It wasnt for the sake of atheism that they killed so many people; they were dictators and it makes no difference whether you are a religious or a secular dictator -- you're equally ruthless. On the other hand, it WAS for the sake of God that Urban II started the Crusades, or that you have Shias being blown up by Sunnis every year.
Asalaamu Alaikum,
Former atheist
Ignace Lepp states "some modern atheists are unquestionably neurotics" which he bases typically on an unhappy experience with religion.
[78] Sam Harris has been criticized by some of his fellow contributors at
The Huffington Post. In particular,
RJ Eskow has accused him of fostering an
intolerance towards
faith, potentially as damaging as the
religious fanaticism which he opposes.
[14][15] Madeleine Bunting wrote in
The Guardian that the purpose of recent books by Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens "is to pour scorn on religious belief – they want it eradicated," and argues that the books are "deeply political," sharing a "loathing" of the role of religion in US politics. Quoting Harris as saying "some propositions are so dangerous that it may even be ethical to kill people for believing them," Bunting says "[t]his sounds like exactly the kind of argument put forward by those who ran the Inquisition."
[79] Quoting the same passage,
theologian Catherine Keller asks, "[c]ould there be a more dangerous proposition than
that?" and argues that the "anti-tolerance" it represents would "dismantle" the Jeffersonian wall between church and state.
[80]
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One criticism of atheism is that godless nations have been responsible for aggressive campaigns against religions or religious people.
Pope Benedict XVI, for example, stated in 2010:
As we reflect on the sobering lessons of the atheist extremism of the twentieth century, let us never forget how the exclusion of God, religion and virtue from public life leads ultimately to a truncated vision of man and of society and thus to a "reductive vision of the person and his destiny"
[85]
While research suggests that atheists are more numerous in peaceful nations than they are in turbulent or warlike ones,
[86] proponents of this view cite examples, such as the
Bolsheviks (in Soviet Russia), who, inspired by "an ideological creed which professed that all religion would atrophy", "resolved to eradicate Christianity as such". In 1918 "[t]en
Orthodox hierarchs were summarily shot" and "[c]hildren were deprived of any religious education outside the home."
[87] Increasingly draconian measures were employed. In addition to direct state persecution, the
League of the Militant Godless was founded in 1925, churches were closed and vandalized and "by 1938 eighty bishops had lost their lives, while thousands of clerics were sent to labour camps."
[88]
In
1967,
Enver Hoxha's regime conducted a
campaign to extinguish religious life in
Albania; by year's end over two thousand religious buildings were closed or converted to other uses, and religious leaders were imprisoned and executed. Albania was declared to be the world's first atheist country by its leaders, and Article 37 of the Albanian constitution of 1976 stated that "The State recognises no religion, and supports and carries out atheistic propaganda in order to implant a scientific materialistic world outlook in people."
[89][90][91]
Christian writer
Dinesh D'Souza writes that "The crimes of atheism have generally been perpetrated through a hubristic ideology that sees man, not God, as the creator of values. Using the latest techniques of science and technology, man seeks to displace God and create a secular utopia here on earth."
[16] He also contends:
And who can deny that Stalin and Mao, not to mention Pol Pot and a host of others, all committed atrocities in the name of a Communist ideology that was explicitly atheistic? Who can dispute that they did their bloody deeds by claiming to be establishing a 'new man' and a religion-free utopia? These were mass murders performed with atheism as a central part of their ideological inspiration, they were not mass murders done by people who simply happened to be atheist.
[17]
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Some philosophers and world religions teach that morality is derived from or expressed by the dictates or commandments of a particular deity, and that acknowledgment of God or the gods is a major factor in motivating people towards moral behavior. The philosopher
Immanuel Kant stated the practical necessity for a belief in God in his
Critique of Practical Reason. As an idea of pure reason, "we do not have the slightest ground to assume in an absolute manner… the object of this idea…",
[45] but adds that the idea of God cannot be separated from the relation of happiness with morality as the "ideal of the supreme good." The foundation of this connection is an intelligible moral world, and "is necessary from the practical point of view".
[46] The French philosopher
Voltaire stated "If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him."
[47]
Niall Ferguson states that without religion there would be no basis for an ethical framework for a person's life, and refers to
G. K. Chesterton's rumoured
apothegm "When men stop believing in God, they don't believe in nothing. They believe in anything". He states that based on historical observation and studies performed by his colleagues at
Harvard University that there is "no question there’s a connection between religion and economic and social behaviour" and he is "strongly convinced that religion performs important social functions in the transmission say, of ethical values between generations" and without it exists "a society that’s likely to be less good at maintaining social order".
[48][49] Historically, practical atheism or
apatheism — which describes individuals who live as if there are no gods and explain natural phenomena without resorting to the divine — has been associated by various writers with depravity, willful ignorance, impiety, and
hedonism. According to the French Catholic philosopher
Étienne Borne, "Practical atheism is not the denial of the existence of God, but complete godlessness of action; it is a moral evil, implying not the denial of the absolute validity of the moral law but simply rebellion against that law."
[6] For many years in the United States, atheists were not allowed to testify in court because it was believed that an atheist would have no reason to tell the truth (see also
discrimination against atheists).
[50]
