Well, something is significantly skewing the results. As of now, the percentages are:

Question: Do you identify with some form of the Christian religion?

Yes, and my faith is important to me. 62%
No. I’m religious but in a personal way. 11%
No. I’m of another faith. 2%
No. I’m an atheist or agnostic. 25%

There is no way in hell that one in four people in Fort Wayne is atheist or agnostic.

I’m sure if the poll was advertised on a Christian site, the percentages would be more realistic. Based on my own anecdotal evidence, the number of non-believers in Fort Wayne is around 5%.

I think the sample size is small. It be would nice to see the total number of submissions. I think the atheist/agnostic numbers will be lower tomorrow.

Online polls like this are not scientific. PZ could slam it but I don’t want to do that.

The atheists/agnostics were only 8% when I did it. It is obviously a small response so far.

Just cast my vote.

I just voted. We’re up to 24%. The N-S prints the results of its polls. It would be nice if we could crash this thing heavily. I have no problem asking for PZ’s help. Call your friends!

At this point, the poll has been so thoroughly crashed that I’ll bet the N-S won’t print the results, except maybe as part of a story about the nasty atheist poll-crashers. It will be interesting to see how they handle it.

Boy, that poll is limited. I want to add a couple of other choices:

Yes, but not in the way YOU want me to believe

and

No, Christianity has been tainted with stupidity.

Yay! Leo Morris just blogged about us. Too bad he didn’t get the referring link right.

Check it out.

Kerry Hubartt, editor of the News-Sentinel, is on Saturday’s editorial page, sharing quotes from Leo Morris’ blog and from the Rasmussen Reports on an Easter poll.

Interesting how many column inches this little incident has received, especially since the News-Sentinel says polls are for entertainment and discussion.

If this is so, Morris and Hubartt probably should have left the poll alone, so that readers could entertain themselves with it and discuss it as they saw fit. But I think this disclaimer is a little too convenient.

And I’m curious — the News-Sentinel doesn’t seem to know what poll crashing is. Is this concept somehow radically techie in some way?

ellecdr,

[T]he News-Sentinel doesn’t seem to know what poll crashing is. Is this concept somehow radically techie in some way?

In his editorial column Hubartt says:

Our poll voting process is designed to allow only one vote per computer, but serious computer geeks know how to disable cookies to get around that restriction.

I guess if he thinks that disabling Cookies is something that only serious geeks know how to do, then perhaps poll-crashing would be considered radically techie.

Hubartt says he’s going to print the results on Monday. I hope to buy a copy of the paper ’cause if it appears in a newspaper, it must be true, right?

Andy D.,

It be would nice to see the total number of submissions.

Hubartt says that over 17,000 responses have been recieved. Given that the poll was posted on PZ’s site, with a number as small as that, I’d bet that almost all of the responses were unique.

EPILOGUE

The News-Sentinel printed the results of the poll, as they do with all their polls. The printed results are:

Yes, and my faith is important to me. 2%
No. I’m religious but in a personal way. 2%
No. I’m of another faith. 9%
No. I’m an atheist or agnostic. 88%

The editor added the following note immediately below the results:

Last week’s question generated a record 17,668 responses, the overwhelming majority of them from atheist Web sites, one with a national audience, whose members wanted to make their presence felt. This would probably be a good time for one of our periodic reminders that the weekly poll is for entertainment only and is not designed to be scientific.

17,668 at 88%. PZ’s readership is huge. I thought it would be around 6 or 7K based on no scientific information what so ever. I was wrong about the percentage being lower later.

Re-opening the thread for discussion of the new NS poll, 29-Apr-09.

It’s been suggested that we ought to “stay away” from the new NS poll. Questions for the suggester of this:

(1) Why?

(2) What the hell makes you think you can ask people what to do or not do on the Internet? I’ll vote in any poll I damn well please.

If the concern is “crashing,” as in casting more than one vote, no one has suggested that; further, I never do it, since I think it’s silly. Those who advocate it, though, usually assert that it’s just to make the point that relying on unscientific Internet polls to gauge the public’s actual opinion on anything is stupid, and that the polls are best understood as mere entertainment—more like playing a silly Flash game designed to increase site traffic and consequent ad revenue than contributing to public discourse.

I’d advocate the slightly less cynical position that such polls can better serve the third purpose of fishing lure, to see who takes notice, gets reeled in, and sends loads of traffic their way. Thus it’s not a scientific poll of what proportion of the readership thinks what: it’s a test to see what groups out there, active, paying attention, and capable of spreading memes.

IOW, another case where the online version of something fulfills a purpose distinct from yet complementary to that of the traditional version of the thing, since Internet communication is inherently different. Which is a useful lesson by itself.

@Butter,

1) Why?- FFW was “quoted” in Leo M’s blog and later in an editorial in the paper. We were accused of being geeks and skewing the results. The final poll cleared that up but how many people saw that? I would prefer FFW not get the reputation of hijacking two polls in a row. Are we stalking the paper now? Moreover, I would prefer not to get dragged into a Obama/abortion debate. The whole thing is silly and is really about a private Catholic University and who they choose to speak. This isn’t our debate. The prior poll was about atheism/agnosticism. If a priest wants to be a jerk and throw a PR fuss and not attend, he has free speech rights to do just that…

2) Don’t put words in my mouth. I said no such thing and even used the word suggest. Of course, Butters as an individual you may do whatever you want within legal limits on the net. That as you know has nothing to do with me. Please vote on the poll, don’t use FFW’s name.

I did say I was going to vote individually. I also said I suggest FreeThought Fort Wayne stay away meaning the organization posting an endorsement to skew the poll.” It is too soon and this is getting borderline stalker. The other poll fit us better and we made our point. Be happy with that. We should also learn about how we were quoted and the how Leo used it against us. The comments section helped but those were not posted in the editorial. I am not saying it was a net loss. I hope it was a gain but I cannot prove it and two poll crashes in a row is pushing it. You know that…

-Andy D

And, of course, FFW had very little to do with the last poll crashing, except for pointing out its existence so the Pharyngulites could swoop in and leave their Dark Mark. (That’s the fifth, lesser known house of Hogwarts, after all: Pharyngula.)

I’m afraid I’m with the other Andy on this one. He gently suggested not to entangle FFW’s name with this poll. He didn’t ask anybody not to vote.

Andy D.: We had a misunderstanding, then. Not entangling the name of the group with this is not what you said:

I suggest that FreeThought Fort Wayne stay away from The News-Sentinel polls for awhile.

If “Freethought Fort Wayne” is understood as having as its referent the persons who comprise the group (and this is a common way of understanding group nouns), then it could easily be taken as a prescription for what individuals ought to refrain from doing.

Further, how would one go about entangling the group’s name with one’s vote on the poll, anyway? One could mention in the comment box that they saw the link here, but that’s merely a true statement, and one that’s probably unavoidable, since this is the sort of place where such links are found.

I’m a bit flummoxed by your reasoning as to why we should avoid it, anyway. You admit that Morris erred in his editorial by attributing the “skewing” (a misleading label for the activity under discussion; see below) to us. So you advocate using a reporter’s error as a reason for us to curtail our activities? Isn’t pointing out the error—i.e., discovering the truth, and acting accordingly—more important?

Moreover, the whole point is that “skewing” isn’t really “skewing”: the polls are unscientific and intended for entertainment (as Morris acknowledged). Their target audience is whoever happens to be visiting their site. If a big chunk of that body of visitors was directed there by an advocacy group, then that’s how it is, and the poll results will reflect that. To construe using a web poll for its intended purpose as “borderline stalking” is specious and hyperbolic.

As to the subject of this poll itself: What Notre Dame does is their own business, but if the subject is construed as a pugnacious, misogynistic witch-doctor’s undue influence over public affairs, it’s pretty squarely within in the realm of things FFW cares about, and there’s no reasonable justification for excluding it from our consideration a priori.

@Butters
The biggest weight in my reasoning not to engage the new poll in skewing is that it is TOO SOON and secondly it is not directly on target with our group. You seemed to miss that. Skewing this poll would suggest that we are overly preoccupied with the news-sentinel and its staff. Furthermore, following that FFW, butters, and the news-sentinel staff knows that this is not a scientific poll what would skewing it accomplish now? The 1st time was funny and we made a bold on target point about atheism. Skewing a 2nd time right after the first on a hot button issue is pushing it. Everyone knows that and all it does is suggest an animal instinct to show off and say “nah nah we crashed your poll again losers.” You can call this hyperbole but this is the perception that many would take.

“We had a misunderstanding, then.”
I could have said it better. However, I did use the word suggest and stated I will vote individually. That should have been enough for anyone not to imply what you suggested I said,
“What the hell makes you think you can ask people what to do or not do on the Internet? I’ll vote in any poll I damn well please.” Simmer down now…

“So you advocate using a reporter’s error as a reason for us to curtail our activities? Isn’t pointing out the error—i.e., discovering the truth, and acting accordingly—more important?”

Once again you are putting words in mouth that I didn’t speak. I said the comments section on Leo’s blog and the editorial were helpful. However, most people around town saw the editorial in the paper which included the geek and skewing language. Our own words were used against us. That is worth remembering and learning from. Many people here did point out the errors online. That was great and NS finally reported what happened on the final poll closing and we made comments here saying that too.

What does skewing the 2nd poll have to do with any of this or more importantly fit with our mission statement? Do you really want to do that or do you just like to argue? Both? lol

Darcy is a public figure and I suppose if you want to write a opinion article about it then fine. It is pretty much understood that we disagree with his religious reasons. However, my opionion is it is private university and I think they can say what they want including the priests. If I was a student I would be thrilled that the overly religous nuts wouldn’t be at the speech… Being a freethinker does not mean that one is a priori pro-choice.

I still suggest that we leave the sentinel poll alone as a group and it is unrelated. OK?

Whoa. I believe you guys are over-thinking this. Crashing polls (and by “crashing” I don’t mean multiple voting, I mean getting the word out to others with a link to the site) is fun. The secondary benefit might be that if a view is perceived as wide-spread, it becomes more difficult to ignore or insult. BTW, PZ has published a link to a St. Petersburg poll about those horrible Florida jebus license plates. Enjoy!

Andy D: Eh, sorry I got grumpy as a first reaction. But what do you think of the substance of the dispute: that “skewing” isn’t inappropriate behavior, if it consists only of an exhortation of our members and visitors to go vote on it? In that context, “skewing” is identical to exactly what the poll is for. (To be fair, the post of ours linking to the original poll probably should have said that explicitly; I certainly would if I ever direct-link to such a poll.)

Or, to look at it another way, “it’s just for entertainment” followed by “we shouldn’t ’skew’ it” is a non sequitur, unless there’s a hidden belief somewhere. The closest thing I can find is “we were quotemined and ‘blamed’ erroneously for this non-problem, even though it was kind of corrected later, which made people maybe perceive us badly.” Which is why I think this characterization:

“So you advocate using a reporter’s error as a reason for us to curtail our activities? Isn’t pointing out the error—i.e., discovering the truth, and acting accordingly—more important?”

stands. And to be clear, “acting accordingly” includes not being frightened away from further participation in such things.

(Of course, I gather that your concern is more that we’d be misperceived as having some sort of official stance on the issue, and on this particular issue I guess I can see that, depending on interpretation of the poll question’s wording. Which is why I’m trying to argue the meat of the crash-or-don’t-crash question more generally.)

Also, FWIW,

Being a freethinker does not mean that one is a priori pro-choice.

Correct. Being a decent human being, who isn’t anti-woman, means one is pro-choice, though.

Littlejohn:

Whoa. I believe you guys are over-thinking this.

Aye. But it’s mostly as stone soup for disagreements over our budding civic role more generally.

@Butters,

Hey thanks for the apology.

In general, I don’t care if we point out a poll like we are doing with this conversation or even writing a specific post with a link if it is about a relevant topic with an article.

I just ask not to call in the big guns and post on this one. I am not frightened away it is just the cost outweigh the gains.

-Andy D