Excerpts from evolutionary literature (Sidebar 3)

From the Humanist Manifesto I (1933):

Tenet 1:		"Religious humanists regard the universe as self-existing and not created."
Tenet 2:		"Humanism believes that man is a part of nature and that he has emerged as the result of a continuous process."
Tenet 3:		"Holding to an organic view of life, humanists find that the traditional dualism of mind and body must be rejected."
Tenet 4:		"Humanism recognizes that man's religious culture and civilization, as clearly depicted by anthropology and history, are the product of a gradual development due to his interaction with his natural environment and with his social heritage. The individual born into a particular culture is largely molded to that culture."
Tenet 5:		Humanism asserts that the nature of the universe depicted by modern science makes unacceptable any supernatural or cosmic guarantees of human values. Obviously humanism does not deny the possibility of realities as yet undiscovered, but it does insist that the way to determine the existence and value of any and all realities is by means of intelligent inquiry and by the assessment of their relation to human needs. Religion must formulate its hopes and plans in the light of the scientific spirit and method."
Tenet 6:		"We are convinced that the time has passed for theism, deism, modernism, and the several varieties of 'new thought'."

From the Humanist Manifesto II (1973):

Tenet 1:		Under "Religion" "...We find insufficient evidence for belief in the existence of a supernatural; it is either meaningless or irrelevant to the question of the fulfillment of the human race. As nontheists, we begin with humans, not God, nature not deity.... No deity will save us; we must save ourselves."
Tenet 2:		"Promises of immortal salvation or fear of eternal damnation are both illusory and harmful. They distract humans from present concerns, from self-actualization, and from rectifying social injustices. Modern science discredits such historic concepts as the 'ghost in the machine' and the 'separable soul.' Rather, science affirms that the human species is an emergence from natural evolutionary forces. As far as we know, the total personality is a function of the biological organism transacting in a social and cultural context."
Tenet 6:		"...The right to birth control, abortion, and divorce should be recognized."
Tenet 7:		"To enhance freedom and dignity the individual must experience a full range of civil liberties in all societies. This includes...a recognition of an individual's right to die with dignity, euthanasia, and the right to suicide."
Tenet 9:		"The separation of church and state and the separation of ideology and state are imperatives."

Prominent Atheists
From the Correspondence of Marx and Engels, (New York 1935), pp.125-126
"Darwin's book (The Origin of Species) is very important and serves me as a basis in natural science for the class struggle in history." (Karl Marx in 1861)

Rockefeller used Darwinism to justified his business practices:
"The growth of a large business is merely a survival of the fittest."

Andrew Carnegie (upon conversion to evolution):
"Light came as in a flood and all was clear. Not only had I got rid of theology and the supernatural, but I had found the truth of evolution."

Nietzsche believed that Christian values of love, compassion, and mercy favored the weak and unfit, thereby propagating weakness and hindering evolution. In this sense, Christianity is more cruel than nature, because nature allows the weak, the sick, and the unfit to die. Additionally, Christian love places the burden of supporting the weak and unfit on the more fit individuals through guilt. Nietzsche's philosophy was that humanity would continue to evolve to form a Superman who would mold humanity. In contrast to a Christian, the Superman would be cruel and relentless, not just condoning cruelty, but "capable of himself creating pain and suffering and experience pleasure from so doing, he must be cruel in hand and deed (and not merely with the eyes of the spirit). Nietzsche's Superman philosophy ushered in Hitler's eugenics as an endeavor to further evolution. (Veith, Gene Edward Jr. 1993. Modern Fascism. p.82-83)

As quoted by Veith, Nietzsche wrote, "The weak and the failures shall perish: the first principle of our love of man. And they shall even be given every possible assistance. What is more harmful than any vice? Active pity for all the failures and the weak: Christianity." (Veith, p.83)

The philosophy of Nietzsche led many of his followers (among them Adolf Hitler and Margaret Sanger) to implement both positive and negative eugenics programs. Positive eugenics encouraged prolific child-bearing of those individuals who are perceived to be "fit." Negative eugenics is the sterilization (coercive, if not voluntary) of "unfit" individuals. It also led to euthanasia and many abortions, and vehement racism against nationalities thought to be less fit.

Hitler, as quoted by Veith, said, "While Nature, by making procreation free, yet submitting survival to a hard trial, chooses from an excess number of individuals the best as worthy of living, thus preserving them alone and in them conserving their species, man limits procreation, but is hysterically concerned that once a being is born it should be preserved at any price." He prefers Nature's way of free procreation and survival of the fittest.
The Ascent of Racism

H.G. Wells called for the "sterilization of the failures."

Margaret Sanger (founder of Planned Parenthood)
"More children from the fit, less from the unfit—that is the chief aim of birth control." (from her book Pivot of Civilization (1922) as quoted by Michael K. Flaherty, "A White Lie," American Spectator, August 1992 p.37.) The unfit were defined as those with mental handicaps, racial minorities (essentially all non-Aryans), and the poor. She believed that sterilization of the poor would eliminate crime and poverty. (Veith, p.108)

According to George Grant, Sanger was "thoroughly convinced that 'inferior races' were in fact 'human weeds' and 'a menace to civilization.' She believed that 'social regeneration' would only be possible as the 'sinister forces of the hordes of irresponsibility and imbecility' were repulsed. She had come to regard organized charity to ethnic minorities and the poor as a 'symptom of a malignant social disease' because it encouraged the prolificacy of 'defectives, delinquents, and dependents.' She yearned for the end of the Christian 'reign of benevolence' that the Eugenic socialists promised, when the 'choking human undergrowth' of 'morons and imbeciles' would be 'segregated' and 'sterilized.'"
(Sanger, Pivot of Civilization, 1922 p.23, 176, 108, 110, 181, 264, 265. As quoted by Grant Grand Illusions: the Legacy of Planned Parenthood 1992. Adroit Press, TN. p.95.)

In 1916, the first birth control clinic was set up, and Sanger and her associates made it their goal to set up clinics wherever those "feeble-minded, syphilitic, irresponsible, and defective (stocks) bred unhindered." (Ibid, p.96)

Stalin's Brutal Faith
Supplemental Reading

Hitler's evolution versus Christian resistance
Supplemental Reading

Evolution and the American Abortion mentality