Modern TV shows have become very inclusive of many groups that were rarely included before. Last year, we had the premiere of Off The Boat. It is the first show in twenty years that is focused on an Asian-American character.
One group that is WAY underrepresented is atheists. There have been representations of atheists on TV, but the portrayals were not always good.
In 2013, a show geared toward African-American viewers, Belle’s, had an atheist character. One episode introduced a new love interest for one of the characters. However, he becomes undateable when she finds out that he is an atheist. Even the writers of the synopsis had to make the character into a villain. The description of the episode read:
“Jill meets the perfect guy and invites him to dinner for an introduction to Bill and the family. His imperfection is revealed and Jill has to decide whether or not to continue dating him.”
Yes, the fact that the character is an atheist is considered an “imperfection.” Somehow network executives get away with making atheist characters look bad.
One guy created this image about it:
Some of these atheists are portrayed badly, but I actually like a lot of these characters. I can see how some people might not like them. Dr. Temperance Brennan (Bones) is a little cold on the show, but she is widely considered a genius in her field. Dexter Morgan is a genius in his field as well, but he is a serial killer.
There are a few recent, popular examples of atheists in TV shows. The character of Kurt Hummel on Glee was a gay, atheist, yet he was still well liked. Piper Chapman on Orange Is The New Black is also an atheist and she is well-liked. Here is a top ten list of other atheist characters on television. Hopefully, we can make more progress in this area in other television shows.
Here is a discussion about atheists being hated:
Featured image by Stefan via Flickr, available under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.
