The fact that atheistic/secular countries are the most stable, has less crime, more educated on average, and has a higher standard of living/level of general happiness should be all it takes to prove to us that religion is BAD. Frankly I think it should be categorized as a mental illness and treated as such. Or at the very least the laws around it should be tightened dramatically in the following ways. The following is kind of long, but I think it's really important and I think it's time for atheists, secularists, and Americans who believe in freedom in general to band together and make all of the following a goal. Anyone with me?

I'm proposing several new laws on religion as well as an entirely new form of government. I say it's time to start a revolution. Think about what our forefathers did and how much they had against them. In the spirit of starting a secular government, which was beneficial for the people and not for the churches and they had England against them with an organized government and army and we just had a bunch of disjointed settlements, but they won and it was a good thing. However, now their vision has been corrupted and deeply mutated and it's all gone wrong. Another revolution saw the freeing of the slaves. Revolutions work! We've been so domesticated that we forgot that we can still unite and demand the government does the right thing or overthrow them completely and rebuild anew. We have centuries worth of new knowledge and information. I think it's time to slay the dragon and build something new and beautiful. So what do you guys think? Think we can do it? Have any propositions of your own? Bare with me, this is kind of a radically different way of thinking. We've swallowed the company line that we need to respect and protect religion for so long. Religion doesn't need our protection. People need our protection. My idea for how to handle religion should not only work to destroy religion within just a few generations, it would also allow us to do so while protecting people's rights to practice their religion. It would simply give more rights to protect children and other people from religion and religious tyranny.

1. Kids should not be exposed to religion until they're at least 21 years of age. That way their brain has finished developing, it would protect them from having religion forced upon them/give them a choice if they want to be involved with it rather than simply being taught to believe in it from childhood. Would certainly protect them from a lot of abuse and neglect they face. For example children being suffocated during exorcisms which happens fairly regularly. Children being withheld from medical treatment. Children being taken to faith healers and the parents being told their child is cured, only for the child to end up permanently damaged or dead just because their treatment was delayed or foregone completely. Children being beaten to death because of religious motivated reasons. These things happen all the time in this country and there's laws protecting parents from being held responsible if it was due to religion. Would also prevent little boys and girls from genital mutilation for religious reasons. They'd be free to have it done as an adult if they choose but that shouldn't be forced on children.

2. Churches must be non-profit or they are treated like a business and face all the same laws, rules, and policies as businesses and they get no more federal funding. We lose $71 BILLION a year in tax money to churches, because they file for all these waivers and benefits and receive them. Why are our tax dollars funding religious organizations?! That needs to stop. There are people homeless, people who can't get proper medical care, children going hungry, disabled people who can't get what they need because we don't have the tax money to cover it, that could also help with things like environmental protection, science and medicine research, and education but churches get $71 billion a year? Think of all the good that could do but it's wasted. That's horrible. I think they should be allowed to collect as much as they want but only get to keep as much as it takes to keep the doors open and the rest should go straight to taxes. Or if they want to keep the money, they must apply to be a business and pay taxes like a business. Heavily taxed. On top of which this would prevent them from making claims they cannot substantiate. Like faith healing, would get them shut down and imprisoned for fraud and practicing medicine without a licence. They would be responsible for their actions basically. This would prevent so much abuse and making it transparent would stop them from committing crimes all the time like they are now.

3. Religion is to be kept either in church or at home. No promoting it, no missionary work, no knocking on people's doors and trying to sell their religion, no more street preachers. None of it. People should be protected from having religion forced on them and since we know religion can infect people and cause harm, like actually causing brain damage, it's a public hazard. I think someone should have to walk into a church and ask about it to learn about it, they shouldn't be ambushed. People will just have to be satisfied with practicing their religion personally and privately or with their church community, which is really all the protection they should get, since it still allows them to practice their religion it simply prevents them from abusing other people's right to be free from religion.

4. Socially, I think it we should stop with this idea that religion deserves to be respected and protected. It doesn't. It doesn't any more than Nazism, or socialism should be because really religion is just a harmful ideology coupled with mass hysteria and delusion. I also think we should have treatment centers opened and dedicated to treating religious mindsets because it's definitely a mental illness and it works on the brain and has similar effects to cocaine. I think religion should be shunned by polite society. Hard core. The way we shun racism, ignorance, and bigotry because religion breeds ignorance and bigotry. Religion should not be venerated like some kind of virtue because it's not a virtue and I'm tired of seeing lives destroyed and people hurt to protect something that clearly hurts them. Religious people are victims, they're sick, and they need our help. We've got to stop enabling them.

I also agree with you that democracy is a failed experiment. I think it's time for a new form of government. Technocracy. Put people who have technically and applicable knowledge of their job in the roles of their jobs. Politicians are not effective and so often they bring their personal religion and ideology into the work place where it has no business being. Theocracies do not work. Period. That's why our forefathers wanted no religion in their government. The intent was for a totally secular government that made decisions based on the greater good that would effect their citizens positively. Unfortunately they miscalculated. They trusted people to vote based on what was right and trusted the elected officials to also do what was right. That dream as failed and what we have now is a broken perverted system.

My suggestion is we put secular scientists, sociologists, anthropologists, psychologists, and generally people who can look at the effect certain actions play on a society and make decisions that are purely beneficial to the citizens rather than what people think they want. Then all the other branches of government has professionals who do the job based solely on the job it's self. Normal hard working people doing their jobs. Who can be totally fired and replaced if they are caught making decisions based on personal ideologies, religions, or money. The government should also be totally transparent (as long as it doesn't risk the security of the country) and there should always be people working round the clock to study their actions and make sure everything is on the up and up. If you want something to happen, you can propose the idea but it needs to have evidence and logic to support it. I would also put anonymous in charge of keeping a watchful eye on the non transparent parts of the government. Basically they would be a watchful guard dog for the people to make sure that power is not being corrupted or used wrong. I truly think that would make our society advance at lightening speed. Religion holds society back, it always has and it's time to take control away from them and let science by our guide because it's shown to work reliably 100% of the time. *Side note. Companies would not be permitted anywhere NEAR the government. People who have any kind of vested interest in big companies would not be allowed to make decisions. It would be treason for companies to bribe people to make concessions that keep them making money. Companies that changed their business models to fit with science and protection of the environment would be given huge tax breaks. Companies that fight against advancement would be taxed much harder. Basically, it would be more financially beneficial to do what's right for everyone and be financially crippling to stand in the way of progress. It would certainly motivate them to help get America off fossil oil dependency. There are roofing tiles that are more durable and are also solar powered. That would be a good place to start, investing in that and beginning to put those tiles on every home and business in the country. That would give us enough power not only to run the entire country, but the surplus could be use to run electric cars. There's other vehicles that have been designed that run off things like water or other cars where the only byproduct was water, so not only would it protect the environment, it would help create water. The oil and power companies fought against it and won because our government is basically so corrupt it's ruled by the 1%.

As for basic laws, I propose we make liberty and protection our highest priorities. You can do literally whatever you want as long as it doesn't hurt a minor and it doesn't hurt a non-consenting adult. We make moves that protect our country and do not protect "hurt feelings" above all else like they seem to be doing today. We make sure our citizens are protected, properly cared for, properly protected, and their freedom is protected above all else. We put the pursuit of science and knowledge as our goal. One nation, hand in hand with science and education.

This new basic law would open a lot of doors to bettering the life of everyone. The following things would become legal as a result. They might sound like bad things, but I'll explain why they're actually good things.

1. Drug use. However, because manufacturing and distributing without a licence would be illegal and have harsher punishment, rather than throwing people who have the ILLNESS of addiction in cages, we could then instead use the money we save from not having to imprison them... for being sick, to help them with their addiction. This has been proven to work in other countries. Their rate of addiction dropped significantly and of course it starved gangs and criminals of one of their most reliable sources of money. They put up little stations all around the country where the people could go to get clean needles, and ride out their high under supervision so they weren't out getting into trouble. Overdose deaths dropped majorly because the employees could call an ambulance and of course it created a lot of jobs and opportunities for people as well. Even teen pregnancy dropped! We need to start educating people about the nature of addiction. Addicts are treated with hate and disgust even though addiction is classified as a medical illness. Being sick is not a crime. These people also get put in prison and get hooked up with bad people and gangs and create a lot of problems and doesn't help them at all. That would also give us a little boost in tax money. Like I said, make distributing and manufacturing without a licence or buying unlicensed drugs illegal and make it very harshly enforced, but prohibition doesn't work. It only benefits the criminals and it hurts tax payers and the addicts. It would also free up a lot of legal resources as the DEA would be tasked with only chasing down illegal manufacturers and distributors who are actual criminals rather than chasing around addicts and doing more harm than good. *Positive side effect. Marijuana would be totally legal. This drug people should be allowed to grow for personal use. It treats so many illnesses with almost no side effects and virtually risk free. There are children all over the country who are having dangerous life threatening seizures and cannot get appropriate, safe treatment. Marijuana practically cures epilepsy and is useful for treating pain without the heavy side effects and chance of becoming physically dependent on opiates. Why is this still illegal on the federal level?!

2. Prostitution - This is another one that only hurts people for being illegal. Once prostitution is legal (and again this has been proven to work in other countries), it can be under the same rules and guidelines as any business. It can be taxed, the prostitutes would be required to be tested every 3 months, forced to use protection and birth control, made to prove their employees are adults, will be protected against exploitation, abuse, violence, attacks, and robbery. Women wouldn't need to rely on the protection of pimps and have the majority of their money taken. They could be self reliant and have the law to protect them. This also helps because it would keep them out of jail too. A person should have full control over what they do with their body. The government should not be telling adults who they can have sex with and for what reason as long as it's consensual. It would free up a lot of legal resources. Instead of cops dressing up like whores and johns and putting people in prison... for having sex with each other (what? seriously? Still?!) they would be able to focus on more important sex crimes like rape, child molestation, sex rings, and human trafficking rather than focusing on victimless sex acts that are beneficial for both parties.

3. Euthanasia - Why are people being told whether they can live or die? Why is the government making life and death, medical decisions for us. Shouldn't every person be free to decide what they want to do with their body? My body, my choice! People are suffering severely in this country and being FORCED to live through it. Often times people die in terror and agony, slow painful merciless deaths. We have the ability to ease their suffering, and isn't that what is the point of the medical community? To ease a person's suffering? Sometimes keeping a person alive does more harm than good. Certainly one should have the right to die with dignity. No matter if another person believes it's a "sin". It's selfish, cruel, and inhumane to prevent a person from dying peacefully. We don't even think twice about putting an animal to sleep out of mercy and love, but if it's a human we think we have the right to insist that they suffer through every agonizing moment? Here's how I think the laws around this should go. 1. If you are in pain and you wish to die, you must 1. Prove that you are an autonomous personality who is mentally capable of making the decision for yourself and are not under the control or will of a third party entity who is encouraging you to do it. Basically, it needs to be YOUR choice and you need to be capable of making that choice. Understanding your situation and coming to the conclusion and be able to understand the consequences of that choice. This can be proven by seeing a psychiatrist and having them write that in their opinion you are mentally competent to make your own decisions, are not under duress, and are not being influenced by a third party. 2. You must show some kind of evidence of your physical pain like a doctors note or some kind of test and prove that you have made sufficient attempts to control your pain. Since drugs, especially medical marijuana would be fully legal and have no limit to how much and how often you use it, most pain could be reasonably managed. Though if in case you cannot control your pain in a way that would leave you functional, for example you can manage your pain but you're always asleep or high and you don't want to live like that, that should also be an okay reason to decide to end thing. 3. If you want to die based on psychological issues, such as constantly being terrorized by some kind of mental or neurological issue or other health issue that destroys your quality of life, you would need to see a therapist and a psychiatrist regularly for a period of at least 1 year and make an attempt to treat your illness, deal with the mental implications of the decision, and possibly the issue like seasonal depression could go away after some time and you change your mind. If at the end of that year you still firmly want to die, you should be allowed to. If you're unsure, you extend the treatment for 6 months and continue extending it for 6 months at a time until you decide one way or another. This will ensure people are not being purely reactive to their mental illnesses but are making a reasoned decision despite this.

These issues can be controversial and people may not *like* the idea of these things being legal, but objectively it is better for everyone except for actual criminals. It's also gives people freedom of choice and will, which is most important. I strongly feel that everyone should have total rights and control over their body, their life, and make decisions that are based on the greater good, and not based on religion and bronze age "morals." A lot of our laws are still really puritan and we shouldn't have to fight these battles one at a time to give people their basic human rights and their right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. If someone is happy with doing something even if it goes against our personal subjective morals, we need to just accept it and live the way that makes us happy rather than expecting others to conform to our ways. Only then do I think true happiness, justice, and freedom can be gained. The evidence backs this up.

So what do you think? Do you agree? If so how can we go about implementing this? Any questions and concerns?