Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.
The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is therefore in embryo the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo
- Karl Marx
Courtesy of Hitchens.
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Marx was wrong:
ReplyDeleteReligion is not the opium of the masses... Opiates have a phySiological effect. It'd be more accurate to describe religion as the placebo of the masses, as both are physiologically inactive and any effect must (rationally) be assumed to be exclusively psychological.
In any case though, Marx is an elitest git who assumed everything in human life was tainted by ideology, except his views. Somehow all opposition was based on people being blinkered by social circumstances engineered and maintained by the dominant capitalist way of life, but Marx and Engels were somehow above this. That's not only elitest, it's self-contradictory. Stop wasting your time and go read Mill, Hobbes or Locke.
I think you are bored and wanting to pick a fight rather that stand by your comments. Surely Marx is being metaphoric and I quote it because I have seen this passage crop up numerous times. Each time I am in awe at the sheer poetry and insightfulness of his work. If I could only write like this I would be a happy man.
ReplyDeleteIn saying this however, religion is not a physiological but exclusively psychological? In a sujective way I think you are somewhat mistaken. Religion affects the mind and the body. As religious guilt affects the conscience it also affects the nervous system. One man castrates himself after and old man circumcises himself. As we see the tears of rapture we see the martyrdom of life. When a monk flags himself it is a psychological action but the effect on his futre health is physiological. As a priest who miraculously developes holes in his hands and feet.
Objectively if we take an evolutionary view, whatever genes that we have that allowed religion to grow, survived because they had a evolutionary advantageous effect. It affects the mind and body both directly and indirectly.
Marx never argued that conditions were always maintained or engineered but could arise out of want and competitiveness as the 'invisible hand' of Smith. Marx wrote for the New York times, was a advocte of free speech and seen the America of the 18th century the next step towards a free an equal society. Much of are views are historically influenced and to say that no opinion is completely free from bias and in truth often contains much is a lesson we should all take note of.
yawn
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