Many worry election portends blending of religion, government
By Mark Sauer
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
November 11, 2004
signonsandiego.com
K.C. ALFRED / Union-Tribune
Norman Hall, an oceanographer at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, says there's talk among some in San Diego's atheist community about moving abroad.
Millions of Americans last week voted to ban gay marriage, claimed "moral values" as their top concern and returned born-again Christian George W. Bush to the White House for a second term.
In the election aftermath, local atheists say they're feeling more marginalized than ever.
"Among our community, a lot of people are saying it's time to think about moving to Canada," said Norman Hall, a San Diego oceanographer and avowed atheist.
Jeff Archer, president of the Atheists Coalition of San Diego, said that after Nov. 2, "Atheists are now at the bottom of the barrel in American society. At least that's how we feel we are perceived.
"The Christian side has been working very hard the past 20 years or so. They have never given up; if they lost a battle, they came back hard and tried to win the war. Many believe now that they have."
Local atheists interviewed, many of them scientists and engineers, expressed the fear that a born-again president believing he has a mandate will strongly assert religious beliefs, like pushing for the teaching of creationism along with evolution in schools.
"The administration we have now has no respect whatsoever for science, and because of that, they have no respect for the truth, and that can be fatal," said Hall, who was raised a Methodist.
"I think unless the country gets a belly-full of this over the next four years and this turns around, the future of civilization will shift to Europe or elsewhere and not be led by the U.S. administration."
Categorizing nonbelievers as atheists, agnostics, humanists, etc., gets tricky. "It's important to emphasize there are many different kinds of atheists; we are not a lock-step group," said Heather Campbell, of the San Diego Atheist Coalition.
And it's difficult to know just how many nonbelievers there are.
In the American Religious Identification Survey of 2001, adults in the "identifying with no religion" category numbered 29.4 million, or 14.1 percent of the population. That was up from 8 percent in a similar 1990 survey. A more-recent survey by political scientist John Green at the University of Akron in Ohio suggests atheists and agnostics make up 3.2 percent of the U.S. population.
It is undeniable, as Bush and John Kerry, a Roman Catholic, demonstrated in repeated professions of their faith, that a nonbelieving candidate in 2004 would have about as much of a chance of becoming president as Ralph Nader.
Pollster John Zogby found during the 2000 election year that when voters are given a hypothetical list of Jewish, black, female, Arab-American, gay or atheist vice-presidential candidates, they were least likely to support the atheist.
If atheists have a political mission, it is to reinforce the wall between government and religion, which they believe is crumbling under Bush and his constituents in the Religious Right.
For that reason, Susi Reed, of the Humanist Fellowship of San Diego, said she considers Bush's re-election "a tragedy."
"I'm scared to death about what may happen," Reed said. "I abhor any power that religion has in government. They shouldn't be there, and Bush is inviting them in."
Andy Pavelchek, of the San Diego Atheist Coalition, said: "I am worried that as things go wrong, as the wheels come off in Iraq and the economy, liberals, gays, atheists, feminists and people who believe in the rule of law will be scapegoated."
A registered Republican who voted against Bush both times, Pavelchek said he is not afraid to "wear my atheism on my sleeve" and has bumper stickers declaring his beliefs.
But several local atheists said they tend to remain "in the closet" and avoid discussions that could lead to confrontations over religion.
"I don't go out and broadcast that I'm an atheist, especially now (after this election) and especially in San Diego, where we are really a minority," said Reed. "I tell close friends and relatives.
"But the humanist fellowship is not an anti-God group. We don't preach against religion, and we don't try to convert people to atheism.
"I feel if religion makes you a better person, go for it. I just don't want it in government."
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