Atheistic education

Education, as practised in the Soviet Union and elsewhere, which systematically propagates a scientific-materialistic world view and disseminates the origins and essence of religion as opposed to science and incompatible with communist ideology, may be referred to as atheistic education. This is intended to liberate people from the vestiges of religion and commences at the kindergarten stage, continuing throughout the school syllabus. It emphasizes the antiscientific and reactionary essence of religion and is linked with studies intended to satisfy cultural and leisure requirements. Such studies are intended to influence the intellect, feelings and frame-of-mind of the pupil, and are reinforced by propaganda through literature, the arts and the media and by introducing civil rites to replace religious ones and drive religion from daily life. When dealing with religious believers, such education draws attention to internal contradictions and inconsistencies in their views and persuades them to understand the dialectical, materialist view of reality.