Daylight Atheism » Demographics

Goodbye Religion? How Godlessness Is Increasing With Each New Generation

Ebonmuse — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 11:05:28 +0000

This essay was originally published on AlterNet.

Something strange is happening to American teenagers. If you believe popular wisdom, young people are apathetic, cynical and jaded; or, they're supposed to be conformists whose overriding desire is to fit in and be popular. But if you've been paying close attention over the past decade, you might have ... [visit site to read more]

New on AlterNet: The Rise of Young Atheists

Ebonmuse — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 10:48:26 +0000

My latest article has been posted on AlterNet, Goodbye Religion? How Godlessness Is Increasing With Each New Generation. It surveys the demographic transformation that's been taking place in American society, with rates of godlessness steadily increasing in each generation since World War II, highlights the work of some outstanding young activists who are part of this ... [visit site to read more]

There Are 10 Times as Many Atheists as Mormons: When Will Non-Believers Become a Political Force?

Ebonmuse — Fri, 01 Jul 2011 10:39:30 +0000

This essay was originally published on AlterNet.

The propagandists of the religious right shout it aloud as their battle cry: "America is a Christian nation!" And in the trivial sense that ours is a nation populated mostly by Christians, this is true. But in the sense that they mean it, that Christianity was intended to occupy a ... [visit site to read more]

New on Alternet: Atheists as a Political Force

Ebonmuse — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 17:09:23 +0000

Today I'm very happy to announce that I've become a contributor to AlterNet, the award-winning online progressive news and opinion magazine. My first essay is titled "There Are 10 Times As Many Atheists as Mormons: When Will Non-Believers Become a Political Force?" Read an excerpt below, and then click through to see the rest:

visit site to read more]

Marriage Equality on the March

Ebonmuse — Tue, 03 May 2011 11:26:16 +0000

At the end of last month, the Delaware legislature voted to approve a civil union bill. If Democratic Governor Jack Markell signs the bill, as he's said he will, Delaware will become the newest state to grant same-sex partnerships all the same legal rights as heterosexual couples - joining, by my reckoning, ten others: Vermont, Connecticut, New Jersey, Illinois, Oregon, Washington, New Hampshire, ... [visit site to read more]

The Graying of the Priesthood

Ebonmuse — Wed, 16 Mar 2011 10:55:04 +0000

I've written several times before about the decline of the Catholic church in the West. But today, I want to shine a spotlight on one corner of the world to study a lesser-known but extremely important symptom of that decline. This was ... [visit site to read more]

Atheism Is Breaking Out All Over

Ebonmuse — Wed, 02 Mar 2011 11:45:14 +0000

Right around the time I received James A. Haught's editorial "Fading Faith", I was working on a similar post of my own. It was motivated by the brutal murder of Salman Taseer and the other signs that religious eliminationism is growing throughout the world, which drove me to wonder if there's any reason left to hope. Although visit site to read more]

Exploring the Gender Disparity on Daylight Atheism

Ebonmuse — Sat, 19 Feb 2011 23:06:11 +0000

As part of my fifth anniversary post, I included a survey where I asked readers to list their gender and their age, mainly just to satisfy my own curiosity. The results of the age poll, to my pleased surprise, formed a very neat bell curve (I have more computer-savvy older readers than I had guessed!).

This wasn't the case with the gender survey, however. I was expecting there to be a gender disparity, ... [visit site to read more]

Daylight Atheism: Anniversary #5

Ebonmuse — Thu, 10 Feb 2011 19:04:28 +0000

As of today, I've officially been doing this blogging thing for five years. Hard to believe, isn't it?

An anniversary seems like a good time to reflect on statistics, so here are some numbers. Since February 2006, Daylight Atheism has had 1,265 posts, 42,573 comments, and 7.8 million total views, representing about 1.2 million unique visitors. So far this year, I'm averaging over 11,000 total hits and over ... [visit site to read more]

Fading Faith: The Rise of the Secular Age

Ebonmuse — Fri, 04 Feb 2011 11:20:57 +0000

By James A. Haught

[Editor's Note: I'm proud to feature the writing of James Haught on Daylight Atheism. Mr. Haught has been an editor and columnist for the Charleston Gazette for over fifty years, as well as an eloquent and prolific freethinker and author of books like Holy Horrors. I've been a fan of his ever since I discovered him, through the Freedom from Religion Foundation, soon after becoming an atheist myself. You can read more of his work at his own website, visit site to read more]

Breaking the Religion-Morality Link

Ebonmuse — Mon, 27 Dec 2010 13:41:19 +0000

One of the first posts on Daylight Atheism, "A Mile Wide and an Inch Deep", was about the pathetic levels of Biblical knowledge in a nation that's theoretically 85% Christian. Well, thanks to a widely reported new survey, we can add another fact to that picture: not only do Americans not know much about the Bible, they don't go to church very often ... [visit site to read more]

Atheists Haven't Forgotten Poland

Ebonmuse — Mon, 20 Dec 2010 12:00:12 +0000

I've mentioned in the past that as the Catholic church dwindles and ages, it's increasingly having trouble finding enough people who want to join the priesthood, and it's relying heavily on the few Catholic-majority countries remaining, such as Poland, that are net exporters of priests. At the time, I mused:

Even former Catholic strongholds such as Italy and Spain, the article points out, have only a ... [visit site to read more]