Are Fundy Victories Pyrrhic Victories?

[Yalta]

I once read that when a minority group rapidly increases in size, people move to suppress that group, and in many cases, ultimately fail.

 

Right now, according to the Pew Survey on religion in America, 16.1% of Americans say they have no religion. And I think that scares the hell out of fundies.

 

According to various sources found when doing a search for "percentage of americans who are christian", I found this quote:

"The proportion of the [American] population that can be classified as Christian has declined from 86% in 1990 to 77% in 2001." ARIS Study, 2001. 4 (It reached 76.0% in 2008)

Along with various inbetween numbers from surveys held in various years in the 2000s.

 

Now, why could this be? My mom, the same person who angrily called me "you who does not believe in God" when I was 12 (though she changed her tune soon afterwards, as she's a very tolerant person), now can't stand the Religious Right and even mocked their love the Narnia movie a few years back. My grandmother, who commented on needing more people of faith a few years ago (she too is still tolerant), has said as recently as last year that the Old Testament upsets her. ("THIS is religion?? This is barbaric!")

 

A book titled "unChristian: What a New Generation Really Thinks About Christianity, and Why it Matters", polls showed that young adults saw Christians as too political, concerned only with conversion, bigoted, anti-gay, and untrustworthy. Hmm... any of that sound familiar?

 

Now we see Christian fundamentalists making power grabs. Some are openly appealing to bigotry. New Gingrich mocked Obama's "secular socialist agenda" (if you disagree with Obama, fine, but the point is the use of the word "secular"), and Glenn Beck refers to atheists as "people who believe in nothing but themselves", and complained about Obama's attempts to reach out to "non-believers". When Sarah Palin said at a rally that she clings to her guns and her religion (taking an infamous quote of Obama's as her own), people cheered. The bigotry play is apparently working.

 

But for how long? These people are acting exactly the way people who dislike Christianity tend to view Christians. They are political, bigoted, anti-gay (there's been talk of "traditional marriage"), etc. They are making Christianity look bad. And much of America, while becoming more fiscally conservative, is also more socially liberal at the same time - there's an increase in people who hold such views that aren't stereotypically "conservative" or "liberal". This attempt to make politicians more "Christian" can definitely get a lot of people to flock to the politicians, but it is scaring much of America.

 

I feel that as the fundies gain more power and popularity with a bigoted base, that will scare the social moderates and social liberals who happen to otherwise share their conservative views. More than that, this union of politics and religion, can't ultimately be good for either. Christianity's popularity has essentially been dropping nearly a percentage point a year. It's been losing popularity faster in the South, according to the Pew study (which is pretty in-depth if you can find it). As fundies seize the reigns of Christianity, they hurt its image. They make Christianity as a whole look greedy and uncaring. By badmouthing non-believers, they essentially say to fiscally conservative non-Christians who might otherwise support them, that they don't matter. 16.1% of the population (and growing) is not a number you can ignore. I feel that if fundamentalist Christianity in America becomes too powerful and spits in the face of that 16.1% (as well as the non-Christian religious and the liberal and moderate Christians who are tolerant like my mother and grandmother), that it can only scare away would-be supporters. People who would support both the fiscally conservative politics, and, by extension, the religion it's tied to.

 

That is why, in an ironic way, I actually want to see the fundies get what they want in the short term. Because in the end, by screwing it up and saying "fuck you" to the ~24% of Americans who are non-Christian, (and, ultimately, the tolerant Christians), they will hurt themselves, their image, and yes, their religion's popularity.

 

 

I typed this in a hurry and didn't really proofread it, so I might repeat myself a lot. Sorry.

 

Any thoughts?

[Ouroboros]

16%?! Really! It used to be a lot less. Wow.

[ContraBardus]

They say the fastest way to deconvert is to actually read the Bible.

 

I'm not so sure 16% is enough to matter a whole lot yet. The fundies act as they always have, and yeah extremist Christianity is losing popularity. It's perhaps large enough to not ignore completely, but in all honesty, isn't really enough to sway any major political movement or most politician.

 

The thing is that most of the deconversions end up in another religion, with a small minority moving to Atheism, and a slightly larger minority becoming Agnostic or Deistic.

 

Atheism is growing slowly larger, but the truth of the matter is that the inflow is little more than a trickle.

 

We've got a ways to go before Atheist/Agnostic numbers reach a place where they'll have enough pull to make any real difference with the Christian Right having it's way.

 

Maybe around 20-25% or so.

 

It annoys me that Christians forget that America has always been a Secularist government. That's the literal definition of what 'Separation of Church and State' means.

 

All and all, I do like how this sounds, but don't see it as realistic at this point.

 

There is a movement building, but it's still in its infancy. I think we're at least a decade if not more away from anything of any real impact occurring like this for Non-believers.

 

I also don't think that the Christian Right having it's way would be good for Atheists and Non-believers. Their way will likely be more dangerous for the country and non-believers. Possibly in the same manner as Nazi Germany was bad for the Jews in a worst case scenario.

 

Though, they're more likely to focus the majority of such a thing on other religions and Homosexuals as opposed to the much smaller group of non-believers. Atheists and Agnostics would eventually end up in the same boat if they weren't to begin with. Though, they're more likely to ignore us at first despite their posturing at this point to take care of bigger fish.

 

I do think they're making themselves look bad, and I hope it continues. Them having their way, not so much.

 

It would be a dark day for Science in the US as well. It wouldn't completely stop, but you can bet that ID will replace facts, and a lot of important research would grind to a complete halt. It would severely cripple medical research and scientific progress.

 

So, yes and no. It's too soon for any kind of major movement yet, but the Christians are more than likely going to continue to shoot themselves in the foot.

 

There's also the problem of Islam growing at a faster rate, and a lot of current Christians are more likely to end up there than as Atheists or Agnostics.

 

There is more hope with the younger generation, but it's also true that a lot of people become more religious when they are older. I'm not holding my breath for a huge surge of non-believers to suddenly appear anytime soon.

 

It's just a matter of...

 

[Shyone]

There is more hope with the younger generation, but it's also true that a lot of people become more religious when they are older. I'm not holding my breath for a huge surge of non-believers to suddenly appear anytime soon.

 

It's just a matter of...

 

I don't think that anything more is needed but to keep religion on the front pages.

 

Other religions, Catholic priests, murdering fornicating preachers and nut cases who "kill for Jeebus" will get people thinking. I know many who have drifted away from organized religion, and if they ever had any doubts, they can let them sink in.

 

We don't need for religion to be in control or behave aggressively towards atheists. They will convict themselves.

[Phanta]

16%?! Really! It used to be a lot less. Wow.

 

It includes many Christians who have forsaken religion, but still ascribe to their faith in and relationship with the Lord. "No religion" does not equal atheist. Not by a longshot.

 

Phanta

[Ouroboros]

16%?! Really! It used to be a lot less. Wow.

 

It includes many Christians who have forsaken religion, but still ascribe to their faith in and relationship with the Lord. "No religion" does not equal atheist. Not by a longshot.

 

Phanta

The last number I heard was less than 10%, so it's still a huge step forward.

 

I think people are getting tired of the confusion of multiple crazies deciding what to believe. Each church has its own "leader"of faith, which everyone has to follow. Americans have become slaves under religion. They broke free from the crown but fell victims of the cross.

 

...

 

Wait, did I misunderstand what you said?

 

The 16% include the nominal Christians? And the 84% are active religious people?

 

I heard somewhere that the number of nominal Christians were like 70% or so, that would put this "no religion" number even higher.

 

Here's the link to the study: http://religions.pewforum.org/reports

 

"Religious unaffiliated" is 5.8% in the group. I guess it hasn't changed so much as it sounded at first.

[ShallowByThyGame]

In educated societies I feel that religion is hemorrhaging. It is easier for young people to get a wider look at the world than it used to be, and that knowledge brings about the skepticism their parents did not have. Even in popular culture religion is mocked as much as it is praised nowadays. Only a boring loser doesn't like George Carlin or Eddie Izzard or Monty Python, for example. While fundies may push a Christian to simply be more moderate, sometimes the lure of Occam is simply too much. The victories of the 60s, I believe, are bearing fruit now as creativity flourishes unchecked. Movies like 'Dogma' are becoming classics, and such things have paved the way for open discussion on the issue.

 

Now, so long as there is peace and relative stability, I feel this will snowball. Children can ask the internet about God instead of their priests. There will always be fundy backlash, but just like the homophobic and racist backlash it hurts the cause more than it helps it. If generation Y is 27% godless as some studies indicate, imagine when generation Y are the senior citizens instead of the 'greatest generation'.

 

I think the best thing we can do is simply be ourselves, and like the gay community, simply declare your existence and let the natural mingling defeat the stereotypes.

 

Yes, I am optimistic, but I have reason to be. After all, mankind has made amazing leaps in the past 100 years.

[Phanta]

16%?! Really! It used to be a lot less. Wow.

 

It includes many Christians who have forsaken religion, but still ascribe to their faith in and relationship with the Lord. "No religion" does not equal atheist. Not by a longshot.

 

Phanta

The last number I heard was less than 10%, so it's still a huge step forward.

 

I think people are getting tired of the confusion of multiple crazies deciding what to believe. Each church has its own "leader"of faith, which everyone has to follow. Americans have become slaves under religion. They broke free from the crown but fell victims of the cross.

 

...

 

Wait, did I misunderstand what you said?

 

The 16% include the nominal Christians? And the 84% are active religious people?

 

Sort of, Hans. Check out this paragraph:

 

Like the other major groups, people who are unaffiliated with any particular religion (16.1%) also exhibit remarkable internal diversity. Although one-quarter of this group consists of those who describe themselves as either atheist or agnostic (1.6% and 2.4% of the adult population overall, respectively), the majority of the unaffiliated population (12.1% of the adult population overall) is made up of people who simply describe their religion as "nothing in particular." This group, in turn, is fairly evenly divided between the "secular unaffiliated," that is, those who say that religion is not important in their lives (6.3% of the adult population), and the "religious unaffiliated," that is, those who say that religion is either somewhat important or very important in their lives (5.8% of the overall adult population).

 

It looks like 5.8% of the religiously unaffiliated have some kind of faith that we don't know a whole lot about. I wouldn't call the Christians I'm thinking of as falling in this category nominal...in fact I think they are often some of the most zealous. They affirm a faith relationship with Jesus, but shun "religion" (churches especially). They are spiritual followers of Christ. I'm thinking of the growing house church movement here, as an example. If a survey asks about religious affiliation, those Christian may not feel they match any of the options provided. I'm suspicious of this 5.8% who are unaffiliated but not not atheistic, agnostic, or secular ("that is, they say that religion is either somewhat or very important in their lives"). It's a question of language ambiguity. I don't know that the survey creators are taking the anti-religion movement of certain Christian faithful into account when they are write these things up.

 

I could be all wet here, Hans, but I see a real inconsistency with the use of the word "religion", so I am skeptical about what is really going on with the unaffiliated group...

 

Religious Tolerance has compiled some interesting statistics from various surveys in one spot, including:

 

A USA Today/Gallup Poll in 2002-JAN showed that almost half of American adults appear to be alienated from organized religion. If current trends continue, most adults will not call themselves religious within a few years. Results include:

bullet About 50% consider themselves religious (down from 54% in 1999-DEC)

bullet About 33% consider themselves "spiritual but not religious" (up from 30%)

bullet About 10% regard themselves as neither spiritual or religious.

 

33% deny religion. That is nothing like these other polls. It could be a problem with the methodology, or it could be that people are struggling with how to respond to the word "religion/religious".

 

Hans, I just stopped this post to do some reading and study the actual survey methodology. I found the actual question they asked regarding affiliation, and what I found mitigates against my heretofore stated concern.

 

Page 27 of Report 2: Religious Beliefs & Practices / Social & Political Views describes a questioning method that would make it very difficult for the Christians I describe to not identify as Christian in some way despite their feelings about "religion". I actually bet the toughest of them land in the .3 percent called "Other Christian" that falls outside of the Protestant and Catholic subcategories. I reckon there might be a few holdouts, and I'm still curious about this unaffiliated 5.8 percent, but I drop this particular theory.

 

Here's the question, if you're interested:

 

Q.16 What is your present religion, if any? Are you Protestant, Roman Catholic, Mormon, Orthodox

such as Greek or Russian Orthodox, Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, atheist, agnostic,

something else, or nothing in particular?

INTERVIEWER: IF R VOLUNTEERS “nothing in particular, none, no religion, etc.” BEFORE

REACHING END OF LIST, PROMPT WITH: and would you say that’s atheist, agnostic, or just

nothing in particular?]

IF SOMETHING ELSE OR DK/REF (Q.16 = 11, 99) ASK:

CHR Do you think of yourself as a Christian or not?

IF R NAMED A NON-CHRISTIAN RELIGION IN PREVIOUS QUESTION (e.g. Native American,

Wiccan, Pagan, etc.), DO NOT READ (ENTER "NO" CODE 2)

IF PROTESTANT OR CHRISTIAN UNSPECIFIED OR SOMETHING ELSE/CHRISTIAN

(Q16=1, 13 OR {Q.16=11 AND CHR=1}), ASK:

Q.17 As far as your present religion, what denomination or church, if any, do you identify with most

closely? Just stop me when I get to the right one. Are you (READ) Baptist, Methodist, Lutheran,

Presbyterian, Pentecostal, Episcopalian, Church of Christ, or Disciples of Christ, Congregational

or United Church of Christ, Holiness, Reformed, Church of God, Nondenominational or

Independent Church, Something else Or none in particular?

INTERVIEWER: DO NOT READ QUESTION IF R VOLUNTEERED DENOMINATION IN

PREVIOUS QUESTION. RECORD RESPONSE IN APPROPRIATE CATEGORY.

 

 

Protestant 51.3

Baptist Family 17.2

Methodist Family 6.2

Nondenominational Family 4.5

Lutheran Family 4.6

Presbyterian Family 2.7

Pentecostal Family 4.4

Episcopalian/Anglican Family 1.5

Restorationist Family 2.1

Congregationalist Family .8

Holiness Family 1.2

Reformed Family .3

Adventist Family .5

Anabaptist <.3

Pietist Family <.3

Friends Family <.3

Other Evangelical/Fund. Family .3

Non-Specific 4.9

Catholic 23.9

Mormon 1.7

Orthodox .6

Jehovah Witness .7

Other Christian .3

Jewish 1.7

Muslim* .6

Buddhist .7

Hindu .4

Other World Religions <.3

Other Faiths 1.2

Unaffiliated 16.1

DK/REF .8

Total 100.0

 

Cheers.

 

Phanta

[Vomit Comet]

What worries me is the fundie breeding rate, and it's not just the Quiverfull freaks. In twenty years Israel is going to be in deep shit because the Orthodox nut-jobs will no longer be a manageable minority. Orthodox families have an average of five to six brats, whereas general Israeli birthrates are typically European and are declining.

 

Give it a generation or two and fundies might be on the numeric up-and-up in this country, and not by the power of the Gospel but by prodigious usage of

their cocks and cunts.

That's taking deconversion rates into account, too. Well, I'd have to go sorting through the numbers.

[Vomit Comet]

33% deny religion. That is nothing like these other polls. It could be a problem with the methodology, or it could be that people are struggling with how to respond to the word "religion/religious".

 

A couple of additional questions having specifically to do with doctrinal belief could figure out who the fundies are, regardless of their formal affiliation. Barna Research Group--which is a Christian outfit, but they're not incompetent when it comes to data gathering--has come up with a pretty good index that determines whether or not the respondent is a "born again bible-believing Christian."

[Seeking]

What worries me is the fundie breeding rate, and it's not just the Quiverfull freaks. In twenty years Israel is going to be in deep shit because the Orthodox nut-jobs will no longer be a manageable minority. Orthodox families have an average of five to six brats, whereas general Israeli birthrates are typically European and are declining.

Sadly true. I come from a family of 5 kids. One of my cousins has 7, two more cousins have 5 each, my brother has 6, one of my best friends has 5, another friend has 5.... And yes, they're ALL fundies. Ugh.

[Vomit Comet]

Also, Google "Secularization Thesis" if you ever get a chance. Social scientists in the 1960s believed that religion would continue to be in decline and that it would cease to exist as we had known it. It would just be a loosey-goosey and largely inconsequential amalgamation of private spiritualities.

 

Didn't fucking happen. The secularization thesis ended up on the scrap heap of failed academic theories. They absolutely didn't anticipate the rise of American fundyism, the explosive growth of Mormonism, the conservative Catholic resurgence in the face of 1960s liberalization, and Islamist lunacy.

 

This is nothing new.

[lunaticheathen]

Religious/spiritual belief can often be a fuzzy, ill-identified thing with many people. I know that for several years, I put "other" on some forms and websites, or simply didn't answer, because I refused to be pegged as "Wiccan." I reject the use of that as a catch-all for Pagans and Neo-Pagans, because Wicca isn't "just anything." Pagan is a more proper "umbrella term" for Earth-centric pre-Christian spiritualities - not that Wicca is exactly "pre-Christian", but I digress.

There are also people who are so eclectic that picking one term just isn't going to cut it. I usually just leave it at "Pagan", but I could call myself a "Afro-diasporic Mediterranean Hindu Thelemic Witch", but that's a fucking mouthful. Some people are "Christian Witches", or "Gnostic Sufi Ceremonial Magicians", "Kabbalistic Manbos", hell, the buffet of religions, and "spiritual, but not religious" is wide open. And just because one picks from the buffet, doesn't mean they aren't serious about their path. I don't doubt that fundyism is on the rise, but I wouldn't assume that just because someone isn't claiming an "organized religion" that they're some Jesused-out nutball. The world of spirituality is just too huge for that.

[qec]

Also, Google "Secularization Thesis" if you ever get a chance. Social scientists in the 1960s believed that religion would continue to be in decline and that it would cease to exist as we had known it. It would just be a loosey-goosey and largely inconsequential amalgamation of private spiritualities.

 

Didn't fucking happen. The secularization thesis ended up on the scrap heap of failed academic theories. They absolutely didn't anticipate the rise of American fundyism, the explosive growth of Mormonism, the conservative Catholic resurgence in the face of 1960s liberalization, and Islamist lunacy.

 

This is nothing new.

 

I saw that video you posted awhile back about the Fundy resurgence in the mid 70's being basically solely due to their private schools having tax exempt status revoked because they wouldn't desegregate. I remember the dude talking about how that bastard Weyrich simply could not rally the Evangelicals around a "Pro-Life" cause until their tax exempt status was revoked due to the Civil Rights Laws that went into effect. It was a fascinating video and showed just how self interested (outside of Weyrich) the rise of the Religious Right really was. Basically the major gist I got from it is that most of them weren't all that terribly upset about abortion before they got their tax exempt status revoked. Then when the Gov started taking their money through taxes, that's what upset the applecart and allowed Paul Weyrich, Falwell, and others to form the Religious Right and the "Moral Majority". Some Majority, twenty five percent..

[Sexton Blake]

Turning people away from the church is a long slow business, but no one can do it like the fundies can, except the pope that is. Formerly very catholic Malta gave him some hassle the other day over pedo priests and he is threatened with arrest if he goes to the UK. Soon the only place "Dracula in a dress" will be able to visit is muslim countries.