even into my sophomore year of college (2006-2007) I still had a sliver of hope that religion could be something more powerful than myself. Then, one day I was dragged to a lame Sunday morning service in a weird, makeshift church near Boulder that clearly used to be a sporting goods store or department store of some kind. Anyways, it started out normally enough, with terrible Christian faux-rock and an overly hyped introduction. Then they rolled out one of their large, flat-screen TVs (which couldn't possibly have been purchased using the collection money, right?) and began to play a video made by the church. It was of a man who was "fixed" by the church. How was he fixed, you ask? Well, he was gay before but the church saved him! Miracle! So, after that I was pretty much done.

"I am against religion because it teaches us to be satisfied with not understanding the world." - Richard Dawkins

Being a music student in Boulder I was surrounded by a wide and eclectic variety of people every day, a significant number of whom were homosexual, and I liked them the same as everybody else. This event at church, combined with a fellow music student saying, "Man, it's too bad all our gay friends are going to hell," put me over the edge. Done. Actually, this person was a girlfriend -- needless to say it ended quickly after this disgraceful comment.

So, starting well before my college years and then intensifying during and thereafter, my ongoing quest to learn about religion and subsequently understand my feelings and reactions to it continues.

Where am I now in my education, with more extensive and ongoing studies in world history and cultural studies, and having taken ethnic studies, human geography, sociology, ethnomusicology, and every world music course CU Boulder offered, I have been exposed to many people, places, things, and events that made me question the legitimacy of religion and its purpose. To make this relatively brief, I can summarize my discoveries by saying this: Historically, religion has done significantly more harm than good, and it is no different today. That is my argument. I would love for someone to prove me wrong.

"Religion is something left over from the infancy of our intelligence. It will fade away as we adopt reason and science as our guidelines." - Bertrand Russell

Finally, before I share an old writing of mine with you, I'd like to point out one more thing. I have noticed the incredible accuracy of this simple formula: Less education, more religious; more education, less religious. As the kids these days say: "Just sayin'." Okay, I wrote this back in 2010 when I lived in Cincinnati, but I thought it was worth bringing out again and adding a couple new insights.

[There are about 19 major world religious groupings, which are then subdivided into about 11,000 distinct religions. I don't think this even includes Ancient Egyptian, Greek, Roman, Mayan, Aztec, etc. religions that existed before the common era. Man needed explanations to phenomena, so they decided, naturally, on the most logical conclusion they could come up with: some kind of supernatural being or beings (polytheism) is/are responsible. Humans today also seek the most logical conclusion to life's biggest questions, and indeed we have many answers, but here in the year 2010, do we not expect to come to a different conclusion than man of thousands of years ago?

"Of all religions, Christianity is without a doubt the one that should inspire tolerance most, although, up to now, the Christians have been the most intolerant of all men." - Voltaire

In the 9th grade, my English class studied Ancient Greek Mythology. I loved it and I was fascinated; I could picture all the characters in my head and enjoyed hearing the great epics of heroes and the gods. We were told, of course, that it was all fictional. The Greeks, who were absolutely one of the most influential, prolific, groundbreaking, and brilliant cultures the world has ever known, believed in these gods, though. How could such smart people believe in such silly, mythical things? Each new generation of Greeks believed in the gods, too. This is because it was part of their culture and it was simply passed down from generation to generation. There is more I could say about many different cultures and religions, but I want to get to my point: I have spent my whole life exposed to Christianity. I mean c'mon, my family is Italian. It is my belief that Christianity today is still the major religion in America (but NOT the world, don't forget) because it is what Americans are used to and it's what we are taught from the time we can talk. Why would we question it? Why would we spend time and energy pondering other faiths, or faith in general? So we just go through life believing it.

"People who want to share their religious views with you almost never want you to share yours with them." - Dave Barry

Going back to the opening paragraph, there are over 11,000 religions in the world. Not one of them has more than 1/3 of the world's population as followers. The very fact that so many different religions exist basically proves that it is simply made up by man, just like the Greeks made up Zeus, Poseidon, and Apollo. Ever since I was a kid going to Catholic Sunday school, I questioned everything. I have a hard time understanding how so many kids DIDN'T question like I did, and how so many adults still DON'T. Even if you end up deciding that you do in fact still believe in God, at least think about it!

Any attempts at research will reveal much about Jesus and the striking similarities he shares with "messiahs" of other religions. Nazareth wasn't even a town until way after the year 33 CE (AD)! How could there exist so many religions already (Greek, Egyptian, Sumerian, etc.) and then all of a sudden, a guy shows up and claims that his is the "right" one? Christianity is just another story, written by men... just like all religions.

“We have just enough religion to make us hate, but not enough to make us love one another.” - Jonathan Swift

The issue of morality comes up a lot. Where do we get the guidelines for morality if it's not from the Bible? How about common sense and human decency? Do I need a grossly outdated collection of stories and superstitions to tell me that physically harming another living thing, or stealing, or lying is wrong? No, I don't. We don't need the Bible to tell us what we ought to do. Plus, most Christians ignore some of it anyways (which is not always a bad thing, since there is some scary stuff in there -- read Leviticus sometime). Yes, there are good things that can come from religion, but also many, many bad things. History has shown this quite clearly.

I don't want to drag this out, but like I said, I've spent my whole life listening to the brainwashing blabber of Christianity (and thankfully decided to use my intellect, advice of people I care about, and the experiences of life to guide me instead), so it's fair for me to be able to talk a little bit about this. I would like it if people took some time to rethink their ideas, but ultimately, it doesn't affect me one way or another. People should do what makes them happy as long as it isn't harming others. The sad thing to me though, is that it seems like religious people are taught to, and do, live in constant fear. Fear of going to hell for sinning, fear of being unforgivable, fear of knowing God sees all the bad things you do. Fear, fear, fear. Why choose to go through life like this? Some believe that Jesus accepts all and forgives no matter what, so there is nothing to fear. But why can't one just be a good person for the sake of being good?]

"The whole thing is so patently infantile, so foreign to reality, that to anyone with a friendly attitude to humanity it is painful to think that the great majority of mortals will never be able to rise above this view of life." — Sigmund Freud

That's what I wrote in 2010, and it's not really in need of major changes in terms of what I think about religion now. After my recent readings about the history of Spain and an extensive, graphic history of the United States (the version textbooks ignore), more and more examples of religion's negative effects keep surfacing. Even more unsettling, though, are the instances of religious harm in our modern world. The conservative Christian in Norway who killed 77 or so people, the constant extremist Muslim attacks in the Middle East and Europe, the Israel/Palestine conflict, Westboro Baptist Church rallies, Jehovah's Witnesses bothering me at my front door, and so on.

Now, I know religion is a very important, positive force in many people's lives, and such people do not use religion in harmful ways. Moreover, I don't necessarily want the whole world to believe what I believe (because that would make me just like a crazy religious person), but what I do want is for people to think and become accepting and tolerant. As I stated in my argument above, religion has done more harm than good. One of my goals is to write a thorough, historically informed post about the harm Christianity and Islam has done in the Western world since before the common era, so that will support my argument more. For now, however, I have said enough to effectively provoke some of your inner ruminations and to genuinely infuriate others.

Question: If the Bible is the true word of God, why are there so many versions of it, and why do today's Christians ignore so much of it?

Bottom Line: Your religion is not the "correct" religion. There is no such thing as a "correct" religion.