by Jane Iwamura

Concert-goers at the Coachella Music Festival this past Sunday night witnessed an otherworldly sight: Tupac Shakur onstage with fellow rap legends, Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg, performing “live.” This would not be so shocking, except for the fact that Shakur was gunned down on the Las Vegas strip in 1996. “What the f— up, Coachella?” Shakur shouted to the crowd—a seemingly impossible greeting, since the annual music festival began three years after Tupac's death. The crowd was stunned. They proceeded to watch in awe as Shakur was “resurrected” in life-like form, shooting rhymes and working the platform, in sync both musically and physically with his collaborators. At the end of the performance, the image of the rap icon dispersed in an ethereal thousand points of light. Tweets flew and videos of the appearance went viral on the web.

Religion writers and other reporters who covered the event might have missed the beat, however. Most of the news stories — including coverage on MTV and in the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal — focus on the technology behind the scenes: a 2-D image projected on a 30-foot-by-13-foot transparent screen and the digital manipulation of Shakur's body and voice (“What the f— up, Coachella?”). These reports choose to dissect the incredible labor and cost behind the project. Dr. Dre, who collaborated with three imaging companies (including James Cameron's Digital Domain), is revealed as “the man behind the curtain.”

Other pieces talk about the money-making potential of such a venture. Rumors spread that Dr. Dre planned to take the virtual Tupac on the road. Still other commentaries and blog posts bemoaned the state of the “live” (read: spontaneous and unmanufactured) performance.

Tupac's “second coming” is rife with religious overtones and touches on issues concerning contemporary spirituality that we also might consider. Why does Shakur's spirit endure? What did the audience at Coachella experience? (And by digital extension, what's the ethos of a generation that has grown up under the heavy influence of rap and hip hop?) What, exactly, are we trying to see in the video? In this case, does science and technology take away from religion and cultural meaning? Or simply confuse the issue? What sense do we make of the death of iconic public figures in the age of digital reproduction?

One can argue that we have already witnessed the rapper's “resurrection” through the posthumous release of “The Don Killuminati: The 7 Day Theory” and the steady flow of albums ever since. 2003 saw the release of “Tupac: Resurrection,” the official documentary about Shakur's life, narrated in his own voice. Tupac's mother, Afeni Shakur, and dedicated MC's (including Eminem) have kept the rapper's spirit alive.

Their devotion is shared by a much wider audience, who see in Shakur a tragic figure, a hero, a martyr. Tupac's life was complex and embodied multiple contradictions. On the one hand, he was visionary, compassionate and an intelligent advocate for liberation and social change. On the other, he was aggressive, emotional and susceptible to all the trappings of the Thug Life. His music reflected these different dimensions. Shakur, in the end, seemed to transcend his flaws. He is upheld not only as a musical icon, but also as a cultural hero. He seemed to be reaching for something beyond what the system stood for and could provide.

The spiritual dimensions of the phenomenon that is Tupac Shakur emerge precisely from these meaning-making processes as they play out in the lives of those he touched through his work.  They imbue his life and music with a significance and aura that few other hip hop artists—dead or alive—enjoy. While there were those in the Coachella audience who took Tupac's apparition as a genius stunt, others fell silent and later described the event as “eerie” and “uncomfortable.”  An unexpected reaction, perhaps, yet one that testifies that the spirit of Tupac is still “living large” in the popular imagination. And that religiosity can spring spontaneously to life in places where we might least expect it.

Jane Iwamura is a Visiting Scholar at the UCLA Asian American Studies Center. She is the author of Virtual Orientalism: Asian Religions and American Popular Culture and co-editor of Revealing the Sacred in Asian and Pacific America.

by Diane Winston and John Green

A visiting Martian might be forgiven for thinking that Americans care more about the religion of prospective presidential candidates than they do about the economy, the environment, health care, or even space travel. And, according to a recent poll, a growing number of Americans would likely agree. Last week a Pew Research Center survey reported that almost two-fifths of the public says the candidates talk too much about their faith.

Are the candidates at fault for this surfeit of religiosity, or is the problem with the news media, which seems eager to tout Santorum's religious “war on women,” Romney's “un-Christian” Christianity, Gingrich's “born-again” Catholicism, and Obama's alleged Muslim heritage?

A new survey of news consumers and reporters reveals a significant gap between the two groups on what's important and how it's covered. Two-thirds of the public says the news media sensationalizes religion, a view shared by a little less than one-third of reporters. Significantly, almost 70 percent of the public prefers coverage on religious experience and spirituality, while reporters' focus is on religion and politics.

“Good News? Media Consumers and Producers on Religion Coverage” is a joint project of the Knight Program in Media and Religion at the University of Southern California's Annenberg School and the Ray C. Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron. A first-of-its-kind survey of journalists and the audiences they serve, the report looks at results across media platforms and also factors in demographic differences.

Reporters and their audiences do find common ground: A majority of both groups agree that the news media “does a poor job of explaining religion in society,” with 51.8 percent and 57.1 percent assenting to that proposition, respectively. Both also ranked television news lowest in the quality and quantity of reportage. But while the public divided almost evenly on the strength of reporting in news magazines, newspapers, radio and online, reporters overwhelmingly said their own organization–whatever it was–did the best job.

One reason for shortcomings in current coverage is that many reporters lack expertise. Half of those surveyed say they don't know a lot about religion. Only a fifth claimed to be “very knowledgeable,” and most in that small segment said their information was from their own religious practice, self-study and their family background. In the past, news organizations encouraged staff to attend seminars and workshops for continuing education. But in the recent climate of cutbacks, journalists are reluctant to spend time away from the newsroom even if enhancing their skills.

At the very moment when more people than ever have access to American news media through online sites, many outlets are cutting back on resources and on personnel. In the rush to save money, managers deem journalists with experience or topical expertise too expensive or too specialized to keep. Those who remain don't have the time to master the basics of beats like science, medicine, economics or religion, which require more than routine familiarity.

Once upon a time, religion was viewed as a specialization. The beat attracted “PKs,” preachers' kids, who knew how to write stories on Sunday sermons and church activities. But nowadays religion intersects with politics, popular culture, foreign policy, the economy and the environment. Even if news outlets do have a designated religion reporter, the range of religion-related stories would be too much for one person to cover. But rather than encouraging all journalists to probe these overlapping relationships, many news outlets rely on the “he said/she said” model or conflict narratives more generally. As a result, reporters who can't differentiate Shia from Sunni Muslims write about Koran burnings, burial customs and Islamic law and politics without nuance or subtlety.

Not surprisingly, then, many Americans say the media sensationalizes religion. But they, too, see its impact in stark terms: nearly half consider religion to be a source of conflict in the world, and just a slight majority sees it as a source of good. In contrast, reporters overwhelmingly see it as a mixed bag. One might think, then, that the news media would be filled with thoughtful stories that explore the complexity and ambiguity of religion in society. But since that's not the case, journalists, lacking strong feelings of their own, may be opting for what's easy.

In either case, consumers should call for less speculation about the candidates' religious faith and more reporting on how they're going to fix the economy, save the environment and send a woman to Mars. Religion figures into all of those endeavors, but without savvy reporting to bring it to light, most of us might never know.

Diane Winston is Knight Chair in Media and Religion, University of Southern California. John Green writes from the Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron. This piece was originally published in the Washington Post on April 5, 2012.

by Maura Jane Farrelly

The Southern Baptist Convention's Richard Land has been generating some controversy in recent weeks. First, there were his comments about the Trayvon Martin killing in Florida, delivered during his nationally broadcast radio show. According to Land, the demonstrations calling for the arrest of George Zimmerman, the man who killed Martin, were the work of “race hustlers” looking to “gin up the black vote for an African-American president who is in deep, deep, deep trouble.” Land, who is the head of the SBC's Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, compared George Zimmerman to the white lacrosse players at Duke University who were falsely accused of raping a black woman in 2006.

Then there were Land's comments this past Sunday on CBS's “Face the Nation.” He called upon GOP presidential candidate Rick Santorum – whose candidacy was extremely popular with evangelical voters – to “seriously consider leaving the race now” and throw his support behind the Mormon front-runner, Mitt Romney. It's not clear whether Land's advice played a role in Santorum's decision to suspend his campaign this week. But Land's comments, which were shared during a broadcast on Easter morning, undoubtedly disappointed many of his fellow Baptists. 

R. Philip Roberts, for example, who is president of the Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, has made a career out of “unmasking” the Mormon faith and has expressed deep concern that a Romney presidency would enable the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints to “use his position around the world as a calling card for legitimizing their church and proselytizing people.”

That Land's comments about Rick Santorum – and his implicit endorsement of Mitt Romney – might be criticized by members of the evangelical community is, perhaps, not surprising. The mainstream news media, after all, have done a wonderful job of covering both the antipathy that evangelicals feel toward the Mormon faith as well as their historically interesting enthusiasm for the Latin Rite Catholic candidate from Pennsylvania. Indeed, Richard Land himself has said on more than one occasion that he does not consider Mitt Romney to be a Christian – which should prompt journalists to interrogate him about his comments on “Face the Nation,” especially now that Santorum is no longer running.

But the notion that Land's comments about the handling of the Trayvon Martin case might also be criticized by evangelicals is a little less obvious, given the way the evangelical community is frequently portrayed in the mainstream media. Evangelicals, after all, are not typically presented as leaders of liberal causes or even champions of racial justice. And yet some of the loudest criticisms of Land's comments on the death of the Florida teen have come from within the evangelical community. Robert Parham, for example, who is executive director of the Baptist Center for Ethics in Nashville, Tennessee, called Land's radio comments “reckless,” and he predicted that they would “feed the deep-seated racial resentment among many Southern Baptists and jeopardize the efforts of other Southern Baptists to advance racial reconciliation.”

The fact of the matter is that the evangelical community in the United States is not a monolith – a reality that has been very much on display this week in Washington, DC, as more than 700 progressive and conservative evangelicals have gathered for the sixth annual “Q Conference.” Modeled after the TED conferences that have been bringing people together from the worlds of technology, entertainment and design since 1984, the Q Conference and its organizers hope to create a platform for “the best and brightest ideas” about how to “redeem entire cultures” and “regain Christianity's cultural influence” in the United States.

Richard Land is among this year's participants. So is Jim Wallis, the evangelical founder of the progressive advocacy group Sojourners who also serves a spiritual adviser to President Obama.  David Brooks, the moderately conservative columnist from the New York Times, also plans to be at the conference. He's not even a Christian; Brooks is Jewish – though as a child, he did attend a school in New York City that was affiliated with the Episcopal Church.

Since its founding in 2006, the Q Conference hasn't attracted much attention from mainstream reporters. But Brooks' participation in this year's conference could change that. And if it does, the change would certainly be a welcome one. Americans of all political and religious stripes could only benefit from a more nuanced understanding of evangelical Christianity that doesn't automatically equate the teachings of the faith with the pronouncements of Richard Land.

Maura Jane Farrelly is assistant professor of American Studies and Director of the Journalism Program at Brandeis University. In the past, she was a reporter for Voice of America and Georgia Public Radio. Her first book, Papist Patriots: The Making of an American Catholic Identity, was recently published by Oxford University Press.

by Laura J. Nelson

The hottest topics on Easter Sunday's news talk-shows? Religion and politics.

“Religion will be less important in the fall in the general election than at any time since 1972, before Roe versus Wade really transformed the landscape,” said Jon Meacham, an executive editor at Random House, who argued on “Meet the Press” that candidates will most likely downplay religion. “It's not frankly in either candidate's interest to get into theological debates at this point.”

Not in the candidate's interest, maybe. But it's never been up to the candidate to decide what issues fall under the public gaze. It's important for voters to understand every trait of a candidate that influences their decision-making process. That includes faith.

“Everyone in politics is going to be influenced by their faith,” Rep. Raul Labrador (R-Idaho) told “MTP” moderator David Gregory. “We can't talk about having politics void of any religious faith because then what you're saying is… you're asking people to not be who they are.”

Just as journalists question statements made during debates and double-check information from city officials, so should they question assertions based on religion. Every candidate should be able to discuss their beliefs; in turn, every assertion deserves close journalistic scrutiny.

A prime example is Mitt Romney. The most common way Americans describe Mormonism is “a cult.” Seven in 10 Americans never speak or rarely speak with Mormons. But as the likelihood grows that Romney will bear the mantle of the Republican presidential nomination, a grasp of Mormonism that starts and ends with “cult” simply doesn't cut it. The responsibility to educate and inform the public about the religion of a man who wants to run the country is squarely on the shoulders of the news media.

Journalists have frequently brought up the quirkier tenets of Mormonism — “Stick that in your magic underwear,” a New York Times columnist Tweeted during a debate — which echoes the sensibility of questions that Romney has been asked at town hall meetings (“Do you believe it's a sin for a white man to marry and procreate with a black? “). But almost no stories have taken the logical next step: following up on those comments by explaining to voters what Mitt Romney really does believe.

But understanding is a two-way street. Part of the reason rumors still swirl around Mormonism could be because Romney himself has appeared reluctant to discuss his faith. Although he has said he “believes in the Mormon faith and [endeavors] to live by it,” there is still very little information on what role his faith would play in his presidency.

Perhaps Romney feels he doesn't need to discuss it. Or perhaps he fears vetting the issue in the current political climate: After all, nearly a quarter of the American population says they would refuse to elect a Mormon. That's twice as high as those reluctant to elect a black, Catholic, Jewish or female candidate. But with so many questions swirling, there's surely a journalist out there who would gladly pick his brain.  

The news and information section of the Jesus Christ Church of Latter Day Saints website provides a basic summary of the Mormon faith. But, like any other religious organization, the LDS Church does not discuss how those beliefs would come into play in the Oval Office.

Covering religion as a factor in decision-making doesn't mean providing a platform for a candidate to spout religious or anti-religious messages. Nearly 38 percent of Americans now believe political leaders are too heavy-handed with their expressions of faith and prayer. More appropriate would be a series of questions probing ethics, policies, decisions and their link to faith. (A stellar example of this comes from Slate, which published a lengthy, in-depth story on how Romney's changing views on abortion are tied to his faith.)

Religion is a critical part of political campaigns, and should be addressed with as much gravitas as voting records and candidates' stances on the issues. Clarifying the political consequences of belief, including Mormonism, would go a long way toward assuaging public doubt about religion. It would encourage voters to make decisions based on fact, rather than rumor and fear.

Laura J. Nelson is a reporter based in Los Angeles whose work has appeared in a variety of news outlets, including the Boston Globe, the St. Petersburg Times, the Los Angeles Daily News and the Kansas City Star. Laura has spent the last three years covering local news in Los Angeles, and will spend summer 2012 as an intern with the Los Angeles Times. She is in her last semester at the University of Southern California, where she is pursuing a B.A. in Print & Digital Journalism and a minor in French. Someday, she hopes to report from somewhere in the Francophone world. Laura believes everyone has a story worth telling.

by Adriana Janovich

When a former student opened fire last week at Oikos University in Oakland, Calif., reporters scrambled to cover the crime. It was breaking news on the police beat, the deadliest school shooting since the 2007 massacre at Virginia Tech and, according to the San Jose Mercury News, the largest mass killing in Oakland's history. It left seven dead and three injured.

Information about the alleged shooter and his possible motive quickly emerged. Later, victims' identities were released. Bloggers weighed in. And news outlets across the country — from the New York Times, the Associated Press, National Public Radio, CNN, the Oakland Tribune and BerkeleyPatch, among others — posted ongoing coverage.

Yet little of that considerable volume of reporting included a clear presentation of the religion angle. Reporters largely ignored the fact the killing spree took place during Holy Week, one of the most sacred times on the Christian calendar. Most failed to mention that police found the gun on Good Friday. While almost all acknowledged that the shooting occurred at a small, private Christian college, details were — at best — scant or confusing.

And that's how they remain. More than a week later, little is known about the school — other than it caters to Korean-American students, offers classes in Bible studies, nursing, Asian medicine and music, and was the site of a terrible tragedy.

Reporting breaking news — especially the context around violent deaths — is difficult. The crime scene can be chaotic, even dangerous. Sources are often in shock, too upset to talk to reporters regardless of whether they are otherwise reliable. But how helpful is it to include speculation from a source who has never heard of the school and can only guess about its religiosity?

Most of the Oikos stories that include religion-related details do so merely in passing, and mostly by quoting statements from the school's website. One bylined blog post in particular seems simply to have strung together bits of text from the site. The school was variously described in other outlets as “fundamentalist,” “evangelical,” “protestant” — with a lower-case P — and “Catholic.” It doesn't help to note the school is affiliated with a San Francisco university or Oakland church if little is known about those institutions.

While memorials were being planned and more meaningful stories could have been written, one writer wanted to know: “Why name a school — or a yogurt, or a sustainable construction site, or an academic journal —'Oikos' in the first place?” Calls to the school “were answered by people whose minds were on other things — and who did not speak enough English to answer questions.”

When Holy Week was referenced, it was typically in Christian media or by clergy, like the “Roamin' Catholic Priest,” chaplain for the Oakland police and fire departments, who spent most of his post recognizing responders. A few outlets mentioned Holy Week in a single sentence.

Language barriers as well as religious and cultural differences might have limited coverage. Competition for the latest updates also complicates matters. But in stories where faith is concerned, discrepancies and mistakes — even in initial drafts — highlight the findings of a recent Knight Chair-Bliss Institute study, which revealed that less than one-fifth of journalists say they are “very knowledgeable” about religion. On the other hand, most Americans — nearly 70 percent — say they're interested in more complex coverage, and the majority of reporters and readers agree — some 51.8 percent and 57.1 percent, respectively — that news media “does a poor job of explaining religion in society.”

In the wake of the Oikos shooting, there's need for follow-up on a faith community that found itself in the spotlight because of a crisis. Otherwise, the small, Christian school focused on faith and healing will remain largely unknown — and maybe misunderstood — save for this tragedy.

Adriana Janovich is an Annenberg Fellow in the specialized journalism program at the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism at the University of Southern California. She's interested in reporting stories about education, immigration, youth, religion, lifestyles and social issues.

by Brie Loskota

When I was a kid the Movieguide newsletter would arrive and, if I was quick enough, I could hide it before my mom stacked it on our bookshelf near the encyclopedias. If I failed, there it sat as an arbiter of what movies were “morally uplifting” (which, for Movieguide, meant pro-Christian, pro-capitalism and anti- just about everything else) and which films would send us spiraling down into moral turpitude. 

After dinner our table was often transformed into ground-zero for the Culture Wars. My older sister and I were instructed to read aloud the movie reviews that categorized and rated the sins of each film in face-reddening detail. The exercise would end when my father issued a ruling as to which films we'd be allowed to see that weekend. Movieguide was a few thin sheets of paper that separated us from Hollywood's anti-Christian, anti-values propaganda.  

A recent Religion News Service article picked up by the Kansas City Star suggests that not much has changed in Hollywood; the entertainment industry remains allergic to religion. Pointing to the lack of religion-based content in successful television shows, the RNS piece highlights a few cases of canceled programs to lend credibility to the common-sense claim that Hollywood is the oil to religion's water.  But is that the whole story?

Turns out no. In fact, Movieguide itself asserts that “faith-based films made more money in 2011 than their left-leaning counterparts,” as a FoxNews headline tells us. An annual report by Movieguide “found that in 2011, American audiences preferred movies with strong conservative content and values over movies with liberal or left-leaning values by an almost six-to-one margin.” How is it that box-office successes for Christian films can exist in the heathen haven of Hollywood? (And let's leave the bizarre notion that moral values and liberal / left-leaning content are diametrically opposed for another blog).

According to Movieguide's head, “[E]very studio now has a Christian film division, and several studios are doing major movies with strong Christian content.”

To wit, the New York Times reports on “October Baby,” a “quiet hit” that received high marks from Movieguide, which belies the notion that Hollywood shies away from religion. Tailored to a mostly Christian audience, the film is “distributed by Samuel Goldwyn Films and the Sony-owned Provident Films, which specializes in socially conservative religious fare” and “benefited from the kind of grass-roots religion-focused marketing (enlisting Bible and prayer groups and ministries) that has carried their other Christian-oriented movies, like 'Fireproof' and 'Courageous,' to box-office success.”   

“The [Movieguide] study also claimed that the stronger the Christian worldview in the film, the more money it made,” according to FoxNews. Perhaps that is the real story. Beyond the ongoing debate about Hollywood's ideological proclivities lies one important fact: Studios have recognized the market power of conservative Christian audiences and are tailoring offerings to fit the niche.  

How did this happen? Who are the players? What does the content look like? And what does this portend for the future?

Perhaps it's time to get beyond the notion that religion is subjecta non grata in Hollywood and dig deeper into the complex machinery supporting and making money off of the religious market. Remember, they call it “The Industry” for a reason.

Brie Loskota is Managing Director of the Center for Religion and Civic Culture at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. She also serves as the program officer for the CRCC Pentecostal and Charismatic Research Initiative, a project that seeks to spur new research on one of the world's fastest growing religious movements.

by Benjamin Gottlieb

The deadly, coordinated bombings in the Patani region of Thailand over the weekend – in which 15 people were killed and hundreds injured – reminded Thais fresh off a successful democratic election of the religious and ethnic tensions that persist in the nation's southern provinces.

Since 2004, more than 5,000 people have been killed in the country's enduring conflict in the south, which pits Thailand's ethnic Malay Muslims against the majority Buddhist populous. The high death total has prompted the Thai government to impose martial law in Thailand's Patani region, which today grants military personnel free rein to apprehend and interrogate “suspected terrorists.”

It's all too easy to liken the recent bouts of terrorism in southern Thailand to the broader, global trend of Muslim fundamentalism and extremism. To the uninformed reader, the script looks familiar: a Muslim group – in this case, suspected members of the Patani United Liberation Organization (PULO) – using religion to justify a violent political ideology and disrupt the lives of ordinary, upstanding citizens.

The problem with such discourse, which is propagated by a lack of context in news media coverage of the situation, is that it completely ignores the history of the Patani region and its fight for autonomy. While the Wall Street Journal has provided some good background information, other mainstream outlets (the BBC, Time and CNN, for example) have been far less thorough.

The struggle is, in fact, centuries old. Patani has seen a host of different rulers, from Hindu-Buddhist governance in the early second century, to an Islamic kingdom in the 13th century. It wasn't until the early 20th century that Patani was annexed by what is present-day Thailand. To think of this conflict, as the media persists in doing, as stemming from the early 2000s and the PULO is a gross omission of Patani's historic significance as a crucible of strife.

Also left out of the weekend media coverage was how the Thai government has used the Malay Muslim issue as a political weapon.  

Public opinion in Thailand toward the country's southernmost provinces has become a mechanism for racist rhetoric, extending perceptions of Malay Muslims to all Thais living in the south. The Thai Buddhists who live in the region have darker skin than their countrymen in the north and, as a whole, resemble the ethnic Malay population. Although the majority of Thailand's deep south is Malay Muslim, somewhere between 80-85 percent, the region is hardly homogenous.

As acclaimed Buddhist scholar Michael Jerryson wrote in his book, Buddhist Fury, “[I]t is the implicit confluence of Malay ethnicity and Islam that generates an impasse for Malay Muslim acceptance in Thai society.”

For Western news audiences, the notion that Buddhists are the oppressors in Thailand and that the Muslim minority is being oppressed runs counter to deep biases that few in our news media are willing to challenge. It's much easier to depict the March 31 violence in southern Thailand as a product of “Muslim extremism” than to explain an inequitable political system that oppresses thousands of Thai Muslims, the vast majority of whom have no connection to the militancy.  

As journalists, we have an obligation not to decontextualize instances of terrorism, like those in southern Thailand, for the purpose of packaging news coverage that is easily digestible. Such distortions will only serve to prolong the life of the self-perpetuating myth that the West is locked in a global conflict against Islam.

Benjamin Max Gottlieb is a multimedia journalist and photographer based in Los Angeles, California. His work has been featured in a variety of news outlets, including the Los Angeles Times, CNN International, CNN's “Business 360” blog, NBC Los Angeles, KCET.com and the Santa Barbara Independent, among others. He is currently a graduate student at the USC Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism, pursuing an M.A. in Online Journalism, and serves as the Executive Editor of NeonTommy.com — a 24/7 online-only news publication. He is also the art director of InTheFray.org, an online magazine that explores global issues with personal perspectives and critical analysis. An avid backpacker and self-proclaimed troubadour, Benjamin is constantly exploring new ways to tell stories.

by Jason Kehe

March was a busy month for atheists. Two Saturdays ago, thousands of them—estimates ranged from 10,000 to 30,000—congregated at the National Mall for the so-called Reason Rally, billed as “the largest secular event in world history.” This past weekend, the U.S. military hosted its first-ever event for soldiers and others who don't believe in God. Finally, a new book just came out called “Religion for Atheists: A Non-believer's Guide to the Uses of Religion.”

But despite this profusion of news about nonbelievers, the media don't seem to be getting any better at covering it. Journalists remain trite, smart-alecky and even hostile in their reporting, guilty of perpetuating the widespread, and almost always unfounded, distrust of atheism that's long made mockery of this country's championship of religious tolerance.

USA Today's story on the Reason Rally exemplifies the worst of this kind of coverage. It begins: “About 20,000 atheists gathered within shouting distance of the Washington Monument on Saturday for a Reason Rally hell-bent on damning religion and mocking beliefs.”

The writer, it seems, would rather be clever than fair. “Hell-bent on damning religion” is excellent, ironic wordplay, but it does exactly what smart, balanced journalism shouldn't do: characterize an entire group of people in a single, oversimplified way. Even worse was the story's headline: “Richard Dawkins to atheist rally: 'Show contempt' for faith.” Dawkins, one of the world's most outspoken atheists, indeed said that in his speech, and surely meant it. But making it the most visible feature of the story implies that it was a sentiment shared by all, that every nonbeliever in attendance was some kind of angry, militant, combative crusader who would rather spit on his Christian neighbor than engage in meaningful dialogue. Is that fair, or right, or true?

Maybe it was, in this case—but it seems unlikely, when other stories suggested that the rally seemed to lack energy and passion. The point of the day was to gather like-minded thinkers together and develop a sense of community, not attack religion. But that's not a sexy headline.

It seems, sometimes, that the standards of objectivity we expect of most journalism don't always apply to reporting about atheists. Fox News's coverage of the rally consisted of two negative opinion pieces (“Why the Reason Rally is Unreasonable” and “The rally for nothing in particular“). But it wasn't just Fox. Most of the coverage wasn't straight news; it was blog-like reaction pieces, like that USA Today story.

In 2006, the American Sociological Association found that atheists are the most distrusted minority in America. One wonders if our coverage of them in the media—the way in which their activities and beliefs are presented to the general public—is at all to blame.

Jason Kehe is a writer and editor based in Los Angeles. He is currently finishing his B.A. in Print and Digital Journalism at the USC Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism and is the Online Book Editor at Los Angeles magazine. He has spent the past four years writing and reporting on L.A. arts and culture, with a special focus on theater. His work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, Jewish Journal, Daily Trojan and Neon Tommy.com, where he served as Senior Arts Editor for two years. Jason also studies neuroscience and film.