Quoting Russell Coker (russell@coker.com.au):
You list 5 states out of 50 (5 out of the 48 contiguous states), that's a good portion of the US.
Indeed, that's the Bible Belt. It exists. I don't live there, for quite a number of reasons. (Please note that I am not an apologist for any country, including either the country in which I was raised, which was the UK, or the country of my birth and citizenship, the USA. Particularly in international discussions, I find that Americans who bray loudly about the merits of their country are a severe pain in the ass, and take extreme pains not to be one.) When I have had occasion to visit Dallas, Texas for a number of weeks after I was graduated from college, and again a decade or so later when I stayed with friends in the suburbs north of Atlanta, Georgia, I was curious to find out whether anyone inquired even indirectly about my religion or lack thereof. Nobody ever did. That is, to be sure, only one data point (well, two), but accords with my sense of the matter, which is that inquiring into people's religion or lack thereof is regarded as rude and deranged, and is therefore Not Done. Which in turn makes one wonder, quite a bit, about the vast majority of the militant atheists who claim to have been 'persecuted'. Clue: Ideologues who claim to have been 'persecuted' very often turn out to have practically begged their opposite numbers to fight with them. Now, that is mostly just a hunch based on a lifetime of having to reassess goofball assertions from ideologues with chips on their shoulders going about figuratively voicing their variant on the Pythonesque 'Observe the violence inherent in the system! Help, help, I'm being repressed.' I do not live in the Bible Belt (nor wish to) and cannot claim any form of expertise about that place.
How many first-world countries have such a large area being "whack a doodle"?
Off the top of my head, France and Belgium do from my personal experience. Also, Quebec outside of Montreal and Quebec City is pretty vehemently Catholic. If you want to further finance my international travels, I would be delighted to collect more data.
We don't have even a single state or territory in Australia that's like that. No, it appears that you (plural 'you') do not -- though I would personally prefer to visit and inspect the several states and territories I haven't yet visited, I will be glad to accept your cheque.
2. Outside those areas, e.g., California, organised atheists characteristically piss and moan about alleged persecution and lack of acceptance that upon examination turn out to be imaginary or strictly elsewhere (i.e., the Bible Belt) or a mischaracterisation of the broader public not enjoying the company of one-note ideologues (including but not limited to crusading atheists), _but_ they nurse a persecution complex in lieu of more interesting hobbies.
http://www.care2.com/causes/whos-praying-for-their-enemies-to-get-breast- cancer.html
Of course there's also some pretty extreme stuff going on.
Wow, an uncredited and unsourced bit of text from an unknown person on the Internet, that then gets trumpeted all over freethoughtblobs.com and the rest of the persecution-complex-ridden militant atheist echo chambers on the Internet. Gosh, _that's_ never happened before! I'll put a note on my calendar, Russell. What a bunch of idiocy. Really? Next, are you going to hit me with the one about the atheist who's going to be prevented from taking office in Asheville, Buncombe County, North Carolina -- and that the lawsuit to prevent this atheist citizen taking office is going to be filed Any Day Now by a 'Black Confederate activist' named H.K. Edgerton? I like that yarn that was spread around by Ed Brayton, by Hermant 'friendlyatheist.com' Mehta, by the freethoughtblogs.com circle, and by the rest of that lot -- credulously -- for months and months without the least semblance of fact-checking. That one never got old.
This is why Fred Nile was never any remote contender for PM, unlike Sarah Palin and Michelle Backman.
Kiddo, Bachmann was never a serious contender, which is why like Rick Perry she was completely abandoned by the professional political operatives who at first were willing to take her money when they discovered that she wasn't even filing in the primary contests and had no local organisation. In other words, Perry and Bachmann were solely pretending to be candidates in order to gain publicity and donations, and literally banked on it. Palin was a brief publicity stunt that backfired on the McCain campaign very badly. If you can get ahold of the HBO movie 'Game Change', you can see the behind-the-scenes facts about that, thinly fictionalised. The usual Faux News (Fox News) talking heads attempted to assert that it was a smear job, and were immediately contradicted by McCain's closes campaign advisors, one of whom said watching the movies was a 'deja vu experience', and is basically spot-on. She's not even pretending to run this time because the facts finally got out. It was pretty scary that she had a chance of riding into the VP office on McCain's coat-tails, but she can barely get elected in Wasila, any more.
The author's closest approach to a reasonable perspective was in this paragraph:
The issue is somewhat neglected because it's not usually perceptible on the coasts and in the larger cities, but the almost complete absence of overt atheism is striking at all levels of US public life, even in cosmopolitan areas.
For 'not usually perceptible', substitute 'absent'. For 'the almost complete absence of overt atheism is striking' subtitute 'In the sane majority of the republic, religion if any is regarded as a primarily private matter that only an unhinged person of some sort would obsess over.
Except of course when the abortion wars start up.
Since 1973, lawful in all 50 states, DC, and various territories. (Previously, lawful in many but not all.) Interesting coincidence: The last time an Australian tried to troll me about abortion was just a few days ago on a different mailing list. Quoting Tony Mills:
The US obsession with abortion.
I believe you mean a small-ish but crazed political faction of whack-a-doodles who do block voting and have strong political strength in backward parts of the country but not others, and who have a few violent and indeed murderous auxiliary members. The current _legal_ status is that abortion is lawful in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and various territories, but that local authorities sometimes attempt to restrict or regulate abortion rights, particularly in the last trimester -- which regulation may or may not eventually get upheld in court if litigated, depending on various facts of the cases and reception in court, tra la. The _pragmatic_ status is that actual availability of abortion services is spotty/difficult in some backward parts of the country but not others (e.g., few clinics in those areas having ever provided services, and then a firebombing or two, and there are fewer or none). Pragmatically, a woman in one of those areas might need to take a many-hour bus ride to another state and stay a few days while being seen. For very impoverished women, that is obviously a serious obstacle.
So why are state legislatures,Republican candidates, and the nutcase right so obsessed with this issue?
Emotional wedge issue used to manipulate swing voters. 'Defence of marriage' is another one, and on and on. Do I need to describe the utility of manipulable swing voters within first-past-the-post electoral systems?
US Exceptionalism
Oh, and by the way: You didn't drag out an example of claimed -exceptionalism- at all. A local political quirk does not constitute 'exceptionalism'. Exceptionalism refers to assertions of special national moral status or historical destiny (made by various past idiots and maniacs). So, maybe giving the tired rhetoric a rest might be good. Quoting Tony Mills:
My bad, I guess I should preface all trans-national comparisons of the US with "In comparable advanced, populous, industrial economies". If you trawl the third world, unsurprisingly, you can find a nation or two worse off.
Well, aren't _you_ the optimist? Check how many of the twelve countries in South America make it lawful for a woman to have an abortion without special reasons (rape, saving the woman's life, etc.). Exactly one, Guiana, first trimestre only. Africa's about the same story, and about half of Asia might as well be Vatican City.
We have a few nut-jobs who protest outside abortion clinics in Australia.
I donate to Planned Parenthood, and particularly lavishly on one occasion when a clinic was being picketed in San Francisco. I wrote my cheque a few metres away and held it up as I walked through the pickets.
The US Republican party seems to be persuing their anti-women agenda all over the US.
Indeed. And I'm looking forward to the landslide defeat.
The paragraph after the "overt atheism" paragraph mentioned Barack Obama speaking at a prayer meeting.
Yes, he speaks anywhere people gather who might vote for him. As an ideologue, you're bothered by that, I gather.
The same paragraph also says that there's only been one "avowed atheist" in the history of congress, and he was in the closet about it for 34 years!
Poor Pete Stark. I actually know the guy. A bunch of loon atheists sent him a questionnaire that he was unwise enough to fill out forthrightly, and now they won't leave him alone. No wonder congressmen who are non-religious just let people assume they're some sort of inoffensive Protestant. I would, too.
It seemed like a good idea at the time. I'll use lower case if it makes you happy.
No, feel free to indulge typical ideologue practices.