Hate campaigns target atheists, humanists and liberals as distinct minority

Brian Pellot

“Atheists, humanists and liberals” are now targeted as a distinct minority by “hate campaigns.” This was the claim made in a report, of which I was the editor, launched last week.

The charge of infidel or heretic in one form or another is logically almost as old as religion itself. Religious non-conformists and minorities, as well as the non-religious, continue to face both theological and legal prohibitions against “blasphemy” and “apostasy,” as our report also covers.

But there is also something new in the world. The Freedom of Thought Report 2014 shows that there has been a shift toward the idea of atheism as a popular movement posing a “threat” to prevailing (and authoritarian) orders. It is an idea of atheists and humanists and secular liberals as such, somewhat divorced from the religious baggage of “apostasy,” and constituting as a mass movement, a “phenomenon,” as one Egyptian cleric put it this year. But not a welcome phenomenon, as examples from around the world make clear.

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