Talk:Antireligion/Archive 1

Archive 1

Archive 2

Linguistics

this should probably be spelled "anti-religious", as an English coinage. A more learned coinage would be (avoiding mixture of Greek and Latin), "contra-religious". Please substantiate that this is even a word. not just a domain name, or else explicitly make it an article about these websites. dab (ᛏ) 23:55, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

Neutrality

This article is ludicrous, it paints anti-religonists with some kind of generalizing brush that Atheists have been getting away with for decades now. That is, that *we* can refer to ourselves in the 3rd person and apply any positive adjective we wish. I.e. O'Hare and other Atheists claiming "Atheists would rather do X than Y." But when the same generalized tone is applied in a perjorative sense, they scream bloody murder at whoever dares to 'stereotype' them.

I think this article may not be quite neutral, or at least, takes the stand point that antireligion is a strange, minority concept. compare the wording of this article to that of an article on a religion. (30/10/2006, 5:54 UTC))

I agreed with the above comment that this article may not be quite neutral. It most definatly does differ from the tone and such of an article on religion such as Christianity. It is not wikipedia's policy to present an article that places a certain emphasis or tone upon the information it contains. I strongly reccomend that the neutrality, noteably the undertone, of this article be discussed and reviewed. Jarryd Moore 16:03, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

This seem to have been corrected, coz i can`t find any violation as of now Dec 9th 06, as far as neutrality goes, nor any inference to atheism. I`ll therefore remove the Neutrality dispute disclaimer.Slicky 22:20, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

anton lavey / satanism ?

Two editors just added, in rapid succession, Anton LaVey and LaVeyan Satanism. The first four words of the satanism article state "Satanism is a religion...." I realize that he defines his religion differently than most do, but I don't see how this can be "antireligion". --lquilter 02:28, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Douglas Adams

Is Douglas Adams really antireligious? There's plenty to say he's an atheist, and he certainly used religion in his humour, but I'm not sure that it extends to antireligion. A lot of statements could be seen as ambivalence ("2000 years after some guy got nailed to a tree"); or even opposition to atheism ("[Man provides] proof of the non-existence of god. ... As an encore he goes on to show that black equals white, and get killed at the next zebra crossing"). Likewise, he also made humour at the expense of democracy ("the wrong lizard might get in"), so is he antidemocratic? I would hesitate to attach too much weight to his comic texts. --h2g2bob 13:05, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

I suggest rather than quoting random assortments of Mr. Adams books, you read the interview which is actually linked as the citation on the page (that's what the citations are for; providing evidence.) It does directly address some of your questions. If you still want to discuss this after having read the interview, please do. It certainly never says "I think all religions are destroying the planet", but it does come across as pretty anti-religious to me, esp. for being from a polite Englishman. (I hadn't previously read it, just read it in response to your comment. So I'm basically agreeing with whoever first listed that.) --Jaibe 21:20, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I think the cite pretty much covers it. VanTucky 21:31, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Taking Daniel off

It is true that daniel dennett wrote a book about a religion as a natural phenomena, but he does think religion should be discarded. He stated himself that it would be arrogant to discard faith and he is simply trying to understand human nature. The book states that religion should not be offlimits to science. If you don't believe me here is a link.[2] — Preceding unsigned comment added by Trilobite12 (talk • contribs) 17:36, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Why SOME religion ?

Why not use definition as: "Antireligion is opposition to religion." instead of "Antireligion is opposition to some religion.". It makes no sense there. If it makes sense there, why it's not in the next sentence, eg: "People who are antireligious may see SOME religions as dangerous, ..." XNathanielX (talk) 22:20, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Teller

Penn is mentioned - shouldn't Teller count? 91.84.182.207 (talk) 16:09, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Christian antireligionist?

This article seems to be antireligion = atheism. I'm a man of faith, but I would identify as an antireligionist, and I would see Jesus as antireligionist. Isn't there any prominent theistic antireligionists? 91.107.53.111 (talk) 19:56, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

The article already mentions a number of antireligious theists, like William Blake. However, there isn't any basis for the claim that Jesus was antireligious. -Silence (talk) 03:51, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes I was wondering about Christian or other theistic antireligionists. Could it not be made explicit who is a theistic antireligionist and who is not? Seriphyn (talk) 12:43, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

I know this is old, but there absolutely is a basis for Jesus being antireligious. It's something that's often debated in my family (with biblical verse). Making an outright statement that there is no basis is just obnoxious and untrue. In fact, I challenge someone to collect textual biblical evidence and make the case here. I'd do it if I had time, but I have a thesis to work on.

Should this article be merged?

I'm not going to take any formal measures at this point, but I'd like to ask whether this article should be merged into Atheism. The distinction between antireligion and atheism is not clear; almost any expression of antireligion falls under one or more definitions of atheism, particularly strong atheism. Furthermore, a two-sentence definition of antireligion followed by a long list of people said to be antireligious simply does not seem to merit a separate article. --7Kim (talk) 18:28, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

My thoughts exactly. I clicked on this article expecting some definition of anti-religion and explaining it as distinct from atheism, but neither issue is addressed. Plus, it's even more confusing when you consider whether anti-religion should be merged with atheism or added to the Criticism of religion page.--Lord of the Ping (talk) 07:11, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

It's pretty clear really. You could believe that God is about as likely as the tooth fairy but still think it is good that other people believe. Many atheists are like this (see Breaking the Spell, where 'belief in belief' (that is, belief that belief is good, even when you don't believe yourself) is discussed). You must realize that there are many dimensions to religious beliefs and attitudes. Interest (the question of whether there is a God is important grading into who cares?; belief in God's existence (the spectrum of theistic probability); opposition to religion (antireligion, grading into indifference to religion and then "belief in belief" or pro-religion); there are probably more that I haven't thought of too. There may be some causal connection between these continuous variables (e.g. people who are anti-religious are probably unlikely to believe in God) but they are still measuring different things.

I think there is more overlap with criticism of religion than there is with atheism, though the two should probably remain distinct. How this is distinct from antitheism is slightly less clear to me; they seem to be occupying very similar niches. Richard001 (talk) 02:28, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

antitheism is opposition to belief in deities, and antireligion is opposition to religion. There is going to be some overlap, but you can be opposed to belief in deities while thinking organised religion is good and you can be opposed to religion but for belief in deities. So they are similar, yes, by no means identical, and the arguments supporting and opposing each position are quite distinct. DaveChild (talk) 14:34, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

reversion wars over Scientology

Some people who don't think Scientology is a religion keep making Christianity and Islam the only example religions in the intro to this article. Personally, I think all three are objectionable belief systems serving ulterior motivations, although no doubt important and even life saving for some of their believers. I don't see that the antireligion page is a very good place for having this dispute. But I strongly object to the removal of content which results in the implication that only mainstream religions can cause people to be antireligious. The introduction as it is written now has a very broad definition of antireligion which is quite different from simple atheism.--Jaibe 09:06, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

I've just made a compromise revision myself, but I'm not at all sure I like it. The point of that sentence is supposed to be that people can object to either organized religion or superstitions in general. Cults are certainly organized religions.--Jaibe 09:12, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

The point is not about Scientology being organised (as a cult or otherwise) or being supernatural, or that antireligious people object to it. I myself am about as as rabidly antireligious as it gets, and I think Scientology is the biggest load of crap out of all three examples. But the argument is over whether Scientology is a religion at all, even a cult one. To comply with NPOV and the actual definitions on that and the Church of Scientology articles, you can't label it a religion. I tried to think of an NPOV way to label it a pure superstition, but that didn't jive either. This isn't about censoring the antireligious objection to Scientology, it's about keeping in line with NPOV. VanTucky 15:44, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

How about this version?

Antireligion is opposition to some or all religions in some or all contexts. People who are antireligious may see religions as dangerous, destructive, divisive, foolish, or absurd. This opposition may be confined to just organized mainstream religions such as Christianity or Islam and include minor religions such as cults; extend to organized belief systems not supported by empirical evidence (such as Scientology), or may more generally include all forms of belief in the supernatural.

VanTucky 15:58, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

How is this different from antitheism then? -- 62.143.100.196 15:30, 15 October 2007 (UTC) (an atheist agnostic antitheist)

Not all religions are theistic, some have no deities at all so antitheism doesn not directly include opposition to them, antireligion would. 134.243.210.14 (talk) 19:34, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Notable people

I included Karl Marx because he was a materialist who apparently made some noises against religion in general, including his famous Opium of the People/ Opiate of the Masses scribblings. Thus, he was probably an antireligionist. 204.52.215.107 22:45, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

Just because he was "probably" an antigrligionist doesnt mean he actually was. If you wish to include someone in the list that you are unsure of, please first go and find a source that comfirms that they are antireligious (yes even if you put "allegedly" in). Remember we are presenting a collection of information, not our own deductions from information. Just a reminder :-) Jarryd Moore

Removed Marx. He was an atheist, but I can't find any proof he was antireligious. His "opiate of the people" remark is usually taken out of context; in-context, it suggests that religion is a natural and possibly positive or negative result of living in an unpleasant world. In his time, opiates were considered legitimate and useful painkillers, not strictly harmful recreational drugs as they often are considered now. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.194.186.9 (talk) 05:29, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

Also, Brandon Boyd does NOT SAY that he's an atheist. He simply says that he opposes Christianity, and implies that he feels that way about organized religion in general. So while he's anti-religious, he's not necessarily an atheist.--Josh

Wouldn't Lemmy Kilmister from the band Motorhead be on this list too? I thought he hated god and all religions

What about William Blake? Didn't he feel organised religion repressed true spirituality or something? The flying pasty (talk) 21:19, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

I removed Adolf Hitler, because anyone who has read the speeches of Adolf Hitler can see clearly that he frequently made statements in support of Christianity and Christian themes. The only references used to proclaim him antireligious (or that he was an atheist) are "Hitler's Table Talk"[3], which is not speeches he made, but rather dinner conversations that people around him later recalled him saying. Plus, there is already an article in Wkipedia all about Hitler's Religious beliefs, and it does not support the claim that he was anti-religious. Dwirish (talk) 20:43, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

References

I have never heard of this term before as distinct from atheism

Could we have some sort of reference or authority for the claim that "antireligion" is distinct from atheism. I am quite interested in atheism, yet I have never once heard of "antireligion" being an alternative. The list of people here seems to be so similar to a list of atheists that it conflicts the opening about how the two terms are different. Epa101 (talk) 17:10, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

OF COURSE they're different. An atheist is a person who doesn't believe in god(s), but they may not see any problem in other people believing. In contrast, this article is saying that antireligious people are, ANTI RELIGION. As in they DO have a problem with other people putting their faith in invisible spacemen who never answer them. The point is... I can not BELIEVE in squirrels, but that is different to if I didn't believe and thought squirellism was an evil that needs to be expunged from society. That would be anti-squirrel. Healyhatman.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.149.114.32 (talk • contribs) 19:43, 24 December 2007

So anti-religion against all religions? even atheism? Is atheism a religion? Isn't a religion a BELIEF... so isn't atheism a religion of disbelief? How can one be "antireligious" when all people possess an opinion. It's a logical paradox. 72.221.114.113 (talk) 08:21, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Bogus Figures

The figure of 21 million victims of antireligious politics of the Soviet state is clearly bogus. Here is an article in Russian, where its author calculates up to half a million repressed on religious grounds in any way(mostly sent to GULAG) The same article quotes the total number of criminal verdicts 1918-1953 as 4 308 487, 835 194 of them -- death penalty. The total number of repression victims (executed, jailed and resettled) is about 10 million people. Causalities in the Russian Civil War amounts to about 2 million (both sides). And I may remind you, the site I quote is an Orthodox site, where people are clearly not interested in lowering the figures. They come to the above mentioned 500 000 as an upper bound, there are other scholars giving figures like 5 times less. The only way to get 21 million is to add here all the famine victims maybe, (because officially overwhelming majority of the population was recorded as Orthodox Christian before the Revolution) and count them as "Christian dead by actions of godless government = martyr". So I edit the numbers. As well as sentence about Church property: by law, church buildings and so on were not property of Orthodox Church, but were state property, rented by the Church, since the 18th century. RlyechDweller (talk) 04:55, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

include all reliable sources, dont cherry pick. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.188.96.167 (talk) 10:38, 19 July 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, teach the controversy, baby! Russian history scholars versus American baptist preachers. Should we add also tens of thousands persons killed on the altars of Satan in the USA every year, maybe? RlyechDweller (talk) 19:57, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

Difference between antitheism and antireligion

Could somebody please explain the difference. It doesn't say anywhere in the article why there is a difference, it just says that there is, and I don't get why. Aren't theism and religion the same thing? Jprulestheworld (talk) 11:37, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Theism is simply a belief in God or gods. Religion includes organization of people with the same beliefs and includes practices in worship of God, gods, or other supernatural forces. So, antitheism is directed at changing people's minds. Antireligion is directed at disrupting organizations and changing people's actions. Debates, published opinion articles, harassment, imprisonment, torture, and murder have all been used in support of one or both of these positions. It is the goal not the means of reaching it that distinguishes these positions. Fartherred (talk) 05:08, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Order of describing persecutions

In describing the persecutions of the Khmer Rouge religion should come first because this is an article about antireligious activity. That it was a part of a more general persecution should be second. I will restore that order. - Fartherred (talk) 10:37, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

You make a good point. I agree, so I have not changed the text. However, in another paragraph, I did change the adjective "violent" back to "extreme." I feel this change is necessary because the word "violent" is too specific to describe what happened in the Stalin period. Killing clergy was violent, yes, but was it also violent to turn churches into museums? No... So we need a word that includes both the violent and non-violent aspects of Stalinist persecution. I thought extreme would be a good word. Ohff (talk) 22:39, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

I do not see that refusing to allow religious persons to do scientific work is less extreme than refusing to allow buildings to be used for religious purposes. How do you make such a judgment? - Fartherred (talk) 02:52, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

Religious persons were (mostly) barred from doing scientific work during the Stalin period as well (let's leave aside for a moment the fact that many religious persons could hide their faith and so on). The comparison is not between (a) refusing to allow religious persons to do scientific work and (b) refusing to allow buildings to be used for religious purposes. The comparison is between (a) refusing to allow religious persons to do scientific work and (b) refusing to allow buildings to be used for religious purposes and refusing to allow religious persons to do scientific work and taking a number of violent measures. Clearly, in this case, (b) is more extreme. Of course, I'm entirely open to suggestions for a different word we could use. "Extensive," maybe? The early Stalin period saw many more antireligious measures than other periods, so those measures were more extensive at that time. Ohff (talk) 06:40, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

By the way, what do you think about my proposal above to change the focus of this article? It would be great to have an article that traced the development of antireligious thought (i.e. the opinion that religion is bad) from its earliest recorded instances to the present day. This would go back much further than the French Revolution. Ohff (talk) 06:56, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

So, you feel that violent is unsuitable because it fails to describe one of the types of persecution under Stalin. On the other hand you feel extreme is suitable because when comparing religion based employment discrimination to the total set of Stalinist persecutions, religion based employment discrimination is less extreme. I agree that we should compare religion based employment discrimination to the total set of Stalinist persecutions, the violent destruction of religious buildings, the violent beatings of religious people, and the murders. Let us leave aside for a moment the contention that anyone who makes a claim to be not religious in order to get more cushy employment is telling the truth, no matter how many times that person has attended religious meetings. The choice of extreme instead of violent is utterly without logical support and should be reverted. - Fartherred (talk) 10:49, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

Original mix and match

The article claims but does not prove that there is any difference between atheism, antitheism and antireligion. The term "Antireligion" is in use indeed, but in a couple of books I perused this was nothing but a synonym to atheism. Please provide solid references which define "antireligion" as a separate concept. Otherwise this artisle is to be replaced with a disambiguation page. Yceren Loq (talk) 00:38, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

It seems to me that the topic of this article is actually [[Antireligious persecution]] or [[Anti-religious persecution]]. It is not about a philosophical position, but the use of physical force, as provided by law or outside of a legal framework, to prevent people from practicing, teaching, or spreading religion. The existence of such persecution is documented well. Changing the name of this article and perhaps dropping a category or two might be possible. I do not understand what is intended with a disambiguation page. Do you intend that the content should be dropped or moved to another title? Fartherred (talk) 04:34, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

The article on [[Religious persecution]] is mainly about those with one religion persecuting those with different religions. Atheists persecuting religious people is relatively new to history. The instance in the French revolution may have been the first. It is not so new that people should be ignorant about it and maintain that if people had no religion there would be no persecution. Attempts to eliminate religion have involved the worst persecutions in history. This is a topic that ought to be addressed on Wikipedia. Only the titles of articles and categorization are in doubt. Fartherred (talk) 04:59, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

But it seems we already have an article mostly dedicated to the persecution of religious people by atheists - namely [[State atheism]]. If any article should be renamed to [[Antireligious persecution]], it's that one, because it contains far more information than this one. So maybe this article should be rewritten to focus on persecutions carried out by atheists who were not in control of a state? That would avoid overlap with state atheism. Or maybe this article should focus on antireligion as an opinion rather than a historical practice, and therefore discuss the writings of antireligious authors and the reasons people have given for opposing religion? I don't know - what do you think? Ohff (talk) 22:51, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

I would favor renaming [[Antireligion]] as [[Antireligious persecution]] because it deals with a wider topic even though State atheism is the more developed article. I have added a reference to [[State atheism]] in the ==See also== list. The antireligious thought could be moved to an article named [[Antireligious thought]]. A few people should agree to do the work of splitting the article into two or better yet one reliable person should agree to do it. Let me know if you find a willing slave. - Fartherred (talk) 22:27, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

On second thought the antireligious thought could be moved to [[Irreligion]], [[Atheism]], [[Agnosticism]], or [[Naturalism]], wherever it would best fit. - Fartherred (talk) 23:58, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

This thread seems closest to the year old OR tag I just removed as stale. Atheism, anti-theism, and anti-religion are all distinct. The second is largely made up and would implicitly a kind of theism, if not a another word for atheist. Anti-religion however is epitomized by the so-called Church or the Cult of Reason which actively evangelizes against forms of belief not solely based on reason and experience. 72.228.189.184 (talk) 20:23, 5 September 2012 (UTC)

OK, my misconstrual of anti-theism to something typically encountered but not what's referred to by that name here. 72.228.189.184 (talk) 20:27, 5 September 2012 (UTC)

It seems that this article is about argumentation and actions intended to discourage the practice of religion in general. The [[Cult of Reason]] is only one type of Antireligion. Perhaps the article could be split into [[Atheistic persecution of religion]] and [[Atheistic propaganda against religion]] as distinct from religious persecution and propaganda against other religions. I am not sure I understand your point. - Fartherred (talk) 20:34, 6 September 2012 (UTC)

The Khmer Rouge atrocities

I intend to restore the paragraph on the Khmer Rouge atrocities and add another reference. - Fartherred (talk) 08:20, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

There are good references for that. The Cambodian genocide was a particular interest of mine and I have deep feelings about it. Angkar's persecution of Muslims, in particular, was horrific, and certainly the topic can be mentioned here. However it needs to use quality sources, and shouldn't make simplistic claims conflating religious persecution with the entire catastrophe, which was much broader in scope. --Sammy1339 (talk) 13:45, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

The mere fact that religious persecution happened within a larger persecution does not mean that it was not religious persecution. The Khmer Rouge focussed particularly on Buddhist monks killing about 95% of them, whereas more than half of the general population survived. I do not conflate anything. I give the religious persecution in context of the general horror of killing in which it occurred. - Fartherred (talk) 14:02, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

I don't have the stomach to argue with you about the Khmer Rouge. I'll try to find some better sources for this section. --Sammy1339 (talk) 14:06, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

Areligion

I have known many people who describe themselves as "areligionists", some of them for many years. I also describe myself in this way. I have never known anyone to describe themselves as an "antireligionist". "Anti" implies a strongly active opposition, rather than a state of belief. An "antitheist" would be someone strongly and actively opposed to all forms of theism. While some atheists fit into that extreme category, most don't. The same is true of areligionism: some areligionists are that strongly and actively opposed to religion; the vast majority are not.

This whole article exudes a pejorative viewpoint, as by someone who sees areligionism as an extremely negative thing, and has chosen to grind their axe about it in a Wiki article. Better no article at all, than one so clearly and inaccurately biased.

I suggest deletion.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.95.43.249 (talk) 01:01, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

Unclear how your post didn't get autosigned. In any case, yes a cursory examination indicates you are correct and the common believer bias is being expressed, together with the usual calumny against the first wave of socialism. Deletion or merge would seem to be indicated. Alternatively, we could work it out as exposition of the flat fact that what a religion is is a false belief system inasmuch as there is a unique one (science) that produces truth. As there cannot be a greater intellectual and moral wrong than basing human existence on falsehoods or persuading others to do so (every other "evil" flows from this), you may now say that you know of at least one antireligionist. Lycurgus (talk) 20:21, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

I've also restored the auto-signing you apparently deleted. Please don't do that. Lycurgus (talk) 21:08, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

I see you are an antireligionist. The point of the article is not to defame anti-religious people, but anti-religious activities of states got put into the same article as anti-religious people for a lack of a better place to put them. Renaming a portion of the article as perhaps [[Anti-religious persecution]] was discussed in the section "Original mix and match" above, but nothing was done. The activities taken attacking religion that are described in the article actually took place. This is by no means an exhaustive list. It is not calumny to describe actual wrong-doing. It should be reported and remembered so that we might avoid similar things in the future. A pejorative tone would be mild compared to the thorough condemnation that those anti-religious activities deserve. The last time I checked, I found the documentation of those activities to be sufficient. I am sorry if that puts an unfavorable light on legitimate statements in opposition to religion, but it cannot be helped. - Fartherred (talk) 18:52, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

Don't people wanna do the indents anymore? In any case I do agree that the forceful suppression of religion is wrong. People must come to reject made up stuff as fundamental belief on their own. The failures of the past to bring about a reason based foundation for human being generally do need to be made clear and I am very far from wanting to suppress that in any way. The problem comes when these failures are then taken as justification for persistence of the thing they tried to address albeit in a totally wrong way. In fact there are relatively few people like myself who are against religion of any sort, not just theistic ones, so wanted to make it clear that there are such individuals. One further clarification: when a religion ceases to be a belief system taken seriously as such and becomes a vessel for folkways and cultural heritage distinct from that then the malignant thing is transformed into something net positive (as is probably the case for example for a simple majority of Jews today). Lycurgus (talk) 19:52, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

I was indenting one from the paragraph above to which my comment referred, as per WP:Indentation example #3. It might be helpful if everyone followed a consistent practice. I think I understand your viewpoint and that is more important than proper indentation. - Fartherred (talk) 13:39, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

A mix of styles works for me :) As someone has said "foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds". Lycurgus (talk) 14:12, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

So as an apparently rare, at least in the West, exemplar of an advocate of what this article is about, want to be clear that there is an unnamed thing which would be where religion is now in non Sinitic cultures. That thing would be a body of motivation for the masses which did not involve lies about the essential nature of reality. Because of a blind spot on this outside East Asia where the masses are dominated by religion, an article like this can become a hobby horse for someone wanting to decry the persecution of religion. That's probably inappropriate given current site policies and therefore a justification for the suggestion the opener of this thread made.

If it's to stay, address the POV concerns, you need a Freedom from Religion § because there being no likely merge target in religious persecution or freedom of religion the other alternative would be deletion. Lycurgus (talk) 20:56, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

As above, I would not oppose moving the content about persecution of religion to [[Anti-religious persecution]], but persecution of religion has occurred. To not mention it would give a false idea of history. - Fartherred (talk) 00:09, 11 July 2015 (UTC)

Well the false idea is that there is much religious persecution which isn't by religions. Yes that move would obviate the need to address the Freedom from Religion issue and allow you to concentrate on the persecution of religion of any sort. Lycurgus (talk) 00:15, 11 July 2015 (UTC)

If you count the amount of persecution by the number of the persecuted that were killed, the persecution by atheist states really stands out. For example the persecution of Catholics by Henry VIII and the following persecution of protestants by Bloody Mary concentrated on the noble class that had property worth confiscating. There were people truly concerned about religious differences that were enlisted to do the work, but the course of the persecution was guided by people interested in taking someone else's property. Common people were mostly ignored, and mostly ended up following the religious example of their lord. Persecutions by relatively recent atheistic states were the first persecutions that had available modern organizational techniques to be thorough. - Fartherred (talk) 00:39, 11 July 2015 (UTC)

In Cambodia the Khmer Rouge killed about 1.7 million people, about a third of the population, with some motivation in killing particularly those that did not fit their pure agrarian model, but no particular reason seems to explain all of the killing. While doing this they managed to pick out Buddhist monks, killing about 95% of them. While a religious persecution was not the main activity, it was not neglected. That shows organization. - Fartherred (talk) 01:52, 11 July 2015 (UTC)

This should be put into context. It partly occurred while United States bombing was still going on which killed an unknown number of civilians and military. This adds to the uncertainty of how many deaths should be attributed to the Khmer Rouge. - Fartherred (talk) 02:31, 11 July 2015 (UTC)

Whether inadvertently or not you are making clear that you are trying to push a POV which is in conflict with the current title of this article, among other things. You persist in conflating political persecutions such as the Khmer Rouge genocide as being primarly about religion when that is more or less flat false. Lycurgus (talk) 03:14, 11 July 2015 (UTC)

I agree with Lycurgus that your interest in this topic seems to be tendentious. You also demonstrate a disturbing degree of ignorance. For example, Operation Menu occurred in 1969-1970, while Sihanouk was in power, and in fact culminated in the Lon Nol coup. At this time the Khmer Rouge were a very minor presence in Cambodia compared to the Viet Cong, and this was over 5 years before the mass-killings and relocations began. U.S. bombing was over before the fall of the Lon Nol government. To say the U.S. bombing was responsible for some of the 1.7 million deaths (by your figures; actual numbers are not well-established) is nonsense, although it arguably was indirectly responsible for the entire catastrophe. I think that you are repeating a polemical narrative that you have found in fundamentalist Christian sources which have a revisionist view of history wherein atheism is the cause of all moral ills, including genocide. --Sammy1339 (talk) 04:04, 11 July 2015 (UTC)

It hardly seems that you have even read what I wrote. Lycurgus wrote: that I was "conflating political persecutions such as the Khmer Rouge genocide as being primarily about religion". While I actually wrote: "While a religious persecution was not the main activity, it was not neglected." exactly the opposite of writing that it was mainly about religion. Do you maintain that a religious persecution cannot occur while a larger political persecution is occurring, and if so why?

To say that the U.S. bombing was responsible for the (about) 1.7 million deaths in Cambodia would be nonsense, but I did not write that at all. The Khmer Rouge were using terroristic killings if not absolutely from its beginnings in 1968 then very soon after. U.S. bombing was done from about 1965 to about 1973. There was considerable overlap. I consider that the 1.7 million deaths should include the entire career of the Khmer Rouge. I will agree that their motivations were seemingly mostly political, but whatever the underlying motivation, a disproportionate number of monks died.

I am not nearly as well informed on this topic as I wish I were, even though these facts can be terrible to know. I hope to learn because knowledge can do some good. - Fartherred (talk) 02:27, 12 July 2015 (UTC)

No. The U.S. bombing of Cambodia occurred from exactly March 18, 1969 to exactly August 15, 1973, excluding a relatively few earlier missions which were directed at Viet Cong targets and flew just over the border. You do not get to consider what the 1.7 million should include. That figure is due to Ben Kiernan, and calculates the deaths from April 17, 1975 until the Vietnamese invasion. You are right, though, that you are uninformed, and your reliance on www.christianagression.org (currently reference 8 in this article) is probably doing little to alleviate your uninformation. I'm sorry if I seem aggressive, but I do take umbrage at your exploitation of these events to promote an ideological narrative. --Sammy1339 (talk) 04:51, 12 July 2015 (UTC)

Action overdue

It's clear that some action must be taken to address the many complaints above. I was going to put a subst move template but opening this thread for a discussion of that. One thing that caught my attention just now was School prayer. So if the article is to survive it must somehow find an appropriate place in main namespace that already has secularization, irreligion, etc. There is still a gap but if this article is to survive, say as Opposition to Religion with Farthereds contributions in persecution sections then there will need to be a balance of presentation of secularization in a positive or at least objective light as well as a redact of the distortions due to the POV for which there are many complaints above. FTR I don't think up until now I've had a single edit on the actual text of this article. Lycurgus (talk) 22:21, 11 July 2015 (UTC)

I think Turkey's present government was secular from it's start and did not engage in religious persecution. I do not have a list of secular (that is not religiously aligned) governments, but I think the U.S. government would be included. While some U.S. government officials might seem somewhat antireligious, the government as a whole is not. Treating a secular status in a positive light seems a little different than treating an anti-religious status in a positive light. While people might reasonably have an antireligious attitude, the only anti-religious government actions that I know of were coupled, sooner or later, with persecutions. My knowledge is sketchy.

Would you object to me starting an article labeled [[anti-religious persecutions]] and moving the persecutions from this article over there. It might later get deleted as not notable, or merged with some other persecution article. - Fartherred (talk) 02:52, 12 July 2015 (UTC)

Yes that would work. As I said the main problem is the conflation of the persecution with the broader efforts to eliminate or restrict. If you do make the move be sure to move this back matter page too, that tends to be a general problem and will be in this case unless the mediawiki move function has addressed. BTW, is it your contention that there has been anti-religious persecution in the United States? Lycurgus (talk) 09:49, 12 July 2015 (UTC)

There have been some people who committed crimes against religious groups in the United States, but nothing that I would call officially approved persecution, yet. I think there was some official discrimination between religious groups in the colonies before they became the United States, but after the constitution, slaves were the only group that could be legally persecuted, and that was not religion based.

WP:Splitting indicates that an article can be split "...if the material is seen to be inappropriate for the article due to being out of scope..." I will have to study the proper way to do this to allow readers to follow the proper history and study the proper handling of the talk page.

I do not want to promote the idea that some groups are more prone to persecute than others. I just want to see history fairly represented so that we might learn from what actually happened. - Fartherred (talk) 22:33, 12 July 2015 (UTC)

So if I perform this action, there would likely be two articles leaving the event. This one with the content redacted for the subject proper, same title hyphenated (with this redirecting there instead of reverse as now), and Persecution of religion with most of the current content. Lycurgus (talk) 11:39, 14 July 2015 (UTC)

I think there may be a problem in that there is already an article named Religious persecution. A forced merger may be called for soon after the split. If you know how to handle the maintenance of the history, and how to direct readers to the proper talk page, then you would be the more likely editor to do the split, and I for my part will not object. I will try to do something to properly represent the many articles on religious persecution, and others can maintain [[Antireligion]]. - Fartherred (talk) 14:24, 14 July 2015 (UTC)

Acknowledged. Lycurgus (talk) 23:45, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

Totalitarian bias

The History section is awfully biased towards presenting antireligion as something almost synonymous with being a genocidal totalitarian state. It's completely casual in doing so, for example "The Khmer Rouge attempted to eliminate religions and all else relating to the old culture of Cambodia. In the process they killed nearly 1.7 million people". The entirety of it will need careful rephrasing and much more extensive set of examples, so that it shows a picture of actual history of antireligion, not history of political religions wiping out theistic religions.mathrick (talk) 15:47, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

The AGF explanation would likely be that the extreme examples are the most ready-to-hand. Ca you think of others that could be included? --— Rhododendrites ^talk |  22:06, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

This article would make one think antireligionists are all genocidal monsters. There has to be a way to balance this article. Anyone? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.19.18.127 (talk) 16:23, 20 September 2015 (UTC)

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Reverted back to Jan 2017 state

Came to see how this was doing per my involvement above and found butchered carcass of a normal article, so just reverted to a presentable state using named identity. Will come back to see if there was subsequent content that should be incorporated. 98.4.124.117 (talk) 20:16, 8 April 2017 (UTC)

Not gotten back to this yet but just commenting for addressing the content, in the West, anti-religion as such as opposed to atheism is so new or such a slim thread (at the superficial level of knowledge common) that it is difficult to present a balanced view, I think that's what the stuff about persecution of religion above was about. Nonetheless there certainly is such a thing for which a full throated article could be constructed as an exposition of same. Opposition to religion (of any kind) in the West didn't begin with d'Holbach, and in the Sinosphere it practically predates Western European (as distinct from European) civilization. I think it's better to leave it unbalanced, portraying anti-religion as persecution of religion until that work is put in. 98.4.124.117 (talk) 20:30, 8 April 2017 (UTC)

So rejiggered the tagging and am clear how I would proceed to address: subdivide History § into Freedom of Religion and Freedom from Religion §§ with the latter having subsections for US State Foundation, French Revolution, and Modern state and private efforts. 98.4.124.117 (talk) 00:43, 9 April 2017 (UTC)

Confucianism is not a religion

This is a common misperception of ignorant Westerners, many of whom presume that everyone everywhere has some sort of beliefs like their own. Confucianism is a traditional system of thought and behavior and has many precepts and things that look like a religion but it does not posit a world other than the material one, fictional beings in it or other common counterfactuals of religion. A similar situation applies for pure Theravada Buddhism, that of the Buddha himself but in that case it is less than the worldly totality that presents itself in Confucianism and many degenerate forms of Buddhism are little different in profile from Islam or Christianity.

About the only thing in Confucianism that qualifies is filial piety which is often translated in the West as "ancestor worship", in a distortion. 98.4.124.117 (talk) 05:22, 9 April 2017 (UTC)

Recent edits

I've removed a couple recent problematic additions which appear to be unattributed cut&paste additions from other articles. The reason I removed them, rather than attribute them, however, is because of the numerous incongruities between what the cited sources say and what was added to the article. For example, what the source described as a propaganda crusade of literature and debates, was instead entered as "persecution" in our article. Another source described secularism, but was entered here only as "atheism" in an improperly conveyed quotation. Twice, the phrase "Under the doctrine of..." is used, without being explicitly conveyed in the cited sources. The whole book, "Inside Central Asia" is cited, without page numbers. The two sentences cited to Blaney (pg. 494) convey something different. There are weird duplications, e.g.; in one sentence, it says "the government founded the League of Militant Atheists...", then in the immediately following sentence, it also says "The League of Militant Atheists was also a 'nominally independent organization established by the Communist Party...'" (with the League wikilinked both times as well). The article already stated that the Khmer Rouge eliminated all the religions, including Buddhism -- to which was added more text saying that the Khmer Rouge banned all religions, including Buddhism. These are just a few of the problems with the newly introduced text. It would be helpful if the editor could indicate here what information they hoped to convey to the reader so that it can be meaningfully incorporated into the existing prose. Xenophrenic (talk) 05:00, 16 April 2017 (UTC)

The additions were actually well sourced to references (including those from academic publishers), meeting Wikipedia's WP:RS standard. Just because Wikipedia:YOUDONTLIKEIT doesn't give you an excuse to remove information about state atheism. This is a repeated behaviour you've engaged in on multiple articles and you were censured at WP:ANI for doing so. Please stop now. AR E N Z O Y 1 6A•t a l k• 02:47, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

I don't see where I cited WP:IDONTLIKEIT as a reason for any of my edits. I'm fairly sure I didn't. It would be helpful if you'd address the actual concerns expressed above. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 06:41, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

Regarding the most recent edits of April 23, there are numerous editorial problems:

• Please don't stack large numbers of source citations at the end of a sentence (or worse, as was done here, after just fragments of a sentence). One sentence had twelve citations. See WP:OVERCITE for some good advice.
• Please don't Wiki-link the same word or phrase multiple times, in paragraph after paragraph. See WP:DUPLINK.
• Please don't remove long-standing cited sources from specific sections of text without giving any indication as to why. (For example, this one: [4] )
• Please don't add citations with |accessdate= parameters saying they were last accessed or retrieved years ago. I assume they were copied from somewhere else on Wikipedia, but it is your responsibility to verify the sources say what you claim they say when you introduce them into another article. (I see that several do not.)

What concerns me the most, however, are these two sentence changes. I've moved these sentence changes here for discussion. The following sentences were changed from this:

The Soviet Union directed antireligious campaigns at all faiths, ...

to this:

Under the policy of state atheism which was aimed to eliminate religions and promote atheism in society, the Soviet Union directed antireligious campaigns at all faiths, ...

No such "policy" is described in that fashion by the cited sources, which actually describe the motivation for the antireligious campaigns. Even Kowalewski, the only source to use close to that wording, clarifies that state atheism was the goal of the ideology. He goes on to clarify on pages 427-8 that Marxism-Leninism is the impetus behind the anti-religious policy.

And from this:

The Khmer Rouge attempted to eliminate Cambodia's cultural heritage, including its religions, particularly Theravada Buddhism.

to this:

Democratic Kampuchea adopted a policy of militant state atheism policy, which led the Khmer Rouge to try and eliminate Cambodia's religious heritage, particularly Theravada Buddhism.

The added source citations did not support this additional text about such a policy. It is also grammatically incorrect ("policy of militant state atheism policy"?) And what happened to the mention of Cambodia's culture? This cited source states: "the Khmer Rouge set out to erase an entire culture, a major foundation stone of which was Cambodia’s religion, Theravada Buddhism."

Perhaps it would be helpful if you could explain what it is you are trying to convey to the readers with these additions. Xenophrenic (talk) 09:28, 24 April 2017 (UTC)

Okay, so no input then? Xenophrenic (talk) 12:07, 24 April 2017 (UTC)

I see you have resumed editing elsewhere, so I am going to address some of the problems outlined above. I would, however, still like your input on what it is you intend your recent additions to convey to our readers, so that we can work to present it in an intelligible form. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 15:22, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

As user Renzoy16 cited above; the additions were actually well sourced to references (including those from academic publishers). Here is my edit:

The official ideology of Soviet Union, on which its policy towards relgions was based, was Marxism-Leninism, which made atheism an official doctrine of the state, and advocated the elimination of religions by control and suppression, as well as through the promotion of atheism in the public sphere.

Here what the source cited: Soviet policy toward religion has been based on the ideology of Marxism-Leninism, which has made atheism the official doctrine of the Soviet Union. Marxism-Leninism has consistently advocated the control, suppression, and, ultimately, the elimination of religious beliefs. ...

And here also what the source cited: The Soviet Union was the first state to have as an ideological objective the elimination of religion. Toward that end, the Communist regime confiscated church property, ridiculed religion, harassed believers, and propagated atheism in the schools.

and about this edit:

Authorities in the People's Republic of Romania aimed to move towards an atheistic society, in which religion would be considered as the ideology of the bourgeoisie; the régime also held the goal of educating the laboring masses in science, politics and culture--they believed this would help them eliminate "superstition and mysticism".

Here what the source cited:" One of the main aims of the regime was to transform Romania into a communist atheist society in which religion was considered the ideology of the bourgeoise.".--Jobas (talk) 19:01, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

Hey, thanks for finally joining me here at the Talk page. You (and Renzoy) seem to misunderstand my concerns as expressed above. I never said your additions weren't sourced. My concern is more with the conflicts posed between the sources you have cited, and also with properly conveying what the cited sources say. I can "well source" the fact that cats have tails, but that doesn't mean this well-sourced fact should be inserted into our article. That is why I asked if you could please explain what it is you are trying to convey to our readers. It seems that this is the sentence we need to focus on:

The official ideology of Soviet Union, on which its policy towards relgions was based, was Marxism-Leninism, which made atheism an official doctrine of the state, and advocated the elimination of religions by control and suppression, as well as through the promotion of atheism in the public sphere.

Xenophrenic (talk) 19:28, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

Just because Wikipedia:YOUDONTLIKEIT doesn't give you an excuse to remove information, this sentence was based in two sources:

Soviet policy toward religion has been based on the ideology of Marxism-Leninism, which has made atheism the official doctrine of the Soviet Union. Marxism-Leninism has consistently advocated the control, suppression, and, ultimately, the elimination of religious beliefs. ....

The Soviet Union was the first state to have as an ideological objective the elimination of religion. Toward that end, the Communist regime confiscated church property, ridiculed religion, harassed believers, and propagated atheism in the schools..--Jobas (talk) 19:42, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

Jobas, please show me where I said "IDONTLIKEIT". Or show me where I cited that as an excuse to remove information. Why do you say things like that? Xenophrenic (talk) 19:45, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

The souces are new as you noticed and it's true that cats have tails but it was long before this edit so!. this information is important, It shows the ideological background of the Soviet Union, which influenced it's view of religion, It also shows how the regime treats religion as well. The whole sentence is linked with the content of the article and the content of the paragraph.--Jobas (talk) 19:55, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

But why do you link to the "idontlikeit" essay? Xenophrenic (talk) 20:15, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

Still no response? And you still won't share with me what you intend your additions to convey to our readers? I am left to guess what it is. You did give me a clue when you said " this information is important, It shows the ideological background of the Soviet Union", so I've made sure Marxism-Leninism is in the article and linked. I've also re-removed your insertion of duplicate links (see above). I've re-worded the beginning of a paragraph which contained what I think we can both agree is a ridiculously long run-on sentence: The official ideology of Soviet Union, on which its policy towards relgions was based, was Marxism-Leninism, which made atheism an official doctrine of the state, the Soviet Union viewed religion as closely tied with foreign nationality, and thus had directed antireligious efforts of varying degrees and intensities, and at varying faiths, depending on what threat they posed to the Soviet state, and their willingness to subordinate itself to political authority. I removed (again) the partial and selective quote you embedded in the citation to this source. I am interested in hearing your thoughts as to why those specific sentences are of value. I've also undid the inconsistent piping you did, which was inserted without explanation. Xenophrenic (talk) 12:26, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Your last edit summary said you would be posting here on this Talk page soon, and I'm looking forward to that. In the meantime, you've made some problematic edits involving disputed content that we are presently discussing here. Specifically:

• this edit, which introduces a submarine link to a page not supported by the cited source. Sneaky, but I caught that.
• this edit, which added a quotation not found in the cited source, added weasel words and non-NPOV phrasing.
• this edit along with this change, which adds a redundancy (paragraph already notes the goal of promoting an atheistic society) - and your chosen wording makes no sense in English.

I notice that all of your recent edits concern "atheism". I find that very interesting. Would you care to explain why? This might be a good time for you to explain what it is you wish to convey to our readers with your latest edits. I've asked that several times already. Please take the time to communicate, Jobas. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 21:24, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

• About this edit, well the Soviet Union was an Atheist state, and there is a dozen of sources support that cliams.
• about this edit, what the "One of the main aims of the regime was to 'transform Romania into a communist atheist society' in which religion was considered the ideology of the bourgeoise." then The main objective of this anti-religious society was 'to propagate among the labouring masses political and scientific knowledge to fight obscurantism, superstition, mysticism, and all other influences of bourgeois ideologies'. ...the regime's anti-religious campaign aimed to discredit the church and to reduce the influence of religion in society.

About this edit, you could reword if you find this wording makes no sense in English, you can have a look here and see what the source say Propagation of atheism in schools has been another consistent policy, it's say propagation of atheism was another consistent policy druing the antireligious campaigns, so it's related to this section and relevant.--Jobas (talk) 22:00, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

you could reword if you find this wording makes no sense in English --Jobas

Yes, I could, and I usually would. But your recent comments and assumptions of bad faith are not encouraging me to do you any favors. So instead, please exercise a little more care with your editing. Xenophrenic (talk) 14:22, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

It is obviously of vital interest that the State enforced Atheism as a doctrine. This is not deniable, just as it is not deniable that this led to other policies by the State towards the religious. There is no justification for hiding that information that I can see. desmay (talk) 18:36, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

I don't disagree that it is of interest that some states had political doctrines espousing atheist societies, and we have several articles which cover this -- and it is already mentioned in this article as well. So your "justification for hiding" comment sounds just a little weird. And this article is about antireligion, which as the lead says is distinct from atheism, antitheism, etc., so you'll have to be a little clearer on what you are suggesting. Xenophrenic (talk) 21:24, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Here is an example you removed the sentence "moving towards an atheist society", when the source cited " One of the main aims of the regime was to transform Romania into a communist atheist society in which religion was considered the ideology of the bourgeoise" and you removed the sentence "The Soviet Union adopted the ideology of Marxism-Leninism, and made atheism as the offcial doctrine of the state" when the source cited "Soviet policy toward religion has been based on the ideology of Marxism-Leninism, which has made atheism the official doctrine of the Soviet Union. and you removed the the sentence ".. and advocated the elimination of religions by control and suppression, as well as through the promotion of atheism in the public sphere" when the source cited "The Soviet Union was the first state to have as an ideological objective the elimination of religion. Toward that end, the Communist regime confiscated church property, ridiculed religion, harassed believers, and propagated atheism in the schools" and "Marxism-Leninism has consistently advocated the control, suppression, and, ultimately, the elimination of religious beliefs" .. " In the 1920s and 1930s, such organizations as the League of the Militant Godless ridiculed all religions and harassed believers. Propagation of atheism in schools has been another consistent policy"; That's why i mention the Wikipedia:YOUDONTLIKEIT, the source is very clear, and the sentence or my edit is conformed to that source.

Second; you wording my edit and cliaming per cited sources, when the sentence that been added by me is conformed to the source:

Authorities in the People's Republic of Romania aimed to move towards an atheistic society, in which religion would be considered as the ideology of the bourgeoisie; the régime also held the goal of educating the laboring masses in science, politics and culture--they believed this would help them eliminate "superstition and mysticism", thereby reducing the influence of religion.

See what the source cited:

"One of the main aims of the regime was to 'transform Romania into a communist atheist society' in which religion was considered the ideology of the bourgeoise." then The main objective of this anti-religious society was 'to propagate among the labouring masses political and scientific knowledge to fight obscurantism, superstition, mysticism, and all other influences of bourgeois ideologies'. ...the regime's anti-religious campaign aimed to discredit the church and to reduce the influence of religion in society..--Jobas (talk) 19:30, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Hi, Jobas. Thank you for your comments. First, please understand that Wikipedia articles are always being improved, and are edited by many editors - changes you make won't always stay exactly as you make them. You have provided some examples where you say I "removed" sentences, which isn't accurate. If you'll look closer, you will see that in most cases I've simply reworded or improved the wording. In some cases, I've removed redundant information when it was already present elsewhere in the article. This is all standard editing procedure, and none of the edits I've made were for the reasons described in the "IDONTLIKEIT" essay. So I'm going to ask you now to stop assuming bad faith, and realize that your edits might actually be changed for policy compliant reasons. As a good example, you added a quotation "superstition and mysticism", which does not exist in the cited source. There are other examples of editing improvements cited above.

Now a question for you. Is there a reason why each of your recent edits concerns "atheism", when this article subject is antireligion? Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 21:24, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

I've re-worded the first sentence to the Romanian paragraph to say: Authorities in the People's Republic of Romania aimed to educate the laboring masses in science, politics and culture to help them fight superstition and mysticism, thereby reducing the influence of religion and resulting in an atheistic society, in which religion would be considered as the ideology of the bourgeoisie. I feel this sentence better conforms to what the sources we are using convey. As I'm sure you know, our sources say slightly different things, and we need to use editorial discretion to resolve conflicts. For example, the sources say that the Romanian Orthodox church collaborated with the communists, and the communists accommodated it in return, while using the church for political ends. The sources tell us that creating an atheist society wasn't so much a "main aim" in Romania after all, as matters of state took precedence. The sources also tell us that an atheistic society was never even close to being realized in Romania, as throughout the reign of the communist regime the citizenry were 50-70% "believers". I'd like to work with you to make sure our article properly conveys the correct tone as expressed in the totality of the sources we are using, instead of butting heads over content. Can you see that happening? Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 21:47, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Here what the soruce cited Soviet policy toward religion has been based on the ideology of Marxism-Leninism (see Glossary), which has made atheism the official doctrine of the Soviet Union. Marxism-Leninism has consistently advocated the control, suppression, and, ultimately, the elimination of religious beliefs. In the 1920s and 1930s, such organizations as the League of the Militant Godless ridiculed all religions and harassed believers. Propagation of atheism in schools has been another consistent policy. The regime's efforts to eradicate religion in the Soviet Union, however, have varied over the years with respect to particular religions and have been affected by higher state interests., and as user desmay cited above it is obviously of vital interest that the State enforced Atheism as a doctrine and as part of it's antireligious campaigns, Now a question for you why you keep removing information that you don't like.--Jobas (talk) 21:51, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

I asked if you could see us working together on this. In response, you say that. No surprise, I suppose. So please provide a diff where I said I was removing something because I didn't like it. Xenophrenic (talk) 14:22, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

I've re-worded the first sentence to the Romanian paragraph to say: Authorities in the People's Republic of Romania aimed to move towards an atheistic society, in which religion would be considered as the ideology of the bourgeoisie; the régime also held the goal to educate the laboring masses in science, politics and culture to help them fight superstition and mysticism, thereby reducing the influence of religion. I feel this sentence better conforms to what the sources we are using convey. see again what the source cited "One of the main aims of the regime was to 'transform Romania into a communist atheist society' in which religion was considered the ideology of the bourgeoise." then The main objective of this anti-religious society was 'to propagate among the labouring masses political and scientific knowledge to fight obscurantism, superstition, mysticism, and all other influences of bourgeois ideologies'. ...the regime's anti-religious campaign aimed to discredit the church and to reduce the influence of religion in society..--Jobas (talk) 21:53, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

How does your proposed edit address the afore mentioned discrepancies between our sources? Rather than clear the confusion, it just perpetuates it. Xenophrenic (talk) 14:22, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

And where is the source cited: "and resulting in an atheistic society"?. It's cited "One of the main aims of the regime was to 'transform Romania into a communist atheist society' in which religion was considered the ideology of the bourgeoise.", my edit said: Authorities in the People's Republic of Romania aimed to move towards an atheistic society, in which religion would be considered as the ideology of the bourgeoisie; the régime also held the goal to educate the laboring masses in science, politics and culture to help them fight superstition and mysticism, thereby reducing the influence of religion..--Jobas (talk) 16:00, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

Did you understand the question? Xenophrenic (talk) 17:17, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

Apparently you did not understand the question, so I will repeat it, with additional elaboration: How does your proposed edit address the afore mentioned discrepancies between our sources? By discrepancies, I mean the conflicts where one source says one thing, but another source says something different. For example, you cite one source which claims that "One of the main aims of the regime was to transform Romania into a communist atheist society". That is partially correct, and partially incorrect. Why? Because another source you cited also states, "the Soviet regime has failed to develop and apply a consistent and lasting policy toward nationalities and religions. Official policies and practices have not only varied with time but also have differed in their application from one nationality to another and from one religion to another ... questions of nationality and religion were always closely linked. Not surprisingly, therefore, the attitude toward religion also varied from a total ban on some religions to official support of others." Oh, and furthermore, "The regime's efforts to eradicate religion in the Soviet Union, however, have varied over the years with respect to particular religions and have been affected by higher state interests." So you see, some religions were allowed, while some were not. Some religions the regime tried to eliminate because they resisted the communist authority, while others they tried to infiltrate and control to use for their own purposes (like the Orthodox church). They even sponsored and helped to support the churches at certain times, when it served their purposes. So please, when you add something to our article about what "People's Republic of Romania aimed to" do, please consider all of our sources, not just the parts that say what you want to hear. So are you willing to work with me to develop article content that properly conveys what the sources are saying, or will you stick with repeatedly inserting your inaccurate version over and over? I hope you choose to work with me on this. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 21:41, 28 April 2017 (UTC)

Discussion of different POV

A cursory glance at your edits reveals that you wish to remove the term "state atheism" or related terms from articles where it properly provides context for antireligious persecution of the faithful. The source I graciously provided to you explicitly affirms that state atheism was part of an ideology responsible for antireligious violence against people of faith. There are no objections to including this in the text, other than "WP:IDONTLIKEIT," a position you seem to hold in light of examining all of your recent edits of excising information about state atheism, as I mentioned to you above. The reason I put quotes around "superstition and mysticism" is because that was the atheistic communist opinion--that education would result in the waning of religion because they viewed it as "superstition and mysticism". You seemed to present this as a fact (possibly reflecting a POV although I'll assume good faith and see this as an oversight on your part even though it's becoming increasing hard to do so). As the source is published by an academic press, it will remain in the article.--Jobas (talk) 19:59, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

Thank you for this very revealing comment, Jobas. It tells me a lot about you. You admit that your review was "cursory" (careless, hasty), which explains why your conclusion is so wrong, but it doesn't excuse it. Now it is time for you to take a more careful look at the edits, and the reasons for them.

state atheism was part of an ideology responsible for antireligious violence against people of faith --Jobas

No; not in the way you have been trying to make it sound in our Wikipedia articles. Our clearest reliable sources say that under communist ideologies, like Marxist-Leninism, competing forces of control and influence over society - like that of certain religions - were not tolerated, and were actively suppressed. If all religions were ever eliminated, the eventual end result would be a society without religion, which some writers have named an "atheist state". That is the only "part" atheism (the lack of belief in gods) plays in the ideology. So to be clear, "atheism" isn't "responsible" for violence against believers in gods. That responsibility belongs to the regime's need for control and power, against competing influences like religion, and our articles should be written to convey that. Your edits confuse that fact, as I will explain.

There are no objections to including this in the text, other than "WP:IDONTLIKEIT" --Jobas

That is incorrect. There are, of course, no objections to the addition of information that properly convey what ALL of our sources say. But that is not what you have been trying to add, so of course there are policy-based objections to your proposed additions. You have merely refused to see or acknowledge them. Did you simply not see were I said "The reason I removed them, rather than attribute them, however, is because of the numerous incongruities between what the cited sources say and what was added to the article"? Go check, it's still there on this Talk page. Then again, when you tried to insert your own personal interpretation about atheism, I removed it and explained, "The added source citations did not support this additional text about such a policy. It is also grammatically incorrect.... I guess you accidently didn't see that either. It is still on this Talk page, above. Then yet again, when you mixed up "atheistic state" with "state atheism", and tried to insert an incorrect link by hiding it with piping, I explained why I removed it: I've also undid the inconsistent piping you did, which was inserted without explanation. That reason is still on this page, too. Gosh, I guess you just missed that one also. So you see, there are plenty of policy-based objections to your problematic additions, instead of "IDONTLIKEIT", but you just ignore them. There appears to be a comprehension problem

The reason I put quotes around "superstition and mysticism" is because that was the atheistic communist opinion... --Jobas

Those quotation marks you added are called scarequotes, and they are not allowed, because they interject your own personal POV into what is supposed to be an assertion of fact. Once again, your personal POV becomes apparent. We have rules against interjecting it into our articles. You've been at Wikipedia about as long as I have, so certainly you must know this by now.

As the source is published by an academic press, it will remain in the article. --Jobas

And again, you know this isn't true. Just because something is verifiably reliably sourced, that does not mean an editor can declare "it will remain in the article". As our WP:NPOV policy clearly states in its lead: WP:NPOV, WP:V and WP:NOR policies jointly determine the type and quality of material that is acceptable in Wikipedia articles, and, because they work in harmony, they should not be interpreted in isolation from one another. So no, you can't claim just because you found something in a reliable source, you get to stick it into an article in a POV fashion, with your own personal opinions and original research punctuation added. Again, you've been around long enough to know this. So do you have any reason why I shouldn't return the neutral wording to the article? Xenophrenic (talk) 21:41, 28 April 2017 (UTC)

I removed the quotes around "superstition and mysticism", yet the quotation marks appears in the orignal text - see the ' '- , so it is not "my personal POV" or won personal opinion) and here is the new text: Authorities in the People's Republic of Romania aimed to move towards an atheistic society, in which religion would be considered as the ideology of the bourgeoisie; the régime also set ‘to propagate among the labouring masses political and scientific knowledge’ and initiated an anti-religious campaign in 1945 that lasted until 1965 and another one with the duration of 1965–1990 aimed to reducing the influence of religion in society. I don't see here any POV or personal opinions to wording it again.

Nowhere my edit does calim that "atheism" is "responsible" for violence against believers in gods: This edit which made atheism an official doctrine of the state was based on this source The official ideology of Soviet Union, on which its policy towards relgions was based, was Marxism-Leninism, which made atheism an official doctrine of the state, While this edit and the USSR actively propagated atheism in the public sphere was based this source Propagation of atheism in schools has been another consistent policy, the source cited in clearly that propagated atheism was consistent policy. and in both of these edit's i don't see any personal opinion or original research or claims that "atheism" is "responsible" for that violence.

If all religions were ever eliminated, the eventual end result would be a society without religion, which some writers have named an "atheist state".-Xenophrenic

Well not only that, but during the anti-religious campaign the soviet authorities did force people to silence their religious expression as the only one atheists believe the public or government should be allowed to express, and forbade the criticism of atheism and agnosticism, also the soviet authorities founded the League of Militant Atheists (a "nominally independent organization established by the Communist Party to promote atheism") to intensify the persecution, I don't say here that "atheism" is "responsible". But it wasn't only resulting if all religions were ever eliminated, but propagation of atheism was part of the anti-religious campaign when soviet authorities tried to propagation of atheism as consistent policy, also our clearest reliable sources say that Marxist-Leninism ideology -on which SU policy towards relgions based on-, made atheism an official doctrine of the state. It's important to explain the background of the SU policy towards relgions.

Here the the full paragraph, Where my dose not conflict with it:

Soviet policy toward religion has been based on the ideology of Marxism-Leninism (see Glossary), which has made atheism the official doctrine of the Soviet Union. Marxism-Leninism has consistently advocated the control, suppression, and, ultimately, the elimination of religious beliefs. In the 1920s and 1930s, such organizations as the League of the Militant Godless ridiculed all religions and harassed believers. Propagation of atheism in schools has been another consistent policy. The regime's efforts to eradicate religion in the Soviet Union, however, have varied over the years with respect to particular religions and have been affected by higher state interests..--Jobas (talk) 22:14, 28 April 2017 (UTC)

Thank you for your comments, Jobas, but as I mentioned in the section above, when the source says two different things, we can't pick just one part of it to convey in our article. I outlined for you the conflicts in the source we are using, but you did not address those conflicts in your edit or in your comment here. Those conflicts need to be addressed, please. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 15:33, 12 May 2017 (UTC)

I didn't pick just one part of it to convey in our article, and if you feel that way, you simply could add the whole imagie instead of removing.--Jobas (talk) 15:50, 12 May 2017 (UTC)

I don't understand what you are saying. What is "imagie"? And what are you saying I removed? Xenophrenic (talk) 16:11, 12 May 2017 (UTC)

It is not empirically or historically or otherwise deniable that Atheism was sponsored promoted and enforced by the state. Multiple credible sources affirm this is true. I suggest another source to confirm this, The New Atheist Denial of History" by Borden W. Painter Jr, from Palgrave MacMillan (ISBN 978-1137477675). Painter documented both this and efforts to deny the influence of state-sponsored Atheism on persecution and repression of Christian--and Palgrave MacMillan is a mainstream textbook publisher and this book is published for college students. I thus suggest also adding this to references from the article, and affirm that OF COURSE Atheism was enforced by the state, and Atheistic attacks on religion as "superstition" and "against science" and "against progress" were used to both persecute and censor Christians, Jews, even Muslims. It is clearly a fact that Atheism was policy and ideology here, and to maintain Wikipedia quality facts like this must be acknowledged. desmay (talk) 12:04, 29 April 2017 (UTC)

Our sources confirm that the state sought to control or suppress the influence of religion in society. Religious institutions were considered political and societal threats to the communist regimes which couldn't have them competing for control over society. There is, of course, no reliably sourced contention that a lack of belief in gods "influenced" persecution, but that is a popular unfounded meme pushed by religionists like the ordained priest (Painter) you mentioned. An atheistic society was the anticipated goal or result of the Soviet regime, not the "cause" of it, but some editors have misrepresented the sources on that obvious fact. Xenophrenic (talk) 15:33, 12 May 2017 (UTC)

Here what the source cited: "One of the main aims of the regime was to transform Romania into a communist atheist society in which religion was considered the ideology of the bourgeoise. Thus in 1949, the Society for the Popularisation of Science and Culture was established. The main objective of this anti-religious society was 'to propagate among the labouring masses political and scientific knowledge to fight obscurantism, superstition, mysticism, and all other influences of bourgeois ideologies'. ...the regime's anti-religious campaign aimed to discredit the church and to reduce the influence of religion in society.", and my version or edit is more confirmed the soruce, the source for example don't cited "thereby reducing the influence of religion and resulting in an atheistic society", what the soruce it's cited "One of the main aims of the regime was to transform Romania into a communist atheist society in which religion was considered the ideology of the bourgeoise" then ".the regime's anti-religious campaign aimed to discredit the church and to reduce the influence of religion in society", also the source it dosen't cited "aimed to educate the laboring masses in science, politics and culture to help them fight superstition and mysticism", it's cited "to propagate among the labouring masses political and scientific knowledge to fight obscurantism, superstition, mysticism, and all other influences of bourgeois ideologies'", my wording is more conformed to cited source

And here is my "version",:Authorities in the People's Republic of Romania aimed to move towards an atheistic society, in which religion would be considered as the ideology of the bourgeoisie the source cited "One of the main aims of the regime was to transform Romania into a communist atheist society in which religion was considered the ideology of the bourgeoise.; then my edit say the régime also set to propagate among the labouring masses political and scientific knowledge to help them fight superstition and mysticism and the soruce cited The main objective of this anti-religious society was 'to propagate among the labouring masses political and scientific knowledge to fight obscurantism, superstition, mysticism, and all other influences of bourgeois ideologies', the the last part of my version cited and initiated an anti-religious campaign in 1945 that lasted until 1965 and another one with the duration of 1965–1990 aimed to reducing the influence of religion in society. and the the first source cited ...the regime's anti-religious campaign aimed to discredit the church and to reduce the influence of religion in society. could you explain where is the problematic part? and how my version conflict with the cited source?.

Is there an intelligible reason for the removing here?, the source is very clear is cited "Soviet policy toward religion has been based on the ideology of Marxism-Leninism (see Glossary), which has made atheism the official doctrine of the Soviet Union. Marxism-Leninism has consistently advocated the control, suppression, and, ultimately, the elimination of religious beliefs. In the 1920s and 1930s, such organizations as the League of the Militant Godless ridiculed all religions and harassed believers. Propagation of atheism in schools has been another consistent policy. The regime's efforts to eradicate religion in the Soviet Union, however, have varied over the years with respect to particular religions and have been affected by higher state interests". my edit was based on that source.--Jobas (talk) 15:47, 12 May 2017 (UTC)

As I already explained in the section just above this, that same source also states "the Soviet regime has failed to develop and apply a consistent and lasting policy toward nationalities and religions. Official policies and practices have not only varied with time but also have differed in their application from one nationality to another and from one religion to another. Although all Soviet leaders had the same long-range goal of developing a cohesive Soviet people, they pursued different policies to achieve it. For the Soviet regime, the questions of nationality and religion were always closely linked. Not surprisingly, therefore, the attitude toward religion also varied from a total ban on some religions to official support of others." As you can see, you cannot claim they had consistent policies or official doctrines - because they did not, according to the same source. I asked you above to help me resolve these conflicts, which you ignored. I also asked if you would explain in your own words what it was you are trying to convey to our readers, but that has been ignored as well. Is there any reason why I shouldn't remove the problematic wording? Xenophrenic (talk) 16:11, 12 May 2017 (UTC)

I'm not the one who claim they had consistent policies or official doctrines, it what the source cited : Soviet policy toward religion has been based on the ideology of Marxism-Leninism (see Glossary), which has made atheism the official doctrine of the Soviet Union. Marxism-Leninism has consistently advocated the control, suppression, and, ultimately, the elimination of religious beliefs. In the 1920s and 1930s, such organizations as the League of the Militant Godless ridiculed all religions and harassed believers. Propagation of atheism in schools has been another consistent policy. The regime's efforts to eradicate religion in the Soviet Union, however, have varied over the years with respect to particular religions and have been affected by higher state interests, This not my personal opinion or problematic wording, and the section that you provieded it's state that the attitude toward religion also varied from a total ban on some religions to official support of others, no mention here about " official doctrines", and it dosen't conflict with my wording.--Jobas (talk) 16:19, 12 May 2017 (UTC)

I'm not the one who claim they had consistent policies or official doctrines, it what the source cited... --Jobas

The same source also says they were not consistent (see the quote I gave above). So that is a conflict that needs to be resolved, rather than you repeatedly inserting just your problematic and uninformative portion without resolving the conflict. Also, I asked you what information it is you are trying to convey to our readers, but you haven't bothered to explain what it is. If you did, perhaps We could find a way to more clearly convey it. Xenophrenic (talk) 18:09, 12 May 2017 (UTC)

Reverse deletion - quote is directy lifted from citation. To be encyclopedic requires being honest to the record. desmay (talk) 23:50, 12 May 2017 (UTC)

The cited source says: "One of the main aims of the regime was to transform Romania into a communist atheist society in which religion was considered the ideology of the bourgeoise. Thus in 1949, the Society for the Popularisation of Science and Culture was established. The main objective of this anti-religious society was 'to propagate among the labouring masses political and scientific knowledge to fight obscurantism, superstition, mysticism, and all other influences of bourgeois ideologies'. ...the regime's anti-religious campaign aimed to discredit the church and to reduce the influence of religion in society.", for example doesn't says "thereby reducing the influence of religion and resulting in an atheistic society", what the source is saying "One of the main aims of the regime was to transform Romania into a communist atheist society in which religion was considered the ideology of the bourgeoise" then "the regime's anti-religious campaign aimed to discredit the church and to reduce the influence of religion in society", also the source it doesn't says "aimed to educate the laboring masses in science, politics and culture to help them fight superstition and mysticism", it's saying "to propagate among the labouring masses political and scientific knowledge to fight obscurantism, superstition, mysticism, and all other influences of bourgeois ideologies'", my wording is more conformed to source.--Jobas (talk) 12:16, 17 May 2017 (UTC)

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