If I ever read the word secularism in a newspaper, or hear it spoken on the news, or hear it spoken about by friends and acquaintances I almost always find that it is being used to describe something that is not secularism. I find more often than not it is being used to describe something pertaining to atheism.
Now there is nothing wrong in my opinion with atheist proselytism (for lack of a better word), but some form of atheistic advocacy movement is not secularist movement, it is an atheistic advocacy movement.
Secularism is in simplified terms advocacy for the separation of church and state. Which if you asked most people they'd say they were completely for, because it it affords protection to those who do share my beliefs as well as to those who don't. It's fair. But many of these people would not tell you that they were secularists. And this is purely because the word has been distorted. In modern minds it no longer means separation of church and state, it means atheist advocacy.
And so called secularist societies aren't helping either:
The secular coalition for america says :
"The Secular Coalition for America represents the viewpoints of nontheistic Americans"
http://secular.org/constituency
Secular women says:
"The mission of Secular Woman is to amplify the voice, presence, and influence of non-religious women"
http://www.secularwoman.org/about
The secular student alliance "is a 501(c)(3) educational nonprofit. We work to organize and empower nonreligious students around the country. Our primary goal is to foster successful grassroots campus groups which provide a welcoming community for secular students to discuss their views and promote their secular values."
http://www.secularstudents.org/about
The secular web " is owned and operated by Internet Infidels, Inc., a 501(c)(3) nonprofit educational organization dedicated to defending and promoting a naturalistic worldview on the Internet. Naturalism is the "hypothesis that the natural world is a closed system" in the sense that "nothing that is not a part of the natural world affects it." As such, "naturalism implies that there are no supernatural entities," such as gods, angels, demons, ghosts, or other spirits, "or at least none that actually exercises its power to affect the natural world."[1] And without miraculous interventions into nature from a spiritual realm, neither prayer nor magick are more effective than a placebo."
http://infidels.org/infidels/
See a pattern? Secularist = Non-religious = Naturalistic = etc. etc.
Secularism is none of these things, and in my opinion the people perpetuating these myths about it are doing incredible damage to secularism. In my opinion the term has been incredibly distorted, and there has been an incredibly damaging result.
What are your thoughts?