For decades, poll after poll has said somewhere from 40-43 percent of Americans go to church on the average Sunday. It's actually HALF that, about 20 percent.
Pollsters have long known that on some things, most notably on racial preference issues, people will, well, they'll lie to an anonymous pollster on an anonymity-guaranteeing poll, producing the answer they think they "should" give to society.
So, rather than ask, "did you go to church in the last week," pollsters instead did a more extensive time-use set of questions, starting with pollees' Saturday nights.
And, with that, a lot of people didn't remember a Sunday activity called church.
That said, the Slate author is right that the ultimate question is, WHY is religiosity so tied to American identity, so much that many people lie about it?
I'll start it with Jan. 20, 1981, and Ronald Wilson Reagan and the Religious Right.
If any man lied about his religiosity, it's him. And, the Religious Right abetted this for ultimately nefarious ends, of pushing the idea of America as a Christian nation.
1 comment:
I'm pseudo-religious and I don't give a fuck about anyone's religion. Not my boss or coworker or politician. The country was founded on the right to practice or better yet to not practice whatever the hell you want. And the "moral majority" section of conservatives is littered with liars and philanderers anyways. I don't care if you a fucking a fat intern, if the economy is going well and we aren't warring with anyone else, its all fucking good.
Post a Comment