Atheism, faith and dictatoship

[Pastafari]

Hey!

New to this forum. What do you make of this?

-- on coming to power the Nazis closed down atheist and freethought organisations and Hitler regularly spoke, both in public and in private, of his contempt for atheists."

"We do not want any other god than Germany itself. It is essential to have fanatical faith and hope and love in and for Germany."

http://www.quora.com/Was-Hitler-an-atheist

Could it be that atheism actually protects against dictatorship since in its core is an idea of challenging faith and beliefs.



[snip]

[Alex K]

The question that comes to my mind reading your OP is what you actually mean by "atheism protects..." when applied to a population. Do you mean "what if the entire/majority of the population is atheist"? In this case it is crucially important why that is. If they are mostly or all atheist because they are indoctrinated from birth that there is no god, and that it is so because the Dear Leader, or holy logic, says it is so, this is not much help. What you really want in my opinion is critical thinking skills.

One thing seems for certain though - through the systematic eradication of critical thinking in the population, the establishment of a doctrine, a leader caste that may not be questioned because it represents God, and a messianic figure, by the religious institutions, a fertile environment has been provided in the past for a charismatic dictatorship to arise. Hitler could set himself up as the new messiah no problem because the population had been taught to think in those terms, and had been taught not to question. Stalin came after a Tsar who was the supreme leader of the secular and religious realm, and had his authority basically vested in him by God. That some form of state atheism was then established in the Soviet Union was no help against this charismatic dictatorship, because it was not an atheism that had sprung from free thought. The God of Christianity and its Messiah had simply been replaced by a similar, more earthly figure.

So to summarize, I don't think atheism is the highest good here, it can only sensibly be the result of a process, not the starting point.

[pocaracas]

Welcome pastafari!

Since this is not the intro forum, we can just carry on with discussion! nice!

If the majority of the world's population is atheist, then the newborns will, most likely, be raised without any form of religious indoctrination.
As such, their atheism will stem, not from critical thinking about the theistic position, but from lack of exposure to the theistic position.
Perhaps they'll learn about the history of mythology, so they can keep that beast at bay.... but if they come to relinquish that part of history, well... history will repeat itself. The gullible will fall for the cons... everything...

[DramaQueen]

That's why we should give the next generation a better education including comparative religion (I'm talking about my country here)

[pocaracas]

That's why we should give the next generation a better education including comparative religion (I'm talking about my country here)

How about ten generations from now?
And 100?
At some point, this era may become known as the mythological era... or homo-mythologicus

[Thumpalumpacus]

Could it be that atheism actually protects against dictatorship since in its core is an idea of challenging faith and beliefs.



[snip]

The history of China and the USSR seem to indicate that atheism is no proof against totalitarianism.

[Alex K]

The history of China and the USSR seem to indicate that atheism is no proof against totalitarianism.

And indeed, why should it be! It merely removes one possible justification.

[Jenny A]

I'm afraid I'm just chiming in with more of what's been said already, but no simply not believing in god doesn't put anyone on the front lines against totalitarianism. Critical thought expressed out loud might.

I'm not entirely sure though, that Hitler shut the free thinkers down because he was afraid of what they might say in public. Hitler chose to persecute a number of marginalized people including gypsies, gays, blacks, abstract artists, etc. in large part to bolster his own popularity. Wouldn't surprise me to learn that atheists were just one more group Hitler thought the Germans would like to do away with.

[Holden Caulfield]

Atheism in itself does not protect or encourage free thought if that is the doctrine imposed by the ruling power. Atheism in itself does not mean good or bad much the same as Christianity, Islam, etc. The non-belief in a god does not really have any effect on the overall critical thinking of populace. Regimes like Stalin have proven that enforcing atheism idea is no better than enforced religious belief if there's no education behind it.

The key to true atheistic believe is simply free access to knowledge. There's a reason the strongest numbers of atheists are among the highest educated populaces. Knowledge is atheism's best weapon.

But an atheistic believer that takes extreme measures to prove his point (ie taking of lives) is no less wrong than any other "believer". Or even just the enforcement of atheism via goverment, that's equally as wrong as anybody enforcing a belief system. Atheism must be fostered at the grass roots not dictated.