“According to Pew, in 2018 more than a quarter of the world’s countries experienced a high incidence of hostilities motivated by religious hatred, mob violence related to religion, terrorism, and harassment of women for violating religious codes.” 

55 of the 198 countries in the world impose high restrictions on religions.  It is strange that religion that is supposedly the source of peace, harmony and happiness is the force behind devilish and sadistic activities. Most scholars either directly agree to religions sanctioning violence or blame the understanding one has of the religious texts.Atheism is not the solution a rational human would look for in the present situations, considering the fact that 84% of the world population identifies with a religious group. 

What do we do?

We as individuals hold an equal amount of power to shoo away religious extremism as hold the officials.If you really want to make a change here is what will help you.

• Respect: It is okay to be religious and to be outrageous about it. What is not okay is demeaning other religions, their followers and their practices, verbally, virtually, silently or vehemently. 

• Offensive and funny: There’s a thin line between being disrespectful and being sarcastic. To be funny is all right. It’s important. The moment your joke hurts someone else’s sentiments, it’s no more funny. 

• Islamophobia is NOT justified: Considering that Islamic groups have been visibly active when the discussion is about extremism, it is necessary we address the Islamophobia. Imagine if three of your family members got cancer and everyone started avoiding you because they suspect you’ve got the germs too and that they’re contagious. We do not justify it, right? Similarly, it is not justifiable to spread or harbor hate for an entire community owing to the rotten apples in the basket. 

• Think big: What is religion? A desperate approach of mankind for hope, the will to live and getting explanations to the happenings of the Universe? No matter what your definition of religion is, it has nothing to do with harming others emotionally, physically or in any plausible way. So a believer or not, stop making it all about yourself and look at the bigger picture.

• Be aware and read: In the era where your mobile beeps every minute with a new notification, you have the best shot at staying updated about the world and its affairs than any other generation has had in the past. Let trusted news applications have a place in your phone and spare a few minutes to reading about the world every day. Just having a top streak score on Snapchat and a thousand followers on Instagram won’t help unless you know about the most recent abnormalities that took place in the city where your follower belongs from. 

There is a lot more that you can do to make a tiny but effective contribution in being a woke and moral world citizen. All you need is the will to do so. Trust me, it’s not as hard as it looks.