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[IMG]http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/dam/assets/121008074844-belief-atheist-reason-rally-sign-story-top.jpg[/IMG]
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The Reason Rally, billed as a watershed moment for nonbelievers, was held March 24 in Washington.
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Washington (CNN) – The fastest growing "religious" group in America is made up of people with no religion at all, according to a Pew survey showing that one in five Americans is not affiliated with any religion.
The number of these Americans has grown by 25% just in the past five years, according to a survey released Thursday by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life.
The survey found that the ranks of the unaffiliated are growing even faster among younger Americans.
Thirty-three million Americans now have no religious affiliation, with 13 million in that group identifying as either atheist or agnostic, according to the new survey.
Pew found that those who are religiously unaffiliated are strikingly less religious than the public at large. They attend church infrequently, if at all, are largely not seeking out religion and say that the lack of it in their lives is of little importance.
And yet Pew found that 68% of the religiously unaffiliated say they believe in God, while 37% describe themselves as “spiritual” but not “religious.” One in five said that they even pray every day.
John Green, a senior research adviser at Pew, breaks the religiously unaffiliated into three groups. First, he says, are those who were raised totally outside organized religion.
Second are groups of people who were unhappy with their religions and left.
The third group, Green says, comprises Americans who were never really engaged with religion in the first place, even though they were raised in religious households.
“In the past, we would describe those people as nominally affiliated. They might say, 'I am Catholic; I am a Baptist,' but they never went" to services, Green says of this last group. “Now, they feel a lot more comfortable just saying, ‘You know, I am really nothing.’ ”
According to the poll, 88% of religiously unaffiliated people are not looking for religion.
“There is much less of a stigma attached" to not being religious, Green said. “Part of what is fueling this growth is that a lot of people who were never very religious now feel comfortable saying that they don't have an affiliation.”
Demographically, the growth among the religiously unaffiliated has been most notable among people who are 18 to 29 years old.
According to the poll, 34% of “younger millennials” - those born between 1990 and 1994 - are religiously unaffiliated. Among “older millennials,” born between 1981 and 1989, 30% are religiously unaffiliated: 4 percentage points higher than in 2007.
Poll respondents 18-29 were also more likely to identify as atheist or agnostic. Nearly 42% religious unaffiliated people from that age group identified as atheist or agnostic, a number far greater than the number who identified as Christian (18%) of Catholic (18%).
Green says that these numbers are “part of a broader change in American society.”
“The unaffiliated have become a more distinct group,” he said.
Pew's numbers were met with elation among atheist and secular leaders. Jesse Galef, communications director for the Secular Student Alliance, said that the growth of the unaffiliated should translate into greater political representation for secular interests.
“We would love to see the political leaders lead on this issue, but we are perfectly content with them following these demographic trends, following the voters,” Galef said.
“As more of the voters are unaffiliated and identifying as atheist and agnostics, I think the politicians will follow that for votes.
“We won’t be dismissed or ignored anymore,” Galef said.
The Pew survey suggested that the Democratic Party would do well to recognize the growth of the unaffiliated, since 63% of them identify with or lean toward that political group. Only 26% of the unaffiliated do the same with the Republican Party.
"In the near future, if not this year, the unaffiliated voters will be as important as the traditionally religious are to the Republican Party collation,” Green predicted.
Green points to the 2008 exit polls as evidence for that prediction. That year, Republican presidential nominee John McCain beat President Barack Obama by 47 points among white evangelical voters, while Obama had a 52-point margin of victory over McCain among the religiously unaffiliated.
According to exit polls, the proportion of religiously unaffiliated Americans who supported the Democratic presidential candidate grew 14 points from 2000 to 2008.
In announcing the survey’s findings at the Religion Newswriters Association conference in Bethesda, Maryland, Green said the growing political power of the unaffiliated within the Democratic Party could become similar to the power the Religious Right acquired in the GOP in the 1980s.
“Given the growing numbers of the unaffiliated, there is the potential that that could be harnessed,” he said.
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Source:
[URL]http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2012/10/09/survey-one-in-five-americans-is-religiously-unaffiliated/[/URL]
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1 in 5 Americans has no religion.
1 in 3 under the age of 30 have no religious affiliation.
Old news, but good news
[QUOTE=usaokay;37970559]I don't believe in anything. Not god, science, or the flying spaghetti monster. Just go with the flow of life, man.[/QUOTE]
Science isn't a belief. But I'm a lot like you, I'm just a person goddamnit.
[QUOTE]The number of these Americans has grown by 25% just in the past five years[/QUOTE]
Later, on Fox News
[QUOTE]The number of these Americans has grown by 25% just in the past four years[/QUOTE]
Religion itself isn't a bad thing, and not having a religion doesn't really reflect in your personality most of the time. I'd like to see some numbers about being part of [I]organized[/I] religion.
A lot of people in my school are either atheist or mormon lol
[QUOTE]Pew found that [B]those who are religiously unaffiliated are strikingly less religious than the public at large[/B]. They attend church infrequently, if at all, are largely not seeking out religion and say that the lack of it in their lives is of little importance.[/QUOTE]
WOW!!
[quote]And yet Pew found that 68% of the religiously unaffiliated say they believe in God, while 37% describe themselves as “spiritual” but not “religious.” One in five said that they even pray every day.[/quote]
move along, same old shit different tune
I wonder how many people answered they were religious on the basis of their family being so rather than their actual beliefs.
I hope this will only go up in the future
[QUOTE=clc666;37970573]Science isn't a belief. But I'm a lot like you, I'm just a person goddamnit.[/QUOTE]
I take it as a belief, personally. It's something that you believe to be objectively true; in the same way that some religious people believe that the teachings of their religion are objectively true.
[URL="http://spaz.ca/aaron/school/science.html"]An interesting text to cite here[/URL]
[QUOTE=mac338;37970576]Later, on Fox News[/QUOTE]
Source?
And the comments on that article must be hilarious.
"The nation finds this post scary"
[QUOTE=Maloof?;37971669]I take it as a belief, personally. It's something that you believe to be objectively true; in the same way that some religious people believe that the teachings of their religion are objectively true.
[URL="http://spaz.ca/aaron/school/science.html"]An interesting text to cite here[/URL][/QUOTE]
Science is analyzing your surroundings to know what things are and how they work, not to say this is reality and the only reality and anything otherwise is not true. Yes it is to help understand our life, but understanding a clocks mechanisms doesn't formulate a belief on life itself. What you posted says science is just a bunch of assumptions, if everything through science was assumed we wouldn't be where we are today. What you posted is itself an assumption of how people who use science think. But science again isn't thinking a certain way, it's the analyzing of your surroundings and how it works.
I believe in not believing. That is, show me the proof and then we both know it's the truth. Till then, I remain a skeptic.
I am from that third group, raised in a sort of religious family(went to church on Easter and Xmas) but it wasn't exactly an important thing. As I got older nothing in my daily life was helped, or even affected, by religion in any way. It just kind of became irrelevant. And that's how I got to this point.
Yes! The death of religion is nigh, and before you know it there will be world peace :D
[QUOTE=critein_protein;37971992]Yes! The death of religion is nigh, and before you know it there will be world peace :D[/QUOTE]
the earth will still be a p shitty place to live in regardless of the belief of the majority of people
[QUOTE=critein_protein;37971992]Yes! The death of religion is nigh, and before you know it there will be world peace :D[/QUOTE]
this attitude really makes me angry.
[QUOTE=BrickInHead;37970644]move along, same old shit different tune[/QUOTE]
No problem with me. If people want to believe in a God personally or hold some sort of personal spiritual belief, it's not of my business. As long as they don't push those beliefs onto others, I have no problem.
I'm not really affiliated either way TBQH. I take no real umbrage with believing in God or not, but I wouldn't let my beliefs get in the way of somebody doing something [I]they[/I] believe is right.
[QUOTE=critein_protein;37971992]Yes! The death of religion is nigh, and before you know it there will be world peace :D[/QUOTE]
I'm actually scared about what would happen if r/atheism and similar have nothing to bitch about
[QUOTE=Kinversulath;37972127]As long as they don't push those beliefs onto others, I have no problem.[/QUOTE]
This. Applicable to atheists as well.
[editline]10th October 2012[/editline]
[QUOTE=latin_geek;37972169]I'm actually scared about what would happen if r/atheism and similar have nothing to bitch about[/QUOTE]
they'd probably start crying about vegans
or people who enjoy anime
[QUOTE=Maloof?;37971669]I take it as a belief, personally. It's something that you believe to be objectively true; in the same way that some religious people believe that the teachings of their religion are objectively true.
[URL="http://spaz.ca/aaron/school/science.html"]An interesting text to cite here[/URL][/QUOTE]
Apart from a few axioms that you essentially have to assume to be true in order to function at a useful level (causation, that we live in an observable reality, etc), science is about a about as much of an antithesis of a belief system as you can get.
Just because some retard 'believes in science' without skepticism doesn't make the methodology a belief system. Science is trusted because it's been proven time after time after time that it works, and that the methods used provide repeatable, verifiable, falsifiable results.
If you have something that shows flaws within the methodology of science, feel free to share. You'd be looking at a Nobel prize on a bad day, and completely altering the course of civilization on a decent day.
[QUOTE=critein_protein;37971992]Yes! The death of religion is nigh, and before you know it there will be world peace :D[/QUOTE]
There isn't a direct relation to religion in general and violence you dolt.
Not every religious person is (ironically) a devil and not every atheist is a saint.
[QUOTE=ROFLBURGER;37972247]There isn't a direct relation to religion in general and violence you dolt.[/QUOTE]
[URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atheism#Atheism.2C_religion.2C_and_morality"]actually, there's some correlations[/URL]
[quote]Sociologist Phil Zuckerman analyzed previous social science research on secularity and non-belief, and concluded that societal well-being is positively correlated with irreligion. His findings relating specifically to atheism include:[74][75]
Compared to religious people, "atheists and secular people" are less nationalistic, prejudiced, antisemitic, racist, dogmatic, ethnocentric, close-minded, and authoritarian.
In the US, in states with the highest percentages of atheists, [B]the murder rate is lower than average. In the most religious US states, the murder rate is higher than average.[/B]
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[url=http://www.pitzer.edu/academics/faculty/zuckerman/Zuckerman_on_Atheism.pdf]source[/url]
however, I'm not defending critein_protein's moronic statement
As a Christian, I hate it when people force religion on others. It does nothing but harm others and cause anger in all communities.
[QUOTE=Kinversulath;37972127]No problem with me. If people want to believe in a God personally or hold some sort of personal spiritual belief, it's not of my business. As long as they don't push those beliefs onto others, I have no problem.
I'm not really affiliated either way TBQH. I take no real umbrage with believing in God or not, but I wouldn't let my beliefs get in the way of somebody doing something [I]they[/I] believe is right.[/QUOTE]
in the US the whole "spiritual but not religious" and "still believing in a god" thing are frequently people who go to psychics and shit
it demonstrates no significant increase in the trust of scientific theory and method which is annoying
Oh shit. Well it seems that there is a bit of a relation.
But not every religion is a violence prone religion.
[QUOTE=Maloof?;37971669]I take it as a belief, personally. It's something that you believe to be objectively true; in the same way that some religious people believe that the teachings of their religion are objectively true.
[URL="http://spaz.ca/aaron/school/science.html"]An interesting text to cite here[/URL][/QUOTE]
Well science isn't a belief period, science is something that's proven by facts, you can't not believe in facts.
To quote Flight of the Phoenix:
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Spirituality is not religion.
Religion divides people; belief in something unites them.[/quote]
[QUOTE=BrickInHead;37972879]in the US the whole "spiritual but not religious" and "still believing in a god" thing are frequently people who go to psychics and shit
it demonstrates no significant increase in the trust of scientific theory and method which is annoying[/QUOTE]
It does, however, indicate an increase in tolerance for other religions and for those who are not religious.
I thought the title said railgun for a second :v:
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