Argument from Conscience

[Redbeard The Pink]

So you bekieve the propaganda of a corrupt and twisted ideology. Not surprising. But can you do the same for Stalin and Mao...(crickets).

I pretty well already addressed Stalin and Mao, but why not? Let's do it again.

First off, those guys weren't espousing atheism, they were espousing Communism. Knocking down opposing ideologies is extremely normal for groups making a bid for power. Hitler knocked down all the churches so he could build churches run by the Nazi state (christian churches, mind you), and Stalin knocked them down because they threatened the state. Mao was barely a Communist and was mostly interested in setting up a personality cult centered around himself.

At any rate, tearing down other people's churches is far more common in religious societies than in secular ones, and as Nemo pointed out, none of the violence you're describing was done under the "flag" of atheism in the same way that religious atrocities are expressly religiously motivated. Most modern secular societies still enjoy religious freedom, in fact. The societies with the least religious freedom are actually religious ones...go figure.