Things Atheists Didn’t Do
By Dave Hitt on Oct 24, 2008 in Atheism, Religion, Things Atheists Didn't Do
Here’s a list of things atheists didn’t do over the past month or so.
An Atheist did not set fire to his 11 year old niece for wearing lipstick. She has burns over 90% of her body and is not expected to survive.
No atheist decreed it was OK to kill the owners of Satellite TV stations that broadcast “immoral” content. That was a Islamic Cleric who also said Mickey Mouse should be killed. Atheists know that Mickey Mouse isn’t real either.
Atheists did not vandalize the homes of a half dozen politicians in Minnesota. They didn’t spray paint threats and a reference to Psalms 2 on their homes.
Atheists didn’t rape a nun in India. That was Hindus, who have also killed 30 people and left thousands homeless in their attacks on Christians.
Atheists did not gun down an aid worker in Afghanistan. That was, of course, Muslims. But hell, she was a woman, so they probably only consider it half a murder (which means they’ll have to work harder to fill their monthly quota.)
No atheist announced that women should now be limited to a one-eyed veil. That as an Islamic holy man.
It wasn’t an atheist court who sentenced a man to death for asking about woman’s rights in class. That was, of course, a Muslim court. But they changed their mind, and now he’s only sentenced to twenty years in prison. Allah is merciful.
Atheists don’t punish women for being raped. But if you’re an Islamic rape victim who can’t find four men to testify they witnessed the crime, you’ll be beaten if you’re single and stoned to death if you’re married. Imagine how nasty the punishment would be if Islam wasn’t the religion of peace.
No atheist teacher burned crosses into his students arms. And I’ll bet you a fine cigar or the refreshing beverage of your choice that the students that rallied to support him weren’t atheists either.
Meanwhile, what do you get from atheists? Tasty, tasty bacon!
@blufindr
“I’d like to see some of your proof that atheists are more likely to commit heinous deeds.”
I provided proofs to you many times here. You decided to pretend not to understand them. Once you mature enough, you may be able to try their contest in more creditable manner. Currently, it seems that only way you can cope is ignorance. Spiritual maturity can only be achieved by will and experience, not by age. So far you sound to me like you are missing all of that. But not to worry, because my goal was actually never to prove anything to you, since it’s impossible at your state. My goal was just to have fun and ridicule because your ignorance calls for it.
Your confusion about children and spirituality can only come from your background. You can’t be born into a religion or morals. It is a choice of will and understanding. Only a complete idiot can even consider that kids got higher moral standards then fully spiritually and physically developed healthy adults. Ask a two year old what they think about adultery, and see how you go. You personally believe that people are born good or bad. Don’t try to deny it, because it is foundation of theory you linked that nature and not nurture is more relevant in development of human psyche. Unless of course you got no clue what‘s it about …
I don’t agree with that. Same people do sometimes good, sometimes bad, depending on circumstances, and both nature and nurture form them. More you know about those circumstances and background, harder it gets to judge them and criticize. What helps them decide and make “better†choice are their principles and ideals. As atheist you lack most of that, because you reject religion that is foundation of the whole concept of morals the way we know it.
“Check out the Salem Witch Trials. They violated that particular tenet, perhaps not with the same magnitude numerically as Stalin, but certainly so relatively-speaking.â€
Your comparison is very distressing. You people keep forcing me to repeat for each of you separate. I already said here somewhere that comparison of dozen victims to millions is not supporting your argument. Egocentric fanatics in Salem killed few unlucky women in try to keep the rest under oppression. Moreover, it was not even religious act, although perpetrators claimed it was. Religion was only justification. Main reason was politics and madness. Otherwise, witches would be still burning left and right today. Besides, it was not atheists that stoped them doing such crime. It was religious people. On the other hand, Stalin killed millions solely because of their religiousness, and yes, it was politics and mental illness again. He was able to destroy such enormous number of victims because he had millions of atheism crazed followers obeying him. How many times can you ignore this fact and start whole useless cycle of denial again without understanding the meaning and implications? Those poor religious people were persecuted and killed by atheists. MILLIONS OF PEOPLE! Not dozen! In statistics, 10 compared to 1 000 000 is trivial. That slaughter went on for almost a century. It’s still happening. Do you still want to keep ignoring it? I can rephrase this many, many times, just keep asking.
true_believer | Sep 21, 2009 | Reply
Reiterate them. Seriously, I can’t remember a single one.
“Spiritual maturity can only be achieved by will and experience, not by age.”
Yeah… The extent of my experiences chiefly concern playing pawn to agendas not my own. It’s turned me cynical. No God would allow such a travesty as for an innocent child to take on the role of an adult. That kind of experience is perhaps not the kind you were looking for, but it is one of the reasons I find it difficult to believe in a divine being. As for will, well. Choosing to ignore the blatant lack of evidence for God’s existence is mindless, at best.
I believe you missed a large segment of one of my previous posts, linking you to a page where children too young to understand morality choose to act altruistically, anyway. Anyone who’s been in the company of very young children would understand that.
“Only a complete idiot can even consider that kids got higher moral standards then fully spiritually and physically developed healthy adults.”
Many of these “spiritually and physically developed healthy adults” end up going on to commit crimes, or minor sins (lying and the like). Heck, I can’t think of a single adult that has never done something cruel for the hell of it. Children are not cruel for the sake of cruelty itself. Adults are. That makes them purer, and of higher moral standard, than adults.
Most two-year-olds I know can’t form a coherent sentence, yet. They don’t understand the concept of adultery. Your analogy is false.
I don’t reject faith, which is the chief component of religion. I do reject blind faith. Fundamentalist atheists piss me off as much as fundamentalist theists do. Except, you know, we never beat the living crap out of someone for violating what we thought was morally correct.
“Religion was only justification. Main reason was politics and madness.”
As is Stalin’s slaughter of theists. It was purely to establish Communism as the new religion of the land. He had followers — as did those who perpetrated the witch trials.
And hey, if we’re talking about crazed followers, what about Hitler? He was, for all intents and purposes, Christian enough that he had “God is on our side” inscribed in his militia’s belt buckles. He had an entire nation help his genocide.
“Otherwise, witches would be still burning left and right today.”
Seriously, you believe in witches?
“It’s still happening.”
Where?
What about the unknown amount of people, ridiculed, lambasted, and punished by the church for being gay or whatever? We just going to forget them too? I’m fairly sure that if we count up all those victims, they’ll outnumber Stalin’s by a significant amount. After all, Christianity was in vogue for such a long time, compared with atheism.
blufindr | Sep 21, 2009 | Reply
blufindr, such a wall of text and nothing in it, just pathetic. I won’t repeat my answers to your bullshit “facts” again, just scroll up and READ! You won’t make your argument stand just by repeating same refuted things, try maybe bringing in some new facts. How stupid is asking a question that’s been answered on this same site few times already? I knew that atheism requires huge amounts of ignorance but this is just absurd.
“He was, for all intents and purposes, Christian enough that he had “God is on our side†inscribed in his militia’s belt buckles.â€
That was for idiots following him. He had to unite all Germans behind same goal, so he used what he needed. Nope, he was atheist. Nationalist-socialism was atheistic ideology, and not religion. Nationalism is also atheistic. Hitler did not comply with any requirement to be called Christian.
Religion=DO NOT KILL
NSDAP=Kill all non Aryans
Obviously incompatible.
“Where?”
As we all know, tovarish Stalin was Martian, so must be on Mars then, genius. Mao was from Venus. Ceausescu was from Jupiter, and Nazis are of course from Moon, they got base there called … “Omegaâ€, which got giant “lazerâ€, …
“What about the unknown amount of people, ridiculed, lambasted, and punished by the church for being gay or whatever?â€
We could add to that now numerous ignorant atheistic people as well, that are being ridiculed “by Churchâ€. Still, numbers are not nearly close, let alone comparison of ridicule and death. Weak argument.
Church=not religion=political organisation=not ridiculing gays.
Ridicule=by people=me=not religion.
“Most two-year-olds I know can’t form a coherent sentence, yet. They don’t understand the concept of adultery. Your analogy is false.â€
Rofl.
true_believer | Sep 22, 2009 | Reply
hahahaha that comment made my night. Great post by the way.
asdasd | Oct 8, 2009 | Reply
If I’m not mistaken, I think there are quite a few “atheists” who were responsible for killing millions – Hitler, Stalin, Lenin, just to name a few. Your theory may have a few holes in it. Please correct me if I’m wrong. By the way, can you name an atheist who has opened an orphage or hospital? What atheist group has assisted in Haiti?
ghippe | Jan 31, 2010 | Reply
Man, I’m glad the way to prove that atheism is right is by applying crimes to religious people because we know ONLY religious people are criminals. That makes the argument so well. Well known fact…atheists are NOT criminals, that’s why they are atheists. Golly…this has got to be the worst excuse for an argument I have ever heard. Hey, Jack, it’s not religion that committed the crime, it was PEOPLE. Here’s another news flash…God is not people. If the people had followed the teachings then this crap WOULDN’T have happened. Go figure. I can see how that’s difficult to work out though. Why don’t you show us how it’s done by doing nothing, as not required by religion, you won’t have to make an actual effort. Safer to stand back and gloat instead of joining the battle, huh? Don’t worry, you’re safe from making an effort now, because you’re an atheist and you job is…is…nothing, just what you believe in. Can’t fail at nothing can you?
bobby | Apr 10, 2010 | Reply
@ ghippe Non-Beleivers Giving Aid was set up to help out the folks in Haiti, and collected $11k in the first two hours. In less than half a day they passed the $50,000 mark, $100,000 in less than 24 hours, $175,000 by the next day, and a quarter of a million dollars by sunup Monday morning,
Bill Gates and Warren Buffet, both atheists, have made the largest charitable individual donations in history.
Ever hear of Andrew Carnegie?
BTW, Hitler was a Cathloic. Ya might want to study a bit of history there.
@bobby Every crime on this list was inspired by religion. Every one.
Hittman | Apr 10, 2010 | Reply
“Islamic rape” victim? Wow, I didn’t knew they had a separate “class” of rape altogether from other ethnicities or from classes regarding anatomic specificities.
They probably make the victim wear a burka first or something, to turn them on even more. Or maybe they bury the victim, as if they were going to stone her to death, but upside down. Or perhaps they just rape while reciting the “how to rape properly” chapter on the q’ran. And then the “thanking Allah for rape”, afterwards.
wtf | Aug 3, 2010 | Reply
This list proposed as a shot against religion in general is absurd and irrational.
What about the Soviet union and the genocide of roughly 30 million Russians, Ukrainians, Poles, and Central Asians on anti-religious grounds? Doesn’t the largest persecution and genocide of the last century which was perpetrated against the religious by an atheistic regime count?
Has no one read the The Gulag Archipelago (by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn) or The Anti-Humans (by Dumitru Bacu)? If you can come out of reading The Anti-Humans and still claim that atheistic philosophies, groups, and individuals have not committed the most horrific of atrocities, I fear for the state of modern humanity.
For those who would be so bold to claim that somehow the religious are particularly motivated to commit evil by religious while the atheists commit evil due to individual character flaws are missing the point. There is no causal connection between the general concept and attitudes of religions (though there are specific instances in which causal connections can be seen, for example in varieties of the religion that has the most examples on the list above) and violence any more than there is one between atheism and violence. If we wish to make the argument that non-atheism is conducive to atrocity then go right ahead and say that theism, pantheism and strong agnosticism are conducive to violence. You’ll sound stupid doing so because such a point is stupid. Rather it is much better to say that extremism in any form religious or non-religious, belonging to a person of group that adheres to any understanding of the existence of a god can twist the mind and character of humans to do evil.
Capt. Murphy | Oct 4, 2010 | Reply
I would argue that all of those actions were committed by atheists. Anyone knowing God’s way would not perform those actions and claim they were God’s wish. In fact they would have to be certain that either there is no God or that God is infinitely forgiving in order to make these false claims without fear of consequences to their souls. Alternately, are we arguing that atheists are incredibly lazy or infinitely devious?
Kevin Sweeney | May 20, 2011 | Reply
Doesn’t the largest persecution and genocide of the last century which was perpetrated against the religious by an atheistic regime count?
Beleivers delight in pointing out that there are no morals in atheism. They are right. That doesn’t mean it espouses bad morals, it means it is morally neutral. It is simply not believing in gods. Not believing in unicorns is not moral or immoral.
So yes, when an atheist does something bad you can’t blame atheism. On the flip side, when atheists do something good, you can’t give atheism the credit.
There is no causal connection between the general concept and attitudes of religions (though there are specific instances in which causal connections can be seen, for example in varieties of the religion that has the most examples on the list above) and violence any more than there is one between atheism and violence.
Have you read the Bible? It is full of commands, from god, to do absolutely vile things. It supports slavery and genocide and rape and incest and draconian punishments for minor offenses.
And when you’re done with that wonderful guide to live, try the Koran. It takes all that hate and violence and kicks it up several notches.
You won’t find anything remotely like that in the atheist’s holy scriptures, because we don’t have any holy scriptures.
If we wish to make the argument that non-atheism is conducive to atrocity then go right ahead and say that theism, pantheism and strong agnosticism are conducive to violence. You’ll sound stupid doing so because such a point is stupid.
You're right, it would be stupid, because there aren't a plethora of instances of people doing evil in the name of those beliefs. Only in the name of specific religions, and most of them in the name of abrahamic religions.
I would argue that all of those actions were committed by atheists.
That’s desperately idiotic. And trite, because this dumb argument has been used as a cheap cop out forever. Someone who does something horrible isn’t a true whatever, because a true whatever would never do that.
Bullshit. Everyone on this list is a true believer, and will argue that they are doing it right, and other believers who disagree with them are the ones in error.
Hittman | May 21, 2011 | Reply
jesus christ, how many fucking idiots feel the need to use the Hitler, Stalin, Lennon comments as if they just introduced it. I guess the idea of nationalism is just to deep when you spend all day studying up on a book as real as Harry Potter. I would like to know where my fellow atheists found the stats on us making up 10% of the population and only 1/4 % of the criminals. If that is true, I would love to see the source to print off and hand out to any retard claiming you can’t have morality if you don’t believe in the invisible man.
justin | Aug 9, 2011 | Reply
I’ve read the bible… in fact more that one version. In the first place it should be in the fiction section of the library. Secondly, any book that condones rape, slavery, murder and even genocide is not what I would concider a good source for social values. It should be illegal to expose children to this garbage… telling them they will burn in hell for eternity if they don’t believe is child abuse.
Uncle Matt | Aug 22, 2011 | Reply
I tend to think it’s not religion that’s bad, but rather organized religion. It’s when people orgarnize, have the pack mentality, suddenly need money, need to judge all those not belonging. Organized religion is the root of all evil. Much of the evil in the world has been done in the name of religion. Should we organize, might we fall prey to that same mentality?
norma | Aug 22, 2011 | Reply
The bible a good basis for moral values? You’re kidding right?
thinker | Aug 22, 2011 | Reply
Good point. But like you, I also like to point out the counter-argument. While you are correct that we should not condemn entire groups for the dishonor of individuals, there also comes a time that the entire group is synonymous with the act of dishonor. And even though that is what the author seems to forget, it is the main point that you don’t see atheists doing these sorts of acts to begin with. No one was ever really killed in the name of science… which is the point.
Jason | Aug 22, 2011 | Reply
60 girl students thrashed in Pak for not wearing Hijab by armed gang with Iron rods.
http://www.ndtv.com/article/world/60-girl-students-thrashed-in-pak-139798?pfrom=home-otherstories
Apostate Dan | Oct 9, 2011 | Reply
The reason why atheism isn’t to blame for Stalin, Pol Pot, etc. and that religion is to blame for bombings and human rights abuses all boils down to a single concept: derived authority.
Atheism in of itself cannot possibly authorize any action, good or bad. Theism, on the other hand, can. It doesn’t always, but it can. I am an atheist, and today I could kill my wife and my two dogs. But I don’t. Why not? Because I love my wife and dogs and would be incredibly heartbroken if they died. Not believing in God doesn’t make you an emotionless automaton. Even if I did, to say I did it because I was an atheist doesn’t make any sense. Like I said, just because literally nothing is preventing me from committing those acts doesn’t mean I’m going to commit them. In actuality, there is something preventing me from doing so other than my emotions toward them: the law. The social contract of a civilized society demands certain behaviors be curbed, including killing people and stealing their stuff. If you break those rules, there are dire consequences. But even if those rules didn’t exist, someone would eventually make them up because most of us don’t want to live in that kind of a world. If we did, then it wouldn’t be seen as immoral to begin with.
Now, let’s say I belonged to a religion and one day a religious leader told me that GOD SAID I should kill my wife and dogs. I didn’t want to, but let’s say my faith was so strong I did it anyway. Now you could say “God wouldn’t tell you to do that,” but how in the world could you possibly know that? What evidence do you have that points to a God who wouldn’t do such a thing that couldn’t also apply to a God who would?
And that’s that problem right there: derived authority. It’s not necessarily harmful to believe something that is not supported by evidence, but it becomes harmful when you use that belief to AUTHORIZE actions. And that belief doesn’t necessarily have to be religious, either. Stalinist Russians may not have believed in a God in the traditional sense, but they believed in an ideology and quasi-deified their leader. The regime persecuted skeptics and freethinkers just as religious regimes have done, and in fact Stalin’s Russia, Pol Pot’s Cambodia, and Kim Jong-Il’s North Korea have far more in common with Theocratic governments than they do with secular ones.
Brian | Oct 17, 2011 | Reply
Heard about Christ so I got a Bible, read it, prayed, read it, prayed, read it, prayed etc. etc. then went for a walk and found I no longer just walked past homeless people uncomfortably saying “howzitgoin’?” but stopped to talk and went home and got them food and clothing… oh sorry… your attack was on the phony baloney religious crowd Satan has out there to discredit faith in Christ… my mistake.
Glen | Mar 11, 2014 | Reply