Is Religion a Positive or Negative Force? An Essay for SSCI AS 304

This essay delves into the multifaceted impact of religion on society, examining both its positive and negative consequences. It argues against the notion that religion is inherently beneficial, presenting evidence of its role in fostering prejudice, discrimination, and social conflict. The essay explores how religion can contribute to social identity, yet simultaneously create divisions and lead to intolerance. It further critiques the concept of blind faith and the potential for religious leaders to exploit followers. While acknowledging religion's capacity for promoting social cohesion and inspiring cultural achievements, the essay ultimately emphasizes the need for critical evaluation and responsible engagement with religious beliefs. The author cites several sources to support the arguments.

Running head: IS RELIGION GOOD OR BAD?
IS RELIGION GOOD OR BAD?
Name of the student:
Name of the university:
Author note:

1IS RELIGION GOOD OR BAD?
For centuries religion has been a significant part of society, and the human experience of
religion is universal. Every society consisting past as well as present have shared a specific set of
beliefs in regard to the supernatural. Millions of people across the globe are shaped and impacted
by religion by forming individual or collective identity (Johnstone, 2015). However, religion has
also been one of the reasons for many conflicts in society in the past as well as the present.
Therefore it is often accused of being unnecessary and obsolete in today's society. In the same
perspective, this essay argues against the topic, religion is good for society and presents reasons
that prove religion is bad for society.
According to Yilmaz, Karadöller and Sofuoglu (2016), religion promotes prejudice
behavior. For thousands of years, religion has been cultivating arbitrary moral standards which
lead to discrimination in society. Discrimination and prejudice have a long history of human
society, and every person is aware of its consequences. Also, it is well known that the psycho-
social concept is caused by the feeling of in-group and out-group throughout society. There is
undoubtedly a connection between religion and prejudiced behavior which involves
discrimination towards homosexuals, non-religious and other religious groups. When the cause is
investigated, it is the rise in religious intolerance towards other groups which is intensely
associated with discrimination. Also, as religion has become a source of social acceptance for
individuals it leads to an increase in racial and religious intolerance. The concept of priming is
well associated with religion, which relates to a familiar stimulus with certain words that are
related to religion. For example, words like prayer, Jesus and the bible are conceptually
associated with conservative thoughts in the United States (Marshall, 2016). Therefore there is a
high possibility of developing prejudiced behavior among individuals through phenomena of
priming.

2IS RELIGION GOOD OR BAD?
According to Herriot (2014), religion provides a social identity to individuals. Religion
has served as a social identity for years, moreover, it is one of the crucial function of religion.
However, the concept of social identity has both positive as well as negative impact on
individuals. According to social identity theory, human's behavior can mostly be impacted by its
social identity, and it has the capability of reducing as well as reinforcing prejudice behavior in a
person. The positive impact may be reflected by the civil right movements where religion plays a
vital however, it is again religion that makes a particular group or community target of the
concerned threat. The entire religious group and the community may fall victim to religious
identity threat leading to social conflicts. The religious threat has the potential of creating the
feeling of insecurity within the community which may lead to other social issues (Hunter, 2018).
The concept of in-group and out-group encouraged by religion and religious beliefs are
commonly seen responsible for it.
Religion promotes a sense of faith however, it is merely a blind faith and obedience that
overrides critical thinking and reasoning. According to Abela (2014), due to the blind faith,
people lead towards ignorance and denial of scientific knowledge and it even creates obstacles in
scientific growth and progress. Through religion, people begin to believe in supernatural powers,
another life and many more concepts which often do not solve the current problem. By
promising rewards in another life, people are distracted by religion from the problems they face
in the present, where they are actually living. When given a considerable amount of thought, it is
a powerful as well as a dangerous tool in the hand of a certain religion, political elites and related
agents. These associated people in order to maintain their privileged status or in order to
convince the public to sacrifice their wills and wishes (Furseth & Repstad, 2017). For example,
the incident occurred in 1978 in Guyana was based on religious aspects. Almost 900 members of

3IS RELIGION GOOD OR BAD?
Jim Jones’s people’s temple drank cyanide-laced juice to commit mass suicide. During such
dreadful cases, it has been observed that millions of people believing in that particular religion
was below poverty and agreed to wear a suicide vest. While the believers were in misery, the
religious leaders enjoyed wealth, luxury and worry-free life. If there were no religion, there
would not be any believers who would ignore the consequences of the drinking cyanide-laced
juice (Abbott, 2015). Through these kinds of incidents, religion can be called the opium of the
people.
According to Galek et al. (2015), although religion has been seen as one of the primary
sources of all the conflict in the world, it still has some of the crucial factors that help to make
society a better place. Religion promotes social cohesion and helps in uniting people. It is one of
the primary reason religion was created, and it exists even today despite its disadvantages.
Religion motivates people to the right thing by engaging them with morality, humanity, and
ethics. Great leaders such as Martin Lurther King Jr, Mahatma Gandhi and many more were
empowered by the faith that made them stand up for injustice, help people who were in need and
initiate changes in order to make the society a better place (Guha, 2017). Religion inspires great
cultural achievements as it is witnessed that some of the humankind’s forms of expression have
been inspired by religion such as Taj Mahal in India and pyramids in Egypt.
Religion has been present in the society for centuries and also dominated humans from
the dawn of humanity. Due its long history, it has become deeply involved with human lives that
providing morality, identity and many more. It cannot be denied that it is a powerful tool that can
motivate human behavior for better as well as worse. Therefore, it is solely on human as well to
understand religion and act accordingly.

4IS RELIGION GOOD OR BAD?

5IS RELIGION GOOD OR BAD?
References:
Abbott, C. B. (2015). The Reverend Jim Jones and Religious, Political, and Racial Radicalism in
Peoples Temple.
Abela, A. V. (2014). Appealing to the imagination: Effective and ethical marketing of
religion. Journal of Business Research, 67(2), 50-58.
Furseth, I., & Repstad, P. (2017). An introduction to the sociology of religion: Classical and
contemporary perspectives. Routledge.
Galek, K., Flannelly, K. J., Ellison, C. G., Silton, N. R., & Jankowski, K. R. (2015). Religion,
meaning and purpose, and mental health. Psychology of Religion and Spirituality, 7(1), 1.
Guha, R. (2017). Why Gandhi matters. In Gandhi's Moral Politics (pp. 88-99). Routledge India.
Herriot, P. (2014). Religious fundamentalism and social identity. Routledge.
Hunter, J. D. (2018). The new religions: Demodernization and the protest against modernity.
In Cults in Context (pp. 105-118). Routledge.
Johnstone, R. L. (2015). Religion in society: A sociology of religion. Routledge.
Marshall, R. (2016). Destroying arguments and captivating thoughts: Spiritual warfare prayer as
global praxis. Journal of religious and Political Practice, 2(1), 92-113.
Yilmaz, O., Karadöller, D. Z., & Sofuoglu, G. (2016). Analytic thinking, religion, and prejudice:
An experimental test of the dual-process model of mind. The International Journal for
the Psychology of Religion, 26(4), 360-369.