6 ms·

Except, of course, the genocide of Native Americans - which was done by self proclaimed Christians.

reitanqild 10y ago
Doesn't refute my point that the fact that Christians as well as "Christians" oppressed the Indians were mostly coincidental; had Europeans been atheists the results would have likely been very much worse for the natives.
- mikeash 10y ago
  I would love to know why you think atheists would have been worse.
  - reitanqild 10y ago
    Because of evidence from atheist leaders from the French reign of terror through all communist madmen until today. No religion, not even if you count Hitler religios (dubious claim in the first place I'd say) comes close to Mao and Stalin.
    - mikeash 10y ago
      I'd say the Taiping Rebellion was just as bad. When you consider that they didn't have access to the sort of industrialized death that people on your list did, I'd say it was much worse.
      - reitanqild 10y ago
        TIL. Upvoted. Still hard to beat 20th century communist atheists in efficiently killing off their own populations or French revolutionaries in being creatively evil.
        mikeash 10y ago
        I would say that nothing beats the genocide of the Americas for sheer scope, numbers, duration, and cultural loss. All of your examples ended in a decade or two, that lasted centuries.
        hourislate 10y ago
        My intent is not to diminish the genocide of the Americas but.... I don't think you realize how many people Stalin, Mao, Hitler have killed. We all know Hitler had to resort to incineration to get rid of the bodies. Stalin filled mines with the remains of Ukrainians and others. They couldn't dig holes big enough to bury the dead. I have no idea what Mao did with the 50-80 million bodies he had on his hands. Between just these 3 guys your looking at well over 100 million people and that is not including war dead. Just people being exterminated for various reasons. So to say that nothing beats the genocide of the Americas is not accurate.
        0134340 10y ago
        The Nazi movement had Christian influence. Whether it influenced the movement in a malicious way is arguable but Nazism wasn't an entirely secular movement. Hitler used the term in Article 24 of the 1920 Nazi Party Platform, stating: "the Party represents the standpoint of Positive Christianity". - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_Christianity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_Christianity And to be intellectually honest, none of those you stated committed atrocities in the doctrine of atheism because it has none. Don't throw atheism under the bus when someone criticizes your religion because atheism is the lack of belief in gods, nothing more.
        reitanqild 10y ago
        Listen up: I'm not here to pick on atheists. I do have many friends who are and I think I see many who behave more decently than many religious. It is only when someone mounts sweeping attacks on all or specific religions, based on things that, -while done in name of said religion-, are not described in the sacred texts of said religion, -then I do use the opportunity to gove a little history lesson. Because if I and other Christians should feel bad because genocide of X, Y and Z then certainly atheists should feel bad because of the reign of terror, Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot etc. Or rather; not. None of us should. If we should feel bad about anything it is that we aren't doing more now. That certainly bothers me.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - panzagl 10y ago
    Catholics (and especially Jesuits) were given the task of baptizing natives and turning them into Christians. The church often came into conflict with the ruling class over their treatment. Other Christian churches often had the same obligations.
    - mikeash 10y ago
      I'm not sure what that has to do with it. Everybody was religious, of course there were religious people on both sides of the "should we murder everybody in sight?" question.
  - einhverfr 10y ago
    Atheists would have been worse because it is not a problem of religion per se. Western Christianity always held out hope that the church could oppose the state (and sometimes did). There is no real room for any competition to the state in a fully atheistic society. That's why Mao and Stalin were so bad. It wasn't because of atheist doctrines (outside of atheistic political doctrines), but there was too much power concentrated in too few hands.
    - mikeash 10y ago
      I don't see how that has anything to do with religion. Having multiple opposing powers is happens without religion, and having a single powerful authority happens with religion.
      - einhverfr 10y ago
        Religion is a social pattern and it connects to other social patterns too. Also I think it is important to scope that "atheism" is usually a shorthand for "Western, Secular Humanistic Atheism" which is philosophically an off-shoot of Protestantism in general and Calvinism in particular. You get a different set of results when you look at Buddhist Atheists or Hindu Atheists for example (because in neither of these traditions is religion dependent on belief like it is in Christianity). Hope that helps.
- i386 10y ago
  The burden of proof for your statement lacks about 2000 years of history
- fennecfoxen 10y ago
  >had Europeans been atheists Silly counterfactual. A more interesting one would be if Europe had remained firmly Pagan instead of substantially Christianizing in the first millennium AD. In that case, one could imagine that no great religious alliances would oppose the Ummayad and Ottoman caliphates, nor would Byzantium hold out as long as it did... eventually we might be looking at an Islamic colonization of the New World, as the well-regarded Islamic traditions of science and scholarly inquiry ultimately discovered America. A big question would be whether colonization and conquering would proceed at the same pace without the Spanish efforts, and if not, whether smallpox resistance and the like could have taken root and afforded the native American peoples a better fighting chance. And would the same ethnic groups be represented among the colonists? What slavery practices would we have seen?
- ittekimasu 10y ago
  That's a good point; British "agnostic" "liberals" (incl. notably Mill), often defended the British task of "civilizing the barbarians" the world over.

Doesn't refute my point that the fact that Christians as well as "Christians" oppressed the Indians were mostly coincidental; had Europeans been atheists the results would have likely been very much worse for the natives.

mikeash 10y ago
I would love to know why you think atheists would have been worse.
- reitanqild 10y ago
  Because of evidence from atheist leaders from the French reign of terror through all communist madmen until today. No religion, not even if you count Hitler religios (dubious claim in the first place I'd say) comes close to Mao and Stalin.
  - mikeash 10y ago
    I'd say the Taiping Rebellion was just as bad. When you consider that they didn't have access to the sort of industrialized death that people on your list did, I'd say it was much worse.
    - reitanqild 10y ago
      TIL. Upvoted. Still hard to beat 20th century communist atheists in efficiently killing off their own populations or French revolutionaries in being creatively evil.
      - mikeash 10y ago
        I would say that nothing beats the genocide of the Americas for sheer scope, numbers, duration, and cultural loss. All of your examples ended in a decade or two, that lasted centuries.
        hourislate 10y ago
        My intent is not to diminish the genocide of the Americas but.... I don't think you realize how many people Stalin, Mao, Hitler have killed. We all know Hitler had to resort to incineration to get rid of the bodies. Stalin filled mines with the remains of Ukrainians and others. They couldn't dig holes big enough to bury the dead. I have no idea what Mao did with the 50-80 million bodies he had on his hands. Between just these 3 guys your looking at well over 100 million people and that is not including war dead. Just people being exterminated for various reasons. So to say that nothing beats the genocide of the Americas is not accurate.
        0134340 10y ago
        The Nazi movement had Christian influence. Whether it influenced the movement in a malicious way is arguable but Nazism wasn't an entirely secular movement. Hitler used the term in Article 24 of the 1920 Nazi Party Platform, stating: "the Party represents the standpoint of Positive Christianity". - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_Christianity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_Christianity And to be intellectually honest, none of those you stated committed atrocities in the doctrine of atheism because it has none. Don't throw atheism under the bus when someone criticizes your religion because atheism is the lack of belief in gods, nothing more.
        reitanqild 10y ago
        Listen up: I'm not here to pick on atheists. I do have many friends who are and I think I see many who behave more decently than many religious. It is only when someone mounts sweeping attacks on all or specific religions, based on things that, -while done in name of said religion-, are not described in the sacred texts of said religion, -then I do use the opportunity to gove a little history lesson. Because if I and other Christians should feel bad because genocide of X, Y and Z then certainly atheists should feel bad because of the reign of terror, Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot etc. Or rather; not. None of us should. If we should feel bad about anything it is that we aren't doing more now. That certainly bothers me.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- panzagl 10y ago
  Catholics (and especially Jesuits) were given the task of baptizing natives and turning them into Christians. The church often came into conflict with the ruling class over their treatment. Other Christian churches often had the same obligations.
  - mikeash 10y ago
    I'm not sure what that has to do with it. Everybody was religious, of course there were religious people on both sides of the "should we murder everybody in sight?" question.
- einhverfr 10y ago
  Atheists would have been worse because it is not a problem of religion per se. Western Christianity always held out hope that the church could oppose the state (and sometimes did). There is no real room for any competition to the state in a fully atheistic society. That's why Mao and Stalin were so bad. It wasn't because of atheist doctrines (outside of atheistic political doctrines), but there was too much power concentrated in too few hands.
  - mikeash 10y ago
    I don't see how that has anything to do with religion. Having multiple opposing powers is happens without religion, and having a single powerful authority happens with religion.
    - einhverfr 10y ago
      Religion is a social pattern and it connects to other social patterns too. Also I think it is important to scope that "atheism" is usually a shorthand for "Western, Secular Humanistic Atheism" which is philosophically an off-shoot of Protestantism in general and Calvinism in particular. You get a different set of results when you look at Buddhist Atheists or Hindu Atheists for example (because in neither of these traditions is religion dependent on belief like it is in Christianity). Hope that helps.
i386 10y ago
The burden of proof for your statement lacks about 2000 years of history
fennecfoxen 10y ago
>had Europeans been atheists Silly counterfactual. A more interesting one would be if Europe had remained firmly Pagan instead of substantially Christianizing in the first millennium AD. In that case, one could imagine that no great religious alliances would oppose the Ummayad and Ottoman caliphates, nor would Byzantium hold out as long as it did... eventually we might be looking at an Islamic colonization of the New World, as the well-regarded Islamic traditions of science and scholarly inquiry ultimately discovered America. A big question would be whether colonization and conquering would proceed at the same pace without the Spanish efforts, and if not, whether smallpox resistance and the like could have taken root and afforded the native American peoples a better fighting chance. And would the same ethnic groups be represented among the colonists? What slavery practices would we have seen?
ittekimasu 10y ago
That's a good point; British "agnostic" "liberals" (incl. notably Mill), often defended the British task of "civilizing the barbarians" the world over.