Losing Faith in Humanity...

[sapphi_snake]

garvey0 said:

PhalanxCO said:

SciFiBoy said:

im an atheist, part of the reason I dont like religion is that people use it as an excuse for those things or worse yet promote those things because of their religion, I dont hate all relgious people (this is @ dsister), I just think that ALOT of them, in particular thoose that I have met, tend to be more bigoted and narrow minded than atheists/agnostics.

I've found a lot of athiest/agnostics that are just as bigoted and narrow.  It's a problem that both sides suffer from. Personally, I am very religious but if someone else chooses not to be, that's their decision. I believe we all have free will to make our own choices. I will not force my views down someone's throat, but I expect not to be treated like an unenlightened idiot in return.

I'll admit, people have done horrible things over the centuries in the name of religion. The Crusades, The Inquisition, terrorism (in the middle east and other areas) had terrible consequences for innocent people. However, there is also a history of persecution of religious groups by Socialist (Athiest) nations. Granted is it not on the same level as what's been done by radical religious beliefs, but it exists nonetheless.

My point is that a general lack of respect is demonstrated by members of both sides of this debate.

I enjoyed your post, and just wanted to note something as well...

Mao zedong (who was an atheist for those who don't know) is responsible for the deaths of anywhere from 50 to 77 million people - far more deaths than any of any of the events that you named.  A portion of this was religious persecution.  I'm not trying to say that atheism is a religion of murder, just trying to help show that they are not any more moral than religious people.

I know a lot of people really love mao, and I don't want to cause any offense or heart-ache.  I just wanted to state the facts of the killings themselves.

First of all atheism isn't a religion.

In Mao's case people died of political reasons and many people died indirectly as a result of hunger. All this was done in the name of the chinese cultural revolution. He didn't kill anyone in the name of atheism. The exact same thing can be said about Stalin. 

In the case of the deaths and conflicts caused by religion, they were caused directly by the religion in question religion, and all the killing was done in the name of religion (for example the wars between protestants and catholics happed exclusively for religious reasons, and would not have taken place had Christianity not existed).