If Scott Roeder was an Atheist would he still have murdered Dr. Tiller?

[Fury]

Atheists have better things than abortion to worry about.

[Straw Man]

you assert that operation rescue and ludicrously religion are culpable for this nut jobs action...

russels teapot...LOOK IT UP another logic thing...who knew you wouldnt know?

I asserted nothing of the kind in this thread and in other threads I suggested a link might be found during the investigation.

Again, watch the Peter Schaeffer video.  He explains exactly how the religious right uses specific rhetoric to intentionally rile up the unstable people on the fringe of the of pro-life movement and when something bad happens they pretend to condemn the violence and act as if they have no clue what could have motivated the action. 

[Straw Man]

From "A License to Kill: Atheism and the Mass Murders of History (Chapter 19)", of "What's So Great About Christianity?" by Dinesh D'Souza


While they regularly fault religion for its role in promoting conflict and violence, secular writers rarely examine the role of atheism in producing wars and killing. It's interesting that we routinely hear about how much historical suffering religion has caused. Five hundred years after the Inquisition, we are still talking about it, but less than two decades after the collapse of "godless Communism", there is an eerie silence about the mass grave of the Soviet Gulag. Why the absense of accountability? Does atheism mean never having to say you're sorry?

In the past one hundred years or so, the most powerful atheistic regimes--Communist Russia, Communist China, and Nazi Germany--have wiped outout people in astronomical numbers. Stalin was responsible for about 20 million deaths, produced through mass slayings, forced labor camps, show trials followed by firing squads, population relocation, starvation, and so on. Jung Chang and Jon Halliday's recent studyMao: The Unknown Story attributes to Mao Zedong's regime a staggering 70 million deaths. Some China scholars think Chang and Halliday's numbers are a bit high, but the authors present convincing evidence that Mao's atheist regime was the most murderous in world history.

Stalin's and Mao's killings--unlike those of, say, the Crusades or the Thirty Years' War--were done in peacetime and were ;erformed on their fellow countrymen. Hitler comes a distance third with around 10 million murders, 6 million of them Jews.

In short, the followers of Islam and Chrisitanity, for all of their flaws, aren't even CLOSE to amassing the amount of bodies that either Stalin or Mao racked up.

who else did the communists and nazi's target for extinction besides religious people?

[LurkerNoMore]

Its obvious that most crimes are because of Christians and operation rescue.Lets see,we have 5 doctors in the history of this country that have been shot down by anti-abortionists.Lets compare that to how many whites have been gun downed by blacks.Certainly,it must be because they are black that they are prone to murder.It must be leaders like Obama,Jackson and Sharpton who inspire such hatred.It cant possibly be just a bunch of nuts or criminals doing what they do.There has to be some more evil motive behind it.Stupid.

Worthless post.

The topic is Christians/atheists and the acts of violence due to their beliefs.

You attempt to draw a comparision to race violence. 

Completely irrelevant.  You simply can't stop the "race" issue long enough to even post on a simple topic for once.

[LurkerNoMore]

who else did the communists and nazi's target for extinction besides religious people?

Bro, you are attempting to use logic and facts on the wrong kind of people here.

[Straw Man]

Bro, you are attempting to use logic and facts on the wrong kind of people here.

yeah you're right and I'm too busy today to spend much time with it

[MCWAY]

you assert that operation rescue and ludicrously religion are culpable for this nut jobs action...

By that standard.....(from D'Souza's book, same chapter).

In comparing the crimes of religion and the crimes of atheism, it’s important for us to apply a consistent standard. Philosopher Daniel Dennett supplies such a standard in his book Breaking The Spell. He proposes that religion be judged by its consequence, or, as the biblical expression has it, “by their fruits ye shall know them”. Dennett doesn’t particularly care whether these consequences were intended by the founders of the religion or if it represents its highest values. He’s not especially interested in separating the true teachings of religion from its distortions. “It is true that religious fanatics are rarely if ever inspired by, or guided by, the deepest and best tenets in those religious traditions. So what? Al Qaeda and Hamas terrorism is still Islam’s responsibility and ABORTION CLINIC BOMBING is still Christianity’s responsibility” This is all very fine. Let’s accept Dennett’s standards. But they by the very same criterion, the millions of murders committed by Stalin, Hitler, Mao—not to mention those of a range of lesser tyrants—are all atheism’s responsibility…..

If Christianity has to answer for Torquemada, atheism has to answer for Stalin. By the same token, if the ordinary Christian who has never burned anyone at the stake must bear the same responsibility for what other self-styled Christians have done on behalf of their religion, then atheists who think of themselves are the kinder, gentler type do not get to absolve themselves for the horrible suffering that their beliefs have cause in recent history.

who else did the communists and nazi's target for extinction besides religious people?

Bro, you are attempting to use logic and facts on the wrong kind of people here.

Neither Straw Man nor you do anything of the sort. For starters, Kazan already answered his question. Of course, since no one made the claim that religious people were targeted exclusively, the foolish conclusion that Straw Man is trying to reach holds no weight, especially since (in the simplest of terms) people are either religious or they are not.

D'Souza's book continues to point out the blatantly obvious (but foolish) tactics of non-believers, who try to lump the atrocities of religion to the core beliefs of its followers, past and present, while AVOIDING/whitewashing association with atheists who commit similar atrocities (though much higher in scale and volume) with themselves and their core beliefs.

[loco]

If so on what grounds?

Are there any atheist or agnostic radical/extremist pro-life groups?

They all seem to be christian/catholic

BBC NEWS
Wednesday, 7 November 2007

At least eight people were killed when an 18-year-old gunman opened fire at a school in Finland Wednesday, according to Finnish police...

...In the rambling text posted on the site, Auvinen said that he is "a cynical existentialist, anti-human humanist, anti-social social-Darwinist, realistic idealist and god-like atheist.

"I am prepared to fight and die for my cause," he wrote. "I, as a natural selector, will eliminate all who I see unfit, disgraces of human race and failures of natural selection."...

...Sipila said that Finland, which has a population of about five million, has around two million firearms, although gun laws are tough. "We do not know where he got it from," he said

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7082795.stm


And Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot, all atheist leaders murdered millions of innocent people less than 80 years ago.

[MCWAY]

BBC NEWS
Wednesday, 7 November 2007

At least eight people were killed when an 18-year-old gunman opened fire at a school in Finland Wednesday, according to Finnish police...

...In the rambling text posted on the site, Auvinen said that he is "a cynical existentialist, anti-human humanist, anti-social social-Darwinist, realistic idealist and god-like atheist.

"I am prepared to fight and die for my cause," he wrote. "I, as a natural selector, will eliminate all who I see unfit, disgraces of human race and failures of natural selection."...

...Sipila said that Finland, which has a population of about five million, has around two million firearms, although gun laws are tough. "We do not know where he got it from," he said

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7082795.stm


And Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot, all atheist leaders murdered millions of innocent people less than 80 years ago.

Let's see if Straw Man is "too busy" to address this one.

[Deicide]

From "A License to Kill: Atheism and the Mass Murders of History (Chapter 19)", of "What's So Great About Christianity?" by Dinesh D'Souza


While they regularly fault religion for its role in promoting conflict and violence, secular writers rarely examine the role of atheism in producing wars and killing. It's interesting that we routinely hear about how much historical suffering religion has caused. Five hundred years after the Inquisition, we are still talking about it, but less than two decades after the collapse of "godless Communism", there is an eerie silence about the mass grave of the Soviet Gulag. Why the absense of accountability? Does atheism mean never having to say you're sorry?

In the past one hundred years or so, the most powerful atheistic regimes--Communist Russia, Communist China, and Nazi Germany--have wiped outout people in astronomical numbers. Stalin was responsible for about 20 million deaths, produced through mass slayings, forced labor camps, show trials followed by firing squads, population relocation, starvation, and so on. Jung Chang and Jon Halliday's recent studyMao: The Unknown Story attributes to Mao Zedong's regime a staggering 70 million deaths. Some China scholars think Chang and Halliday's numbers are a bit high, but the authors present convincing evidence that Mao's atheist regime was the most murderous in world history.

Stalin's and Mao's killings--unlike those of, say, the Crusades or the Thirty Years' War--were done in peacetime and were ;erformed on their fellow countrymen. Hitler comes a distance third with around 10 million murders, 6 million of them Jews.

In short, the followers of Islam and Chrisitanity, for all of their flaws, aren't even CLOSE to amassing the amount of bodies that either Stalin or Mao racked up.

Strawman...they didn't have the technology to do it. You can't make comparisons like that. If they had had mass transport, machine guns, radios, etc...it would likely have been similar.

[MCWAY]

Strawman...they didn't have the technology to do it. You can't make comparisons like that. If they had had mass transport, machine guns, radios, etc...it would likely have been similar.

Oh, yes you can, especially considering the Crusades laster far longer than Stalin's regime.

D’Souza covers that weak canard in the same chapter:

Religion-inspired killing simply cannot compete with the murders perpetrated by atheist regimes. I recognize that population levels were much lower in the past, and that it’s easier to kill people today with sophisticated weapons that it was in previous years with swords and arrows. Even taking higher population levels into account, atheist violence surpasses religious violence by staggering proportions. Here is a rough calculation. The world’s population rose from around 500 million in 1450 to 2.5 billion in 1950, a fivefold increase. Taken together, the Crusades, Inquisition, and the witch burnings killed approximately 200,000 people. Adjusting for the increase in population, that’s the equivalent of one million deaths today. Even do, these deaths caused by Christian rulers over a 500-year-period amount to only 1 percent of the deaths caused by Stalin, Hitler, and Mao in the space of a few decades

Basically, Hitler's regime topped the body count of the Crusades, Inquisition and the Salem Witch trials, by at least TENFOLD......ALL BY ITSELF.

We can see the difference by looking at attitudes towards Jews in medieval Europe. In 15th-century Spain, a Jew could escape Christian persecution simply by converting to Christianity. Ferdinand and Isabella did not object to having ethnic Jews in Spain; they objected to the practice of Judaism in what they wanted to be a completely Catholic country.

Hitler’s objection to Jews, on the other hand, was not religious. A Jew could not escape Auschwitz by pleading, “I no longer practice Judaism”, “I am an atheist”, or “I have converted to Christianity”. This mattered nothing to Hitler because he believed the Jews were inferior racial stock. His anti-Semitism was secular.


So, this claim that atheist regimes slayed millions more, due only to possession of  better and more weapons is preposterous.

[loco]

Let's see if Straw Man is "too busy" to address this one.

Because of threads like this by Straw Man, I am beginning to believe Beach Bum when he says that Straw Man is nothing but a paranoid, anti-religion extremist. 

[BM OUT]

Worthless post.

The topic is Christians/atheists and the acts of violence due to their beliefs.

You attempt to draw a comparision to race violence. 

Completely irrelevant.  You simply can't stop the "race" issue long enough to even post on a simple topic for once.

The comparrison is as obvious as David Lettermans hook nose.YOU CANT BLAME others for someones nuttiness.The guy is a christian?So what?He was also an anti-government guy.The guy that shot the recruiter is a muslim BUT also acriminal who was in prison.The idea that you blame Christianity for a kooks behavior is stupid.There are MILLIONS of Christians in this country.FIVE abortion doctors have been shot.FIVE!!!EVER!!!!!If Christians were more prone to violence EVERY abortion doctor would be killed.

[Straw Man]

Let's see if Straw Man is "too busy" to address this one.

yep - I am pretty busy this morning but what would you like me to say.

There are nutbags on all sides

Unlike the bible thumpers on this site I would not deny that this guy beliefs triggered his violence.

Now how about the same acknowledgement from your side regarding Roeder and the other people driven to violence by their religious beliefs

[Straw Man]

Because of threads like this by Straw Man, I am beginning to believe Beach Bum when he says that Straw Man is nothing but a paranoid, anti-religion extremist. 

relax loco - I'm probably one of the more tolearant people on this board and I have nothing against religion (as you should know).  My only problem is with religious extremists

[Straw Man]

By that standard.....(from D'Souza's book, same chapter).

Neither Straw Man nor you do anything of the sort. For starters, Kazan already answered his question. Of course, since no one made the claim that religious people were targeted exclusively, the foolish conclusion that Straw Man is trying to reach holds no weight, especially since (in the simplest of terms) people are either religious or they are not.

the problem with you (and some of your buddies on this board) is that you can only see things in simplistic terms even when the issue is complicated and nuanced (as most are)

I didn't see Kazan's post but I went back and read it and he said:

"Educated people, teachers, basically anyone who could think on their own and counter what the communist were trying to do"

So should we assume that the Nazi's and Communist were pushing an atheist agenda or just trying to kill anyone who could think and possibly be a threat.  Would teacher say they were pushing an anti-education agenda or an anti-intellectual agenda (that actually may be close to the truth).

The atheist angle may be a feature of the Nazi or Communist agenda but not a reason for their existence. 

I have a cup holder in my car but the purpose of my car is not to hold cups but to provide transortation (okay that's the best I can do off the top of my head). 

This site is becoming a bad habit during the work day.

I'm outa here until the afternoon/evening

[loco]

The comparrison is as obvious as David Lettermans hook nose.YOU CANT BLAME others for someones nuttiness.The guy is a christian?So what?He was also an anti-government guy.The guy that shot the recruiter is a muslim BUT also acriminal who was in prison.The idea that you blame Christianity for a kooks behavior is stupid.There are MILLIONS of Christians in this country.FIVE abortion doctors have been shot.FIVE!!!EVER!!!!!If Christians were more prone to violence EVERY abortion doctor would be killed.

Just five?  The atheist guy from Finland murdered more than that by himself in one day.  And millions of innocent people were murdered by atheists like Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot.

[tonymctones]

yep - I am pretty busy this morning but what would you like me to say.

There are nutbags on all sides

Unlike the bible thumpers on this site I would not deny that this guy beliefs triggered his violence.

Now how about the same acknowledgement from your side regarding Roeder and the other people driven to violence by their religious beliefs

As i stated earlier there is a point when religious beliefs stop and a persons personal beliefs begin obviously its not a religious belief to go around killing ppl. Sure they are his religious beliefs but they are not religious beliefs if you understand the difference. you cannot use his actions to demonize religion like you want to do.

until you can show that the bible advocates such actions then those actions taken by roeder where not in the name of christianity, they were in the name of his individual beliefs

[Straw Man]

As i stated earlier there is a point when religious beliefs stop and a persons personal beliefs begin obviously its not a religious belief to go around killing ppl. Sure they are his religious beliefs but they are not religious beliefs if you understand the difference. you cannot use his actions to demonize religion like you want to do.

until you can show that the bible advocates such actions then those actions taken by roeder where not in the name of christianity, they were in the name of his individual beliefs

tony - there is violence all over the bible.  I would post the quotes but then our resident bible scholars would rationalize why they don't apply today

Again, I have no problem with religion but I do have a problem with religious extremists.

Scott Roeder is a religious extremist and a terrorist.   Why do you keep deny that HIS religous beliefs motivated his actions?

ok - I'm really out of here until tonight.

[tonymctones]

tony - there is violence all over the bible.  I would post the quotes but then our resident bible scholars would rationalize why they don't apply today

Again, I have no problem with religion but I do have a problem with religious extremists.

Scott Roeder is a religious extremist and a terrorist.   Why do you keep deny that HIS religous beliefs motivated his actions?

ok - I'm really out of here until tonight.

i already stated that HIS religious beliefs played a role in this but HIS religious beliefs are not RELIGIOUS BELIEFS...yes there is violence all over the bible that doesnt mean the bible advocates this type of violence does it? ive asked you time and time again to show me and you havent so ill assume you cant proving my point.

you certainly do have a problem with religion straw its probably the most prevelant characteristic of your posts on this board. You say one thing in one thread and say where did i say that in THIS THREAD...LOL did you all of a sudden stop believing what you typed in the other threads?

[24KT]

From "A License to Kill: Atheism and the Mass Murders of History (Chapter 19)", of "What's So Great About Christianity?" by Dinesh D'Souza


While they regularly fault religion for its role in promoting conflict and violence, secular writers rarely examine the role of atheism in producing wars and killing. It's interesting that we routinely hear about how much historical suffering religion has caused. Five hundred years after the Inquisition, we are still talking about it, but less than two decades after the collapse of "godless Communism", there is an eerie silence about the mass grave of the Soviet Gulag. Why the absense of accountability? Does atheism mean never having to say you're sorry?

In the past one hundred years or so, the most powerful atheistic regimes--Communist Russia, Communist China, and Nazi Germany--have wiped outout people in astronomical numbers. Stalin was responsible for about 20 million deaths, produced through mass slayings, forced labor camps, show trials followed by firing squads, population relocation, starvation, and so on. Jung Chang and Jon Halliday's recent studyMao: The Unknown Story attributes to Mao Zedong's regime a staggering 70 million deaths. Some China scholars think Chang and Halliday's numbers are a bit high, but the authors present convincing evidence that Mao's atheist regime was the most murderous in world history.

Stalin's and Mao's killings--unlike those of, say, the Crusades or the Thirty Years' War--were done in peacetime and were ;erformed on their fellow countrymen. Hitler comes a distance third with around 10 million murders, 6 million of them Jews.

In short, the followers of Islam and Chrisitanity, for all of their flaws, aren't even CLOSE to amassing the amount of bodies that either Stalin or Mao racked up.

Not sure if it's YOU or Dinesh D'Souza who has it wrong, ...but Hitler was no atheist. That man was a devout Catholic

[Dos Equis]

Oh Good Lord.  What a stupid question/thread.   

[Dos Equis]

Because of threads like this by Straw Man, I am beginning to believe Beach Bum when he says that Straw Man is nothing but a paranoid, anti-religion extremist. 

It's true.  lol.   

Remember he thinks anyone with a fundamentalist belief in religion is mentally ill.   

[MCWAY]

Not sure if it's YOU or Dinesh D'Souza who has it wrong, ...but Hitler was no atheist. That man was a devout Catholic

AHHHH!!! The ol' pass-the-buck routine, by claiming Hitler was Catholic.

Not quite!!!



Hitler’s Table Talk, a revealing collection of the Fuhrer’s private opinions assembled by a close aid during the war years, shows Hitler to be rabidly anti-religious. He called Christianity one of the greatest “scourges” of history and said of the Germans, “Let’s be the only people who are immunized against this disease”. He promised that “through the peasantry we shall be able to destroy Christianity”. He also condemned Christianity for its opposition to evolution. Hitler reserved special scorn for the Christian values of equality and compassion, which he identified with weakness. Hitler’s leading advisers—Goebbels, Himmler, Heydrich, and Bormann—were atheists who hated religion and sought to eradicate its influence on Germany.

Some atheist writers like Christopher Hitchens have sought to push Hitler into the religious camp by pointing to Nazism as a “quasi-pagan phenomenon”. Hitler may have been a polytheist who worshipped the pagan gods, these writers say, but polytheism is still theism.

[LurkerNoMore]

Just five?  The atheist guy from Finland murdered more than that by himself in one day.  And millions of innocent people were murdered by atheists like Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot.

So what you are claiming is that Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot only targeted people who were religious.  Is that correct?

Otherwise, if they murdered a single atheist, there is no way you can draw a comparision with your little example.  They were murderers.  Plain and simple.