Dear Yuyutsu,

I would love to see peace there. I would love to see peace everywhere. The reality is that, if they all were to become David F clones, they would find something else to fight about.

Sung to the tune of Home on the Range:

Oh, give me a clone
A clone of my own
With the Y chromosome turned to X.
Then this clone, this clone of my own
Would be of the opposite Sex

There is no God. Judaism is nonsense. Islam is nonsense. Christianity with a messiah who didn't bring peace, a god in three parts, a virgin having a baby and life after death is triple nonsense.

Dear Yuyutsu,

To be serious you spoke of "something that takes the mentality and aspirations of these people into account at least to some degree, something less than the total destruction of all these people hold most dear?"

Seriously, I think most people hold their nonsensical religious beliefs most dear. They kill each other to defend that nonsense. I think the total destruction of what those people hold most dear to be replaced by kindness, rationality and the scientific method as a way of thinking would be a great improvement over what many people hold most dear. It is my opinion that what most people hold most dear isn't worth a pail of warm spit.

Dear David F.,

Well you know that we disagree over some issues on God and religion, but that's OK: you cannot force me to forsake my faith, neither over the internet nor in Australia. Even if you claim that what is dearest to me is nonsense, your view does not change the fact in the slightest that that and none other is what is dearest to me.

Putin believes that there are no Ukrainian people, that those who call themselves "Ukrainian" should and want to be absorbed by Russia. He believed that the Ukrainians will welcome his troops as "liberators" - well he got a nasty surprise that shattered his unrealistic expectations.

So you too wish to step into the Middle-East like an elephant in a china shop, telling them to change their religion, to believe in science instead and all that, to hate what they now love and to love what they now hate - you know what? They will fight you back as bitterly as the Ukrainians fight their Russian invaders, as bitterly as the Jews fought the Romans in Massada, as bitterly as a mother duck fights when you try to take what is dearest to her, her duckling. Then you are neither even Russian nor Roman - so instead of making peace you will run home bleeding, crying, calling Mom for help.

You further opine that: «what most people hold most dear isn't worth a pail of warm spit.»

- not just the religious people even, now most people!
Well you may be in your 90's, but with such non-compromising and insensitive attitudes you gained no peace-making communication skills during your long life, only the skill to make others upset and angry.

Orthodox Jewish parents who learn that their sons or daughters (for Muslims it's only the daughters) wish to marry outside the faith, sit Shivah and thereafter consider their child as dead. Many Jewish parents send their children to Israel for that very purpose, to help them meet a Jewish spouse/partner and prevent them from marrying others - now you try to break their will...

Jews and Muslims can intermarry to become one people and peace will have a chance
davidf,
But isn't peace exactly what neither side wants ? If it were then there'd be peace already !

Dear Yuyutsu,

I do not advocate forcing anyone to do anything. Although I think your beliefs are nonsense I would not use compulsion to get you to deny them. Reason usually takes second place to primitive nonsense that appeals to the emotions. I do not expect an epidemic of reason to rid humanity of the religious crap they are filled with. I am happy that I have lived to 96 and am apparently in my right mind. I am happy that some people have rid themselves of religious crap. I am happy that some people are kind. The reality is that your nonsense or similar nonsense will continue to curse humanity. I think you and others ocasionally have generous impulses which break through the religious crap. In the Middle East a Muslim fanatic shot Sadat, and a Jewish fanatic shot Rabin. That is the reality, and kindness along with reason are in short supply.

Dear David F.,

Thank you for clarifying that you do not support the use of force.

You know well that my view of religion is very different to yours, but this is not the topic here.

I still believe that peace, including in the Middle-East, can also be achieved by less drastic means than either physical or spiritual murder, for example by a respectful territorial compromise and separation.

I know that you wish for peace in the Middle-East, but sometimes I wonder whether your wish for their loss of religion is even stronger.