Why Western Society Seems so Disjointed



All of us, or maybe just me, enjoy reading things that are exactly what we believe. An author who writes for the public just published a nice article listing 10 things humans across cultures and time fear and/or believe that give religion an opening. He says humans believe religions in order to fill needs from these fears/needs and that if/when religion does not work anymore something else moves in. That something else is today's political factions, tribes and single-issue voters. It all suggests the case Christians make that it is "needed" for a cohesive society has some validity. The author points out we can handle these without religion.

Readers here know all the "needs" listed in the link but I'll list some of the old regulars: Fear of death/need for an afterlife, need to know/understand the origin of human, need to know rules to live by for approval and the need for a villain/Satan to blame things on.

There are others the link author does not list in the ten. One is ego, the need to be known by someone/something important. Another is loneliness. Whether the list is 10 or 20 matters not. Humans need to fill some hole. The link author then explains we can all fill these holes or needs by understanding they are part of being human. The fear of death can be filled by understanding we have been lucky to be alive and want to be greedy. We want more life but reality is there is none when we are dead. We want to blame someone for whatever is wrong but maybe it is just humans of which includes us.  

While the author does not go into this, it seems reasonable to me that Trump's popularity may well be, as least in part, due to the decline in Christianity. He has a big rural/blue collar vote. This sector is one of the least religious in today's polling. MAGA has filled in where Christianity left a hole.  

The link carefully points out it is not necessary to backfill the hole left by leaving religion with nonsense. Instead, humans need to understand themselves. We need to realize we have these "needs" to know but accept there is stuff we don't know and get over it. 

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