Atheisms Unbound: The Role of the New Media in the Formation of a Secularist Identity

Abstract

In this article we examine the Internet’s role in facilitating a more visible and active secular identity. Seeking to situate this more visible and active secularist presence—which we consider a form of activism in terms of promoting the importance of secularist concerns and issues in public discourse—we conclude by looking briefly at the relationship between secularist cyber-activism and secular organizations, on one hand, and the relationship between secularist activism and American politics on the other. This allows us to further underscore the importance of the Internet for contemporary secularists as it helps develop a group consciousness based around broadly similar agendas and ideas and secularists’ recognition of their commonality and their expression in collective action, online as well as off.

Keywords

• New Media, Atheism, Internet, Secularism