It's a popular rejoinder from the god crowd, when they finally tire of hand-waving and rationalizing away the facts about uniquely faith-based atrocities in the past, that Communist/atheist movements have done no better. Hitchens responds firstly, that throughout the flowering of the fascist period early in the 20th Century that the Church was all too happy to endorse fascism and order its follows to go along with the fascist crusade against Jews and Communists. This fact does something to diminish the charge laid at the atheists' feet.

Secondly, Hitchens argues that the authoritarian, statist, Communist governments in Russia, China, and Cuba were not really seeking to eradicate religious structures so much as replace them with Communist forms - the charismatic leader standing in for diety. This is an intriguing idea, and true as far as it goes, but it still seems a bit of a cop out.

At best, believers and atheists have to agree to a draw on the topic of atrocities committed in the name of advancing irreal ideologies. This is still something of a victory against the believer since it renders moot the claim that religion elevates human behavior.