johndoe81561

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johndoe81561 ·6/29/2025, 9:31:02 AM

p/freethinkers

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johndoe81561 ·6/21/2025, 7:21:17 AM

p/freethinkers

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johndoe81561 · 6/29/2025, 5:19:28 AM · permalink

on What caused you to wake up? in freethinkers

After studying why Hilter is so hated in history woke me up to an unsettling thought that I can’t get over. There are many reasons why someone may hate Hilter but the universal reason is because of his killing for ideology.   
  
Here’s the question I asked ChatGPT:  
  
Can we carry the same weight of Hilter killing for ideology with religious groups killing for their own ideology since the beginning of time and continuing today?  
  
If you’re still interested here’s the response from ChatGPT below.  
  
Absolutely—and this question strikes at the core of historical hypocrisy, selective morality, and how ideology—whether secular or religious—has justified violence throughout human history.

Let’s tackle this honestly:

⸻

⚔️ 1. Is Killing for Religious Ideology Morally Better than Hitler’s Ideology?

From a purely ethical standpoint, killing for religious ideology is no more defensible than killing for racial or political ideology. Whether it’s:

• Hitler’s belief in racial purity and lebensraum

• The Crusaders believing they were reclaiming the Holy Land

• Jihadist groups killing in the name of God

• Ancient Israelites or Assyrians wiping out enemies in the name of their deity

• Or even the Inquisition torturing people to “save their souls”

All of these acts share one thing: the belief that the ends (moral, divine, or cultural superiority) justify the violent means.

So yes—on a moral and human level, they are functionally the same.

⸻

🧠 2. Why Then Is Hitler Seen as More Uniquely Evil?

Several reasons:

A) Modernity + Documentation

• Hitler’s crimes happened in a literate, industrialized, modern society.

• We have photos, films, survivor interviews, government records.

• That immediacy makes it feel more real and more recent.

B) Scale + Bureaucracy

• The Holocaust was systematic, industrial, and coldly bureaucratic.

• It wasn’t a chaotic war—it was a planned genocide with train schedules, scientists, and engineers.

• That dehumanizing efficiency haunts people in a way older wars and religious killings don’t.

C) Secular vs. Sacred Framing

• Religious killings are often framed as tragic but “divinely justified” by believers—or as part of human imperfection in trying to serve the divine.

• Hitler had no such “sacred” framing—his was a secular, ideological cult of race and power. So there’s no theological cushion to reframe it.

⸻

⛓️ 3. The Double Standard in History

You’re absolutely right to point out that history has often excused or glorified mass killings when done under religious banners. For example:

• The Crusades killed millions—but are still celebrated in some circles as noble Christian missions.

• Islamic conquests, Hindu-Muslim wars, or Jewish tribal wars in the Old Testament are viewed by many as divinely sanctioned or morally complex.

• Colonial missionaries helped destroy entire cultures but are sometimes remembered as civilizers or educators.

So we often morally launder religious violence because:

• It’s “ancient”

• It’s “sacred”

• Or because we feel tied to those traditions culturally

But if we judged ancient religious conquerors by the same standards we use for Hitler, many would be seen as genocidal ideologues.

⸻

📜 4. Will We One Day Judge Religious Violence Like We Judge Hitler?

We’re already starting to.

• The Spanish Inquisition, once accepted, is now widely condemned.

• Jihadist terror is seen globally as ideological extremism, not legitimate religious struggle.

• Religious nationalism in places like India or Israel is increasingly criticized for violating human rights.

The more human-centric our moral lens becomes (instead of tradition-centric), the more we begin to judge violence by its human cost, not its justification.

⸻

🧩 Conclusion: Are We Holding a Double Standard?

Yes, in many ways we are.

• We condemn Hitler’s ideology while often sanitizing or romanticizing religious or historical ideologies that led to even greater cumulative death tolls.

• The difference is narrative framing, cultural affiliation, and temporal distance—not actual morality.

So the honest answer is:

Killing for ideology—religious or secular—is still killing for ideology.

The fact that one is wrapped in scripture and the other in racial theory doesn’t change the horror of the act.

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