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January 19

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Category:Kangta

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The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: keep (non-admin closure). Marcocapelle (talk) 07:30, 27 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: Simply not enough content to warrant an eponymous category per WP:OCEPON as Category:Kangta albums is enough to hold all related articles. StarcheerspeaksnewslostwarsTalk to me 19:58, 19 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep, filled - this was one of my cat red link attacks, not sure what happened as I'm normally pretty sensitive to overcategorisation and usually try to fill out these kinds of categories. Which I've now done a bit, although I suspect that part of the problem is that being perhaps the Korean equivalent of Gary Barlow not all the articles that should be there actually exist yet. Anyway, it should be full enough now to stand on its own merits.Le Deluge (talk) 11:40, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Kangta is a notable personality and my opinion is that Category:Kangta albums can be a sub-category of this one in order to incorporate other articles relating to them. Eliko007 (talk) 22:38, 23 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Persecution by atheists

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The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: No consensus - with caveats. I came very close to closing this as Delete. I cannot see that any of the Keep votes have given any compelling reasons why the category should stay "as-is". Indeed, the majority of the Keep votes were very poor indeed in regards to policy. There is something of a consensus for keeping a similar category, but not named as such. The suggestion of Category:Religious persecution by secular governments given below is, I suggest, a good one. I suggest all editors who have commented here work towards moving this category to something approaching that one, because as given, the current title is frankly original research. Black Kite (talk) 23:57, 13 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: The category has been emptied by User:Xenophrenic who indicated would be willing share a list of the content that was removed from the category. As nominator I do not have an opinion about the pros or cons of deletion of the category yet, because I don't exactly remember what was in the category to begin with. Marcocapelle (talk) 18:34, 19 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Co-nominator's rationale: The category fails WP:OCEGRS which states: If a substantial and encyclopedic head article (not just a list) cannot be written for such a category, then the category should not be created. For example, Category:LGBT murderers. Such categories attempt to misleadingly convey a causative correlation. Attempts to create a head article have been made before, usually resulting in this: Historical persecution by atheism or Historical persecution by atheists (see deletion discussion 1 and deletion discussion 2), and it is hard not to view the creation of this problematic category as an end-run around past community consensus. In addition, the category fails WP:CATDEF, which states: Categorization must also maintain a neutral point of view. Categorizations appear on article pages without annotations or referencing to justify or explain their addition; editors should be conscious of the need to maintain a neutral point of view when creating categories or adding them to articles. Categorizations should generally be uncontroversial; if the category's topic is likely to spark controversy, then a list article (which can be annotated and referenced) is probably more appropriate. As will be seen in the ensuing discussions below, creating a category to imply religious persecution is an attribute of atheism is anything but uncontroversial. Xenophrenic (talk) 18:08, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

1922 confiscation of Russian Orthodox Church property‎
233 Spanish Martyrs
498 Spanish Martyrs
522 Spanish Martyrs
Acerrimo Moerore
Ad Apostolorum principis
Agustín Caloca Cortés
Anacleto González Flores
Anti-Catholicism in the Soviet Union
Anti-religious campaign during the Russian Civil War
Cambodian genocide
Category:Anti-clericalism
Category:Anti-religious campaign in the Soviet Union
Category:Cristero War
Category:Demolished churches in the Soviet Union
Catholicism in the Second Spanish Republic
Chronicle of the Catholic Church in Lithuania
Cristero War
Dechristianization of France during the French Revolution
Dominic Tang
Eastern Catholic victims of Soviet persecutions
Enver Hoxha
Eugene Bossilkov
Islam in Tajikistan
Islam in the Soviet Union
Jaime Hilario Barbal
Jenaro Sánchez Delgadillo
Josef Beran‎
José Sánchez del Río
League of Militant Atheists
Marguerite Rutan
Martyrs of the Spanish Civil War
Martyrs of Turon
Martyrs of Daimiel
Marxist–Leninist atheism
Mateo Correa Magallanes
Meminisse iuvat
Miguel Pro
Operation North
Persecution of Buddhists
Persecution of Christians
Persecution of Christians in Mexico
Persecution of Christians in the Eastern Bloc
Persecution of Christians in the Soviet Union
Persecutions of the Catholic Church and Pius XII
Pietro Leoni
Polish anti-religious campaign
Red Shirts (Mexico)
Red Terror (Spain)
Refractory clergy
Religious persecution in Communist Romania
Saints of the Cristero War
Severian Baranyk
Soviet anti-religious legislation
State Secretary for Church Affairs
Temple of Reason
Three Martyrs of Chimbote
Tomás Garrido Canabal
USSR anti-religious campaign (1970s–87)
USSR anti-religious campaign (1958–64)
USSR anti-religious campaign (1928–41)
USSR anti-religious campaign (1921–28)
Walter Ciszek
Zynoviy Kovalyk

The problematic category was also inserted into these articles by editors other than Jobas: Darío Acosta Zurita, Islam in Albania (1945-1991), Mercè Prat i Prat, Pierre-Adrien Toulorge, Reign of Terror.
This misnamed category misleadingly implies that atheism (absence of belief in deities) is the source of persecution, which is nonsensical. There are a number of categories given for "Persecution by XXX", where XXX = a particular religion, and certain tenets of that religion (re: blasphemy, apostasy, adultery, homosexuality, etc.) might be a source of persecution. But atheism isn't a religion (a common misconception), nor does it mandate any persecuting action like some religions might (stoning, lashes, exile, death, etc.). There is a reason why we don't have a Persecution by atheists article to back up this category. Looking at the articles tagged with this category, it is apparent that persecution of religions by some communist governments is being mis-labeled as "Persecution by atheists", as if atheism was the source of the persecution. The communist dictatorships were the source of the persecution, and they were striving for an atheistic, non-religious government. The same confusion was applied to articles about anti-clericalist governments; the source of the persecution was the anti-religious government, not "atheists". Xenophrenic (talk) 22:39, 19 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Notes for closers, administrators and nominators (some off-topic)
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Well sound you forgot that you directly pinging User:Knowledgebattle, who is known POVs.--Jobas (talk) 22:21, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Marcocapelle, you strongly agree which was inappropriate? Jobas' insertion here of personal attacks on a fellow editor in violation of WP:NPA, or my justified removal of those personal attacks per WP:TPO (and as explained in detail on his user Talk page)? (And I fully agree that this isn't the right place for any of this discussion, but this is where you resumed it.) Xenophrenic (talk) 21:40, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The Historical persecution by atheism (see deletion discussion was from 10 years ago (in 2007), Well it's wikilawyering. At the time of the 2007 decision, there was no notability criterion for stand-alone lists (see this version of Wikipedia:Notability).--Jobas (talk) 20:14, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
What are you goin on about? This discussion is about a category nominated for deletion. Xenophrenic (talk) 22:14, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
It's also probably worth noting that this matter is also being addressed, in a slightly skew way, over at WP:ANI#You are displaying racism!, where questions regarding the nature of the single notification made to this discussion by Xenophrenic and other matters which might relate to canvassing are being discussed. John Carter (talk) 14:36, 13 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Threaded discussion
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Hi, Jobas! Would you mind refraining from making personal attacks? Let's keep this discussion focused on the category under review, and if you'd like to express your concerns about perceived behavioral problems of editors, please do so at WP:ANI. Thanks, Xenophrenic (talk) 22:39, 19 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Jobas, could you please give a policy-based reason for your oppose? Or alternatively, provide reliable sources which clearly convey "Persecution by atheists"? Also, I see no discussions where consensus to keep the problematic category was developed. Xenophrenic (talk) 18:08, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Having asked twice already, and with no response forthcoming, I'll take that as an indication that you have no support for the problematic category you created. Xenophrenic (talk) 08:30, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
According to Geoffrey Blainey: "Most atheists rejected, as did many modern Christians, the idea of a God who constantly intervened in daily affairs. Another effect of Christianity, they argued, was the promotion of war and violence. It tends to be forgotten, however, that the most ruthless leaders in the Second World War were atheists and secularists who were intensely hostile to both Judaism and Christianity. Later massive atrocities were committed in the East by those ardent atheists, Pol Pot and Mao Zedong. All religions, all ideologies, all civilizations display embarrassing blots on their pages". (source: A Short History of Christianity; Viking; 2011; p.543), according to the same source Many priests were killed and imprisoned. Thousands of churches were closed, some turned into hospitals. In 1925 the government founded the League of Militant Atheists to intensify the persecution.
Under the doctrine of state atheism in the Soviet Union, there was a "government-sponsored program of forced conversion to atheism" conducted by Communists. Christopher Marsh, a professor at the Baylor University writes that "Tracing the social nature of religion from Schleiermacher and Feurbach to Marx, Engles, and Lenin, I attempt to explain how the idea of religion as a social product evolved to the point of policies aimed at the forced conversion of believers to atheism. After all, Marx himself never advocated using force to stop people from believing in religion, but in the end this is precisely what regimes did in his name."
So there been reliable sources cited that source of the persecution in some countries was the anti-religious and atheist government.--Jobas (talk) 23:03, 19 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The definition of atheism may not be important to you, but it is important for our readers. When you created the category "Persecution by atheists", you are telling our readers that there is persecution because of atheism, which is not true and is not reliably sourced. Hopefully you can understand that. Please let me know if you do not. A category which says "Persecution by XXX" means the persecution is because the subject is XXX. A category which says "Persecution of XXX" means the persecution happened because the subject is XXX. If you intended the category to mean something else, you will need to reword it.
Your Blainey quotes say three things. (1) Blainey says some ruthless leaders (he doesn't name who) in the Second World War were also atheist or secularist, and that is very likely, since there are billions of secularists and atheists in the world. (2) Blainey also says that Pol Pot and Mao were atheist and they also committed atrocities, which I think is also true. (3) Blainey says all religions, all ideologies, all civilizations can be the source of bad things, which is very probably true — but atheism isn't a "religion" or an "ideology" or a "civilization". Blainey does not say anyone was "persecuted by atheists". In fact, what Blainey was actually saying is that not all war and violence is promoted by Christianity, and he gives examples of non-Christians (Mao, Pol Pot) to support his point. You would know this if you read the sentence just before the ones you quoted on page 543. Perhaps this quote about people like Stalin, Mao, Hitler, Pol Pot, etc, would be helpful to your understanding: "Individual atheists may do evil things but they don't do evil things in the name of atheism." The blame for that lies with "dogmatic and doctrinaire Marxism", or totalitarianism, etc. (Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion; Pgs 315-316).
Your Marsh quote (if you read all of it) affirms what I have been saying, that it was the political regime, not "atheists", which did the persecution. From that same source, you'll see that Marsh explains it was the Bolsheviks who did the persecuting, not "atheists", although I'm sure many of the Bolsheviks were also atheists. I'm also sure many had mustaches, but that also was not the source of the persecution. Do you have any reliable sources which actually state that there was "Persecution by atheists"? We will need those sources if we are to maintain this category. Xenophrenic (talk) 18:08, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Religious believers in the Soviet Union were not persecuted by the abstract Platonic ideal of atheism in general, but they were persecuted by certain specific atheists in accordance with one particular specific manifestation of atheist ideology.
Are you referring to the ethologist, evolutionary biologist and atheist apologist Richard Dawkins who spends most of his time disparaging and critic of religions and religious people, and by the way he in not a historian (according to his Wikipedia article)? as far i remember Dawkins suggests that phrases such as "Catholic child" and "Muslim child" should be considered as socially absurd, and he is a prominent critic of religion that has stated his opposition to religion as two fold: religion is both a source of conflict and a justification for belief without evidence. So please bring sources of historians.--Jobas (talk) 20:14, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Apologist? No, I was referring to this Richard Dawkins. (And I don't understand what it is you wish to have sourced to a "historian"; clarify please?) Hope that helps, Xenophrenic (talk) 22:14, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Surely I was referring to this Richard Dawkins, but unfortunately he is not a "historian", therefore his personal opinion is not objective here.--Jobas (talk) 17:11, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
He is a respected academic (and a colleague of your McGrath, in fact), so he is a reliable source. Why do you say he needs to be a historian? Xenophrenic (talk) 19:59, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
So far you have provided non except Dawkins who is not a reliable source on the issue.
The Pew Research Center which shows that after the fall of communism religious identification increased because of atheist repression of religion during the Soviet rule. This is another line of evidence from this reliable source.
"For centuries, Orthodox Christianity was the dominant religion in Russia. This began to change in the early 20th century, following the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution and the imposition of state-sponsored atheism as part of communist ideology. During the Soviet period, many priests were imprisoned, many churches were converted to other uses or fell into disrepair, and people who publicly professed religious beliefs were denied prestigious jobs and admission to universities. While it is likely that some share of the population continued, in private, to identify with the Orthodox Church and other religious groups, it is impossible to measure the extent to which these attachments survived underground during the Soviet period and to what extent they faded away. Similarly, it is difficult to disentangle the extent to which the upsurge in Orthodox affiliation found in the surveys represents an expression of long-held faith or a genuinely new wave of religious affiliation. It may be that after the fall of the U.S.S.R. in 1991, Russians felt freer to express the religious identities they had quietly maintained during the Soviet era.3 However, given that the share of Russians identifying with a religion rose almost as much between 1998 and 2008 as it did from 1991 to 1998, the data suggest that the change is not solely an immediate aftereffect of the collapse of the Soviet system." [1].--Jobas (talk) 20:06, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
...religious identification increased because of atheist repression of religion during the Soviet rule - Jobas
Huh? Your Pew source does not say that. Pew wouldn't be so careless as to use a nonsensical phrase like "atheist repression of religion". Atheism is not anti-religion. In fact, there are many very religious atheists. Please read it again more carefully. Your source attributes the "communist ideology", as do many source. Xenophrenic (talk) 20:51, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, and yes I've cited many reliable sources already (keep reading; they are in English). And your declaration that "Dawkins who is not a reliable source" doesn't hold water here. You are welcome to raise your concern at the Reliable Source Noticeboard if you'd like. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 20:51, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Gee, you have cited many reliable sources!, well so far you have provided non except Dawkins who is not a reliable source on the issue.--Jobas (talk) 21:19, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I have cited many sources! What does "provided non" mean? Is that Arabic? Dawkins is a reliable source, of course, until I hear otherwise from WP:RSN. Xenophrenic (talk) 05:52, 23 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Xenophrenic, I would appreciate if you could cease making any personal attacks about my Arabian heritage, especially with your sarcastic "English please" posts. It is highly inappropriate and in-conducive to the respectful academic atmosphere of collaboration that we seek to foster on Wikipedia. Strike one--you've canvassed users with your POV here; strike two--you're displaying racism. Kindly accept this warning before you strike out to ANI.--Jobas (talk) 02:57, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
again please source your comment that persecution isn't a component of atheism.--Jobas (talk) 14:13, 23 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Could you quote me exactly where I made that comment? (Hint: I never made that comment in this discussion, but I agree with it.) Ramos has tried to assert that persecution is a component of atheism, but hasn't yet provided reliable sourcing for such an absurd statement. It's right up there with "Fruit Loops is a component of atheism"; nonsensical, so there isn't likely to be a lot of sources stating it. Xenophrenic (talk) 21:40, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for your comment, User:Laurel Lodged. It actually is not, according to reliable sources, a legitimate member of "Religious persecution", which is the very reason why it was nominated for deletion. But if you have reliable sources which say otherwise, it would be great if you could produce them for us to review. Otherwise, your comment doesn't advance the discussion. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 18:08, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@Xenophrenic: What are the attributes of the other members of Category:Religious persecution tree that make them worthy members of that tree which are not shared by the nominated category? Laurel Lodged (talk) 21:06, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The other "Persecuted by XXX" subcategories of "Religious persecution" (there are 4 - Hindus, Buddhists, Christians, Muslims) have the attribute of being religions. As religions, they also have tenets (rules, dogma, commandments) upon which individuals or groups may act to commit persecutions (which may range from mere discrimination to capital punishment). Atheism, on the other hand, is not a religion or ideology or even a cohesive group, and has no such tenets. Atheism is the absence of belief in supernatural deities. One cannot persecute others "in the name of atheism"; it's nonsensical. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 23:08, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@Xenophrenic: My question related to the Category:Religious persecution tree, not to a non existent Category:Persecution by religious groups tree. The former has persecution visited by people of one religion (or none) on a group not affiliated to that religion (or non religion). So whether it's "by" or "of", the common thread is persecution. The point of this discussion is whether or not the bit in parentheses above (i.e. "none" and "or non religion") ought to be in scope for the grandparent tree. If the answer to the question is in the affirmative, then the nominated category ought to stay. Laurel Lodged (talk) 13:01, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Just so we're clear, I never referred to a nonexistent category tree. And also, "atheist/atheism" is neither a religion or non-religion. With those clarified, let's continue: I believe you misunderstand the point of this discussion. We are not discussing whether ("none" and "or non religion") is a component of the parent tree. It is, and we have no disagreement on that. We are discussing the malformed, misnamed Category:Persecution by atheists, which by its very wording misleads our readers to think atheism is the source, cause or impetus behind the persecution - which reliable sources (and common sense) say is not the case. If the category was instead named "Persecution by anti-religious groups" (which "atheists" certainly is not - there are many quite religious atheists), there would be no problem here. So to answer your question, should "non-religion" be a component of the Religious persecution tree? Probably (see the Bolsheviks campaigns against religions, for instance), but that isn't what we're discussing here. Does that alleviate some of the confusion? Regards Xenophrenic (talk) 16:15, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
It is true to say that Atheism is not axiomatically anti-religion. I'm sure many atheists never give religion a second thought, let alone work up a sweat about being positively anti-religious. But I'm not sure if the same can be said the other way around. That is, is anti-religionism the same as atheism? Muslims could hardly be described as anti-religious. Neither could Jews, Christians or even pagans. Each espouses religiosity. So if there is persecution being perpetrated by anti-religious elements, is is possible to say that such elements are not atheistic? Are there any anti-religious elements out there that are not also atheistic? Put another way, is it really tenable to say that Bosheviks sought the destruction of the Russian Orthodox Church because they were Bolsheviks, not because they were atheists? Is such a schizophrenic division between Bolshevism and atheism possible? How many religious Bolsheviks were there? Laurel Lodged (talk) 11:58, 23 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
So if there is persecution being perpetrated by anti-religious elements, is is possible to say that such elements are not atheistic?
If there is persecution being perpetrated by an anti-religious element, our category should read: Religious persecution by [element], where that 'element' is the source of the anti-religion. "Atheism" is not anti-religion. It is simply an absence of belief in deities. So what is the actual impetus behind the anti-religion? To use the Soviet example, reliable sources say those in power (the Bolsheviks) saw religion (primarily the Orthodox Church) as a rival for control and influence over the populace, and it therefore had to be suppressed or removed. "Is it possible to say the Bolsheviks are not atheistic", you ask? It isn't an issue; our category under discussion isn't "Persecution by a totalitarian government, which also happens to be atheistic".
Are there any anti-religious elements out there that are not also atheistic?
You mean one god-believing religion in conflict with another god-believing religion? Of course. That was a rhetorical question, right?
is it really tenable to say that Bosheviks sought the destruction of the Russian Orthodox Church because they were Bolsheviks, not because they were atheists?
Bolsheviks sought the destruction of the Russion Orthodox Church because they were a rival power (quite formidable, in fact) in the control and influence of the populace; not because they were atheists (a lack of belief does not equate to hostility toward religions or deity-believers). Please let me know if there is any remaining confusion. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 21:40, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose This category is certainly worth keeping because numerous reliable sources are clearly available on the topic of atheists persecuting people for numerous reasons including discrimination against people's worldviews and belief systems precisely because others were not atheists. USSR, Cambodia, China, and numerous other countries engaged in variant kinds of persecutions of religious people of all stripes. Following User:Jobas, excellent resources like "STORMING THE HEAVENS: THE SOVIET LEAGUE OF THE MILITANT GODLESS" by Daniel Peris (Cornell University Press) are easily accessible which detail various levels of persecution done by some atheists in the USSR, for example. The suggestion that one switch "persecution by atheists" to "persecution by communists" would obscure the issues because not all atheists have been communists. For example, Dechristianization of France during the French Revolution is a case before communism even existed. Also, the charge of atheism being a component of persecution makes sense give that communism is perfectly compatible with Islam, Christianity, and other belief systems. In other words, Muslim communists, Christian communists, etc of course do exist. The original intent of the category seems to have been that atheists be highlighted because people in the USSR, China, Cabodia, etc could have had communist societies with religious diversity. And yet the focal point for many of these persecutions went beyond political view points into personal, religious or ultimate worldviews. It went beyond politics and economics. Huitzilopochtli (talk) 02:42, 20 January 2017 (UTC) — Note: An editor has expressed a concern that Ramos1990 (talk • contribs) has been canvassed to this discussion. [reply]
...numerous reliable sources are clearly available on the topic of atheists persecuting people for numerous reasons...
It would be great if you could please produce them here for us to review. As it stands now, all we have are sources of religious persecution by communist governments and dictators as they tried to eradicate religion and implement an atheistic regime. Please be careful not to confuse the very real religious persecution by political forces in their attempt to eradicate religious influence, with "persecution by atheists", which is not what occurred. I happen to own Storming the Heavens. From the very first page: When the Bolsheviks came to power in 1917, they promised to sweep away all that was old in Russian society and to create an entirely new civilization. [...] One of the most dramatic points on this agenda foresaw the metamorphosis of Holy Russia into an atheistic Soviet Russia. While the Bolsheviks ultimately attacked all religions and denominations with devastating effect, their main thrust was directed at the Russian Orthodox Church, which was still a vital force in Russian culture. As you can see, the Bolsheviks, a revolutionary political government faction, persecuted the religious and is the source of that persecution. But your confusion is understandable, as their eradication of religion would result in an atheistic society, but "atheists" is not the source of the persecution. I'm looking forward to the numerous sources you mentioned. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 18:08, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, even what you quoted from "STORMING THE HEAVENS" proves my point that the Bolsheviks went beyond politics into persecuting religious organizations which makes no sense since Communism and the Orthodox Church were not intrinsically opposed. Religion and communism are certainly compatible so the issue is not based on politics. It goes beyond that into worldviews and personal convictions (beyond communism or capitalism or any other political or economic configuration). Furthermore, in the intro of "STORMING THE HEAVENS" it does note that atheism was an active part of a social program so one cannot say that atheism was not involved Soviet activity "Created in 1925, the League of the Militant Godless was the nominally independent organization established by the Communist Party to promote atheism. By all outward appearances, the League seemed to succeed in its mission. In 1932, seven years after its creation, the League claimed 5.5 million members, 2 million more than the Communist Party itself. The League's Central Council in Moscow published its own newspaper, Bezbozhnik (The Godless), several other Russian-language journals, and propaganda materials in many other languages of the Soviet Union. Antireligious pamphlets and posters were printed in large numbers. The League's far-flung network of cells and councils sponsored lectures, organized demonstrations, and actively propagandized against religious observance. Leading Bolshevik figures gave speeches at the League's national congress in 1929, at which the League officially became "Militant." The Communist Party, the Komsomol, the trade unions, the Red Army, and Soviet schools all conducted antireligious propaganda, but the League was the organizational centerpiece of this effort to bring atheism to the masses.". Others here seem to have provided other examples of reliable sources on the matter already too.
I will admit that the concept of persecution by Christians, Muslims, and etc are difficult to show since even the concept of religious violence seems to never be a primary reason, but a side justification for normal secular ends or needs. There are of course works which document the recent invention of the concept of "religion" which note that conceptions of religion are not historical and certainly not found in any holy texts - see "The Myth of Religious Violence: Secular Ideology and the Roots of Modern Conflict" by William T Cavanaugh (Oxford University Press). Interesting stuff. Huitzilopochtli (talk) 05:58, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
... "STORMING THE HEAVENS" proves my point that the Bolsheviks went beyond politics into persecuting religious organizations --Ramos1990
Thank you, we are on the same page regarding the source of the persecution. Now we need to create an appropriate category to convey it. As for your other comments and personal opinions, they might make for interesting discussion someday.
Others here seem to have provided other examples of reliable sources on the matter already too. --Ramos1990
Perhaps the others would be so kind as to make them available for our review. The scant few sources provided so far, like the Peris source we've been discussing, only confirm that our present category is inaccurate and misleading. Xenophrenic (talk) 08:30, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Hmmm...if you already agree that the issue is in things beyond communism (i.e. atheism and religion) then what is the issue? The sources of persecution are not in communism (as you originally proposed), but in atheism and anti-religious belief systems (in other words personal convictions on the nature of reality). Atheism is what the category tried to highlight - things going beyond communism or politics or economics so the category makes sense as is or with minor adjustments. Keeping in mind that Christian Communists and Muslim communists were around, it make no sense to limit anything by communism. Especially since the French (who were not communists) did engage in persecutions too. The scope is broader.Huitzilopochtli (talk) 09:08, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
What is the issue, you ask? The issue is the Category:Persecution by atheists has been nominated for deletion for being a nonsensical, inaccurate and source-less category. You initially offered the Peris source as possibly supporting the absurd notion that the absence of belief in gods is the source of persecution, but it turns out Peris said the communist Bolsheviks were the source of the persecution of religious organizations. (You, me, and the source agree.) If you think your sources "make no sense", that is an issue between you and the sources. So now I'm waiting for the next of your "numerous sources" offerings. As of now, there have been no sources presented which support the "Persecuted by atheists" construction. Xenophrenic (talk) 22:50, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Yes. That ALT would probably be better again. Laurel Lodged (talk) 12:56, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
User:Laurel Lodged, A secular state (such as India) is very different from an atheist state (such as North Korea). Let's refocus to the discussion at hand which is whether to keep the category or not (thus far, most votes are in favour of opposing the deletion and keeping the category). Right now, the related categories read: Persecution by Muslims, Persecution by Buddhists, Persecution by atheists, etc. We need to follow standard conventions or else all of these categories would need to be renamed. Thanks.-- Jobas (talk) 20:14, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
One flaw in your assertion: atheists aren't in the "Muslims, Buddhists, etc." related category. Atheism isn't a religion like those others, so you are talking about two separate "conventions" here. Only the nonsensical "Persecution by atheists" would need to be renamed. Xenophrenic (talk) 22:50, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Laurel Lodged and Marcocapelle that Category:Religious persecution by secular governments would be an improvement. To be clear moving forward, however, Xenophrenic never said advocating atheism was hardly ever the primary reason for persecution. According to reliable sources, atheism was never the reason for persecution at all. Xenophrenic (talk) 22:14, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Which sources? till now you didn't provide any source!.--Jobas (talk) 12:37, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
English, please? Are you saying I haven't provided any sources until now? (And if so, what's the problem?) Xenophrenic (talk) 22:50, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep / Oppose In the textbook Christian History, Professor Alister E. McGrath of the University of Oxford in England writes that "From 1925 onwards, the League of Militant Atheists had urged the burning and dynamiting of huge numbers of Soviet churches, including some of great cultural importance." History is filled with several instances of persecution by atheists; Christians, in addition to Muslims, Buddhists and others have died or been placed in gulag camps as a result of intolerance by some atheist groups, in addition to atheist governments, and militant atheist leaders, such as Enver Hoxha, the dictator of the Socialist Republic of Albania. A Dictionary of Albanian Religion, Mythology, and Folk Culture states that:

Article 37 of the Albanian constitution of 1976 stipulated, "The State recognizes no religion and supports and carries out atheist propaganda in order to implant a scientific materialist world outlook in people."

Accordingly, Edwin E. Jacques in "The Albanians: An Ethnic History from Prehistoric Times to the Present" writes that “Northern mountaineers too insisted that the authorities should distinguish between the removal of politically unreliable priests and the fundamental human right to believe in God. Nevertheless, every mosque, church, monastery, convent, religious school, hospital or orphanage throughout the country was burned down, torn down or converted to serve what the state called ‘some more useful purpose.’” One editor's attempt to remove all the articles from this category and then nominate it for deletion is very inappropriate. Their edits will need rollbacked in due time. AR E N Z O Y 1 6A•t a l k• 16:07, 20 January 2017 (UTC) — Note: An editor has expressed a concern that Renzoy16 (talk • contribs) has been canvassed to this discussion. [reply]
Are you referring to the priest and Christian apologist Alister McGrath who spends most of his time disparaging atheists and atheism (according to his Wikipedia article)? Yeah, I'd be a little cautious about leaning too heavily on him in this matter. You quote him about the League of Militant Atheists, but you should realize that was an "organization established by the Communist Party to promote atheism" (page 2 of the source recommended above by Ramos1990), and was a tool under control of the communists who were doing the actual persecution.
History is filled with several instances of persecution by atheists...
Then it should be no trouble for you to produce the reliable sources to support that contention. Please remember that we are looking for sources which state there was "Persecution by atheists", and not persecution by governments trying to eradicate religion and establish an atheistic regime, and not persecution by dictators or totalitarians who also happen to be atheist. Looking forward to your help, Xenophrenic (talk) 18:08, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Well being a priest do not minimize him, wasn't Georges Lemaître who proposed the theory of the expansion of the universe a priest also?. Alister McGrath is an intellectual historian, who's currently holds the Andreas Idreos Professorship in Science and Religion in the Faculty of Theology and Religion at the University of Oxford. who's was previously Professor of Theology, Ministry, and Education at King's College London and Head of the Centre for Theology, Religion and Culture. who's has also taught at Cambridge University and is a Teaching Fellow at Regent College. McGrath who's holds three doctorates from the University of Oxford, a DPhil in Molecular Biophysics, a Doctor of Divinity in Theology and a Doctor of Letters in Intellectual History.--Jobas (talk) 20:37, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Gee, that's all really nice. But none of that addresses the reliably sourced fact that the League was the name given to the organization created and controlled by the Communist Party to promote atheism and eradicate religion, so the communists are the persecutors - making "Persecuted by atheists" inapplicable. Xenophrenic (talk) 22:14, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment In my view this issue is a symptom from a deeper issue. While verifiability is at the core of ALL Wikipedia content, it appears that there is a strong reluctance to uphold this core policy for category membership and templates. I have never been convinced by any of the arguments that such category or template inclusions are harmless, and merely for convenience (as they are in my potentially misleading and even if true often original research (synthesis)). But for some reason the majority of editors simply does not appear to care about misleading implication in categories and templates. In other words, I am not sure this is the place to reach consensus on this, as similar problems are much broader across the whole project. In fact references I added to templates have been removed as overdoing it, and citation needed tags in templates have been aggressively removed because they would list all articles where the template was included as a page being insufficiently referenced (which is by definition the case by adding an unsourced template) rather than only the template itself. There does not even seem to be a way to add references to category membership (which in my view makes all challenged categories removable per core policies) Arnoutf (talk) 19:51, 20 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong Delete - The 'Soviet communism = atheism' is a Christian-apologist 'talking points' meme that appeared around a decade ago, and is still somewhat popular one today (although it is growing quite tired, and has practically disappeared as a 'debate-gotcha'). It is of the opinion of some (and any citations will be to these) that it was not, in fact, a totalitarian leadership (like many organised religions) that opposed religion, but an "atheist" one. This category is only trying to 'reinforce' that selective view of reality in an effort present it as, not the selective-reality opinion it is, but fact. There are dozens of articles that try to do this as well, such as the State Atheism one... the facts within the article may be individually real, but together under that title, they are, at best, an opinion presented as fact, and, at worst, a lie. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 21:59, 20 January 2017 (UTC) — Note: An editor has expressed a concern that ThePromenader (talk • contribs) has been canvassed to this discussion. [reply]
No, I was not canvassed at all: I came across a notification that this discussion was open on the Talk:Atheism page.
The fact that someone would resort to this sort of based-on-no-evidence wikilawyering-accusation rather than present a rebuttal only underlines the above. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 06:00, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
User:Xenophrenic made a request on the atheism article, in order to WP:CANVASS users that he thought might be sympathetic to his POV here, we provide sources as According to Geoffrey Blainey: "It tends to be forgotten, however, that the most ruthless leaders in the Second World War were atheists and secularists who were intensely hostile to both Judaism and Christianity. Later massive atrocities were committed in the East by those ardent atheists, Pol Pot and Mao Zedong." (source: A Short History of Christianity; Viking; 2011; p.543), and user:Huitzilopochtli provide a source shows that atheism was going beyond communism into persecution by worldviews by other worldviews (i.e. atheism). meanwhile he doesn't.--Jobas (talk) 12:42, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
English please? We've already addressed the fact that Blainey doesn't convey that there was persecution because of atheism, and your statement "atheism was going beyond communism into persecution by worldviews by other worldviews" has no meaning in the English language. Reword, please? Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 16:21, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
again please source your comment persecution isn't a component of atheism?.--Jobas (talk) 14:13, 23 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I don't believe I made that comment; I also did not make the comment that water is wet. Xenophrenic (talk) 21:40, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per much of ThePromenader's and Xenophrenic arguments. Putting articles together in a disputed category implies a true relation between the article name and the topic of the article. Without a reliable sources making that connection explicit that is original research / synthesis. Arnoutf (talk) 10:21, 21 January 2017 (UTC) — Note: An editor has expressed a concern that Arnoutf (talk • contribs) has been canvassed to this discussion. [reply]
original research ? well Geoffrey Blainey is one of the reliable sources that been provied.--Jobas (talk) 12:42, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Your Blainey source doesn't mention "Persecution by atheists", which is what we are discussing here. You say that English is not your native language, so perhaps you have misunderstood what you have read? It doesn't support the nonsensical category you created. Blainey only says: (1) some ruthless leaders (he doesn't name who) in the Second World War were also atheist or secularist, and that is very likely, since there are billions of secularists and atheists in the world. (2) that Pol Pot and Mao were atheist and they also committed atrocities, which I think is also true. (3) all religions, all ideologies, all civilizations can be the source of bad things, which is very probably true — but atheism isn't a "religion" or an "ideology" or a "civilization". Blainey does not say anyone was "persecuted by atheists". In fact, what Blainey was actually saying is that not all war and violence is promoted by Christianity, and he gives examples of non-Christians (Mao, Pol Pot) to support his point. You would know this if you read the sentence just before the ones you quoted on page 543. Perhaps this quote about people like Stalin, Mao, Hitler, Pol Pot, etc, would be helpful to your understanding: "Individual atheists may do evil things but they don't do evil things in the name of atheism." The blame for that lies with "dogmatic and doctrinaire Marxism", or totalitarianism, etc. (Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion; Pgs 315-316). Do you have any reliable sources which actually state that there was "Persecution by atheists"? We will need those sources if we are to maintain this category. Xenophrenic (talk) 22:50, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Category / Oppose Deletion and Renaming Wait, so Xenophrenic's argument is that atheists are incapable or persecuting others who disagree with them? Entire governments committed themselves to this cause all the way from the French Revolution to the Soviet Union to North Korea today, in addition to atheist dictators who killed Jews (and others) in the name of propagating the ideology of atheism. (Personal attack removed) Eliko007 (talk) 22:43, 23 January 2017 (UTC) — Note: An editor has expressed a concern that Eliko007 (talk • contribs) has been canvassed to this discussion. [reply]
No, Xenophrenic's argument is not that atheists are incapable of anything - that would be silly. Atheists are regular people, just as capable of everything you and I are capable of. Now when you say "Entire governments committed themselves to this cause", I think most of us agree - which is why we are having this discussion. Our category doesn't say "Persecution by North Korean government" or "Persecution by Soviet Union" like it should. Instead, it says "Persecution by atheists", which is nonsensical and misleading. I think you mis-typed your !vote. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 21:40, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Xenophrenic, you are being warned not to alter my comments as you did here. And do not put words into my mouth. Those governments are collectively united by the fact that they have a policy of militant state atheism, a policy that resulted in the murder of many Jews. The category must be Category:Persecution by atheists to reflect the fact that Jews and other religionists were tortured by atheists because they would not convert to atheism. Eliko007 (talk) 21:52, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I did not "alter your comments", nor have I "put words in your mouth". I removed your unsubstantiated personal attack upon a fellow editor (as allowed under WP:TPO) - please refrain from violating Wikipedia's WP:NPA policy in the future. Let's keep this civil, alright? As for your assertion, "the fact that Jews and other religionists were tortured by atheists because they would not convert to atheism - that is, of course, complete nonsense. Per our normal procedures I will now request that you provide the reliable sources to substantiate, and when you realize they do not exist, I'll ask you to strike-through that absurdity. Xenophrenic (talk) 20:10, 7 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete: We may speak of "persecutions by communists/any other anti-religion ideology" but not of "persections by atheists". Atheism is not an ideology, while communism/Christianity/Islam are. We can know with certainty what a Christian/Muslim/communist believes (they have a set of beliefs/dogma), but not what is/are the beliefs of "atheist". Persecutions of religious communities by communists or nationalists were carried out for social issues: confiscation and statalization of church property, dissolution of churches which as such (a "church" is a social entity) are social bodies separated from the social state/nation/nation-state, the constitution of which is the primary objective of communist and nationalist ideologies (the argumentations for North Korea and Revolutionary France are the same: both established nation-states in which churches appear as opposing/separate bodies of different beliefs; strictly speaking, they are not even definable as atheist, since NK's ideology is based on a cult of deified Kims and French revolutionaries were Deists and instituted a Cult of the Supreme Being and Reason as a replacement of Christianity). Besides this, I notice that the category was created by Jobas after an edit war: I have been following him (and his many sockpuppets) for some time, and I find many of his edits and editing methodology to be highly problematic.--80.182.145.219 (talk) 19:27, 24 January 2017 (UTC) — Note: An editor has expressed a concern that 80.182.145.219 (talk • contribs) has been canvassed to this discussion. [reply]
  • Marcocapelle, Can IP vote here?.--Jobas (talk) 19:51, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
If you genuinely believe I'm using sockpuppets, take your concerns to WP:SPI where your suspicions will be denied with prima facie evidence. and by saying I have been following him mean you stalking me? Do you not realize that is against policy?.--Jobas (talk) 20:27, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep but come up with either one or more specific additional categories for groups which might have been called "atheist" at the time but don't meet the current broadly held definition of that term, and, maybe, include in this category some language clearly defining the specific requirements needed to be included in this specific category. John Carter (talk) 21:48, 1 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, John Carter. Could you please provide a reason for your "Keep" position? Without a reason, the closer of this deletion discussion isn't likely to seriously consider your input.
include in this category some language clearly defining the specific requirements needed to be included in this specific category
Requirements such as: "Must be supported by a reliable source showing that "atheism" is the cause of the persecution"? That is already a requirement, and that is why the problematic category is presently empty. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 20:18, 7 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Addendum: I just noticed that you have added another comment below. Of key interest is that you note the importance of: ...whether the persecutors were according to modern scholarship performing the persecution primarily on the basis of religious belief of some sort or whether that were a secondary or tangential matter involved. ... whether atheistic communist persecutions in some areas were primarily religious persecutions, or because the believers in that case were also among the strongest opponents of the those governments. Unfortunately, in all the cases I know of regarding this, I also know that in most of them the group which is accused of doing the persecution ascribes the persecution to non-religious reasons, and in almost all those same cases the modern version of the group then being persecuted disagrees with that assessment. As Wikipedia editors, we should be using the best sources outside of both groups (the religiously persecuted group and the totalitarian regime persecutor group). Many such reliable sources do exist, and they overwhelmingly describe the source and motivation of the persecution as the totalitarian regime's efforts to suppress resistance from competing centers of influence and power (read: most churches and clergy). Trying to assert (with a straight face) that the religious persecution was conducted by "atheists" because the targets "believed in deities" reveals itself to be a ridiculous position in light of the fact that many churches (and sometimes whole religious faiths like Islam) were allowed to continue unmolested if they ceded to the political regime's stipulations and control, while those who resisted had church property confiscated and clergy imprisoned as subversives to the government. That shows where the impetus behind the persecution really was. Xenophrenic (talk) 20:18, 7 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. [Lest the nominator object — I was brought here by the ANI thread that he started]. Unlike atheism, atheists definitely are capable of conducting persecution. Atheism being a belief about god(s) [specifically that he/they do(es) not exist], and divinities necessarily being a religious topic, it's rather ludicrous to claim that atheism does not involve religious beliefs. Why must it be inappropriate to have a Persecution by atheists category when persecution by those of other religious perspectives is appropriate? The argument about the uselessness of Persecution by theists is off topic, basically because theists are divided into numerous religions, some of which might be considered not-exactly theistic (what would you do with Martyrs of Japan, whose persecutors were influenced by Shintoism and its focus on lesser spirits, and influenced by Mahayana Buddhism and its seemingly ambiguous ideas of divinity), and anyway such a category might be useful as a parent for Persecution by Muslims, Persecution by Christians, Persecution by Hindus, etc. This category really can't be split in a similar manner, unless you have categories for Persecution by nonreligious atheists, Persecution by Taoist atheists, and the like, but that all depends on whether there are enough articles in each field to warrant splitting this thing up. And finally, "religious persecution by secular governments" would embrace everything from the events appearing on the Mormon War disambiguation page to the attempted suppression of religion in revolutionary France, and it would exclude religious persecution by rebel groups (e.g. religious killings by Maoist guerrillas in various places, e.g. the death of a Hindu leader discussed at [2]) and other parties that aren't governmental. Nyttend (talk) 05:18, 10 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
"Atheism being a belief about god(s) [specifically that he/they do(es) not exist], and divinities necessarily being a religious topic, it's rather ludicrous to claim that atheism does not involve religious beliefs. "
That is just apologetic-ally patently false. 'Atheism' is but a disbelief in gods (or god-claims), and that is obviously what's being targeted here. The (mostly non sequitur) rest has been adressed here already many times before. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 16:04, 10 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Alternative categories or rename proposals
[edit]
@Marcocapelle:, A secular state (such as India) is very different from an atheist state (such as North Korea). Let's refocus to the discussion at hand which is whether to keep the category or not (thus far, most votes are in favour of opposing the deletion and keeping the category). Right now, the related categories read: Persecution by Muslims, Persecution by Buddhists, Persecution by atheists, etc. We need to follow standard conventions or else all of these categories would need to be renamed. Thanks.--Jobas (talk) 12:33, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • With the alternative we will keep the category. But a secular state is a broader and more neutral concept than an atheist state. Editors in favor of deletion seem to be troubled mostly by the (narrower) atheist/ideological focus, I suppose we can reach a better consensus by keeping the category and broadening the scope and make it less POV. Marcocapelle (talk) 13:39, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Again, same difference, and appeals to antiquity and popularity (number) do nothing to change the fact of the matter. "But it's a different word!" is not an argument, either, because the goal (presenting selective opinion as whole-story fact) is exactly the same, and it will tell the same story, albeit without the firebrand 'atheist' tag (and it is for that that those 'pushing' the 'communism = atheism' agenda translated the 'godless' in communist propaganda to 'atheist'), to the reader.
To show that any such 'atheist only' 'persecution' category merits existence, one would have to demonstrate, with citable, objective sources, that organisations not totalitarian, dictatorships, etc., persecuted in the name of atheism (or secularism) and nothing else. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 12:59, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • If you can't demonstrate that historical consensus calls those states (and describes their acts) by that name, then it's not fact at all, it's, at best, a minority-view (opinion), and, at worst, an unsupported apologist affirmation presented as fact. Either way, it has to be presented as such, but categories and article titles are a sneaky way around that. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 17:23, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I have to agree with User:Jobas here since there is a difference between secular state vs an atheist state. Most secular states are not atheistic states at all (they are mixed like the US government or the Indian government) The point of that category is to note that atheism has been involved in persecution (e.g. the League of the Militant Godless and others). The component of persecution here is personal worldviews of reality, not politics or economics. Persecution of people due to people's personal convictions of the universe and reality are beyond the scope of any government. In a technical sense, none of the persecutions in USSR or China or Cambodia should have occurred since personal worldviews of relaity are not the business of any government. The fact that people and institutions were targeted over personal views of reality is surely disturbing since any politics could have worked irrespective of personal worldviews. The fact that they did occur is sure evidence that belief in atheism did influence persecutions to some degree. Why would atheists make organizations of promoting atheism and persecuting all other worldviews if atheism was not involved? Clearly it was. Another good text on a history of atheists persecuting in the USSR is the "The Plot to Kill God: Findings from the Soviet Experiment in Secularization" By Paul Froese (University of California Press). I think that what User:Laurel Lodged proposed of Category:Religious persecution by atheists is a decent compromise or perhaps Category:Religious persecution by secularism. I think that Xenophrenic mentioned that the association of atheism with persecution might be the issue, but this is not a good reason for removal since Christianity, Islam, and others are also not inherently associated with mandates for persecuting either. Furthermore, it is certain that when any persecutions occurred, it was usually done by personnel who favored it and personnel who did not. Like any military group or campaign, the work was done but that does not mean that most participants were in favor of the actions their duty required of them.Huitzilopochtli (talk) 20:30, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, the association of persecution with atheism has "the issue" of no causative correlation. There are no "rules" to atheism upon which an atheist might justify a persecution action, unlike with Christianity, Islam, and others. Xenophrenic (talk) 22:50, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Opinion on 'selective worldviews' aside (non-sequiturs that will figure nowhere in any article or category), that does nothing to change the fact that it was totalitarian/despotic/dictatorship regimes doing the persecution (the 'godless atheists' was but one Soviet-sponsored youth group, not the entire Soviet communist totalitarian-communist regime ); presenting that as just 'atheism' is both disingenuous and a partial truth (or, in other words, a falsehood), and no amount of 'selective reality' (sophism!) rhetoric unshared by any historian consensus, but only a narrow selection of apologist opinion, can change that. Presenting apologist-opinion 'talking points' without presenting them as such, especially as historical fact, is quite against everything Wikipedia is all about. "Category:Religious persecution by atheists' is attempting to use/abuse Wikipedia to WP:SOAPBOX a lie, period. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 21:46, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I applaud Marcocapelle's attempt to go beyond simply acknowledging a problem, and attempting to actually come up with solutions. The problem was the creation of a "Persecution by atheists" nonsense category by User:Jobas. It was created under the same misconception that the problematic (and now deleted) articles Historical persecution by atheism and Historical persecution by atheists were attempted - in the words of their creator: I just seems to me that if there are articles about persecutions done under religion that if it can be shown that persecutions where done under non-religion that would be balance. (--LoveMonkey) The illogic is astounding; atheism isn't "non-religion" nor a "religion", and while persecution has indeed been done in the name of various religions, persecution has never been done in the name of absence of belief in gods. Jobas statement above, Right now, the related categories read: Persecution by Muslims, Persecution by Buddhists, Persecution by atheists, etc., demonstrates the same illogic. No, Jobas, they are not "related categories" because "Muslim" and "Buddhist" imply adherence to religious tenets, while "atheist" proscribes no such religious tenets.

Marcocapelle has suggested renaming the nonsense category to Category:Religious persecution by secular governments, which has some merit for two reasons: (1) it would still allow the grouping of some very real instances of religious persecution, and (2) it correctly indicates the source of the persecution as the government or regime. The problem, however, is with the word "secular" which has potentially multiple conflicting meanings. Our article on secularism says, "One manifestation of secularism is asserting the right to be free from religious rule and teachings" which arguably could encompass Soviet hostility toward religion, but our article also says, "a state declared to be neutral on matters of belief, from the imposition by government of religion or religious practices upon its people", which does not describe the Soviet position at all, and is actually a common meaning of the word. Other editors (above) have also voiced concerns about the "secular" part. I've looked at all of the previously tagged articles listed above and I think all those with actual sourced incidents of religious persecution would be covered properly by just these: Category:Religious persecution by communists (or 'under communism'), Religious persecution under anti-clericalism. Xenophrenic (talk) 22:50, 21 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Perhaps a better compromise would be to name it Category:Religious persecution by secularism. Secularism is more of a broad term that of course includes atheist activities as opposed to "secular" which is a universal and even a Christian term from the medieval period. The argument that User:ThePromenader brings up about regimes doing the dirty business therefore their worldviews are innocent makes no sense since if the worldviews played no role then organizations like the Militant Godless should not have existed (why would atheists call themselves "atheists", then write about it and make proclamations with it?) and no religious persecutions would have occurred because communism is not inherently anti-religious (an easy example is religious communism). On top of that ALL members of any regime carry worldviews themselves, but only a few usually bring them out and manifest it in public policy and life like the Soviets did with the League of the Militant Godless. All regimes, politics, totalitarian governments are all compatible with all religions. The extra step of isolating people's worldviews when they do not impact their worldly activities is the focus of this discussion.Huitzilopochtli (talk) 01:56, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
There is no compromise with mistruth. Again (and again): unless it can be demonstrated that an organisation that does not have another goal (despotism, totalitarianism, communism, etc.) conducted the persecution 'in the name of secularism' (and no other), and that historical consensus shares that view, then the 'persecution by secularism' label (which a categorisation is) is a lie. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 04:55, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Hmmm...what you said "unless it can be demonstrated that an organisation that does not have another goal (despotism, totalitarianism, communism, etc.) conducted the persecution 'in the name of secularism' (and no other)" does not make much sense since nearly no persecution was ever done exclusively in the name of a worldview. All persecutions involve complex goals (and much of it affects the public and thus politics) of which atheism and religion take part of in some instances. Here is yet another addressing more to the point- "Godless Communists: Atheism and Society in Soviet Russia, 1917-1932" by William B. Husband (Northern Illinois University Press) states in the Intro: "For centuries, Russian intellectuals as well as the rank and file have vigorously debated what it means to be Russian and, with even greater passion, what the mission of Russia ought to be. The resultant array of competing prescriptions has undoubtedly enriched the country's intellectual life and reverberated strongly beyond its borders, but it has also failed to produce anything resembling consensus. The worst cases have led to persecution and bloodshed. This book examines one highly significant chapter in the ongoing contention over collective behavior in Russia: the promotion of Soviet atheism during 1917-1932. The study of belief systems - religious, ideological, philosophical, scientific, occult - provides important insight into every society, of course, and Russia is by no means unique in having experienced calamity and carnage when one group tried to alter the basic views and actions of another. Long before Marxism, efforts to eliminate heresy and apostasy, variously defined, and to control the social environment punctuated Russian history no less than the rest of the violent and intolerant premodern world. By the nineteenth century, ideas from Europe helped ferment intellectual, political, and spiritual discord in Russia, and the socioeconomic displacement and secularizing influences that everywhere accompany industrial modernization challenged tsarist institutions no less fundamentally than other monarchies and landholding aristocracies. But the cultivation of atheism in Soviet Russia also possessed distinct characteristics, none more important than the most obvious: atheism was an integral part of the world's first large scale experiment in communism. The promotion of an antireligious society therefore constitutes and important development in Soviet Russian and the social history of atheism globally...In sum, this study of early Soviet atheism will demonstrate that - in addition to well documented clashes of political parties, classes, nationalities, and interest groups - the intensity of competing cultural perceptions and aspirations in Russian society played an instrumental role in shaping the aftermath of the revolution...Therefore, whatever one's personal view of the phenomenon Russians literally call godlessness [bezbozhie], atheism was a historical reality of the Soviet period - a belief system that millions accepted as literal truth and with which millions more reached an accommodation."
Perhaps you or Xenophrenic can point out where in communism, it is mandatory to destroy the Russian Orthodox Church, priests, alter peoples belief systems, etc? Huitzilopochtli (talk) 05:16, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Repetition does not make truth, and address the point, not the person. And 'persecution by atheists/secularism' is the claim, so it is for it to demonstrate that it represents historical consensus.
If it was communists doing the persecution, then a factual label would be 'Soviet communist anti-religious persecution'. The goal here is to attribute 'crimes' to secularism and atheism (that are not even 'things' in themselves, let alone an organisation, so this is disingenuous, too), and that is exactly what readers will take away from it... thus the goal.
Apologism may very well attain its WP:SOAPBOX goal through other means ('tire-em-down', canvassing, 'majority rules', etc.), but none of that makes fact. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 05:42, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
You have not provided sources that show that communism was that cause of persecutions of religious people. I am actually hoping you would provide some foundation to switch from atheism to communism if you were to shift some of the blame in that direction. I already provided 3 sources by Soviet historians showing that atheism was an active component of degradation of non-atheists including influencing demise. Merely being totalitarian or communist does not mean that religion has to be persecuted, no? The only counter I see is a citation on Richard Dawkins and he is not a reliable source on the topic since he has no academic background in that matter. You should provide some sources on your view. Atheism is not just an abstraction but an empirical manifestation that is quantifiable by the fact that people self-identify as atheists, people write about atheism and society, promote atheistic identity and activism towards society, produce groups and organization to talk about atheists and what they should do in their lives and society at large, etc. Lenin-Maxism which is a fusion of atheism and communism did lead to injustices every once in a while, considering that Karl Marx alone (communism) had some mixed positive views on religion, the negative stuff came from somewhere else. The amount of devastation done to religious believers seems inexplicable except throught putting some of the blame on radicalized atheism - which why aggressive attempts were done to make atheists, not communists.Huitzilopochtli (talk) 06:34, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Again again again, 'atheist persecution' (as 'atheism' and nothing else) is the claim, so it is for it to demonstrate historical consensus (and no amount of talk-page sophistry is a replacement for this). It does not have it, thus the attempt to shift the burden of proof. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 06:54, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Again - Already addressed that numerous times. Atheists persecuting religious people at social, cultural, institutional and even personal levels. Who else is persecuting religion? Communist Christians? Communist Muslims? Lack of citations for pure communism being the culprit does not really help.Huitzilopochtli (talk) 07:36, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
No, you ignored it several times. 'Communist persecution of religion' would be accurate and reflects historical consensus. 'Atheist persecution of religion' is not and does not, and we both know that. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 08:00, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Nope already addressed with quotes from historians. Communism itself is not the source of antireliigon - it was atheism. There would be no need for the emergence of the League of Millitant Atheists if communism is all that was needed to do the persecutions. If communism is anti-religion by default then provide a source by a historian showing that it was the cause of antireligion. It should not be hard if it is so common of a view. Finding sources on atheism as being involved in the persecutions are not hard to find either, which is why I have provided some already. Here is another one "Anti-religious Propaganda in the Soviet Union: Study of Mass Persuasion" by David E Powell (MIT Press). Huitzilopochtli (talk) 08:46, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Historical consensus, but I have repeated myself so often that you must be purposely disingenuous at this point. You can attempt to rationalise your unshared-by-historic-consensus apologist propaganda all you like, but attempting to use wikipedia (and game it) to spread it as a 'fact'-label when it is not is flagrant abuse of it. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 09:38, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Since most of the articles this category has been applied to concern Communist Russia's persecution of religion, there is no reason that a 'Communist Russian anti-religion' (or the like) category would not suffice for articles that apply; historical consensus supports it.
The ignoring historic consensus (to favour only a few selective publications (and even these do not support this category's claim, as demonstrated earlier)), with the insistance on using the word 'atheist' (or 'secularist') alone only demonstrates that the goal here is to use Wikepedia to spread a narrow Christian-apologist anti-atheist agenda-opinion and make it seem fact. This is clear for all. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 09:53, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
How is this ignoring historical consensus when historical consensus acknowledges atheism as a core component of Soviet society? It's called Marxist–Leninist for a very good reason (a fusion of communism-Marx and atheism-Lenin) and there is a reason why historians regularly refer to it as that combination. Lenin can be blamed for inserting atheism when none of it was needed. You speak of historical consensus when you have not provided an example of historians actually removing atheism form their society. Again who did the persecutions? Christians? Jews? Even today, pretty much all the anti-religion rhetoric is fueled by atheists and their groups. There are not many candidates for sources of active anti-religion. The category merely notes that atheists have contributed to persecuted other for various reasons in the same way that Muslims or others have - of course no persecution is ever based soley on worldview, much of t is triggered by secular - mundane motives. But the denial of such basic historical facts is a bit worrying.Huitzilopochtli (talk) 10:20, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
If what you claimed was true, you could cite any mainstream source, yet you can't, and even the ones you cite do not support your claim. Your agenda is clear. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 10:24, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The extra step of isolating people's worldviews when they do not impact their worldly activities is the focus of this discussion. --Huitzilopochtli (Ramos1990)
Huh? No. The focus of this discussion is the nonsensical and policy-violating Category:Persecution by atheists. More specifically in this sub-section of the discussion, we're discussing the possible creation of alternative categories which adhere to Wikipedia policy and reliable sources, and still allow us to categorize some notable instances of religious persecution. All the superfluous talk about "worldviews" and what-not appear to be distractions not related to the matter at hand. And please remember: "atheism" is not a "worldview". ("Atheism itself is not a worldview, it is not a philosophy of life." --Krueger 1998)
Perhaps you or Xenophrenic can point out where in communism, it is mandatory to destroy the Russian Orthodox Church, priests, alter peoples belief systems, etc? --Huitzilopochtli (Ramos1990)
If you are objecting to having "communism" or "communists" in the name of proposed new categories describing those at fault for religious persecution, I somewhat share your concern. The aggression against religions (churches, priests, etc.) is not an actual principle of communism, just as it is not a principle of atheism, or even Marxism (see Marxism and religion). The antagonism toward religion (using the Soviet history as an example) can be traced to Leninism and particularly the establishment of the Soviet Union. In your opinion, do you think it would be more feasible to create multiple subcategories under "Religious persecution" based upon specific government regimes (i.e.; Soviet Union) instead of ideologies (i.e.; communism)? Xenophrenic (talk) 19:35, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Split -- Some of the items in the list relate to persecution by communists, as a result their atheist ideology, but the martyrs of the Spanish Civil War were probably the victims of anti-clericalism, rather than specifically of atheism. There may be some other sub-classes. One answer may be to encourage the content to be moved to a series of sub-cats, leaving this as a container. We can then decide whether it is useful as a container. Peterkingiron (talk) 17:33, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
...as a result their atheist ideology...
Let's try to keep our terminology accurate, please, just to avoid confusion. As we know, "atheist ideology" isn't a thing, and atheism isn't an ideology. (Atheism is not itself an ideology; there is no such thing as an "atheist mindset" or an "atheist movement." Atheism per se hasn't inspired and doesn't lead to anything in particular because it is an effect--not a cause--and there are countless reasons for a person to not believe... --Perkins 2008) It simply means absence of belief in deities. Can we assume you meant "anti-religious ideology"?
One answer may be to encourage the content to be moved to a series of sub-cats...
I agree with that much, User:Peterkingiron, and have proposed as much above, with Category:Religious persecution as the container. Xenophrenic (talk) 19:35, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
We could, of course, put those articles in the "Religious persecution" category until we have suitable subcategories. Xenophrenic (talk) 05:59, 23 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • General comments
  1. There is a lot in the above discussion referring specifically to communists. Note that communists have a category of their own: Category:Religious persecution by communists, which is a category that is not nominated here. The more typical examples for the nominated category are Mexico in the 1920s and republican Spain in the 1930s.
  2. There is a lot in the above discussion referring to goals of persecutors. Note that the original alternative proposal Category:Religious persecution by secular governments is goal-free, it only tells us who the persecuting party is, namely governments of countries that have separated church and state. Marcocapelle (talk) 18:51, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Marcocapelle State atheism is a term used for a government that is either antireligious, antitheistic or promotes atheism. In contrast, a secular state purports to be officially neutral in matters of religion, supporting neither religion nor irreligion. The Religious persecution was State atheism that tried to promotes atheism.--Jobas (talk) 21:05, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Atheist states are a subset of secular states, as they have separated church and state too. There's not going to be any consensus in this discussion on whether certain states have persecuted religious people with the goal to promote atheism, but I still believe that we can reach consensus on the fact that certain secular states (like Mexico and Spain) have persecuted religious people for whatever goal. After all, by strict logical reasoning, the goal to promote atheism is a subset of 'for whatever goal'. Marcocapelle (talk) 21:19, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Marcocapelle, Under the doctrine of state atheism in the Soviet Union, there was a "government-sponsored program of forced conversion to atheism", Many priests were killed and imprisoned. Thousands of churches were closed, some turned into hospitals. In 1925 the government founded the League of Militant Atheists to intensify the persecution. This league was a "nominally independent organization established to promote atheism.", criticism of atheism was strictly forbidden and sometimes resulted in imprisonment.
During the rule of Plutarco Elías Calles, Mexico has been characterized as an atheist state, and his program as being one to eradicate religion in Mexico. ( Nationalism, Liberalism, and Progress: The dismal fate of new nations, Cornell Univ. Press 2000).
And as i said before a secular state purports to be officially neutral in matters of religion, supporting neither religion nor irreligion, While an State atheism is a term used for a government that is either antireligious, antitheistic or promotes atheism. Thanks.--Jobas (talk) 21:35, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Is it not clear here that the goal is taking an aspect of a totalitarian regime and making it seem... the regime itself by using it as a label for its actions? And why that label? This is not only selective, unsupported by any historical consensus), but a demonstration of a clear apologist and anti-atheist agenda (as, demonstrably, only these try to present this 'view' (as fact!))... this is already bad enough, but the refusal to accept any term but 'atheism' makes the goal of making 'atheism' seem an identifiable 'group' or 'groupthink' (which it is not, unlike communism and other religions) in order to better denigrate it very very clear. Because denigration is the goal here.
There is no reason why a totalitarian regime's persectutions (of competing totalitarian organisations (like many religions)) cannot be attributed to the regime/organisation as it is commonly known and referred to by historical consensus, and these regrouped under a 'persecution of religion' category. Anyone truely interested in sharing fact would have no problem with this. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 22:25, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The categories of "Persecution By Muslims", "Persecution by Christians" suffer similar ambiguities to the category we are discussing because governments were involved in those cases too, which had diverse goals, not just one. It is quite difficult to label any conflict as merely driven by abstractions like Theism or Islam or Christianity or Atheism. None of these abstractions promote persecution in and of themselves because they are all theoretical, but that would not mean that empirical and measurable manifestations would not occur. In the case of atheists in the Soviet Union we do have noticeable aftershocks as Pew Research Center data has shown that there were solid rises in religious self-identification away from "unaffiliated" (which includes atheism, agnosticism, etc) all of a sudden right after the USSR fell (per their graphs). They note, "For centuries, Orthodox Christianity was the dominant religion in Russia. This began to change in the early 20th century, following the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution and the imposition of state-sponsored atheism as part of communist ideology. During the Soviet period, many priests were imprisoned, many churches were converted to other uses or fell into disrepair, and people who publicly professed religious beliefs were denied prestigious jobs and admission to universities. While it is likely that some share of the population continued, in private, to identify with the Orthodox Church and other religious groups, it is impossible to measure the extent to which these attachments survived underground during the Soviet period and to what extent they faded away." [3] It makes sense that under diverse persecution, people would make stealth identities to reduce the damage or already be gone or dead, but the rise since the early 90's is noticeable. Huitzilopochtli (talk) 02:44, 23 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
If you are suggesting that other categories, "Persecution By Muslims", "Persecution by Christians", etc., should be reviewed, I would be interested in participating if you decide to nominate them for review. The reasons Category:Persecution by atheists is being deleted probably will not apply to those other categories, however. As for your observations regarding the "communist ideology" mentioned by the Pew source, I don't think anyone is arguing against the fact that "During the Soviet period, many priests were imprisoned, many churches were converted to other uses or fell into disrepair, and people who publicly professed religious beliefs were denied prestigious jobs and admission to universities." Religious persecution did happen. The reason the category is being deleted is because it misleads our readers as to the source of the persecution. Xenophrenic (talk) 03:49, 23 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Hmm...the Pew source noted "...the imposition of state-sponsored atheism..." in the sentence before (see quote). In other words atheism with power and resources, not mere communism. Any abstraction or idea with power can lead to strong misuse because people will add flesh to it like the Soviets did with their version of atheism (they wrote about it, made organizations about it, made holidays about it, went into people's worldviews about it, they persecuted their metaphysical competition, etc). I may consider the other categories later on.Huitzilopochtli (talk) 06:42, 23 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
No amount of 'selective reality' sophism (that will not appear in a category label) will change the fact that you are attempting to take the actions of totalitarian Soviet communism (and even 'communism' in that label is disingenuous, but I digress) and make atheism seem their cause, origin and motivation. This attempt to mislead readers, and WP:SOAPBOX a demonstrably anti-atheist agenda, is a blatant misuse of Wikipedia.
Again, if the goal was indeed presenting a factual regrouping to readers, then there would be no problem with attributing the persecutions to their authors using the terms they are most commonly referred to by the public and historical consensus. But the effort here to ignore both historical consensus and reality (disassociating and singling out one choice action of the totalitarian-'communism' 'cause') to attempt to pin the blame on 'atheism' through an 'atheism' (and no other!) label is a clear demonstration that (ab)using Wikipedia to WP:SOAPBOX an agenda, not fact, is the goal here. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 09:13, 23 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep / Oppose There are allot of POV editors on this allot that also appeared in the State atheism Straw poll [4]. Wikipedia census does not overide valid sourcing from scholarly sources. Editors on this discussion will not accept sources and instead want to bring things up for a vote to override with is in peer reviewed sources. Sources that say atheism is a source of persecution. 2015 Chapel Hill shooting is but a recent example. On the government or state level you have scientific atheism which persecutes religions and people of those religions. There is nothing to say that people whom have religious convictions by reason of atheism should have their religious rights given or protected. As a matter of history examples like the War in the Vendée and the Cristero War that are not just Eurasian. LoveMonkey (talk) — Note: An editor has expressed a concern that LoveMonkey (talk • contribs) has been canvassed to this discussion.
Sources that say atheism is a source of persecution.
Please provide those reliable sources. This certainly isn't one. Your assertions are meaningless without reliable sources to back them up. Provide them, please? Xenophrenic (talk) 09:13, 8 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I would like to see what scholars like say Paul Froese [5] have to say about these logical fallacies that are being treated as valid positions. As the entire argument to have the categories deleted is in essence an argument from silence. LoveMonkey (talk) 18:51, 23 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
What logical fallacies? Just calling something one doesn't make it one (at best it's a 'fallacy fallacy' ; ). Anyhow, I'm very sure that if someone wanted to say that the Kennedy assassination was a communist plot, they could find 'valid sources'... but that, too, would be a agenda'd mistruth in total defiance of what historical consensus says. The claim in question is present in Christian apologetic sources only (and this is not an 'argument from silence'; it's a demonstrable fact that damns itself). So this vote, too, is founded on nothing demonstrable.THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 20:27, 23 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The argument from silence as I have already stated. LoveMonkey (talk) 13:21, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Well, that doesn't even make any sense; you do realise that you're on Wikipedia, where all claims must be reflected/backed by reliable sources (and not just a few selective anti-atheist/apologetic ones), right? THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 13:45, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
You appear to be assuming bad faith as you and your side here say things like "English please" and this or that "doesnt even make sense" to you as if you have to be in agreement, policy here says thats not so that behavior is a characteristic of disruptive editing. If you can not hear or understand which is a vio called WP:IDHT then you are not here to contribute you are here to disrupt. Here is a reliable source - Professor Paul Froese [6]. Here is a line from that reliable source "This article is dedicated to explaining why Communists could not successfully convert the masses to atheism." [7] Your response says you can understand and that you instead refuse to understand and that you will not listen. By saying you can't understand or you refuse to listen you are not being reasonable you are not being rational. LoveMonkey (talk) 14:17, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
When one has no argument, try ad hominem (and I never asked for 'English', by the way, and your 'argument from silence' demonstrably does not make sense). If the 'communism = atheism' claim was true, then it would appear in mainstream sources such as the Encyclopedia Britannica. It doesn't, so go figure. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 22:28, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
According to your Froese source, The Communist Party destroyed churches, mosques, and temples; it executed religious leaders; it flooded the schools and media with anti-religious propaganda; and it introduced a belief system called “scientific atheism,” complete with atheist rituals, proselytizers, and a promise of worldly salvation. Note that the persecutor is the Communist Party (which is why we are deleting the nonsensical "Persecuted by atheists" category), and possibly creating a "Religious persecution by Communist Party" category, or something equally accurate. Please also note that since "scientific atheism" a belief system, that means it isn't atheism, so we really should stop misleading our readers. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 21:40, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Jobas, LoveMonkey, Ramos1990, and others are correct here. Renaming the category to "secular governments" or "secularism" only dilutes the fact that individuals and governments persecuted the religious to impose atheism on society at large. The category should therefore continue to remain as its current name, Category:Persecution by atheists. To echo the comments above, a secular state such as India, is very different from a state that has a policy of state-sponsored militant atheism, like North Korea. Eliko007 (talk) 22:46, 23 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete this is "me, too" category; where someone is attributing "by atheists" to various secular, even officially atheist, governments. We don't including all the categories of oppression by Foo, the acts of every governmental agency run by Fooish folks; if so, these categories would have endless views of what constitutes oppression and which religion had control of its perpetrating entity: are/were laws against sodomy oppression by Islam in Iran, by Christianity in Germany, by atheism in the Soviet Union, and by ??? in the United States - or were they policy choices by the bodies politic of the place and time? Carlossuarez46 (talk) 02:05, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Reply Isn't every sub-cat a "me, too" category? I'm not aware of persecutions committed by secularists as secularists. Secularists, actuated only by their secularism, irrespective of their standing as religious or non religious, don't do such things. Only secularists who also happen to be atheists occasionally indulge in persecutions. Can a secularist who is religious be a persecutor? If he is, then he cannot be truly a secularist. Laurel Lodged (talk) 11:38, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Hello Laurel (I agree with your reply to Carlossuarez46) what you are saying is sort of whats at fault and is what for example Professor Paul Froese addresses [8] in that how secularism fails is when it works WITH atheism and is directed then by the no religion or religion prohibition, goal. Secularism then becomes hi jacked by atheism into endorsing atheism as the religious stance of the state enforced by the state. Thats the whole point of this entire set of interactions. As you have POV warrior atheists whom keep repeating the same logical fallacy of argument from silence claiming because no sources they will accept say that atheism and or atheists ever persecuted or oppressed anyone. Or that atheism never persecuted anyone to force them to give up their religion. Or that atheism never sought laws and government force to the prohibit religion the outlawing of religion and or the prohibition or outlawing of religious practice again toward the goal of atheism and or no theism. LoveMonkey (talk) 13:35, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Your repeatedly citing the 'argument from silence' is more than a tad ridiculous, especially when all Wikipedia claims depend on historical record and consensus (or they cannot appear!). And it has been demonstrated many times already that the few sources attributing said persecution to 'atheism' (and not Soviet communist-totalitarianism) are anti-atheist and apologetic, and this is not reflected in mainstream/historical consensus publications at all. Wikipedia is not a platform to WP:SOAPBOX a decidedly agenda'd WP:ESSAY.
Note to moderators: Fact-check everything, please; even this. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 13:55, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
You have no scholarly sources that say atheism has never persecuted anyone. You have no scholarly sources that say atheists has never persecuted anyone. You state over and over again that because sources that have been provided to you by me and other editors (again Professor Paul Froese for example [9]) here do not say exactly as you insist that they do not say what they actually say. Just because they did not use your exact wording does not mean that in their silence that they source you position. LoveMonkey (talk) 14:35, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Yes please have the moderators note the quote from Professor Froese "This article is dedicated to explaining why Communists could not successfully convert the masses to atheism." It does not say convert the masses to communism does it? [10] LoveMonkey (talk) 20:56, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Even your citation "This article is dedicated to explaining why Communists could not successfully convert the masses to atheism." (which is not '"This article is dedicated to explaining why atheists could not successfully convert the masses to atheism." that this category claims) demonstrates the mistruth in a 'persecution by atheists' label. Cheers. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 22:39, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, and Paul Froese is demonstrably an anti-atheist apologist, which even better demonstrates that it is a fringe agenda that is being soapboxed here. If the 'atheist persecution' claim was true, one would think that, in a Christianity-dominated English-speaking world, that there would be ample mainstream documentation supporting it... that isn't the case at all, so go figure. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 22:48, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
You are incorrect, LoveMonkey. Nobody is discussing converting anyone to anything. We are discussing persecution. Froese says the Soviets / Communist Party were the persecutors; they exiled the clergy (sometimes imprisoned or even killed them). The only thing some "atheists" might attack - because of their atheism - is religious belief, not people. If they are also going to persecute people, it will not be because of atheism, it will be because of some ideology. And your Froese source agrees. As for no scholarly sources, see below. I also urge you to read your sources more carefully. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 21:40, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Reliable sources conveying that persecution was not "by atheists", but by the totalitarian regimes and dictators who tried to suppress or abolish religion and usher in an atheistic society.
Many of these same sources also identify the "by atheists" meme as a popular myth propagated by theists, theologians and religious apologists. --Xenophrenic
For good people to do evil doesn't require only religion, or any religion, but simply one of its key elements: belief without evidence--in other words, faith. And that kind of faith is seen not just in religion, but in any authoritarian ideology that puts dogma above truth and frowns on diseent. This was precisely the case in the totalitarian regimes of Maoist China and Stalinist Russia, whose excesses are often (and wrongly) blamed on atheism.
— Faith Versus Fact - Jerry A. Coyne - Viking Publishers, 2015; Pgs. 220
Although it was not fully successful in its mission, the Soviet-led antireligious campaign might have had some lasting effects, as the proportion of atheists and nonreligious in post-Soviet societies remains quite high even in the absence of scientific atheist propaganda and coercion.

In the midst of gaining power, the Bolsheviks began an antireligious campaign seeking to disestablish influential religions like Eastern Orthodoxy, to nationalize all church property, and to transfer responsibility in providing public services (such as birth, marriage, and death registration) from church to state organizations. Seeing religion as antithetical to the modern project of socialist political and economic development, revolutionary leaders thought it necessary to disentangle religious institutions from the state and to create conditions in which religion was deemed irrelevant to society's members.

The timing for an antireligious campaign seemed ripe in the late tsarist regime as an increasing portion of the population, especially in Russia, was disenchanted with the close role the Russian Orthodox Church bore with the state. ... Thus, even though the Soviet regime would be the first regime ever to devise a campaign promoting atheism, a general skepticism (at least with regard to the Russian Orthodox Church) was already present at the eve of the revolution. ... Seeking immediate separation, the newly established Bolshevik leaders provoked an antireligous campaign that often involved violent, coercive actions. This initial campaign was followed by a relatively calm period (although intimidation tactics and arrests of clerics continued), which focused on propaganda and socialization. ... The conflicts during the Civil War era, however, were eventually seen as counterproductive to the cause of establishing an atheist socialist society. Thus, most of the 1920s witnessed a shift from directly coercive measures to gradual measures to socialize citizens as atheists.

In 1925, the Party established the Soviet League of the Militant Godless (or, Militant Atheists) to organize a systematic program against religion. ... The League of the Militant Godless was conceived as an association of volunteers who were committed to promoting "scientific materialism" through eductional activities like lectures, reading circles, and promotional materials. The League's creation symbolized the Bolshevik regime's attempts to shift the antireligious campaign away from coercion to socialization. However, this shift toward a more passive antireligious campaign was not supported unanimously.
— Atheism and Secularity (Vol. 2) - Edited by Phil Zuckerman - Praeger, 2010 - Pgs. 46-47
A fundamental tenet of Marxism-Leninism is that religion will ultimately disappear. If it began to seem unlikely to do so, the authorities would naturally adopt measures to promote its disappearance, since its continued presence was a rebuke to the claims of the ideology. The above impulse was reinforced when the system developed into full totalitarianism (in the USSR, from the late 1920s): the internal compulsion of such a system demanded the liquidation of any social institution (not just religious) which was not under its complete control.
— Religious Policy in the Soviet Union - Edited by Sabrina Petra Ramet - Cambridge University Press, 1993 - Pgs. 4
If God defines what is good and what is evil, then those who follow God's commands are morally justified to commit similar atrocities. History shows the result: holy wars, burning of heretics, the Crusades, the Inquisition, the Thirty Years' War, the English Civil War, witch hunts, cultural genocide, brutal conquests of the Aztecs, Incas, and Mayans, ethnic cleansing, slavery, colonialist tyranny, and pogroms against the Jews eventually leading to the Holocaust.

Theists try to counter all this by pointing to the mass-murdering atheists of the twentieth century: Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Nicolae Ceausescu, Enver Hoxha, and Kim Jong-Il, as if this somehow justifies the religious mass murders that they can hardly deny. Hitler is usually included in the litany, but he was a Catholic. Indeed, the Cathollic Church never excommunicated a single Nazi, but in 2010 it excommunicated nun Margaret McBride for allowing an abortion that was necessary to save the life of a pregnant woman suffering from pulmonary hypertension.

Religion scholar Hector Avalos has studied documents from the Stalin era that only recently became available. He points out that there is no documented statement in which Stalin justified his actions by saying something such as, "I don't believe in God, therefore I am committing violent act X." On the other hand, in all the examples we saw above of terrorists associated with some religion, you can find direct statements of the form, "God wants X, therefore I am committing violent act Y." Avalos says, "We cannot find any direct evidence that Stalin's own personal agenda killed because of atheism."

Now you might argue that while Stalin did not kill in the name of atheism, his godlessness failed to provide any restraint on his behavior. But then, neither has godliness provided much restraint to the murderers of history.

Avalos does not deny that Stalin committed many antireligious acts. But the predominant acts of violence committed dring the period 1932-39, called the Great Purge, or the Great Terror, were clearly political in nature. Religion played a minor role. If a church went along, it was left alone. If it objected, it was persecuted along with everybody else who refused to cooperate.
— God and the Folly of Faith - Victor J. Stenger - Prometheus Books, 2012 - Pgs. 254-255
Neither religious belief nor religous disbelief is a guarantee of good behavior. Incentives like greed, power, anger, resentment, fear, or desperation can overwhelm the moral incentives listed earlier in the previous section, which can make an atheist or a believer behave badly.

Still, plenty of people in both camps spend an enormous amount of energy trying to paint the other side as immoral by using the bad behavior of famous monsters--dictators or criminals drunk on greed, power, anger, and all the rest--as an indictment of everyone who shares the monster's religious (or nonreligious) label.

But using the horrendous acts of Grand Inquisitor Torquemada, or Adolf Hitler, or Fred Phelps to draw conclusions about the average Ned Flanders Christian is a stretch. Likewise, thinking that Idi Amin or Osama bin Laden are any reflection on the moral character of my Muslim neighbors ignores all the other variables that made the famous monsters what they were.

The same applies to Joseph Stalin, Mao Zedong, and other atheists with immoral behavior to answer for. Like the religious villains, their actions say more about unchecked power than about their opinions of gods. And drawing conclusions about what it means to be an everyday atheist from Stalin is as silly as doubting the ethics of a passing Quaker because Torquemada lost his moral compass.
— 'Atheism For Dummies - Dale McGowan, PhD. - John Wiley & Sons Canada, Ltd., 2013 - Pgs. 257
"Hitler and Stalin were atheists. What have you got to say about that?" The question comes up after just about every public lecture that I ever give on the subject of religion ... It is put in a truculent way, indignantly freighted with two assumptions: not only (1) were Stalin and Hitler atheists, but (2) they did their terrible deeds because they were atheists ... assumption (2) is false. ... What matters is not whether Hitler and Stalin were atheists, but whether atheism systematically influences people to do bad things. There is not the smallest evidence that it does. Individual atheists may do evil things but they don't do evil things in the name of atheism. Stalin and Hitler did extremely evil things, in the name of, respectively, dogmatic and doctrinaire Marxism...
— The God Delusion - Richard Dawkins - Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2008 - Pgs. 278; 315-316
To view atheism as a way of life, whether beneficial or harmful, is false and misleading. Just as the failure to believe in magic elves does not entail a code of living or a set of principles, so the failure to believe in a god does not imply any specific philosophical system. From the mere fact that a person is an atheist, one cannot infer that this person subscribes to any particular positive beliefs. One's positive convictions are quite distinct from the subject of atheism. ... The practice of linking atheism with a set of beliefs, especially moral and political beliefs, allows the theist to lump atheists together under a common banner, with the implication that one atheist agrees with the beliefs of another atheist. And here we have the ever popular "guilt by association." Since communists are notoriously atheistic, argue some theists, there must be some connection between atheism and communism. The implication here is that communism is somehow a logical outgrowth of atheism, so the atheist is left to defend himself against the charge of latent communism. This irrational and grossly unfair practice of linking atheism with communism is losing popularity and is rarely encountered any longer except among political conservatives. But the same basic technique is sometimes used by the religious philosopher in his attempt to discredit atheism.
— Atheism: The Case Against God - George H. Smith - Prometheus Books, 2010 - Pgs. 21-22
While most theists accept that religion has resulted in much unnecessary suffering and history, they argue that atheists, notably Stalin, Mao and Hitler, killed more people in the twentieth century alone than were killed for religious reasons in all the previous centuries put together. ... [Religious Studies Professor Hector Avalos] found no evidence that Stalin killed because of atheism. Rather, the data indicate that Stalin's genocide was driven by the politics of forced collectivization.
— The New Atheism - Victor J. Stenger - Prometheus Books Pgs. 115-116
Myth 27: Many Atrocities Have Been Committed in the Name of Atheism This sort of claim is often made by theists. (Several are named, including McGrath) ... Isn't it interesting that the list of evil-doers always seems to begin with Hitler followed by Stalin and Pol Pot--sometimes with Mao Zedong added for good measure? ... It's standard operating procedure for Christian apologists. ... Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot were actually atheists, but they acted in the name of their positive belief systems, not in the name of a liberal critique of religion. ... Other dictatorships that committed their share of atrocities were certainly not driven by atheism. For example, Franco's Spain was controlled by an expressly Catholic idology. Similar comments could be made about other fascist movements and dictatorships, most notably Ustashi in Croatia. ... the Soviet Union was undeniably an atheist state, and the same applies to Maoist China and to Pol Pot's fanatical Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia in the 1970s. That does not, however, show that the atrocities committed by these totalitarian dictatorships were the result of atheist beliefs, carried out in the name of atheism, or caused primarily by the atheistic aspects of the relevant forms of communism. ... Can we find any grain of truth in this myth? Yes. There were persecutions of churches ... however, Stalin and other communist leaders were more concerned with the political influence that organized churches could exercise than with the substance of any particular beliefs, or with an insistence that their populations renounce belief in God. The Soviet regime viewed the churches and their leaders as political rivals that had to be neutralized for it to succeed in its goals. ... Similar comments can be made about the regime of Mao Zedong. ... A similar pattern of utter ruthlessness, combined with attempted economic transformation on an apocalyptic scale can be seen in the conduct of the Khmer Rouge regime ... While we do not doubt that religious people were often targeted as enemies of all these regimes' grandiose plans, this was usually because churches and other religious authorities (such as those related to Confucian tradition in China) were seen as actual or potential sources of resistence. ... None of this followed from mere atheism, and instead far more comprehensive political and economic ideologies were relied upon.
— 50 Great Myths About Atheism - Russell Blackford, Udo Schüklenk - John Wiley & Sons, 2013 - Pgs. 147-149
Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot possessed a complete hatred of anyone opposed to their communist ideals. Those who dared to challenge communism were simply removed. They were atheists, certainly, but like most atheists this fact meant little to them. That they did not believe in God was something that they had in common, but equally all three men had dark hair. Nobody is suggesting that hair colour has fuelled their genocidal tendencies. The driving force for their persecution of religion was communism. It was also the driving force for their persecution of all land-owners, political opponents, intellectuals, and dissenters. Their motivation was not atheism, it was communism.
— The Atheists Are Revolting! - Nick Gisburne - Lulu Press, 2007 - Pgs. 140
Before we can proceed, it is critically important to realize that the entire "debate" in Western civilization about atheism and religion has been conducted in religious, and more specifically theistic, terms. Two gross, and false, assumptions have driven this debate. The first is that religion, and more specifically theism, is the default position: most people are religious/theists, and atheism is the exception: something not only to be explained but to be opposed. The second is that religion is theism, and therefore atheism is "a-religion" and "anti-religion." [...] humans are not "natural theists"; that is why it takes so many years of teaching and indoctrination, so much institutional weight, so much colonization of experience, to instill the concept of theism. Humans are natural atheists -- not in the sense of attacking god(s) but in the sense of lacking god(s). No newborn human has any ideas about, let alone any "beliefs in," god(s) -- or for that matter, any other religious entities. [...] No human is born a theist. Humans are born without any god-concepts. Humans are natural atheists. [...] The second and more pernicious source of error is the attribution of "belief" to atheists, sometimes literally the insistence that atheism is a belief. Theists certainly, and atheists occasionally too, will say that atheism is a belief -- the belief that god(s) does (do) not exist. This is a familiar and seductive way of thinking, since "belief" is such a ubiquitous and powerful concept. Surely, Christians argue, belief is universal and essential to religion; still more, religion is only one kind of belief. Theists often go so far as to call science a belief-system, to equate all knowledge with belief. [...] The relevant point for current purposes is that absence of belief, even active rejection of a belief, is not itself a belief. [...] Atheism, as we have established, is not a "belief" that there is no such thing as god(s) but a default or a reasoned lack of any such belief.
— Atheism and Secularity (Vol. 1) - Edited by Phil Zuckerman - Praeger, 2010 - Pgs. 1-8
First of all, there is no such thing as state-imposed atheism.  A state can ban religion, but it cannot ban atheism because it is not a belief, a faith, a set of doctrines or dogmas and cannot be imposed on anybody.  Atheism is an absence of belief, and you cannot ban something that does not exist.  I have heard the argument so many times from believers who think that atheism is a belief. They compare it to a religion.  They say it takes faith.  They accuse us of hating god.  Believers really need to find another line of fire, as all of these arguments only serve to make them look like complete idiots, which is unnecessary, as many believers are otherwise intelligent individuals. This chapter, however, will deal with the claims about Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, Mass Murder and Broken Relationships.  We'll start with the people mentioned, and, as far as I'm aware, none of them said "I don't believe in god, therefore I will slaughter lots of innocent people". ...

Joseph Stalin was raised to be a Catholic Priest and I remain curious as to why his Christianity is shoved aside in all these arguments. Yes, there is no way to get around the fact that in his early career, Stalin made a vast effort to rid Russia of religion, but that had nothing to do with atheism.  It was the only way he knew to seize power of the country. For generations the entire populace of Russia had been taught that the head of state was supposed to be close to god.  At the time in question, the head of the church in Russia was a tyrant.  The Russians were already disposed to servility and all Stalin did was exploit these two facts, and place himself in the position of god.  Once Stalin was firmly seated in office, he revived the Russian Orthodox Church in order to intensify patriotic support for the war effort.  Stalin was part of a council convened to elected a new church Patriarch.  Then the Russian theological schools were opened, and thousands of churches began to function. Even the Moscow Theological Academy Seminary was re-opened, after being closed since 1918.

So, while Stalin was no peach, he was not exactly what you would call a died-in-the-wool atheist.  He was more a secular minded religious opportunist, which is a personal character trait.  He did not use atheism to gain control, but religious principles that were modified to fit his own, sick and twisted method of revolution.
— A Voice Of Reason In An Unreasonable World – The Rise Of Atheism On Planet Earth - Al Stefanelli - UAF Publishers, 2011 - Pgs. 230-234
ATHEIST REGIMES The first ever officially declared atheist nation in the world was Albania under the role of communist dictator Enver Hoxha ... The former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) was also explicitly atheistic ... Finally, we must acknowledge North Korea, one of the worst nations on earth today in just about all respects ... North Korea maintains a state sanctioned and enforced atheism, with the only 'religion' permissible being the worship of the dictator. ... there is no question that some of the worst regimes of the twentieth and twenty first centuries have been explicitly atheistic. But perhaps atheism isn't the main problem. Maybe totalitarianism is. After all, some of the world's worst tyrannical, corrupt, and bloody regimes during the same time period have also been explicitly theistic ... we know that when power is held undemocratically, the result will always be negative. Fascism, totalitarianism, communism--all such forms of national dominance have been based on might and repression, rather than freedom and liberty. ... [Gregory S. Paul's] research has consistently shown that the correlation still holds: the least theistic democracies fare better on nearly all indicators of social well-being than the more theistic democracies. ... This fact renders suspect any proclamation that theism is a necessary element or condition of societal well being, and it renders manifestly false the argument that atheism is somehow detrimental to society.
— The Oxford Handbook of Atheism - edited by Stephen Bullivant, Michael Ruse - Oxford University Press, 2014 - Pgs. 506-508
Is there any evidence at all, anywhere, that morality needs religion, that atheists are simply bad human beings who treat their fellow man worse than religious people do? If so, where is the evidence? The almost invariable answer to this question one receives from religious stalwarts is a specious one, so specious that those Christian writers who peddle it are either very misinformed or deliberately lying. They cite the horrors of Hitler and Stalin, claiming both were atheists. But where is the evidence that Hitler, an altar boy as a Catholic youth, later became an atheist? The definite weight of the evidence is that he did not. ... less than nine months before he killed himself in his Berlin bunker, he proclaimed that his miraculous survival from the previous day's attempt on his life "only confirmed my conviction that Almighty God has called me to lead the German people to victory." ... The anti-atheists feel they have their strongest case against atheism in Stalin, an avowed atheist. Being a Marxist and communist, of course he was an atheist. But everyone knows that in the movement toward communism led by Lenin and a young Stalin in Russia and resulting in the Russian Revolution of 1917, atheism was but an ancillary tenet to the main engine behind the movement--the redistribution of wealth through a class struggle that would bring about the collapse of capitalism. And Stalin was simply a brutal dictator who wanted total control over the physical and economic lives of all Russians, their religious belief being way, way down the list ... the tyranny of Hitler and Stalin, as well as Mao Zedong, had nothing to do with religion. To say that Stalin was evil because he was an atheist is to say that people who are atheists are likely to be evil, a preposterous suggestion.
— Divinity of Doubt: The God Question - Vincent Bugliosi - Vanguard Press, 2013 - Pgs. 226-229
A challenge for understanding secularist activism includes the question of how to conceptually categorize such diverse subgroups in terms of a "collective identity" or "collective interest." ... As one atheist author noted, "atheism is not itself an ideology; there is no such thing as an "atheist mindset" or an "atheist movement." Atheism per se hasn't inspired and doesn't lead to anything in particular because it is an effect—not a cause—and there are countless reasons for a person to not believe in God, ranging from vicious to innocent to noble. The newborn baby lacks a belief in God, as does the Postmodern Nihilist, the Communist, and the Objectivist—but each for entirely different reasons having dramatically different implications. So lumping all of these together under the "atheist" label as if that were a meaningful connection is profoundly confused.
— Atheist Awakening - Richard Cimino and Christopher Smith - Oxford University Press, 2014 - Pgs. 104-105
So now we have the two atheist editors on here engaging in ad hominem personal attacks against Professor Froese and saying that no scholarly source say that atheists whom happened to be communists (as there are such things as Christian communists) killed people and attempted to convert them to atheism NOT just communism as the quote I noted. So we have the fallacy of personal attacks and the fallacy of argument from silence and now we have editor Xenophrenic posting quotes that either do not say what he is sourcing them to say (they do say atheists did persecute people) or it appears Xenophrenic is and continues to be engaging in argument for the logical fallacy of No true Scotsman that these Atheist socialists or atheist communists did not attempt by violence, repression and force to not only force-able convert people to either communism and or socialism AND ATHEISM, but that no true atheist would do such a thing-hence the fallacy No true Scotsman. As atheism does not require that people agree with it and yet I gave a scholar whom says it did in the USSR use the government to try and force people to convert to it (atheism). Therefore these humans now are no longer humans because they are the every changing term atheists (another fallacy called moving the goal posts). These arguments appear to be made in echo chambers as atheists deny any repression committed by atheists but use the standard when theists do repressive things and if the standard be that Muslim terrorists kill in the name of their religion so too atheist (like the Chapel Hill murders [11]) kill Muslims in the name of no religion or non belief or atheism. As editors here are forever fighting to say only they understand what atheism is and also that we (Wikipedia) have to get them to agree to atheism being non belief until we point out that someone says that people have done bad stuff because of non belief then again we go back to it being these bad people did bad stuff but that only happens if said people are theist as soon as they are atheists their unbelief in the good or God as Plato says had nothing to do with the bad that they did. That is absolutely irrational and an absolute denial of human nature. LoveMonkey (talk) 01:56, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
so too atheist (like the Chapel Hill murders) kill Muslims in the name of no religion or non belief or atheism
Please provide a reliable source which supports that nonsense. Preferably a source which isn't easily shown to be nonsense. All of these hand-wavy assertions are meaningless without comprehensive reliable sources to back them up. Xenophrenic (talk) 09:13, 8 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
No, you have two contributors (identity politics brings nothing to the argument) patiently demonstrating that what some are attempting to push as fact here (through using categories as labels) reflects neither reality nor historical consensus, but an identifiable-group (and observing that the author is part of it is not 'ad hominem') fringe opinion. That's it. Myself, I add the WP:SOAPBOX element to it, because that's demonstrably what's going on here (attempts to abuse Wikipedia this way are many - it's the world's most consulted site, after all). THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 07:33, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The article provided by User:LoveMonkey is pretty good! That journal is top notch too! Not sure why most of the abstract is ignored when it does address the issue: "Under communism, the Russian religious landscape consisted mainly of two competitors—a severely repressed Russian Orthodox Church and a heavily promoted atheist alternative to religion called “scientific atheism.” Under these circumstances, one might expect the rapid spread of religious disbelief, but the intensity of the atheist campaign originated from official mandate and not popular appeal. In turn, scientific atheism never inspired the Russian population and grew increasingly uninspired as Soviet officials created a monopoly “church” of scientific atheism in hopes of replacing persistent religious beliefs and practices. It also note coercion for these goals.
In the body of the article it clearly notes "Atheists waged a 70-year war on religious belief in the Soviet Union. The Communist Party destroyed churches, mosques, and temples; it executed religious leaders; it flooded the schools and media with anti-religious propaganda; and it introduced a belief system called “scientific atheism,” complete with atheist rituals, proselytizers, and a promise of worldly salvation. But in the end, a majority of older Soviet citizens retained their religious beliefs and a crop of citizens too young to have experienced pre-Soviet times acquired religious beliefs. This article seeks to explain why atheists, with the full support of a totalitarian state, were unsuccessful in secularizing Russian society." It is pretty clear and the article fleshes out quite well the activities that "atheists" did engage in.
I think that is is pretty clear that the issue is not "atheism" per se (that is an abstraction like Islam or Christianity), but what atheists there did to affect people's personal beliefs about reality (which is beyond the scope of any normal secular government). Hope this helps. Huitzilopochtli (talk) 03:15, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
"I think that is is pretty clear that the issue is not "atheism" per se"
Thank you for that, at least. In reality, what you have is two competing 'we think for you (so obey, or else!)' totalitarian organisations, and the dominating one kicking the competition out. Of course, presenting things here that way is out of the question, because historical consensus and most references do not. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 07:33, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
It is sort of like the difference between "racism" and "racist". Racism is an abstraction (and is harmless really), but the focus of the category is on the racist (actual actions and deeds by agents who discriminate by race). In the case of atheists, they discriminated by beliefs in the supernatural and personal belief systems of reality when there was no need for it. Does this help?Huitzilopochtli (talk) 08:52, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
"Racism is an abstraction (and is harmless really)"... on the side, that is a troubling declaration. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 10:07, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
No, you're actually distracting/muddling the issue by by descending into sophism again. You keep declaring (accusing) that 'atheists did' (and seek to advertise that), but the overwhelming majority of the historical record says 'communists did', and that's the only point here. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 10:01, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Jobas1990 that the Froese source "clearly notes" that the "Atheists waged a 70-year war on religious belief in the Soviet Union" and work toward a secularized society, just as they have continued to do in much of the Western world until present day, while the "The Communist Party" destroyed churches, mosques, and temples; it executed religious leaders..." - or, in short, persecuted. So a category named "Religious persecution by a communist party" does have at least one source to support it. The Froese source does not support the nonsensical "Persecution by atheists" creation, however. The Froese source mentions "persecution/persecuted" exactly six times, and every time attributes it to Soviets / Communists - not atheists or atheism. What the "totalitarian state" did to persecute religion with the hopes to create an atheistic society was indeed beyond normal secular government, and this Froese article correctly places blame (unlike our misleading category under discussion).
As for calling "racism" a harmless abstraction, or equating atheism with Islam and Christianity, those opinions require a whole separate discussion and are wholly unrelated to the matter at hand. Xenophrenic (talk) 10:59, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The source that states "This article is dedicated to explaining why Communists could not successfully convert the masses to atheism." Convert the masses to atheism is something that you claim doesn't exist. Or Communists trying to convert people to atheism means that the communists to convert people to atheism must not have been atheists nor could they be cause you cant understand such a thing. And if you cant understand it, its not allowed. As you have already done and you fellow editor PROMENADER you do not listen to this but will instead either attack Professor Froese or post another passage from Professor Froese out of context and claim THERE that's not what Professor Froese said because I PROMENADER or Xenophrenic reinterpret what Professor Froese said to mean what I want him to say. Rather than what Professor Froese actually said and is posted and sourced. There is no such thing as an atheist that does bad things like persecute people because in order to be an atheist they just can't do that (fallacy of No True Scotsman). You both use a whole series of informational fallacies as misdirects No True Scotsman, Moving the Goal Posts, Argument from silence and gaslighting. No one seems to understand but you the meaning of the word atheist or the word atheism. Or atheist can't do bad things and still be atheist. Note to others reading this Wikipedia is allowing this type of disruptive behavior even though it is against policy WP:IDHT. How is it that this entire argument is that because sources do not use the exact wording that only your side can define then they are not saying what they are saying? The criteria is governments that stated that they were atheist did bad things thats the only criteria in order for that to be true no has to source their motive if they called themselves atheist and tried to convert people to atheism then they did. There is no criteria that because people can not get them explicitly state "because of atheism" and converting the masses to atheism could have no other motive to a rational or reasonable person. LoveMonkey (talk) 15:38, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
"This article is dedicated to explaining why Communists could not successfully convert the masses to atheism."
Again, Frose states himself that it was the communists who persecuted religion, and he also quite correctly treats, with his 'to atheism', atheism as a (non-)concept, and not a 'thing' or 'neferious group' as only apologists and anti-atheists often do. I didn't have to point out that Frose is seemingly of these persuasions, granted, but that does nothing to change the fact that your claim-accusation does not even agree with the very cherrypicked source you cite. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 15:49, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
So the 70-year war waged by atheists and the communists who destroyed churches & mosques were two different groups? Is this what you would have us believe? Laurel Lodged (talk) 11:17, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
That's not what was said at all. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 12:21, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
You're being uncommonly reticent @ThePromenader:. At the risk of a verbose shower, I must ask you to clarify how many groups you see and the extent to which these groups completely overlap, partially overlap or do not overlap at all. Laurel Lodged (talk) 12:39, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Only you are mentioning two groups (and the concepts of 'overlapping', etc.), so it looks like you're attempting to deconstruct n' distract... the point already quite over-extensively demonstrated is very simple, and already stated just above. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 15:39, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
You see Laurel Lodge these editors are outright straight up [[WP:IDHT editors. They refuse to hear and want their agenda and are not here to cooperate. LoveMonkey (talk) 16:29, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
That's one helluva tu quoque.THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 16:48, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@LoveMonkey: Instead of voicing your personal opinions about your fellow editors, could you instead provide a reliable source which conveys that religious persecution was committed by atheists because of their atheism? Your Froese source does not convey it, and many sources refute it, so if you can provide additional sources it would be helpful.
@Laurel Lodged: You asked, So the 70-year war waged by atheists and the communists who destroyed churches & mosques were two different groups? Is this what you would have us believe? Reliable sources would "have you believe" that the revolutionary forces were communists, and Russian, and atheist, and anti-capitalist, and pro-proletariat, and anti-bourgeoisie, and many other things. The 70-year war waged by atheists (actually a millennia-old war which is still ongoing, but "70 years" is Froese's focus in this Russian era) isn't persecution. According to Froese, the religious persecution is attributed to the Soviet / Communist revolutionaries who were trying to suppress the power and influence of the Orthodox church, and even replace it with a weird belief system they created and confusingly named "scientific atheism" (no relation to actual atheism). Please reassure me you aren't under the misconception that the Russian people rose up against the influential Orthodox Church because "darn it, we don't believe in gods so neither should you!" Facepalm Facepalm Xenophrenic (talk) 20:11, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Go ahead and deny and ignore the fallacies in your position. LoveMonkey (talk) 21:05, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
In order to deny something, it has to demonstrably exist first: just accusing someone of 'so' doesn't make them 'so', nor does it bring anything to an indefensable position (but it is a great hallmark of one). Anyhow, anyone who can read, fact-check and think for themselves will decide for themselves; all is quite evident at this point, and anything from here on in will be but repetition. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 22:13, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@LoveMonkey: Could you instead provide a reliable source which conveys that religious persecution was committed by atheists because of their atheism? Your Froese source does not convey it, and many sources refute it, so if you can provide additional sources it would be helpful. Xenophrenic (talk) 09:52, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
How does the comment "This article is dedicated to explaining why Communists could not successfully convert the masses to atheism."'[12] how does that not mean that religious persecution was committed by atheists because of their atheism? Your argument is irrational in that it says that communists whom were not atheist persecuted religious people to try and convert them to atheism because they were communists as again there are Christian Communists? You cant seem to hear my point but you so much want people to listen and hear yours. LoveMonkey (talk) 14:08, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
That sentence says he is trying to explain what "Communists" could or could not successfully do (who happened to be atheists). What we are looking for are reliable sources which say that atheists persecuted because they were atheists. Please read that whole article and pay attention to whom Froese attributes the actual persecution - it's always to the Soviets / Communists. And remember that he is speaking about "scientific atheism", not actual atheism. Froese concluded, the Soviet government generously financed atheists while brutally suppressing religious advocates. For this reason, scientific atheism should be considered the equivalent of a religious monopoly. We could have a "Religious persecution by Soviet governments", but the category under discussion is nonsensical and misleading. Xenophrenic (talk) 15:31, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I think people can see that you are in complete denial about this as why would Christian communists or Buddhist Communists impose atheism? Because they would not. So you think you have a valid position by saying that the line does not say atheism imposed atheism therefore your wide and reaching generalization "no atheists" ever imposed their atheism, is expressed in what Professor Froese said? That not a logical or rational argument. I will admit you are consistent in being irrational in that you keep using the fallacy argument from silence, which is cause sources don't say it, like you like it. They are saying what they are saying or that because no sources says it your way, it does not exist. Between this and your use of the logical fallacy no true scotsman you have no argument at all. LoveMonkey (talk) 16:52, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I think we're done here, LoveMonkey. Rather than address the substance of my comment, you personally attack a fellow editor as "in complete denial", "consistent in being irrational", "denied by atheist editors on here", etc. I'll wait for a more civil editor to make your argument for you. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 17:05, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
(Personal attack removed) LoveMonkey (talk) 18:37, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • (Second 'Keep' !vote by this editor.) Keep the category as Category:Persecution by atheists I am in agreement with User:LoveMonkey and User:Laurel Lodged that this discussion has been poisoned by Xenophrenic and ThePromendader who refuse to listen to the logical arguments and citations that individuals such as User:Jobas and User:Ramos1990 have put forth. When I expressed concerns that Xenophrenic had canvassed all the individuals who voted to delete this category here (ThePromenader, Arnoutf), Xenophrenic went ahead and deleted my concerns of Xenophrenic canvassing. If Xenophrenic is gaming the system, it's going to be difficult to make any genuine progress here. As I said above, the category's name should be kept as Category:Persecution by atheists because the whole reason that Jews (like myself) and other religionists were tortured by atheist states and atheist dictators is because they would not renounce their faith and convert to atheism. Militant state atheism is the cause of persecution, not secularism or anything else. Eliko007 (talk) 22:04, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Again, I was not canvassed; what alerted me to this was a note on the Talk:Atheism page. My long experience here has shown me how Wikipedia can be (ab)used as a platform to broadcast mistruths, and that is exactly what's going on here.
Logic, by the way, is only as good as what one puts into it: if one of its elements is a presupposition, lie, or evidenceless affirmation, then its product is, too. And, again, this is the case here; the 'communism=atheism' claim is most (if not all) of these; again, if there was any truth to it, historical consensus and mainstream references would show it clearly, yet it doesn't, and even the cherrypicked sources of those attempting to WP:SOAPBOX it here disagree with them.
If anything, voting to promote a fringe agenda one knows is untenable (amidst empty accusations (Wikilawyering) and ad hominems, which are most always a sign of a lack of any valid argument) is a demonstration of WP:GAME if I ever saw one. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 22:56, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Denying that something exists does not make it true, especially when there are historical records in place. What really is laughable is that you fail to understand that the promotion of atheism is an integral part of communism. And the notice that alerted you to this discussion was one that Xenophrenic wrote (Personal attack removed) to comment here. Notice how he did not place a similar post on the Judaism or Christianity talk page, despite the fact that adherents of these religions were the ones persecuted by militant atheists. Eliko007 (talk) 23:33, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
You're attempting to shift the burden of proof, and again, the fact that not even those making/promoting the 'communism=atheism' claim can find support for it in even their own selective opinion pieces (and the fact that it is unechoed in any mainstream publication) pretty well demonstrates its own agenda'd invalidity.
I'm sure we both know full well that Xenophrenic is not canvassing, and it is, in fact, the most transparent way of going about bringing attention to this quite off-the-radar discussion. So how, pray tell, did all all of you come by it? THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 23:49, 25 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
"What really is laughable is that you fail to understand that the promotion of atheism is an integral part of communism. "
So why the untenable contortions to extract the one aspect that technically barely qualifies as 'atheism' (anti-theism would be a more accurate term to describe persecution of religion) from its authors and present it as the 'sole accused' (something that even cherrypicked sources won't do)? That's not only laughable, that's cognitive-dissonance blatant anti-atheist-agenda-soapboxing. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 00:00, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Leaning Delete (see update following my signature) but don't feel entirely confident I understand the whole picture, and no opinion [at this point] on renaming. This is a complex subject and a cumbersome thread marred by tangents and accusations. At this point, to be realistic, it's going to be hard for uninvolved people to jump in. A summary would help, but I don't want to request a summary since it seems likely it'll just result in further disputes. I would like to address the accusations of canvassing that run through this thread. As far as I can tell, they're based on a message at Talk:Atheism. This is very clear cut not canvassing according to that very page (WP:CANVASS), which explicitly allows for notifications at "The talk page of one or more directly related articles." Talk:Atheism is not a page that is watched exclusively by atheists. Quite the contrary. It's an article about a directly related subject to this. Xenophrenic furthermore provided context for relevant deletion discussion in the past, which understandably could be understood as moving away from neutrality, but I still don't think you could call it canvassing, and repeating it (especially when considering the majority of people participating in this discussion are closer to the keep side than delete), strikes me as distracting from the actual issues (which is not to say intentionally distracting, but practically distracting and hence a hassle for people like me who start reading through the discussion and give up because it keeps getting sidetracked by such things). ... So, now that I've distracted further by continuing to talk about canvassing (and unless I have basic facts wrong, I'm not interested in discussing the canvassing issue further), I'll return to the actual subject at hand. To me the arguments that seem most persuasive are those that suggest this category may take liberties with extracting atheism from communism and/or conflating with anti-clericalism. I'm very willing to be persuaded otherwise, but I think for this category to make sense we'd need sources talking about persecution of a people in the name of atheism for its own sake, not as an aspect of a larger sociopolitical paradigm for which the ultimate ideal is communism rather than, again, atheism for its own sake. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 01:49, 26 January 2017 (UTC) Updated - I wasn't even thinking in terms of WP:CATDEF and WP:OCEGRS, but with those added to the equation, I can only put myself squarely in the delete column, with an audible sigh at the sometimes appallingly bad logic and WP:BLUDGEONing on display throughout this discussion. If this were an article, I'd feel more compelled to highlight particulars, but we're just talking about a binary decision here and the right way to go is increasingly clear. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 22:54, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I think some misunderstood my thing about racism and racist. One is an abstraction (merely theoretical - people can talk about it without actively being a participant in discrimination e.g. investigating for and against issues of race), on the other hand a racist is an actual person or group that engages in actual actions. There are positive cases of racism, by the way, usually in racial stereotypes that benefit groups (e.g. Asians are good at math) or even in racial pride, a decent article is [13] on the complex issues. Anyways, one is abstract ("-ism") and the other is concrete ("-ist"). That was the point. In the case of the Soviet Union, the historical consensus is that atheists took power and used it to their favor to promote persecutions of Orthodox Christians, Muslims, etc among other things. I don't think we can blame Communism for much considering that communism is certainly compatible with any religion, as me and Xenophrenic have already noted.
I would like to add a quote from a historian's view in "The New Atheist Denial of History" by Borden Painter (Palgrave Macmillan): "In the larger picture, historians have written about the Soviet campaign, initiated by Lenin and made state policy by Stalin, to eliminate religion, targeting all religious institutions but especially the dominant Russian Orthodox Church. Historians' works, from general surveys of the USSR to monographs on religious and cultural policies, tell the story of physical destruction of churches and monasteries, persecution and execution of clergy and believers, and attempts to win Soviet citizens to scientific atheism through such means as museums of atheism housed in former churches and proselytizing by the League of the Militant Godless. In the face of this well-known evidence, Richard Dawkins, justly appalled by the Taliban's destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas in Afghanistan, informs us that he does "not believe there is an atheist in the world who would bulldoze Mecca—or Chartres, York Minster or Notre Dame, the Shwe Dagon, the temples of Kyoto or, of course, the Buddhas of Bamiyan."...Dawkins's ill-informed statement turns out to be only one of a long list of false, misleading, and irresponsible historical pronouncements from the Big Three bestselling New Atheist authors: Dawkins, Hitchens, and Harris. As an historian, Dawkins patently falls short in his knowledge and understanding of Soviet policies and practices toward religion." Huitzilopochtli (talk) 02:50, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Regarding Painter's assertion that it was a "Soviet campaign" that tried to eliminate religion and persecuted clergy, and even created a belief system/replacement religion with rituals, invocations and everything, they named "scientific atheism" (no relation to actual atheism), most scholars agree with him. As for "Dawkin's ill-informed statement", it is only "false, misleading, and irresponsible" when taken completely out of context as Painter (and every religious apologist who can pay to get a book published) did. Left in context, as Dawkins was speaking about such fanatical destruction to zealously comply with religious edicts. There is no parallel in atheism - no such edicts to motivate such destructive action. Painter looks like a reasonably well-educated historian, so it is difficult to assess whether his misrepresentation of Dawkins was intentional or accidental. Xenophrenic (talk) 09:52, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Category: Xenophrenic seems to feel that atheism cannot be a factor in being a persecutor. This false in a number of ways. For one, many atheists actively disbelief in deities (not just an absence of belief). While some atheists may persecute others for unrelated reasons, there are many examples of persecutors doing so for reasons that actively relate to their atheism. Atheism does not (normally) mandate persecuting others, but this does not exclude it from it (sometimes) being a related motivation. Theism also does not (normally) mandate persecuting others, but this too does not exclude it from it (sometimes) being a related motivation. tahc chat 03:48, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Please don't misrepresent my "feelings", Tahc. If you wish to respond to something I've said, please quote me exactly, or better still, quote the reliable sources I'm quoting (because I don't argue based on "my feelings"). Your assertions that atheism motivates persecution and that there are "many examples" of persecution because of atheism are highly dubious, so I am requesting that you provide reliable sources (suitable for use in this discussion about a category) to back them up. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 09:52, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Please note another reason why people whom are reading this might be confused by it. Is that there are often articles and books and reports showing how atheists sue to force people to silence their religious expression as the only one atheists believe the public or government should be allowed to express is one of no religion which is atheism. [14], [15], [16], [17] , [18] As the only expression that atheists expressed they will allow is their's i.e. atheism. This is under the idea that there is supposed to be separation of church and state but not atheism and state. This is making people or forcing people to have the only expression allowed to be an atheist expression. No religion is the only thing allowed to be displayed on public property. No religion is the only opinion allowed to be expressed in the public school system. If any religious expression is attempted people are threatened with government intervention. So people are seeing reports daily of atheists going to the government and forcing people to remove their expressions of the religious from the public domain. The theists definitely say their expression is being silenced and that they are being forced to remove their religious expression so that the only expression allowed is atheism. The people behind this very clearly say they are atheists and the reason they are removing religious expression is as atheists they find it against what they believe or and non-believe.[19], [20], [21], [22], [23], [24] LoveMonkey So yes I am saying that atheists force people to express atheism as the official stance of their government. Atheists force people to accept only atheism as the proper stance for their government and atheists use the government and the force and threat of punishment from government to conform to atheists belief or non belief DAILY. LoveMonkey (talk) 15:29, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
LoveMonkey, I just carefully checked each of the 11 news links you provided, and not a single one says there was "persecution by atheists". To the contrary, each story is about Christian persecution of non-Christians, and the illegal government endorsement of one religion over another religion. You just said, "So yes I am saying that atheists force people to express atheism as the official stance of their government. Atheists force people to accept only atheism as the proper stance for their government", yet not a single source you've provided supports that nonsensical claim. Do you think no one will closely check the links you provided? Xenophrenic (talk) 16:14, 8 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Please, easily-confused people who may be reading this, please do not look at any other publications than the ones 'suggested' above for evidence that 'atheists' are a 'group' (not a '(non-)concept') that 'persecutes' people (because you will be confused when you find no mention of any such thing), and please rely on the comment above to 'interpret' what you do see in the above very carefully-chosen publications, as, without it, it would seem that they do not support that claim, either (because 'atheists' are very sneaky and pretend to be totalitarian dictators by wearing 'communist' name tags). And that totalitarian 'communism' that they're trying to spread (in place of religion)? It should really be called 'atheism', but you are not intelligent enough to understand that, so a few here are doing their best to overcome every obstacle (such as 'reality' and 'Wikipedia is not a place to soapbox fringe opinions as fact' and 'other Wikipedia rules' (as never mind how voters found this off-the-radar page, but just take our word for it, only 'atheists' canvass (because 'no accusation, no crime', I guess))) to better 'educate' you, so please let them. Thank you.THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 15:34, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
An aside the logical fallacy poo pooing does not actually counter the substance of peoples arguments it is as all fallacies a fallacious and invalid way to address if a way of thinking or stance is wrong. LoveMonkey (talk) 15:44, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Anyone reading is free to fact-check everything mentioned therein, and please do. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 15:46, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
When people's free expression is violated they will say this is a form of persecution. To argue as both you editors have done almost entirely based on logical fallacies it should be obvious that you are engaging in tenacious editing and no matter how validate the points or sources or positions expressed in counter to yours you will not cooperate nor capitulate you are here edit warring to remove things that offend you no matter how valid or sourced and true those things might be. I can not draw from your comments any other conclusion. LoveMonkey (talk) 15:54, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Heres something to fact check. An atheist sued to have a religious memorial removed. [25] The atheist won, other than an atheist memorial (one without god, gods or religious content) what type of a memorial would this atheist and the atheist organization allow? As a secular memorial would be one that reflects the lives of the actual soldiers buried there and that which would include any religion and no religion not no religion alone. LoveMonkey (talk) 16:18, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
You appear to have misread your source. Word-search on that article doesn't mention "atheist" even once, but it wouldn't matter if it did. FYI: atheists don't decide what can or cannot be displayed in public places in the U.S.; that is decided by the Constitution (and high courts), which have already declared that establishment of one religion over another (or over non-religion) is not allowed. We really should get back to the topic of actual "Religious persecution" now, but thank you for sharing your opinion. Xenophrenic (talk) 16:47, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
You now appear to be saying that the articles I posted showing athiests suing people to remove their expression of their religion from public is not so.[26] Steven Hewett identifies as an atheist "And yes there are atheists in foxholes, because I am one.".[27] LoveMonkey (talk) 17:01, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
You would do better to read what I actually write, rather than what you assume I "appear to be saying". Allow me to repeat, so that you are clear on what I said: FYI: atheists don't decide what can or cannot be displayed in public places in the U.S.; that is decided by the Constitution (and high courts), which have already declared that establishment of one religion over another (or over non-religion) is not allowed. We really should get back to the topic of actual "Religious persecution" now, but thank you for sharing your opinion. Xenophrenic (talk) 17:11, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Please please please please please' close this "discussion" before we get sued for inhuman treatment to a dead horse. Laurel Lodged (talk) 17:54, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Wouldn't that be 'inequitable' treatment, where the persecution of a dead horse is concerned? ; ) THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 17:59, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Close it now before Eliko007 adds a first, second, third "Keep" !vote? Xenophrenic (talk) 18:20, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I read what you wrote and I again confirm no true scotmans and argument from silence are not valid arguments to be against the idea that human beings called atheists don't try and impose their atheistic views on other people (creating organizations that use the power of government and force to make people either express atheist views and or to silence their own religious expressions). That human beings identified as atheist have taken government power and not attacked theists and tried to silence theists expressions. Your arguments says nothing to counter that nor the sources provided that show this happen should not be considered valid either. LoveMonkey (talk) 18:45, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

"That human beings identified as atheist have taken government power and not attacked theists and tried to silence theists expressions. "
Are you now claiming that atheists created communist-totalitarianism just to persecute religion? We're getting into flat-earther territory, here. When something never happened, how can there be a historical consensus on it? Go figure.
By the way, I suggest that you research your fallacies before throwing them around as accusations; doing that only makes yourself look bad. I say this out not as a criticism (as anyone reading will do this, themselves), but out of concern for your repute, here. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 18:55, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I suggest you just stop using them. As the logical fallacy Strawman is to purposely misrepresent what is being said by the opposing argument. So there is yet another fallacy your side has engaged in anyone in doubt got back up and read the table created by Xenophrenic. LoveMonkey (talk) 15:01, 2 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Go figure that categories that say persecuted by atheists, they do not say persecuted by atheists because they were atheists. The fact that this is lost on you is proof that you are here engaged in tenacious editing and edit warring as no where it is that one would have to source the motive behind any such persecution. If atheists did it then atheists did it, its that simple they by being designated as atheists speak to their motive by self designation. Wikipedia is not asking by policy for any such a thing only you two are. LoveMonkey (talk) 19:04, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I'll just let your seeming point-accusation bury itself ; ) THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 19:49, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strongly Oppose Deletion: I do not find the argument that atheism is not an organized body to be a compelling reason for deletion. Many totalitarian regimes exist that persecuted Christians. Many were were atheistic. In the case of Communist Russia/China/Cuba from the 1920's onward, this was a coordinated philosophical effort. Eastern Catholic Churches were seized and turned over to Orthodox authorities. The Chinese government still outlaws Roman Catholicism, instead sponsoring the Patriotic Catholic Association. I would maybe favor renaming the category "Persecution by atheistic regimes" or "Persecution motivated by atheistic philosophies", or various subcategories there of. Even if the persecution is motivated by the desire to prevent influence by outside religious authorities, that still does not mean that religious persons were oppressed for not conforming to the state sponsored beliefs or lack of beliefs. --Zfish118⋉talk 00:36, 1 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
That isn't one of the compelling reasons for deletion. The most compelling, and still unrefuted, reasons for deletion are that the category violates WP:CATDEF and WP:OCEGRS, doesn't have a distinct and comprehensive supporting main article to support it, and it is misleadingly named. But the fact that "atheism" (a word of description indicating a lack of belief in deities) is not a group, religion, philosophy, ideology or organized body has indeed been raised as a supporting argument.
Many totalitarian regimes exist that persecuted Christians.
EXACTLY. Totalitarian governments/regimes persecute, not "atheists" (although no one disputes that some people enforcing the will of the regime may also be atheist). Many here have suggested renaming the category to accurately reflect that fact. You seem to grasp that the source of the persecution is the totalitarian government effort to suppress competing influences over the populace, even in your Chinese government example, but then you lose all credibility with comments like "religious persons were oppressed for not conforming to the state sponsored beliefs or lack of beliefs". You will need to provide solid reliable sourcing for that, specifically showing how atheism is the reason behind the persecution. (Hint: you will be the first in this discussion to do so.) Think for a moment: to your understanding, did the Chinese government "outlaw" Roman Catholicism because of their belief in deities, or because the Vatican was considered a foreign threat and influence upon Chinese society and politics? (Hint: Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association doesn't mention atheism even once.) Without reliable sources backing up your assertions in your comment, your input isn't likely to be seriously considered. Xenophrenic (talk) 20:15, 7 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Tally of arguments for and against deletion so far
[edit]

The following summary was compiled by Xenophrenic, an involved participant in this discussion:

Delete the category because ... Keep the category because ...
The category violates WP:CATDEF which requires that categories be non-controversial and neutral. No rebuttal (in fact, all of the passionate argumentation proves it is quite controversial). One participant
alleges that other categories may also be in violation, and should also be deleted.
The category violates WP:OCEGRS which requires a substantial and encyclopedic head article about
the category. Two such articles (Historical persecution by atheism & Historical persecution by atheists)
were already deleted as overwhelmingly inappropriate.		 We need the category as payback / counter-balance for all the categories about persecution by various religions.
Closer examination of the Peris, Blainey, Husband, Marsh, Painter and Froese sources reveal that they do not convey
that there was religious persecution by atheists because of atheism. The persecution was instead attributed
to totalitarian Soviet / Communist regimes (who were atheist) who desired to suppress or remove religious
institutions they viewed as competition in the control and influence of the population.		 While Blainey, Marsh, Froese, et al., never actually say "persecution by atheists", we feel it can be interpreted as saying
that there was persecution by atheists in Russia because they were atheists.
At least 14 reliable sources were produced conveying that religious persecution was motivated not by atheism
but by the socio-political desire of an authoritarian regime to suppress a competing influence over the populace.
Many of these sources also assert that the framing of the persecution as "by atheists" is a common but
disingenuous attempt by apologists for religion to place blame for the abhorrent behavior of tyrants on the lack of belief in god.		 No rebuttal to the preponderance of sources, with one exception: Dawkins was called an "unreliable source" on atheism, and "ill-informed"
on Soviet policies toward religion.
Atheism, which is simply a lack of belief in gods, does not prompt persecution of people. Atheism is not a belief
system; it has no tenets, rules, commandments, codes of conduct or action like religions do.
Artificial constructs like "scientific atheism" and "state atheism" are not atheism, but are instead antireligious ideologies
and belief systems.		 The persecutors were likely atheists, so therefore we must imply that the persecution against the church must have been caused by atheism.
The persecutors were also Marxist-Leninist revolutionaries trying to take over and control a country by suppressing and replacing all sources
of resistance or influence like the mighty Russian Orthodox Church ... but no, it was definitely the lack of belief in gods that caused the persecution.

For Wikipedia policy reasons alone, the category is to be deleted. It isn't non-controversial, as required; it doesn't have a comprehensive main article as required (not for lack of some people trying); and the impetus of the category wording seems to have originated out of an ill-conceived tit-for-tat response to the categories of persecution in the name of religion. Parties on all sides of the discussion agree, however, that "Religious persecution" did occur, so some of the Wikipedia articles linked above could be tentatively added to the Category:Religious persecution until more specific (and accurately named) sub-categories are created. Xenophrenic (talk) 20:55, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It might be better to redo the table by to keeping the summary by Xenophrenic for "deletion" and provide a summary by someone who participated for "keep" (Ramos1990) to have a more balanced overall summary of the situation:
Delete the category because .... Keep the category because ...
The category violates WP:CATDEF which requires that categories be non-controversial and neutral. The category is notable and can be Controversial like other categories that also exist such as [Category:Persecution by Christians], [Category:Persecution by Muslims], [Category:Persecution by Buddhists], etc. None of these other ones were co-nominated for deletion by the nominator to delete [Category:Persecution by Atheists]. It would at least have shown consistency if such was done from the start.
The category violates WP:OCEGRS which requires a substantial and encyclopedic head article about
the category. Two such articles (Historical persecution by atheism & Historical persecution by atheists)
were already deleted as overwhelmingly inappropriate.		 Substantial articles on the matter already exist such as State atheism. The category is an appropriate corollary for all the categories about persecution by worldview since all of these kinds of persecutions involved higher aims than merely altering people's view of politics, government (e.g. communism), or economics. They involved worldview-control and atheists are part of that history.
Closer examination of the Peris, Blainey, Husband, Marsh, Painter and Froese sources reveal that they do not convey that there
was religious persecution by atheists because of atheism. The persecution was instead attributed
to totalitarian Soviet / Communist regimes (who were atheist) who desired to suppress or remove religious
institutions they viewed as competition in the control and influence of the population.		 Closer examination of the numerous academic sources provided (Peris, Blainey, Husband, Marsh, Froese, Painter, etc) show extensively that there were active attempts by atheists, with the help of government power, to actively persecute religious people and institutions and also to actively promote atheism to the masses (via atheist organizations, literature, legislation, teaching atheism in school, proselytizing for atheism, etc) to enforce worldview-control, not just political or economic control.
At least 14 reliable sources were produced conveying that religious persecution was motivated not by atheism
but by the socio-political desire of an authoritarian regime to suppress a competing influence over the populace.
Many of these sources also assert that the framing of the persecution as "by atheists" is a common but
disingenuous attempt by apologists for religion to place blame for the abhorrent behavior of tyrants on the lack of belief in god.		 Most editors here seem to agree that all the historical reliable sources provided (none of which were from religious apologists - by the way - but by practicing historians), clearly relate atheists and/or atheism with goals that affected the destiny and unfortunate fate of religious people and religious institutions. The support of the state simply helped accelerate the attempts to reach atheist influenced anti-religious goals. One source, Pew, even showed increase in religiosity and decrease in irreligiosity and atheism after fall of the USSR which indicates some relief from repression since switching occured. Only one source, Dawkins - who has no historical expertise, was provided that attempted to state that atheists are absolved of their behavior and actions because atheism didn't influence anything. Painter, who is an active historian reviewed such a claim a found it to be historically incorrect in light of historical scholarship.
Main argument for deletion is that atheism does not influence anything since it is just as lack of belief in gods. Atheists have empirically made atheism into more than just a lack of belief in gods, which is why atheists made atheist organizations (e.g. League of the Militant Atheists), atheists self-identified as "atheists", they wrote extensively about atheism in society and culture (e.g. Bezbozhnik), they wrote about and encouraged "characteristics" of atheists, they distinguished their group from everyone else, etc. They may not have beliefs in gods, but they sure have beliefs that extend out to society (naturalism, "dialectical materialism", "scientific atheism", etc) - sometimes influencing discrimination against theism and religion.

I tried to get the gist of those for "keep". If I missed anything please add on.Huitzilopochtli (talk) 05:51, 27 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

All that's been accomplished here is an imitation of the first table (in an effort to make 'things look equal'?) with the 'for' side filled with the same unsubstantiated claims that have been many-times disproven in the overly-long, repetitive conversation above. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 11:33, 27 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the input, Ramos1990 - I have modified my tally table accordingly. I did, however, have to leave out some of your suggestions from my table that didn't seem to me to rise to the level of an argument. For example:
  • The category is notable and can be Controversial... - No, Wikipedia actually has a rule that it cannot be controversial, and must be neutral.
  • ... like other categories that also exist... - For reasons best explained at WP:OTHERCRAPEXISTS, it is not a valid argument to say we keep this category which is in violation of policy because "other categories are also in violation". I did note your opinion, however.
  • Substantial articles on the matter already exist such as State atheism. - No, state atheism isn't atheism, it is a misleadingly-named government construct which is antireligion (and may even promote an atheistic society), so we are still in need of a substantial article about this category.
  • ...the categories about persecution by worldview... Then you'd better come up with a name for it, because atheism is not a worldview in any way, shape or form. (See Krueger source above.)
  • Most editors here seem to agree that all the historical reliable sources ... clearly relate atheists and/or atheism with goals that affected ... religious people and religious institutions - Most? No, but I do agree that a concerning number of editors claim sources say what they do not, and when pressed to provide the exact wording to support their claim, they resort to ad hominem. (Not you; you've been quite civil - totally mistaken - but quite civil.) I'm also still waiting for a source which conveys there was persecution because of atheism, which is what the nonsense category implies.
  • Only one source, Dawkins ... was provided that attempted to state that atheists are absolved of their behavior and actions because atheism didn't influence anything. - No, Dawkins has never (to my knowledge) said that anybody is absolved of their behavior. In the source listed above, Dawkins noted that the assertion that the communists did their horrible deeds because they were atheists is false. He also said, "Individual atheists may do evil things but they don't do evil things in the name of atheism. Stalin and Hitler did extremely evil things, in the name of, respectively, dogmatic and doctrinaire Marxism." And no, Dawkins wasn't the only source to assert that. Coyne also said as much, as did Stenger, Avalos, McGowan, Blackford, Stefanelli, Ruse, Bugliosi, ...}}
  • Painter ... reviewed such a claim a found it to be historically incorrect in light of historical scholarship.
  • Well if he did, you haven't shown us where. All I've seen is his remark about Dawkin's "bulldozer" quip. Perhaps provide a cite or quote for us to review?
  • Closer examination of the numerous academic sources provided ... show extensively that there were active attempts by atheists, with the help of government power, to actively persecute... - Not in the sources provided so far. All of those sources say it was the Soviet / communist regimes which persecuted and attempted to establish atheism. (And before you point to the 'League' as your sole example, please recall that it was created many years after the persecutions were started, and the League was created by the communist regime and given the explicit mandate to promote atheism and criticize religion.
  • ... atheists made atheist organizations (e.g. League of the Militant Atheists) - No. See previous bullet-point. Atheists can no doubt organize, to resist oppression by the Orthodox Church for example (see similar groups in Western societies like Freedom From Religion Foundation or American Humanist Association), but the violence and persecution has been by the totalitarian communist regime, according to your sources.
Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 11:59, 27 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Thanks for accurately representing the pros of keeping the category as it stands now User:Ramos1990. Xenophrenic's version seemed to be a straw man of the very strong case for retaining Category:Persecution by atheists. I'm pretty confident that the sysop that closes this discussion will take into account your case, as well as the fact that it's unfair to WP:CENSOR Category:Persecution by atheists while keeping Category:Persecution by Christians, Category:Persecution by Jews, Category: Persecution by Muslims, Category: Persecution by Buddhists, etc. Any thoughts to offer User:Jobas, User:Laurel Lodged, User:Renzoy16, and User:LoveMonkey? Eliko007 (talk) 22:25, 31 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I count on the 'sysop' actually considering arguments and (preponderance of) sources. And when one 'needs' to 'wikilawyer', accuse emptily, and 'play teams' as an argument (which is, in a way, taking readers for idiots), you can be sure that they don't have much of an argument to consider. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 01:48, 1 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
It appears that the entire side wanting the category deleted has engaged in a series of logical fallacies including the straw man fallacy when constructing the table as was pointed out. Saying that atheists have not forced their views by way of government onto people is in denial as atheists daily sue people to get the government to silence religious expressions. So that the only view allowed now on public property is the atheist one. As much as this reality is lost on the atheists on here atheists have to use the logical fallacy No True Scotsman that no atheist could be an atheist and do that let alone persecute theists or force atheism on people and victimize those that resist and still be an atheist. Note Wikipedia does not say that people have to provide a motive for why the atheist governments engaged in opposition only valid sources that state that they did. LoveMonkey (talk) 16:45, 1 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
You keep inventing 'sides' and accusing them of 'fallacies' that you do/can not demonstrate; that is not productive at all, as there is only fact here. No amount of sophism is going to appear in a category/label, so only if it is a topic mentioned almost unanimously by mainstream references (and by that name), can it be used as one. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 18:51, 1 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
You keep using fallacies now you are gaslighting by calling my mental health into question by implying I invented you. In a real debate your tactics would disqualify you. LoveMonkey (talk) 13:29, 2 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
There is nothing of that in anything I wrote, and have full confidence in readers' ability to read and think for themselves. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 14:26, 2 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete – I enter into this discussion with some trepidation and perhaps too late. I don't see this as a properly named category. For a category like this, persecution must be a prolonged series of acts by an organized group, ideally an organized group that has some state power behind it (otherwise all sorts of group-on-group antagonisms would have to be labeled persecution) or is the state. That is, the persecution must include some air of legitimacy, it can't be the action of some breakaway rebel group attacking their opponents – a different word would be appropriate for that. You then have to consider what is the organizing principle behind the persecuting group. That is, in this case, is atheism the primary identifying characteristic or is it an ancillary aspect? With respect to the "officially atheist" communist governments, that's not always such an easy question to answer. In looking at the groups being persecuted, the categorization must attribute to them some sense of being innocent victims. Again, to use the example of rebels, it's not generally considered persecution to fight against or take action to suppress rebellion. Was the reason for Soviet anti-clericalism based more on the role the church had as a potential rallying point for political opposition or simply required by the state's officially being atheist?
    There should be limits to lumping disparate groups into the "by xxxx" part of the category name. Does it make sense to use the same category for Soviet anti-clericalism and for the lawsuits by the Freedom from Religion Foundation against Texas public high schools to prevent prayers at football games? For the bulk of the articles suggested for membership in this category, there might be a more restricted category named something like "Religious persecution by governments and quasi-governments with communist (or anti-clerical) ideologies". That might avoid tarring all atheists for the actions of this more restrictive collection of groups with political power who happen to also have been atheist. Isn't that the basis for most of the objections here?  —jmcgnh(talk) (contribs) 06:31, 27 January 2017 (UTC)— Note: An editor has expressed a concern that jmcgnh (talk • contribs) has been canvassed to this discussion. [reply]
Not WP:CANVASSED – Notice on Talk:Atheism counts as "appropriate notification: The talk page of one or more directly related articles".jmcgnh(talk) (contribs) 06:37, 9 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
"Tarring atheists with the actions of, and motivated by, political authoritarianism, just because they happen to be atheists" is indeed a primary reason the objectionable category is being deleted. "Category:Persecution by atheists" incorrectly and misleadingly attributes the cause of the persecution to people's lack of belief in gods. The reliable sources (even those cited by editors arguing to 'keep' the problematic category) clearly convey that the actions taken against the churches and clergy were by the revolutionary governments/dictators for political and authoritarian reasons to remove them from their positions of power and influence over the populace. Reliable sources also show that the communist regimes, for example, allowed some religious institutions to remain while closing others, and the regimes also removed restrictions on religious institutions at times (eg; during wartime) - these are all actions by authoritarians exercising control, and not the actions of "atheists" upset that people believe in gods. Your suggested category of "Religious persecution by governments and quasi-governments with communist (or anti-clerical) ideologies" is far better supported by reliable sources, but perhaps too lengthy. "Religious persecution by governments with anti-religion ideologies" would still cover the same subjects.
By the way, as for the links produced by LoveMonkey to recent stories about activists filing lawsuits, did you notice every one of them is about the state-sponsored persecution of non-Christians by Christians? They all show the endorsement of one religion over other religions and non-religions, which is unlawful in the U.S. on public property. Those links don't pertain to the category under discussion here, and I agree that introducing them here doesn't make sense. Xenophrenic (talk) 20:10, 7 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Honestly, the summary above, with the comment in the first box regarding whether this and/or any categories of "Persecution by (foo believers)" is a good point. The most important factor I think involved would be, basically, whether the government or society in which the persecution took place were historically, for a long period of time, atheist (or whatever) or not, and whether the persecutors were according to modern scholarship performing the persecution primarily on the basis of religious belief of some sort or whether that were a secondary or tangential matter involved. I'm thinking, for instance, that a lot of modern scholars have ascribed some of the Spanish Inquisition (about as obvious and most frequently referenced case of "religious persecution" I can think of) substantially if not primarily to the fact that those being persecuted were according to the profiling of the day the groups which were dissident with and in some cases actively at war with the existing government. This might also relate to whether atheistic communist persecutions in some areas were primarily religious persecutions, or because the believers in that case were also among the strongest opponents of the those governments. Unfortunately, in all the cases I know of regarding this, I also know that in most of them the group which is accused of doing the persecution ascribes the persecution to non-religious reasons, and in almost all those same cases the modern version of the group then being persecuted disagrees with that assessment. John Carter (talk) 22:05, 1 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Should I interpret this comment to mean that, "honestly", you now feel that the "Persecution by atheists" category should be deleted if certain "Persecution by (foo believers)" are also nominated for deletion, as suggested in the "first box summary" above? Well, thank you for acknowledging that this category under discussion should be deleted. If your reasoning is sound regarding the similarly worded categories about religions, I would support those efforts, too. If I've misunderstood your comment, John Carter, could I bother you for further clarification? Regards, Xenophrenic (talk)
First, I rather resist the idea of your referring to my comment as an "acknowledgement," as it seems to be to be rather a prejudicial interpretation. Some of the Vietnamese Martyrs are described in that article as being "killed in the politically inspired persecutions of the 19th century". I would not think that those martyrs would necessarily qualify as victims of persecution by whatever term would be used to describe the religion of the then-current government, and maybe in some sense shouldn't qualify for inclusion in whatever might be the relevant category. Maybe. That raises the issue regarding exactly how frequently and clearly we today can differentiate between church and state in earlier times, which is at best really questionable. However, I believe that there is or was a more or less official opposition to religion of Marxism and Leninism. I don't see anything specifically addressing religion in the Leninism article as it stands, but it is hard to miss the disdain for religion in the thought of Marx and Marxism, and on that basis, and the fact that numerous generally fairly reliable sources have taken a position that the Soviet regime was also fairly explicitly anti-religious and actively engaged in persecution of religion of some sorts would to my eyes at least indicate that, if the other categories of "persecution by foo religious groups" are to continue to exist, this category should as well, and at least cover the disagreement among sources as to whether the persecutions involved were necessarily by "atheism" and the related articles. There is the serious question as to how to differentiate some other instances of possible governmental persecution based on religion from other forms of persecution from governments which have a verifiable religious inclination of some sort, but that would apply to a lot of other categories of this type as well. John Carter (talk) 16:48, 8 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. I'm seeing evidence that this is a legitimate topic which respected academics and journalists have addressed in numerous publications. Officially atheist governments have often engaged in systematic persecution of religious organizations and religious individuals. I'm not seeing much evidence of academics or other experts claiming that atheist governments and organizations never persecute others on the basis of religious beliefs. Majoreditor (talk) 04:46, 4 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Majoreditor, if you are "seeing evidence" that "atheists" (and not simply governments which are officially or ostensibly atheistic) are behind systematic persecution, could you please produce that evidence here for the rest of us to review? So far, all sources produced here show that the totalitarian regimes are responsible for the persecution, not atheists. Without reliable sources showing that "atheism" is responsible for the persecutions, your comment doesn't advance the discussion. Xenophrenic (talk) 20:15, 7 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
If, however, a persecution is done by a totalitarian regime with what is widely reliably sourced as being an atheistic inclination, and the subjects of the persecution are those who do not share that inclination, then an argument could reasonably be made that the totalitarian regime was also an atheistic regime. A government of state atheism is one many individuals might reasonably think could be described as atheistic. John Carter (talk) 17:15, 8 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
But to describe an 'atheistic' totalitarian regime as 'atheism' alone is not only an impossibility (as 'atheism' is a concept, not a 'thing' or identifiable entity or political organisation (as religions and totalitarian regimes alike are)), but a willfully misleading presentation of a partial reality (whose goal, through its excruciatingly selective 'placing of blame', demonstrates itself). THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 23:58, 8 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The same would apply to Christian, Islamic, Hindu, or Buddhist totalitarian regimes, or any belief system held or supported by any totalitarian regime, and, honestly, if your argument would apply to atheistic totalitarian regimes, it would, I think, logically, have to apply to any totalitarian regimes of the types I named here as well. John Carter (talk) 00:09, 9 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
You seem to have ignored the part where 'atheism' is not a 'thing' or religion (like Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, or Buddhism is), and yes, if a totalitarian regime is the author of acts or events, then it should be named as the author of these, not whatever secondary '-istic' aspects it may have. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 13:43, 9 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Here are some citations from the article on Religion in the Soviet Union:
Thus the USSR became the first[1] state to have, as an ideological objective, the elimination of religion[2] and its replacement with universal atheism.[3][4] The communist regime confiscated religious property, ridiculed religion, harassed believers, and propagated atheism in schools.[5]
And here is a quote from a certain atheist named Vladimir Lenin, also taken from the article Religion in the Soviet Union.
State Atheism in the Soviet Union was known as gosateizm,[2] and was based on the ideology of Marxism–Leninism. As the founder of the Soviet state, V. I. Lenin, put it:

Religion is the opium of the people: this saying of Marx is the cornerstone of the entire ideology of Marxism about religion. All modern religions and churches, all and of every kind of religious organizations are always considered by Marxism as the organs of bourgeois reaction, used for the protection of the exploitation and the stupefaction of the working class.[6]

The point is the both atheist governments and atheist individuals were responsible for persecution of religions and religious individuals. we can pull information on Cina and Mao Majoreditor (talk) 01:35, 10 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Strong delete. Xenophrenic and others have summarised it pretty well. Atheism is simply a lack of belief in deities, and has no call to action whatsoever, let alone a complete system of ethics on which all atheists roughly agree. As such, atheism does not motivate anyone to carry out any specific action, such as persecution. Although there is such a thing called secular humanism –an atheistic moral system in the sense that no deities play a role in the question how one should behave– there seems to be no literature about 'persecution by secular humanists' or something like that. All the items that would be in this category have something to do with Communist regimes, or something that looks like Communism. Again, Communism is in part an 'atheistic' moral system in the sense that no deities play a role in the question how one should behave, but the rationale for violence does not follow from the notion that no deities exist. They flow from the Marxist idea that the ruling class, including the clergy, should be destroyed by a violent revolution ("class struggle"), and that post-revolution ordinary people should receive nonreligious education so that they will eventually become atheists. These types of persecution were mostly anti-clerical in nature: they were carried out by regimes that tried to break the power of organised religion, held by clergymen – many of which were indeed killed in the Soviet and other periods – and did not kill ordinary lay religious people just because of the fact that they were religious. And as ThePromenader said, especially in Christian apologetics, equating Soviet Communism with atheism is a common poisoning the well tactic to try and dissuade anyone from apostasy ('Stalin was an atheist! You don't want to become like him, do you?!'). This category may have been created as a religious apologetic false equivalence argument between persection by religions groups and persecution 'by atheists'. It has no place on Wikipedia. Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 23:24, 8 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

  • Keep I've seen no satisfactory reason in this massive, ugly thread that satisfactorily demonstrates to me why the category should be deleted, and I reject the arguments for deletion that are based on the definition of atheism (for which there seems to be little consensus). Unless I'm very much mistaken, the rationales should be based on policy and not on personal definitions, but that doesn't seem to be the case in this discussion. Or, to phrase it more accurately, this shouting match in which none of the major players are interested in listening to what the other side has to say. With that in mind, I'm sure the immediate reaction of some of those pushing for deletion here will be to write an argumentative, non-policy-based, TL;DR response telling me how wrong I am and calling for others to fact-check me. I am not, however, interested in debating with people who won't listen, although I will be more than happy to trout-slap anyone who accuses me of having been canvassed. (Seriously, the 'this user has possibly been canvassed' war above is not impressing any of us latecomers to the discussion.) Lepricavark (talk) 00:08, 11 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
But there is nothing to fact-check in anything you've said: you've simply pooh-pooh'ed the discussion (that you apparently haven't even read or fact-checked: some here have exhaustively 'listened' and fact-checked every reference provided) and voiced disdain for a certain 'side' in the debate. There is only fact and reference here, and your 'vote' addresses neither. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 11:24, 11 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
You have no idea whether I've read the discussion, yet you've assumed bad faith just the same. What you refer to as exhaustively listening and fact-checking references is in reality simply just exhausting. If you had bothered to read my entire comment, you would have noticed that I expressed a certain amount of disdain for the conduct of the "major players" on both sides of the debate. I went back and read your original !vote, and saw absolutely no reference to policy in your rationale, but I did see a lot of personal opinions being represented as facts (with no references, either). Indeed, this entire debate has been dominated not by policy-based arguments, but by personal viewpoints. If you seriously expect newcomers to this discussion to read every single comment in its entirety, you are sadly misguided. You are part of the crowd that has pushed this discussion to the brink of being completely overwhelming, and you've done it with POV-laden posts like the one above that I've just finishing thoroughly fact-checking and debunking. Let me make one thing clear: nothing is going to persuade me to change my mind. You've already exhausted your arguments in this discussion. I'm !voting keep. I've explained why I'm !voting keep. I've defend my keep !vote more thoroughly than I intended. Any further badgering of me is pointless. Lepricavark (talk) 15:47, 11 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Your vote-commentary demonstrates itself that either you haven't read or fact-checked, or you are being very selective in your reading, otherwise it would not be possible to make your 'no-one is listening' accusation. Not only that, but someone has even made a table-summary of all arguments, highlighted the very claims fact-checked before the answer... and if you don't fact-check, how can you vote? That, in itself, in addition to all the side-taking and POV-accusations, demonstrates something else. And you haven't even referenced any argument, let alone 'debunk' one, and that claim demonstrates yet something else. There is no need to make any accusations of 'assuming bad faith': all of this speaks for itself. THEPROMENADER ✎ ✓ 20:05, 11 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Nope. Lepricavark (talk) 23:05, 11 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:GKIDS animated films

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The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: delete. – Fayenatic London 00:03, 17 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: I'd actually helped to categorize this a while back without realizing that this was a distributor, not producer. As stated at Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2014_April_15#Category:Drafthouse_Films_films and other Cfds, films have multiple distributors per market and medium, and accordingly this has never been considered to be a WP:DEFINING characteristic. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 18:05, 19 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Ancient Roman forts in England

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The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: merge. – Fayenatic London 18:14, 9 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale This one seems to have been left behind by a previous CFM. Just a tidy-up. Laurel Lodged (talk) 16:15, 19 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Instead Merge Category:Roman fortified camps in England‎ to Category:Ancient Roman forts in England. Peterkingiron (talk) 17:49, 22 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Reply A lot of re-categorisations could be done to improve this after this nomination goes ahead. I see nothing in the nom that would have an adverse effect on what has been written above. Let's clear the anomaly first then do some judicious re-categorisations where necessary. Laurel Lodged (talk) 11:32, 24 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Smart speaker

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The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: rename (non-admin closure). Marcocapelle (talk) 07:35, 27 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: Per WP:CAT, should be plural. McGeddon (talk) 13:18, 19 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this section.
  1. ^ "Revelations from the Russian Archives: ANTI-RELIGIOUS CAMPAIGNS". Library of Congress. US Government. Retrieved 2 May 2016.
  2. ^ a b Kowalewski, David (October 1980). "Protest for Religious Rights in the USSR: Characteristics and Consequences". Russian Review. 39 (4): 426–441. doi:10.2307/128810. JSTOR 128810 – via JSTOR.
  3. ^ Ramet, Sabrina Petra. (Ed) (1993). Religious Policy in the Soviet Union. Cambridge University Press. p. 4.
  4. ^ Anderson, John (1994). Religion, State and Politics in the Soviet Union and Successor States. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. p. 3. ISBN 0-521-46784-5.
  5. ^ "Anti-religious Campaigns". Loc.gov. Retrieved 2011-09-19.
  6. ^ Lenin, V. I. "About the attitude of the working party toward the religion". Collected works, v. 17, p.41. Retrieved 2006-09-09.
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