In a revelation that's part belief, part bias, and a dash of unexpected
irony. New research peaks behind the curtain of Christian nationalism and its curious relationship
with the attitudes toward atheists in the United States. While atheists face persistent prejudice,
the study uncovers a surprising twist. Black Americans in states steeped in Christian
nationalism appear less prejudice against atheists than their white counterpart. Black Americans are giving
Christian or Black Americans in Christian nationalist states are giving prejudice the side eye.
The study unravels a nuanced dance between identity defiance and unintended alliances and an era
of growing division. The results not only illuminate the intricate dynamics of belief systems,
but also raise broader questions that reach beyond the realm of eight This story
is from siposts by Eric W. Dollan on December third, twenty twenty three.
Phoebe, I'm excited to hear what you have to say on this,
I mean, the psychology of Christian nationalism and their distrust of atheist othertimes given
now we've got actual, actual data on this I mean, that's quite impressive.
But it is fascinating that African Americans in high Christian nationalist areas, according
to the article, did not share the same mess as their Caucasian which I
found to be quite an interesting thing. Technical yeah, yeah, you know,
because it just doesn't quite mesh doesn't quite doesn't quite mesh doesn't quite meld
with what you would expect you would expect. As Christian nationalism increases, a
broad swathe across the board would say, hang on a minute, we distrust
atheism. It's like, for example, in high Muslim majority countries, you
would expect a greater level of trust or other Muslims. You wouldn't expect it
to be well, okay, well Muslims from this area actually trust other Muslims
less. It's not something you'd actually expect to see. But having the side
of big paper to actually back this up with actually really interesting because it doesn't
really surprise me. Because what it does show is that in these areas people
don't all voters one mind. There's no hive mind here, which is actually
really lovely to see. And when you actually break it down, to start
breaking this down by race and to go well, hang on, a minute,
this race of this race don't all speak as one. And I've now
got you know, data on that, and that's actually quite nice to actually
confirm that people actually do have individuality and these things. But when you start
digging into this, you would expect Christian nationalists, the crystal fascists of this
world to absolutely hate the four of us on this screen and everything that we
stand for, because we are the unsavable people. Myself in particular because I'm,
according to them, I'm an aposta because I've left a religion left too,
and how old am I? God, I'm the worst of the world.
But to actually see other people going, oh well, it's not the
person actually really nice to see. I mean, I'm not, you know,
a heteronormative individual. A lot of the people aren't particularly heteronormative. When
it unfortunately comes to the African American community. There are high rates of single
mothers, high rates of lone parents, high rates of absolute fathers, and
in white communities that much lower. And I think that that may have something
to do with as well. Which is something to bear in mind is that
whilst Christian nationalism is something that distrusts atheism, it also distrusts lack of heteronormative
conformity. So the two point four children, nuclear family, mother, father,
children, going to school, academically, extracurricular activities, dog house with
two rooms upstairs, two rooms downstairs, front garden, backgarden, et cetera.
It's not something you're going to find in a lot of my local African
American communities ran because they've got high poverty, right, and high poverty rates
don't generally tend to lead to the dog, the car, the house,
et cetera. And I think that looking at this from an economic lens as
well is quite interesting because it shows that Christian nationalism is just like society itself.
It is diverging, and it is produced against itself in these matters.
So, Infidel, what shall take? Well? First, I hope that
everyone has their official copy of the Great Atheist Mass planned close, because I
was going to reach out and talk about it. You know, I'd hate
to be discriminated against the group that's not prepared for Okay, okay, oh
wait, I thought it was the recipe book. I forgot. I wasn't
supposed to talk about that in public. I'm so so so sorry, Scott,
but you know, seriously. You know, I hate to call us
a religious group. We're not a religious group. I mean, we're the
lack of religious group, but we are the one of the fastest growing.
And I understand why the Christian nationalists are so anti And it's not just the
fact that we disagree. Are we stand for over something different than what they
believe. It also goes down to what they're told time and again you sit
and listening to what you know, people standing behind a piece of wood or
screaming at their people and telling them about people like us and people that are
not like them, whatever them is. And that's always a new term,
depending depending on who's saying it. But you know, this negativity makes sense,
and you mentioned the common ground. You know, I think that what
we're seeing is the convergence of whites becoming a plurality and no longer a majority
in this country, along with Christianity lose the control, and these people are
feeling concern and anger from both sides. And yes, they're taking it out
on other people, and it's out of fear. It's out of fear changed
and something different. They're getting older. Church population continues to decline, so
their choices are as they yell louder or chain. You know, we are
seeing even in like more moderate and I hate to say moderate with them,
but you know the Pope saying, well, you know, maybe gay people
are okay if we squint and do this and we can pretend this is okay.
They can do that, but the Christian Nationalists, they're trying to hold
a line. And that line that they're trying to hold is inevitably going to
move, and that that's the good part. You know. Right now they're
whining to anyone who's willing to listen. You know, perhaps we should.
You know, last Pride month they even lost cracker Barrel and the woke.
So you know, for me personally, they can have cracker Barrel back.
You know, I got a cracker barrel. I'm sorry, Phoebe. I
do apologize, but I'm willing to sacrifice it for the team. And because
the truth is, uh, they're just getting louder and they're getting smaller.
And for that, I say, they they're going to feel the way they
feel and they're going to become less relevant as that continue. Scott, where
are you at? You know, I have to right, yeah, yep,
that's that's next on the agenda here. Now, I just need to
say, as the math teacher on the panel here, it just warms my
heart that we're getting so much interpretation and so much interest, and and and
so many different takes on what is basically just a big math problem. Right,
they gathered all of this data, they came to all these conclusions.
It was really cool the way that they did it. So excuse me for
geeking out for a little bit. That's a compliment in my house, NERD.
But so they also gathered all this different demographic data with their sample,
and so that allowed them to make all these you know, very nuanced comparisons.
And we've talked about some of these already, the first one, of
course, being that increased Christian nationalism indicated increased prejudice against atheists on a personal
level, but not at a state level, okay, And so so what
that would imply is that, you know, there's different aspects to a person's
identity. Some people might consider their religion part of their identity. Some people
might consider their nation as part of their identity. You know, there's all
these different things that we can attach to our identity. And so since there's
a difference in these two measurements. What we're what they're saying is that these
Christian nationalists consider themselves more Christian than national right and so and so it's it's
more of a personal, small community kind of of kind of impetus to to
toe of this particular line and to hold this line. It's not so much
at a larger scale like at a state level. And so, you know,
a person's religion is a lot more reflective of that person. It's derived
from their like I said, their immediate person, their personality, their identity,
and so on. The author if I read through geeking out right,
I read through the actual report and so in the discussion area, they were
talking about their own perceived flaws in the in the study and so, which
is always a good sign if you see a research or criticizing their own results.
Uh, that that's kind of a sign of integrity and authenticity. They
went on to add they wanted to add a county level comparisons as well,
and they thought that that might shed a little light on that discrepancy between the
individual levels and at the at the state level. The second interesting find that
they are interesting thing that they found, and we've talked about this already as
well, is that in the states where UH Christian nationalism was a little higher
on the scale, black individuals were actually less likely to show president pre prejudice
against atheists. And and of course that shouldn't be surprising. I mean,
why would black Americans have any mistrust for you know, for authority. I
mean, you know, crazy, right, you know, they're they're quite
familiar with the business end of bigotry, right right, bigotry duck, Yeah,
and so you know, so I can't imagine why that would be an
issue. But but there's actually a hidden layer in there, if you if
you peel away those layers. We said before that states with with higher Christian
nationalism went along with increased UH prejudice against atheists, but it was not at
the state level, but at this but there was that racial aspect. And
so if states with high and I'm getting a little too complicated here, but
states that have higher levels of Christian nationalism, if the black residents of that
state actually we're lower on the prejudice scale, that means that the white community
must have been higher, and that that discrepancy kind of masked the difference.
And so white individuals that were in states that at higher you know, I'm
just going to stop. I think I'm out mathed everybody, and so math
fatigue, right, So I just wanted to point out those equation exactly exactly.
But I just I thought the study was a gold mine. I thought
they had a large, diverse sample, they had interesting and interlinked results,
and they had a few curveballs thrown in there. You know what more could
I ask? Ask Eli? What's your take on that? Yeah, So
as the undergraduate science student on the panel, I'm happy to nerd out with
you. I just don't have the expertise. Welcome, Welcome, we have
a big tent. We have a big tent. So I also I was
excited that I was like, oh, I have access to like scholarly libraries
through my school. So I pulled up the study as well, and I
wanted to look at it, and I found very interesting, speaking specifically about
the summary, the comparative summary of the variable, I'm sure you looked at
as well. It's interesting that it is strictly in evangelical Christians where this prejudice
against atheists is so high. If you look at Jewish or Muslim participant in
the survey. There and I don't have it in front of me now,
but there they're prejudice. Their score of prejudice against atheists was point zero three
point zero eight, where with the Evangelical Christians it was in the thirties,
you know, on the left side of the or the decimals. So that
was a really interesting at first. I really thought when I read the title
of the article, I thought this was kind of a no brainer. Christian
nationalists would advocate for a Christian theocracy and an atheist would inherently oppose that idea.
There maybe some one off, you know, circumstances, but I think
by and large, most people who don't believe in a god and the Christian
God would be the enemy of Aquin Nash. So that was what I first
thought was a no brainer. But I did find it interesting. Of course,
like we've all said already, that black America seem to show less prejudice,
and I, of course I'm speaking about an experience that I don't have,
But what I've learned from people of color that are sharing their experiences me
is that they tend to, at least those that I've spoke, tend to
pay attention to how people treat them individual not how groups treat them, but
how individual them and make their judgment of that first character or their their social
proximity to that person based on how the individual treats them, because they are
so used seeing that prejudice that perhaps like maybe minor sometimes perhaps microaggressions, or
or sometimes true art and horrible like discrimination and racism, and they're so used
to seeing that. And I think that anybody with who is capable of empathy
is going to who experiences something horrible all the time, is not going to
want others to experience that as well, and would therefore be more trusting of
And I think you'll see that most of us in the atheist community. Again,
there are one off examples, but by and large most that I've spoke
with that i'm aware of, that I see on you know, shows like
this, are very open, very accepting towards all lifestyles, all types of
people. Just if you're a kind person, I will be kind to you.
It doesn't matter how you live your life, as long as you're harm
to others. And so I think that's where sort of these particular Black Christian
nationalists and the atheists that I am familiar with, I think that's what they
have in common and why they they don't why there's not quite that prejudice those
that were pulled by the service. That's great, that's great, and that's
interesting what you were what you were just talking about, because it implies that
what I was saying before about how their personal identity, their religious identity,
their local their small community identity kind of trumps their their national commitment. But
but what you're saying is maybe personal experience can trump that that that small group
identities. So that's so that's a good thing. That's a good thing.
As you know, we know that, you know, as people get to
know people in these out groups, they become less outgroup. Right And I'm
sorry, go ahead, Nope, So I believe professor nee is how you
pronounce it. The author of the study. Their interpretation was that it was
a sort of coming together, like the black Christian nationalists and the atheists that
are both victims of bigotry and oppression coming together as a no, we'll fight
against it. I don't think it's quite that. I don't think it's an
intentional union. I think it's just as I described, it's just a natural
result of being the victim of that prejudice by Christian nationalists And would you say
that, strange Bedfellow? Sure one might, could one could I have a
question for the group for the panel here again this is from the discussion section.
You know, they were reflecting in ways that they could improve their their
study. Uh, the author wondered, quote, does individual Christian nationalism cause
prejudice against atheists? Or does an anti atheist attitude strengthen one's beliefs in Christian
nationalism? So this is the causation versus correlation thing. So they saw that
there was a correlation, but they pondered of what could be the cause?
Is the Christian causing the nationalism or is the nationalism causing the Christian or you
know, the other way around? Infidel? What's your thoughts? Oh,
without a doubt, the Christianity aspect is drived Bove. They want Christian nationalism,
but to get that you have to have Christianity as the ultimate law bringer,
law giver, and that's what they want. They really do want a
Theoic. I really do believe that when it comes down to it, the
more extremist people on this end are looking for something that is totally incompatible with
what we see as a government. You know, we talk about this is
unconstitutional or constitutional protection. We have people like the Speaker of the House right
who wants to have a constitution mention. So when you have people like this
governor crab system, what these Christian nationalists want is something completely incompatible with the
form of government that we're talking about. What we understand, something completely difficult.
Eli. I tend to agree with you. I think it is overwhelmingly
the Christian nationalism uh leading toward the anti eighth At. I wouldn't say there
is an insignificant amount of it being the other way though. I think people
who may not have leaned toward Christian nationalism may have been maybe I'm conservative and
I'm a Christian, and then maybe have encounters with atheists or have hear stories
or there's they're they're being taught about atheists or atheist and by their church or
their pastors or their unreligious community, and they're getting ideas based on that and
then leaning more towards the Christian nationalist standpoint because that makes it feel united against
you know, the sick horribly. So you're saying they're identifying as Christians first,
and then they're saying, well, I guess I better hate atheists,
know, and so then they do that as a result, and then the
whole thing kind of jels together in one big nasty uh whatever. Yeah,
I think I think more not like a decision to hate just for the sake
of hating necessarily in all cases, probably not maybe subconsciously. Then yeah,
just starts starting to like, oh, well, I'm a Christian and atheists
are not Christian, and atheists hate God because of course that's that's the reason
we're atheists. We're just mad at God. So what they hear behind the
pullpit whatxact time and time again, the dehumanization of a sorry, And I
think that's what leads to there, Phoebe, what do you think will give
you the last take on this? Is the Christian nationalism causing the prejudice against
atheists or is other way around? Well, you can't have this kind of
prejudice against atheism unless you've learned it somewhere, because you can't walk down the
street and have a sign about your head saying atheist theist. It just doesn't
work like that. It must have come from somewhere, and it seems blindingly
obvious that this has come from Christian because Christian nationalism, at its fundamental heart
is a belief system, and they view atheism as a lack of a belief
system, and that breaks the metric that they run by. They don't hold
these prejudices against other religious groups to the strength that they hold them against atheists,
in my opinion, because they see those groups as having a belief system
that they can tap into and change. And the people that they dislike the
most are the ones that they considered the apostates that are now the atheists,
and they only focus you are abandoned God, blah blah blah blah blah,
that's an atheist. What they will never say is this person never had a
belief in a deity to start with, which is also a valid form of
atheism. Not everybody is born with a religion, and anybody who says you
are born with a religion can go and take that attitude and shove it up
there, because nobody is born with a religion. Religion is taught in the
same way prejudice is taught. This prejudice comes hook line and sinker from the
religion that is taught and the nationalistic dogma. In this extreme interpretation of Christianity
that does nothing but on a fundamental level, push prejudice. True enough said,
enough said, I think I can't. I think we're all in agreement
on that. And on that note, I want to thank Infidel sixty four,
Phoeb Rose and Eli for joining me on nonprofits today. I really wish
this conversation could keep on going