Does this exist? Being a history nut, I’m sure that Joseph Stalin’s ban on religion was pretty fundamental. Same with the Chinese government, Cuba, Marx, etc.
Posted: October 18th 2010
Dave Hitt www
When someone makes that claim or uses that phrase, ask them to list atheist fundamentals.
The phrase is usually used as an insult – by fundamentalists. Fundamentalism evidently kills off the part of the brain that handles irony.
Posted: October 19th 2010
bitbutter www
First I think it’d be a good idea to be clear about what’s meant by the word fundamentalist. Historically the word refers to adherence to the 'fundaments’ of a holy text; a conservative position that rejects more modern interpretations.
Of course this makes no sense in the context of atheism; there is no sacred text to disagree about.
Maybe the questioner really has 'intolerant atheism’ in mind. There have certainly been extremely intolerant atheists—people, like Stalin, who were prepared to kill others for disagreeing with them. Is there some link between atheism and murderous intolerance?
It could be claimed that atheism meant that Stalin did not feel accountable to a 'higher power’; that he felt free to destroy lives because he did not believe he would face an ultimate judge of his earthly crimes. But no one can claim to know this; history has no shortage of murderous theists, many of whom justified their killings by appealing to their metaphysical beliefs (for example the Old Testament’s, Joshua). There are of course many peaceful theists and atheists too. God belief, or lack of it, doesn’t seem like a reliable predictor of anti-social behaviour in my opinion.
Posted: October 19th 2010
Mike the Infidel www
For fundamentalist atheism to exist, atheism would require some fundamentals beyond “not believing in any gods.” That’s all atheism is.
Stalin’s ban on religion was largely meant to eliminate his political opposition, and can really be chalked up to his totalitarian ideology. Essentially, whenever you see atheism blamed for someone’s behavior, you can dismiss it as irrelevant. There is no causal connection that can possibly be drawn from a lack of belief to any action of any kind. That person may well be an ideologue, but the concept of ideological atheism is nonsensical.
Posted: October 19th 2010
SmartLX www
Fundamentalism is adherence to the fundament, or foundation, or core principles or tenets, of an ideology. Atheism isn’t an ideology at all, it’s merely a conclusion that there’s no decent, available evidence for gods. There are really no tenets to work with. Compare this with fundamentalist Christianity or Islam, each of which is incredibly specific about what God has to say on a huge variety of subjects, from abortion to land ownership.
Communism is a fully fledged ideology, with a very rigid foundation of rules and philosophy. Atheism does not form part of its fundament; rather, it enters into it by default because Marx said oppressed people use religion to take their minds off being oppressed. It’s the “opium of the people”, he wrote. It’s irrelevant to Communists whether there’s any evidence for gods, because religion has no practical place in its ideal world. That’s more anti-religion with an ulterior motive than it’s an actual conclusion of atheism.
If you do nevertheless think of atheism has having its “fundamentalists”, Communists are not those people. They’re atheists because the state tells them to be, regardless of what they really believe. If you were a practising Hindu for convenience because you lived in a country with an officially Hindu dictator, you probably wouldn’t consider yourself a real Hindu let alone a fundamentalist.
Posted: October 19th 2010
Eric_PK
It’s pretty clear that Stalin was anti-church, which made a lot of sense. The church owned a lot of land and had other wealth and had the ear of the people, and as such, was competition to the state.
The attitude towards religion is complex – the soviets actively taught atheism, but they also tolerated religious belief and even organized religion in some areas.
If you look at the re-emergence of religion after the fall of the soviet union, it’s pretty clear that there was a whole lot of religion there already.
Posted: October 18th 2010