Things to throw at people who claim "fundamentalist atheism's just as bad as fundamentalist Xianity"

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

If Christian fundamentalists had their way in this country... I mean REALLY had their way, with no Constitution, no secular courts, no organizations championing freedom of religion and separation of church and state to get in their way, these are just a few examples of the way things would be:

- Daily religious instruction, prayer and Bible study would be required in all schools.
- Church attendance would be mandatory.
- Only Christians would be allowed to serve in elected office or as judges.
- All laws and all science education would have to conform with the Bible and meet the approval of religious leaders.
- Artificial contraception would be illegal.
- Divorce would be illegal.
- Blasphemy would be illegal.
- Working on the Sabbath would be illegal (except for football players and NASCAR drivers).
- Abortion would be illegal and punishable by death.
- Known homosexuals and atheists would be imprisoned or killed. Homosexual activity would be illegal and punishable by death.
- Extramarital sex would be illegal and punishable by death.

Then I ask them to tell me what the worst-case scenario would be if “fundamentalist" atheists had their way about everything, and then to tell me which world they’d rather live in... haven't had a worthy response yet.

I wish I had written the above, but it wasn't me -- it was skepticscott.

[Chovexani]

1. I think they're equally obnoxious.

But not equally dangerous, not by a long shot. The fundie Christians have that one sewn up.

[papau]

2. if "fundamentalist" atheists had their way" - see the result of the atheist French Revolution

[HeresyLives]

3. When did the French Revolution

become an atheist movement??

[edhopper]

15. You probably are talking about

the results of the Enlightenment movement that had it's basis in France. The main outcome of that philosophy was the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States.
So I kind of like what those early "French Atheist" had to say.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

4. The RESULT of the (atheist?) French Revolution was GOOD.

A more civilized country than what was there before.

You would have an smidgeon of a point had you omitted "the result" from your subject line, and asked me to look at he Revolution itself -- a decade of bloody madness -- but, sadly, theocracies tend to stay in the madness stage for far LONGER than that.

[Goblinmonger]

54. Oh, I know

Why didn't those uppity poor (and, I guess according to you, atheists) just eat their damn cake and let the monarchy live on in the spledor?

[hifalutin]

5. Sorry to have to ask but what is

Xianity?

[Random_Australian]

6. Seen the abbreviation Xmas? Same deal.

Xianity = Christianity

[hifalutin]

7. Dumb me,

thank you, this is the first time I've seen it.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

8. Subject length limitation forced me to use that spelling. -nt

[hifalutin]

9. Perhaps

fundy might have been a better choice?

No problem, thanks.

[trotsky]

13. Actually, early Christians themselves invented the "X" abbreviation.

X = Greek letter chi, which is the first letter in the Greek spelling of Christ.

[John Gauger]

24. It comes from the Greek letter 'chi', which is the same character as 'x'.

'X' is the first letter of the Greek word "christos," meaning "anointed" or some such. It's commonly seen in Catholic churches as "XR" (chi-rho) - the first two letters of Christ's name in Greek.

[Recursion]

10. Err.. Maoism and Stalinism come to mind (nt)

[oscarmitre]

11. And they are

related to a Christian theocracy how?

[Silent3]

18. Maoism and Stalinism...

...were quasi religions with the earthly gods of Mao and Stalin. Their so-called atheism was merely the stance of crushing anything that would detract from the worship of Mao or Stalin, tearing down anything that would detract from devotion to the Communist party.

When people are goose-stepping down the streets with giant banners of Richard Dawkins, please let me know.

[Recursion]

28. That's the "no true Scotsman" argument that fundies use

And it doesn't really work here either.

Now, philosophically I will admit to a stretch since communism is fundamentally materialistic (in the technical sense of the term), which is distinct from being fundamentally atheistic (I don't even know if "fundamentally atheistic" is a coherent idea, since atheism is not a doctrine).

[Silent3]

34. If I were claiming that no "true athiest" would ever...

...run a totalitarian regime, or otherwise do other mean and nasty things, I'd be guilty of the NTS defense. (We might as well abbreviate it at this point! :) ) I'm quite capable of admitting that atheists, even the "true" ones, can commit terrible acts.

The distinction between religion as a motivating and central theme to oppressive theocracy, and atheism as merely a useful, ancillary adjunct to a Communist regime, is not a mere NTS dodge.

[Recursion]

35. Ah, here's our disagreement:

The distinction between religion as a motivating and central theme to oppressive theocracy, and atheism as merely a useful, ancillary adjunct to a Communist regime, is not a mere NTS dodge.

Ah, this is a factual disagreement then: I deny that religion was anything more than an ancillary adjunct to the theocratic regimes of the middle ages, just like the "historical dialectic" and "dictatorship of the proletariat" were not actually the motivations of the Soviets. In both cases, the motivations were money and power.

What's that old joke? "If the country has to put 'Democratic' in its official name, you can be pretty sure it isn't".

[Silent3]

42. What about theocratic regimes today?

I'm not just talking about motivations of those in power, which are always suspect. I'm talking about the rallying cries that work to get the masses to support one's rise to power, and the carrots and sticks used to keep the masses under control after gaining power. Atheism has never been the rallying cry that gets oppressive regimes into power, and once they are in power, official atheism is no more than one part of a general stance against any doctrines or systems of authority that could possibly challenge the authority of the state.

The Christian theocracies of the middle ages are difficult to compare to modern situations in some ways, but clearly the religious sentiments of the masses were exploited by those in power, from getting the masses to buy into "the Divine Right of Kings", to getting them to march off to war in the Crusades.

Today's Islamic theocracies certainly depend on promoting religious dogma and stirring religious sentiments. There may be many underlying issues of nationalism, tribalism, economics, culture, resentment of foreign power and influence, etc., that factor in strongly to the particular religious sentiments that are and can be manipulated, the particular aspects of dogma which are played up and played down, but religion is still the central organizing theme, and religion plays on the human psyche in ways that many other competing "-isms" can't match.

Fundamentalist supporters of Christian theocracy exist among many "true believers" in the US (e.g. the Dominionists), not just among a few people who might merely wish to crassly exploit religion to gain power. To the extent that these people are dangerous, it is the form of their religious beliefs that makes them dangerous and exploitable. These people might not have won themselves a theocracy yet, but there's no way we'd have had eight years of Bush without them. There is no parallel population of atheists for some hypothetical, nominally atheist power monger to exploit, not only as a percentage of the total population, but even as a percentage of all atheists.

Look at a theocracy, and no matter how many non-believers might merely be hiding behind religious masks for the sake of power, you'll find plenty of True Believers among both the rulers and the ruled, eager to force their beliefs on others, people who play their parts in the scheme of power for explicitly religious reasons. On the other hand, I know of no repressive government which has ever existed either consisting of, or depending upon, large numbers of people eager to enforce atheism for the sake of atheism, and eager to create more atheists just to have more atheists.

[dmallind]

19. which were of course not driven BY atheism

Or frankly all that philosophically driven period. These tired supposed rebuttals of arguments about the danger of theocracies, apart from the questionable validity of "well your guys do it too" in the first place, always neglect to address the difference between causal and coincidental traits. The Crusades, Inquisition, Rudolph's bombings, 9/11 etc were done FOR religion, only and 100% because of religious belief. Mao and Stalin certainly proclaimed atheism and certainly attacked religion, no doubt about it and I'm not going to be hypocritical enough to attempt a "no true Scotsman" fallacy like a lot of believers do. However they did not become tyrants because they were atheists, and did not set out to fight for atheism. They set out to fight for communism with themselves as the central controllers, and saw the churches as competing power centers and believers as people who would have divided loyalties. Nobody but nobody has established an atheistic tyranny for the sake of atheism, or committed significant terrorism driven primarily by atheism. The same is definitively not true for religion.

[skepticscott]

23. One fact these people often ignore

is that Stalin actually supported religion and the Russian church when it suited him to do so (i.e. when he felt he needed their help to maintain himself in power), so atheism was clearly not his driving motivation.

[Recursion]

27. That's a bit naive, frankly.

The Crusades, Inquisition, Rudolph's bombings, 9/11 etc were done FOR religion, only and 100% because of religious belief.

You don't really believe that, do you? The Crusades were about control of the silk and pepper trade routes. The Inquisition was about removing non-Castillian political forces from Spain. Etc. Those were "about religion" in the same way that Iraq is "about freedom": a convenient fig leaf. I do agree with you that Stalinism was not "about atheism" in that sense, either, but it was a fig leaf for them,t oo.

[dmallind]

29. Different context

That "fig leaf" was what got the people donning chain mail and oiling up the thumbscrews. That "fig leaf" was the rallying cry, and yes absolutely was motivation. I don't think King Richard et al. needed to worry about media spin, because there was no media to spread disagreement and no democracy even if people disagreed with him, and yet the rallying cry was to rescue Jerusalem from the infidel. Of course the trade routes are handy too, but that's a bit more than a media spin for religion. Atheism was neither of these, merely a coincidental tool to suppress competition. As another poster said, Mao didn't rouse his rabble and gain converts to his small c crusade by telling them of the glories of atheism and asking them to fight for an absence of god belief.

That's the fundamental difference. You can't get people to rise up and sweep away the infidels for the sake of not having to go to church on Sundays. It takes the motivation of paradise and the co-opted opinion of Gawd Almighty to motivate people to do things like that. The machinations of leaders and the motivation of masses who do their bidding are not the same, and you can't motivate hardly anybody, and definitely not the great mass of an entire people, to commit atrocities for atheism. For ideology which coincidentally eschews religion? Sure, but not BECAUSE OF the absence of religion.

[Recursion]

30. I completely disagree

That "fig leaf" was what got the people donning chain mail and oiling up the thumbscrews. That "fig leaf" was the rallying cry, and yes absolutely was motivation.

I think you've kind of swallowed modern misconceptions about the middle ages. Then, as now, money is what makes people go kill other people. I mean, Richard was gay; this isn't exactly a guy who's making a point to follow church doctrine. There wasn't democracy, but the barons were fairly powerful (even moreso after he left John in charge) and they wouldn't send their serfs and children off to fight if there wasn't a significant financial advantage to be had.

[dmallind]

32. Well let's back up a little then

Let's assume that nothing about winning the Holy Land from the Muslim was connected to religion at all. Pretty damn big coincidence if you ask me but hey.

Now - 9/11 was about money? Eric Rudolph made money blowing up gay nightclubs? On a national scale Palestinians are willing to kill themselves because the Jews have money? Israelis won't move from a not particularly uniquely blessed area even though it means constant threat of bombs and a need to send each and every one of their sons into uniform, not to mention have them kill a bunch of Palestinians guilty and innocent, because they wouldn't make money if they lived in the US or Europe instead and stopped trying to carve a secure Jewish homeland out of a huge area of people who don't want them to exist (and they have that opinion of Jews for money, right)?

Let's forget history then because obviously we can't exactly ask Richard what he really wanted or read his speeches and look at the news reports of his rationalizations. Let's look at today. We may be fighting "terror" in the WAY we are because of oil, but it isn't the promise of a financial advantage that's driving people to fly planes into buildings or fight to their mutual destruction over a tiny scrap of dubiously productive land because it's got a couple of buildings on it mentioned in some old books is it?

And none of them are fighting for the lack of god belief either. which remember is the main point.

[Recursion]

33. Glad you asked...

Now - 9/11 was about money?

*cough* I can't talk about what I think 9/11 was about without getting this thread locked, so I won't go there. Suffice it to say, I do think it was entirely about money.

Eric Rudolph made money blowing up gay nightclubs?

People like Rudolph and the guys that kill doctors who perform abortions are the only examples I can think of where it does seem to be actually based on religion; I'll concede that point.

On a national scale Palestinians are willing to kill themselves because the Jews have money?

No, they're willing to kill themselves because the Jews are living on land that the Palestinians consider theirs, and because they aren't allowed to do things like have jobs, eat, or go to the doctor, and their communities are punished communally whenever an attack occurs.

Actually, the Palestinian resistance is pretty famous for not being an Islamist movement, which is how they've been able to (until Fatah's attempt at a coup) more or less have solidarity among Muslims, Christians, and secular Palestinians (Geez... I'm talking about 9/11 conspiracies and Palestine in one thread... let's see who can beat the lock!)

but it isn't the promise of a financial advantage that's driving people to fly planes into buildings or fight to their mutual destruction over a tiny scrap of dubiously productive land because it's got a couple of buildings on it mentioned in some old books is it?

Dispossessed people will do just about anything, given enough desperation. As I pointed out, the Palestinian resistance is not an Islamist movement. The people who fund and plan hijackings were doing it for geopolitical reasons, specifically to draw America into wars in southwest asia (they succeeded in spades, but overestimated the solidarity of the Islamic world).

Now, you'll probably say something like, "fine, these demagogues may not be doing things for religion, but religion is how they get their minions to make such sacrifices." In some cases, perhaps, though I think that's hardly proven (we know very little about the actual motivations of a given suicide bomber. To bring back the Soviet example, how did he get people who putatively believed in no afterlife or eternal reward to charge Nazi tanks armed only with a rifle? Again, it's not exactly clear, but religion is by no means the sine qua non of tyranny and violence, and it's only one of many tools despots have to get people to do horrible things.

[dmallind]

41. I think you are being unduly narrow here

Islamism is not the sole definition of religious inspiration for Muslims. EVERY single time I have heard Arafat or his successors asked about why they cannot accept peace deal X or Y it has not been "because my guys can't get a job" it has been because they cannot accept not having dominion over holy sites in Jerusalem. That's the reason why any peace talks leave the status of Jerusalem to the end and avoid the natural compromise of making it a shared city with both Jewish and Palestinian authorities in place. There are neighboring countries with Muslim populations living in oppressive conditions under Muslim rule, but there are no equivalent attempts to wipe those regimes from teh map.

By the way since it's a rare person indeed who can discuss this issue dispassionately without making snap decisions about others on limited info, I should probably at this point mention for anyone reading that I by no means toe the Israeli line here either - they are equally to blame, and will not accept the same compromises either because Jerusalem has THEIR holy sites too. Again, even the least hawkish Israeli PM can be absolutely relied upon to state they cannot simply divide the land by population density and share Jerusalem like any rational person would suggest not because of financial hegemony but because the land was given to them by their god.

But let's back up even more and posit, purely hypothetically I assure you, that every mention of religion throughout all the multiple atrocities done in its name (and in it's name as a stated driver, not just by someone who happens to be religious) were entirely manipulative fig leaves by unscrupulous leaders. Again I don;t accept this, but let's cut to the chase. The central issue here seems to be a disagreement over degree of motivation. Forget for a moment any religious or emotional content and consider the following scenarios:

Rabble rouser A: "Join me comrades as we take over the country for the sake of our shared love of Zark, because if we take the country for Zark we will be given Brox. If we fail we will suffer Glob!!"

Rabble rouser B: "Join me comrades as we take over the country, because we don't think Zark will do anything to help or hurt us either way!"

Which has the most potential to motivate people to kill? A shared deep faith in something greater than yourself which will reward or punish you - be Zark state or deity or party or even a person - or an absence of faith in it?

[Recursion]

45. I guess I'm a marxist

Rabble rouser A: "Join me comrades as we take over the country for the sake of our shared love of Zark, because if we take the country for Zark we will be given Brox. If we fail we will suffer Glob!!"

Rabble rouser B: "Join me comrades as we take over the country, because we don't think Zark will do anything to help or hurt us either way!"

Which has the most potential to motivate people to kill? A shared deep faith in something greater than yourself which will reward or punish you - be Zark state or deity or party or even a person - or an absence of faith in it?

I guess I'd be a Marxist for saying that whoever has the capacity to offer them more economic and physical security by their offer. I think people are in general not very stupid and incredibly selfish.

[dmallind]

49. Well aside from the fact that marxism has never done that yet

I think to assume that all motivation is economic is to ignore countless examples in history AND current events where people expressly claim religious motivation and then go on to actions which are not only not in their best financial interests, but risk their lives(or even categorically end their lives) and their freedom.

To dismiss the religious motivation then is to say a) all these people are lying in some universal macchiavellian scheme to discredit religion and/or hide their own cupidity and b) a large number of people are stupid enough to think that their personal involvement in insurgencies, terrorism, or opposition to neighboring states of different religions will improve their financial lot.

Wouldn't a simple Occam's razor application suggest they are probably in fact telling the truth and acting on religious motivation?

[trotsky]

51. ...

I guess I'd be a Marxist for saying that whoever has the capacity to offer them more economic and physical security by their offer.

Right. Which is EXACTLY why the poor conservative religious folk in the US vote against their own economic (and REAL security) interests again and again and again, simply because the Republican party promises them religious goals: banning abortion, persecuting gays, and fighting for more god in the public square.

I think people are in general not very stupid and incredibly selfish.

And upthread you said you were cynical? Make up your mind.

[Silent3]

43. About those "convenient fig leaves"

Part of the whole point here is that religion makes a damn good convenient fig leaf. Atheism has never been that fig leaf -- if you're saying atheism was a fig leaf for Stalin, I'd love to hear an example of that. Can you tell me of a single case where Stalin rallied a strongly atheist population by saying he was arresting half the people in one neighborhood, and shooting all of the people in some other village, in the Name of Atheism, and the people cheered, "Yes! In the Name of Atheism!"? Anything even roughly equivalent? I can imagine people being rallied to sack churches based on resentment of clerical wealth and power, but not by stirring "atheist zealotry".

Atheist sentiments are not anywhere close to being as exploitable as religious sentiments are. No one has ever, to my knowledge, stirred up atheist sentiments as a successful ploy to gain control of lucrative trade routes, to expel competing political forces from a country, or to get people to fly planes into buildings.

[Meshuga]

55. The reason behind who is in power is one thing

But the tool used to get people to fight the wars for you is religion. It is easy when religious fanatics are available for that purpose.

However, you are trying pretty hard to protect religion from their share of blame. The Inquisition was about religion. Jews who became "New Christians" were allowed to live and the people who were caught practicing Judaism would be tortured to death. I have a lot of interest in the subject as well as a wall filled with books holding copies of thousands of documents from the inquisition with cases that lead to torture and death. And guess what? They were all about religion.

[Silent3]

21. I should have added this...

I'm well aware of the argument that brutal and repressive governments are all about power, and that any religions trappings can be dismissed as convenient mechanisms employed to gain and hold power.

But even in that light, the relationship between atheism and repressive Communist governments, and the relationship between religion and repressive theocracies, are clearly two very different kinds of relationships.

Communist revolutions did not get started by whipping the masses into a frenzy with stirring, fiery atheist rhetoric. They appealed to the anger of class differences, getting the have-nots riled up against the haves. To the extent that anger was whipped up against church authorities, it had nothing to do with the philosophical distinctions of atheist thought, and everything to do with opulent churches and the clerics within doing more to serve their own needs, and the needs of the rich and powerful, rather than the needs of the masses.

Atheism has at most been ancillary, hardly central, to any repressive government.

Religion, however, has many times taken center stage. Whether the leaders in theocracies are "true believers" or not (I believe many theocrats are true believers. It's not as if blindness to extreme the hypocrisy often required to run a theocracy is a rare thing.), it's the religious fervor of the masses that puts theocrats into power, and religious fervor, fear of divine retribution, and fear of the earthly power of religious leaders, that keeps the theocrats in power.

You can easily find Christian fundamentalists in the US who will gladly advocate for a form of government that enforces their religious principles. You'll have a very, very hard time turning up the true equivalent among atheists, people who would outright ban religious practice and brutally punish those who "stepped out of line".

[John Gauger]

25. In what way can that be called "fundamentalist atheism?" eom

[hootinholler]

12. Fundamental Atheism

I'm trying really hard to get my mind to bend around that concept. It just ain't happening.
:rofl:

-Hoot

[trotsky]

14. Stick around this forum.

There's a small but rabid group who insists these "fundie" atheists are just as bad/dangerous/etc. as the Jihadists and Christian extremists of the world.

[Donnachaidh]

16. and have they given any examples of fundie atheistic terror?

Or is their guilt manifesting this asinine delusion? "Fundie atheist"? What's next from these people? Are they going to insist that Buddhists are fundie terrorists because David Carradine showed how skillful *those people are* on his TV show? :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm:

[trotsky]

17. "Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot" is the usual refrain.

You know, because they murdered strictly in the name of atheism and certainly not for political power. :eyes:

My personal theory is that most people like to think of themselves as sensible, moderate, exactly where a person "should" be when it comes to issues. So certain liberal believers see the rabid right-wing fundies and desperately NEED someone on the "other" end of the spectrum to "balance" those loons out, so they can feel safe and sensible in the "middle." Thus the creation of the mythical fundie atheist.

On edit: I should also add, I think some atheists engage in this thinking too. Maybe they are uncomfortable with their atheism on some level, and need to feel that "moderate" feeling rather than being on the extreme end of disbelief (i.e., not believing). So the "fundie atheist" caricature comes in handy for those people too.

[dmallind]

22. I think your latter point is more covered by "agnostics" and "not religious" types

The idea that there is a continuum of belief with theism on one end and atheism on the other, with intermediate points such as agnostic etc is a persistent but false idea. Theism and a lack of theism represent a binary condition, but those who seek the middle either out of genuine desire to fairly consider both options or a timid unwillingness to admit to being an unpopular group member often try to argue that agnostics are a separate category, even inventing new ones such as apatheist. The truth is agnosticism and atheism are answers to two different questions, and almost all self described agnostics when asked "do you believe in a personal god" show themseleves to really be atheists.

It is bad enough when dictionaries (which of course give usages rather than technical definitions, but nobody remembers that either) perpetuate this false middle, but I've seen people who should know better do the same.

It is of course perfectly possible, and indeed very likely, for someone who is one to be both. I am an atheist - I have no belief in personal gods. I am an agnostic - I do not accept the idea of certainty which comes from mystical revelation rather than more empirical epistemology.

[Recursion]

31. Well, I don't think they murdered "for" atheism...

...any more than the crusades or inquisition were "for" religion (there's an unfortunate tendency today to actually believe propaganda from the past -- these people were not particularly less intelligent than we are, and it's important to remember that); in all cases money and power are the only things that get people to do those kinds of things.

[trotsky]

36. Why is Israel being fought over to this day?

Oil? Nope.
Other natural resources? Nada.
Religious significance to all of the big three monotheistic religions? Check, check, and check.

[Recursion]

37. No, because the Israelis are living on land that the Palestinians think is theirs

This is hardly the first time that kind of war has happened. The brutality of the Israeli occupation of the territories has a lot to do with it too. The Palestinian resistance is specifically not an Islamist movement.

[trotsky]

38. Why do they think it's theirs?

And why do the Jews think it's theirs?

[Recursion]

39. In the first case, because they lived there for thousands of years

In the second case, because they lived there for thousands of years hundreds of years ago.

[trotsky]

40. And the idea that the land was promised to them by a god...

has absolutely nothing to do with it. Of course.

[Recursion]

44. I don't think so, really

Again, I think I'm a bit more cynical than you. People are motivated by money, security, and power, not religion.

[trotsky]

46. And if money, security, or power were an issue here...

I might just agree with you.

[skepticscott]

47. And what motivates the Christian Zionists

whose agenda drives a great deal of our Middle East Policy? The (entirely) religiously based conviction that the End Times and the Second Coming cannot happen unless Israel is completely in control of the Holy Land.

[Recursion]

48. Why do you think that? Because they say so?

Yeah, that's a group of people whose words I really trust :sarcasm:

[skepticscott]

50. So what exactly is your point?

Other than that, because the plain meaning of the words and clear intent of the actions of Christian Zionists undermines your argument, they MUST all, without exception, be lying.

It's a plain and incontrovertible fact that many fundamentalist Xstians expect and eagerly look forward to the Rapture and the End Times. It's also beyond question that they believe those End Times cannot come if the nation of Israel does not control the Holy Land. What part of the equation don't you get? These people vehemently oppose (and lobby strongly against) any Middle East peace agreement that does not leave things in a state conforming with their interpretation of Biblical prophecy concerning the Second Coming.

[zonmoy]

52. because the true villain has told them that the fundy christians will get all the power and money

when they bring about the end of the world. undoubtedly the same thing he tells the muslims and jews to keep them fighting.

the true enemy isn't the devil. he is just the patsy for the real villain. god himself.

[pegleg]

57. If you want to see how an officially atheistic government operates

you need only to look at the Chinese in Tibet. Are these the "fundamentalists" of whom you speak?

[John Gauger]

26. I've heard that term many times.

Never heard it defined mind you, but I've heard it used. I don't know where the rest of you went to school, but when I discuss a term or concept I like it to have a definition first.

[SidDithers]

20. Rotten fruit works well too...nt

Sid

[Dabinci]

53. That's an oxymoron

How can an atheist be fundamentalist? Beats me.

[knitter4democracy]

56. No, it's just plain false.

An oxymoron is a term comprised of two opposing terms that is somehow still true. "Fundamentalist atheist" is not true, so it can't be an oxymoron.