Quote Originally Posted by eggrole1
Real fast also.. Hitler was a Roman Catholic, Stalin Russian Orthodix, Manson used drugs and references to himself being a god to convince the others to do what they did, and I have no knowledge of the Columbine's beliefs. Even if your argument holds true that the religious leaders do not speak for the masses, you can see that in 4 "events" you posed, 3 of them had religious backing, and the 4th an unknown to me, but I will assume they were atheist until otherwise found.
Hitler was NOT a Roman Catholic. He was baptized in a Catholic church at a very young age, and apparently was never excommunicated, but he was not a follower of Christianity. I'll freely admit that he was one of the zealots that you speak of, using supposed religion to justify horrible actions, but in terms of core beliefs, mainline Nazis were a mix of Darwinist secularists, with a very small amount of Christian ideologies mixed in for good measure. Using certain religious scriptures to justify anti-religious actions doesn't make that person religious. Otherwise Richard Dawkins could be considered a secular theist, which wouldn't make a whole lot of sense! Joseph Stalin was a self-proclaimed atheist, another supporter of Darwinism, and was extremely harsh on Russian churches at the time due to his lack of faith in any religion. Stalin didn't believe in a God, and made many public statements stating so. The Soviet dictator said on one occasion, "You know, they are fooling us, there is no God... all this talk about God is sheer nonsense." There are many, many more of Stalin's statements that mirror this one.

As for me becoming a murderer because my God supposedly allows me to "kill my enemies", that's off-base, too. A certain set of commandments that I hold dear explicitly prohibit murder, amongst other things. If I wanted to reinterpret scriptures to suit homicidal tendencies, I could. But then again, anyone can twist words around to justify horrible actions against another. They certainly don't have to be religious works, it's just that sadly, on several occasions, they have been.

The only point I'm trying to make, and have been trying to make, is that humans have a propensity to become violent. Religious humans, or otherwise. I could point out many Shintoists and Buddhists who lived during Feudal periods in Japan and all throughout Asia who murdered countless serfs in pious fits of rage and dominance, but I wouldn't point the finger at Shinto or Buddhism for the heinous acts of a fanatical few. Rather, I'd point the finger at the fanatical few themselves. But, that's just me. I don't see the need to blame their religious beliefs for the fact that they themselves were maniacal and homicidal lunatics. They're to blame, not their implied religious beliefs.

Psychotic people enable themselves... they're not enabled by religion. If they do try to justify their actions using religion, then in most instances, they're taking their religious doctrines out of context... well, most of them. Some religions do appear to be inherently evil, and state such evil tendencies in their holiest of doctrines. In my opinion, of course. But I can only name one religion that justifies violence through "holy scripture", and to try and keep things civil, I'll decline to mention the religion by name.