Who killed more people Atheists or Christians?

[Tonus]

Silly question. What kills people is not belief or disbelief, but intolerant dogmatic ideology - ain't no one got a monopoly on that.

And our crazy drive to form social groups with an us/them mentality, of which religion is just one manifestation. If god is real, we would expect that religion in general (and possibly one religion in particular) would move people to behave differently, yet it has often served as the basis for some of the most reprehensible mistreatment of people for as long as we can tell. To this day, devout religious adherents do terrible things to their fellow humans, regardless of how "peace-promoting" their holy books are supposed to be.

When people try to compare how many people have been killed by atheists versus how many have been killed by Christians, why isn't the Christian side of the ledger ZERO? The history of Christianity should be of a movement that, despite never killing a single person and always aiding its enemies, managed to thrive and bring about a peaceful world in spite of human imperfection because god's rules cannot help but produce such a result. How many Christians have actually acted like Christians when they look at the 100 million body count they ascribe to atheists and their best response is "at least we didn't kill that many!"

[Anomalocaris]

The majority of people in the 20th c. were xtians.

Not true of the 20th century, nor of any century.

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Communists killed over 100 million people.

Yes!!! We win!

No, even if that was true, we still don't win. Christians killed 100 million native Americans in just one of their atrocities, 400 years before communists did in all their atrocities combined. What is more Communists killed 100 million people when 100 million people was 1 person in 30 people in the world. Christians killed 100 million people when 100 million people was 1 person out of just 5 people in the entire world.

So who did better in trying to murder all of humanity that existed on earth when they tried it?

[Tartarus Sauce]

Seems like a question designed to encourage people to jump to faulty conclusions.

People have a tendency of killing others with motives completely absent of religious reasons, regardless of the religious affiliation of the killers/killed. Both religious and non-religious individuals and groups have committed murders and massacres against others, so neither side can claim that the presence of their viewpoint is an absolute safeguard from committing acts of violence.

Therefore, the only relevant angle left to analyze is in a situation where belief or lack of belief was a significant motivating factor in the killings. People from pretty much all religions have killed in the name of their theology, it's a well documented and depressingly common occurrence both historically and in contemporary times. Such, however, is rare with atheists, whom seldom ever go around killing in the name of atheism. This, of course, does not inherently mean that all atheists are more moral than all theists, but it does demonstrate that religions tend to be one of the most commonly and easily exploited systems of justifying horrendous actions. Atheism lacks such rationalization processes for acts of violence.

[The Valkyrie]

"Who killed more people Atheists or Christians"

Smallpox - rough estimate 500 million in the past few hundred years.

Therefore, if you believe in it, God killed more people.

[Anomalocaris]

If you count policy fuck ups, then count Winston Churchill of the Church of England - canonized, if not virtually deified amongst the Anglo Saxon world - killed 3.5 million Indians during WWII, and subsequently expressed sentiments to the effect of "good, they are a worthless no good race anyway".

Evidence? Citation?

When Churchill first came into office in 1940, he immediately welcomed the escalating conflict between Hindus and Muslims, saying he hoped it would be "Bitter and bloody" - Myers, Kevin (6 August 2010). "Seventy years on and the soundtrack to the summer of 1940 is filling Britain's airwaves". The Irish Independent.

During the great Bangel famine of 1943, Churchill refused to allow any relief efforts including release of surplus shipping capacity to ferry relief food supplies offered by the United States. When the dire situation of 4 million femine death was represented to Churchill, he replied "why hasn't Gandhi died yet?"

Churchill's attitude towards Indian was so racist in a racist era that his own secretary labeled him "unbalanced and unhinged" in his hatred of Indians.

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"Who killed more people Atheists or Christians"

Smallpox - rough estimate 500 million in the past few hundred years.

Therefore, if you believe in it, God killed more people.

All people who ever lived died. Therefore god killed everyone that ever lived.

Atheists missed the vast majority. God wins.

[Tartarus Sauce]

Evidence? Citation?

When Churchill first came into office in 1940, he immediately welcomed the escalating conflict between Hindus and Muslims, saying he hoped it would be "Bitter and bloody" - Myers, Kevin (6 August 2010). "Seventy years on and the soundtrack to the summer of 1940 is filling Britain's airwaves". The Irish Independent.

During the great Bangel famine of 1943, Churchill refused to allow any relief efforts including release of surplus shipping capacity to ferry relief food supplies offered by the United States. When the dire situation of 4 million femine death was represented to Churchill, he replied "why hasn't Gandhi died yet?"

Churchill's attitude towards Indian was so racist in a racist era that his own secretary labeled him "unbalanced and unhinged" in his hatred of Indians.

Sounds quite like him. Churchill was a bloodthirsty, war-mongering, racist (he wasn't that fond of Jews either) prickhead that possessed callous indifference to human suffering. In other words, the right kind of guy to lead Britain during WWII, but the wrong guy for just about anything else.

[Mister Agenda]

If that's the case then I won't ask questions like this anymore. Wasn't trying to provoke people. The thread can be closed for all I care. I was curious what the answers would be.

A practicing Christian is actually suppose to love their enemies. How many Obedient Christians are there? Don't know if I have met them.

What makes it a troll question is limiting it to the 20th century. It's like an anti-Christian picking the century with the most Crusades as the target century.

In the 20th century we had mechanized killing devices that made it easier to kill large numbers of people than ever before. Do you think the Inquisition's body count might have been higher if they had machine guns?

And comparing atheists to Christians is a category error, like comparing apples to oranges. Why take one demographic with only one characteristic in common: nonbelief in a deity, and compare it with a demographic with a variety of beliefs in common? If you're going to do that, you might as well make it atheists vs. Quakers, it's just as meaningful.

So apples to apples would be atheists vs. theists, or communists vs. Christians. But the first doesn't make atheism look bad enough, since you have to weigh their crimes vs. the crimes of Christians, Muslims, et al, combined. And the latter has an obvious comeback: So what? I have as much in common with Stalin because I'm a communist as a Quaker has with Osama bin Laden because she's a theist.

If you want me to question the wisdom of my atheistic identity, show how freethinking humanists have the highest body count.

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What frost says.

It's a valid question, but contains a logical landmine. There is an implied post hoc ergo propter hoc error, that because theists / atheists killed more it was because they did so BECAUSE they were atheists / theists.

Without looking it up I believe chairman Mao tops the body league table, what was he?

Tibetan Buddhist. Talked about going to meet God soon when he was elderly.

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No, Mao is as atheist as they come. He usage of "Great God" was almost assuredly figurative, much as Mikhail Gorbachev spoke of "God on high", or modern Chinese communists speak of death as "going to see Marx".

Mao was conflicted. As a communist, he felt atheism should be promoted, but he also said “it is wrong to tell people to be against religion.”. (to delegates from Peru). He never announced or specifically wrote that he was an atheist. And there's this exchange recorded in 'Behind the Bamboo Curtain':

Pham Van Dong: How are you, Chairman Mao?

Mao Zedong: Not very well. I have had a cough for some days. It is time to go to Heaven. It seems that I am summoned to meet the Good God. How is President Ho?

I don't possess your certainty that he was 'as atheist as they come'.

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Not sure if there even were 3.5 million Native Americans to kill, much less that Winston Churchill is responsible for their deaths.

I'm pretty sure that the Indians being referred to did not live in the Western Hemisphere.

[Anomalocaris]

I don't possess your certainty that he was 'as atheist as they come'.

Whatever else Mao was he was a not inconsiderable poet, prose writer, and skilled wordsmith, and was adept at using both classical chinese literary allusions and devices, as well as modern earthy peasant language, in his speechs and writings to set the right tone, build the right rapport, to get his people to view him the way he wants and do things he wants.

Much of what Mao said and wrote after he took control first of the chinese communist party and then of china was not for the purpose of clarifying his own personal views, but for getting people to do what he wants. So what he said and wrote after 1930s were often emotive, earthy, and full of a lot of hot air.

So I would not take literal translations of what he says literally.

The best reference of Mao personal views on society, religion, afterlife, etc are probably to be found in more obscure early writtings from the 1920s, when communism movement was more ideological and he wasn't yet embroiled in the intrigues and power struggles of a taking control of a real party trying to seize power.

These writtings suggests he was personally as dialectic materialist and atheist as was possible to imagine.

[Really?]

Well lets see. During the first world war there were 16 million deaths. Using the rediculous accounting that lets us describe the actions of each state involved as merely a representation of its leader or leadership cabinet thats 16 million in that war all in the christian column.

In the second world war it gets a LOT murkier. All Casualties CAUSED by Americans, Brits, Austrialians, Canadians, French, Italians, Germans, Austrians, Serbs, Romanians, Poles and Yugoslavs get counted in the Christian Column. While all Russian casualties get counted as Athiest. Japanese inflicted casualties don't count as anything. A conservative estimate for deaths in WW2 is 50 million. Again, going conservative the number of German deaths is 9 million. Considering that the military casualties were only HALF that number AND That most of the civilian casualties were the result of the WESTERN allied bombing campaign that means that realistically it ought to be metered out at 60/40 christian/non christian. However, for generosties sake I will say that 5 million of the 7 million where caused by athiests (Russian communists). So of 50 million DEAD 1/10th were CAUSED by athiests.
These numbers typically include holocuast dead.

Our current tally is Christians 61 million, Athiests 5 million.

The Korean war is another cluster. North Koreans are NOT athiests. They have a form of forced worship of their leadership. However, the NATO powers that took part WHERE Christian. The number of deaths of N. Koreans is put at about 1 million. The total number of NATO deaths is put at about 250K.

Vietnam is more straight forward using his utterly inane counting method you have imposed. There were 300K Americans killed. There were approximately 2 MILLION vietnamese BY Christian/American forces.

I could keep going on and on like this and showing that the number of Christian inflicted deaths during fighting during the cold war vastly outnumbered the number of deaths inflicted by communists but its irrelevant.

We could then add in things like homocide rates. Nearly half a million people are killed every year by homicide. The Chineese actually have a very low homicide rate, and countries that are having a religeous resurgence like Russia now have sky high murder rates. A reasonable breakdown for he past 100 years would be 50 million deaths broken down as 10 million Athiest, 25 million Christian, 15 all other religions.

The 100 million number that the OP likes to point to is a HIGH END estimate of certian communist regimes. Further, to get it it has to include people who were killed in work camps and as a result of displacement.

A fair comparison, then, would be to include every single native american death from 1900 until the reforms of the reseveration reforms of the 1970s, every single civil rights death in the US as well as every single lynching or death in the 20th century united states of an african american person until the signing of civil rights legislation, very single incident like ruby ridge, wako, Every single person who died will in a japanese internment camp, every single Indian who died during the india's struggle for indepedance, every single aboriginal death in the 20th century, every single death of an a non-white african in South Africa until the end of apartide, Every death cuased by the peronistas and similar south american facist hit squads, and finally all the deaths cuased by the European powers as they struggled to retain their African colonies. Including all of this things would generate a number of well over 100 million people as well.

Again, using the counting method were only the religion of the head of state of the government that carried out or allowed for the slaughter to take place ALL of these things get laid on the Christian doorstep. Its a huge stack of dead bodies that they have conveniently forgot in their effort to say communism = atheism and communists killed a bunch of people.

Seriously, a reasonable estimate is that 1/3 of the world is Christian. 1/6th of the world is "non-religeous" which lumps athieism, agnosticism, and other kinds of non-formalized religeous belief togther. These portions mean that anything "athiests" did Christians did in larger numbers. Its not hard to figure out.

Maybe a question that looks at how many Christians killed others because they either

a) believed that they needed to kill others for a specifcally christian reason
b) those others were not christian and they believed that should kill kill non christians

compared to Atheists who killed because the victim was religeous OR because they felt that as an atheist they could kill without consequence.

Really, in the end even the "communists killed 100 million people" is going to be swallowed up by all the stupid crap that christians have done that killed people.

[Phatt Matt s]

I dont like this thread. I feel like an immatureshitheel for starting it. Why wont thiz thread die!