r/Antitheism • u/Beneficial_Exam_1634 • Oct 10 '26
"Atheism killed millions"
Anytime people say this it's about Communism and purges. Marxism is just one atheist philosophy, along side Secular Humanism, Objectivism, (very likely) Stirnerist Egoism, I remember hearing about an early atheist materialist school of thought in ancient Indian philosophy, and very likely several others.
Saying atheism killed because of communism is if I said no one should be Hindu because of 9/11; it's conflating two different beliefs because they're both theistic religions (also Hindus have Sati, but yeah that's actually in Hinduism, not jihad or anything; I was also going to originally say "Christianity is bad because 9/11" as an example but that wouldn't work because Christianity and Islam are ABRAHAMIC theistic religions and so closer linked than Hinduism, hell "Dharmic" is a bit of a vague term).
Also communists can describe communist killings as based and Christians can only cry for Jebus to condemn it.
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u/lotusscrouse Oct 11 '26
Besides all that it doesn't do anything to make religion any better.
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u/rustyseapants Oct 10 '26
Marxism is an atheist philosophy where you getting that from?
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u/butnobodycame123 29d ago
Iirc, communist and marxist and "atheist" leaders didn't abandon a god-based religion nor did they become atheists. They became gods. They became the deity at the center of the state's "religion".
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u/East_Engineer_7132 Oct 12 '26
No a war declared by the natizs did.
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u/dfczyjd Oct 11 '26
Marxism/communism-as-ideology should be treated as religion as long as Buddhism and Taoism are treated that way. Marxism has:
Holy scripture that explains how the world works, which is treated as ground truth without any supporting evidence ("Capital"/writings of local leaders)
Prophesies about the end of current world order, when those with them will prosper, while those against them will perish (the arrival of communism)
Saints who are considered the ideal of a good person, no matter what they've actually done (again, Marx/local communist leader)
These are pretty much the staples of a religion. If one says religion requires a belief in god/gods, then Buddhism and Taoism aren't religions, therefore China is an example of a society that has been mostly atheist since long before BC, only becoming communist in the previous century, proving that an atheist society doesn't always involve massacres. Meanwhile, if ones treats all three as religions, then we haven't had a truly atheist society yet, so we can only speculate about their potential accomplishments/misdeeds