Why is the atheist movement in decline?

[historia]

Consider these recent comments from several prominent atheist activists:

You know lately when I look around on social media, and in the media in general really, I see these proclamations. Proclamations that the atheist movement is on life support. It's dying. It's probably beyond saving.

. . .

As an atheist activist myself, I can understand myself why some activists have just left the party. They just got tired of it. All the politics and the posturing and the trolls and the bad faith operators out there. They have seen first hand that atheists are not immune to scandal, to ugliness, to irrationality, to this unhealthy rage.

If you look at the major atheist groups right now -- like the national groups, the ones that are doing the real activist work, like American Atheists or Secular Coalition -- they are not bringing in the kind of donations they used to. Most of them are starved for cash. They're downsizing left and right, because people aren't just giving like they used to.

And I talked to a lot of the major donors out there and they said, "Well, we're kind of tired of seeing the atheist community just fight amongst itself and not really get anything done. We'd rather not give money if we don't think it's going to go somewhere."

It is a hard time to be an atheist activist . . . We are suffering a level of defeatism that I've never seen before . . . I have heard "it's over" so many times it makes me sick . . . This apathy is infecting us and it's hurting us . . . That has resulted in a splintering and a faction-ing of the movement that I've never seen before . . . We're in a bad situation and it's getting worse.

Atheism has squandered its momentum on a defensive old guard and apologists for neglect of events happening in our world. I’m going to have to suggest that we all abandon it.

Question for debate: Why is the atheist movement in decline?

[historia]

The transcript below is from “Through the Wormhole� S05E01 and concerns analysis of religious census data from around the world. The whole episode focuses on God, but the part referred to below starts at around the 19 minute mark.

Danny Abrams* is an applied mathematician at Northwestern University. Religious affiliation has been tracked via census reports in many countries for up to 250 years in some cases and we can see how the sizes of religious groups have grown and shrunk. We looked at 85 regions around the world and in every case, every place where it’s ever been measured, the fastest growing religious minority is the non-affiliated, the group of people who don’t affiliate with any religion at all. To find out if this trend will continue, Danny plugged census data from nine different countries (Australia, Canada, Finland, Ireland, Switzerland, Czech Republic, Austria, Netherlands, New Zealand) into his mathematical models and made a surprising prediction. Religion is heading towards a tipping point. According to Danny, by the year 2050, in 6 out of the 9 countries he studied, religiously affiliated people will be a minority. The wheels of society are making people align. A non-religious majority looks set to emerge.

This is a textbook example of cherry-picked statistics. The authors of this TV show have carefully framed the issue in such a way so as to only take into account the census data from certain countries and regions, rather than from the whole world.

Obviously, if we want to know the population trends for the whole world, we have to look at all the census data, not just those from select parts of the world.

[historia]

The percentage of the overall population that recognize as atheist continues to go up.

No, the percentage of the world's population that identifies as atheist or agnostic has been steadily declining since the 1970s.

Atheist groups do indeed seem to be a different story. This is not surprising, since trying to build an organization around something that people don't believe is hardly a foundation of commonality. It'd be like a movement for people that don't believe in Bigfoot.

The only reason atheist groups were ever organized (in my opinion) was to fend off the increased attempts by a minority of religious folks to jam religion into things like science classes or the government, which is clearly forbidden by the Constitution. Hence organizations like the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF).

But atheist groups have found themselves also getting into other political arenas, like the gun control debate, or the social justice warrior nonsense around things like the fictitious gender wage gap. That's a problem obviously, because being an atheist has nothing to do with these other things, which means you probably have a wide array of opinions on non-atheist topics, which starts in-fighting in the group. I think that is precisely what we've seen, and it doesn't surprise me.

Certainly a fair analysis of the problem.

But, as David Silverman tells it, atheists are second class citizens in the United States, facing serious discrimination from things like the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, school vouchers, and the conservative agenda of the Trump administration. Is that just fear mongering intended to whip up the base, in your opinion?

Also, there are other movements that include diverse people focused on opposing a particular idea or practice -- I'm thinking here specifically of the Pro Life movement. That movement hasn't descended into in-fighting like the Atheist movement has. Why do you think that is?

[brunumb]

[Replying to post 31 by historia]

The authors of this TV show have carefully framed the issue in such a way so as to only take into account the census data from certain countries and regions, rather than from the whole world.

The authors of the show did not produce the data. Your comment suggests that you did not give due consideration to what was actually said.

[historia]

Question for debate: Why is the atheist movement in decline?

It isn't, as has been shown.

Nobody in this thread has disputed the claim that the atheist movement is in decline, and several have confirmed it.

A handful of people have made the tangential claim that the percentage of the world's population that is atheist is on the rise, but that is erroneous.

Why didn't you check the facts before preaching such nonsense ?

I always check my facts. I know the demographic data here quite well. Clearly you don't.

[historia]

The authors of this TV show have carefully framed the issue in such a way so as to only take into account the census data from certain countries and regions, rather than from the whole world.

The authors of the show did not produce the data. Your comment suggests that you did not give due consideration to what was actually said.

On the contrary, I know what is -- and, more importantly, what is not -- being said in that quote, precisely because I'm quite familiar with several reports on worldwide religious demographic changes that actually take into account all the census data and not just data from select regions and countries.

[Jagella]

This is a textbook example of cherry-picked statistics. The authors of this TV show have carefully framed the issue in such a way so as to only take into account the census data from certain countries and regions, rather than from the whole world.

Obviously, if we want to know the population trends for the whole world, we have to look at all the census data, not just those from select parts of the world.

In many cases all the data is not available, and that's why statisticians rely on samples they hope are representative of the population. In this case Danny Abrams cited the sources of his sample data, so he is at least being honest. I don't see any reason to believe he was deliberately cherry-picking to make the conclusion appear that atheism is on the rise throughout the entire world. We could, of course, argue about how well his sample represents the whole world.

[polonius]

Atheism is not decreasing. See PEW study.

http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/20 ... ous-nones/

“Religiously unaffiliated people have been growing as a share of all Americans for some time. Pew Research Center’s massive 2014 Religious Landscape Study makes clear just how quickly this is happening, and also shows that the trend is occurring within a variety of demographic groups – across genders, generations and racial and ethnic groups, to name a few.�

“Religious “nones� – a shorthand we use to refer to people who self-identify as atheists or agnostics, as well as those who say their religion is “nothing in particular� – now make up roughly 23% of the U.S. adult population. This is a stark increase from 2007, the last time a similar Pew Research study was conducted, when 16% of Americans were “nones.� (During this same time period, Christians have fallen from 78% to 71%.)�

https://news.nationalgeographic.com/201 ... -religion/

“The religiously unaffiliated, called "nones," are growing significantly. They’re the second largest religious group in North America and most of Europe. In the United States, nones make up almost a quarter of the population. In the past decade, U.S. nones have overtaken Catholics, mainline protestants, and all followers of non-Christian faiths.�

[William]

[Replying to post 12 by Jagella]

I'm really glad to hear that you're aware of social issues we atheists should be addressing. It's important for us atheists to be already thinking about a just an equitable society that we can build.

Occasionally it is heard. Not so often is it seen.

Opportunities to step up are never far away. Perhaps ones time and energy might be better invested in such things rather than wasted on trying to convert the religious.

♦ The Necessity of Changing Our Present Systems of Disparity.

[NervyGuy]

Nobody in this thread has disputed the claim that the atheist movement is in decline, and several have confirmed it.

I guess that depends on how 'the atheist movement' is defined. Can you present your definition? Do you mean something like "number of atheists" or "fervor of anti-religious activity" or "quality of anti-religious activity" or something else?

A handful of people have made the tangential claim that the percentage of the world's population that is atheist is on the rise, but that is erroneous.

Me, I think it's pretty silly to believe that we can sort the atheists from the theists, as if they are real objects like automobiles or smartphones.

I always check my facts. I know the demographic data here quite well. Clearly you don't.

So what do you see as the demographic facts regarding worldwide atheism?

[Jagella]

Perhaps ones time and energy might be better invested in such things rather than wasted on trying to convert the religious.

Well, I'm glad you posted this comment because it indicates to me that I've gotten through to at least one person.

Oh--and is it safe to assume that those who agree with you here are not wasting their time here?