Obama-is-a-Muslim Myth Surprisingly Bipartisan
Brad DeLong quoted a mystery reader as offering the following aperçu:
12% of the country still thinks Obama is a Muslim. 8% thinks he faked his birth certificate. The new Washpost/ABC poll says that 22% of the electorate id’s itself as GOP. Thus it is a fair inference that roughly half of declared Republicans are fringe lunatics–which explains why “respectable” conservative media outlets like National Review publish the Andy McCarthys and the Victor David Hansons, and why GOP politicians like Michelle Bachman and Steve King are now “mainstream” for the GOP.
I thought that was funny, but Brendan Nyhan points out that it doesn’t seem to be true: “The most recent Pew poll shows that 17% of Republican believe Obama is a Muslim — not 50% — along with 10% of independents and 7% of Democrats.”
To me, the striking thing about the poll isn’t so much the number of people who think Obama’s a Muslim (around 10 percent of people will apparently believe anything) as it is the truly huge proportion of the population who seems to be agnostic on the subject. Only 48 percent of Americans think Obama’s a Christian! Which is surprising not so much because of the ignorance it reveals as for the fact that I would have thought you need to get your Christian Q Rating considerably higher than that to win an election.
43 Responses to “Obama-is-a-Muslim Myth Surprisingly Bipartisan”
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June 24th, 2009 at 10:49 am
I wouldn’t put down all of the non-answers to “I don’t know.” I suspect that a meaningful chunk of the electoral thinks he’s an atheist or irreligious.
June 24th, 2009 at 10:51 am
Matthew — you’re Jewish — you just aren’t getting this. Being a “Christian” isn’t an ethnic, ancestral, or nominal thing for many, if not most, Christian-Americans.
In many places, especially the South, being a “Christian” requires avowed, explicit, and public profession of Faith. And, unfortunately, it often excludes heterodox sects (mormons, Jehovahs witnesses, and for some Catholics (!!!)).
Obama is not a Muslim, but by the standards of many Americans, he is not a Christian either.
June 24th, 2009 at 10:52 am
It is possible to argue that Obama is a Muslim without resorting to wingnuttery. As I understand it, under a strict interpretation of Islamic law, Islam is inherited through the father and cannot be disavowed under any circumstances. If Obama Senior was born Muslim, as seems to be the case, Obama himself would be Muslim under this strict interpretation notwithstanding the fact that he’s a practicing Christian.
June 24th, 2009 at 10:54 am
I think that many people may be agnostic on the subject because they don’t care what kind of fairy tales our President believes in. At least I am one of them.
In other words, the whole issue is nothing more than a marker for the general idiocy of our political discourse.
June 24th, 2009 at 10:55 am
Obama is probably agnostic. What’s interesting is that 18-29 years-old do the worst on this Muslim nonsense: the era of checking-news-on-Internet will be fun.
June 24th, 2009 at 10:55 am
I’m going to ditto Christianish’s remarks.
Often I’ve probed evangelicals about who they consider a Christian and it is pretty small. I’ve even said, suppose you have a Catholic who goes to Mass once a week a believes in his Church’s dogma. The answer is always, I don’t know, does he accept Christ as his personal savior? Of course, the average Catholic does not use that language so in fact the evangelical probably would not consider him a Christian.
June 24th, 2009 at 10:57 am
I think that many people may be agnostic on the subject because they don’t care what kind of fairy tales our President believes in. At least I am one of them.
You are most certainly wrong about that. Americans, unfortunately, do care, and your use of the word “fairy tales” for religion puts you among a tiny minority, tiny enough not to come even close to explaining these results.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:00 am
It is possible to argue that Obama is a Muslim without resorting to wingnuttery. As I understand it, under a strict interpretation of Islamic law
OK, a different kind of wingnuttery.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:01 am
I believe that he is an atheist. The story he tells of having been a nonbeliever and then becoming a Christian just doesn’t sound believable to me. Instead it sounds like what I would do if I were planning on running for office.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:01 am
I am in the “tiny minority” of people, along with gregor, that does not care what fairy tales the president believes in. The only two relevant positions to me are “Does not believe fairy tales are real” and “All other.”
I have a preference for the former but tolerate the latter.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:02 am
“As I understand it, under a strict interpretation of Islamic law, Islam is inherited through the father and cannot be disavowed under any circumstances.”
That interpretation would apply in neither Kenya nor Indonesia. As for the law in question, it is a strict interpretation, but not an accurate one. Nothing in the Quran would imply anything but a voluntary acceptance of Islam. Later texts are sometimes different and usually inconsistent. Some texts are accepted by some Muslims and other texts are accepted by other Muslims. But a reading of the Quran in Arabic would certainly suggest otherwise. Once you are an adult, you are free to choose.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:02 am
It is possible to argue that Obama is a Muslim without resorting to wingnuttery.
Apparently not, that is a wingnut argument: http://www.danielpipes.org/5286/was-barack-obama-a-muslim
June 24th, 2009 at 11:05 am
How come nobody seems to break down the “Obama is a Muslim” numbers to see how many think that’s a bad thing and how many don’t?
I recall reading about some Republican operative who tested focus groups with the Obama is a Muslim/Bill Ayres/etc. nonsense and found, to his horror, that many of his subjects believed the stuff and planned to vote for Obama anyway.
It would be really interesting to find voters who say: “Sure, he’s a Muslim — not that there’s anything wrong with that.”
June 24th, 2009 at 11:06 am
I’d guess that most people know that Obama identifies himself as a Christian. My understanding is that people convinced he is a Muslim believe he is a secret Muslim. Meanwhile, some people on the Left believe that Obama only attended Rev. Wright’s church to build a political base, not out of any genuine conviction, while his critics are likely to think he actually believed what was preached in his church but may regard that preaching more as politicized religion than what they see as actual Christianity. There are differing views on the set of beliefs defining Christianity (fundamentalists being most rigorous, but mainline Protestants have some standards if the poll is anything to go by) and (even on the Left) on the sincerity of Obama’s religious convictions.
I wonder what to make of the fact that some African Americans, the group for whom Obama’s Wright church attendance was supposedly intended to pander to, do not consider Obama a Christian. Either they reject Black Liberation Theology or they agree with white liberals that Obama only embraced it in order to pander.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:10 am
Yeah, I’m also among those Obama supporters who think he was cynical enough to join a large popular black church in Chicago 20 years ago because he knew it’d be necessary to have that history to advance in Chicago politics. The number of people that grow up atheist and convert to Christianity is incredibly small, and reading his books it seems like he knows exactly what to say to make it sound like that’s what he did because he’s well aware no atheist could possibly get elected to high office.
But I may just be projecting. Who knows.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:11 am
Following what CJ notes @13, the Dem figures include progressive who would be please as punch to have a Muslim president.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:13 am
At the margins, aren’t you dealing with some percentage of people who fall into the “Jay-Walk All Stars” of people who don’t even know who obama is, or who just guess randomly on the survey.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:13 am
it’s not possible to argue that without resorting to sophistry, however.
you cannot inherit a religion. you either subscribe to it or you don’t. and if you don’t subscribe, the religion cannot claim you – regardless of what the religion’s laws say.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:21 am
you cannot inherit a religion. you either subscribe to it or you don’t. and if you don’t subscribe, the religion cannot claim you – regardless of what the religion’s laws say.
That may be true for the conceptions of Christianity dominant in this country, but other religions–because of their laws–can and do “claim” people all the time.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:27 am
Anthony that is an important point. One thing to add, however, is that most of the people who are aware of Muslim claims on this matter are people who have been informed by the right that it is so and thus are likely to be using as another reason to state their opinion as opposed to genuine confusion as how to interpret Obama’s statements of his Christian belief vs. claims the Muslim religion makes on him.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:32 am
David,
You’re right. Obama is in no way and under no conception (except the wing-nutty one you rightly discredited earlier) a Muslim. My response was a very limited one to cleek’s naively individualistic claim that you can only belong to a religion if you subscribe to it, and that a religion can’t claim you. I did not, though, mean to legitimize speculation that Obama might somehow be a Muslim with that comment.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:33 am
I think the Christianity is all a front. He really believes in Leprechaunology when he’s with his family, and chases rainbows for pots-o-gold. How else do you explain those ears and that grin? His wife wears green an awful lot.
If you’ve seen the movies, Leprechaun 1-456, you know that they’re a bigger threat than Muslim Extremists anyday. They’ll attack your hot girlfriend while she showers listening to hip-hop!
He should prove that he doesn’t worship Leprechauns!!! This is in outrage!
June 24th, 2009 at 11:37 am
I agree with other sentiments expressed here– if I were asked, I would say that he was an atheist, which is super, because I am happy to see an atheist in office!
June 24th, 2009 at 11:39 am
perhaps “claim” was the wrong word.
a religion, regardless of the country or religion, cannot make you an adherent of that religion without your consent. you either believe it you don’t, despite whatever labels the religion wants to put on you.
as analogy: the right says (and perhaps even believes it’s true) that Obama is a socialist and a communist. but neither of those are true, and simply saying so won’t make them true. and neither would be true even if The Official Laws of Socialism and Communism (if there were such a thing) said he was by virtue of inheritance.
this is common sense.
religion is not a sign someone sticks on your back as you walk by – it is something that comes from inside you. and anyone arguing that Obama is a Muslim by virtue of his father’s (non-practicing, IIRC) religion is arguing in bad faith.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:40 am
Barack O’bama: always after me Lucky Charms.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:45 am
religion is not a sign someone sticks on your back as you walk by – it is something that comes from inside you. and anyone arguing that Obama is a Muslim by virtue of his father’s (non-practicing, IIRC) religion is arguing in bad faith.
I see what you’re saying and I totally agree that anyone claiming Obama is a Muslim through some interpretation of Islam’s claims is dishonest and arguing in bad faith.
I don’t fully agree, though, that religion comes from inside you and is only a matter of what you personally believe. I think this is a modern (and largely Protestant) conception of how someone becomes and is defined–by himself and others–as a member of a religious community.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:54 am
Dude’s a Vulcan. Straight up.
June 24th, 2009 at 12:02 pm
Am I reading the poll correctly? It appears to me that 7 percent of people who approve of the job Obama is doing believe he’s a Muslim, while 19 percent of those who disapprove believe that he’s a Muslim.
So more than a fourth of the people who believe he’s a secret Muslim approve of him.
June 24th, 2009 at 12:11 pm
Frankly, I would hope that Obama is an enlightened non-theist-atheist as am I. But, in the final analysis I don’t really care — he’s not a screwball religious nutcase as was GWB, and that’s an improvement no matter the details.
June 24th, 2009 at 12:13 pm
I think one of the things that fails to be mentioned here, perhaps, because its a more universal, and perhaps more benign, explanation is that names matter to people. An individual’s name carries with it a ton of baggage that every one interprets through the lens of our culture. Certain names are WASPy, some are Jewish, some sound “white trash,” others sounds “ghetto,” and some most have a gendered element.
That humans engage in this level of coding (or stereotyping) is fairly commonly known. I remember the study of “white” and “black” names and job interviews.
The Barack is a muslim meme, at least in the broadest sense, is explained by the fact that his name is, for Americans, a muslim name. For many this a problem, for others a feature, but I think you shouldn’t just think of people who attribute the President’s name to be a muslim as crazy, hateful, or ignorant.
The good news is that these names change perceptions over time (Stacey Keach, last of the macho Staceys.)
June 24th, 2009 at 12:32 pm
There once was another Illinois state legislator with limited Washington experience whose religion was hard to figure out, and was often thought to be ginned up for campaign purposes, or missing altogether. He turned out OK.
Think of it as a tradition.
June 24th, 2009 at 12:35 pm
Sorry, that “tiny minority” of freethinkers is at least 10% of the U.S. population according to 2007 data.
Tens of millions of Americans simply do not care whether the president believes in fairy tales, the supernatural, that the bible is the literal word of God, or any of the above.
June 24th, 2009 at 12:52 pm
lobstakiller:
Listen, I am an agnostic, but your own statistic shows that I am right. 10% is a tiny minority and does not even begin to fill the gap between the 59% of people who answered the question and those who didn’t. Moreover, presumably that 10% tend to be more highly educated, right? Well, respondents with college or more had the highest response rate. The people with the lowest response rate had no HS degree.
But perhaps I am wrong here, perhaps I am ignoring the vast agnostic hordes across the US who simply refused to answer the question based on principle. That’s also why we have the religious politics that we do. Because nobody cares about religion.
June 24th, 2009 at 1:44 pm
Matt’s last point in this post is the most interesting one.
I, too, would have thought you would have needed a much higher percentage of Americans identifying you as a (practicing, believing) Christian in order to be elected POTUS. Maybe this is a positive sign that the influence of the religious right really is on the wane, in a weird way.
I bet many of the members of Congress who list their affiliation as “Methodist” or “Presbyterian” or whatever are actually agnostic/atheist in private; the only avowed, “out” non-believer I’m aware of Rep. Pete Stark (D-CA).
If Obama’s middle name was something else and he was from a Christian or Animist tribe on his father’s side, one wonders if he could have gotten more like 56 or 57% of the general election vote.
June 24th, 2009 at 1:56 pm
Are you saying that freethinkers do not care if the President believes in fairy tales, or the literal word of the Bible? Or are you saying the 10’s of millions of “believers” don’t care?
I, for one, am an atheist, and do care deeply if my President believes in the literal word of the bible. If you don’t believe the earth is billions instead of thousands of years old, than I have to question your sanity and ability to accept and act on evidence instead of faith.
These types of beliefs are how you end up with a George Bush in office.
However, I accept that most people in this country are religious to some extent, but don’t take it all literally (Pascal’s Wager types) and I’m willing to accept that a President could be of this ilk, and be a reasonable person.
I’m actually not sure if Obama is genuine about his beliefs, sometimes it seems like he is, other times he seems pretty agnostic, but he never advocates the hard-line or unreasonable aspects of religion, so I’m fine with not knowing the truth.
June 24th, 2009 at 3:09 pm
The important point here is that you can poll on anything in the US and get around 10% of people who’ll say the sun revolves around earth, the earth is flat, the sky is green, Mark Sanford was hiking the Appalachian Trail, etc.
June 24th, 2009 at 3:42 pm
If anyone is interested in learning more about the Obama/Muslim myth, then check out this paper draft done by Brendan Nyhan et al. http://www.duke.edu/~bjn3/obama-muslim.pdf
June 24th, 2009 at 3:50 pm
So, apparently, there’s a substantial number of people who believe that
a) Obama is faking his Christianity, probably because of the substantial number of people, mostly Christians, who wouldn’t vote for a nonbeliever, and
b) that’s OK, because there isn’t supposed to be any religious test for political offices and if he’s only fooling bigots, no harm no foul.
At least, that’s how I would interpret these results.
Personally, I believe that Obama is a Christian, but one who believes in equal rights for everyone and therefore, that religion shouldn’t be involved in government. So he keeps his religion in his private life.
One reason I don’t think he’s a closet atheist is that I think there’s a couple of times he’s tried to be inclusive of everyone and ended up including people of all religions. I don’t think an atheist would make that mistake.
June 24th, 2009 at 7:20 pm
Re: As I understand it, under a strict interpretation of Islamic law, Islam is inherited through the father and cannot be disavowed under any circumstances.
You understand wrong. Islam must be accepted voluntarily. Hence the Profession of Faith (”There is no god but God and Mohammed is his Prophet”), which is the equiavlent of Christian Baptism and which everyone must say, sincerely, before they are admited to Islam. Your statement is true only to the extent that once a person becomes a Muslim they are regarded as Muslim for life, and any rejection of Islam is seen as the sin (in some places the crime) of apostacy. I’m not sure how old one must be to make the Profession of Faith, but there’s zero evidence that Obama ever did, and the Islamic world has made no claims on him.
June 24th, 2009 at 9:11 pm
Davis X. Machina wins this thread hands down.
But also, I think you’re dropping the most interesting question here: how many people both believed that Obama was a Muslim and voted for him? You’d expect not many, but it’s worth checking. As @28 pointed out, more than a quarter of people who think Obama is a Muslim also approve of the job he’s doing.
June 25th, 2009 at 5:41 am
Matt,
Although you’ve never had anything to say about it, you have read Obama’s 1995 autobiography, which devotes many pages to his reasons for joining Rev. Wright’s church.
Having read that, do you actually believe Obama is a Christian?
The distinguished essayist Jonathan Raban studied Obama’s memoirs for The Guardian and looked into Rev. Wright’s chruch and concluded that Obama is a “scrupulous agnostic.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jan/05/uselections2008.barackobama
June 25th, 2009 at 9:14 am
No Steve, I don’t believe he is a Christian in the strictest sense of the word. I do, however, believe you are a scrupulously racist cunt.
June 25th, 2009 at 10:31 am
@41,42: Looks like real Steve and fake Matt, although I could be wrong.
The amount of identity spoofing going on here recently is becoming annoying, IMO. I don’t know what could be done about it, though.