If atheism is liberating, why did great atheist thinkers have such a negative effect?

Question

Nietzsche posited the "will to power" and believed that Christianity (because of its teaching of equality) was responsible for the three things he hated most: socialism, democracy and feminism. He lauded the pagan value of domination over the Christian value of compassion. Marx believed that religion was the opium of the people. His followers believed that the end justifies the means. The interpreters (or misinterpreters) of Nietzsche and Marx have caused immeasurable suffering in the twentieth century, certainly more than the interpreters (or misinterpreters) of Jesus have done over a much longer time period. Why did this happen? Was it because if you reject God, you also consciously or unconsciously reject any moral basis for human actions?

Answer 1

Not all men are of the same thinking and intelligence. Opinion always vaarries.
jtm

Answer 2

"Was it because if you reject God, you also consciously or unconsciously reject any moral basis for human actions?"

You just can't get that false idea out of your head, can you?

"The interpreters (or misinterpreters) of Nietzsche and Marx have caused immeasurable suffering in the twentieth century, certainly more than the interpreters (or misinterpreters) of Jesus have done over a much longer time period."

That is so obviously false that you shouldn't have bothered to write it. You'd have done better if you hadn't mentioned it, and hoped that we simply didn't think about it. It just undermines your point.

"His followers believed that the end justifies the means."

So do Christ's followers. In fact your own words here clearly illustrate that fact: like the vast majority of Christians here, you're more than willing to lie in support of your religious convictions.

"He lauded the pagan value of domination over the Christian value of compassion. "

The pagan value of domination? Are you just throwing random words together here? Do you have any idea how ridiculous that sentence is? It's almost exactly backwards.

Finally, do you think that atheists see Marx and Nietzsche as the "great thinkers" representing their position? I certainly don't, and in fact I don't know any followers of Marx or Nietzsche. If you've got a problem with their philosophies, take it up with the people who hold those philosophies. What you've written here is no more valid than if I'd written it and titled it "If religion is so liberating, why did great thinkers raised religious have such a negative effect?".

Answer 3

What gives the impression that atheists have had a negative effect? IF history is any testament AT ALL, we can see that government itself, which has enslaved mankind for millenia , has had a much more negative effect than any philosopher, atheist or otherwise.

Government like other religions is a MEME. It does not phenomenologically exist. I cannot point to a building or a person and say "there is the government". Anticipating the spurious argument that the government is the people here in America, then WHY does government always act against the best interests of its citizens?
Why does all the money collected from the private taxpayer as income tax go to pay only interest on the debt if the federal reserve is a part of government..(it is a private bank)
Why did NAFTA AND GATT get passed despite the fact that 75% of Americans were against it?
Because the government is owned and run by private interests, that is why. You pay 50% of your labor right off the top of your paycheck and another 30% in hidden fees and taxes, lisencing, etc..that is 80% of your labor consumed by this leech.

Governments KILL, and they adopt ideaologies and philisophies to justify what they do.
History is a testament to the brutishness of the human race whether religion is used as an excuse or not...
Is that not a "negative effect"?

People have been killing each other over mere thoughts in their heads for over 6000 years now...the only way to stop it is to realize that a murderer or a thief on a personal level is a personal evil, but to incorporate a mass murderer and thief called government only magnifies the problem.

Mankind's dilemma is to stop drinkng the damn koolaid peddled by these mobsters and to grow the hell up.

Answer 4

"The interpreters (or misinterpreters) of Nietzsche and Marx have caused immeasurable suffering in the twentieth century, certainly more than the interpreters (or misinterpreters) of Jesus have done over a much longer time period"

Quit trying to justify what christianity has done. Even one death from people purporting to follow a loving god is too many. Inquisition. Conquistadors. Crusades. Ireland. The list is long and bloody.

So what does that tell you about their basis for morality? (maybe you will say they were not 'true christians' and I say that is a lame cop-out. THEY thought they were doing gods will).

Answer 5

Was it Nietzsche's rejection of religion that caused Naziism or was it his fervent belief in his Uebermensch nonsense? Was Marx dangerous because he rejected religion or because he pushed communism with a religious fervor? Did Stalin and Mao kill tens of millions because they didn't believe in a god or was it because of their fanatical belief in their particular political system?

Consider the Crusades, the genocide against the Albigensians and Waldensians, the various inquisitions, centuries of witch burnings and torture of 'heretics', the Thirty Years' War (which killed about 1/3 of everybody in Bavaria), not to mention encouraging the Black Plague and other epidemics by teaching that disease was caused by sin and not bad sanitation. I've seen estimates of upwards of twenty to thirty million people killed by Christianity over the years. Perhaps less than the number of people killed by Stalin and Mao, but a horrifically big number nonetheless. If a guy kills only 1/3 of the people that Jeffrey Dahmer killed, he'd still be a murderer.

"Was it because if you reject God, you also consciously or unconsciously reject any moral basis for human actions?"

If that was true, then everybody in prison in America would be an atheist. In reality, the overwhelming majority of prisoners in America are Christian. Also, you don't see to many atheists in America turning into serial killers the moment they lose their religion. If you actually knew atheists in person, you'd realize that they're just as ethical as any True Believer...

Answer 6

See if you can find the book Malleus Maleificarum. Otherwise, just look up the term Children's crusade, or inquisition, or just read up on the causes for war over the last 2 millenia. I'm a Christian, but I don't think that anyone can legitimately argue that christianity isn't the cause for quite a bit of suffering - certainly a lot more suffering then the handful of atheists. If you just want to compare equal timeframe, then don't forget Hitler, who honestly believed he was a good Christian, while the pope ignored what the man did, instead of condemning it.

Answer 7

Communism in practice replaced the old opium of religion with a new opium of the State. And it took a Christian (a crazy one, to be sure, but Hitler described himself as a Christian) to twist Nietzsche's words into a social program rather than the path of an individual. A real Übermensch wouldn't have put up with fascism.

Answer 8

Why did this christian have such a negative effect ?

A quote by Adolf Hitler for you ....

"My feelings as a Christian point me to my Lord and Savior as a fighter. It points me to the man who once in loneliness, surrounded by a few followers, recognized these Jews for what they were and summoned men to fight against them and who, God's truth! was greatest not as a sufferer but as a fighter. In boundless love as a Christian and as a man I read through the passage which tells us how the Lord at last rose in His might and seized the scourge to drive out of the Temple the brood of vipers and adders. How terrific was His fight for the world against the Jewish poison. To-day, after two thousand years, with deepest emotion I recognize more profoundly than ever before the fact that it was for this that He had to shed His blood upon the Cross. As a Christian I have no duty to allow myself to be cheated, but I have the duty to be a fighter for truth and justice... And if there is anything which could demonstrate that we are acting rightly it is the distress that daily grows. For as a Christian I have also a duty to my own people.

-Adolf Hitler, in a speech on 12 April 1922 (Norman H. Baynes, ed. The Speeches of Adolf Hitler, April 1922-August 1939, Vol. 1 of 2, pp. 19-20, Oxford University Press, 1942)

Answer 9

do you consider Marx and Nietzsche atheists.
Marx thought that both religion and atheism a waste of time.
http://www.workersliberty.org/node/4864/print
and Nietzsche was most obviously not an atheist if you judge him by this.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Antichrist_%28book%29
here is the famous 'god is dead' quote. does this when read in its full context seem look the words of an atheist?

God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?

—Nietzsche, The Gay Science, Section 125, tr. Walter Kaufmann

Answer 10

You pose a fair question, followed by the right answer.
Let's not forget though, that it may be that not all statements provided by the characters you mentioned were sincere, especially regarding religion.

e.g. Karl Marx's real name was Karl Mordecai, he was a Jew. Lenin was a Jew. Most of the Bolshevic parliament was composed by Jews. During that regime, 66 millions Christians were killed, and churches torn down, but not the synagogues. Was their alleged atheism real, or did they have a different agenda?
The reality is that Jews invented both Communism and Capitalism, and drove followers of either, against each other.

Answer 11

"Was it because if you reject God, you also consciously or unconsciously reject any moral basis for human actions?"

Basically, no. You're saying that Christianity holds the monopoly on right and wrong. This is not the case. Just because certain atheistic leaders have turned out to have flawed methods, this does not excuse the innumerable religious leaders who preached intolerance of others.