Is there a connection between being gay and being atheist?

Well, alot of religious people are extremely homophobic so I suppose there tends to be a connection as hate is a pretty big turn off.
But of course there are many people in the LGBT+ community who are also religious, as they have decided that being part of that is not a sin.
And of course many religious people are allies, but for the moment I'd wager there's a big divide in acceptance from the religious side and the secular one. I imagine that will change.

Honestly, I didn't accept myself until I became an ex-Christian, because I was part of the conservative side. I was homophobic. BUT, I suppose that wasn't really a big part in my deconversion. I just personally didn't accept myself until I allowed myself to think freely. And for me that was quitting my religion. If I had stayed a Christian I'd like to think I eventually would have become liberal as well, as I was an odd one in the community there as it was.

 

Gay people were once considered insane, and the Republican party actually got more popular by bashing homosexuality. Democrats, being their rival party, began to hold the opposite opinion.

Had the Democrats been the one to denounce it, things would be very different.
Religion has been connected with the modern Republican party, so many atheists are lefties, and the party's official stance on SSM is "ban it", to appeal to their base. So many gays are also lefties.

Yes, I think there is a good amount of overlap.
I am an atheist, but I am not a left-winger in any sense of the word.

 

I have a gay friend that is christian so its not black and white.
Even harder example is after the holocaust some jewish ppl still believed in god.

 

My sexuality has nothing to do with my atheism. It stems from reaching age 10 - or as I call it, The Age of Reason.

 

I'm not sure. Atheism is about non-belief and I don't see why LGBT people are any less likely to believe than the wider population. I do think we are more likely to turn away from the institutions (Churches, Synagogues, Mosques etc.) that supposedly represent different faiths, but that's a different issue. I am gay, but I'm also a Christian.

 

Well, my orientation is not connected to me being an atheist.

Possible reasons I'm an atheist:
* I'm autistic - apparently autistic people are more likely to be atheists
* I was sexually abused, and have never gotten a good answer to why a loving God would knowingly allow me to suffer through that
* From K-4 I attended an absolutely awful school that pushed Christianity at me and told me I'd go to Hell for being disobedient

 

I think if gay people are more likely to be atheists. If that's true, which who knows?

It would be because religion turns its back on the LGBT community in a lot of cases. People who otherwise wouldn't have dreamed of turning away from god are so quickly and easily dismissed by the church they used to turn to. At that point, they just feel rejected and I could see that leading someone off the religious path fairly easily.

 

I think gay people are more likely to be left-leaning and lead secular lifestyles. We're a rather small segment of the population compared to the straight majority, and most gay people I have encountered usually fit similar profiles (atheist/agnostic, socially liberal)

(I know being atheist and left-leaning are not the same thing, but it's something I have noticed anyway).

 

I can pretty much guarantee you that even if I were completely straight, I'd still be an atheist. I remember questioning the existence of a god at age 5, long before I ever knew what sex was or had any idea that I was gay.

 

Well I was anti-theist LONG before I knew what my sexuality...

 

Wow, this poll pretty much settles it XD.

I can't equate gayness with atheism though. It is only the fact that liberal, atheist political parties are the ones who primarily support gays as opposed to the more religious conservatives. Because the churches tend not to like gays, obviously we more frequently shun their particular brand of crap.

But I'd like to think I can see past the human-created muck to the idea that there is an entity greater than ourselves who is responsible for everything we know. And the God closest to me is one who doesn't hate people for whom they love.

 

I consider myself an agnostic atheist.
It wouldn't surprise me if gay people were more secular, considering a lot of religous folks are total douchebags about homosexuality (particularly followers of Abrahamic religions; Christainity, Judaism, Islam), but I know I'd still be secular if I wasn't a lesbian.

 

Yes. A huge reason is that a lot of churches and religions are jerks to gay people, or just have no understanding of the subject. That being said, a lot of people are still atheistic regardless of their gender identity or orientation. It is an interesting subject.

 

I could see there being some sort of correlation, since there are a ton of homophobic religious institutions out there. Those institutions can easily push people away from their religions.

Overall though, I think that there are many things that lead to a person's decision to leave their faith, and sexuality only plays a part in that.

 

Personally, my sexual orientation nor gender have anything to do with my religion. In the words of John Lennon, "Imagine there's no heaven. It's easy if you try". I actually ended up deciding I was truly an athiest when I was taking the garbage out, and I'd noticed that during church songs, I wasn't really into it because I kept questioning what I was singing to, or if I was singing to anything at all. I ended up actually imagining no heaven, and that opened up possibilities to me. There are worlds out there, worlds that we've noticed. Just recently, we discovered several thousand worlds. I would be shocked to hear that we're still the only ones in space.

My sexual orientation came after that, actually. I went onto Yaoihaven one day when I was curious about it after hearing about it. Lo and behold, my body started producing the fireworks everyone talks about, but with the opposite sex.

 

Correlation, not causation, me thinks.

I began questioning the existence of a god since elementary school so have been an atheist since I was maybe 14.

Around the same time, I'd got my orientation figured out but the two conclusions stemmed from different reasons. I didn't become an open atheist until after I'd learned about religious bigotry.

 

It's seemingly logical given that many here have suffered at the hand of people, their wrong-headed, and often ill-informed interpretations of the Bible to reject God. In reality, what you should be rejecting is the chruch and the people practicing hatred and judgement. I can only speak as a Christian and a practicing Anglican. I am out to the congregation and the rector, a gay married to another man. The church my wife and children attend actually has a larger gay population, some of whom hold positions on the vestry committee.

I was raised Roman Catholic though fairly loosely. My mother had family that was Catholic, Lutheran, and Jewish. My father had a love hate relationship with the Catholic Church and swore I'd never attend Catholic schools...unless my grades didn't improve after freshman year and then it would be off to a Jesuit military academy...my mother thought 12 was too young to commit oneself to a particular church.

I attended a small conservative Presbyterian college, became aware that I might be gay...had to take 6 hrs of religion...I took New Testament criticism. Later I joined a non-denominational fundementalist chruch...tried to have the daemons of gayness prayed out of me...it was a temptation not a state of being...parted ways married a Catholic girl and raised our children as such...left to go to an Anglican Church...I left out that I had become and Anglican much earlier...while on a religious retreat I came to grips with being gay...started the with the expectation of growing closer to my wife and God. See God does have a sense of humor :lol:

Long story short, in many ways I'm closer to God than I've ever been. I even have faith that when the dust settles and in time after the divorce my wife and I will be closer.

Without faith I don't know how I could face life. All kind of bad things happen in this world...Hobbes said, "the life of man (is) solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short." How are we to face life then I would offer up these words - Matthew 22: 36-40:

'Master, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?' He (Jesus) answered, ' "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind." That is the greatest commandment. It comes first. The second is like it: "Love your neighbor as yourself." Everything in the Law and the phrophets hang on these two commandments.'

I hear no condemnation here. As a matter of fact if being gay were such a huge issue to the Son of God, I'm sure it would be mentioned; there might even have been a miricle healing of it, but there isn't. No word. Mum. As for Paul and the Old Testament there are explanations from biblical scholars. Read about them. Man is the problem, not God. The Church is an institution that is supposed to have God at it's center, but is ultimately a man-made institution and thus bound to be flawed, subject to the same foibles as men.

My heart aches and bleeds for those who've been hurt by fellow Christians. I just came out and was condemned by my oldest friend we've known each other since high school. Did it smart it sure did. So what am I called to do...I'm still called to love her and forgive her...I do even though her friendship will be lost to me for the rest of my life if I "choose" to be gay...and there's part of a big misunderstanding that one day may empirically be found to vindicate who we are. I guess I don't feel the need for the proof. She has a blind spot in her faith, but she is not evil incarnate.

I'm not seeking to convert you. What I do ask is that you take a good solid look into with whom you're really angry. I get being angry with society, because I've not been in a closet as much as a panic room the bulk of my life, and I've lived there because of more than just a church's admonition, but from a secular world that said I wasn't good enough until I conformed and stopped scaring the horses.

If I marry again, and I hope I do one day. I'm looking forward to sending my wedding announcement into my small conservative Presbyterian college and see it my announcement makes it into the alumni news. I won't be angry with God though if they don't :roflmao:

 

Me being gay has nothing to do with my atheism. I was raised Christian and went to a Catholic school up till the 5th grade, but I never really believed in God despite that. I decided I wanted to live life my own way, and not how some 2,000 year old book tells me to. That plus many religious people being homophobic is a big turn off, and how overly "moralistic" some religious people are.