Quite a few news outlets are covering the recent Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life report detailing the changing nature of the religious landscape in this country. I actually read through a good part of the report looking for statistical faux pas to use in my “How To Lie With Statistics Series,” but found only minor ones…good job.

What I’d like to highlight, however, is the way in which the media is, to say the least, stretching the results.

Here are the headlines and choice quotes from a few “reputable” sources:

1. US News & World Report. Headline: Protestants Verging on Becoming Minorities - US News and World Report.
2. AFP. Headline: Protestants on verge of becoming minority in US: study.
3. Boston Globe. Choice quote: “A sweeping new study of religious affiliation in the United States finds a country in which Protestants are becoming a minority”.
4. The Australian. Headline: US protestants verge on minority.

Really, minorities? The report shows that Protestant Americans have dropped in numbers to 51% and US News & World Report seems to think that if they drop below 50% they will be a minority. Technically they would be correct, but they would be more correct in saying that Protestants would still be a plurality as they would be, by far, the largest religious group in the country. Something tells me that Protestants won’t be treated like other “minorities” in this country.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 26th, 2008 at 12:42 am and is filed under News, Rant, Religion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.