Belief Makes You Stupid: Difference between revisions

* ''[[South Park]]'''s general philosophy towards religion seems to be "faith may make you stupid sometimes, but it will probably also make you good (or at least well-meaning)." The episode "All About the Mormons?" especially plays with this; the Mormon family is presented as ridiculously gullible for buying the story of how their religion was founded, but when Stan calls them out for that one of their sons points out that they're also the only family in the entire town who's happy and loving, largely because their church's ''main'' focus is on family values, not religious history.

** Then they still got it a bit off, as the history of the church is a major focus of study (alternating with books of scripture). The origin story is seen as vitally important, as it's the thing the LDS church bases its validity ''on''.<ref>For example, if Joseph Smith didn't have the First Vision and the Book of Mormon is a hoax, then there goes the keystone of a member's testominy that their faith ''is'' God's restored church.</ref>

* ''[[The Simpsons]]'' seems to lean this way in recent seasons, as [[Trope Namer|Ned]] has gotten [[Flanderization|Flanderized]] from "overly religious [[Good Samaritan]]" to "[[The Fundamentalist]] [[Knight Templar]]", usually so he can be arrayed against the more scientifically-minded [[Creator's Pet|Lisa]]. In "The Monkey Suit", Ned's opposition to the teaching of evolution turns the town into a fundamentalist dystopia, and in "You Kent Always Say What You Want" he went on a crusade to cleanse television after Kent Brockman swore in pain upon taking some hot coffee to the lap.<ref>And before that, we see Ned monitoring all TV shows for "impropriety", including Krypto "licking himself" on ''[[Smallville]]'', prompting even his own children to say [[You Need to Get Laid]]</ref>

* Like the game, this is almost played straight in [[Dead Space: Downfall]]. Nearly all the Unitologists are shown as either ignorant, horrible misguided, violent lunatics, and even just plain not right in the head. The biggest exception is Samuel Irons who is portrayed as being the [[Only Sane Man]] among the entire Unitologist sect, as he is clearly aware that the Marker and necromorphs are a threat rather than as a key to ascension. Not only does he help the initially distrustful [[Doomed Protagonist]] Alissa Vincent and her P.C.S.I. Security team cut down the horde of undead marauders, he performs a [[Heroic Sacrifice]] by distracting the necromorphs so that Alissa and her remaining team member helped the survivors escape (which all go in vain of course).