Lockdown - Lights Off

There was once a dude who very wisely said "Man is born free but everywhere he is in shackles". He wasnt very far off when he said that.

At a very young age me n my God had a parting of ways. As a kid I looked around and all I could see was people pointing fingers at people because of God. People killing seemingly because of God. All in the name of God? Religious discourse happened at my junior sports meet when classmates formed groups and started pointing out why the other group wouldnt go to heaven. These were 11 year old kids we are talking about here.

I cant help but cynically smirk when I hear people talking about a secular utopia where all people come together and live happily ever after. Why?
Because from the time we are born we have been conditioned towards a 'Us' and therefore contrasted against a 'Them' . When the end of a penis is cut I am inititated into a clan. My primary identity. When I choose to abstain from a certain type of food my identity is being solidified. How can you then ask me to ignore this identity of mine and adopt some higher obscure identity that is supposed to exist but nobody seems to belong to.

I never liked religion much. All it told me was what all that I could not do. I couldnt eat this , I couldnt go there , I couldnt do that. So many rules . All for what? What did it give me in exchange? Hell, whats in it for me? But still people all around me seemed to smitten by it. My family so obviously was far down that track. I was even more confounded when my friends also started goin down that track. Guys who until recently had stood with me asking if there was actually a God suddenly goes Halleluijah on me. I still havent understood why?

Sometimes its guys who are branded the social 'unimportants' who join that camp and suddenly they have an importance. They are part of some group socially . They have friends , they have a life. Apparently God has made it all happen.
On the other hand sometimes its the popular guy who makes the choice.Nyways sometimes its guys who already have a life who choose to join the 'halo'.
Sometimes its just people who have gone through so much shit in one life that they just need something to believe . Something that makes them believe that their's is not enitrely a worthless existence. That they are part of a bigger picture.
Sometimes like my gujju friend told me once , everything that can be done is done and we can do no more ,we need insurance. We need to believe that the Big Daddy up there is gonna make things go our way and if they dont then its not our fault cause this was simply not meant to be. .

These were the percipible reasons that I found for people to act in an apparent illogical behaviour. Whatever the reasons and whichever camp they joined , one thing common between all of them was the absence of any freedom after they did. They chose their identities and never questioned anything about it. Not a story not a rule.

People say that religion is nothing but a set of values. A set of values that one chooses to live by. Although all the basic tenets are supposedly the same I find that the values are different. Since they live by different values its no rocket science to understand that at some points these values may bring them on opposite sides of a river.

I imagine a world without any religion to make sure that this situation never comes about. All I got was that if not religion then something else . Nationality perhaps? What I got was that we made religion. If not this we will make something else. We are all born free .Independent minds , free thoughts. However we choose to chain ouselves . To have our decisions made for us. That way if something goes wrong we have somebody else to blame. Responsiblity is more than a word , its a curse.