So I was thinking that it was about time I started watching Battlestar Galactica. I Know, I know, "half a decade too late" you might say. I was always hearing people saying what a good show it war, but I just never got around to watching it so I decided to start now. Well, I started reading up about the series first, 'cause I like knowing ahead what a show is about before i start watching it. Stumbling in a forum I observed that a lot of people were saying that the finale sucked (and having been extremely dissappointed by Lost finale I didn't want to go through something like that again). Allegedly it sucked due to some religious nonsense.

Well reading more about the series I discovered that religion was a very important part of the series, but there was something that striked me (other than ridiculous things like robots having a religion): the poor representation of atheists on that show. Also it seemed to me from what I read and from the forums I checked out that the few atheists that appeared on that show were portraid as amoral, nihilistic, drug consuming, prostitute frequenting and mainly as jerks.

This got me thinking about something that I hadn't noticed until now: the underrepresentation of atheists in movies/TV.

You barely see a TV show that has atheists in them, and when a show has such a character he's most likely unlikable. The most famous atheist character on TV right now is most likely Dr. Gregory House, from the TV Show House, and if you've ever seen an episode of that show you'll now that while Dr. House is a brilliant man he also is a junkie a-hole.

I've never seen the TV show Bones but I understand that the main character is an atheist, but she also has Asperger's Syndrome, so basically she's mentally disabled.

Another thing that bothers me is how atheist in TV shows always seem to become beleivers by the end of the show (think the admiral guy from Battlestar Galactica or Jack Shepard form Lost). And don't get me started on the whole "cynical nihilistic selfish atheist who becomes a better person after converting to a religion theme" (I believe an atheist guy from Battlestar did just that).

This whole negative representation of atheists reminds me of the times when gays used to be constantly portrayed as serial killers, paedophilers and sexual abuse victims.

So what do you think? Do you agree that atheists are underepresented in TV shows/movies? Do you agree that there seems to be a biasd against atheists and that shows portray the ideea that an atheist has to become a believer in order to be a decent person? And do you think that there is a a bias for religious people, especially Christians, and that they're never represented negativelly, or at least their religion is never blamed for any bad behavior those characters may exibit?

Atheists are defintely misrepresented in tv and cinema, it's pretty obvious in many movies how religious undertones are inserted.  Look at Tron by disney, the movie pits the atheist oppressors against the faithful heroes.  But instead of believing in gods since they're supposedly programs they're being oppressed for believing in "users" who are worshipped like gods (the people who write the programs) and the bad guys always make fun of them for believing in them.   If you're an atheist on TV you have to either be troubled by depression and anxiety, a drug addict, or a megalomaniac/facist.  Which obviously is not what real atheists are like on average.

Brita in community is Atheist! Also in Bones, it is never stated that she has such disorder, the character she is based off however did. 

I noticed a lot individuals in shows and media that they have no religion. (Which is similar to myself, does that mean I'm atheist? no)

Religion is often not talked about in shows, but most characters seem to be non-practicing Christians.

BTW, has anyone noticed the overrepresentation of Jews on TV shows, compared to atheists (there are more atheists in the US than there are Jews)? It seems like every sitcom has one or more Jewish character(s).

An issue here is that atheism isn't a belief in anything.  It is a lack of belief in something (God/gods).  Just because one is an atheist doesn't mean anything really, so there is a void there.  Writers will plug this or that in, to round out the character.

Temperance Brennan isn't mentally disabled,  where did you learn that? Its possible that her lack of social skills and  pop culture references could mislead someone who has never seen the show into thinking she is mentally disabled.

On topic: In the episode of Southpark where everyone is atheist and they were all fighting over what to call themselves, which made them all seem really stupid. On Bones Temperance often calls out Booth's religous beliefs, and I believe her role to be a positive view of Athiests.

I don't buy into this at all. I think there are plenty of characters who may be atheists in the writer's head but just don't bother delving into that portion of the character because, well, atheism is BORING. It doesn't make for a good story.

Religious undertones are fun because there's so much meat there to wrangle around into a fully-developed character. After all, most religious stories are interwoven with strong morality tales, quests for knowledge, and all the juicy stuff that makes a story interesting.

Atheism just doesn't provide that kind of material.

Atheists usually follow some form of philosophy since atheism itself is a singular belief, belief that there is no god.  It must be accompanied by other beliefs.  This actually allows atheist characters to have much more depth in their beliefs than christian characters.  So no it has nothing to do with how interesting atheism is. 

Consider this, there is an atheist sect of Judaism and christianity, there are buddhist atheists, there are atheists who simply follow rational explanations and don't attempt to guess beyond that and more belief systems that fit well with atheism.

I've never really noticed much of it, but it may be because it's mostly British and Japanese series that I watch, plus the odd CSI episode. I'd probably be mildly annoyed at preaching and characters based on that criteria, though I'm pretty good at filtering out a lot of what's coming from the tv.

I must say though that I wouldn't enjoy a character with a habit of restating atheism and trying to enlighten about that. To me it just runs a lot closer to non-committed/non-practising theists who don't really care to educate others in the matter. Outside of these forums it's extremely rare for me to even have to tell people I'm an atheist, let alone  bring out argumentation and try to convert them.

edit: I'm more annoyed by having the media depict girls as pink-loving shallow shrieky creatures who want to wear make up at 12 and other stereotypes around the more material sides of society.

Bones provides some great lines because she's atheist. Normally when calling out Catholicism.