On Religion
I am an atheist, and I despise the caste structure created in our society. I believe caste is an offshoot of religion and it should be eradicated. Many social reformers and leaders have dedicated their lives to this cause.
Religion as an institution is quite an old one. I also think it was the most necessary evil then. A local priest in a temple or a church had many shoes to fill. He (it is scarce that it was a she) was the organiser of the community, psychologist, entertainer as well as the mediator in tussles. He probably had so much power that eventually he abused it. His role was to keep the sanity of the community and get the community united in the name of religion. Later, that could unity could be used for a war or a fight against another society or religion.
Come to the present.
Even though many of us, including me, claim that we are atheist, we are not. We might be religious about many aspects of our life.
We either are in Apple or Andriod religion when it comes to our devices. If you are in Apple religion, Jony Ive is in our pulpit now, and Steve Jobs is still our god. We judge people based on the kind of device they carry in the pocket or wear on their hands. We feel an affinity towards the people closest in our religion.
I have seen the same enthusiasm in the developers around me. You are either into JavaScript or hate it. You either love the frameworks of JS like AngularJS, NodeJS or you despise them.
It is the same with micro-services, diet, sports and what not. I belive it is perfect and healthy until this becomes our identity. We might start to hate and hurt ourselves emotionally because of this.
Let us hold them as views, instead of identity. Of course, the views should be strong but weakly held. When we are challenged enough with reason and data, our views should change, instead of we blinded by it.
I have many strong views about topics, and it goes from Apple Devices, Carbohydrates, Fasting, Zero-Inbox, Genre of Audiobooks and so on. But I hope I am sane enough in the future to change when things change.
What are you religious about?