I think religion is merely the route (and only one of many). The real parasite is the desire for power, and I don't know how you deal with that. It's just too intrinsic to people.
Contrary to popular opinion the original sin of the Torah (the first five books of the Hebrew Testament that is foundational to Jews, Christians, and Islamists) has nothing to do with procreational or recreational sex. The original sin was humankind's tendency to try to be like God and thereby gain
more power.
So this concept of the desire for power as
the parasite is at least 3,000 years old and the stories of creation, Adam and Eve, likely predate the Torah by another 1,000 years. Calvinists, coined the term "total depravity" to describe this human tendency.
