Hmm…interesting question.
Funny part is I have found myself late at night, arriving by bus into an unfamiliar city, I didn’t speak the language, had to find a place to stay. It was an empty field where we were dropped.
Now if a group of men came toward us, and we’d been told they’d just come from a prayer meeting, I think I would feel more secure.
Then again, I was in Indonesia, so most certainly that prayer meeting would have been Islamic. It doesn’t change anything for me. You?
The likelihood of your example having occurred is from zero to –10. Not so Lynn’s description of being beaten up by Christians. I’d bet my last dollar on it being true.
Being gay does not have a built in motivation for aggression, or a history of creating aggression. Religion does.
Atheist, and I would feel safer, mainly for the reasons given above - knowledge helps lessen the fear of the unknown. Any group would make me feel better as long as it wasn’t a hate organisation against straight, white, pudgy non-threatening guys. A sports event might make me wary, but only if they expect me to know who won and they’d been getting rascally drunk for the previous two hours.
What Lynn said.
I’m agnostic, btw.
I’m gay. Knowing that someone is religious does nothing at all to make me think they are less likely to want (or try) to harm me.
Agreed, the two times in my life I’ve been attacked was both a group of young men, actually the second time was more of a riot with people dousing cars in gasoline etc. I’ve been cursed at and invited to come down an alley and fight a group of around five drunk guys too, I declined their offer.
You bet your ass I always keep on eye on groups of teens/twentysomething men, easily the most dangerous demographic.