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Atheism's Harm vs. Religion's Harm

When I discuss the harm done in religion's name with my sister, who is Moslem, she inevitably brings up the harm done in atheism's name, including Stalin in the process. I am not sufficiently well informed about history to know whether or not she is right that harm has been done in atheism's name. (I know that Marx thought that religious belief would simply vanish once people ceased to live under oppressive economic conditions, so that he didn't see the need to actively combat religious belief, but I also know that the USSR was an officially atheist state.) What sort of reply would you give to someone who contended that while harm has been done in the name religion, it has also been done in the name of atheism, so that the look-at-the-harm-religious-belief-does argument isn't effective?

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Permalink Reply by Greg LeGore on October 23, 2011 at 8:46pm

Transhuman, no. Transtribal, maybe making a bit of progress here. The more I live, the more I realize that each human has much in common - too often hidden by our ancient tribal, religious, and cultural dogmas and biases...if only they could be cast aside and we see each person without these hindrances.

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Permalink Reply by leveni on October 24, 2011 at 8:54am

The more I live, the more I realize that each human has much in common

I'm also of this opinion.

Transtribal

Is this your invention?

It's great. It could be a great word to describe the intermediate stage between humans and transhumans. Or the first step in becoming a transhuman.

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Permalink Reply by Greg LeGore on October 24, 2011 at 6:04pm

I doubt that as many others, far smarter and more eloquent than I, have made the case about transcending tribalism. I used it because it conveyed what I meant: our cultural differences are local and changeable.

As we become more global, we widen our circle of concern and include others in rather than excluding them upon the basis of family, tribe, ethnicity, or any other category and finally stop at human or, better, sentient being.

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Permalink Reply by SecularCortex13.x on September 10, 2011 at 11:39pm

I think it's more corporate corrupt big(insert biz here) post-modern-monarchy-like battle(s) going on... influence battles indeed. the atheism the newest of influence; the most evolved imho... no pun.

check this out: http://www.linktv.org/programs/the-war-you-dont-see
I was taken aback. indeed.

religion is obsolete and everyone knows.. they just wanna be raptured which is crap. cop out.
tired of the lies. how about YOU?

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Permalink Reply by Greg LeGore on September 19, 2011 at 8:23pm

As has been noted by many others more eloquent than I, Hitler was religious; Stalin's government was a cult of personality similar to a religion.

History is full of horrors inflicted by humans against other humans in the name of religion.

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Permalink Reply by C.J. Scoggins on October 22, 2011 at 10:26am

To me we cannot win that battle on the big picture because as you stated there is no way of knowing with certainty the motive behind others actions. The key here is to make it personal to your sister focus on what her particular religion teaches her as a woman is her place according to that teaching. Is she equal to the man? Does it give her true self worth or is her value based only in as long as she is a part of the faith? Another suggestion is to ask a simple question. With all the different beliefs about God How does she know that her belief is the correct one? It may take time but the key is to get her to think, to do so you must understand what she believes and then appeal to her emotion and logic. In short you must see her as an individual and in truth show her she has value as a person. All religions take away the individuals Identity and replace it with a group mentality. Show her she is an individual with value.

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Permalink Reply by Tara Benson on October 22, 2011 at 7:19pm

Christians (and apparently Muslims) like to throw out Stalin, and other atheist rulers as "evidence" of the horrors committed in the name of atheism. But none of them committed their acts in the name of atheism. Nobody ever committed a crime in the name of no-gods or to further the cause of atheism. They did so for their political agendas. Atheism was but a tool for them, not their motivation. They demanded absolute loyalty to the State. People who worshiped any god(s) would naturally be problems as "one cannot worship both god and mammon". Accordingly religion was suppressed to ensure complete obedience to the State.

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Permalink Reply by Matt VDB on October 23, 2011 at 3:05am

Hi Tara,

Nobody ever committed a crime in the name of no-gods or to further the cause of atheism. They did so for their political agendas. Atheism was but a tool for them, not their motivation.

I've participated in this thread quite a bit, and I've heard many people utter similar arguments. I have to say I still do not find them convincing. Frankly I think it's some very thin semantical veneer that's being built here.

Let me put it like this: suppose you were talking about the Albigensian crusade with a Christian, and he brought up that -really- the reason the Pope sought to exterminate the cathars was because they didn't want to agree with edicts the Pope had made. And since the Pope demanded absolute loyalty to himself as part of his political agenda, the people who died in this Crusade are to be put on the tally of ambition and imperialism, not on religion.

Or what if someone characterised the witch craze as the persecution of individuals who were thought to be harmful to the community at large and had to be removed. Would you then buy that this really had nothing to do with religion but was simply scape-goating on the part of a community?

Would you tell these people that they are (a) making perfect sense or (b) playing semantical games with you?

The fact is, Stalin and other communist leaders were atheists. And they did want to spread atheism; they saw it as a frame of mind that was holding humanity back, and to destroy it would make people more aware and pay more attention to the world they were living in - and these enlightened people would then unshackle themselves from the bourgeois etcetera...

Now we can bicker about whether or not atheism was their primary goal, yes or no, but the fact is that it was one of their goals, and lots of people died for it.

These are deaths in the name of atheism and spreading atheism. To skate around that point is dishonest.

Kind regards,

Matt

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Permalink Reply by Chris Dodds on October 23, 2011 at 11:54am

I'm not entirely sure you can use Stalin as an example of an evil atheist, simply because no one's 100% sure what his own beliefs on the matter were. He came into power in an officially atheist state, I know, but he was known for quoting the bible, something that I've seen very few atheists do. I'll admit, I don't much about the USSR, but I do remember reading something where someone suggested that Stalin would most likely have been a Deist.