Obese atheists and marriageability

The atheist divorce rate is a steep 37%.

For more information, please see: Atheism and divorce

The Christian apologist Michael Caputo wrote: "Recently the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life has published its mammoth study on Religion in America based on 35,000 interviews... According to the Pew Forum a whopping 37% of atheists never marry as opposed to 19% of the American population, 17% of Protestants and 17% of Catholics." See also: Atheism and marriage

According to the 2001 American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) over 50% of all atheists and agnostics don’t get married. The fertility rate is significantly lower in the atheist population (see: Atheism and fertility rates).

Atheism and obesity

See also: Atheism and obesity

According to the Gallup Inc., "Very religious Americans are more likely to practice healthy behaviors than those who are moderately religious or nonreligious."

Gallup declared concerning the study which measured the degree to which religiosity affects health practices: "Generalized linear model analysis was used to estimate marginal scores all five reported metrics after controlling for age (in years), gender, race/ethnicity, marital status, education (number of years), log of income, and region of the country... Results are based on telephone interviews conducted as part of the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index survey Jan. 2-July 28, 2010, with a random sample of 554,066 adults, aged 18 and older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia, selected using random-digit-dial sampling."

The Gallup study gives some insight into the above average health habits of the very religious and not necessarily the health habits of atheists. The reason is that the Gallup organization defines a non-religious as a person where "Religion is not an important part of daily life and church/synagogue/mosque attendance occurs seldom or never. This group constitutes 29.7% of the adult population." While many Western atheists are non-religious, not all non-religious people are atheists.

Gallup further declares:

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Very religious Americans make healthier choices than their moderately religious and nonreligious counterparts across all four of the Healthy Behavior Index metrics, including smoking, healthy eating, and regular exercise. Smoking is one area of particular differentiation between the very religious and less religious Americans, with the nonreligious 85% more likely to be smokers than those who are very religious.

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In the journal article Religion, self-regulation, and self-control: Associations, explanations, and implications, psychologists McCullough and Willoughby theorize that many of the positive links of religiousness with health and social behavior may be caused by religion's beneficial influences on self-control/self-regulation.

For more information please see: Atheism and obesity

Obese atheists have fewer dating opportunities

According to the abstract for a paper presented at the 2004 annual meeting of the American Sociological Association: "Obese individuals have fewer dating opportunities, marry later and marry less desirable partners."

Studies indicate that atheists are a minority in the population. Studies also indicate that people tend to marry people with similar values or who resemble their parents or themselves. In addition, the Bible teaches Christians not to marry a non-Christian (The Bible also teaches a believer to stay married to a non-believer if you are already married). Also, interfaith marriages often have greater marital friction and interfaith marriages historically have had higher rates of divorce. Therefore, it would not be surprising if obese atheists find it more difficult to find marriage partners and if atheist/theist marriages also have increased marital friction and higher rates of divorce since these two worldviews are so different.

Obese male atheists and marriageability

Studies and web traffic data appear to indicate that women in the Western World tend to be more religious than men.

See also: Atheism appears to be significantly less appealing to women and Atheism and marriage

Survey data and website tracking data of prominent atheists' websites indicate that in the Western World, atheism appears to be significantly less appealing to women. Studies also indicate that atheists are a minority in the population.

In September 26, 2008, The Telegraph reported concerning the English population:

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The proportion of adults in England who are an unhealthy size has soared over the past 15 years with one in four now seriously overweight. There have always been more obese women than men but the gap between the genders has now been cancelled out. In addition, the number of overweight women has fallen in recent years while the number of morbidly obese men is rising sharply.

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Given that atheism appears to be significantly less appealing to women, obesity reduces one's marriageability, atheists are a minority in the population and that people tend to marry people with similar values or who resemble their parents or themselves as noted above; this would suggest that obese male atheists may find it more difficult to find prospective female partners for marriage. And of course, militant atheism might make matters even more difficult.

See also

• Atheism and marriageability
• Atheism and obesity
• Atheism and health
• Atheism and depression
• Atheism and suicide