You Gotta (Dis)Believe

ON SATURDAY, November 2, Washington, D.C., will be filled with people who don't believe in God. Or in any case, more full of people who don't believe in God than usual.

American Atheists, the lead organization of the un-God movement, is sponsoring something called the Godless Americans March on Washington. The event promises speeches from Atheists, Freethinkers, and Secular Humanists, along with music and other activities. Joe Zemecki, the office manager at American Atheists, told CNS News, "It will be a very kid-friendly event. And we're planning on keeping this very positive."

Ellen Johnson, president of the New Jersey-based, 2,300-member group, contends that atheists are especially energized right now. "All across the country, American atheists are speaking out as never before," she says. Johnson explains that the combination of September 11-inspired public displays of religion and last June's 9th Circuit decision on the Pledge of Allegiance has rallied atheists across the land.

Exactly how big will the march be? Johnson allows that she has no idea how many atheists will come to Washington, but she's optimistic. American Atheists points to a recent American Religious Identification Survey, which states that over 30 million Americans are godless. However, until now, they've been scattered. "Atheists are not joiners," Johnson says sheepishly.

But while there may be few atheist confabs in the real world, in cyberspace they're innumerable. At the march, their members will come together in the flesh: Over 70 organizations have already endorsed the March on Washington, including the Atheist Empire, Atheists Anonymous, the Institute for Unicorn Research, the Atheist Alliance International, Teens Without God, and the Young Atheists Society.

On the web, an atheist can do just about anything, from buying godless gear (like Darwin fish or mugs emblazoned with the slogan "Tough love is a timeout in the corner, Not an eternity in HELL!") to meeting a mate (try the Single Atheists virtual community, "A virtual place to meet/find religion-free singles in your area.") to catching up with army buddies ("atheists in foxholes")(seriously).

The American Atheists website has essays on how atheists should approach life's big moments, including Wedding the Atheist Way, Dying an Atheist in America, and Coming Out--Atheism: The Other Closet. This last article is a recurring theme in the atheist world, because, as Johnson says, "We still have that taint on us that the gays used to have." In the Venn diagram of social politics, all interest groups intersect, so naturally there's a site for Gay and Lesbian Atheists and Humanists, but its sliver of the pie is pretty small: Even though gay advocacy groups claim there are 25 million homosexual Americans and the atheists claim 30 million, I was only the 44,762nd visitor since July 1996.

Hopping around their web world, one quickly gets the impression that there are two basic types of atheist. The first is the sincere, scholarly atheist, the type who walked away from the Unitarians when they got too evangelical. The Maine Atheists Union typifies this bunch. They want to "think freely" and "live free," and one of their main precepts reads: "Nobody has all of the answers and nobody ever will. Take the time to get as close as possible to the truth."

The other group is like Orwell's embittered specimen from "Down and Out in Paris and London," "the sort of atheist who does not so much disbelieve in God as personally dislike Him." These shrill types can be found in places like MSN's God is a Lie! chat community and, of all places, high school.