PZ Myers thinks so...and I largely agree. It seems that in a capitalist culture the popularity of an idea or in some cases ideology is directly correlated with its material marketability and atheism certainly is not very sellable in that regard (as the above comic pointedly points out).Via the Las Vegas Weekly:
Look for atheist perfume and you’ll be looking for eternity. You won’t find the works of Bertrand Russell packaged like the latest issue of Self or Cosmo, as the publishing company Thomas Nelson does with the Bible. (“Becoming is the complete New Testament in magazine format, but it wouldn’t be a culture ’zine if it didn’t address men, beauty, fitness and food!”) Look for the atheist equivalent to Christian yo-yos and Christian neckties and you will come up as empty-handed as Mother Teresa passing the plate at Christopher Hitchens’ dinner table.
No doubt the thought of atheist lip balm and atheist jelly beans is hard to reconcile for many freethinkers—one of the virtues of atheism is that not every aspect of one’s life has to be yoked to some clingy deity who feels totally left out if you don’t include Him in everything you do. Plus, there’s simply the logical disconnect: What do jelly beans have to do with atheism? Why not stick with books, rational arguments, reason?
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