I have a quick question for the world. I was looking a renting out a room to a college student or something, and I was using Craig's List to advertise for it (yeah, I know about the number of creepozoids on Craig's List, I'll be fine).
Anyway, when advertising for housing, you are not allowed to discriminate. Unless you are renting a room in a house, then you can discriminate with regard to sex.
But you are not allowed to say "No muslims", or "Jews Only" or anything like that. Here is the description on this item from the fair housing act as summarized by Craig's List.
2. religionAtheism isn't a religion.
- postings stating a preference for the religion of a desired applicant
(eg. "Christians only," "no Muslims," etc)
- postings describing the religion of current occupants of the complex
or neighborhood (eg. "nice, Christian neighborhood", or "Jewish family
seeks roommate," etc)
Can I write "Atheists only?" Isn't that the same as specifying "college degree required" or "Only for people who where hats"?
Not that I would be interested in doing that, I'm just wondering.
Logging you in...
Transplanted Lawyer · 830 weeks ago
Techskeptic 69p · 830 weeks ago
I wasn't going to do that anyway. I was just wondering. Seems lame. One more place where atheists are conveniently corralled with other reliigons without gaining the benefits of being a religion with respect to government or law.
However I can sort of see it since saying "atheists only" might be construed to be the same as saying "No christians, muslims, jews or anyone else that believes on beings that no one can physically see"
Daniel Rutter · 830 weeks ago
In this case, I suppose you could call yourself a "freethinking household", which would fend off at least some Holy-Book-bashers. Heck, you might even be able to just say "atheist household", though that sounds a bit weird.
(See also a couple I've seen here in Australia: "Green leafy backyard", meaning "we smoke weed", and "broadminded", which can mean anything from "my girlfriend sometimes stays over" to "this is an all-nude house". :-)
I think that anybody who actually tried to make a point of atheism not being a religion, ergo requiring it is not religious discrimination, would not be arguing in good faith. Lots of "legal loopholes" fall into this category; yes, you may have found yourself a little plot-hole in the legislation, but that doesn't mean that people shouldn't try to figure out whether your loophole is clearly against the intent and spirit of whatever rule you're dodging, and if it is, bust you anyway.
This is a major theme in many countries' justice systems. If all they needed to do was enforce the law like robots, we wouldn't need a lot of juries.
(Sometimes people ARE required to enforce rules like robots, of course, because of preposterous corporate policies or "zero tolerance" and "three strikes" laws. But that's a discussion for another day.)
Jack 119p · 830 weeks ago
Techskeptic 69p · 830 weeks ago
One thing though which has come up in everyones comments; While I was wondering aloud about the legality and ethics of doing so, I really never intended on doing something like that. I doubt most atheists would (I could be wrong on that, im not sure"
More weird, is that when I thought of the issue the very first time, my concern was not for religion coming into my house, but instead that a devout theist might be uncomfortable living here. Neither my wife or I am religious, and while my wife is comfortable with it, she is not outspoken about it. I, on the other hand, will happily discuss religion with anyone. We are both quite comfortable and happy living in an evidence based world.
Daniel,
At least here, you can not actually say "atheist household" without a code word, but I do like your idea about "free thinking family"