Humes fork
Banned
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- Jul 9, 2011
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Recently a study was carried out in Sweden about the Swedes' views and attitudes toward different things in society. One of the issues was attitudes toward the five world religions as well as atheism (treated as the equivalent of a religion for the purposes of the study). About attitudes, not beliefs (though one's beliefs obviously impact on one's attitudes). The results can be seen below (the words are similar enough in Swedish and English that I don't think translation will be necessary):
I can see Christianity being positively rated because many people associate it with various Swedish traditions. I'd suspect Judaism's negative rating has to do with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as well as just old-fashioned antisemitism (Sweden was historically much less tolerant of Jews and Catholics that say England or the Netherlands). No idea about why atheism. Hinduism and Buddhism get the ratings they do. I think negative views on Islam come from Islamic terrorism, cartoon riots, attempted murders of Lars Vilks, and associated events. I don't think old plain xenophobia is enough to explain it. From a European point of view, Buddhism and Hinduism are even more foreign than Islam, yet are rated better.
I can see Christianity being positively rated because many people associate it with various Swedish traditions. I'd suspect Judaism's negative rating has to do with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as well as just old-fashioned antisemitism (Sweden was historically much less tolerant of Jews and Catholics that say England or the Netherlands). No idea about why atheism. Hinduism and Buddhism get the ratings they do. I think negative views on Islam come from Islamic terrorism, cartoon riots, attempted murders of Lars Vilks, and associated events. I don't think old plain xenophobia is enough to explain it. From a European point of view, Buddhism and Hinduism are even more foreign than Islam, yet are rated better.
