Antipathy toward atheists stems from religious distrust, not general dislike

Evidence

This theory is a step in the right direction, and helps us appreciate that the content of stereotypes matters a great deal, and that the diversity of different prejudices is part of the explanation. However, it does not go far enough to explain the peculiar nature of atheist distrust, and because it is not a cultural evolutionary theory, it is silent about the religious origins of large-scale cooperation. Aside from failing to distinguish stereotypes of atheists from those of feminists and Jewish people—who despite their identical warmth/competence profiles are trusted much more than atheists—it does not clearly delineate between trust and pleasantness, which would likely be classified together under the umbrella of “warmth.” Trust and pleasantness, however are different things, and in fact in our studies they led to very different moral reactions. More significantly, however, we have found many indications that antipathy toward atheists has religious origins: (1) it is specifically about distrust rather than disgust, fear, or general dislike; (2) it is strongly and consistently predicted by religious belief; and (3) to be even more precise, it is driven by the religious intuition that people lacking belief in supernatural surveillance cannot act morally. — Norenzayan, Ara, Big gods - how religion transformed…, 291

Categorization

• XREF: Connects directly to the reader’s core analytical thread: the distrust is about perceived absence of supernatural surveillance (Big God mechanism).