Video Update: Comments On Richard Dawkins

**jazyjason** · 01-05-2011, 03:16 AM

Originally Posted by jyoshu

Since this has been video link day apparently, here's a clip demonstrating how atheism has been just as causal toward atrocities as religion has. (See it through to the end of it)

YouTube - Atheisms Negative Effect On History(Richard Dawkins Response)

See this is where I disagree here. We as Atheists do not go around threatening to destroy the civilized world or churches, or people, or certain ethnic groups because of our conclusions that there is a lack of evidence to show a deity exists.

Rather, we use our objective and critical thinking to see the world and the universe around us for what it truly is. You are attempting to bridge the atrocities of the Crusades and modern Fundamentalism with the atrocities of Stalin. Two separate entities motivated by different reasons.

Fundamentalism gives clairvoyance to commit atrocities and see them as justified.

Where as in Stalin's case as shown, it was not Atheism in general that is to be seen in these crimes but the actions put forth by a literal madman using the foundations of Atheism as justification for murder. Just like in using literal texts from scripture to kill abortionists, Stalin contorted the views of Atheism and objective reasoning to bypass any conscience he may have once held.

Joseph Stalin - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Stalin had a complex relationship with religious institutions in the Soviet Union.[300] One story reports that while he studied at a seminary, he became a closet atheist.[301] However, this story fails on several obvious accounts, including Stalin's remaining religious, even pious, for some years longer.[302] One account states that Stalin's reversal on bans against the church during World War II followed a sign that he believed he received from heaven.[303]

Historian Edvard Radzinsky used recently discovered secret archives and noted a story that changed Stalin's attitude toward religion.[303] The story in which Ilya, Metropolitan of the Lebanon Mountains, claimed to receive a sign from heaven that "The churches and monasteries must be reopened throughout the country. Priests must be brought back from imprisonment, Leningrad must not be surrendered, but the sacred icon of Our Lady of Kazan should be carried around the city boundary, taken on to Moscow, where a service should be held, and thence to Stalingrad Tsaritsyn."[303]

Shortly thereafter, Stalin's attitude changed and "Whatever the reason, after his mysterious retreat, he began making his peace with God. Something happened which no historian has yet written about. On his orders many priests were brought back to the camps. In Leningrad, besieged by the Germans and gradually dying of hunger, the inhabitants were astounded, and uplifted, to see wonder-working icon Our Lady of Kazan brought out into the streets and borne in procession."[303] Radzinsky asked, "Had he seen the light? Had fear made him run to his Father? Had the Marxist God-Man simply decided to exploit belief in God? Or was it all of these things at once?."[303]

During the Second World War Stalin reopened the Churches. One reason could have been to motivate the majority of the population who had Christian beliefs. The reasoning behind this is that by changing the official policy of the party and the state towards religion, the Church and its clergymen could be to his disposal in mobilizing the war effort. On 4 September 1943, Stalin invited Metropolitan Sergius, Metropolitan Alexy and Metropolitan Nikolay to the Kremlin and proposed to reestablish the Moscow Patriarchate, which had been suspended since 1925, and elect the Patriarch. On 8 September 1943, Metropolitan Sergius was elected Patriarch.

Another reason that may have motivated this greater tolerance after the war, was the great failure of the persecutions of the 1920s and 1930s to actually achieve the intended result of eliminating religion.

The CPSU Central Committee continued to promote atheism and the elimination of religion during the remainder of Stalin's lifetime after the 1943 concordat.[304] Stalin's greater tolerance for religion after 1943 was limited, and persecutions resumed at the end of the war, although on a lesser scale than had been existent in the 1930s. For these reasons it is unlikely that Stalin had changed his atheistic rejection of religion during this last portion of his lifetime.

**jyoshu** · 01-05-2011, 08:23 AM

Originally Posted by jazyjason

See this is where I disagree here. We as Atheists do not go around threatening to destroy the civilized world or churches, or people, or certain ethnic groups because of our conclusions that there is a lack of evidence to show a deity exists.

Neither does religion. That's the point.

**Penfold** · 01-05-2011, 11:36 AM

Hitchens /Bliar debate; Is religion a force for good? Part 2 of 8

(part one contains no debate, just interminable introductions) it actually starts at 4.30.

YouTube - Christopher Hitchens vs Tony Blair part 2

**jazyjason** · 01-05-2011, 12:58 PM

Originally Posted by jyoshu

Neither does religion. That's the point.

You are utterly stupid Jyoshu I am sorry... utterly ignorant. This has to be the stupidest claim I have ever heard. Do you just look past evidence?

Surely you have not forgotten the motivations behind 9/11 the crusades... And even today's assassination of a Pakistani governor due to his moderate stance on religious law......

**jyoshu** · 01-05-2011, 02:43 PM

Originally Posted by jazyjason

You are utterly stupid Jyoshu I am sorry... utterly ignorant. This has to be the stupidest claim I have ever heard. Do you just look past evidence?

Surely you have not forgotten the motivations behind 9/11 the crusades... And even today's assassination of a Pakistani governor due to his moderate stance on religious law......

Jason, at this point you're just flying off the handle and not even thinking about what you're reading in peoples' posts. You've obviously fallen prey to some pretty silly and downright laughable stuff lately from the anti-theist movement. Religion doesn't threaten to 'destroy the civilized world' as you claim. It's not going to make the sky fall. You sound like a religious fundie these days (albeit attacking religion), it's fascinating to watch you at this point! 9/11 was not due to 'religion'. It was due to extremist fundamentalism. You really need to learn the difference.

**Stonewall** · 01-05-2011, 02:59 PM

Originally Posted by jyoshu

Jason, at this point you're just flying off the handle and not even thinking about what you're reading in peoples' posts. You've obviously fallen prey to some pretty silly and downright laughable stuff lately from the anti-theist movement. Religion doesn't threaten to 'destroy the civilized world' as you claim. It's not going to make the sky fall. You sound like a religious fundie these days (albeit attacking religion), it's fascinating to watch you at this point! 9/11 was not due to 'religion'. It was due to extremist fundamentalism. You really need to learn the difference.

Extremist fundamentalism IS religion. 9/11 occurred because those terrorists thought they were doing the work of their god. Without religion, that would never have happened. That is the type of thing that happens in a theocracy, which, as I have said before, is religion in its purest form, undisturbed by the secular, outside world.

**Penfold** · 01-05-2011, 03:04 PM

Good men do good things, bad men do bad things, but to make good men do bad things takes religion.

**jyoshu** · 01-05-2011, 03:53 PM

Originally Posted by Stonewall

Extremist fundamentalism IS religion.

But that is irrelevant--it is the extremism that is the problem, NOT the religion. Jason is barking up the wrong tree. Extremist fundamentalism has existed in numerous movements; nationalism and patriotism are examples.

Originally Posted by Stonewall

Without religion, that would never have happened.

And without patriotism, Hitler's atrocities might never have happened. That doesn't mean we should blame patriotism. The blame should lie at the feet of extremism, not religion.

**Stonewall** · 01-05-2011, 04:24 PM

Originally Posted by jyoshu

But that is irrelevant--it is the extremism that is the problem, NOT the religion. Jason is barking up the wrong tree. Extremist fundamentalism has existed in numerous movements; nationalism and patriotism are examples.

And without patriotism, Hitler's atrocities might never have happened. That doesn't mean we should blame patriotism. The blame should lie at the feet of extremism, not religion.

Patriotism doesn't have laws and commandments.

The fact is that the evils that are done by extremists lie in the scriptures of the holy books. They are not just made up by extremists. They didn't invent the idea of death to blasphemers and infidels, adulterers, homosexuals, etc. These things are in the scriptures, and believing they are from God causes people to follow it. Just because there are semi-rational people who follow the religion but don't agree with the violence that is advocated in their holy books does not get their religion off the hook.

**Xcaliber** · 01-05-2011, 04:24 PM

Originally Posted by jyoshu

But that is irrelevant--it is the extremism that is the problem, NOT the religion. Jason is barking up the wrong tree. Extremist fundamentalism has existed in numerous movements; nationalism and patriotism are examples.

And without patriotism, Hitler's atrocities might never have happened. That doesn't mean we should blame patriotism. The blame should lie at the feet of extremism, not religion.

Hitlers Atrocities Were committed because he believed he was doing the work of GOD, religion was the direct cause.

**Steeeeve** · 01-05-2011, 05:22 PM

Originally Posted by Xcaliber

Hitlers Atrocities Were committed because he believed he was doing the work of GOD, religion was the direct cause.

No, Hitler being a nutcase was the direct cause. Without religion people will just blame their actions on something else.

**Xcaliber** · 01-05-2011, 05:33 PM

Originally Posted by Steeeeve

No, Hitler being a nutcase was the direct cause. Without religion people will just blame their actions on something else.

Of course it would take a complete Nut to do the things Hitler did, I'm not disputing that. But He did so Thinking he was doing those things for His GOD, the same as the terrorists in 9/11. Religion Breeds extremism, that's proven throughout history.

**Easyrider** · 01-05-2011, 06:15 PM

Originally Posted by Stonewall

The fact is that the evils that are done by extremists lie in the scriptures of the holy books. They are not just made up by extremists. They didn't invent the idea of death to blasphemers and infidels, adulterers, homosexuals, etc. These things are in the scriptures, and believing they are from God causes people to follow it. Just because there are semi-rational people who follow the religion but don't agree with the violence that is advocated in their holy books does not get their religion off the hook.

People who do evil in the name of Christ / Christianity have only themselves to blame. It's not the fault of the Christian religion or the New Testament. The teachings of Christ are clear that you are to love God and your fellow man. Every evil committed on the face of the earth is the result of people VIOLATING the teachings of Jesus Christ.

**jyoshu** · 01-05-2011, 06:23 PM

Originally Posted by Stonewall

Patriotism doesn't have laws and commandments.

The fact is that the evils that are done by extremists lie in the scriptures of the holy books. They are not just made up by extremists. They didn't invent the idea of death to blasphemers and infidels, adulterers, homosexuals, etc. These things are in the scriptures, and believing they are from God causes people to follow it. Just because there are semi-rational people who follow the religion but don't agree with the violence that is advocated in their holy books does not get their religion off the hook.

No, we know the scriptures aren't the cause, otherwise Christians everywhere (some more adherent than the fundies) would be doing these things. There's something about a fundie that draws them to these passages in particular, not the other way around. Writings have no will of their own; Mein Kampf doesn't make people go out and become white supremacists. The extremist does that because he's an extremist and he's looking for an excuse of justification.

Add that to the fact there is plenty in the same Bible to make it clear it is now very WRONG to do those things, under the teachings of Jesus. Christianity is clearly against the items in the parade of horribles you mention.

**Accipiter** · 01-05-2011, 06:29 PM

Originally Posted by Easyrider

Every evil committed on the face of the earth is the result of people VIOLATING the teachings of Jesus Christ.

How do you know this is true?

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