Cranford, NJ—Today, American Atheists launched the U.S. Secular Survey in cooperation with numerous other national and local secular organizations, including Atheist Alliance of America, Camp Quest, Center for Inquiry, Foundation Beyond Belief, The Freethought Society, Hispanic American Freethinkers, Recovering from Religion, Secular Coalition for America, Secular Student Alliance, and Society for Humanistic Judaism.
“Today, there are more than 75 million non-religious Americans, making us more numerous than evangelicals, yet we sorely lack data about who we are as a community,” said Alison Gill, American Atheists’ Vice President for Legal and Policy, who is leading the U.S. Secular Survey project alongside a team of researchers from Strength in Numbers Consulting Group.
“Federal surveys capture zero demographic information about religion, and even large polling organizations don’t offer enough data about the experiences of atheists, agnostics, and non-religious Americans. The U.S. Secular Survey, on the other hand, will enable a deeper analysis of the lived experiences of non-religious people, enabling us to understand the challenges atheists face in their daily lives, to advocate for atheist civil rights, to establish programs to meet community needs, and to seek grant funding to benefit our population,” she explained.
Following completion of the survey, American Atheists will provide data and an analysis report to partner organizations in order to benefit the entire secular community.
“Atheists are far too often overlooked, but the U.S. Secular Survey will give atheists a platform to tell our stories, and by doing so, make it easier for others to open up about their beliefs,” said Nick Fish, American Atheists’ President. “Atheists and other non-religious Americans will have the opportunity to make their voices heard and help determine the future of the secular movement by adding their voices to the conversation.”
“With a goal of surveying as many as 10,000 non-religious Americans, the U.S. Secular Survey will be the largest survey of our community ever conducted,” added Gill.The U.S. Secular Survey is now open and will run through November 22. You can take the survey at secularsurvey.org.
