Atheists: Remove “No Religious Preference” from Military
Update: Military.com notes:
a week after the Military Association of Atheists and Freethinkers submitted the petition on WhiteHouse.gov the effort has garnered just 25 of the 25,000 signatures it needs by Feb. 5 to get any kind of response from the White House.
Jason Torpy, a former Army captain and current atheist, has filed a petition on WhiteHouse.gov to have “no religious preference,” or “NO REL PREF,” removed from the options in troops’ military records. He also wants the question removed from the list of requirements during inprocessing, making it an optional “opt in” later.
The latter is probably extremely unlikely. First, the military has been mandated by law to make a variety of things a “mandatory opt in,” based on the belief most servicemembers will never make the extra effort to do so otherwise. (For example, one congressman floated the idea of forcing members of the military to enroll in the pseudo-retirement “Thrift Savings Plan.”) Torpy explicitly stated there was pressure to “choose Christianity” in basic training: Read more