# Let us speak of the evils of Christianity. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 26, 2005, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300 "2005-03-26T01:33:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 16\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2005, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300/61 "2005-03-27T18:34:27Z")
Now, as to how Christianity might be evil – certainly, Christians have committed great evils in the past, specifically in the Middle Ages, with all that witch-hunting and so forth. And those who are familiar with my other posts on this board will know that I am no friend of Islam, but the Crusades were definitely chock-full of evil acts by Christians against a largely innocent Muslim world (ah, how times have changed!). Citing the historical evidence of Christian evil only demonstrates that Christianity is a religion that has been capable of evil in the past, says nothing about its present role. And talking about the theological underpinnings of Christianity and whether they create a propensity for good or evil is generally fruitless, as that stuff has been going on for centuries and will just wind up with the equivalent of another debate over how many angels can dance on the head of a pin and/or who did best on the Diet of Wurms. The thing to do would be to ask are there any Christian groups or subgroups that are up to stuff that could generally be described as “evil” right now, in the present day, and of course the answer is “Yes, yes there are.” We could start with the Christian Identity crew, the religous arm of the Aryan Nation. Right-wing bigots, racists and hatemongers to the bone. Of course, they’re a tiny subgroup of Christianity and it would be wrong to condemn Christianity in general as evil because of them, but it’s fair to say that some elements of Christianity are evil, since the Christian Identity crew call themselves Christians and they are by any reasonable standard, evil. But there are two much larger groups of Christians that are open to charges of being evil: Catholics and Christian fundamentalists. Catholics are evil becauseB they have an attitude about birth control that’s sexist to the bone, and because they are sexist to the bone. Their stand on abortion rights is only part of the equation – reasonable people can disagree reasonably on abortion. It’s their stand on birth control that’s fucking evil. It could reasonably be argued that they just want lots of poor women to get knocked up so they’ll produce more orphans to be worked as virtual slaves like the slave orphanages they had going in Ireland and Australia in the 70s. And that business about preist/pedophiles – sure, every religion has had its problems with pedophiles – they’re attracted to roles where they associate freely with other people’s kids in a position of trust – but no other religion’s leadership chose to conceal their pedophiles from the law, and actually shuffled them from parish to parish where they could continue preying on children. That was evil. That was fuckin’ evil. But that’s not all. Catholic leaders have historically been big fans of censorship, a fandom that continues right up to the present day. The Catholics were the guiding force that led to the creation of the Hayes Office censorship board in the 1930s that kept American films and television so dull for 40 years, and they’ve backed every major censorship move since. They’re not satisfied to have the pulpit, they want to control every aspect of what people can see and hear. Just because they haven’t been too successful lately doesn’t mean their goals have changed. And with the current political climate moving in favor of censorship, they may yet see success. They’re fuckin’ evil and anti-American for that reason. Christian fundamentalists are also big fans of censorship, though their fandom doesn’t have the historic traditions and organizational resources of Catholic censorship groups. Nevertheless, people like Wildmon and Falwell are politically powerful and have a well-organized base of people who support censorship. The could really fuck America up if given a chance, and the Republicans seem inclined to do so. But of course the fundies are also sexist pigs, specifically the one who took over the Southern Baptist Convention, which shortly afterward adopted a rule stating that it was a wife’s position to be subordinate to her husband. Now I’m all for this sort of thing so long as it’s all fun and games, but having it established as a religious tenet to be obeyed in real life is just bullshit. And fuckin’ evil besides. That’s why Southern Baptists who had an ounce of decency in them – like former President Jimmy Carter – parted company with the Convention soon afterward. Christian fundies are also really weak on the separation of church and state, in the sense that they think the church really oughtta run the state. They’re always trying to use the power of the state to force kids to acknowledge their vision of God, whether or not they’re fundamentalist or even Christian kids (atheist kids, you get the impression they think they should be taken from their parents) because they don’t have one iota of respect for the beliefs of others. They wanna make kids acknowledge God by forcing them to recite the current tainted version of the Pledge of Allegiance in school, and by making them listen to long, boring school prayers every day in school. Combine this readiness to use the power of the state to enforce religious values and this pro-censorship bias, and you have a real formula for the Christian equivalent of mullahs running things. Fucking evil? Fucking A! Having said all this, I must acknowledge that both Catholicism and fundamentalist Christianity, like most churches, do a lot of good things in the way of charitable acts and helping people when they really need it. What separate Catholicism and fundamentalist Christianity from most other U.S. churches is that they have all this evil stuff going on, too. If I could switch out Catholicism and fundamentalist Christianity for one or two of the milder, more help-the-needy churches, say Methodism or Lutheran churches, I’d do it in a heartbeat. And of course, Catholicism and fundamentalist Christianity at their worst don’t hold a candle to fundamentalist Islam at its worst, for sheer evilitude. The best and most probable outcome will be that we will all outgrow our need for Great Sky Fairies in a few decades, and all the preachers will all have to either turn to good works as being good for their own sake, or selling some other brand of snake oil for personal aggrandizement. Happy Easter, ya’ll! ---
**Author:** ![rfgdxm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c0e974/32.png) [@rfgdxm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rfgdxm)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2005, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300/62 "2005-03-27T19:26:00Z")
> [@Zsofia](#): > > Wouldn’t you have stood up to the very real litany of hate in the churches in, say, Ohio, though? Would it have been more important to you to vote for the anti-gay-marriage amendment or against the very nasty, vitriolic, not-very-Christian poison that was spewing from the pulpits? Sometimes I think you have to make your decisions based on the company you’d keep. What church in Ohio or anywhere else would let me speak? I just voted against the anti-gay amendment to the Michigan Constitution because I thought it was stupid. This just ain’t a matter that needs a Constitutional amendment. Of couse it passed easily regardless of my vote. ☹ I don’t think what consenting adults do in bed is a political matter. I could not care less who my neighbor sleeps with. ---
**Author:** ![VarlosZ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d78d45/32.png) [@VarlosZ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VarlosZ)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2005, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300/63 "2005-03-27T23:32:56Z")
> [@Brutus](#): > > I find it amazingly stupid and bigoted to jump up and down and say ‘Let’s list all the negative traits we can pull out of our asses regarding this group.’ I can’t remember the last time I agreed with Brutus, but I second this sentiment. When the conservatives on this board talk about the anti-Christian bias here, this is what they mean. The response to this thread has been mixed, but most posts do not seem to object to the thread’s theme. In contrast, can you imagine the response if the thread had been: "Let us speak of the evils of. . . . . . Judaism . . . Islam . . . Homosexuality" The thread and the OP would be rightly, severely, and almost universally villified. I think “tacky” is the right word. ---
**Author:** ![Excalibre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@Excalibre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Excalibre)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2005, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300/64 "2005-03-28T00:20:05Z")
> [@Brutus](#): > > I find it amazingly stupid and bigoted to jump up and down and say ‘Let’s list all the negative traits we can pull out of our asses regarding this group’. I agree wholeheartedly with Brutus. First time for everything, I guess. ---
**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2005, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300/65 "2005-03-28T00:33:22Z")
> [@Brutus](#): > > I find it amazingly stupid and bigoted to jump up and down and say ‘Let’s list all the negative traits we can pull out of our asses regarding this group’. > [@Excalibre](#): > > I agree wholeheartedly with Brutus. > > First time for everything, I guess. I agree also. But to be fair to the anti-christians (and I am one, as anti-religion includes anti-christian) what if those who are jumping and listing have a genuine perception of the imperfections of a particular religion, and so want to remind the readers that ‘it’s not _all_ good’ at this time of year. What if in **Brutus** ’s statement the ‘group’ was ‘racists’ or ‘nazis’, would it be so bigoted and stupid then? Perhaps the anti-religious percieve the fundementally religious as being just as bad and dangerous as the nazis were. Godwin’s Law blah blah whatever. ---
**Author:** ![Scott\_Plaid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/258eb7/32.png) [@Scott\_Plaid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scott_Plaid)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2005, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300/66 "2005-03-28T01:00:06Z")
> [@VarlosZ](#): > > "Let us speak of the evils of. . . > > . . . Judaism > . . . Islam > . . . Homosexuality" > > The thread and the OP would be rightly, severely, and almost universally villified. I think “tacky” is the right word. I disagree. I have started a thread about the evils of Judaism, or rather, one evil, in do I hafta kill Amalek? I don’t wanna! > **[Why do I hafta kill Amalek? I don't wanna!](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=308975)** > > In samuel15:3, it says: I don’t recall him giving the order to stop killing people. He also said to blot out amalek’s name multiple times. I was reminded of this when I attended a Purim meal for free alcohol and food recently. Sure, so if the... ---
**Author:** ![The\_Hook](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ccd318/32.png) [@The\_Hook](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Hook)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2005, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300/67 "2005-03-28T02:26:42Z")
> [@lawoot](#): > > I have many Christian friends - LIBERAL Christian friends - who are against gay marriage, but have no problem w/civil unions. They have stated that it is the word ‘marriage’ that ticks them off. They feel that ‘marriage’ is a religious ritual. If the states would offer up civil unions as an alternative, they would vote for it in a heartbeat. Pardon me if this is a hijack, but would these friends of yours know that atheists can marry as well and that it most definitely doesn’t have a thing to do with religion for their part? ---
**Author:** ![Excalibre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@Excalibre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Excalibre)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2005, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300/68 "2005-03-28T05:35:54Z")
> [@Lobsang](#): > > What if in **Brutus** ’s statement the ‘group’ was ‘racists’ or ‘nazis’, would it be so bigoted and stupid then? > > Perhaps the anti-religious percieve the fundementally religious as being just as bad and dangerous as the nazis were. > > Godwin’s Law blah blah whatever. They’re _not_ Nazis, they’re Christians. If the anti-religion crowd thinks Christians are comparable to Nazis, then they’re idiots. And assholes to boot. Has your relativism advanced to such a degree that you can make room for people to believe that Christians are the equivalent of history’s worst mass murderers? ---
**Author:** ![newcrasher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b3f665/32.png) [@newcrasher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/newcrasher)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2005, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300/69 "2005-03-28T15:02:36Z")
I clicked on this thread with a heavy heart. I was pleased when I find that the OP has failed utterly to engage the masses in a Christian bashing. I have noted the OP poster, and will probably avoid his threads from now on, or at least approach them aware of his lack of taste and sensitivity. ---
**Author:** ![Scott\_Plaid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/258eb7/32.png) [@Scott\_Plaid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scott_Plaid)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2005, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300/70 "2005-03-28T15:05:08Z")
Don’t worry, I am planning to bring out a christian bashing later, but for right now, I want to work on what I will post. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2005, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300/71 "2005-03-28T15:06:16Z")
Of course, there is the option of reading the posts of the people who have responded to the OP to find out what “the anti-religion crowd” thinks. That might work. Yeah. And for the record, I don’t think you have to be anti-religion to post in response to the OP as intended. An objective viewpoint will show that Christians, like most groups who’ve been around a long time, have a history of much evil and much good. ---
**Author:** ![newcrasher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b3f665/32.png) [@newcrasher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/newcrasher)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2005, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300/72 "2005-03-28T15:16:31Z")
> [@Evil Captor](#): > > Of course, there is the option of reading the posts of the people who have responded to the OP to find out what “the anti-religion crowd” thinks. That might work. Yeah. > > And for the record, I don’t think you have to be anti-religion to post in response to the OP as intended. An objective viewpoint will show that Christians, like most groups who’ve been around a long time, have a history of much evil and much good. And I agree. As a Christian who is well aware of our troubled history and shortcomings, I often have been critical of many of the tacts taken by leaders in our faith over the centuries. But to simply make a lundry list? It is not PC to bash any other group, why bash Christians? ---
**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2005, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300/73 "2005-03-28T15:19:29Z")
> [@Excalibre](#): > > They’re _not_ Nazis, they’re Christians. If the anti-religion crowd thinks Christians are comparable to Nazis, then they’re idiots. And assholes to boot. Has your relativism advanced to such a degree that you can make room for people to believe that Christians are the equivalent of history’s worst mass murderers? You misunderstand my point. I was not comparing christians to Nazis. I was simply using an extreme case to highlight the invalidity of Brutus’s statement. **I was trying to show that one can list the evils of a group and not be biggoted in doing so.** ---
**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2005, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300/74 "2005-03-28T15:22:00Z")
My mistake. I did imply that anti-christians might compare fundementalist christians to the Nazis. But my previous statement was as intended in my previous post. ---
**Author:** ![Scott\_Plaid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/258eb7/32.png) [@Scott\_Plaid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scott_Plaid)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2005, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300/75 "2005-03-29T16:29:42Z")
You know, I have decided to recant my earlier position and instead speak about the evil of atheists and how they persecute christians in America. For a few examples, I have turned to [Life In Our Anti-Christian America](http://www.infidels.org/misc/humor/lioaca.html) by [Robby Berry](http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/robby_berry/). Now, I realize that some of the below quotes are due to Athiests themselves, and not to the Big Book of Atheism, but they find support for their positions in the book. I also realize that many of the atheists here are open minded, but I have seen many examples of the below behaviors in my daily life. > [@](#): > > Several atheists have shot and killed Christian priests as they were going to work in their churches. Similarly, atheists are well known for blockading churches on Sunday mornings. \* > [@](#): > > For years people in places like Ireland and the Middle East have been killing each other over the difference between Atheism and Humanism. > [@](#): > > Atheists do everything possible to get laws passed that will prevent irrational Christians from making their own choices in matters of sex, procreation, life-styles, family units, etc. > [@](#): > > During the 1988 election campaign, George Bush said that Christians should not be considered patriots or real American citizens. > [@](#): > > Atheists have often invented “deathbed deconversion” stories about famous Christians, claiming they became atheists just before they died. > [@](#): > > Baseball games and the like have “The Star-Spangled Banner” sung by hard-rock groups bellowing out lyrics such as, “Foolish god-crazed slaves (whip crack)/At the altar of Rock and Roll you’ll kneel!” and the singers will encourage any Christians in the stands to get eaten by lions held ready on the playing field. > [@](#): > > The word “Christian” is recognized as a term which represents the worst of human attributes: cynicism, pessimism, selfishness, and moral turpitude. The word “Atheist,” on the other hand, is used to signify all that is virtuous, as in, “That’s mighty Atheist of you!” > [@](#): > > Prisoners have become wise to the fact that they may receive early paroles if they claim to have found Atheism and been saved by Darwin. Such a conversion to rationality is thought to be a favorable sign of the rejection of a life of crime. ---
**Author:** ![Hoodoo\_Ulove](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/58956e/32.png) [@Hoodoo\_Ulove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hoodoo_Ulove)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2005, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300/76 "2005-03-29T17:44:24Z")
And what about Martin Luther’s calling for the razing of synagogues and the homes of Jews? The Nazis loved that one. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/let-us-speak-of-the-evils-of-christianity/296300.md?page=3)