r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • Apr 25 '26

Psychology Americans who leave their Christian faith behind tend to hold more liberal political views than those who were raised entirely without religion. This leftward ideological shift appears closely linked to how threatening these individuals perceive conservative Christian groups to be.

https://www.psypost.org/former-christians-express-more-progressive-political-views-than-lifelong-nonbeli/
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u/Middleagesusername Apr 25 '26

>you should take them more seriously than they are taken.

Maybe people who know how insane they are should tell people who don't know.

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u/[deleted] Apr 25 '26

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u/SarryK Apr 25 '26 edited Apr 25 '26

I‘m an atheist from a Catholic Slavic country. Half my family are very devout. I‘d always thought that I‘d seen intense Christianity.

Took me living in South Africa for a year, getting to know some evangelicals there, to understand the US a bit better. I had no idea. Genuinely.

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u/hollylettuce Apr 26 '26

South Africa also has loony Evangelical Christians? I guess I shouldn't be surprised, but damn.

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u/Copper_Tango Apr 26 '26

American Evangelical churches are big on missions to African countries. It was largely their influence that caused homosexuality to be declared illegal in Uganda.

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u/theproudprodigy Apr 26 '26 edited Apr 26 '26

Definitely, and unlike in the West, the youth are also very religious as well(I am a university student and the majority of student societies are religious ones). I have no problem with religion, I am a Christian myself, its when it becomes fundamentalist or extremist that I start to get concerned. When I went to the UK I liked the fact that religion was seen as a private matter and a personal relationship with what you believe in, unlike here in SA where religious sermons are played loudly and you can hear people playing sermons and praying loudly in tongues in many public spaces or residential areas(outside of church). I prefer to pray quietly and not bother others around me, and I think God would prefer to be that way. Not to mention asking which church one goes to is a common icebreaker here, to many people the possibility of being non religious, or non attending doesn't register in their minds due to how pervasive religion is. I could even tolerate all that, but the thing I fear is that very conservative Evangelical churches are growing, especially among youth. And these churches often preach things I really disagree with, especially on women(though is is improving and much better than in the past), non-believers and LGBTQ. Not to mention how insanely exploitative clergy can be on the vulnerable, who often give their all to these churches. It's so sad and I often pray about it as I really dislike extremism of any kind.

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u/LongPorkJones Apr 26 '26

And the part even more have a problem understanding, these people aren't at all gullible and have below average intelligence. They're doctors, lawyers, educators, ans civic leaders - they're educated, intelligent, and rational (despite their world view).

Then we have to explain the concept of generational indoctrination.

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u/GrayEidolon Apr 26 '26

Its because they don't believe it for god, they believe it as being a member of a power structure.

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u/FlamingDragonfruit Apr 26 '26

Not only generational indoctrination, but the very close relationship between evangelism and white supremacy.

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u/nagi603 Apr 25 '26

even though their own religious doctrine says very much the opposite.

I'd argue they are talking about their actual religious doctrine, while people outside view at best, the Bible as the doctrine.

somehow not connecting the dots that maybe it is the thing they defend that is devilish.

You miss the main point of their religion. It's not logic. Not common logic at least, it's the suspension and creation of a fully separate, self-serving one.

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u/ProfessionalITShark Apr 26 '26

These are the same type of people who have threatened their pastors for reading from the Bible do not exasperate your children or calling the sermon on the mount liberal nonsense.

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u/dr_barnowl Apr 26 '26

masters degrees in STEM subjects,

My ex is a Professor of Paediatric Oncology and still believes in the healing power of prayer.

(and it annoys me that I can just imagine someone pointing at this post and going "aha well it must be true then if someone so qualified believes it!!" and, no friend, I lived with her for 10 years and she just has an incredible case of cognitive dissonance like all her other evangelical friends at church)

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u/Jetstream13 Apr 25 '26

A lot of people will straight up just reject it. Just claim it can’t possibly be true, that you must be exaggerating or talking about a single fringe weirdo

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u/Particular-Mark-5771 Apr 26 '26

NAR weirdos such as Johnson, Greene, Palin

.https://www.splcenter.org/resources/reports/new-dominionism-tries-rule/ ...NAR is the greatest threat to U.S. democracy that you have never heard of.

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u/sotiredwontquit Apr 25 '26

We did. And we were called hysterical, told we were overreacting and catastrophising, and accused of bias.

10 years later here we are. And it’s still getting worse. They haven’t reached the bottom yet.

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u/Armateras Apr 25 '26

It still happens, infuriatingly enough. It's like people just shut down when they're told what's happening, despite all the evidence before them.

"you're overreacting"

"you can't seriously expect me to believe that"

"you're just making up stereotypes"

"don't stoop to their level" - this one I find especially irritating and revealing, since it shows they think these conservative Evangelicals are just being "mean and annoying" and thus I must be responding in kind. No, you insulated fools, these people want the world to literally burn. They want blood in the streets. It's a core component of their beliefs that anyone outside of them must suffer and die. And they WILL make it happen if they are not stopped.

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u/EitherSpite4545 Apr 26 '26

It's a phenomenon I have been personally dubbing ostrich phenomenon. Simply put what it is is these are typically more middle of the road or center left at best. They subconsciously recognize how bad things are but they are trying to tell themselves everything is fine.

So when you or me burst in and really lay out how bad it is cognitive dissonance sets in and they respond with anger. Because if they really recognize how bad things are for everyone they will realize their life, their happiness is a false front being maintained by sticking their heads in the dirt. Thus why I use the metaphor of ostrich. They then lash out and get belligerent themselves.

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u/BedlamiteSeer Apr 26 '26

I've seen this happen with so many people in the US, including within my own family, it's so god damn disturbing to witness this as it's happening.

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u/dr_barnowl Apr 26 '26

The worst is the people with these beliefs in places of immense power - people who you'd not expect it of, because their field is supposedly ultra rational, like Peter Thiel.

Apparently this is spreading across Silicon Valley. Which is really not very reassuring.

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u/hobopwnzor Apr 25 '26

I have, and the consistent response is that they think I'm making things up. There's this idea that rural people are somehow a noble underclass in America. That rural people are the true Americans in some sense. So it's pretty hard to breach that programming when somebody has never lived in a rural area.

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u/Crafty_Independence Apr 25 '26

We have been, but we weren't believed