In the current world we live in, religion is not necessary

To the judges: I humbly request the judges to judge this debate with an open mind, dropping your personal biases and give a judgement based on who has made better arguments and ergo has given a superior case. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Burden of Proof: The question of who has the burden of proof in this situation rests in the resolution itself and not, as CON claims, on the person who proposed it. Let’s take a deeper look into the resolution, ‘In the current world we live in, religion is not necessary’ The keyword that requires attention here is, ‘not necessary’. So let’s question ourselves, when does something become ‘not necessary’? It is when the absence of it creates positive or negligible impact to the situations and things that were connected to it. So in accordance with the resolution, my burden is to show that the present world WITHOUT religion would be better or be very much the same as it would be WITH religion. And my opponent as he is against the resolution, to do justice to his position, will have to bear the burden to show that the outcomes of a world without religion would be largely negative. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- And with that made clear I move on to make my case. As of now I have five contentions to support my stance and they are as follows: C1. The laws that govern religion are archaic C1.A Religious laws are man-made rules that were tailored for a different set of circumstances Religious laws weren’t made by a supreme omniscient, omnipotent being but by men ourselves. And no matter how ideal it might seem, religious texts would inevitably be, riddled with opinionated views and biases on situations.Say for example, homosexuality might be prohibited in many religious teachings but if this is imbibed and followed we would then compromise the freedom to choose life partners for a segment of the population.And the worst part is that religious rules are not amendable and staunch followers would end up committing immoral and unethical activities in the name of religion. Examples like the caste system [1] and the practice of untouchability in countries like India are few of the many negative social practices that were sprouted from religious laws. C1.B Science right now does what religion did in a better way Yes, maybe a thousand years ago, when the knowledge about nature and natural phenomenon known to mankind were limited, religion served a purpose i.e., to explain those natural occurrences and to eradicate fears in the minds of the common masses caused by ignorance. But in today’s world science has progressed enough to have the actual reasons as to why things happen as they do and therefore religion is no longer needed. C2. Religion offers a false sense of comfort People claim that religion provides us hope and gives us the strength to tackle our problems. But this is just a delusion of comfort that results as a cause of blind faith.We only become stronger when we are tested i.e., when we go through hardships in our lives. Situations of crisis helps us push our limit and makes us know what we are capable of. Believing that an imaginary deity can solve our problems could in many cases render us incapable of confronting the problem on our own, due to lack of effort from our side. The comfort that religion offers us compromises the belief that we have in ourselves and makes us less prepared. The argument that a religious person is happier than a non-religious person is like saying that a drunken man is happier than a sober one. Hence, religion blinds us from seeing our problems as they actually are and in the long run would make us weak and less prepared to face problems in our lives on our own. C3. Religion can be misleading due to misinterpretation Since the policies of religion relies on wordings and scriptures written many hundreds of years ago, the possibility of those texts getting misinterpreted is unavoidable.A simple example might be the use of the words ‘Good’ and ‘Evil’. Words as such are purely subjective and can be associated to a wide variety of things based on a person’s opinions. Thus, this might tempt religious fanatics to undertake immoral or illegal paths or practices and justify them with their religion. C4. Religion promotes irrational thinking All around us we see people making several sacrifices, wasting precious time, money and energy on tedious undertakings just to stay true their religion. Being maimed, burnt, killed in the name of religion is not history. The apparent 'progressive' world we live in still practises some horrific brutal rituals, which in spite of being banned by governments worldwide see a large number of participants even today.[2] Due to the brutal nature of these rituals I have refrained from posting them here but interested readers can very well check them out by following this link: http://www.dnaindia.com... Also a lot of time and money gets consumed for temples and places where deities get worshipped, which could have been used for other productive purposes. “Churches don't pay property taxes on their land or buildings. When they buy stuff, they don't pay sales taxes. When they sell stuff at a profit, they don't pay capital gains tax. If they spend less than they take in, they don't pay corporate income taxes. Priests, ministers, rabbis and the like get "parsonage exemptions" that let them deduct mortgage payments, rent and other living expenses when they're doing their income taxes.”[3] In the U.S alone people give more than $82.5 billion a year to religion [3] and what do we get in return? Practically nothing. So we must ask ourselves is this really necessary? C5. Religion divides us and breeds violence Religion blinds us from our collective identity as human beings and separates us into different categories based on our beliefs. When you call yourself a Hindu or a Muslim or a Christian or anything else, you are separating yourself from the rest of mankind. History has shown us that when you separate yourself by belief, by nationality, by tradition, etc. it eventually breeds violence when they clash against each other. Religion has a bloody past where it has caused a huge number of small and large scale wars. Some of them have even continued for years and killed many. [4] So is such a price worth paying for whatever significant advantage that religion has to offer for us? Counter-Proposal: This is perhaps the strongest suit for my cause. So in this hypothetical world of mine where religion doesn’t exist what takes its place and fills the void? Well the answer is two words: Education & Awareness. Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.[5] If at least half of the energy, time and money invested to religion, if not all, is channelled for enlightening the public with education and awareness then we would see mankind progressing rapidly with perfect harmony and peace! And with that, I believe that I have convincingly shown that religion is not really a ‘necessity’ in the current world we live in and thus have upheld my case. I look forward to my opponent’s arguments Over to you CON. References: 1: https://en.wikipedia.org... 2: http://www.dnaindia.com... 3: http://www.washingtonpost.com... 4: http://addictivelists.com... 5: Quote by Nelson Mandela