Buddhism sure as hell has oppressed others. The Tibetan caste system where Lamas were on the top and everyone else was basically a slave, for example. And then there's the Rohingya genocide in Myanmar, which was encouraged by the monks.

As for Jainism, it teaches that men are a superior species to women and women cannot attain salvation without being reborn as a man first.

Gnosticism I don't know much about. Did they preach against slavery? Did they preach about equality between men and women? Did they say that children should be protected from harm? I doubt that they did all three (or other modern progressive ideas), but feel free to disabuse me of that notion.

Part of the problem is that it's pretty difficult to invent new things for your religion to be for or against when new concepts or technologies arise. Buddhists (despite what I said above) are supposed to refrain from killing. Would Siddhartha Gautama think that AI is alive? If so, is it immoral to ever turn one off? That is a moral question that has a great potential to arise in the very near future and I don't think any religion is prepared for it.

I think they might be coloring with a bit of a broad brush, but religion - broadly speaking - is conservative. Some religions may promote values that we agree with and traditionally associate with progressivism (pacifism, egalitarianism, altruism). It’s because they’re based primarily on old or even ancient writings.

I was raised a traditionalist Catholic. I went to catholic school until high school until I went to high school where I became an atheist (which I didn’t even know was an option) and was invited by the school to investigate other educational opportunities.

I also studied Theravada Buddhism for many years. Theravada Buddhism isn’t conservative in the MAGA sense of the word, of course. Especially in the tradition I studied, it concentrates on personal investigation rather than treating the texts and teachings as literally true. A common way of presenting teachings is to say something along the lines of “If it helps, let it help. If not, ignore it.” Still, monks are not permitted (generally speaking) to interact much with women, monks and nuns live separately, and I honestly have no idea how a trans person would fare in that environment.

There’s always a problem when you found the basis of your philosophy in a historical text rather than a constantly evolving understanding. One of Chomsky’s chief complaints about Marxism is that it’s founded on and bound by Marx. He points out correctly that people don’t call evolutionary biology “Darwinism”. I mean, creationists do, and biologists might if they’re referring to a very specific concept, but for 99% of the time we just call it “biology.”

So, building your worldview around a fixed text is by definition conservative. Being flexible about its interpretation can make it less conservative. By and large, though, they’re trying to conserve something.

Well then maybe they shouldn't embrace iron age morality.

How not to be a dick to others- based on ancient moral ideas of what that means.

Do you know what Jesus never said? "Do not enslave people." That simple sentence could have saved how many lives? But slavery was fine 2000 years ago, so he never said it.

Which is why religion is conservative.

From a compass perspective for the most part I would say religion is vaguely conservative because it tends to create a hierarchy of people whom are influenced by a very specific historical tradition and designate people trusted to serve as it's custodians. Since people like power there is generally an incentive for people in those positions to enjoy the perks of being an authority.

But you know what... That doesn't matter.

I think that completely dismissing the idea of religion as a force for Progressive change in the sphere of Social Democracy is misguided. People believe in religions because the underlying concepts represent a framing device of the world that makes sense to them. Subscribing to a an organized power structure is actually kind of an independent factor.

Schisms in favor of progressive changes happen throughout history from time to time and their impact should be noted. While a lot of Churches signed on to assist in the brewing holocaust there did exist a distinct Christian resistance to Nazi persecution of Jewish people and political dissidents helped save hundreds thousands of people from the camps by organized evacuation. Many of the people did so because of their convictions of faith and some died for it.

The sharp dismissal of people of faith as potential allies in the fight or their conceptualization of their faith's teachings is to my mind misguided and selfish. It shows you place your own religious traumas and prejudices above the value of creating allyship to keep the people you profess to care about safe. Changing religions from the inside to more broadly embrace a kinder and enduring new interpretation of doctrine and tradition has value. Making other allies feel welcome and making use of what they have to offer is key to actually winning this fight. This should not be the time or place to puff out your chest and proclaim "I am more moral than they are!" we don't have time for petty squabbles about whether a belief in Christianity makes you a bad leftist. We of the trans community need help and this choosing beggar mentality of allies rejecting and scorning each other is against our needs.

I have never heard of a child getting arrested for slapping another child.

Nope. All Christianity. Europe is more progressive despite Christianity, not because of it. Which is also why Europe is, in general, far more secular than America and has far more non-religious people.

It was a relatively short time ago when Europe was imposing Christianity on a lot of the rest of the world and making laws which forbade things they considered to be non-Christian.