Trick Question, Part 2: In the past 100 years, which has killed more; Atheism or Religion?

Question

Stalin- 20 mil dead. Mao, as many as 100 mil., but we may never know the truth. Conservative estimates put his score card at 30 mil. Historians have discovered that while Mao was starving his citizens to death, he encouraged cannibalism as a way to support the state and to rid the townships of religious practitioners. Hitler may have been raised Catholic, but he referred to himself as “a complete pagan”, and his Nazism was rooted in Atheism just as Communism, Marxism and Fascism was. To deny the connection is to be dishonest about the facts. In the past 100 years, Atheism has been the root of more human suffering than any other modern belief. The witch burnings of Europe killed as many as 100 thousand. Salem witch trials killed 16. Linguistic arguments to support an answer is no substitute for facts. Look at the numbers, Atheism has been at the root of over 100 mil dead in the past 100 years; less than 5 mil world wide attributable to religions.

I am not religious, just factual.

Answer 1

If we must generalize, religion, because no one has committed mass killings in the name of Atheism. Can you say the same for religions?

Your tangential "facts" of Communism = Atheism, Nazism = Atheism, Fascism = Atheism are groundless. Your most blatant fallacy is equating Hitler's paganism to Atheism. "Paganism" refers to the RELIGION of polytheism.

Plus, you generalize much.

From the extremists to the lip-servicers, there are many degrees of Atheism as there are of religion. Also, as in religion, there are many varieties of those who do not believe in deities: Humanists, freethinkers, rationalists, naturalists, and skeptics, to name a few. There are even "crossovers," such as Buddhism, which is considered atheistic.

Yes, it would be a much simpler & understandable world if we could all make broad generalizations about the important issues. But taking this easy way out, instead of comparing specific forms of religion & atheism, is at best unproductive and at worst destructive.

Answer 2

Funny how you limit it to the past 100 years only. What about the religious atrocities that happened way back further than a hundred years?

Is that why you called this a 'trick question'?

And atheism is responsible for the greatest crimes in human history? Baloney!

People of faith often claim that the crimes of Hitler, Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot were the inevitable product of unbelief. The problem with fascism and communism, however, is not that they are too critical of religion; the problem is that they are TOO MUCH LIKE RELIGIONS. Such regimes are dogmatic to the core and generally give rise to personality cults that are indistinguishable from cults of religious hero worship. Auschwitz, the gulag and the killing fields were not examples of what happens when human beings reject religious dogma; they are examples of political, racial and nationalistic dogma run amok. There is no society in human history that ever suffered because its people became too reasonable.

Answer 3

All of these facts show religion or lack thereof hasn't actually killed anybody! I think people have killed more people than religion and atheism combined!

What belief system a person claims is irrelevant to a discussion like this. What is relevant is the reality that all humans have done something wrong somewhere and would likely do more if not for a moral code of some sort.

We should stop the finger-pointing and start accepting responsibility for our actions. Here, let me go first. I am a sinner and have done many things I am not proud of. I will also be willing to accept the blame for millions of deaths to help our society move forward and acknowledge that we need God's forgiveness. I know I do. Praise to Him who offers forgiveness to all of us!

Answer 4

I notice that the most intelligent response you had received at the time I hit the "answer" button argued that atheism is just a belief in the non-existence of any deities. It ignores the fact that it also requires a belief in absolute materialism which robs us of the ability to make any philosophical distinctions between humanity and a stray meteor outside sentimentality. It also ignores the fact that government will always corrupt, so that sentimentality will also be twisted and changed. We aren't made of compartments. Every belief affects every other. It's a simple truth of life.

It's very telling that that was the most intelligent response you received.

You do stretch things with Hitler, though. His paganism wasn't atheism in the sense we're discussing. He researched and strove hard to resurrect old Norse deities and accumulate spiritual artifacts from all over the world. I don't think he can make the cut.

Answer 5

On the topic... Stalin did not kill in the name of atheism, neither did Mao, or 'catholic to the end' Hitler.

Had to answer Innokent's disgusting suggestion that atheists are without a moral code...

I don't believe in Santa Claus either, even though there is substantially more evidence for HIS existence, ie. 'some'... but that doesn't make me unable to distinguish between right or wrong, or make me incapable of making the ultimate sacrifice, if need arose.

In fact I'd say I do things for the 'right' reasons, rather than because a discredited, deliberately edited and mistranslated, book of contradictions TELLS me to, or because of a FEAR that I might go to hell if I don't obey it.

The rise of Atheism is a sign that the human race is finally starting to grow up, but religion remains our most deadly inheritence; the most pernicious evil on the planet. Think of a certain current major conflict where BOTH sides believe God/Allah is on THEIR side. There is NO possibility of compromise there, the only possibility is more and more war.

regards,

RouX

Answer 6

Was it done in the name of atheism? I think you make a good point- people assume that religion starts all wars, etc, when really it is more complicated. But if you separate the actual people who do the killing- the religious (generally prohibited from killing in any religion), then you come back into the same problem. Why do people take orders to do what their religion states they should not? Since most people are religious- in Russia, China, and Germany, it stands to reason the actual people doing the killing are violating their religious beliefs for some other reason.

Answer 7

Stalin and Mao were Atheists, but that wasn't their motivation. They were both strictly motivated by power. It wasn't ABOUT atheism. The Crusades, the conquest of the America's, the Inquisition and so on was clearly about religion.

Hitler: Well picking out people by religion is pretty much the definition of being motivated by religion. He was a Catholic. There are references to it all over the Nazi symbols. It is true that he mixed in some pagan beliefs, buy why do you think there are Easer eggs and Christmas trees? Saying that he was anything but a Christian and at least somewhat motivated by that fact is dishonest.

Answer 8

Why don't you start thinking about today.
Yesterday is over and all peoples need to use those times as a learning experience to move forward. You can sit here all day and try to point fingers at people, but when the day is done the one truth will remain:
There isn't a group on earth who isn't guilty in some things, and rightious in others.
Oh, and the salem witch trials, according to the folks at the Salem Museum that I visited, there were only seven of them, and the whole entire thing was blown out of proportion in order to make loads of money, which they do, each and every year.
It is what keeps the City of Salem in existance. The tourism.

Answer 9

You are religious not factual,because if you were factual you would know something. Religion is a set of rules and demonstrations made up by man to keep small minded people blind.Do whatever I say do. This is nothing new thousand of people were killed in the old testament because of their struggle of disbelief. We live by faith and not by sight. Both Atheist and religion have killed more than thousand of people. The issue is God is real and he is a protector of those that serve him. God says put not your trust in man simply because he will let you down
(more than you know and sometimes a far as to the grave.)

Answer 10

no trick question, faith has been in the back of greater wars & atrosities then every physique, devil makes use of faith to misinform the international locations. this journey has already befell 25020 yrs from the removal of the kingship from Israel Ez 21:25.........(Revelation 12:7-9) 7 And conflict broke out in heaven: Mi?cha?el and his angels battled with the dragon, and the dragon and its angels battled 8 in spite of the incontrovertible fact that it did not be triumphant, neither replaced right into a place stumbled on for them any greater in heaven. 9 So down the great dragon replaced into hurled, the unique serpent, the only noted as devil and devil, who's deceptive the full inhabited earth; . . .