Is it normal to think religion in general is holding humanity back?

Just like the old adage 'guns don't kill people, people kill people', It's not religion holding humanity back, it's people.

well its certainly very divisive.

Everyone likes to blame religion. Religion came from people, it's man made. Saying that something humans made is the reasons humans hold the species down is silly; humanity holds humanity back, religion is just one part of it.

Yes. It is.
It has always been like this. Religion is a very powerful weapon to control people and have them fear the unknown, or fear pretty much whatever you tell them.

If religion wasn't holding back humanity, we probably could have sent a man to the moon before the 1800s.
In general, people that fear the unknown,and avoid taking risks. They tend to avoid what's new as a concept... Those people slow down progress. However, usually they have the power and resources (kings, church, presidents...) and the inventors, thinkers, allround brilliant minds - don't!

I worship at the house of nicotine.

I think u hit the nail right on the head. It's interesting when you trace religion back and see what it caused. Like the Roman Catholic church was the original Christ based religion and it was originally united with the government. So any 'sin' could get you jailed or worse. It was a 'sin' to cut up a corpse, but not being able to cut up a corpse for medical research result in hindering medical advancement. It teaches that all power of the mind is 'of the devil'. I beg to differ. If it weren't for Einstein, Tesla and Da Vinci imagine what we wouldn't have to if it weren't for these 3 men, and all 3 of them used their 3rd eye/intuition/power of the mind/etc to make their inventions. It's interesting what you realize when you study these things and you open your mind and see there was a certain agenda behind all these things. 1. divide and conquer 2. control

In my country we celebate religion by sacrifice youngest wife to giant sand crab of death to honer he for founding our empire.

Religion mostly forces its followers to make sense out of non-sense. This is only OK for those retarded people that have a difficult time making sense out of anything.

Teach your babies logic. Guild them away from cognitive biases.

Western religion always has.

It has and in some cases, still does support many obscene things, unfortunately their group seems to feel justified in exerting its will on the non religious masses. There are countless examples which all of us are familiar with.

In the past it was worse, medicine was even restricted as some practices were defined as witchcraft and such.

Now, I say western religion as there are practices which are known to advance the human condition. Meditation and mindfulness both originated in "religion". I believe such practices are of benefit.

Religion needs to be put back in its box. It is not a political party, it is a lobby group who is only listened to because they have voting power. They exert their will on the world, on those that have no, nor want no relationship with them or their beliefs.

Ill support your right to believe in whatever you wish, as long as you do not control MY life with your stories.

No it's all about power. Religion just is used to command power, less so these days. Power comes in many forms, money, religion status etc. The government arn't religious.

I'm religious and very curious about the world.
I'll thank you to make assumptions about me.

Yes. Religion is.

Some people are willing to kill or die in disagreements over where you really go when you die. Is this ironic? I'd say, "Good riddance."

Yep. I don't hate all religions or religious people, but christianity and islam, at least their followers, disgust me. Their blatant fear and hate of anyone or thing that is different, their relentless efforts to force others to conform and believe mindlessly that a magical being will make everything okay (or lets shitty things happen because of a "plan")...I'm surrounded by this shit and constantlyn condemned because I'm not like them. I used to simply not gaf, but this insane behavior has driven me to feel nothing but total disgust at these people.

Shintoism and the like are cool, though. :P At least they're not assholes about what they believe. Far kinder and more creative than the major religions.