Atheism, not religion, is the real force behind the mass murders of history

Vivificat! - News, Opinions, Commentary, from a Personal Catholic Perspective ^ | 21 November 2006 | Dinesh D'Souza

[Chickensoup]

D'SOUZA: These are warriors. And we have to realize that the principles of our way of life are in conflict with people in the world. And so -- I mean, I'm all for understanding the sociological causes of this, but we should not blame the victim. Americans shouldn't blame themselves because other people want to bomb them.


What is to disagree with here? This is a war even though the media wont admit it.

[padre35]

Estimates of how many people were living in the Americas when Columbus arrived have varied tremendously; 20th century scholarly estimates ranged from a low of 8.4 million to a high of 112.5 million persons. Given the fragmentary nature of the evidence, precise pre-Columbian population figures are impossible to obtain.

Hmm abut 3 seconds to discover that gee, no one really knows exactly how many indigenous people were present in the Americas when Christopher Columbus arrived.

And the proof of your claim is.....?

[elfman2]

"Beg pardon, but thinking Marxism was just a series of singular nutcases is as close to irrational as it gets. It is shown itself to be the worst system of all, atheism with a bloodlust and mandate to kill anyone who disagrees with their philosophy. Proven over and over again vitually everywhere its tried."

The Christian Inquisition in Spain was no less disorganized, intolerant, or bloody than Marxism. Atheism is not an ideology that can be “tried”, no more than theism is an ideology that can be tried. Both are simply properties of ideologies. Many good and bad.

[elfman2]

" The point is that whereas Christians have already said long *mea culpas* for all sort of excesses, real or imagined, atheists haven't and many in their pride think that excesses made in the name of secularism and atheis does not concern them. Like Mr. D'Souza points out, that's hubris. "

First, the opposite of atheist is theists, not Christian. We are not a group of remotely like minded people or an organization of any kind, despite the efforts of some to market their organization with that label.

In that regard, Theists - as some imaginary group, neither have the inclination nor ability to collectively apologize for the “excesses” of the Christian inquisition in Span. But I suspect if it were properly explained, the Inquisition and its subsequent genocide in the new world would appear no more abhorrent to a random theist than atheistic “excesses” would to a random atheist. All were run by ideologues gone wild.

[.30Carbine]

Neither theists nor atheists ideologies are immune to their share of freaks

That statement in its context assumes an untruth - that murder in the human heart is a freakish thing rather than the norm of our condition.

The real "freaks" in this world are the Mother Theresas.

[elfman2]

Teófilo,look at padre35's post in #42 for example of how even Christians on this thread have not learned the lesson from the “excesses, real or imagined” of atrocities rationalized under the name of their religion.

Rather than recognize how even Christians can run amuck through genocide, he is hanging his hat on the size of their slaughter in the new word. Whether it be 5 million killed from a world population a fraction today's size or 100 million, widely pointing blame for our problems at all those who believe in one less God than you is nonsense.

[elfman2]

" That statement in its context assumes an untruth - that murder in the human heart is a freakish thing rather than the norm of our condition. The real "freaks" in this world are the Mother Theresas. "

I think your view of human nature is twisted if you think mass murder of the innocent comes more natural than mass compassion for the innocent.

[.30Carbine]

One word: Abortion.

[GiovannaNicoletta]

bookmark

[elfman2]

One word: Abortion.

One word: Embrio

[elfman2]

With a "y"

[Lakeshark]

And everyone who committed those above atrocities was an atheist? Dearest Wolfie:
You simply can't admit that the Marxists are against theism of all kinds can you? It's in their writings, in their speeches, and in their actions. It's called militant atheism. They have all proudly called themselves atheists, so get a clue sometime soon.

Please get over your inability to do anything but screech "Prove they're not atheists!", when it's pretty self evident they are, and please regenerate your brain cells sometime soon.

[Wonder Warthog]

D'sousa is wrong. It wasn't atheism--it was socialism. The Nazis weren't atheists (though they weren't necessarily Chrisitians, either)---but they WERE socialists.

[Lakeshark]

I have never argued that the Inquisition was good, nor the Salem witch trials.

But the Inquisition was child's play compared to the holocausts of the 20th century, there is simply no comparison. Hundreds of millions slaughtered by Marxism vs. about 5,000 in the Inquisition. Once again, I'm not defending the Inquisition, not at all.

Doesn't make the Inquistion any less horrendous, but come now........you don't expect me to believe that "religion" starts all wars and evil when faced with the huge and overwhelming numbers killed by Marxists, do you?

Ponder the hundreds of millions number for a little while at least. BTW.......you might want to re-think using Howard Zinn's books for your sources.....

[JCEccles]

The truth stings, does it?

Even ignoring abortions (which are largely secularly justified pre-murders) ideological atheism was directly responsible for the mass murders of more than 100 million people in the past century alone. You can't twist that ugly fact into a positive plug for godlessness.

I would say atheism sucks. But in truth, it murders. On a HUGE scale.

[JCEccles]

Atheism and socialism are conjoined twins, malevolent manifestations of the same secular phenomenon.

[elfman2]

"But the Inquisition was child's play compared to the holocausts of the 20th century"

The Christian inquisition, not to mention the 150k witch burnings in Europe, set the stage for the “child’s play” genocide of tens of million by Christians in the new world. Considering world populations, that’s comparable to atheistic blood baths in the 20th century, and that’s without touching on the slaughters by theists in the Middle East.

Why bring up the “religion starts all wars” argument? That’s as absurd as your atheism is responsible for all genocide claim. Collectivist fanaticism is responsible, and all ideologies are vulnerable to it. Modern Christianity and modern atheistic ideologies like Objectivism have presumably reformed and evolved to make it less likely, but both have their puritans fanatics that want to blame all their problems on the other, a feature or all genocide.

[Lakeshark]

I never said atheism was reponsible for all genocide. I have never defended theists for their own madness.

Just said that atheists have been by far the worst offenders, slaughtering hundreds of millions for merely disagreeing with them. Which is an unquestionably true statement.

Deal with it.

[elfman2]

"I never said atheism was reponsible for all genocide. I have never defended theists for their own madness. Just said that atheists have been by far the worst offenders, slaughtering hundreds of millions for merely disagreeing with them. Which is an unquestionably true statement. Deal with it. "

Yesterday it was 100 million, today it’s 100's of millions. Theists are slaughtering millions today who disagree with them, and slaughtered 10's of millions in colonial times for much the same. I suspect that roughly half the genocidal nut cases were theists and half were atheist, but I’m absolutely sure that all blamed their problems on those who disagreed with their ideology. Sound familiar? “Deal with it.”

[aimhigh]

I'd love to see your hard data proving that.

I'd like to see hard data disproving it. Since when did the Chinese Communists keep meticulous records on those killed by government caused famines?