South Park sang it best.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Hm3mDatFpNE

Joseph Smith was called a prophet (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) He started the Mormon religion (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb). (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) Joseph Smith was called a prophet-

(Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) Many people believed Joseph (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) And that night he-ee saw an angel (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

(Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

Joseph Smith was called a prophet (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

(Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

He found the stones and golden plates (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) Even though nobody else ever saw them (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

(Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

(Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

And that’s how the Book of Mormon was written (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) (Dumb dadumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) (Dumb dadumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) (Dahumb dahumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) (Dumb dumb dumb dumb duuumb, duuumb.)

Martin went home to his wife (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) And showed her pages from the Book of Mormon (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

Lucy Harris smart smart smart (Smart smart smart smart smart)

Martin Harris dumb dadumb-

Lucy Harris smart smart smart Martin Harris dumb. So Martin went on back to Smith Said the pages had gone away Smith got mad and told Martin He needed to go pray (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

(Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb.

when you believe one outlandish thing, it’s easy to be convinced of others. On top of that one of the main tools religions have is fear. Make people believe in some horrible fate, then convince them the only way to avoid that fate is through doing exactly as you say.

Yourlve got the cause and effect backwards there big shoots.

Their entire worldview depends on blindly believing things that don’t make sense and are unverifiable

They are trained from a very young age to accept anything an authority tells them.

They were conditioned to growing up. Their parents taught them to, they saw how the ingroup and the outgroups work and settled on the ingroup. Not much more to it than that i’m afraid.

I mean they believe there’s a man in the sky that they don’t see who controls everything. Then that big man speaks through the pastor and this pastor interprets this book for them to hear. Everything good or bad is part of some divine plan. Then the whole thing is wrapped around the idea of wholehearted faith.

All throughout history, religious leaders plant themselves as a way to control people and power over them. See Europe, Asia, Africa, the Americas.

I don’t know about across the pond, but to me that always seemed to be a loud minority of charismatic leaders gathering big flocks. Which the rest of The Church tries to distance itself from.

I think this isn’t specifically tied to religion. It’s just it’s noticeable when it is. People are manipulated by governments and the media all of the time. It even happens in largely secular states as well.

You say evangelicals, but there’s also the likes of Mormons, Seventh day Adventists (not really a big cult now as it used to be), Jehovah’s Witnesses. There are Sunni extremists and Shia extremists in Islamic countries. China had weird cults as well such as the Falun Gong. But that also had an atheistic movement in the cultural revolution. Nazi Germany’s movement was borderline pagan in nature.

I think maybe you have it backwards people who are easily swayed/trusting of authority/gullible are going to be naturally drawn toward religion. Skeptics/those who don’t take things at face value are going to be naturally skeptical of it.

Religion doesn’t make you stupid but it’s very attractive to the sort

I have the opposite perception - that people become in fact more conservative and buying into conspiracy theories more readily as they age.

Why are most religious people so easy to manipulate?

Targeted Propaganda creates an online echo-chamber where everyone thinks that they’re correct for obvious -to them- reasons (Selective reporting, lying by omission, no one reads the retraction etc.). Add to that the addictive and isolating nature of smart technology, the sense of community they find in their personal traits/hobbies/beliefs/interests and the fact that the rich are actively trying to destroy the middle and working class. That’s how you get someone from group X, who believes they are wholly correct and smart enough to not be manipulated by media, asking why group Y is so easy to manipulate. It’s not about characteristics of faith, or anything like that. It’s the people at the top, telling you it’s other members of your class dragging you down. Through the global media monopolies that they control. We’re all part of it.

It’s why religions make such a BIG DEAL about “faith”.

Faith is simply a commitment to believe things that otherwise contradict obvious reality (but which invariably work to some “leader’s” advantage).

I think you have it backwards, it’s no wonder people who are easy to manipulate get drawn into religion.

Because they have been taught, from childhood, to just believe whatever the guy up front tells them to.

If you believe in a magic man in the sky and a talking snake, it’s probably pretty easy to convince them of other things too.

The same reason why people who believe in crystal-healing are easy to manipulate.

Because they have glaring gaps in their rational thinking ability