The Real Murderers: Atheism or Christianity?

But atheism always substitutes a material thing as a god. The atheist's own will, the state, a misconception of science,...

Atheism is nothing more than what you have when you don't have religion. Anything else -- loyalties, morals, opinions, philisophies or politics -- is a seperate matter from atheism.

The official purpose of the persecution, as declared by the Bolsheviks themselves was to promote atheism. The fact that you have identified these particular atheists' god-substitute as the state does not invalidate that point.

If they were advancing an agenda that involved loyalty to the state, then they were promoting more than just atheism. It doesn't mean that they weren't atheists or that their agenda relied on a lack of allegiance to any gods, but their agenda was not, in itself, atheism.

I see where you are coming from. That is not the meaning that I get from that statement (although it is a perfectly acceptable meaning).

However, if you take a look at Nazism and Communism, they were not only advancing a political agenda, they were also advancing an economic and "moral" (i.e. belief system) one as well.

One of the first things that they try to do when taking over a country is to stomp out all other beliefs other than theirs.

>I see where you are coming from. That is not the meaning that I get from that statement (although it is a perfectly acceptable meaning).

Oh, I don't doubt that the intended meaning from the original statement was an unfair insinuation against Christianity. I simply don't believe that the truth of the statement itself validates the conclusion.

However, if you take a look at Nazism and Communism, they were not only advancing a political agenda, they were also advancing an economic and "moral" (i.e. belief system) one as well.

Actually, I'd say that their economic and "moral" system was tied with their political agenda. Semantic difference, I suppose, I won't dispute the nature of their agenda.

One of the first things that they try to do when taking over a country is to stomp out all other beliefs other than theirs.

Again, I won't dispute that this happens often (though not always; IIRC Alexander the Great and Hammurabi were lenient in allowing, to some extent, the previous religious beliefs of the peoples of conquered lands.). I simply dispute that atheism, in and of itself, is the primary motivation for what happened in the USSR or Nazi Germany. The battles fought and the people killed happened because of a political agenda, just like most wars throughout history. The only difference is that (in the case of Communism at least; Hitler often appealed to duty to God) the conquerers didn't use the guise of religion to "prove" their moral superiority.

It appears that you are saying that atheism is not a belief system. IMHO, if you don't believe in diety, then you are either athiestic or agnostic. Neither Nazism nor Communism was agnostic, since agnosticism admits to only a lack of knowledge of God. &nbspOTOH, athiesm denies Diety's very existance. This was one of the key underpinnings of both Nazism and Communism. Their almost fanatical desire to remove these "superstitions" from the human race.

At this point, the supernatural God is replaced with the state God, and all attempts are made to squash anyone believing anything differently.

Communism as an economic theory doesn't hold water, since it has never been practiced on a large scale - even by communists. It has been about control of people and their beliefs, otherwise why have the worst atrocities committed by communists been perpetrated against their own peoples.

So, 100,000,000+ communist citizens killed by communists, 30,000,000+ nazi citizens killed by nazis in this century alone. Contrast that to 300,000 christians killed by christian nations (for witchcraft) over a 3-century period and perhaps 2 - 3 million (I am guestimating here. I don't know the actual figure) during the 30 years war (the nearest thing to an internecine religious war the christians have ever had). Throw in the 3 or 4 millions killed in christian vs islamic wars in various parts of the world in the 20th century, and the hundreds of thousands killed during the intermittent wars between christians and islam during the last thousand years and we see that the religious wars still don't come up to the level of killing done in the 20th century by communists and nazis.

>It appears that you are saying that atheism is not a belief system. IMHO, if you don't believe in diety, then you are either athiestic or agnostic. Neither Nazism nor Communism was agnostic, since agnosticism admits to only a lack of knowledge of God. &nbspOTOH, athiesm denies Diety's very existance.

Atheism is the absence of property theism. Agnosticism is the belief that the existence of deities is unprovable -- but it does not preclude faith (or lack thereof) that deities exist. Atheism doesn't mean not denying the existence of $DEITYNAME, but it isn't defined as such, because it would require knowing the defined natures of every deity in the whole of human history to carry any meaning -- otherwise how could they be denied?

This was one of the key underpinnings of both Nazism and Communism. Their almost fanatical desire to remove these "superstitions" from the human race.

Nazism was about more than wiping "superstitions" from the human race -- it was about genocide, it was about control and it was about the superiority of specific human traits. It wasn't about removing religion altogether, it was about removing religions that 1) prevented people from pledging alliegance to the Nazi state or 2) were the convenient scapegoat for all of the problems plaguing Germany at the time.
Communism's goal -- well, the "communism" practiced by Lenin and Stalin -- was establishing itself as the only authority to whom its citizens would obey. That does mean stamping out religion, but again that's a function of communism, not atheism itself.

Communism as an economic theory doesn't hold water, since it has never been practiced on a large scale - even by communists. It has been about control of people and their beliefs, otherwise why have the worst atrocities committed by communists been perpetrated against their own peoples.

This is getting onto a bit of a tangent, but I disagree on the nature of communism. Communism isn't inherently oppressive, but the so-called communistic governments oppress their people because it's the only way to keep them in line. Communism actually works well if you are dealing with a small isolated village; it falls apart when you try to expand it to an entire nation.
Communism doesn't fail because it's oppressive. It becomes oppressive because it will fail otherwise.

[snip some numbers, my posts are too long as it is] Throw in the 3 or 4 millions killed in christian vs islamic wars in various parts of the world in the 20th century, and the hundreds of thousands killed during the intermittent wars between christians and islam during the last thousand years and we see that the religious wars still don't come up to the level of killing done in the 20th century by communists and nazis.

The problem is that in the end, most of the slaughter throughout history are done for political reasons with religion being used by the leaders as justification. They may be pushing atheism or Christianty with a sword as a means to an end, but it's rare that their goal is to remove/enforce religious belief. Stalin just managed to replace duty to and fear of God with duty to and fear of The State.

My whole point, which seems to fill up an entire screen in IE because I never know when to shut up, is that "atheism" itself has been no more a motivator of slaughter and violence in human history than Christianity or religion in general.

The problem is that in the end, most of the slaughter throughout history are done for political reasons with religion being used by the leaders as justification

This I have to disagree with. The communists and nazis attacked in the name of the state (fatherland or motherland), never in the name of God (although various leaders did mention their duty to God). Furthermore, most wars in the past appear to be less religiously motivated, even tangentially, than politically motivated. I would suggest that the communists and nazis of the last century have easily wiped out more of their citizens than all people combined killed in actual battle since Temujin (what he did to India makes what we did to Hiroshima and Nagasaki look tame in comparison).

Fine, then I trust you will allow Western Christians to defend their forebearers by pointing to other agendas underlying the murderous phases of their history: the Crusades were necessary to reestablish trade routes or undermine the remaning authority of the Emperor (but were publicly justified using religion, the same way promotion of the state was justified using atheism), the Thirty Years War was really a struggle over political power in German (but both sides used religion to justify their agenda...).

I think that would be an idiotic position to take for the same reason I think your defense of real-existing-atheism-in-power is.

once again, it's Jesus saying it not me or anyone else

So you claim.

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Then he started talking about not only the destruction of indigenous beliefs, but also the destruction of missionaries. That's what he wanted to see happen. He also said that Christians and religious groups are responsible for the greatest massacres of history. It turns out he was quite supportive of Wicca and indigenous religions which worship the Mother Earth force, Gaia.

In other words, he was an idiot.

Yes thats it, an idiot!

I know from people who were involved that missionaries making contact with remote peoples is a far better thing than the remote peoples making contact with logging and mining interests. The missionaries actually do care about these people and what happens to them. The logging/mining interests care principally about the land the folk occupy and see them merely as means to an end or someone to get out of the way or as a source of labor or prostitutes.

bttt