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Love thy Neighbour… or not: Christians, but not Atheists, Show High In-Group Favoritism

C

Clara Tea

Well-Known Member
Justanatheist said:
Abstract
Atheists are among the most disliked groups in America, which has been explained in a variety of ways, one of which is that atheists are hostile towards religion and that anti-atheist prejudice is therefore reactive. We tested this hypothesis by using the 2018 American General Social Survey by investigating attitudes towards atheists, Christians, Buddhists, Hindus, Jews, and Muslims. We initially used a general sample of Americans, but then identified and isolated individuals who were atheists, theists, nonreligious atheists, religious theists, and/or theistic Christians. Logically, if atheists were inordinately hostile towards religion, we would expect to see a greater degree of in-group favouritism in the atheist group and a greater degree of out-group dislike. Results indicated several notable findings: 1). Atheists were significantly more disliked than any other religious group. 2). Atheists rated Christians, Buddhists, Jews, and Hindus as favourably as they rated their own atheist in-group, but rated Muslims less positively (although this effect was small). 3). Christian theists showed pronounced in-group favouritism and a strong dislike towards atheists. No evidence could be found to support the contention that atheists are hostile towards religious groups in general, and towards Christians specifically, although this may have been a Type II error. If atheist groups do dislike religious groups, then this hypothetical dislike would be significantly smaller in magnitude than the dislike directed toward atheists by Christians.
Secularism and Nonreligion

This is an interesting report it actually confirms what I thought was my possibly biased perception that many Christians see atheist as the bogeyman.

Of course this is only for the US it would be interesting to see if results were different in other countries, especially less monotheist based.ones

So what is it that some Christians find so upsetting about atheists
Edit, on further reading and discussion, this is not a fair representation of the report.

Christians on average appear less tolerant of atheists than atheists are of Christians, why is this?
Click to expand...

The Religious Right took over politics, polluted, ran us into bankruptcy and debt, made wars (thou shalt not kill), then are miffed that some complain.
 
J

Justanatheist

Well-Known Member
Clara Tea said:
The Religious Right took over politics, polluted, ran us into bankruptcy and debt, made wars (thou shalt not kill), then are miffed that some complain.
Click to expand...
I have seen a shift to the right in politics in the UK but as yet we have not been infested by religious right.
 
1

1213

Well-Known Member
Justanatheist said:
...Atheists rated Christians, Buddhists, Jews, and Hindus as favourably as they rated their own atheist in-group, ...
Christians on average appear less tolerant of atheists than atheists are of Christians, why is this?
Click to expand...

So, do I understand correctly, they basically asked Atheists that do they like other groups as much as them? If so, how do we know are they speaking truth? I think that is not very good test, because person can answer to that as he thinks is the good answer and then act in real life differently. Better would be to look how people threat others in real life.

Maybe the difference in perception is that at least from my point of view, atheists often attack against Christians and many times with dishonest arguments, while by what I know, it is not as common for Christians to attack against atheists?
 
J

Justanatheist

Well-Known Member
1213 said:
Maybe the difference in perception is that at least from my point of view, atheists often attack against Christians and many times with dishonest arguments, while by what I know, it is not as common for Christians to attack against atheists?
Click to expand...

Which is exactly the perception that this study casts in doubt.
 
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