Thursday, January 4, 2018

Quote Of The Day: Hitchens On The Fair Test


Happy New Year!

Whenever an atheist articulates any sort of expression to the effect that religion as it is traditionally understood should disappear, the theist will quite often predictably respond with the insinuation that getting rid of religion will result in gulags and mass slaughter. It's as if to say, godlessness necessarily leads to such atrocities. I heard it just the other day on Twitter. Well it's obviously false. Atheism cannot be conflated with communism. And I think Hitchens had one of the best counter points to show why that was so. From his Google talk:


Now you might be saying, "Wait, weren't they all believers?" Well, some were pantheists, and some were deists, but they were all products of the enlightenment and critical of traditional organized religion and its role in society and government. They were secularists. That was especially true of Voltaire, Paine, and Jefferson. A culture founded in secular enlightenment values—which the Soviet Union was not—is not going to end up anything like what most theists think a godless society will be.

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