Well they are not arbitrary, and they are deeply historical and have tons of context. Even if you cite the church of the flying spaghetti monster, well it has exactly 0 followers. Also in the countries where there is still violence due to religion (ie. ISIS conditions) but made speech 100% free (or free as in US style rule) it is very likely the violent elements will mostly go away. That's assuming you "could" - in most of these countries it's a long way off.
Forgive me if I am misunderstanding your statement - "Even if you cite the church of the flying spaghetti monster, well it has exactly 0 followers."
Our faith has many followers. Also, among religious communities, we are shown to put our money where our mouth is. We back our beliefs, as do other faiths, with charity/cash.
I am happy to be part of a religious congregation that, in the context of microfinance/lending to strangers (not for profit, by the way), performs admirably when compared with more popular, mainstream religions:
But can I ask you, do you actually believe the FSM exists or is it more of a statement about how nutty religion can be? Because that's what Wikipedia says, not a religion, a social movement.
"is a social movement that promotes a light-hearted view of religion and opposes the teaching of intelligent design and creationism in public schools"
