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Permalink Reply by Dave Mann on February 22, 2013 at 8:03pm

Just as all Atheists are not Communists so too not all Communists are Atheists.  The connection is historical only; there is nothing that determines Atheists will be tending towards a communist philosophy and vice versa. The government of North Korea may say it is Atheist (I do not know if it does or not) but it promotes blind worship of the Party and leadership as if they were god-like. For any Atheist free enough to think for her or his-self rejection of an all powerful government would be easier than rejection of an all powerful god; so, do not give a centimeter to any theist who attempts to refute Atheism by offering Communism as evidence.  I consider myself to be a student of Marxism and Sartrean Existentialism - if that is at all relevant.

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Permalink Reply by Unseen on February 22, 2013 at 10:43pm

You can't be a Marxist Communist and be religious. "Religion is the opiate of the people"...remember?

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Permalink Reply by RobertPiano on February 23, 2013 at 7:39am

living "people gods" are even more dangerous than book and tablet gods. they promise hell in this world.

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Permalink Reply by Secular_Humanist on February 23, 2013 at 1:39am

wikipedia isn't always a trusted source. You can replace that 64% irreligious with the 'Juche' ideology which asserts that humans are gods. 

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Permalink Reply by Secular_Humanist on February 22, 2013 at 8:19pm

We have to be very careful in how we classify North Korea given the lack of information and insight into this isolated nation. From the readings I have done and the rhetoric coming from the West, the DPRK has disassociated itself from the idea of a communist nation. This statement doesn't come lightly as I have read Karl Marx's limited works on communism. Furthermore, the DPRK's constitution has also removed any mention of communism and any mention of Marxism-Leninism (which it had adopted in the 1950s after Stalin's death). 

Whether there is a connection between communism and atheism needs to be looked at in terms of historical context. Marx himself was an atheist. As was Lenin and Stalin. When the Bolsheviks took control in Russia and began the move towards socialism after the revolution, they (esp Lenin) did crackdown on the influence of the Russian Orthodox Church. Lenin viewed religion as a private matter that was to be left outside the affairs of the State. That is not to say that he was attempting to convert people out of religion. It was an attempt to reduce religious institution power (given that the old ruler the Tsar was an autocrat and had strong support from the Russian Orthodox Church). That is just one example of what can be classified as "extreme". However there are political theorists who uphold to Marxist ideology and also happen to hold a belief in a deity. A few examples are Fidel Castro, Hugo Chavez, Rafael Correa etc. 

So the connection between communism and atheism is very limited. The ideas of communism and atheism are not mutually inclusive of one another. One can be a communist but also have religious beliefs (this is limited as communists are usually materialists) and one can be an atheist without being an communist.

Whenever you hear an argument from theists that atheism to its extremity can be seen as fundamentalists, you have to bring their attention to the historical context. Next time they mention the DPRK make mention of the fact that the citizens of the DPRK may not believe in a monotheist god, but in something called 'political religion' where the citizens worship Kim Il Sun and Kim Jung Il. The idea stems from Kim Il Sun's writings on a theory called 'The Juche Idea'. Look into a bit further, but essentially the Juche Idea promotes humans as masters of their own destiny. It can lead to humans viewing themselves as gods.  

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Permalink Reply by Gallup's Mirror on February 22, 2013 at 11:08pm

Cults of personality and religions of state share the same characteristics as religions of sky-gods. Dogma is dogma whether it is ideological or theological in nature.

Note for example the official party line of North Korea, which states that Kim il Sung turned pine cones into bullets and walked on water. His son, Kim Jong-il, officially was born under a new star in the night sky, as foretold by a talking bird, and could control the weather. 

A similar (if less supernatural) cult of personality surrounded Mao Zedong in Communist China for decades during and after his life. Joseph Stalin had hymns composed to his personal worship and had the Soviet press extoll his infallibility, practices which even Nikita Khrushchev later denounced, saying Stain had transformed himself into "a superman possessing supernatural characteristics akin to those of a god".

These men did not commit atrocities because they were atheists. They committed atrocities because they were absolutists and had seized enough power to become godlike figures themselves.

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Permalink Reply by Nate Lundgren on February 23, 2013 at 1:52am

North Korea and other countries have dictatorships that use communism, socialism, theism, atheism or whatever -ism they can use to maintain power for the few elite at the top. Dictatorships come in all religious or non-religious flavors and styles. They are pyramid scam governments filled with insane amounts of corruption, abuse and murder. 

Time and evolution will determine the best form(s) of government by trial and error like it has in the past and continues to do so now.   Atheism is a philosophy/idea/opinion about religion and usually extended to include a dislike of dogmatic ways of thinking.

I lived in South Korea and I can tell you that the culture there is very much groupthink, dogmatic and the subjugation of the individual to the hierarchy. Even with democracy and more liberal culture being allowed/nurtured there, many are still very conservative and have their old religious and superstitious ways of thinking and being. Infrastructure and technology wise it is advancing a lot (in some ways faster and better than the US) but socially it is still not very friendly or welcoming to non-Koreans and very slow to change the rigid hierarchy system.

Korea (when it was united in the past) was called the Hermit kingdom for a very good reason. I'm glad some of them (mostly in the South) are opening up more but most of them still have a long way to go before they could be considered an open or diverse society or country. (North or South)  North Korea is obviously much more focused on staying as grumpy hermits as long as they can and maintaining Korean only solidarity like they historically have been doing.

Every system has it's good and bad parts but North Korea most certainly has a larger percentage of harmful practices and systems that greatly overshadow any good things they have done. Atheism really is not even an issue that they spending any time or energy being concerned about. A military dominated theocracy (military leaders as gods) is what I would call the system in North Korea and not communism or atheism. (I don't see atheism as a form of government any way you look at it, it's just an idea/worldview) Atheism can't be anything other than what atheists make it to be. So far most well educated atheists view it as a personal opinion and perspective and not as a political party or dogma of any kind.

Many theists are just willing (or conditioned) to be blatant liars to try to make atheists look bad. If you are talking with those kinds of theists you will almost always lose no matter how nice or smart you may be and should just tell them to look up the words integrity and honesty in the dictionary. If that doesn't work just tell them to fuck off and stop being absolute idiots.

Mostly it is a never ending nightmare situation and those kinds of debates should be avoided. If they can't be reasonable and accept evidence and logical consistency as the standards for the debate then they are not worth talking with at all.

Generalizing is an evolutionary tool that has served well in the past. I don't have a moral opinion about it other than it is just one tool and not the best one for most issues. It does help us to be intellectually lazy/efficient use of our time/energy. hahaha 

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Permalink Reply by Claire Couch on February 23, 2013 at 11:41am

We have to own communism is we want to make headway. 

I'd say, yes, atheism, devoid of anything else, cam lead to nationalistic or ideological, or personalistic cults.

But, atheism, as I get it, is the questioning of dogma.  It's being rational, and thus it's all about rejecting religion, and mindless nationalism, and ideologicalism, rejecting personality cults, too...

Sure some atheistist types embraced communism..  I'm an atheist, I endorse Tsarism...  I'm an atheist, I endorse democracy, I'm an atheist, I endorse militaristic oligarchy..  I doesn;t matter..

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Permalink Reply by Arcus on February 23, 2013 at 2:54pm

Communism is inherently atheistic as Marx perceived religion to be a tool to suppress the working class.

However, communism is hardly a set of coherent policy prescriptions ready for implementation, which is why it comes in many "flavors" such as leninism, stalinism, maoism, etc. Most have been quite vehemently atheist and anti-theistic. However, a few of these flavors have incorporated religion, Ceausescu (Romania), Castro (Cuba), and the Pathet Lao (Laos) comes to mind, and NKs Juche ideology is a form of secular religion which is somewhat comparable to fascism in its manifestations. It should be noted that NK started off with confucianism, which is atheistic. Last, but not least, most of the Arab republics, especially the Baath run ones, have or has islamo-socialist leaders. As a side note, the Arab cold war was between the pan-Arab socialists and the monarchies. 

For debates, use those examples and add in that Stalin went to seminary school. 

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Permalink Reply by Hope on February 24, 2013 at 6:52am

Bashar Al-assad is an example of a "Socialist Ba'ath" leader.. Arabians suffered a lot from these people!

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Permalink Reply by Dave Mann on February 24, 2013 at 3:23pm

Syria's and Iraq's Baath Parties were originally modeled on Fascism and later Nazism which are diametrically opposed to Communism and Marxism. On gaining full control of the state and Party, one of Saddam Hussein's first objectives was the physical liquidation of all socialist, communist and trade union party members. After the second world war Syria and Iraq became client states of the Soviet Union because of their mutual agendas.

As we all know, Christopher Hitchens, a Trotskyist (Marxist) activist in his early days, wrote extensively on this topic.

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Permalink Reply by Arcus on February 24, 2013 at 3:42pm

From Bitter Legacy: Ideology and Politics in the Arab World (p. 60): "Aflaq's thought dominated the Ba'at party" and "[he] insist[ed] on the overthrow of the ruling class and socialism as the pillars of the new nationalism." Pan-arab socialism is certainly a different flavor than Russian or Chinese, but it's closer to those than fascism in ideology (though perhaps not in policy, i don't really know).

While they did collaborate with the Nazis, it was due to anti-colonialism aimed against the French and British, as well as a rejection of Soviet-style internationalist Marxism. Saddam was a tyrant and not particularly ideological. 

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