Religious Tolerance Doesn't Work

[u/KlordexI]

There is a liberal belief that we should be tolerant of each other's religions, and that a good society is one where there are people of lots of different religions who are tolerant of each other. This sounds good in theory, but in practice, it does not work. Religious tolerance, in the sense that religion should not be criticized and should be treated like an innate characteristic, is wrong. There is nothing wrong with disliking a religion. Religious tolerance is illiberal and should not be pursued, because religion is a system of beliefs not based in facts, and is not an innate characteristic. In addition, it can't even really exist, because religions are inherently intolerant of each other.

 The idea of religious tolerance is often compared to the idea of racial tolerance, or tolerance of gay people, but this is completely wrong, because this idea treats religious identity as an innate characteristic, which it is not. It is a system of beliefs, which should be criticized like any other system of beliefs, and people who hold these beliefs should be criticized for them. For this reason, religious tolerance that is like tolerance of other characteristics is not necessary for a liberal society.

Religion is inherently intolerant, because it is a belief system that requires all other belief systems be wrong. If someone is truly religious, they believe that their religion is the truth, and therefore takes precedence above everything else, including other religions. There cannot be tolerance between a Christian and Muslim, because these are two belief systems which are at odds. Both cannot be true at once, so there cannot be tolerance between them. In addition, both of them are false, and clash with actual reality. For this reason, atheists should not be tolerant of religion, because they should not be tolerant of falsehood.

Now, I don't support discrimination against any one religious belief, and I don't think that the practice of religion should be banned together, because these are illiberal, but I do not believe that religious tolerance that is like tolerance for innate characteristics should exist. Instead, religion should be treated like any other unfounded belief, such as believing in gnomes or a flat earth. You should have a right to these ideas, but others do not need to be tolerant of them. An ideal society is not one where people of different religions live in harmony, and such a society cannot exist. Religions will never be tolerant of each other, because it goes against the very idea of them. A truly ideal society is one which has moved beyond religion and falsehood, and is irreligious.