Why atheism is a rich man’s world - and how we can change it.
Aug 14th, 2008 | By Chris Basinet | Category: FeatureHere’s the thing: females aren’t a minority. Constant reminders consisting of everything from TV ads to misused pronouns don’t let us forget the struggle with basic civil and social rights that women have battled, past and present alike. Caught up in the urgent ideals of feminism and modern liberal values, it’s sometimes easy (even for women) to forget that females are half of the world’s population, especially when it comes to things like careers in math and science. A survey conducted by the Center for Inquiry shows that over 80% of atheists are male. What’s more, the same survey suggested that over 40% had at least a six-figure income.
It’s hardly a secret that there just tend to be more men in science. The times are a-changin’, but even so, let’s face it. The face of atheism is now, more than ever, a gray-haired sausage fest in a thousand dollar tux. This is one of the more unfortunate side effects of “new atheism” brought up by the (otherwise exceptional) lead of Dawkins, Hitchens and Harris: the “big three” of non-belief nowadays. (Ironically, I’m pretty sure Dawkins would have been Woodrow Wilson.) Personally, I’m not a complainer. Somebody needed to resurrect (excuse the poor choice of words) atheism, and that’s just what happens when the only people bold enough to do it happen mostly to be our male, bordering-on-senior-citizen counterparts. We’ll just have to problem solve, and put our noggins to use, as atheists and members of society.
Well, by now, we pretty much know that an atheist woman is kind of like your token gay uncle.
So now what?
Mass cultural change was never easy, especially since the problem lies beyond atheism itself. Obviously, much of it has to do with how women fit in with science. While valid, that point has been brought up enough times that if I had a dollar every time I heard it, by now I would have been able to afford a tux, a sex reassignment surgery, and a serious box of hair bleach instead of spending my time actually working on the issue.
As it is, no one gives out grants for counting the repetition of an argument.
Maybe instead of trying to draw in more women first, we should focus on encouraging the atheist females we already have. As Islam shows us, it’s better to have people following big rather than a big following. (It also shows us that having both isn’t half bad, either.) What I’m saying is that if you’re female… what are you doing reading my thoughts about feminism? Go start your own blog, and put yourself out there.
Next to religion, it’s no surprise that we’ve been losing the women. After all, they have things like the Virgin Mary, nuns, and Rebecca St. James. What can I say, they’ve one-up’d us in that respect.
We have no official organization, no official leaders, no Avril Lavigne wannabes to proselytize for us… in fact, we’re only left with one single thing which we all happen not to believe. It’s only to be expected that its public image would go uncontrolled. So who should control it?
Well, you already do. One of the nice things about atheism is that it’s sort of an anarchy in itself, but it’s also a democracy by default, because only the atheist public can really decide their own image. For example, with The God Delusion, Dawkins certainly decided what his was, and everyone else just kind of picked it up and followed his lead.
Which brings me to my point: it’s important over time that atheism gains some more female poster-children. Women otherwise attracted to religion should be shown that atheism is not a patriarchy (like religion is).
And getting those reps is not the onus of some pie-in-the-sky organization that controls atheism behind the scenes. We don’t have an atheist Vatican. It’s up to you to decide the image you put out of your own brand of atheism. We just have to remember to include women in the same outreach.
Cheers
Last 5 posts by Chris Basinet
- My top 5 emerging blogs of 2008 - November 2nd, 2008
- Islamic death sentence for blasphemy thrown out - October 21st, 2008
- The Pope’s almost-assassination - October 19th, 2008
- Christopher Hitchens on Fox - October 19th, 2008
- On Purpose - October 11th, 2008
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I’m such a big fan or your writing Chris.
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Chris Basinet Reply:
August 14th, 2008 at 8:34 pm
Rodrigo,
Likewise, it just so happens I’m a big fan of your comments.
=]
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I think the purpose hiding behind the veil of this post is that Chris loves pepper-gray-haired men…and sausages…lots and lots of sausages. And consequently, men eating sausages. Lots and lots of men eating lots and lots of sausages. But in all seriousness, Great post. Kudos.
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Chris Basinet Reply:
August 14th, 2008 at 8:54 pm
I can’t believe you caught me. I guess the jig is up… I’m really only a vegetarian until a man with gray hair gets involved.
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I’m a disc jockey in Southwest Missouri on a rock station that runs the great Adam Corolla show in the morning. You’d think with him being an atheist himself I would be able to tout my atheism on my show as well. Not so. The powers that be would flip out if I brought it up. Ahhh, life in the Bible Belt.
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I think Hirsi Ali certainly counts as a female icon.
And heck, maybe Avril Lavigne is an atheist too?
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Well, as far as the North Texas area goes, I’m one of three women who help run the non-religious group on the UNT campus. I understand this need for women to be just as vocal as men, and it is a hard time trying to get regular women attendance to the group. I feel it is high time for a woman atheist to pop out of the shadows and it doesn’t have to be from an area of science: as long as she’s intelligent, well-spoken and can hold her ground against those who are of (to put it politely) opposing viewpoints.
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If people desire their chains, nothing can free them. You have to make people want freedom more than they want their chains.
If I knew how to do that, I would do it.
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Susan Jacoby?
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[...] This is a response to Chris’ post: Why atheism is a rich man’s world - and how we can change it [...]
I’m going to disagree with your premise, and not for the same reasons as Katie in the subsequent post on why it doesn’t matter. It seems that you are only referring to the big-named published authors when you say that atheism is a rich white man’s world. I can only say that they are the big hitters, but you are making a large generalization based on a small group.
When it comes to “boots on the ground” atheists are represented across gender lines very well. At least in the Minnesota Atheists, we have a large number of women active members (the people that restrict their activities to merely attending meetings is much more largely male.) Our board and leadership is represented by a majority of women.
I don’t think it is fair to characterize us based on the number of bestselling authors represented.
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Tyler Handley Reply:
August 24th, 2008 at 3:07 pm
Mike, from my observations I would disagree that females are well represented in the movement. My student group may be 50% female, but only about 5% of the females are active, while about 40% of the males are. At the CFI student leadership conference this summer, the ratio was 8 males to every 2 females (I actually calculated this). Now, clearly we have different subjective observations. We need to find some sort of study on this.
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Katie Kish Reply:
August 24th, 2008 at 4:16 pm
why wouldn’t you say do the lowest common denominator thing and say 4 to 1? … just curious.
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Tyler Handley Reply:
August 24th, 2008 at 4:26 pm
I don’t know??
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Spike Reply:
September 8th, 2008 at 7:17 am
Because 8:2 is more readily translated to 80:20
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Okay, Tyler, it seems as those we are working from anecdotal data. But the actual data being beside the point, if there is a perception in your atheist circles that women aren’t joining is reason enough to address the issue. So, I know that there are many women and transgenders who are atheists, perhaps they can tell you why they are not feeling welcome; or perhaps they just don’t perceive that active membership is important to them.
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Tyler Handley Reply:
August 24th, 2008 at 6:20 pm
I wonder if it’s more a case of women not feeling welcome or that active membership isn’t as important. I’ve done much Facebook searching to recruit for my campus club and found that most people who label themselves “atheist” are male, and most who label themselves “agnostic” are female. Though, I’m wary to make any broad generalizations from this observation.
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I suppose I have been what could be called an “atheist” for many years, although I don’t go around advertising it. One of the many things I find repellent about religion is its proselytizing aspect, so why would I want to do that in the name of atheism? Anyone who is moderately intelligent and interested in the truth about religion will eventually arrive at the conclusion that it is nonsense. Trying to force people to see what they’re not ready to see is pointless.
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I’m an atheist and yeah, we’re not natural proselytizers, but I think some of us (not me really) feel we have to be for the sake of balance against the assault of religious proselytizers, I personally feel under attack when I see them in my town centre, and hate the thought that they might influence someone. I live in the UK, by the way, where atheism is much more socially acceptable than in the US, it would be interesting to know if the same gender imbalance exists here.
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I would like to say thanks to all the Edger crowd for this site. I was made aware of you-all by a post on Ed Brayton’s “Dispatches From the Culture Wars” at Sciencblogs.com.
New Atheism is old, white and male? Maybe, if you ignore Lori Lipman Brown, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Ellen Johnson? But, looking at the lists of atheists on wikipedia, one does see a preponderance of men, generally old, and whitish.
I think Katie does a great job explaining why this is so, and whether or not it is a problem that needs dealing with.
I do not think of it as a problem, not even an image problem. What I think is that it is the prefect opportunity to really look into your prejudices and find out why you think the way you do.
Try this: Look at your feelings about the idea that the majority of atheists that one can see are older, whitish rich males. Peel the layers of the onion and apply the reasoning that freethinkers are purported to put ahead of emotionalism. What meaning are you applying to the statistics that is not really there? What consequences do you foresee that really will not come to pass? What bromides are you substituting for thought? Knowing that in 100 years, nearly every person who reads this blog today will be dead, and mostly forgotten, where does this issue really fall on the list of things you -should- be doing to make your time here as meaningful as possible?
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Great piece, but what about the other part… a “rich” man’s world?
Atheism being a world of the “rich”- by which I mean the luxury of a leisure class- is a harder problem to tackle. How do we get those from underprivileged backgrounds to take a stand again irrationality? The perception of a “cultural elite” has always been a difficult stigma for us. As much as I often a promote a capitalistic, top-down approach to activism this needs to be met by a grassroots element, but (granted certain notable exceptions) we rarely see outspoken atheists coming out of the underprivileged sectors of society.
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[...] people should get involved in the discussion. A few good examples, in my opinion, can be found in this pro and this contra opinion about recruiting women into skeptical organizations, as well as this post [...]