So Many Christians, So Few Lions

So Many Christians, So Few Lions: Is There Christianophobia in the United States? by George Yancey and David A Williamson, 142 pages

This study by a pair of sociologists from the University of North Texas finds that the frequency of anti-Christian attitudes is in line with anti-Semitic and anti-Muslim attitudes, with the difference that the latter prejudices tend to propagate on the lower levels of our society, while the former is endemic on the upper levels, particularly in the media and academia.  As a result, bigotry against Christians in the US, while sharing some root characteristics with other prejudices, is distinctly different in many of its manifestations.

Unfortunately, the study is handicapped by its treatment of "Christian", "conservative Christian", "fundamentalist Christian", and even "conservative Protestant" as equivalent terms.  While the authors attempt to justify this by pointing out that those with anti-Christian attitudes often conflate these categories, this does not entirely convince, especially since many of the same respondents also confused "Christian" with "conservative".  As a result, it is difficult to extricate political animus from anti-religious hatred.  This reduces the book to an excellent presentation on the nature of prejudice with the equivalent of a bunch of randomly selected anti-Christian internet comments attached.