Which civilization is responsible for the highest number of atrocities in the history of human civilization?

Question

Which civilization is responsible for the highest number of atrocities in the history of human civilization to date? Please give unbiased
answers with proves.
(1) Judeo-Christian Western Civilization(The Americas,Western Europe, Australia and their extension--Latin America,Russia and Eastern Europe)
(2) Islamic Civilization
(3)Indian Civilization
(4)Chinese Civilization

answer to Ibrahim :
Won'y you include the crusade,inqui
sition and very recently the 2 world wars
and jewish holocaust.
the soviets were atheists but they were the production of (1).

answer to JESUS IS LOVE:
LOL. did they sacrifice more than 70 million in less than one hundred years???

answer to Thin Kaboudit:
do you have a chart of the Mao Casualties.
ok, let's see who wins the Chinese or the Western
http://www.hitler.org/ww2-deaths.html
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/FWWdeaths.htm
ADD others to these.

answer to bekkie:
I am not strictly accusing any religious groups
but the products of the civilizations.
The Western Civilization is based on Judaism,
Christianity and Greek-Roman values.
Islamic Civilization is quite distinct from the former.

Answer 1

Whichever the Nazis belong to. I'm guessing they fall under 1.

Answer 2

I would list NONE OF THE ABOVE.

The Soviet Union killed more than any other people and given historical population numbers, probably more than the combined numbers across centuries for others. Since the Soviet Union was founded upon rational atheism, I would say the highest of these would be Leninism-Stalinism.

It is rather important to understand why as well.

If you believe that people are merely the current collection of atoms and have no inherent value, then killing for the good of the State is not evil because evil does not exist. When you add in the collectivist mentallity inherent in Leninism, you have a deadly combination.

That said, most people do not actually read Lenin. He was quite brilliant. It is very easy to see why people followed him. His ideas were brilliant but, as was unknown at the time, flawed. He did not account for the needs of the individual as a component to support the well being of the whole. No one at the time really understood what collective ownership did to individual behavior. It is improper to include even Christian Russia in Judeo-Christian Western Civilization.

Russia was never part of the Christian West. It was alway part of the Christian East. The two could be different denominations. It is difficult for Protestants in particular and to some extent Atheists how both East and West continue to exist within one Church.

While it is true that Christianity was the only religion for most of Russia's history, the role of religion in the East has always been different than in the West. In the West, the civil government completely collapsed and did so catastrophically. All civil functions came to a complete halt. All that was left that crossed borders were the Catholic clergy and the monastic communities. In the East, the Roman Empire survived until the 15th century, nearly to the Reformation. The Church never had the burden of governing people nor acting as legislators for the citizenry. That said, the East had entirely different problems.

Properly speaking, it is historically and theologically incorrect to lump Western Europe and Eastern Europe together as a single civilization. That disappeared in the late Roman Empire and was dying before the formal collapse. The Eastern bishops considered the Western bishops barbarians and they were correct. Had you lived in Western Europe in the 600's you would have found a land much like Afganistan today. Regardless of religion, such a land is barely able to survive. Religions that come out of that experience are not the most enlightened. It is amazing Christianity survived let alone thrived. I would recommend reading good historical accounts of Italy in the late 12th and early 13th centuries. The land that started the Renessance makes current Afganistan look like a cheery joyful place that you should go on vacation.

So my unbiased answer is 5) none of the above.

Just also a note, you left out the Japanese Empire in the above list, the African Empires and as well as the pre-European societies of the Americas.

If you happen to be able to read Russian, it is quite interesting to read 19th century Russian literature before the revolutions that shook Russia and see how the propaganda machine took over the 19th century enlightened symbols. In particular, I would recommend reading "Mervye Dushi," by Gogol. He also wrote "The Inspector General," which was played by Danny Kaye in a remake of this Russian classic, which at the time was about 100 years old when Kaye redid it. The 19th century authors left the 20th century propaganda machine fertile material that guaranteed

One other note, it does depend upon how you count the victims under Stalin. I use the midrange numbers that have come out since the collapse of the Soviet Union, which means Stalin handily beat Hitler, but if you use the highest estimates (which are probably way off) Hitler was an amatuer.

What is frightening, if you think about it, Rwanda is small compared to Stalin. The Sudan's Dafur region still doesn't compare into the same magnitude and both are horrific. Stalin did things however that were incredible. Not only did they execute the people, but they found all photographs and references to those people and had the picutures touched up to make it appear they never existed and the text changed to appear the person never was. They didn't just kill someone, they erased all evidence such a person existed except the living witness of those doing the killing and their own internal records.

The only possible person who could beat Stalin is Mao. It depends upon how you view Mao's coming to power and the transition into collectivism. Stalin's killings were clearly purposeful, Mao's may not have been. Mao may be more responsible for gross mismanagement and ideological failure than willful atrocity. While Soviet managed famines appear to be purposeful ways to purge opposition and grab land and power, Mao may simply have not realized his ideas were incompetent. On the other hand, failure to fix incompetence especially you own where millions die, could be viewed as an attrocity. I suspect, however, it was more the result of a failed system than willful killing. If you choose to list the failures of Mao as attrocities then Mao wins by probably 5 million. Mao, like Lenin, didn't realize had disasterous his ideas were. They sounded good to an uncritical mind. The implementation was, as with Leninism, a disaster. China however has embraced capitalism and so has turned that disaster around to some degree.

Answer 3

Islam should be grouped with Christianity and Judaism, shouldn't it, since it couldn't have come into being without them?
I would have to say Christianity, but not Judaism so much. I have never heard of mass racism and general hate existing to such an extent as it has since the beginning of Christianity.
For the person who answered earlier blaming pagans, I would like to bring up the subject of the Inquisition and the Witch Trials. The Witch Trials, in which victims of long standing grudges were tortured and/or killed after being accused of witchcraft, including children.

Answer 4

(4) is your winner. Between 1958-61 and 1966-69, Mao Ze-Dong was responsible for the deaths of some 49 MILLION people during the "Great Leap forward" and the Cultural Revolution.

Stalin isn't even a close second at about 12 or 13 million dead.

Don't you just rejoice in being human?

Answer 5

number 1

Answer 6

Soviet Union -- If I'm correct the number was at 20 million deaths.

Oh, and a reminder to the anti-religion folks.. The Soviets were atheists for the most part.

Answer 7

1)

Answer 8

I'm sorry, but I can't get past the 200+ years of slavery right here in the US. Aside from the deaths that resulted from hundreds of African people being held for days in cramped cells before being shipped to the US. Aside from their being packed on ships, below deck,shackled, amid vomit, feces, the dead and an atmosphere of hostility, for months at a time. Aside from the number of Africans that were displayed, still in shackles, naked, inspected as one would livestock, and sold...as livestock. Aside from the forced breeding and birthing, for the purpose of producing more African-American slaves for use or sale...again as livestock. Aside from the number of African Americans that were killed or, out of desperation, killed themselves trying to resist such treatment. Aside from the number of people that were worked to death, beaten to death, or killed for amusement (anyone want to know where the term 'picnic' really came from?). Aside from the deaths at the hands of people who were incensed that the 'institution of slavery, on the base of which they had built their fortunes, businesses and lives, was ending. Aside from the deaths and mistreatment of African Americans that still continue to this day, caused by people who still long for a return to the old southern ways. I believe that the whole idea of the forced servitude of a particular group of people, by what ever justification, to be an atrocity in itself.

Answer 9

Please cut it out. Pagans have been killing and sacrificing people though the ages. A little reading goes a long way.