Are more atheists and agnostics Democrats? In this Slate.com article the author makes this point:
The author’s evidence that atheists and agnostics are Democrats is completely flawed. However, do atheists and agnostics tend to be Democrats?
In what manner is the analysis “completely flawed?” I’d say it’s incomplete – that is, we cannot judge how significant the 60 percent figure is unless we also hear about other delegates aligned with religion at both Republican and Democratic conventions – but it’s not a completely irrelevant data point.
- Rick
If if we take the 60 percent figure as representing all Democrats, it still doesn’t tell us anything about Republicans. But we can’t take the 60 percent to represent all Democrats, it all represents first time white delegates. Also, just because they claim no attachement to religion does not mean they are atheists or agnostics.
It is like saying 70% of new black employees at Main Street Tire Service are Star trek fans, so Star Trek fans end to work at Main Street Tire not Second Street Tire Service.
Actually, it is not like this. It is even worse.
I’d say the author of that article is really stretching, including atheists and agnostics in a definition of “religious extremists,” which is usually used to mean people who use their religious beliefs to justify taking action against things they dislike.
In any case, the fact that 60% of the delegates at one Democrati convention claimed “no attachment to religion” doesn’t mean they’re atheists or agnostics; I know plenty of people who dislike organized religion but consider themselves Christians, for example. And even if it did, it still doesn’t mean that atheists or agnostics tend to be Democrats, as Oktberfest points out.
Calling atheists “religious extremists” is absurd, since they aren’t religious, let alone extremist. One might as well call a pacifist a “militant extremist”.
To be fair, there are militant atheists (like these from my very own town) and I would classify them as “religous extremists” in that they are extremist about matters having to do with religion. I don’t consider atheism to be a religion but my point is that it’s not completely beyond the pale to describe at least some atheists as “religious extremists.”
As to the OP I could only offer a WAG and that WAG is that the perception of the Republican Party as, how to say this nicely, “highly responsive” to the desires of the religious right could be likely to lead an atheist/agnostic away from the Republicans and to the other big game in town (although it’s not like the Dems in general are beating down any doors to capture the atheist vote).
I think we need to get back on track or this will become great debate territory. Are there any studies that show atheists and agnostics tend to be Deomcrats?
Not just Republican. Widely supported among African Americans, too, most of whom are not Republicans.