Will Atheists Believe Anything?

A quote which is apparently misattributed to G.K. Chesterton: "When people stop believing in God, they don't believe in nothing — they believe in anything", doesn't quite cover the subject, but it is close.

Consider this Atheist who has created her own reality and system of truths, and is trying to convert the world, a woman who has both a real name and a fake name which she uses simultaneously: D.M. Murdock/Acharya S. In her article, "An Atheist Here to Destroy?", she affirms the title, and goes on to explain how mysticism is true, and all religions are false (or part true, or something, it's not clear). She makes assertion after assertion, firmly convinced that her mystical truths are self-evident and in no need of explanation, evidence, or rational support.

She starts with these "truths":

"It has been suggested that I am an "atheist" and am "very destructive." However, I am neither a theist nor an atheist, although, for the most part, I prefer atheists because they can think for themselves and are not as vicious as "believers." Their morality comes not from the outside, imposed by some supernatural figure, some repressive puppetmaster in the sky, but from within, as dictated by their own autonomy, wisdom and maturity."

Now, it's hard not to agree with the last comment, because Atheists do, in fact, get their morality from their own autonomy, their own (lack of) wisdom, their own (lack of) maturity [note 1]. But do Atheists in general think for themselves? Do they employ syllogistic arguments coupled with actual physical evidence to make a case for their beliefs. Emphatically, no.

She proceeds to ramble on mystically, with many mystical assertions self-obvious only to herself, and then there is this, which is where I stopped:

"Let us think back to when we were children, before we started getting conditioned--or, more appropriately, brainwashed--by those around us. We did not see race, gender, ethnicity or religion. We saw other children, beings with smiling faces exuding innocence. The unbridled, radiant love of life beamed from our souls and flowed from our hearts. Then we started to learn that we were no longer one empathetic being but were part of a variety of groups that separated us from each other. Suddenly, we were "boys" or "girls," "blacks" or "whites." We were "Americans" and "Russians." We were "Christians" or "Jews." And those over THERE were not like us over HERE. Again, this is extremely ugly and is at the root of all kinds of prejudice and bigotry that go on day in and day out. These are, in reality, false separations."

"One empathetic being"? The absurdity prevented me from reading further. Anyone who has ever been around children knows that they are born as selfish narcissists. When children spontaneously share and care, their parents video the event and put it on YOUTUBE because it is so rare.

And so, backing up through her fanciful personal universe, I came to realize that she is not living among us. She is long gone from our perceived reality, and fully acclimated to her own.

The quote that started this page really should state more inclusively that Atheists are free to make up any reality they wish, and attempt to live in it. Atheists can make up any morality they wish, and attempt to force the rest of us to live in it. Atheists can deny all rational arguments showing that Atheism cannot prove its own premises, all the while claiming ownership of truth and evidence. Thus it is that Atheists lose any claim to rationality and therefore any claim to sanity. And that this is easily documented and shown to be the case.

It seems like I should finish reading the article, but I have no desire to intrude into her personal faux reality any further than I have to.

Note 1: It is well documented that Atheists are largely males who attained their "wisdom" during adolescence, never outgrew the simplistic arguments, and never attained full maturity (rampant misogyny being a case-in-point, as is the concept that ridicule is an effective argument).
H.T. Anshuman Reddy

The Bolshevik League of Atheist Militants, and Mass Murder in the USSR

Atheists want to divorce Atheism from Communism, for obvious reasons. Atheist denialism reaches one of its peaks when faced with the countless millions who were butchered by Atheist Communists in the 20th century. But the facts remain; the history is there; only irrational denialism in the form of historical revisionism could remove it.

Not only were Marx and Engles Atheist, they were rabidly so. When Lenin took control, his attachment to Marx and Lenin was supplemented by his attachment to Nietzsche. Under Bolshevism, the Russian population was to be de-kulaked and de-religioned. And an organization arose to help out with that: the League of Militant Atheists. Under the Atheist Bolsheviks and the LMA, it has been estimated that tens of thousands of priests, bishops, and religious administrators were murdered. 13,000 priests were "dekulakized in 1930" alone. Tens of millions of adherents were murdered as well. Further evidence of Atheist foundations of the purge is this anecdote: all church bells were seized by decree, because "the sound of bells disturbs the right to peace of the 'vast majority' of atheists in the towns and in the countryside".(1)

Although bloody and serious, the purge was not complete. In 1936, 28% of Orthodox churches still remained "in service". But by 1940, the 30,000 churches prior to Lenin had fallen to 500 (2).

"The Soviets' official religious stance was one of "religious freedom or tolerance", though the state established atheism as the only scientific truth. [83][84][85] Criticism of atheism was strictly forbidden and sometimes resulted in imprisonment.[86]

The Soviet Union was the first state to have as an ideological objective the elimination of religion. Toward that end, the Communist regime confiscated church property, ridiculed religion, harassed believers, and propagated atheism in the schools. Actions toward particular religions, however, were determined by State interests, and most organized religions were never outlawed. It is estimated that some 20 million Christians (17 million Orthodox and 3 million Roman Catholic) died or where interned in gulags.[87] Some actions against Orthodox priests and believers along with execution included torture being sent to prison camps, labour camps or mental hospitals.[88][89] The result of this militant atheism was to transform the Church into a persecuted and martyred Church. In the first five years after the Bolshevik revolution, 28 bishops and 1,200 priests were executed.[90] "(3)

In actuality we'll never know how many were murdered by Atheists for Atheism. But the number is obviously huge.

Any claim that Atheism was not a part of the Communist massacres is delusional or dishonest or both. Historical revisionism must not be allowed, ever.

Note 1: Black Book of Communism, p 172.

Note 2: http://www.realclearreligion.org/articles/2012/08/20/the_new_soviet_league_of_militant_godless.html

Note 3: http://religion.wikia.com/wiki/History_of_the_Eastern_Orthodox_Church