Which Ideology has the greatest % of atheists?

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I'm curious as to which ideology you think has the higest percentage of atheists.

Just to clarify for those ill-versed in percentages, some groups (lets say "moderates") may have a higher total number of atheists than other groups (lets say "libertarian socialists") because one group has a greater number of people in total compared to the other group. But the percentage of atheist in the smaller group (libertarian socialists) may be greater than in the larger group (moderates).

My own working assumption is that left-libertarianism would have the greatest number of atheists, just because such movements have had an antirelgious character since the 17th century and much of right-libertarianism, while more secular than the mainstream, has been interjected with some of the devout due to its overlap with American paleoconervatism.

I'm a bit of an odd-ball when it comes to my religious and political views. I'm Republican and I'm Atheist.

Isn't it kind of by design communism?

You don't have to be an atheist to be a communist.

You only have to reject religion.
Religion is the opiate of the masses, not God/god

In reality, it's not so much that you have to even reject religion, but you have to take upon yourself a new religion. one where society (ie, the greater good) is god.
Communism in some ways can be viewed more as a religion than a politic. It's more a way of life, than it is a way to set up a system of government.
And specifically it is only initially anything to do with politics... it is a way to eliminate politics which will no longer be needed as the society takes over. (after the dictatorship of the proletariat, which one could argue is capitalist democracy)

Mind you.. I am talking about it in it's esoteric form, as per Marx. Not the so called Communist regimes that were in fact another system all together (State capitalist) such as USSR and Maoist China.
Under Lenin.. and under him alone, the USSR did have real similarities to communism.
Cuba has some too.... Problem is Castro as become the god, not society.

Maybe the whole problem is that humans are so simple that they need a single focus.. and only by giving that focus to the "leader" can they accept it. Problem is once one is deified... it's hard to continue with your original ideological intent.

Leftwing nationalism is another issue... the state (as opposed to the leader or the people) becomes a god.
In many cases that god sits alongside an otherwise "religious" god... but the state is deified too.
Consider the USA's attitudes towards the flag... Then consider a Catholic's attitude toward the cross... The Muslim's towards the image of Mohamed, etc etc There are rites, rituals, do's and don'ts and people get VERY upset when someone else breaks with those rules, regardless of the other person's personal beliefs.

I do however in the end agree with the OP that left-libertarianism is most consistent with atheism.
the libertarian puts the self to the fore. the left puts society to the fore. As the system is at least semi-extreme god if one believes in it, is relegated to at least 3rd. All that would remain of god-belief within such a group would be the odd token believer and a few fundies that have developed theistic ways to justify and require such a system

There is Christian communism:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_communism

It isn't as if Marx defines the title forever.

That being said, I am somewhat confused over the different defined ideologies:
Libertarian Capitalism/Right-Libertarianism
Neoliberalism
Classical liberalism

I would probably also be confused over these as well:
Social welfare liberalism
Social Democracy

I mean, I know there are some subtle differences, but I just see too much overlap/potential for overlap. (For example, Milton Friedman has been labeled all three of the first set of ideologies)

Anarchists, or your left-libertarians/libertarian socialists, are perhaps maximally radical in that they reject all established forms of social order (economic domination, social/class domination, gender domination, etc.), and surely most of them would see at least the Abrahamic god in that light. Communism is more or less the social system left-anarchists propose: a stateless, classless/egalitarian society of voluntary cooperation and association. Communists themselves, at least Marxists, may see period of state socialism, a "dictatorship of the proletariat," as a justifiable transition to full communism, something which anarchists reject. Marxist-Leninists and Stalinists followed "democratic centralism" (rigid party discipline), so they take orders from the top down. The international communist parties took direction from Moscow (well, China eventually became influential enough that it could buck the Soviet Union from time to time), Marxist-Leninists would be atheists to follow the norms set by the party's leaders. For most of them, there wouldn't be much more thought or conviction beyond that. In Marxist theory, religion would be seen as a way for the established classes to enforce their dominance in society; of course, the Communist parties replaced Christian churches and Buddhist temples with themselves as a locus of worship, but they weren't technically thought of as gods--quite.

Conservatism of all stripes is pretty amenable to religion and the concept of gods; right-libertarian merely makes the question an individual one.

Right, and Christian variations of left-libertarianism do exist. For instance, the notion "Christian anarchism" tends to be very left-libertarian but is Christian in orientation.

It seems that the definition of "communism" likely is including socialism, as otherwise a large category is underserved, and there are a number of Christian socialists, heck, there have been theological movements that have tried to combine Marx and Christianity.

As for the conduciveness of right-libertarianism to theism? That's mixed, particularly given that I don't think I could meaningfully apply a lot of the lines drawn *too* well to the actions of other people, as there is too much overlap.

I mean, today there are major atheist thinkers who are right libertarians, such as Michael Shermer. There have been past movements in right-libertarianism which were deeply atheistic, such as Objectivism,(Love her or hate her, Ayn Rand was not a theist at all) and which have spurred people who have written against God. (George H Smith was deeply influenced by Rand, and is known for his work in counter apologetics, including the book "Atheism: The Case Against God", which I have not read but have merely heard the popularity of) As well, many of the right-libertarian thinkers have rejected mainstream theism, as Friedrich Hayek claims in "The Fatal Conceit" that an anthropomorphic God is not something reasonable to conceive, Ludwig von Mises in his book on economics called "Human Action" includes a formulation of the problem of evil and argues that according to economic reasoning, an acting omnipotent being is nonsense. Milton Friedman was a non-religious Jew, but I don't think he was as open about that.

At the same time, libertarianism has a lot of populist and conservative elements in the ideology(unless we want to argue that they are all *really* classical or neoliberals or even paleoconservatives), and really is in some sense more neutral towards God, unlike some of the anti-clericalism on the far-left. That being said, I think a lot of people of religion would be uncomfortable with the libertarian ideas of legalizing prostitution, allowing most drugs, and so many other ideas.

I think your poll is suffering from a good sample size and a unified polling source. This message board isn't geographically (nor culturally) close enough to really form a solid representation of anything.


I'm the sole social democrat, so far.

I think that atheists are more inclined to justice, believe it or not. Antonin Scalia said at one point that to him, executing an innocent person is no big deal as there is an afterlife, he believes. Atheists are more interested in justice in the here and now, and do not believe in a hereafter where everything is sorted out and justice prevails.

Now there are atheists who are social darwinists which is unfortunate...

Marxism