Atheism and Tyrants and why it doesn't matter.

So for my first blog, I will skip the introduction's they're to the right of this little post anyway.

Recently I have been getting a little tired of people attacking atheism on the grounds that some tyrants were supposedly atheist, this usually happens in response to atheists pointing out that a lot of present day and historical leaders did a lot of wrong in the name of some theism or other.

I'll give an example; An atheist points out that the supposed leaders of the catholic church we're responsible for the crusades, to which a theist replies something like this; "Hitler and Stalin where atheists and they did horrible things too!"
The problem here is is that even if they were atheists, which is a different discussion entirely, one I do not intend to address at this moment, the argument the theist makes is flawed to start with.

I'll explain why.

Atheists (at least non I ever met nor any of my atheist friends) do not claim Hitler or Stalin for atheism, nor do any atheists I know claim anybody for atheism for that matter. Atheism is not an organized religion, it is not in fact a religion at all. Atheists tend to be free thinkers and unless you want to call one atheist free thinker recognizing a mind akin to his own in another atheist an organization they are not organized either.

Theists on the other hand claim all sorts of bigots, criminals and tyrants for their respective theisms I could make a very long list indeed but I'll stick to the crusade example for now, Pope Urban II instigator of the first crusade is in fact claimed by the theists of the catholic denominator as on of their own, he has a statue raised in his honour even because he was such a great catholic.

What this shows really is that where an atheist can in fact say; "Look mr. theist this Urban II guy was a pretty horrible person and you openly subscribe to the same theism he did and more so he did a lot of evil in the name of. And your theism still claims him as a member of that theism and raised a statue in his honour as icing on the cake, I find that pretty disturbing".
Now if mr. theist replies to this with; "You subscribe to atheism, so did Hitler, i find that way more disturbing".

The theist makes a critical mistake here, even if Hitler was an atheist that doesn't say anything about atheists in general "we atheists" do not claim Hitler as one of "our own" and I'm fairly certain no atheist ever raised a statue in his honour to celebrate what a great atheist he was. Furthermore Hitler didn't commit atrocities in "the name of atheism" he did so in the name of national socialism and at the worst one might argue that particular ideology shares the common characteristic with atheism that it doesn't subscribe to a big all seeing fairy in the sky as a matter of political practice, but this would even then be a minor commonality as it surely wasn't at the basis of national socialist beliefs.

So dear and not so dear theists please stop trying to force tyrants upon atheists as "one of theirs" we are not like you an organized group of people sharing a common belief claiming people to be "ours" the only thing all atheists have in common is we deny the existence of a god. Nothing more, nothing less.
Being told even if only by implication you share the ideals and morals of people like Hitler and Stalin is deeply offensive to someone who has never subscribed to an ideology or theism that warrants any such accusation.