Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Rhea · 01-02-2002, 05:48 PM

I would _really_ like to have an in-depth discussion of this. It is often used in arguments by christians , "yeah but look at Stalin and Pol Pot and..."

But they didn't really do it for the glory of Atheism, or to promote atheism. But on the other hand, they kind of _did_, didn't they? Their brand of Communism required/promoted atheism, and it was in the name of atheistic communism that these murders were carried out.

Please I seriously want to be able to form an educated opinion on this. Serious discussion requested.

copernicus · 01-02-2002, 06:31 PM

Rhea, it is almost certainly the case that Communist fanatics have singled out religious believers for persecution--torture and murder. It is also the case that religious fanatics have persecuted nonbelievers--not just atheists, but people of other religious faiths--for their beliefs. This is not about whether one is a believer or an atheist. It is about intolerance and prejudice against those who disagree with some authoritarian doctrine. The issue here is tolerance of those who disagree on religious principles, not the particular principles that persecutors and victims hold. People who are intolerant of others do not persecute others for the "glory" of their beliefs. They persecute others because they fear that their own beliefs would otherwise fail to survive.

tronvillain · 01-02-2002, 06:35 PM

I don't see that there's anything to discuss, since atheism in of itself had nothing to do with those killings whatsoever - a multitude of accessory beliefs were required.

excreationist · 01-02-2002, 07:08 PM

Rhea:
<a href="http://www.iljboards.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=3210&perpage=15&pagenum ber=5" target="_blank">ILJ Boards - What is today's Biggest Evil</a>

Here is what I wrote there (it is kind of relevant and it is hard to restate):

Quote:

>>Is the "trancendant authority" of freedom and
>>equality enough? Or does it have to be a god
>>of some sort?

>Actaully , the names might be more familar as
>Tung, Stalin and Lenin. So the sorts of
>governements that athiests set up tend to be
>brutal and barbaric in the extreme. Feel free to
>provide examples that haven't been.

Well the American government was set up by deists such as Thomas Jefferson, George Washington and Benjamin Franklin. They rejected religion but I guess they needed to believe in a god to explain the origin of the natural world. (Evolution hadn't been invented yet)
In their constitution they said there had to be a separation between the church and the state. Then in about the 1950's McCarthy started the "In God We Trust" thing on your money. That would have been a response to communism. Note that I'm from a Australia so I don't have much knowledge about American politics.
<a href="http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/fields/religions.html" target="_blank">CIA - Worldwide religion information</a>
Czech Republic: atheist 39.8%
Hungary: atheist and other 7.5%
Slovakia: atheist 9.7%
Slovenia: atheist 4.3%
So anyway, hardly any of the countries that used to make up the Soviet Union are atheistic. It was just that those that came into power were atheists or at least opposed religion and made atheism the state religion.
They might have done this because religions can often speak out against the state and cause people to be against the government.
As you probably know, those communistic governments were totalitarian and they were run by dictators. They got into power because of communist revolutions where the workers wanted better treatment, but in the end, the communist party forgot about the workers and they killed them people who complained.
The government didn't remain in power because a majority of the people wanted it (since they weren't democratic countries) - they remained in power because they killed or imprisoned people who spoke against the government or tried to topple it.
So basically, it is true that atheists can become ruthless dictators, but this doesn't mean that a society made up of atheists willingly chose to have a dictator rather than a democratically elected government.
BTW, places like South America have large numbers of strong Christians, and they also have ruthless dictators. And Asian and Middle Eastern countries can have large numbers of Moslems as well as dictators. And the leader could believe that they are a committed believer.
<a href="http://www.gallup-international.com/survey15.htm" target="_blank">Gallup International Religion Survey</a>
This says that worldwide, about 8% of people are atheists, about 17% are agnostic and about 30% just believe in a life force or soul. The other 45% believe in a personal god.
So anyway, at the moment there would still be believers in democratically elected governments in every country, but often the governments are secular - they don't have anything to do with God.

>Since when where freedom and equality
>transcendant values ? Without an AUTHORITY that
>is transcendant to make the values transcendant
>they are not, they are merely human opinions.
>Try again.

Well objectivist atheists(?) such as Ayn Rand believe that we can arrive at objective morality using reason. If you believe that freedom and equality are things that are very important then they may be set in stone, like in a constitution, to stop governments from doing exactly as they please.

>I was merely suggesting that governements that
>make a point of rejecting any sort of reference
>to god tend to be evil and barbaric. That is
>all.

Well at the moment a majority of people believe in God or are at least unsure about the idea. Any government that makes atheism the state religion isn't doing what the majority wants and therefore mustn't have been democratically elected. And since it is a totalitarian government, it is much easier for it to commit atrocities since it doesn't have to do what the people want - it can simply get rid of the trouble-makers since the government has absolute power.
So basically at the moment, governments that impose atheism on the nation are antidemocratic since atheists are currently in the minority. And remember that Christians and Muslims often have totalitarian governments as well.

ChurchOfBruce · 01-02-2002, 09:24 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Rhea:
<strong>I would _really_ like to have an in-depth discussion of this. It is often used in arguments by christians , "yeah but look at Stalin and Pol Pot and..."

But they didn't really do it for the glory of Atheism, or to promote atheism. But on the other hand, they kind of _did_, didn't they? Their brand of Communism required/promoted atheism, and it was in the name of atheistic communism that these murders were carried out.

Please I seriously want to be able to form an educated opinion on this. Serious discussion requested.</strong>

I know very little about Mao or Pol Pot, so I'm going to keep my discussion about Stalin.

First of all, Stalin attended an Orthodox seminary in his youth. By the time he became leader of the USSR, yes, he was in all probability an atheist. However, he did attend the seminary....and he knew *all* the tricks.

First of all, Stalin didn't pick out believers to kill. Stalin killed *everybody*. Stalin's method of terrorism--and that's what it *was*--was even more random, in most cases, than most terrorism. He'd tell his executioners that he wanted 300 people killed on x night in x district. Who got killed was almost immaterial to him, just as long as there were people carted off on trumped-up charges.

When Stalin *did* kill particular people, the reasons were almost always political. This *did* include Christians, but not rank and file Christians--rather, members of the Orthodox hierarchy. In his pick-and-choose killings, he killed a whole lot more Communists--fellow atheists, most of them--than he did Christians.

Stalin used the Orthodox church when it served his purposes. This was especially true during the War. Monasteries and churches were reopened, priests trained, and Stalin let the Church do what it wanted--as long as it rallied the people to support him and the war effort. Which, since he by then controlled the church heirarchy, it did. After the war, he went back to closing churches and monasteries.

But the main thing you have to understand about Stalinism is that Stalin *did* want the people of the USSR to believe in a deity--only he wanted to make sure that said deity was *him*. Stalin did his best to deify himself. If you read some of the propaganda--including ghost-written works of Stalinist "scripture"--you'd see there was an effort to deify Stalin. Stalinism *was* a religion, complete with mythology, propaganda, brainwashing, and the mock-deity himself. Stalin wasn't what I would call a "philosphical atheist", he was a nominative atheist because he didn't want *competition*. Any worship of God took away from worship of Stalin.

--Frank

RyanS2 · 01-02-2002, 09:59 PM

John Hill wrote:

"Mao Tse Tung, was not a declared atheist either. He killed off dissidents in much of the same manner as Stalin, to promote his cultural revolution that included a religious element. Even Castro, an atheist, knew he could not kill the church in Cuba and did not even try."

There's actually a really good series of articles on one of the infidels.org resources that talks about Christianity in Russia, and shows the growth of the Church's during Stalin's reign.

Vorkosigan · 01-03-2002, 12:29 AM

Also, Rhea, the Communists executed atheists who were not communists, at least in China and Vietnam. Too independent-minded, you know.

Michael

Jamie_L · 01-03-2002, 04:55 AM

Churches are often targets of totalitarian regimes not because they worship some god or other, but because they are a competing source of power over the populace. These leaders are not trying to promote atheism, or killing people because they think atheism is the truth everyone should know, but because the church is a threat to their authority. Religious belief really doesn't enter into the decision to commit these atrocities. It's about consolidating and maintaining power.

Jamie

Rhea · 01-03-2002, 05:03 AM

Thanks everyone so far. This is a great start to being able to rationally counter - in my own mind, if not in debate - the argument that "Atheism has killed more people than religion ever did".

More thoughts are very welcomed!

Koyaanisqatsi · 01-03-2002, 07:01 AM

Let's not forget the most important fact: demonizing (in this case, literally) your enemy.

We're a christian cult-oriented nation, so to call the communists "godless" was an instant and simplistic way to get the voting majority to hate them. Propaganda 101.

That's the whole purpose of indoctrinating idiots into cults in the first place. "Oh no, they're godless! KILL THEM WITH EXTREME PREJUDICE!"

The same goes for the attempt to paint Hitler with the atheist brush, eventhough the Germans as a volk are/were extremely christian and justified the holocaust based upon the fact that the Jewish people were "christ killers" (Christm�rder)

For that matter, the same goes for the Protestant/Catholic wars; the Crusades; what we did to the American Indians; Bosnia; the Middle East; etc., etc., etc.

The primary purpose of the christian cult is to make wars justifiable; an "us" vs. "them" mentality, where "god" is on "our" side (even if it's the same god!).

Whenever cult members try this argument with me, I just respond, "No one has ever justified murder or convinced a group of atheists to kill in the name of Bertrand Russell and no one ever will."

01-02-2002, 05:48 PM	#1
Rhea Veteran Member Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Recluse Posts: 9,040	Mass killings "in the name of atheism" I would _really_ like to have an in-depth discussion of this. It is often used in arguments by christians , "yeah but look at Stalin and Pol Pot and..." But they didn't really do it for the glory of Atheism, or to promote atheism. But on the other hand, they kind of _did_, didn't they? Their brand of Communism required/promoted atheism, and it was in the name of atheistic communism that these murders were carried out. Please I seriously want to be able to form an educated opinion on this. Serious discussion requested.

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01-02-2002, 06:31 PM	#2
copernicus Veteran Member Join Date: Jul 2001 Location: Bellevue, WA Posts: 1,531	Rhea, it is almost certainly the case that Communist fanatics have singled out religious believers for persecution--torture and murder. It is also the case that religious fanatics have persecuted nonbelievers--not just atheists, but people of other religious faiths--for their beliefs. This is not about whether one is a believer or an atheist. It is about intolerance and prejudice against those who disagree with some authoritarian doctrine. The issue here is tolerance of those who disagree on religious principles, not the particular principles that persecutors and victims hold. People who are intolerant of others do not persecute others for the "glory" of their beliefs. They persecute others because they fear that their own beliefs would otherwise fail to survive.

01-02-2002, 06:35 PM	#3
tronvillain Veteran Member Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Alberta, Canada Posts: 5,658	I don't see that there's anything to discuss, since atheism in of itself had nothing to do with those killings whatsoever - a multitude of accessory beliefs were required.

01-02-2002, 09:59 PM	#6
RyanS2 Regular Member Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Louisiana Posts: 216	John Hill wrote: "Mao Tse Tung, was not a declared atheist either. He killed off dissidents in much of the same manner as Stalin, to promote his cultural revolution that included a religious element. Even Castro, an atheist, knew he could not kill the church in Cuba and did not even try." There's actually a really good series of articles on one of the infidels.org resources that talks about Christianity in Russia, and shows the growth of the Church's during Stalin's reign.

01-03-2002, 12:29 AM	#7
Vorkosigan Contributor Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Barrayar Posts: 11,866	Also, Rhea, the Communists executed atheists who were not communists, at least in China and Vietnam. Too independent-minded, you know. Michael

01-03-2002, 04:55 AM	#8
Jamie_L Veteran Member Join Date: Oct 2001 Location: U.S. Posts: 2,565	Churches are often targets of totalitarian regimes not because they worship some god or other, but because they are a competing source of power over the populace. These leaders are not trying to promote atheism, or killing people because they think atheism is the truth everyone should know, but because the church is a threat to their authority. Religious belief really doesn't enter into the decision to commit these atrocities. It's about consolidating and maintaining power. Jamie

01-03-2002, 05:03 AM	#9
Rhea Veteran Member Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Recluse Posts: 9,040	Thanks everyone so far. This is a great start to being able to rationally counter - in my own mind, if not in debate - the argument that "Atheism has killed more people than religion ever did". More thoughts are very welcomed!

01-03-2002, 07:01 AM	#10
Koyaanisqatsi Veteran Member Join Date: Sep 2000 Location: Yes, I have dyslexia. Sue me. Posts: 6,508	Let's not forget the most important fact: demonizing (in this case, literally) your enemy. We're a christian cult-oriented nation, so to call the communists "godless" was an instant and simplistic way to get the voting majority to hate them. Propaganda 101. That's the whole purpose of indoctrinating idiots into cults in the first place. "Oh no, they're godless! KILL THEM WITH EXTREME PREJUDICE!" The same goes for the attempt to paint Hitler with the atheist brush, eventhough the Germans as a volk are/were extremely christian and justified the holocaust based upon the fact that the Jewish people were "christ killers" (Christm�rder) For that matter, the same goes for the Protestant/Catholic wars; the Crusades; what we did to the American Indians; Bosnia; the Middle East; etc., etc., etc. The primary purpose of the christian cult is to make wars justifiable; an "us" vs. "them" mentality, where "god" is on "our" side (even if it's the same god!). Whenever cult members try this argument with me, I just respond, "No one has ever justified murder or convinced a group of atheists to kill in the name of Bertrand Russell and no one ever will."

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