Talk:Secular movement

What is the purpose of this article?
There are already articles on subjects such as Secularity or Irreligion or Separation of church and state or Secularism or Secular humanism or Atheism or agnosticism or Nontheism - it is not at all clear what this article is trying to add on top of what these articles already provide. It seems to me that this one should be merged into the appropriate parts of those articles, if there is anything worth keeping here.--Gronk Oz (talk) 13:52, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

None of those articles deal with the specific phenomenon of the secular demographic exerting itself socially, politically and legally as a movement in the United States in the post-9/11 era. Atheism, secular humanism, nontheism, etc. are all general views on religion and/or philosophy. As for separation of church and state, that is a concept (like "free speech"") that is timeless and would not be defined as a specific historical movement. Even Christians and other religious people often support church-state separation. As such, the unsigned comment added by Wikihumanist (talk • contribs) 14:09, 21 February 2015 (UTC)


 * The article needs to identify clearly what it is about. The opening sentence says that it is about a trend, i.e. the increasing number of people.  This is reinforced by the rest of the paragraph, which talks about "the demographic" and refers to the number of people who self-identify as being non-religious.  So to then shift the focus entirely and start talking about some kind of equal-rights organization instead is at best confusing, and at worst misleading. The way to avoid this problem is to choose your subject, define it clearly and unambiguously in the lead, and then stick to it through the article. It would also help to avoid weasel words like "movement" and "demographic" used outside the literal meaning; they only give rise to misunderstanding; use direct English instead.--Gronk Oz (talk) 16:26, 21 February 2015 (UTC)


 * If the purpose of this article is to describe a demographic shift in religious attitudes in the United States towards secularisation/secularism, then that is already being covered by the article Irreligion in the United States. I agree with Gronk Oz that this article should have a clearly distinct purpose from simply describing the demographics, otherwise I advise a merger. Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 13:29, 2 March 2015 (UTC)


 * Support merge propasal - there is some good material here which should be merged into the existing article.--Gronk Oz (talk) 14:07, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

Gronk, the article does identify what it is about, and in fact it's about something quite specific and historically relevant - a movement of America's seculars to become more visibly engaged in the culture wars. This distinguishes it from more vague, general concepts like "irreligion" or "demographics of atheism," which don't refer to any specific time or place. To discuss all the secular activism of the last decade or so within an article that is timeless (such as "irreligion") would cause the historical significance to get lost. The modern American secular movement is a social/political/legal movement with historical relevance to a specific place and time (America, 21st century), and is documented by various events as described in the article (and which could be expanded upon). Wikihumanist (talk) 01:05, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
 * , I think your concerns will be addressed if you read the details of the proposal. The proposal is to merge this into Irreligion in the United States - not, as you are concerned, "more vague, general concepts...which don't refer to any specific time or place". It is a matter of consolidating similar articles together, not splitting the information unnecessarily. However, you and I have had our say so let's hear what others feel is the best approach, and why... --Gronk Oz (talk) 04:17, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

OK, I'm convinced. Merger makes sense. Wikihumanist (talk) 11:36, 3 March 2015 (UTC) SUPPORT MERGE then rewrite the article into the titlesake "secular movement around the world". — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mahfuzur rahman shourov (talk • contribs) 16:01, 28 September 2015 (UTC)
 * Oppose the merger. Secularism and irreligion are two separate issues. In the United Stares there is a tendency for the 'conservatives'/'religious' to try to frame secularism as being against religion rather than simply keeping religion out of the governmental sphere. Many of these people are Dominionists. Any merge proposal should be the subject of a formal RfC to draw in more editors to comment since this looks to be a pretty low traffic page. I came here because one editor here posted at ANI wanting to delete this page after the merge (we do not do that) based on only three editors commenting here. J bh  Talk  16:25, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

I think this is a very interesting topic and one that might work as a good WikiPage... however, I think one way to improve the neutrality of the article is to slow down the tirade against progressivism/liberalism and try to just point to the raw facts and let others see the sharp increase in such ideas in American History, or even World History for that matter... which is the bigger picture anyway. So, in that case, go ahead and merge it like you said, and turn this article into a world secular movement... I'd help you if I had the time... I'll keep an eye on this pages development and help when I can... Wyatt Hughes (talk) 03:06, 23 April 2016 (UTC)

Why is the "secular movement" limited to America?
Atheists and non-theists are all over the world; why does this article claim they limited to only America?--Gronk Oz (talk) 13:52, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

The secular movement in America is a social and political phenomenon unto itself. Struggles for racial equality and LGBT equality can be found worldwide as well, but we still see references to the "civil rights movement" and the "LGBT movement" used as referring to specific American phenomena. Of course, if someone wanted to do an article on, say, a secular movement in England or somewhere else, they could do so, but this article deals with the American secular movement in the post 9/11 era. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wikihumanist (talk • contribs) 14:14, 21 February 2015 (UTC)


 * If you want to write an article about just the social movement in America since a certain date, then call it that - change the title to something like "Secular movement in America in the 21st century". Otherwise the name is misleading; it purports to represent the entire phenomenon, but in fact your intent is to cover only a small part of it. (I know this will come as a shock, but there is a lot more to the world than America, and al lot more to history, including the history of secularism, than the 21st century). I really don't follow your references to racial equality - most of the articles do indeed cover the world-wide phenomenon, although there is a separate article on Racial inequality in the United States; it simply is not the case in Wikipedia that term is "used as referring to specific American phenomena" as you claim. LGBT is similar; the articles are global in scope unless the title specifies otherwise.--Gronk Oz (talk) 16:35, 21 February 2015 (UTC)


 * I agree with Gronk Oz. If the article is only about the United States post-9/11, it has to be renamed. If so, it should be distinguished from New Atheism, which is an atheist movement that originated as a direct response to the events of 9/11 (though it is broader than the United States alone, and certainly includes Europe, and other continents (perhaps to a lesser extent) as well). Also, not all secularists have to agree on civil rights/racial equality and LGBT issues, nor are the LGBT and civil rights/racial equality movements entirely "secular"; you will find many Christian denominations supporting same-sex marriage, for example, who would reject the label 'secular' outright. Let's not confuse things here. Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 13:39, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

The article does distinguish the secular movement from New Atheism (see the last section). In fact, that is a very important point that needs to be made -- not all secular activism should be seen as "New Atheism." And nobody is suggesting anywhere that only seculars support LGBT rights -- you're right, let's not confuse things here!! The "opponents" of this article seem to reject the very idea that there is a "secular movement" in the US in the post-9/11 era, when in fact the article shows that there is -- look at the stuff listed. In fact, from a social-political-legal standpoint, there has been an explosion of secular activism, with seculars "coming out" and asserting themselves like never before in US history. Someone editing the article tried to argue that several secular groups have been around much longer than just the last decade or so, but that writer misses an important point -- those groups did almost nothing from an activism standpoint until recently. Until the last decade or so, those groups were for the most part more like "clubs" for like-minded people. They did no secular ad campaigns, and there were no atheist lobbying groups, no congressmen "coming out" as atheist, no atheist groups constantly engaging with the religious right. In fact, the article can be expanded upon, as right now it is just a skeleton of what it could be - yet even now it reflects the fact that there is indeed a movement. Wikihumanist (talk) 00:39, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

Unsupported and possibly offensive claims
There are some unsupported, possibly offensive claims here that need to be addressed.
 * 1) A rise in the number of people who self-classify as not being affiliated with a religion does not mean they are affiliated with a different (secular) movement.
 * 2) Claiming that most non-religious people hold certain political affiliations is not justified by anything I have seen in these references.
 * 3) Claiming that most non-religious people hold certain views on social issues would need some very solid evidence to back it up, which I don't see  here.--Gronk Oz (talk) 14:07, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

A couple of cites have been inserted to show atheist political leanings. As for the first point, the article doesn't claim that at all who are religiously unaffiliated are "affiliated" with with the secular movement. The fact that seculars exist in growing numbers is evidence of a demographic trend. The increased visible activity of seculars in society (including the activity mentioned of secular groups), is evidence of the movement (even though of course not all nonreligious Americans are taking part activity in the movement -- just as not all gays take part in the LGBT movement). — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wikihumanist (talk • contribs) 14:25, 21 February 2015 (UTC)


 * Again, the article conflates the two different concepts hopelessly. In just the second sentence, it does this explicitly by saying "The secular movement can be seen in the increase in the number of Americans who identify as religiously unaffiliated..." No, it cannot - those are two different concepts and one is not evidence of the other. It is exactly that confusion that gives rise to the problem statements above.  I generally hate to cite Wikipedia policy, but it might help you to understand the issue if you look at WP:SYNTHESIS.--Gronk Oz (talk) 16:48, 21 February 2015 (UTC)


 * Gronk is right. I've seen the same claims made in the UK by the humanist (=atheist) lobby that anyone not affiliated to a religion is automatically one of their ilk. No, many people who are not religious here believe in "God", a "god" or "spirituality" of some sort, they're just not card-carrying members of a religious or spiritual group. Or they're just apathetic. However, just as atheists have appropriated the concept "humanist" (which was originally championed by Christians in late medieval Europe) they have also interpreted the word "secular" - which means (according to the Oxford Dictionary of English) "not connected with religious matters" or "not under religious authority" - to mean "atheistic". Yet most secular countries today would claim to be multi-faith societies not atheist ones.
 * Secularization on a national scale goes back at least to the French Revolution and subsequent Napoleonic era, but was also a major feature of Communism, for example, in the Soviet Union and China after the First World War and East Germany after the Second. So this article is a very narrow, modern US perspective. IMHO the article should be merged with secularization, which itself needs more work on the historical aspects. -- Bermicourt (talk) 11:38, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

The point that an increase in the number of "unaffiliated" does not in itself make a "movement" is valid, and that can be addressed, but the essential point of the article—that there has been a virtual explosion of secular activism since the turn of the century, an explosion that in historical terms can legitimately be described as a "movement"—remains valid. Tucking this article, which gives numerous examples of the movement, under a general category such as "irreligion" or "secularization" would be a disservice. Now, as for the wording that Gronk complains about, I think it could be tweaked to clarify that the reference to the increased numbers of unaffiliated is something that correlates with the secular movement (but is not necessarily evidence itself of the movement). Wikihumanist (talk) 18:49, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

Discussion for improvement (toward a world secular movement as has been decided above)
Let's move ahead and work on some suggestions for this project. My first suggestion would be to re-title it to say something like Worldwide secular movement, or something like that. Perhaps we can find a source which talks specifically about such a movement. However, we need to do something about this article, so that we don't mislead anyone to an "in-process" page while we fix it. Wyatt Hughes (talk) 03:14, 23 April 2016 (UTC)


 * Why don't we change the title of the article to "Secular Movement in the United States" instead of worldwide and leave the article american based? It's much easier to do that, then to change EVERYTHING in the article to fit a worldwide perspective. Make a different article about secularism in other parts of the world and leave this one American. What's wrong with an article about a movement in America being only American? Daxri 06:04, 25 January 2018 (UTC)