"For those who require unrelated people to take responsibility for those who claim to be their co-religionists (not a demand ever made of Christians)" I want to believe this is sarcasm intended to draw attention to what Christians actually endure regularly but it just doesn't work. At the risk of being accused of trying to hijack the comments section (I'm not) of an otherwise good article, let me say, acknowledging the above quote's different context, that there are nonetheless a nearly identical group of people doing precisely that blame-spreading to Christians and other religious when Islamist terrorist acts like this occur - anti-religious bigots who rant online against everyone except Islamists after Islamist incidents just like today's occur. It seems by your comment you need to be made aware of it. I don't know what motivates such to offer blaming and hence wiping out religion altogether as a cure-all for society's ills, but the discrimination they endorse in society against all faithful regardless of stripe is clear and real. Setting aside for a moment the extreme cowardice in using a moment like this to dodge repercussions of criticism by blasting entirely other religions, the number of thusly hostile online comments today alone can't be ignored if you want to say what you did. To go back to your parenthetical comment, sorry but in the West at least, there is plenty of blame-spreading for these acts to Christians by anti-religious posters, lumping them and other religious quite regularly with the most unreasonable members of entirely other religions. As an atheist who appreciates the value of culture and history I resent bigots waving around atheism as an antidote as if religion were a sickness. It is arrogant and intellectually stunting to be so cavalier about the boundaries of one's own ignorance, a problem which writers much greater than me have pointed out as a real threat to the sciences. You are not guilty of any of this of course, but passing off comments which ignore a very similar experience had by Christians, Buddhist activists, and others under a possibly even worse premise (i.e. all faithful need to go) is unacceptable (to say nothing of the absurd notion that the creativity of abusers and the mentally ill will instantly cease in a world without religion).
"For those who require unrelated people to take responsibility for those who claim to be their co-religionists (not a demand ever made of Christians)" I want to believe this is sarcasm intended to draw attention to what Christians actually endure regularly but it just doesn't work. At the risk of being accused of trying to hijack the comments section (I'm not) of an otherwise good article, let me say, acknowledging the above quote's different context, that there are nonetheless a nearly identical group of people doing precisely that blame-spreading to Christians and other religious when Islamist terrorist acts like this occur - anti-religious bigots who rant online against everyone except Islamists after Islamist incidents just like today's occur. It seems by your comment you need to be made aware of it. I don't know what motivates such to offer blaming and hence wiping out religion altogether as a cure-all for society's ills, but the discrimination they endorse in society against all faithful regardless of stripe is clear and real. Setting aside for a moment the extreme cowardice in using a moment like this to dodge repercussions of criticism by blasting entirely other religions, the number of thusly hostile online comments today alone can't be ignored if you want to say what you did. To go back to your parenthetical comment, sorry but in the West at least, there is plenty of blame-spreading for these acts to Christians by anti-religious posters, lumping them and other religious quite regularly with the most unreasonable members of entirely other religions. As an atheist who appreciates the value of culture and history I resent bigots waving around atheism as an antidote as if religion were a sickness. It is arrogant and intellectually stunting to be so cavalier about the boundaries of one's own ignorance, a problem which writers much greater than me have pointed out as a real threat to the sciences. You are not guilty of any of this of course, but passing off comments which ignore a very similar experience had by Christians, Buddhist activists, and others under a possibly even worse premise (i.e. all faithful need to go) is unacceptable (to say nothing of the absurd notion that the creativity of abusers and the mentally ill will instantly cease in a world without religion).
Thank you.