Sorry if I'm about 10 years late to this conversation, if this exact idea has already been propagated and responded to in detail, feel free to point me towards any existing resources.

Personal Beliefs: I am a staunch athiest/agnostic who does not believe in God, especially any specific God, as a matter of looking at the data and making a decision based on the evidence, with a high degree of certainty based on how overwhelming the bayesian evidence is.

Situation that brought this question to my mind: I was talking to a friend about their belief in the Christian God (denomination unknown), and they told me about how they found God later in life, and that they were actively suicidal (cutting, etc), and that volunteering for a Christian camp helping underprivileged children helped show them how powerful belief in God was and how the hope provided is a positive force in many, especially those with the least to be hopeful about otherwise, after which this friend started believing in God and stopped being suicidal. (I believe this friend is being entirely sincere, in case my tone did not convey that)

It seems to me that while I still believe that religion as a whole has a negative average expected value to the average person, this situation seems to paint to me a picture that for many individuals, the value of religion is one that is strongly positive, and that those who are likely to recieve the most benefits are also those with the least intersection with rationality, basically the opposite of WEIRD populations. I've never strongly tried to change the beliefs about relgion of others, but this revelation definitely makes it harder to try to quickly defend my athiesm to others or explain any disdain for religion that accidentally slips out, and also suggests that for many individuals, trying to convince them athiesm is correct would not only be socially rude, but also not even correct if one's goal is a consequentialist "wellbeing".

How does one deal with the situation when one believes trying to add information to a situation will consistently make people less happy/satisfied, it feels like a sort of cognitive dissonance, would this be considered an infohazard? (All of this assuming you can successfully identify those for whom religion adds net value, and you grant my proposition that it does for them)

Also, is this a consensus stance about how others here think about ...

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