Opposing Religious Violence And Coercion

Many people, myself included, were taught to be respectful of other religions. Contrary to what some think, namely that if you do not accept what they believe, that means you are against what they believe. If you do not accept the divinity of Jesus, for example, because Jesus is not part of your religion, that does not mean you are against Jesus or opposed or hostile to Jesus. It only means most likely that you do not believe in Jesus because it is not what you were raised to believe. There are millions upon millions of people in this world that are members of religions where Jesus is simply not part of the religion. This includes Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, and others. That is far different than proclaiming that any of these religions are hostile towards Jesus or Christianity. To not accept or believe in the Quran, or to not believe Muhammad is the final prophet or a prophet at all, does not mean you are opposed to Islam. It simply means this is not part of your religion and it is not part of what it is you were raised to believe. It is the simple fact that millions upon millions of people in this world, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, other religions, believe in different things than what is in the two largest religions of the world, Christianity and Islam. There was a time in history in which Christians would shove their religion down the throats of others, forcing conversions and murdering millions. Thankfully, Christianity has long ago evolved beyond that. Christianity actively seeks converts, unlike Buddhism, Judaism, Yazidis and a number of other religions, but it seeks conversions by choice, not by force. If Christianity still practiced forced conversions and expansion by force, this world would be drenched in even more blood than it is already drowning in. There are those in the Islamic world that impose their religion upon others by force. Free men and women do not want to live under religious domination and tyranny by any religion. That is why the most successful, productive societies in the world have separated church from state. Religious freedom is a basic human right. Islam has a long history of forcing itself down the throats of others and murdering millions that do not submit. Sadly, this continues to this day. Every minority religious community in the middle east and other places, including Christians, Bahais, Yazidis, are under threat or being destroyed. Muslims that practice and believe differently than the rigid, intolerant forms of Islam aggressively promoted by certain oil rich Muslim nations are also under threat. No one under the banner of their religion has the right to use force or harm members of another faith simply because of what it is they believe. Freedom against religious violence must be a universal right of all people, Muslims included. Opposing Islamic violence is far different than opposing Islam. All religious violence must be opposed, regardless of what religion is practicing the violence. But to pretend that hatred, violence, intolerance, incitement against Jews, Yazidis, Christians, Bahais, Hindus, Buddhists, and others is not running rampant and out of control in the Islamic world might be politically correct, but it is also suicidal. There are Muslims that proclaim that the whole world will be made Muslim by force(violent Jihad). This may be true one day, but if does happen, there will be no one left alive to see it. This is the age of nuclear weapons, and even without them, humans are already destroying this world.