http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HollywoodAtheist

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Atheists in real life are a rather diverse group. After all, the only thing confirmed by the label "atheist" is that the person doesn't believe in God/gods. It's like trying to make a coherent generalization about people who don't like baseball.

In fiction, however, while it is reasonably common to see a character who is never shown practicing or even mentioning religion, it's generally only characters with a fair degree of cynicism and bitterness who will state outright that they are an atheist. Some of the more common character traits are:

Common to all portrayals of the Hollywood Atheist is the idea that faith is the natural state and something must occur to drive the character away from the norm. Given that the majority of humans worldwide are religious (to varying degrees), this understandably colors media greatly, but still, it's always 'my reason for not believing is X.' One never hears 'I just don't have a reason to believe', which is a common (if not the most common) real-life reason given by atheists. The "Problem of Evil" (why would a good God create evil or suffering?) is an age-old question that has perplexed scholars of religion precisely because scholars of religion want to believe. For an atheist who doesn't have reason to believe, the "Problem of Evil" isn't very relevant. However, other atheists will use this as an argument against belief in God.

See also Acceptable Religious Targets. A major exception is science fiction, which often goes so far the other way as to state that Religion Is Wrong and humanity has Outgrown Such Silly Superstitions. For atheists living in fantasy settings where the existence of gods is irrefutable, see Flat-Earth Atheist (who stubbornly disbelieves in the factuality of God/gods) and Nay-Theist (who accepts the factuality of God/gods, but refuses to worship Him/them).

As with other strawman tropes, Hollywood Atheism is a caricature of Real Life attitudes crafted to suit the purposes of various authors; by definition, real atheists are not examples. The fact that there unfortunately are a Vocal Minority of atheists in Real Life who exhibit these characteristics does not mean that you should assume that those characteristics apply to any atheist you meet.

Compare with Holier Than Thou, and see Crisis of Faith. See also Useful Notes on Atheism. Not to be confused with some of the American conservative movement's more vocal members' view of Hollywood's "war on Faith".

The complete opposite trope is "Belief Makes You Stupid".

Examples

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Anime and Manga

Comics

Fan Works

Film

Journalism

In this article and a few others, (religious) columnist Damon Linker calls this type of atheism "honest atheism," and is of the opinion that atheism is incompatible with happiness and optimism, and that atheists who exhibit these qualities (i.e. are not Hollywood Atheists) do so inconsistently with their worldview. As one could imagine, many were quick to disagree.

Literature

Live Action TV

Music

Mythology and Religion

In The Bible, the Amalekites are portrayed this way. There is also Proverbs 14, in which those who say that there is no God are said to be corrupt and do "abominable works" and Romans 1:18-20 says all unbelievers know God exists, but "suppress the truth in unrighteousness". This has of course been used against real atheists sometimes, though whether it was meant that way is debatable (many scholars doubt it, since at the time disbelief in God would have largely come from pagans, although "atheos" note "Godless" was used as a description of them, but Christians were also ironically called this by pagans, as they denied others' gods).

Podcasts

Tabletop Games

Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 An interesting take on atheism in a world where most of the gods are flat-out evil. Or, well, they used to. There used to be more chaos gods, including Necoho who was the God of Atheism. This was in a world where Gods Need Prayer Badly. So the more you prayed to him, the weaker he got, and the less you worshiped, the stronger he got. He would also try to destroy/wreck the other Chaos Gods' plans, and hoped to destroy all gods, including himself. This fell out of favor with the writers. He only actually appeared in the story once, in an RPG adventure; a few authors just enjoy name dropping him as an obscure call-back. The single group that would seem most like they would be atheists- but aren't- are the Tech Priests. They believe that the greatest show of their love is to cut off bits of their bodies and replace them with machinery. However, they do this because they worship a being they call the Machine God, or the Omnissiah (who is all but stated to be the C'tan Void Dragon, one of the eldest forms of life in existence, locked up on Mars by the God-Emperor). The Tau are atheists, but believe in something they call the Greater Good. They do believe in their own intellectual superiority, but they are also cut off from a realm of existence called the Warp, which is where and how the various gods of the 40K-verse work their power. Thus tales of possession and the horrors faced by psykers get nothing but disbelief from them, they refer to Chaos armies as madmen (which, while technically true, leaves out the very important fact that they're divine-powered madmen), and believe manifesting Daemons to be yet another form of alien resistant to the concept of the Greater Good. A Tau fleet pulled into a warp rift in one story was rescued by what is, by all appearances, a minor god embodying their Greater Good philosophy; they still have no idea what to make of it. In a twist of supreme irony, the man who would become the (literal) God-Emperor of Mankind was very much an atheist, as demonstrated in "The Last Church", where he argues with the last priest left on Earth about the merits of faith, using only examples like The Crusades and other religious massacres to make his point. It was so poorly argued that the uneducated drunk of a priest verbally destroyed him and deconstructed his entire grand ambition; it's currently the page quote for God-Emperor. One of his sons betrayed him precisely because his Space Marines worshiped him as a god, when he thought rational thought should replace faith. The Emperor was aware of the Clap Your Hands If You Believe nature of his universe, and wanted to make everyone atheists in order to weaken the gods (which was doomed to fail since Gods in his setting don't feed on faith, but emotion, so unless everyone dies or becomes as emotionless as the Necrons, it won't work out). Oddly enough, faith in the Emperor happens to be a potent weapon against Chaos.



Theatre

In Street Scene, Sam tells Rose that happiness is an illusion just like God is. "Then what's the use of living?" she asks him, and he can't think of any reason why they shouldn't kill themselves. She rightfully calls him out for this.

Dom Juan, by Molière. In it, the eponymous protagonist is portrayed as an atheist, whose mission in life is to dare God to strike him down if he exists. He's a doubter like Thomas of Aquin, hence his libertine ways and his love of breaking anything sacred out of spite (such as sleeping with nuns, offering indecent money to poor people if they will curse God, etc). Except that in the end, God does send somebody to kick his unbelieving ass in the form of an animated statue of a man he previously killed.

Friedrich Schiller's early play The Robbers (Die Räuber) has an atheist antagonist, Franz von Moor, who does not believe in moral values at all. He attempts to murder his own father (The Old Count Moor) and discredit his older brother (Karl von Moor) so he can be Count. When his father does not die—he planned to kill the sick old man by telling him Karl died and let the shock do the rest—he locks him in to starve. When Karl returns and orders his men to burn down the castle and capture Franz, Franz has a long talk with himself and then with a priest about the existence of God and about whether he will be punished for his sins. He reasons logically that he doesn't see evidence for a god, then throws it out of the window and becomes religious out of fear. Before killing himself.

In the musical Celebration, Potemkin used to be a preacher, but since he found out that God is dead, he's stopped caring about the problems of the world.

Inherit the Wind: Hornbeck. His views aren't all that different from his real life counterpart, H. L. Mencken. Hornbeck: Ah, Henry! Why don't you wake up? Darwin was wrong. Man's still an ape. His creed's still a totem pole. When he first achieved the upright position, he took a look at the stars — thought they were something to eat. When he couldn't reach them, he decided they were groceries belonging to a bigger creature. And that's how Jehovah was born. Drummond: I wish I had your worm's-eye view of history...

The Clouds: Socrates and the sophists are portrayed as being atheists who don't believe there's any objective basis for morality, corrupting people with their philosophy. Atheism was among the charges against Socrates raised at his trial, possibly based on this perception (which he denied, while noting the contradiction in also being accused of worshiping new gods), and Plato portrays him as opposed to sophism.

Video Games

Web Comics

Lexx in Alien Dice refuses to believe that a caring and just god would allow anyone to have his crappy life (orphaned, forced to play a game where losing means death or enslavement). Which is a problem for Chel, who's a Baptist.

Danny of Other People's Business fills up the criteria of cynical disposition and crappy life, and even equates atheism to a disillusioned christian.

Joel in Concession is an open atheist who hates religion, going so far as to say it "Suppresses free will and punishes scientific progress" among other things. Whether Immelmann shares Joel's views on religion or not or if it's simply a part of the story is best kept hidden to prevent Flame Bait. Technically Joel is listed as Spiritual/Satanic on the cast page, but he does share many traits with a Hollywood atheist (hating religion, a dead sister, a highly religious abusive father. ).

). The Tiger Barb from 95 Gallons proves to be one during the Christmas storyline; somewhat amusing, given that he's generally a Satan analogue.

Penelope from Questionable Content was raised by fundamentalist parents, which left her with such a hatred of religion that she nearly broke up with her boyfriend for believing in the soul - not God, mind you, much less the Christian God, just the soul.

Similarly, Leslie from Shortpacked! was also raised by devout Christians who ended up disowning her when she came out as gay. She was left with such a hatred of religion that she almost beats up Historical Jesus due to his "cult" ruining her life despite it being repeatedly pointed out to her that there is next to no similarity between HJ and the white caricature bandied about by the American religious right.

Penny from Goblin Hollow was revealed as the Cynicism Catalyst flavor in the aftermath of her telling off a slick backed Benny Hinn-style preacher. Her best friend killed herself out of depression and in the aftermath of this, she heard a radio preacher reference the death in context of how godless and out of control young people were.

Lazarus from Underling.

Web Original

Western Animation

Aversions and Subversions

Anime and Manga

Averted by Roronoa Zoro in One Piece, who was revealed to be an atheist during the Skipeia arc, but not due to his tragic past, and has no problem at all with faith in general. It's just that BECAUSE he's seen so many strange and outlandish adventures that he considers it more likely that anything the can't explain is just another super power they haven't heard of yet as opposed to something caused by an actual God. Being able to rain down lightning on a whim doesn't look as divine after your crew has already spent time fighting a living sand storm and riding geysers into the sky. Furthermore, he also stated that if God did exist, he would like to meet him because he or she would be a Worthy Opponent. He's just that badass.

Foh from B't X is an aversion of this. Having given up on the idea that gods exist due to witnessing war from a very early childhood, he eventually came to realize that does not mean he can be a jerk. The fact he's responsible for getting one character's sister killed, an issue he's willing to let himself get killed over in spite of the fate of the world hanging in the balance, is possibly a driving factor. He strongly believes in mercy and compassion, vehemently hates fighting because it brings only tragedy to people, and runs an orphanage and raises kids right. He even wears a religious memento from his friend's dead sister. It helps that Masami Kurumada, the series' author, is himself an atheist.

Comic Books

Averted in the one-shot comic A Momentary Lapse of Unreason. A main character begins to question God because his parents died in a car crash, but through questioning he begins to base his atheism on logic and theological arguments rather than misery.

Fan Works

In Son of the Desert it's subverted with Trisha. Ishvala turned his back on her long before her life turned sour. Despite her lack of belief she participates in many traditions for social reasons but doesn't believe in Ishvala otherwise. She even refuses to pray when she's dying.

Averted in Cultural Differences, Flash Sentry tells Sunset Shimmer and Princess Twilight that he is an atheist and doesn't believe in any gods. This causes him to have a small argument with Twilight, who believes entirely in her own god, Queen Faust, over how it is possible to not believe in gods and how you can be sure that everyone in your world believes the same as you. Sunset eventually calms them both down and explains to them that the instinct that ponies have that has them believe in Queen Faust isn't shared by humans. Flash for his part says that he is more of an agnostic these days due to all of the magical events he has witnessed first-hand and is more willing to believe in things than he was previously.

Film

Literature

The Stormlight Archive: Quickly subverted in the first book of the series (The Way of Kings): POV character Shallan expects Jasnah, a famous atheist scholar she's seeking out an apprenticeship under, will be this, but while Jasnah's a bit of an Insufferable Genius, she turns out to be overall a likable, charismatic person and one of the smartest people in the novel. Jasnah is always respectful of Shallan's religious beliefs, though she will occasionally roll her eyes at the more ridiculous things. Jasnah's uncle Dalinar (who is himself devoutly religious) respects her greatly, partly because she chose to be honest and explain her lack of belief rather than pretending for the sake of appearances. One of Jasnah's most precious possessions is a book that a religious scholar used to almost successfully convert her. One of her biggest Pet the Dog moments is when she gives it to Shallan following an apparent suicide attempt. When Shallan tells an ardent that Jasnah is researching the Voidbringers (ancient demons assumed to be myths at best), he assumes Jasnah is trying to disprove their existence, and thus disprove religion as a whole. Jasnah scoffs at this, saying that trying to prove a negative is a fool's errand, and destroying religion wouldn't really improve the world at all even if she could do it. Jasnah: Let the Vorin believe as they wish—the wise among them will find goodness and solace in their faith; the fools would be fools no matter what they believed.

Hellborn had Batik, who describes his stance on religion as "no", but still manages to be the sanest, happiest and most emotionally stable character in the book. Not bad for an author who has never been shy about his own Christian beliefs.

Discussed in Triggers, where the US President is a closet atheist. Following numerous terrorist attacks in the US, culminating with his own near-assassination, he decides to destroy Pakistan with nuclear missiles for harboring terrorists. An old woman finds out about his nonbelief and this plan, trying to convince him that doing so will not only cause him to be viewed as a monster, but later people would say only an atheist could have done such a terrible thing (he had planned to admit his atheism after leaving the White House). Also averted by Caitlin and her dad in his earlier WWWTrilogy. Both are simply nice, ordinary people. Author Robert J. Sawyer is himself an atheist, and thus averts this in his works.

Knowledge Of Angels: Discussed. Palinor does not fit the stereotypes, surprising the Christian characters, who believe an atheist has no reason to be moral.

Arc of Fire: Averted. Myrren's doubts about Vraxor finally culminate in her disbelief that he exists, along with the other gods. The series itself has revealed she's wrong, as Vraxor and Nimrod appeared at the start of Dark Heart, while Shial personally has encountered Shayna, though Myrren doesn't know this. Vraxor's holy book however may well be wrong, as she argues. Vraxor and Nimrod having both been gone for a very long time doesn't help to show that they exist of course. The author is himself an atheist activist, and thus explores this with more nuance than most, rather than just the usual negative stereotypes.

Partly averted in Elmer Gantry. Jim Lefferts is cynical and sharp-tongued, to be sure, but he's also the one man to be fair to Gantry after his disgrace and downfall.

Mothwing from Warrior Cats has a naturalist view on StarClan. She especially stands out as she's an atheist medicinecat. Medicinecats are supposed to have a close relationship to StarClan. This is essentially the equivalent of being an atheist priest or nun. Mothwing, however, is a nice cat nevertheless and doesn't show any Hollywood Atheist traits.

The Han Solo Trilogy: Averted with Han, who at one point mentions he doesn't believe in any gods and had been made clear as irreligious in general earlier. He remains neutral or respectful about religion however, unlike in the first film, where he'd mocked the idea of the Force (that was later though). The Ylesian scam religion even had outraged him due to exploiting people's spiritual aspirations, which ends up with them addicted to enslave them, rather than saying this shows the danger of religion, or simply that it's all delusion.

Live-Action TV

Radio

Averted in Old Harry's Game with the Professor who is one of the kindest characters in the series and is only in Hell because he is an atheist - he points out that he's hardly his fault for not believing in God if He refused to openly prove his existence, but God is shown to love blind faith. The Professor's wife is very much the same. Played for Laughs as both the Buddha and Nietzsche are in Hell too.

Tabletop Games

The Planescape campaign setting also had the Athar faction, who's big thing was that they believed the gods weren't really gods, just really, really powerful mortals with huge egos, as evidenced by the fact that the gods could be killed. Like the ur-Priest Prestige Class, they had the ability to muck up divine magic but lacked the "must be evil" restriction on their alignment. They were frequently portrayed as being Jerkass characters, however. An interesting twist with the Athar is that more than a few of them weren't actually atheists as we'd see it — they believed in a divinity of sorts, they just didn't agree that the beings generally called gods were really divine. The Athar's leader is a subversion. While most Athar join the faction due to being betrayed or disillusioned from their gods and are generally bitter and angry, Factol Terrance simply woke up one morning and realized that he simply did not have faith in his god any longer, so he left his clerical position and joined the Athar. Terrance is also one of the most stable, sane and generally pleasant leaders of any of the Planescape factions.

The Pathfinder default setting of Golarion has several examples that fall into a blend of this and Flat-Earth Atheist, but perhaps the best fit is the nation of Rahadoum: after the Oath Wars, a three-way religious war between the faiths of Norgorber note Neutral Evil god of murder, poison and secrets note True Neutral god of magic note Neutral Good goddess of healing, redemption and the sun note "There are gods, but they are not worth our time or attention." and maltheism. Zigzagged in that they are displayed in the setting as being optimistic, well-educated, and generally having strong, positive attitudes towards making life comfortable for everyone; as they know they can't expect any special attention or reprieve from Pharasma note True Neutral goddess of birth and death

Video Games

In Civilization: Beyond Earth, Samatar Jama Barre is an aversion. While he's not religious, and he has a very low opinion of religious figures, he fully supports his brother when he hears that he's visiting the mosque again. He's also probably the nicest of the faction leaders, as well as the most tolerant.

In Stellaris plays with this. Materialists dislike spiritualists, all else being equal, especially when one or both are fanatic, but non-fanatics can set this aside if it fits their other ethos or simple realpolitik; a pacifist, xenophilic materialist will typically prefer an pacifist, xenophilic spiritualist to a miltaristic, xenophobic materialist. However, materialists scoff at Psychic Powers well past the point where doing so is reasonable and get lines like this when condescending Spiritualists, and Erudite Explorers talk this way to anyone they dislike, especially if they're Spiritualist. "You invented your faith to fill empty minds. Your people will never feel the true euphoria of an enlightened intellect."

Web Comics

Averted with the bartender in Jesus and Mo, who's an Author Avatar and depicted positively, in contrast to the eponymous duo's backwards, stupid ways.

Web Original

Western Animation