OPIATE OF THE MASSES? SOCIAL INEQUALITY, RELIGION, AND POLITICS
Landon Schnabel* Indiana University, Bloomington
Abstract: This study considers the assertion that religion is the opiate of the masses. Using a special module of the General Social Survey and drawing on structuration and positionality theories, I first demonstrate that religion functions as a compensatory resource for disadvantaged groups— women, racial minorities, those with lower incomes, and, to a lesser extent, sexual minorities. I then demonstrate that religion—operating as both palliative resource and values-shaping schema—suppresses what would otherwise be larger group differences in political values. This study provides empirical support for Marx’s general claim that religion is the “sigh of the oppressed creature” and suppressor of emancipatory politics. It expands upon and refines the economics-focused argument, however, showing that religion provides (1) compensatory resources for lack of social, and not just economic, status, and (2) traditional-values-oriented schemas that impact social attitudes more than economic attitudes. I conclude that religion is not a simple distraction, but instead a complex and powerful social structure in which people both receive psychological compensation and develop rules-based belief systems that shape their political values.
Key Words: Inequality; Religion; Politics; Attitudes; Gender; Race; Ethnicity; Class; Sexuality
Last Revised: 1/4/2018 Running Head: Opiate of the Masses? Word Count: 11,128 Figures: 1 Tables: 7
THIS IS A DRAFT. DO NOT QUOTE OR CIRCULATE WITHOUT AUTHOR PERMISSION.
* The author is grateful to Brian Powell for exceptional feedback. He would also like to thank Art Alderson, Clem Brooks, Youngjoo Cha, Andy Halpern-Manners, Patricia McManus, Chris Munn, Roshan Pandian, Brian Steensland, Evan Stewart, Jenny Trinitapoli, and members of the Indiana University Politics, Economy, and Culture Workshop for helpful input. This project was presented and benefited from comments at the 2017 meetings of the American Sociological Association, Association for the Sociology of Religion, and Society for the Scientific Study of Religion. Direct correspondence to Landon Schnabel, Department of Sociology, Indiana University, 744 Ballantine Hall, 1020 E. Kirkwood Ave., Bloomington, IN 47405. Email: [email protected]. Opiate of the Masses? 1
Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.
-Karl Marx (1970 [1843])
According to Marx, religion is the opiate of the masses. In other words, religion appeals to the disenfranchised and helps them through suffering, but in so doing distracts from the root causes of their suffering and suppresses the development of emancipatory politics.1 In this study I test, expand upon, and refine this argument. Specifically, I draw on structuration theory (Giddens
1984; Hoffmann and Bartkowski 2008; Sewell 1992) and related cultural approaches to the study of religion (Edgell 2006, 2012; Hoffmann and Bartkowski 2008) to extend the argument from material inequality to social inequality and from economic attitudes to social attitudes. I argue that religion, rather than a simple distraction, is a complex and powerful social structure in which people receive psychological compensation and develop rules-based belief systems that shape their political values. In the process of testing and refining Marx’s argument, this study will answer, at least in part, two key social scientific questions: (1) Why are some groups consistently more religious than others? (2) Why do attitudes toward certain social issues, such as abortion, seem to contradict the positionality principle of disadvantage promoting progressive politics?
Although the “opiate” argument is frequently invoked theoretically, the mechanism by which religion is said to operate as an opiate remains underspecified and undertested. I propose and employ compensatory psychological benefits from religion, including comfort received from religion and spirituality, as a way to measure and examine the potential opiate function of religion. The idea that religion and spirituality provide comfort, consolation, and validation is not new—in fact, it is central to some theoretical frameworks (e.g., deprivation-compensation
1 Weber similarly argued that other-worldly religion can alleviate this-worldly suffering and Durkheim that religion legitimates social arrangements. Opiate of the Masses? 2 hypothesis)—but compensatory benefits from religion and spirituality often go unmeasured in nationally-representative research (see Pargament, Feuille, and Burdzy 2011 on measurement in convenience samples). Moreover, research on gender gaps in religion has argued that women’s lack of status leads them to seek compensation in religion, but has not directly measured the proposed compensatory benefits that appeal to women and other disadvantaged groups (Norris and Inglehart 2011; Schnabel 2016c).
In Marx’s view, religion provides comfort to the disadvantaged and thereby suppresses their political consciousness. Several perspectives in public opinion research—such as the
“underdog” positionality principle and related status and identity theories (Davis and Robinson
1991; Hunt 2007)—suggest that disadvantaged groups develop liberal politics because of their marginalized status in society, recognition of structural inequalities, sympathy for and solidarity with other disadvantaged groups, and subsequent development of progressive identity and partisanship. Yet, women and racial minorities, to whom the positionality principle has been most frequently applied, are not always more liberal than their counterparts on particular issues, especially those closely linked to religious values—for example, abortion, same-sex marriage, and physician-assisted suicide (Schnabel 2016b). A few studies have suggested that religion suppresses liberalism on an individual issue among women and racial minorities (Adamczyk,
Boyd, and Hayes 2016; Barkan 2014; Sherkat, de Vries, and Creek 2010; Wilcox 1992), but religion may operate as a more general suppressor of progressive politics and explain apparent inconsistencies in the positionality principle.
This study first considers whether groups with less status—women, Blacks, Latinxs, those with lower incomes, and sexual minorities—receive more psychological compensation from religion and spirituality. It then examines whether psychological compensation is Opiate of the Masses? 3 implicated in sociodemographic differences in religiosity. After considering the extent to which religion operates as a compensatory resource, I then consider the extent to which religion operates as a traditional-values-oriented schema implicated in political attitudes. More specifically, I examine whether religion suppresses group differences in political values. In the course of testing hypotheses related to the opiate-of-the-masses thesis, I find empirical support for Marx’s general claim that religion is the “sigh of the oppressed creature,” “heart of a heartless world,” and suppressor of emancipatory politics. I expand and refine the argument, however, showing that religion provides (1) compensatory resources for lack of social, and not just economic, status, and (2) traditional-values-oriented schemas that impact social attitudes more than economic attitudes.
RELIGION AS RESOURCE
Deprivation and Religious Compensation
Deprivation-compensation theories have long been used to understand the widespread appeal of religion in the human experience. Davis (1948) said the greater a person’s disappointment and frustration in this life, the more they would believe in and focus on a future life. According to
Davis, focusing on goals beyond this world allows people to compensate for frustrations trying to reach present goals. In other words, people shift their focus to a better future life as Stark and
Bainbridge (1987) highlighted when they said religion provides “supernatural general compensators” that replace unavailable material rewards with future spiritual rewards. Therefore, as far as the human experience leads to unmet material needs, people will seek future immaterial compensation. Benefits provided by religion were foundational in the rational-choice framework for religion (Stark, Iannaccone, and Finke 1996), and what people do with and get from religion in their everyday lives (e.g., receive comfort and make meaning out of hardship) has become all Opiate of the Masses? 4 the more salient in light of the more recent cultural turn in the sociology of religion drawing on concepts such as structuration (Edgell 2012; Hoffmann and Bartkowski 2008).
Structuration theory argues that social structures such as religion are composed of both resources and schemas. Resources are cultural objects or products that can help people reach objectives or enhance status and power, whereas schemas are a set of rules or norms for social beliefs and actions (Giddens 1984; Sewell 1992). Resources and schemas are interrelated structural components that mutually reinforce one another—so that, for example, certain types of religious beliefs (schemas) could provide more compensatory benefits (resources), and compensatory benefits from religion could promote greater commitment to religion and adherence to religious schemas (Hoffmann and Bartkowski 2008). More specifically, someone who faces hardship in their everyday life could find comfort in a belief system that transcends their current hardship and/or lack of power, the comfort they receive could be expected to make them more committed to that belief system, and further commitment to and involvement in that belief system could provide them even more social psychological benefits in a mutually- reinforcing loop. Likewise, intersectionality theory and identity theories argue that people have multiple competing identities tied to interrelated social structures—such as gender, race, class, sexuality, and religion—and that lack of status and power in one area could increase the salience of other identities. For example, a woman may find validation and support in religion that compensates for lack of status in regard to gender (Schnabel 2016c).
Marx focused primarily on class and material deprivation, and the rare empirical tests of his “opiate of the masses” concept focus on whether better material conditions reduce religiosity Opiate of the Masses? 5
(Becker and Woessmann 2013; Wimberley 1984).2 In what may be the clearest example of a study explicitly applying an empirical test to Marx’s argument, Becker and Woessmann (2013) used historical data from Prussia to determine if improvement in material conditions produced secularization. The authors concluded that, because average elementary school teacher incomes were not causally linked to decreased church attendance, religion is not the opiate of the masses.3
Marx’s argument about religion deserves a more comprehensive empirical examination, one that actually measures the proposed compensatory benefits from religion rather than just testing the relationship between average material conditions and religiosity.
Marx focused on economic inequality, but his statement about religion providing compensatory psychological benefits to the disadvantaged could logically extend beyond economic inequality to social inequality in contemporary American society. Certainly, economic standing is a key social divide, but gender, race, and sexuality are equally salient to contemporary American religious life (Edgell 2017; Edgell and Docka 2007; Stewart, Frost, and
Edgell 2017). Accordingly, scholars have highlighted how social divides and forms of deprivation besides material hardship, such as lack of social status, could also motivate religiosity (Christopher et al. 1971; Ellison and Taylor 1996; Glock 1964; Glock, Ringer, and
Babbie 1967). The general deprivation-compensation hypothesis—like Marx’s more specific argument that also includes political implications—remains central to social scientific theories about religiousness (Beit-Hallahmi 2014), but is more often used as a post hoc explanation for
2 Another study was titled in a way—“People’s Opium?”—that suggested a test of Marx’s dictum, but instead the paper explored the relationship between religion and attitudes said to promote economic development (Guiso, Sapienza, and Zingales 2003). 3 Other research not explicitly stated as a test of Marx provides different implications than the Becker and Woessmann (2013) study, suggesting country-level economic hardship is linked to religiosity (Storm 2017). Opiate of the Masses? 6 why group differences in religiosity exist than explicitly tested using measures of religious psychological compensation.
Social Status and Group Differences in Religiosity
A large and contentious literature has focused on why women are more religious than men in
Christian contexts. Various theories have been used to explain gender differences in religiosity: for example, biology-based risk preferences (Miller and Stark 2002), socialization-based risk preferences (Collett and Lizardo 2009), social risk (Edgell, Frost, and Stewart 2017), vulnerability (Norris and Inglehart 2011), psychological characteristics (Freese and Montgomery
2007), and social status (Schnabel 2016c). Schnabel (2015) argued that gender differences in religiosity should be considered in the context of gender differences in other areas, and here I argue that gender differences in religiosity should be considered in the context of other group differences in religiosity. With the exception of sexual minorities who have been further marginalized by religious institutions (Sherkat 2002, 2017), disadvantaged groups are typically more religious than their more advantaged counterparts in Christian contexts. This pattern may be due, at least in part, to religion and spirituality providing compensatory comfort, strength, and validation (Hoffmann and Bartkowski 2008; Schnabel 2015, 2016c).
Some research on gender and other sociodemographic differences in religion emphasizes the material deprivation and physical insecurities women face (Norris and Inglehart 2011), but other research argues that lack of social status and power may be more important than lack of material resources for understanding why women are often more religious than men (Hoffmann and Bartkowski 2008; Schnabel 2016c). This same literature also suggests the American religious context, where Christianity predominates, promotes gender and other social status differences in religiosity because Christianity is perceived as a sympathetic underdog religion Opiate of the Masses? 7 that, as noted by Marx (1970), appeals to the disadvantaged (Schnabel 2015). Therefore, gender and other sociodemographic gaps in religiosity may result from (Christian) religion providing comfort to the disenfranchised. Although past research has argued that Christian religion provides comfort, strength, and support to the disadvantaged, these potential compensatory benefits to everyday lived religion typically go unmeasured in nationally-representative research.
The first step toward a more comprehensive examination of Marx’s argument, and arguments about social status and religion more generally, is to explicitly test whether disadvantaged groups receive more compensatory benefits from religion than more advantaged groups. And the next step is to examine the extent to which group differences in religiosity are a function of psychological compensation. I expect that disadvantaged groups receive more compensatory benefits from religion than more advantaged groups, and that these benefits help explain group differences in religiosity.
Expectation 1: Disadvantaged groups—including women, blacks, Latinxs, those with lower incomes, and sexual minorities—receive more compensatory psychological benefits from religion and spirituality than their more advantaged counterparts.
Expectation 2: Sociodemographic differences in religiosity are in part a function of psychological compensation.
RELIGION AS SCHEMA
Religion and Apparent Inconsistences in the Positionality Principle
According to positionality and status theories of political values (Box-Steffensmeier, DeBoef, and Lin 2004; Davis and Robinson 1991; Hunt 1996, 2007; Kinder and Winter 2001; Manza and
Brooks 1998), group position and a greater awareness of structural reasons for inequality make disadvantaged groups less likely to believe in legitimating ideologies of racism, sexism, nationalism, etc. that justify social hierarchies and inequalities (Frost and Edgell 2017; Sidanius,
Pratto, and Bobo 1994), more likely to recognize and distrust oppressive norms, policies, and Opiate of the Masses? 8 institutions (Collins 2000), and, therefore, more likely to develop progressive politics across a broad range of issues (Davenport 2016). This “underdog” positionality principle is generally compatible with Marx and his idea of group-based emancipatory politics, but differs in its focus on social status instead of economic status and is typically applied to gender, race and, more recently, sexuality.
The status, positionality, and politics literature has consistently shown that women and racial minorities are more liberal on issues related not just to their own wellbeing, but across other issues as well (e.g., women tend to hold less racist attitudes than men). A recent study applied the positionality principle to sexual minorities—who tend to be less religious and practice more inclusive forms of religion due to their marginalization by many religious groups—and found they tend to be consistently more liberal than heterosexuals across hundreds of attitude items in the General Social Survey (Schnabel 2016b). In that study, women and
Blacks tended to be more liberal than their more advantaged counterparts on most topics, but on some specific social issues tied to traditional religious values—such as abortion, sexuality, and suicide—they were just as if not more conservative than their counterparts.
Scholars working from status-based frameworks for public opinion and politics—for example, the underdog positionality principle, conflict theory, and other identity and group interest theories—have frequently neglected religion as a potential explanation for unexpected null or even reverse findings. In popular usage, the phrase “opiate of the masses” is frequently employed to refer just to consolation and happiness premiums provided by religion. But in context Marx was not simply saying that people seek comfort in religion because of hardship, but also that religion suppresses emancipatory politics and prevents proletarian revolution against the bourgeoisie. According to Marx (1970), religion is an “inverted consciousness” that responds to Opiate of the Masses? 9 disadvantageous material conditions with nonmaterial compensators. This compensatory spiritual focus of Christian religion is said to then limit the development of emancipatory politics to address the disadvantageous conditions that made religion and spirituality more appealing.4
Complementing Marx’s argument, Simmel said subordinated groups are more likely to accept social domination—and less likely to develop status-based politics—if those above them in the social hierarchy are perceived as spiritually subordinate to a caring, personal, and fair higher authority in which the subordinated find support.
Similar to Marx, structuration theory predicts that religion both provides comfort and shapes politics. But whereas Marx focused primarily on palliative distraction related to economic status and economic attitudes, applying structuration theory to religion would suggest that religion provides a compensatory resource to people who social lack status or power, and that it also provides a cultural schema, or set of cultural rules, for thinking about, motivating, and justifying moral values and behavior (Hoffmann and Bartkowski 2008; Vaisey 2009). Recent cultural and social psychological approaches to the study of religion confirm that religion is a potent resource that when used by people acts back upon them with substantial symbolic power.
Illustratively, this work shows both how people use religion to make meaning out of their everyday lives (religion as resource), and how religion as a legitimating force can promote exclusionary symbolic boundaries (Edgell 2012) and motivate or constrain social action (Vaisey
2009) in ways that justify and exacerbate inequalities (Jost et al. 2014) (religion as schema).
More specifically, religion promotes system-justifying beliefs that enforce exclusionary moral boundaries and highlight individual responsibility over systemic causes of inequality (Haidt
2012; Jost et al. 2014; Rankin, Jost, and Wakslak 2009).
4 Marx (1970) went so far as to argue that to struggle against religion is also to struggle against the unequal
Opiate of the Masses? 10
Therefore, when religion is used as a comfort-providing and meaning-making cultural tool by the socially disenfranchised, its symbolic power could facilitate moralistic rather than emancipatory belief systems, legitimate power structures, and promote inequalities (Edgell 2012;
Haidt 2012; Lizardo 2009). Yes, some small countercultural religious groups explicitly promote progressive values (e.g., Unitarian Universalism) and larger religious groups run by marginalized groups have at times mobilized for certain progressive issues, such as racial equality in the Civil
Rights Movement. But, as a whole, religious schemas tend to promote conservative identity and traditional values on at least gender, sexuality, and other issues closely related to religious teachings. Supporting the possibility that American religion is an actively conservatizing force, it is primarily issues linked to religion and religiosity on which disadvantaged groups are no more liberal and sometimes more conservative than their counterparts (Adamczyk et al. 2016; Barkan
2014; Schnabel 2016b; Wilcox 1992).5
Although religion as a suppressor of liberal politics has not been broadly examined, cultural approaches to religion have highlighted the identity- and outlook-shaping power of religion (Edgell 2012; Perry and Schnabel 2017; Tranby and Zulkowski 2012) and a few studies have suggested religion suppresses liberalism on one or two specific issues (Barkan 2014;
Wilcox 1992). Although not framed as a test of Marx’s opiate-of-the-masses concept, these studies provide some indication that religion as both resource and schema could account for why
conditions said to make religion appealing. 5 Even though some religion is liberal, that does not mean it is actively liberalizing adherents in the same way conservative religion conservatizes adherents by promoting strict adherence to specific rules and teachings. Consider a liberal Episcopalian: If they became a secular ex-Episcopalian, would they become more conservative? Or, instead, would they be just as, if not more, liberal? Certainly some specific congregations seek to instill progressive values in people who might otherwise be more traditional, but there do not seem to be large denominations operating as actively liberalizing forces in the same way as there are large denominations that are actively conservatizing forces. And even though some Black Protestant congregations are strongly Democratic, they still tend to promote traditional religious values on certain social issues (e.g., sexuality) (Adamczyk et al. 2016; Schnabel 2016a; Sherkat et al. 2010; Wilcox 1992). Opiate of the Masses? 11 we do not always find the group differences in politics we might expect based on the positionality principle.
Moving from the theoretical to the empirical and directly testable, a suppressor variable is a measure that conceals the strength of a relationship, such as the relationship between disadvantaged social status and liberal politics. This occurs when a variable is associated with two other variables in opposite directions. If, for example, disadvantaged groups receive more comfort from religion and comfort from religion is associated with conservative politics, then this comfort, as Marx proposed, suppresses what would otherwise be larger and more consistent group differences in politics based on positionality.
Based on Marx’s argument about religion-as-distraction, comfort from religion (i.e., religion as resource) directly suppresses group differences in politics. But structuration theory would suggest that religion as structure is both resource and schema. Whereas we could expect religion-as-resource to explain why disadvantaged groups are more religious, we might expect religion-as-schema, which is closely interrelated with religion-as-resource, to be the reason religion shapes politics. This process is illustrated in Figure 1, where social disadvantage leads to using religion as a resource, using religion as a resource promotes religious schemas, and religious schemas shape political values. Based on structuration theory, I expect that religion-as- resource will suppress liberal politics among disadvantaged groups via religion-as-schema.
Expectation 3: Religious compensation (i.e., resource) suppresses liberal politics among disadvantaged groups via religiosity, literalism, and fundamentalism (i.e., schema).
[Figure-1]
Economic Values and Social Values
Marx emphasized economics. According to him, religion suppresses emancipatory economics by means of distraction (Marx 1970). More specifically, abstract other-worldly distraction diverts Opiate of the Masses? 12 attention from material this-worldly concerns. Whereas Marx suggested religion passively shapes politics through distraction, structuration theory would suggest that religion actively shapes values through rules-based schemas. Therefore, although Marx would suggest that religion should be a particularly important for economic politics, structuration theory would argue that religion should be particularly important for whatever rules-based schemas religion promotes among its adherents.
Religion and conservative politics are closely linked in the contemporary United States with its politicized religiosity (Goren and Chapp 2017; Hout and Fischer 2002, 2014; Putnam and Campbell 2010; Steensland and Wright 2014), and religious schemas are more closely linked to social values, especially on issues such as gender and sexuality, than economic values (Felson and Kindell 2007; Schnabel 2016a; Tranby and Zulkowski 2012). Due to my expectation that it is not just distraction but the link between religiosity and social conservatism that would suppress progressive politics, I predict that religious schemas will have more of an impact on social values than economic values.
Expectation 4: Religion more strongly suppresses group differences in social values than economic values.
DATA, MEASURES, AND METHODS
Data
The U.S. General Social Survey is a repeated nationally-representative survey with consistently- fielded questions and special modules fielded in one or a few years. This study uses data from different years depending on the availability of key variables. Opiate of the Masses? 13
Measures
Psychological Compensation
Psychological compensation is measured with seven questions taken from a broader scale of everyday experiences with religion and spirituality (“Daily Spiritual Experience Scale”6) fielded as part of a special module in 2004. Although the Daily Spiritual Experiences Scale is correlated with other religion measures, past research has shown it is distinct from religiosity and important for psychological well-being above-and-beyond the impact of religious practices (Ellison and
Fan 2008). The items asked how frequently (never or almost never=1, once in a while=2, some days=3, most days=4, every day=5, and many times a day=6) people have the following experiences:
1. I find comfort in my religion or spirituality. 2. I find strength in my religion or spirituality. 3. During worship, or at other times when connecting with God,7 I feel joy which lifts me out of my daily concerns. 4. I ask for God's help in the midst of daily activities. 5. I feel guided by God in the midst of daily activities. 6. I feel God's love for me, directly. 7. I feel God's love for me, through others.
Factor analysis yielded a one-factor solution. I conducted all analyses first with this one-factor solution and then a summative scale (a=.96)8 and found the same patterns. I present results for the summative scale because the results are the same and this method is simpler and more familiar to some scholars. Descriptive statistics for this scale are presented in Table 1.
[Table-1]
6 This scale is frequently fielded and validated on convenience samples, but rarely fielded in nationally- representative research (Underwood 2011). 7 The following preceded these items: “A number of items use the word ‘God.’ If this word is not a comfortable one, please substitute another idea that calls to mind the divine or holy for you.” 8 Additional analyses using individual items and then using subsets of items also yielded the same patterns. Opiate of the Masses? 14
Religiosity, Literalism, and Fundamentalism
In analyses using the 2004 special-module compensation items, religiosity is measured with two key commitment and practice measures: (1) strength of religious affiliation (no affiliation=1 to strong affiliation=4) and (2) attendance frequency (never=1 to more than once a week=9).
Analyses using more recent 2008-2016 data also include a newer measure of religious salience
(not at all religious=1 to very religious=4), as well as a measure of prayer frequency (never=1 to several times a day=6).9
Literalism is measured with a three-category item: Bible is (1) a book of fables, (2) inspired but not literal, and (3) literal word of God. Type of affiliation is measured with the GSS- formulated fundamentalism measure, which categorizes affiliations into three groups relevant to politics and not conflated with race—a key factor in this study—like some other classification systems: (1) liberal, (2) moderate, and (3) fundamentalist (Smith 1990).
Politics
This study considers several measures of political identities, attitudes, and behaviors, including general measures of political ideology (extremely conservative=1 to extremely liberal=7), political affiliation (strong Republican=1 to strong Democrat=7—a categorical measure yields equivalent results), and voting behavior (voted Democrat in most recent presidential election=1).
I also include attitudes about specific social issues on which some marginalized groups are not consistently more liberal selected based on previous research (Schnabel 2016b): abortion
9 I first considered each religiosity measure individually and found similar patterns across measures. I then conducted factor and scaling analyses and determined the measures fit together well and load on one factor. One- factor solutions and a standardized summative scales provide the same patterns. These standardized religiosity scales follow previous GSS research, including Barkan’s (2014) study on religiosity as a suppressor of women’s support for abortion (also see Mockabee, Monson, and Grant 2001). I excluded the prayer measure from the religiosity scale in the 2004 analyses due to possible conceptual similarity and high correlation with the psychological compensation scale. Opiate of the Masses? 15 attitudes (seven-item scale), morality of same-sex relationships (always-wrong=1 to not-wrong- at-all=4), other sex-related attitudes (five-item scale), same-sex marriage (strongly disagree=1 to strongly agree=5), gender attitudes (four-item scale), legislation of morality (four-item scale), free speech (18-item scale), prayer in public schools (approve Supreme Court ruling against required prayer in public schools=1), physician-assisted suicide (support it for person with incurable disease=1), corporal punishment (strongly agree with “a good, hard spanking”=1 to strongly disagree=4), science and environment (15-item scale), and marijuana legalization
(support=1). I also consider a number of economic attitudes, including: redistribution
(opposition=1 to support=7), welfare spending (too much=1 to too little=3), workers need strong unions (strongly disagree=1 to strongly agree=5), confidence in organized labor (hardly any=1 to a great deal=3), taxes for those with high incomes (much too high=1 to much too low=5), right to adequate standard of living (not at all important=1 to very important=7), large income differences necessary for prosperity (strongly agree=1 to strongly disagree=5), inequality persists because it benefits the rich (strongly disagree=1 to strongly agree=5).
Gender, Race, Class, and Sexuality
Gender is measured as woman=1 and race/ethnicity is measured in four categories (non-Latinx- white, non-Latinx-Black, Latinx, and non-Latinx-other-race). Class is measured with a measure of whether family income was above or below $100k (approximately the 90% vs. the 10%).10 In analyses including data before 2008, sexuality is measured with behavior (whether respondents
10 Whereas the 99% vs. the 1% would be closer to Marx’s argument—or, better yet, a measure of wealth instead of income—there is not a sufficient sample size to make such a comparison. Additional analyses considered alternative class measures—continuous income, class identification (not asked on all survey versions across years), and subjective economic status (also not asked of everyone)—and found similar patterns. Where available, subjective economic status reported in comparison to others (a comparative social status aspect of class) was a particularly strong predictor of psychological compensation, indicating that social status (i.e., status in comparison to others) may be more important than actual material resources for the patterns in this study. Opiate of the Masses? 16 had same-sex partners in the last five years, opposite-sex partners only, or no partnering information). Analyses focused on data from 2008 forward use the newer self-identified orientation measure (lesbian, gay, or bisexual versus heterosexual).
Additional Covariates
The models also include the following sociodemographic covariates: education (categorical measure of highest degree attained), age (in years), marital status (married=1), parental status
(parent=1), region (South=1), rurality (rural=1), and a series of binary variables for survey year.
Analytic Strategy
The study uses all observations with data on compensatory benefits from religion and on religiosity, each of which are dependent variables in different models. Sample sizes for other analyses vary by availability of outcome measures. Missing data on covariates are imputed using chained equations.11 OLS regression is used for continuous outcomes and Sobel-Goodman mediation tests determine percentage and significance of total-effect-of-an-independent-variable- explained by mediator variables. This method first regresses dependent variable on independent variable, then mediator/suppressor variable on independent variable, and then dependent variable on both the independent variable and mediator/suppressor variable. These models also account for covariates. The Sobel-Goodman tests were conducted using a Stata user-written program
(sgmediation) and cross-checked with the KHB method (using the khb user-written program).12
11 Race, gender, marital status, region, and rurality had no missing data, and those missing income, sexuality, literalism, or fundamentalist data were included as separate missing categories as indicated in Table 1. Additional analyses using listwise deletion or imputation instead of separate categories yielded equivalent patterns. Data were imputed for <1% of the sample on parental status, age, and education. Regression analyses use multiply-imputed data where the number of imputations equaled 20. Mediation analyses use single imputation for compatibility with the sgmediation Stata user-written program. 12 Additional analyses with bootstrapped standard errors for Sobel-Goodman tests did not alter the results. Opiate of the Masses? 17
All outcomes are standardized (mean=0, sd=1), which means that coefficients presented in the tables represent group differences in standard deviations.
I first examine whether disadvantaged groups score higher on psychological compensation. I then consider the extent to which group differences in religiosity are a function of this compensation. Finally, I explore the argument that religion suppresses group differences in progressive politics, considering (1) general political identities, attitudes, and behaviors, (2) social attitudes linked to religious values, and (3) economic attitudes.
RESULTS
Religion as Resource
I first examine the relationship between social status characteristics and religious psychological compensation in the context of group differences in religiosity, literalism, and type of affiliation.
The first model in Table 2 presents compensatory psychological benefits received from religion and spirituality by gender, race/ethnicity, class, and sexuality. Women, Blacks, Latinxs, those with lower income, and sexual minorities each receive more compensatory benefits from religion than their counterparts. The psychological compensation scale is standardized (mean=0, standard deviation=1), and women score .44 of a standard deviation higher on psychological compensation than men, and Blacks .60 and Latinxs .40 of a standard deviation higher than non-
Latinx whites. Those with incomes under $100k score .28 of a standard deviation higher on psychological compensation than those with higher incomes, and sexual minorities score .41 of a standard deviation higher than heterosexuals.
[Table-2]
Table 2 also presents group differences on a religiosity scale, as well as ordered measures of view of the Bible (literalism is the highest category) and type of affiliation (fundamentalism is Opiate of the Masses? 18 the highest category). Like the psychological compensation scale, each of these measures is standardized. Disadvantaged groups are generally more religious, have a higher view of the
Bible, and are more fundamentalist. Sexual minorities—who have been marginalized by organized religion, especially in fundamentalist contexts and via certain literalist interpretations—score significantly lower on religiosity, literalism, and fundamentalism despite scoring higher on psychological compensation from religion and spirituality. Whereas disadvantaged groups tend to score higher across the measures presented in Table 2, group differences for psychological compensation tend to be larger than group differences on the other measures.13
Overall, Marx’s claim that religion provides psychological compensation is confirmed, though this extends beyond Marx’s focus on those with less material status to those with less social status. The consistent and parallel patterns for psychological compensation across gender, race, ethnicity, class, and sexuality provide clear confirmation for Expectation 1: groups with less social status receive more compensatory benefits from religion and spirituality.
Religion provides psychological benefits to the disadvantaged, but do these benefits help account for sociodemographic differences in religiosity? Table 3 presents the relationship of gender, race, class, and sexuality with a standardized measure of religiosity before and after accounting for compensation.14 When accounting for psychological compensation, women are no longer significantly more religious than men and the previously large effect for Black vs. white is substantially smaller.
[Table-3]
13 Additional analyses demonstrate that the “opiate” function of religion translates into general happiness premiums, especially among the disadvantaged. Opiate of the Masses? 19
Table 3 also includes summary results from mediation analyses, presenting the percentage of each sociodemographic gap that is a function of psychological compensators. Each of these results were calculated in a separate models with religiosity as the outcome, the given predictor as the effect-to-be-explained, psychological compensators as the mediator, and all other measures included as covariates (as a reminder, I use the Sobel-Goodman method).15 First, we see that 113% of the gender gap in religiosity is a function of psychological compensators
(mediation over 100% indicates that the coefficient has reversed directions). To put this percentage in context, Miller and Hoffmann’s (1995) risk preferences explanation, which continues to elicit debate, accounted for 40% of the gender gap in religiosity.16
In addition to fully explaining the gender gap in religiosity, psychological compensation also accounts for a significant and substantial percentage of race and ethnicity gaps in religiosity.
Although psychological compensation accounts for 59% of the large Black-white race gap, a significant difference persists as demonstrated in the second model of Table 3. Psychological compensation mediates 148% of the more moderate ethnicity gap, which means the coefficient for Latinx vs. non-Latinx white has reversed. Although there were not significant differences in religiosity by sexuality or class, psychological compensation is still a significant mediator that reverses coefficients on both measures.
14 The bivariate coefficient for sexuality on religiosity is negative, but is positive in the model including covariates presented in Table 3. 15 The Sobel-Goodman approach takes into account the strength of a relationship before and after the mediator, as well as the relationships between the key predictor and the mediator and the mediator and the key outcome. Therefore, mediation or suppression can be significant without a large percentage of mediation/suppression if the predictor is closely related to the mediator and the mediator closely related to the outcome. 16 Large proportions of gender and others gaps explained by psychological compensators could be due, in part, to compensation-seeking resulting from broad social processes related to status and power, and does not preclude explanatory power of likely mutually-reinforcing factors such as social expectations, performance of gender, and socialized psychological characteristics (Edgell et al. 2017; Schnabel 2015). Opiate of the Masses? 20
For theoretical reasons laid out earlier, I expected that group differences in religiosity are a function of status and compensation processes. But to ensure that the findings for group differences in compensation did not simply result from religiosity driving compensation, I also considered whether religiosity accounts for group differences in psychological compensation.
The results presented in Table 3 demonstrate that significant and substantial group differences in psychological compensation persist when accounting for religiosity, suggesting that group differences in religiosity do not drive group differences in psychological compensation.17
Therefore, the data appear to support Expectation 2: group differences in religiosity are in part a function of psychological compensation.18
Religion as Schema
Thus far, I have demonstrated that religion-as-resource plays the compensation-providing opiate function Marx proposed. I now consider whether religion suppresses group differences in political values. Table 4 explores the path model laid out in Figure 1, considering whether psychological compensation (religion-as-resource) suppresses liberal political ideology via religiosity and types of religious beliefs (religion-as-schema). Model 1 of Table 4 shows that disadvantaged groups tend to report more liberal ideologies than advantaged groups. The outcome variable—fielded as a seven-point item ranging from extremely conservative to extremely liberal—is standardized, so that, for example, women are .17 of a standard deviation more liberal than men. Model 2 adds compensation, which is strongly related to political values,
17 Additional analyses among just the religiously affiliated or including the more detailed RELTRAD religious categorization approach demonstrated the patterns are not due to affiliation or type-of-affiliation differences across advantage/ disadvantage, but disadvantaged groups can find certain strains of religion more appealing than others (Hoffmann and Bartkowski 2008). Propensity score matching analyses further demonstrate significant status differences in compensatory benefits received from religion. 18 Additional analyses demonstrated that psychological compensation also helps explain group differences in literalism and fundamentalism. Opiate of the Masses? 21 and the coefficients for the group differences appear larger. For example, when accounting for psychological compensation women are .26 of a standard deviation more liberal than men.
[Table-4]
Table 4 next shows summary results from Sobel-Goodman mediation tests, which demonstrate the suppression of liberal political views by psychological compensation is substantial and significant across groups. In other words, group differences in political ideology by social status would be even larger if it were not for the greater psychological compensation disadvantaged groups find in religion and spirituality. For example, the already-substantial
Black-white gap in liberal political views would be 59% larger if not for the greater comfort
Blacks find in religion.
Resources and schemas are two key components of structure, and are closely related to one another. We have already seen that compensatory resources help explain why people are more religious, and that we might expect that it is less the resources and more the schemas that suppress group differences in political values. Models 3 and 4 add religiosity and then view of the Bible and type of affiliation to the model. Adding these factors to the model does not indicate any further suppression of group differences in political values, but, as expected and visualized in Figure 1, they do help explain the pathway by which psychological compensation suppresses group differences in politics. Additional path analyses demonstrate that the suppression of group differences in political values operates through compensation to religion and from religion to politics, with compensation explaining group differences in religiosity and religiosity suppressing group differences in political values. Psychological compensation, therefore, is not the key suppressor of group differences in politics—instead, it is the religiosity, literalism, and fundamentalism that are facilitated and reinforced by compensation that shape political values. Opiate of the Masses? 22
The psychological compensation measures were only available as part of a 2004 special module, and I have demonstrated that religiosity, literalism, and fundamentalism are the pathway by which compensation promotes conservative politics.19 Therefore, I now turn to more recent data (2008-2016) to consider the extent to which religiosity, literalism, and fundamentalism suppress group differences in politics.20 Table 5 first presents the patterns for political ideology, confirming that religion suppresses group differences in ideology for this larger and more recent sample. Whereas compensation suppresses sexual orientation differences in political values, religiosity, literalism, and fundamentalism mediate the large difference between LGB and heterosexual views because, despite scoring higher on psychological compensation, sexual minorities are typically less religious, less literalist, and less fundamentalist.
[Table-5]
Religiosity, literalism, and fundamentalism are each independently related to political ideology, but most suppression is already present in the model with just religiosity. This pattern is likely due to larger group differences in religiosity than in literalism and fundamentalism. In fact, higher scores on literalism and fundamentalism among disadvantaged groups appear to be interdependent with group differences in religiosity, which is in turn are interdependent with group differences in psychological compensation. Therefore, in confirmation of Expectation 3, it appears that compensation makes disadvantaged group mores religious, which promotes traditional religious schemas, which promote conservatism and suppress group differences in political values.
19 Additional analyses found similar patterns for the impact of compensation on group differences in politics for other outcomes. 20 I selected this time period because the new, and arguably much better, measure of sexuality as self-identified sexual orientation, instead of partnering behavior, was first available in 2008. Opiate of the Masses? 23
Based on Marx we might expect religion to suppress liberal politics most starkly on economic issues, but I suggested we might expect stronger suppression on social issues closely tied to traditional religious values. Table 5 presents results on support for abortion rights and for economic redistribution. In a pattern that seems contradictory to the positionality principle, disadvantaged groups besides sexual minorities tend to be more opposed to abortion rights than their more advantaged counterparts. Perhaps the most surprising of the group differences is that women are significantly more opposed to a woman’s right to choose than are men. But the patterns shift when religiosity is added to the model. The coefficient for gender reverses, and is even significant in the opposite direction: if it were not for their greater religiosity, women would actually be significantly more supportive of abortion rights than men. And if it were not for their greater religiosity than whites, Blacks would also be substantially more supportive of abortion as well. Moreover, opposition to abortion among Latinxs and those with incomes under $100k would be smaller if not for religiosity. And lesser religiosity among sexual minorities helps explain why they are more supportive of abortion than heterosexuals. Adding literalism and fundamentalism to the model only enhances these patterns. Therefore, seemingly paradoxical group differences in abortion attitudes are largely a function of religion.
Finally, religion does not do much to suppress group differences in attitudes toward economic redistribution. The weak patterns for economic attitudes and strong patterns for abortion attitudes lend support to Expectation 4 that religion would more strongly suppress group differences in social values than economic values. But this possibility should be further examined with tests for significance of mediation/suppression across a broader range of social and economic issues. Opiate of the Masses? 24
Table 6 presents summary results for additional outcomes. The table focuses on whether liberal politics for each group are suppressed by religiosity (or, alternatively, whether conservative politics are mediated). This suppression is calculated by whether Sobel-Goodman mediation analyses provide evidence for a significant amplification of liberal politics among disadvantaged groups when accounting for religiosity. I first present measures of general politics in the form of self-placement on a conservative-to-liberal identity scale (which I showed in more detail above), party identity, and voting behavior. I then present patterns for some key sociopolitical attitudes on which previous work has shown one or more disadvantaged group to be no more liberal or even more conservative than their counterparts. Finally, I present patterns for key economic attitudes.
[Table-6]
The patterns in Table 5 suggested suppression, and the results from mediation tests summarized in Table 6 confirm it. Religiosity significantly suppresses what would otherwise be larger group differences in general politics by gender, race and ethnicity, and class.21
Demonstrating the political importance of suppression beyond just attitudes, religiosity significantly suppresses the greater likelihood that women, Blacks, Latinxs, and those with less income voted for Democratic candidates in presidential elections. Disadvantaged groups do still tend to be more likely to vote for Democrats, but they would be even more likely to do so if it were not for religion. For example, predicted probabilities based on a model including covariates but not religiosity indicate a 5% gap between women (61%) and men’s (56%) self-reported voting for Democrats in whatever election was most recent. When accounting for religiosity,
21 Religiosity does not suppress group differences by sexuality on general politics or other measures presented in the table because sexual minorities are not more religious than heterosexuals. In fact, religiosity mediates group
Opiate of the Masses? 25 however, there is a 9% gap with women predicted to vote Democrat 63% of the time and men
54% of the time.
Similar patterns appear on attitudes toward specific issues that may otherwise seem to contradict the positionality principle (i.e., issues on which some disadvantaged groups are not always more liberal). In fact, religiosity significantly suppressed comparatively greater liberalism among women, Blacks, Latinxs, and those with lower incomes on all issues considered, and the percentage of suppression was generally quite large. Additional analyses focused on individual survey years demonstrate that the significance of suppression was not due to the sample sizes, with smaller samples still yielding significant suppression of liberalism (or mediation of conservatism) among disadvantaged groups across social issues.22 Therefore, it appears that group differences in social and political values would be more substantial and consistent if it were not for the greater religiosity of disadvantaged groups reinforced by the greater psychological compensation they receive. This assertion is confirmed by the patterns in attitudes by sexuality, with sexual minorities—who tend to be less rather than more religious than heterosexuals—more consistently liberal across these measures than the other disadvantaged groups before accounting for religiosity.
Whereas religiosity is an exceptionally consistent suppressor of group differences on general political values and on social issues, Table 6 shows that it is a less consistent suppressor of group differences on economic attitudes. Religiosity can suppress liberal views on economic inequality, but only on certain measures. Religiosity does significantly suppress group differences in attitudes toward government redistribution, welfare spending, confidence in
differences in sexuality, although additional analyses showed that psychological compensation does suppress group differences by sexuality. Opiate of the Masses? 26 organized labor, and the idea that the rich should be taxed more. However, the percentage of suppression is generally low in comparison to the suppression occurring on group differences in social attitudes. Moreover, the suppression of group differences on economic attitudes appears to be largely due to the suppression of group differences in general partisanship (i.e., including political ideology as a covariate explains away suppression), whereas suppression on social issues generally operates above and beyond general partisanship.23
Although stronger suppression on general politics and social issues than on economic issues may appear inconsistent with Marx’s argument, the pattern is consistent with this study’s argument that religion suppresses liberal politics not because of distraction but because of the conservatizing power of religious schemas. Whereas religiosity is a particularly strong conservatizing force on issues of traditional morality, there is a weaker link between religion and economic attitudes. Subsequently, and in support of Expectation 4, religiosity suppresses group differences in political values more strongly on social issues directly tied to religious schemas than on economic issues.
DISCUSSION
This study considered Marx’s assertion that religion is the opiate of the masses and whether this argument can be applied to the contemporary United States. I drew on structuration theory and cultural approaches to the study of religion to apply Marx’s general idea beyond “the masses”
(i.e., the poor) to the socially disenfranchised and to issues beyond economics. I used this extrapolation on the opiate-of-the-masses concept to help explain two key social scientific
22 Moreover, analyses with psychological compensation as a suppressor demonstrated suppression on social attitudes with samples of about a thousand each. 23 In fact, it is possible that conservative schemas regarding certain social issues spill over into conservative partisanship and thereby produce the (less substantial) link between religiosity and conservative economic attitudes. Opiate of the Masses? 27 puzzles: the gender gap in religiosity and why some disadvantaged groups are not consistently liberal across sociopolitical issues. I found that disadvantaged groups find more psychological compensation in religion, and that religion as an “opiate” of the disenfranchised has two key functions: (1) provides comfort and happiness to the disadvantaged and (2) suppresses progressive politics.
Insofar as religion appeals to the poor, provides comfort, and suppresses progressive politics, it is the opiate of the masses. Religion is much more than just a distraction, however.
Religion is a complex and powerful social structure in which people both receive psychological compensation and develop rules-based belief systems that shape political values. In other words, religion provides compensation to the socially disadvantaged as an alternative source of comfort, validation, and power and shapes their outlook according to specific religious schemas frequently oriented to traditional social values. Consequently, it may be more accurate to call contemporary American religion the resource and schema of the people instead of the opium of the people. This extrapolation of Marx’s proposition via structuration theory can be used to rethink religion in the social sciences, explain sociodemographic differences in religiosity, and even account for apparent inconsistencies in the positionality principle.
Sociodemographic differences in religiosity, and especially gender differences in religiosity, have been contentiously debated for decades. Research has typically focused on one sociodemographic gap at a time and thus not situated these individual gaps within a broader and simultaneous consideration of gender, race, ethnicity, class, and sexuality. I found that disadvantaged groups in the realms of gender, race, ethnicity, class, and sexuality all disproportionately receive psychological compensation, which accounts for group religiousness gaps. Of the group differences in religiosity considered in this study, only Black vs. white Opiate of the Masses? 28 differences persist after accounting for psychological compensation. Although Blacks remain more religious than whites after accounting for compensatory benefits from religion, this racial gap is less than half of what it was before accounting for compensation. These findings place gender gaps in religiosity within a larger framework of social status differences and may finally lay to rest essentialist arguments about gender differences in religiosity.
Status-based theories of social attitudes argue that disenfranchised groups will be consistently more liberal. Therefore, scholars have long wondered why disadvantaged groups do not have more consistently liberal attitudes on issues that affect them and other disadvantaged groups, such as the surprising gender gap in abortion attitudes in which men are more supportive of abortion rights than women. This study provides support for the positionality principle of social attitudes, explains what at first appear to be inconsistencies, and highlights the previously underemphasized importance of how religion complicates the relationship between status and progressive politics. Marginalized groups are both more liberal and more religious, and religion suppresses what would otherwise be even larger and more consistent group differences in politics. According to Marx (1970), this suppression is due to religion being an “inverted consciousness,” or focus on other-worldly distraction to address this-worldly disadvantage.24 But at least in the United States, religion and politics are linked in such a way that religion does not make people less political,25 it provides schemas that shape their politics according to specific rules and norms (Edgell 2012; Perry and Schnabel 2017; Tranby and Zulkowski 2012).
24 In some specific cases, such as Jehovah’s Witnesses and Amish, small religious groups reject earthly politics (and thus do not vote, run for office, etc.) for a reason that matches Marx’s religion-as-distraction argument well: a belief, based on a biblical statement, about God’s kingdom being not of the world. 25 Rather than simply promoting political quietude, American religion is highly politicized. Additional analyses demonstrate that religiosity is associated with discussing politics more frequently and trying to persuade others more frequently. This pattern is likely influenced by religion providing a community of people with whom to discuss politics. In addition to conservatizing mechanisms highlighted in past research, political discussion among
Opiate of the Masses? 29
Psychological compensation is an important factor in why some people are more religious than others. If we were to think about religion as a social and psychological good and meaning-making cultural tool—which has already been hinted at in the religion-as-rational- choice and cultural lived-religion literatures—it should not be surprising that people who get more benefit from it would be more religious. Religion is not an impotent cultural resource, however, and provides powerful schemas that can justify and reinforce social boundaries, thereby conservatizing the identity and outlook of those who rely on it in ways that can exacerbate inequalities (Edgell 2012; Pachucki, Pendergrass, and Lamont 2007).
Although religion often promotes traditional values because religious schemas tend to get fixed in a point in time and symbolic boundaries promoted by religion tend to harken back to the past (Edgell 2012; Tranby and Zulkowski 2012), the particular “traditional” issues by which religion (or, more accurately, religions) defines itself shift over time and are both time and place specific (Schnabel 2016a). Therefore, the religious landscape Marx referenced was distinct from contemporary American religion, which is closely linked to socially conservative politics (Goren and Chapp 2017; Hout and Fischer 2002, 2014; Putnam and Campbell 2010). This study indicates that Marx’s statement about religion in his particular historical context can still be applied in principle, but that the interrelationship between disadvantaged status, religious compensation, and political outlook is fluid and specific to a particular inequality-religion- politics nexus. If religious schemas were more closely linked to economically conservative politics and less closely linked to socially conservative politics in the contemporary United
States, I suspect the patterns demonstrated in this study would have fallen more in line with what
Marx might have predicted. And were religions to shift from traditional moralistic schemas to
congregants provides a further mechanism by which religiosity can promote traditional schemas and facilitate
Opiate of the Masses? 30 emancipatory schemas, they could become agents for progressive social change instead of bastions of traditional political values.
I drew on Marx to argue that religion can be understood, at least in part, as a social and psychological good, and that religiousness can be predicted by people getting more from it. We could likewise predict that people will be less religious where they have less need for existential comfort. Marx was an early proponent of the as yet unsubstantiated secularization hypothesis, assuming that religion would decline into obscurity as society advanced. Whereas others tended to argue that scientific progress would lead to the decline of religion, Marx argued that it was not just science but material security and equality that would lead to religion’s demise. Although we have seen religion decline most dramatically in egalitarian Democratic Socialist contexts with strong social safety nets,26 neither the egalitarian revolution nor the global demise of religion have occurred. Therefore, we might expect that as long as hardships and inequalities persist— and secular people have low fertility—the dual-edged sword that is religion will also persist, providing comfort and strength to the downtrodden at the same time that it promotes schemas that are often more system-justifying than emancipatory.
conservative politics. 26 It is possible that American religion’s unique vitality in the context of comparable countries is in part a function of similarly unique inequalities, policies (e.g., lack of national healthcare that disproportionately affects women, Blacks, etc.), and subsequent vulnerability of disadvantaged groups. Opiate of the Masses? 31
APPENDIX: LIMITATIONS, ADDITIONAL ANALYSES, AND NEEDED FUTURE RESEARCH
The link between religion and socially conservative politics is so strong in the contemporary
United States that some liberals select out of religion, or at least out of affiliating oneself with organized religion (Hout and Fischer 2002, 2014). While politics-to-religion selection is important and likely explains some of the relationship between religiosity and conservative politics for the population as a whole, there is not a clear reason to expect disadvantaged groups simply select into more religiosity because of their politics (which tend to be liberal in comparison to advantaged groups). The data used in this study were cross-sectional, but additional analyses using GSS panel data presented in Table A1 confirm the cross-sectional results.27 It would appear, then, that religion likely has a disproportionate conservatizing influence on the politics of disadvantaged groups due to their greater religiosity, which then suppresses what would otherwise be more consistent and larger group differences in politics.
[Table-A1]
Religion having a greater impact on the politics of disadvantaged groups, and thereby suppressing group differences in politics, is primarily due to disadvantaged groups being more religious (and religious schemas therefore affecting them more). But not all religious schemas are the same and religion is not experienced in the same way by different types of people (Edgell
2017; Mckenzie and Rouse 2013; Schnabel 2016c; Wilde and Glassman 2016). Additional analyses with interaction terms demonstrated that a given level of religiosity affects women’s political ideology more than men, but—consistent with Mckenzie and Rouse (2013)—affects the
27 Additional checks controlling for losing or gaining a religious preference (using a measure of childhood affiliation) for the larger cross-sectional samples demonstrated that the suppression patterns are not simply due to people selecting into or out of being religiously affiliated (Hout and Fischer 2002). Opiate of the Masses? 32 ideology of racial minorities somewhat less than whites.28 This pattern may be due to comparatively less conservative schemas in the congregations that racial minorities attend.
Further analyses employed additional interaction terms to consider whether and how the patterns operated differently across different configurations of the social statuses considered in this study.
These analyses were necessarily limited due to small numbers in some disadvantaged groups, but
I did uncover some patterns that either confirmed past research (e.g., gender differences in religiosity are smaller among sexual minorities and smaller among economic elites than their counterparts) or were suggestive of the need for additional future research (e.g., gender differences in religiosity are larger among Blacks than whites).29 Patterns of interactions between different group memberships on religiosity also translate into somewhat different patterns of suppression of group differences in politics that should be further examined in the future.
We might expect the patterns to vary not just by social statuses, but also by religions (see
Schnabel 2015; Schnabel, Hackett, and McClendon 2017). Christianity has been framed by many, including Marx, as a sympathetic underdog religion that appeals to the disadvantaged.
Other religions may or may not provide the same compensatory psychological benefits and may or may not suppress progressive politics. It is also possible that some specific forms of
Christianity—such as Marxist liberation theology that emphasizes social justice among Catholics in Latin America—would provide different schemas that might not suppress progressive politics.
Unfortunately, the data did not have a large number of people affiliated with non-Christian religions. Necessarily limited analyses suggested that the patterns operate differently among non-
28 Despite a somewhat weaker relationship between religiousness and political views among racial minorities, religiousness still has a greater impact on them than whites—thereby suppressing group differences in politics— because of their much higher levels of religiousness. Opiate of the Masses? 33
Christians.30 Therefore, patterns demonstrated in this study may be specific to Christians and/or
Christian contexts. Future research should explore the patterns for non-Christian religions in the
United States and around the world.
In addition to possible heterogeneity by interrelations of social statuses and by religious tradition, the patterns could vary by societal factors such as economic development. For example, Marx’s argument about religion suppressing economic class consciousness may be more clearly borne out where people are more economically destitute in absolute terms. The data were also limited in that the GSS, like other major surveys, does not ask about some of the more radical economic tenets set forth by Marx. I hope future research will examine further measures, interactions, groups, and contexts.
29 Intersectionality theory suggests the patterns would operate differently by the interrelations of each of the characteristics—gender, race/ethnicity, class, and sexuality—but fully-interacting the four factors leads to an unwieldy set of interactions further complicated by multi-category measures. 30 For example, although there were only 50 in the sample with the compensation measure, the patterns for these non-Christian affiliates were notably different than for Christians and the unaffiliated (many of whom hold Christian beliefs and/or are former Christians). Among people in non-Christian traditions, disadvantaged groups do not receive more psychological compensation (although it does appear that lower income may be associated with more compensation). In fact, the coefficient for Black and sexual minority are the reverse of what they were among Christians and among the unaffiliated. Other analyses with somewhat larger samples similarly demonstrated different patterns among non-Christians—for example, group differences in religiosity appear to be different among non-Christians than Christians, with the coefficient for gender being the reverse of what it was among Christians. Opiate of the Masses? 34
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FIGURES AND TABLES
Figure 1: Path Diagram
Liberal Politics + -
Social + Religion Disadvantage (Schema)
+ + Psychological Compensation (Resource) Opiate of the Masses? 40 Table 1: Descriptive Statistics for Key Measures, General Social Survey Mean/ Measures Metric N Proportion SD Range Religion Measures Psychological Compensationa Standardized Seven-Item Scale (a = .96) 1,323 0.00 1.00 -1.97–1.46 Two-item Religiosity Scalea Standardized Two-Item Scale (a = .79) 1,323 0.00 1.00 -1.58–1.69 Four-item Religiosity Scaleb Standardized Four-Item Scale (a = .85) 11,418 0.00 1.00 -1.89–1.85 View of Bibleb 11,418 Book of Fables View Bible as a Book of Fables 0.21 Inspired, Not Literal View Bible as Inspired, but Not Literal 0.44 Literal Word of God View Bible as Literal Word of God 0.32 Other Volunteered Category for Other Volunteered Responses 0.01 Missing Category for Missing 0.02 Type of Affiliationb 11,418 Liberal Affiliation Classified as Liberal (Includes No Affiliation) 0.31 Moderate Affiliation Classified as Moderate 0.39 Fundamentalist Affiliation Classified as Fundamentalist 0.25 Other/Missing Category for Other or Missing 0.05 Social Status Measures Woman Woman=1 11,418 0.55 Raceb 11,418 White, Non-Latinx White=1 0.67 Black, Non-Latinx Black=1 0.15 Latinx Latinx=1 0.13 Other Race, Non-Latinx Other Race=1 0.05 Income under $100kb 11,418 Income over $100k Family Income over $100k in 2000 constant dollars 0.10 Income under $100k Family Income under $100k in 2000 constant dollars 0.80 Missing Category for Missing 0.10 Sexuality (Behavior)a 1,323 Heterosexual Opposite-Sex Partners Only in Last Five Years 0.66 LGB Had a Same-Sex Partner in Last Five Years 0.02 No Partnering Information No Partnering Information (No Partners or Missing) 0.32 Sexuality (Self-identification)b 11,418 Heterosexual Self-Identified Heterosexual 0.78 LGB Self-Identified Lesbian, Gay, or Bisexual 0.04 Missing Category for No Identification Information 0.18 Key Political Outcomes Political Ideologyb Extremely Conservative=1 to Extremely Liberal=7, Standardized 10,973 0.00 1.00 -2.01–2.12 Abortion Rights Scaleb Standardized 7-item Support for Abortion Rights Scale (a = .89) 7,459 0.00 1.00 -2.31–1.45 Redistributionb No Government Action=1 to Government Should Reduce 7,623 0.00 1.00 -1.64–1.31 Economic Inequality=7, Standardized a Cases from 2004; b Cases from 2008-2016 Opiate of the Masses? 41
Table 2: Disadvantaged Social Status Predicting Standardized Psychological Compensation, Religiosity, View of Bible, and Affiliation Type Psychological Affiliation Compensation Religiosity View of Bible Type Woman 0.44*** 0.24*** 0.19*** 0.10*** (0.05) (0.01) (0.02) (0.01) Black 0.60*** 0.46*** 0.50*** 0.54*** (0.08) (0.02) (0.02) (0.02) Latinx 0.40*** 0.19*** 0.19*** 0.08** (0.09) (0.02) (0.02) (0.02) Income under $100k 0.28** 0.09*** 0.18*** 0.15*** (0.09) (0.02) (0.03) (0.02) LGB 0.41* -0.15*** -0.19*** -0.17*** (0.17) (0.04) (0.04) (0.04) Covariates Yes Yes Yes Yes Constant -1.13 -1.10 -0.56 -0.46 N 1,323 18,710 15,242 17,904 Standard errors in parentheses Source: General Social Survey 2004-2016 Note: Models also include an “other race” category, an income category for missing, and a sexuality category for no partnering information, as well as the following covariates: education, age, marital status, parental status, region, rurality, and, when an outcome measure was fielded in multiple years, a series of binary controls for survey year. These models use all available cases for each outcome from 2004 to 2016. Other analyses focus on either 2004 or 2008-2016. * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01, *** p < 0.001 (two-tailed)
Opiate of the Masses? 42
Table 3: Disadvantaged Social Status and Psychological Compensation Predicting Standardized Religiosity Psychological Religiosity Compensation % of Religiosity Accounting Difference Without for Mediated by Psychological Psychological Psychological Accounting Compensation Compensation Compensation for Religiosity Woman 0.23*** -0.03 113%*** 0.31*** (0.05) (0.04) (0.04) Black 0.61*** 0.25*** 59%*** 0.25*** (0.09) (0.07) (0.07) Latinx 0.16 -0.08 148%*** 0.31*** (0.10) (0.08) (0.08) Income under $100k 0.16 -0.01 109%** 0.19** (0.09) (0.07) (0.07) LGB 0.01 -0.23 1854%* 0.40** (0.18) (0.15) (0.14) Psychological Compensation 0.60*** — (0.02) Religiosity — — 0.57*** (0.02) Covariates Yes Yes Yes Constant -1.12 -0.43 -0.50 N 1,323 1,323 1,323 Standard errors in parentheses Source: 2004 General Social Survey Note: Models also include an “other race” category, an income category for missing, and a sexuality category for no partnering information, as well as the following covariates: education, age, marital status, parental status, region, and rurality. The identical coefficients and standard errors for Black in Models 2 and 3 is not an error, the values just happen to be the same out to two decimal places. Sobel-Goodman tests used to determine percentage and significance of religiosity mediated by psychological compensation. * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01, *** p < 0.001 (two-tailed)
Opiate of the Masses? 43
Table 4: Disadvantaged Social Status and Psychological Compensation Predicting Standardized Liberal Political Ideology Model 1: Model 2: % of Total Model 3: Without With Difference Mediated With Model 4: Compensation Compensation by Compensationa Religiosity Full Model Woman 0.17** 0.26*** -53%*** 0.26*** 0.24*** (0.06) (0.06) (0.06) (0.06) Black 0.21* 0.33*** -59%*** 0.37*** 0.35*** (0.09) (0.09) (0.09) (0.09) Latinx 0.12 0.19 -61%*** 0.18 0.20* (0.10) (0.10) (0.10) (0.10) Income under $100k 0.10 0.15 -31%** 0.15 0.17 (0.09) (0.09) (0.09) (0.09) LGB 0.47* 0.56** -18%* 0.52** 0.45* (0.18) (0.18) (0.18) (0.18) Psychological Compensation -0.20*** -0.10** -0.05 (0.03) (0.04) (0.04) Religiosity -0.16*** -0.10** (0.03) (0.04) Bible Inspired -0.35*** (0.08) Bible Literal -0.43*** (0.10) Moderate Affiliation -0.16* (0.07) Fundamentalist Affiliation -0.08 (0.08) Covariates Yes Yes Yes Yes Constant 0.36 0.13 0.06 0.51 N 1,294 1,294 1,294 1,294 Standard errors in parentheses Source: 2004 General Social Survey Note: Models also include an “other race” category, an income category for missing, a sexuality category for no partnering information, Bible categories for other and missing, and a fundamentalism category for other/missing, as well as the following covariates: education, age, marital status, parental status, region, and rurality. Sobel-Goodman tests used to determine percentage and significance of political ideology mediated by psychological compensation. a Negative mediation is suppression (i.e., psychological compensation suppresses group differences in liberal ideology). Mediation can be significant without the original effect being significant when the relationships between the predictor and mediator and between the mediator and outcome are strong. * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01, *** p < 0.001 (two-tailed) Opiate of the Masses? 44
Table 5: Religion as a Suppressor of Group Differences in Standardized Liberal Political Ideology, Support for Abortion Rights, and Support for Redistribution Liberal Political Ideology Abortion Rights Scale (a = .89) Redistribution Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Woman 0.08*** 0.17*** 0.18*** -0.08*** 0.06** 0.06** 0.14*** 0.18*** 0.18*** (0.02) (0.02) (0.02) (0.02) (0.02) (0.02) (0.02) (0.02) (0.02) Black 0.23*** 0.38*** 0.42*** -0.03 0.20*** 0.25*** 0.44*** 0.48*** 0.49*** (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) Latinx 0.11** 0.17*** 0.19*** -0.29*** -0.19*** -0.15*** 0.21*** 0.23*** 0.23*** (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.04) (0.03) (0.03) (0.04) (0.04) (0.04) Income under $100k 0.05 0.10** 0.11*** -0.22*** -0.16*** -0.13*** 0.29*** 0.31*** 0.31*** (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) (0.04) (0.04) (0.04) (0.04) (0.04) (0.04) LGB 0.44*** 0.39*** 0.34*** 0.25*** 0.18** 0.13*** 0.18** 0.15** 0.14* (0.05) (0.05) (0.05) (0.06) (0.06) (0.06) (0.06) (0.06) (0.06) Religiosity -0.29*** -0.19*** -0.42*** -0.31*** -0.10*** -0.06*** (0.01) (0.01) (0.01) (0.01) (0.01) (0.02) Bible Inspired -0.25*** -0.11*** -0.12*** (0.03) (0.03) (0.03) Bible Literal -0.39*** -0.51*** -0.08* (0.03) (0.04) (0.04) Moderate Affiliation -0.07** -0.08** -0.06* (0.02) (0.03) (0.03) Fundamentalist Affiliation -0.15*** -0.08* -0.10** (0.03) (0.03) (0.04) Covariates Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Constant 0.27 -0.12 0.20 0.28 -0.29 -0.01 0.08 -0.05 0.08 N 10,973 10,973 10,973 7,459 7,459 7,459 7,623 7,623 7,623 Standard errors in parentheses Source: 2008-2016 General Social Survey Note: Models also include an “other race” category, an income category for missing, and a sexuality category for no orientation information, as well as the following covariates: education, age, marital status, parental status, region, rurality, and a series of binary variables for survey year. Models with view of the Bible and affiliation also include categories (not shown) for other volunteered responses or missing information. * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01, *** p < 0.001 (two-tailed)
Opiate of the Masses? 45
Table 6: Religiosity as a Suppressor of Liberal Politics among Disadvantaged Groups across Measures Group Differences Suppressed by Religiosity Under Political Measures N Woman Black Latinx $100k LGB General Politics Liberal Political Ideology 10,973 * * * * Party Identification (Strong GOP=1 to Strong Dem=7) 11,334 * * * * Voted for Democrat in Previous Election (if voted) 7,095 * * * * Social Attitudes That Sometimes Appear to Contradict the Positionality Principle Abortion Attitudes Scale (7 items; a = .89) 7,459 * * * * Same-Sex Relationship Morality 7,175 * * * * Other Sex-Related Attitudes Scale (5 items; a = .62) 11,357 * * * * Same-Sex Marriage 7,423 * * * * Gender Attitudes Scale (4 items; a = .66) 7,603 * * * * Legislation of Morality Scale (4 items; a = .40a) 4,044 * * * * Free Speech Scale (18 items; a = .91) 7,519 * * * * Required Prayer in Public Schools 7,292 * * * * Physician Assisted Suicide 6,695 * * * * Corporal Punishment 7,513 * * * * Science and Environment Scale (15 items; a = .79) 3,649 * * * * Marijuana Legalization 7,143 * * * * Economic Attitudes Governmental Redistribution 7,623 * * * * More Welfare Spending 5,492 * * * * Workers Need Strong Unions 2,271 Confidence in Organized Labor 7,331 * * * * The Rich Should Be Taxed More 2,330 * * * Right to Adequate Standard of Living 1,231 Large Income Inequality Not Necessary for Prosperity 1,004 Inequality Persists Because It Benefits the Rich 997 Source: 2008-2016 General Social Survey a Although the alpha for this scale is low, I present it because this was a GSS-formulated scale and the patterns are the same for the individual measures. Note: Models include gender, race, class (family earnings), sexuality, education, age, marital status, parental status, region, rurality, and survey year. * indicates suppression of liberal response or mediation of conservative response by psychological compensators (p < .05 in Sobel-Goodman tests using sgmediation in Stata)
Opiate of the Masses? 46
Table A1: Disadvantaged Social Status and Religiosity Predicting Standardized Liberal Political Ideology in Random-Effects GLS Regression, 2010-2014 GSS Panel Model 1: Model 2: Model 3: Without With Full Model Religiosity Religiosity Woman 0.14*** 0.22*** 0.22*** (0.04) (0.04) (0.04) Black 0.19** 0.32*** 0.33*** (0.06) (0.06) (0.06) Latinx 0.08 0.15* 0.18** (0.07) (0.06) (0.06) Income under $100k -0.04 -0.02 -0.00 (0.05) (0.05) (0.05) LGB 0.25** 0.23** 0.22* (0.09) (0.09) (0.09) Religiosity -0.24*** -0.20*** (0.02) (0.02) Bible Inspired -0.09* (0.04) Bible Literal -0.16*** (0.05) Moderate Affiliation -0.10** (0.04) Fundamentalist Affiliation -0.10* (0.05) Covariates Yes Yes Yes Constant 0.33 0.03 0.21 N 4,344 4,344 4,344 Standard errors in parentheses Source: 2010-2014 General Social Survey Note: Models also include an “other race” category, an income category for missing, and a sexuality category for no orientation information, as well as the following covariates: education, age, marital status, parental status, region, and rurality. * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01, *** p < 0.001 (two-tailed)