Q about arguments for God's existence.

[Esquilax]

You guys always go back to that argument, but when I bring up the same argument for Hitler and others, you attempt to tear it down.

Hitler specifically used religious iconography and principles to incite his people to do his bidding. Whether or not he specifically believed is neither here nor there, the point is that your religion's symbols and natural inclination to obedience and pogroms played a role in that period of history, much as you might want to deny it.

Who cares what reason people use to accomplish their means?

Courts do, people do... haven't you ever seen a sitcom? "I did a bad thing, but with good intentions," has been a trope for decades.

But you're missing the point, which is that you're attempting to pin the blame for some things on atheism, which is a concept, for which the primary motivation can more accurately be ascribed to other things. You're trying to say "atheism oppresses religion," but the things you're pointing to had nothing to do with atheism and everything to do with seizing power from other groups that might hold it. That's why your point is dishonest: you start by accusing atheism of being oppressive to religion, and then when someone actually questions you on whether atheism was the motivation- when you specifically accused it of being the motivation a moment before- you act like motivations don't matter.

You can't have it both ways: do you care about motivations, in which case atheism cannot be blamed for Stalin, or do you not care, in which case your original point is moot because it was just a person doing a bad thing?

Nationalism has been used as an excuse for imperialism forever. Does that mean that we should abolish all all nations or that all nations are evil?

So then why bring up your point about atheism oppressing you poor poor christians?

If a tyrannical dictator wants to accomplish his aims, he will use whatever means he feels will work.

So then why bring up your point about atheism oppressing you poor poor christians?

These communist leaders were and are convinced that people of faith are standing in the way of their plan for total control over the masses.

So then why bring up your point about atheism oppressing you poor poor christians?

I thought that becoming atheist put one above this type of mentality. I always hear that christianity is evil because of all the bad things that were done in its name. It's a bogus argument for defaming christianity.

Just saying it's bogus doesn't make it so. The fact is that there are plenty of violent acts that would not have happened without your religion there to motivate them. The trouble is that you can't even demonstrate that any of the things you believe in are real, and so from an outside perspective, a rational one, those people died for nothing. Your point about nationalism makes no sense: at least we know nations exist. There's a difference between fighting for something demonstrably real, and the waste of life cause by religious violence. Neither should be encouraged of course, but at least the former serves a realistic purpose.