the people's republic of sole

And so stands the ranking for the bottom 3 of who Americans would vote for for President according to a recent Gallup poll.



So what's the deal, why are Americans SO scared of atheists that they'd rather have a Muslim in the White House? Atheists need to get better organized and work on their PR.

On the plus side acceptance among all groups has risen steadily over the past ~80 years that this poll has been taken and this is also the first year that more than 50% of Americans said that they would vote for an atheist.

this poll is stupid

mediocre at best is right, although the question is still a good one.

The single biggest factor affecting a person's views on homosexuality is whether or not that person knows a homosexual. So maybe the problem is that a huge percentage of the American populace doesn't know anyone who is a card-carrying, flaming atheist.

because atheists can't explain why testimonies exist.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjTbuY9Q ... re=related

this

edit: caps lock sucka

Perhaps many people associate being an atheist with not having strong ethical/moral values.

I recently saw a Steve Harvey interview where he said that being an atheist meant a person had no moral barometer. Which is obviously rather absurd. I imagine many people people think this way and perhaps that's being reflected in the poll.

Either way, Ill be taking a seat at the "this poll is stupid" section.

this is definitely true.


if there were a gay/muslim/atheist presidential candidate from the party they liked, people would likely come to terms with it and vote for them anyway:


also this is quite nice and positive:



http://www.gallup.com/poll/155285/Athei ... dates.aspx

it's funny how the statistics in my world are usually quite different than the statistics in the media.

To be fair, Gallup's statistics are probably much more accurate than yours are.

gallup's stats are gathered by scanning the brains of one-dimensional artificially intelligent monkey machines who have been forced to watch tv for the last 60 years. my stats take the subjective perception of an infinite amount of dimensions into consideration.

I think I just got served.

I think this is a big part of it, I've tried becoming more vocal about my lack of belief (while trying to not come off too "preachy") just to let people know that there are decent atheists around. I've also recently found out about some secular organizations who do charity events which I think is a great idea, I'll most likely be participating in a leukemia fundraiser walk later this year as part of a secular team.

that's great that groups of atheists are getting together to do charity and such but i think it will be hard for religious folk to ever accept atheists as a group. the reason being is that atheists basically define themselves as being someone who thinks others are wrong or rather just not believing in something that others do. i always found it odd why people even feel the need to define themselves as nonbelievers but hey, to each their own. i guess people like to feel like they are part of a group. im not religious by any means but i would never want to constrict my perception by saying that i am atheist either. i reckon i always had a problem with objectivity.

I just saw this article on CNN about an "atheist blogger" converting to Catholicism and becoming a "catholic blogger."

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2012/06/2 ... tholicism/



I am not tempted to follow the links to any of these blogs, that's for sure.

--



That might be true. I can't tell if you were attempting to lend credibility to my point, or to undermine it. I think that Joe Biden recently cited "Will and Grace" as one of the main reasons he became okay with gay marriage. Those people don't even actually exist. You can "know" a presidential candidate in a real enough sense so that the candidate influences your perception of those people.

I think it may well be the case that the average American does not know a person who is openly an atheist. They are not well-represented within the media. Does anyone who watches TV here know if there are atheist characters on network television shows who aren't cranks, creeps, or weirdos?

Well that's fine and all as long as we withhold a separation of church and state, however lately there has been more and more blurring of that line with religious groups pushing belief based legislation onto the books. If there's not an organized group to stand up on the other side then there's nothing to stop us from becoming a theocracy.

I read that and from what I could tell her definition of being Catholic is ...unconventional to say the least. Basically she has decided that the innate morality that people have is God. She sounds much more deist than anything from what I've read.

im just throwing shit all the wall but i would guess the atheist that the average american is exposed to is probably young, under 35, and possibly lives an alternative lifestyle that a church going christian wouldnt approve of.

then on the point of getting elected, a candidate is going to pander the populace with the biggest voting clout. it makes sense to appear christian if most of the voters are christian. an atheist would have a better chance lying about their religion or devoutness to get elected.