The planet would be a better place without religion

Definition: Better more desirable, satisfactory, or effective. In order for the "place" our planet to be "better" there must be a conscious form of life to make a judgement on any improvement and the desision as to if the planet is "better" as the planet does not care either way and we the human race are the only life form on earth able to articulate that judgement I would point out that "better" has to be judged by human standards. There are a number of reasons It can be argued that our planet would be better without religion. We live in a world that for thousands of years has been subject to the whims of religion the atrocities that have been carried out in its name are beyond number and today it is still used to incite hatred and separate and persecute other members of our species, my premise is that if we removed religion from are planet although there would still be war and prejudice the world would be a safer and fairer place for all and above all people would struggle to find justification for Some of the worst acts of discrimination and hate human beings are capable of. Statistically predominately secular nations have lower levels of crime and violence then their religious counterparts. In twenty eight country's the practice of female genital mutilation is currently carried out for purely religious reasons. This barbaric practice serves no medical fiction is usually done without anaesthetic and often results in death for the girls involved. There are currently thirteen country's where atheism is punishable by death there are currently no secular country's that execute people purely based on their religious beliefs. I know of no argument against homosexuality other than the religious one yet as of as of July 2015, seventy two countries have laws against homosexuality and there are ten where you can be sentenced to death for homosexuality. We have seen a massive rise in terrorism in recent history and although the real causes behind these attacks are often over looked by the media religion unarguably make it that much easier for terrorist organisations worldwide to indoctrinate and find recruits. There is a huge proportion of the world that rejects scientific findings based purely on religion and this slows scientific research. We can see the impact of this when we look at situations like the Catholic Churches interference in Africa who by denouncing the use of condoms have contributed to the death of countless millions and have played a part in allowing this awful virus to spread. There is also massive resistance world wide to allowing any science that disagrees with various religious texts to be taught in schools and there have been situations where schools have been forced to teach or unable to stop the teaching of ludicrous creationist pseudoscience. By acknowledging that humanity is one speices and that we and all came from one common ancestor it gives us one more tool in intellectually rejecting the xenophobia we see even today on our planet and when these scientific understandings are learned as part of every child's education it makes it harder for the racist element of our society to pass their views on to the next generation. These are just a few of the reasons I believe that are planet would be better without religion. Sources: "Cross-National Correlations of Quantifiable Societal Health with Popular Religiosity and Secularism in the Prosperous Democracies." Gregory S Paul https://en.m.wikipedia.org... https://en.m.wikipedia.org... https://www.washingtonpost.com... http://www.endfgm.eu...:// en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acceptance_of_evolution_by_religious_groups#Acceptance https://en.m.wikipedia.org...