Originally Posted by
gneiss 
Like I said:
People stir up crap in the name of their religion (or lack thereof) all the time. So if non-religious folks won't allow religious people to get away with the tired old, "But he wasn't a REAL [Christian/Muslim/Whatever], he was just pretending so he could twist people to his will," the non-religious don't get to use it either.
Sorry, gneiss...I realized later that I came across as a complete a$$.
There are people who are religious who do commit atrocities, but
not in the name of any religion, just the same as there are atheists who do commit atrocities, but not in the name of atheism. Stalin didn't do what he did in the name of atheism.
When people/countries/groups do commit atrocities in the name of anything dogmatic, whether religious or political, I find that unacceptable. What Stalin did was horrible and wrong.
I do make the distinction between whether it was done in the name of something or not. I don't assume that someone did something just because they are religious
unless it's very clear that's the reason they did.
For example:
There are religious groups in the U.S. who campaign and fight for the right to deny rights to gays. They do this in the name of their religion and they have a lot of power behind their movement. Now, this isn't to the level of what Stalin did, but these people use their beliefs as justification for their actions to supress the rights of others. They can hate me all they want as long as they let me be. Problem is, they aren't leaving me and millions of others alone.