MSU Bias Busters project highlights Hmong Americans, still struggling for recognition half a century after the Vietnam War

June 24, 2024 by

Click this cover image to visit this new MSU Bias Busters book’s Amazon page.

Hmong Americans disagree with a U.S. Census classification

By JOE GRIMM
Director of the MSU School of Journalism Bias Busters project

Nearly 50 years after their evacuation to the United States from Southeast Asia in significant numbers, Hmong Americans are still fighting for an accurate portrayal by the U.S. Census.

Hmong people, who fought in the CIA’s Secret War, were hurriedly flown to the United States and fled to refugee camps when the U.S. pulled out of Vietnam. Today, they are fighting for proper recognition of their origins.

In March—as the Associated Press reported—the U.S. Office of Management and Budget announced several revisions in the way the census categorizes people. It plans to classify Hmong people as East Asians, according to one Associated Press article. Representatives of the group say this is a misclassification that ignores their history and amounts to an erasure of their ethnic group. It can also perpetuate the Model Minority Myth.

The issue is keenly sensitive to Hmong people, whose history has left them without a homeland, in part because of the way they were treated in China.

A second Associated Press article explains the problem. Hmong people say the federal government has incorrectly decided Hmong people originated in China. the big player in East Asia. However, Hmong origins are older and farther north than their years in China. The nomadic Hmong people are asking to be recognized as coming from Southeast Asia, where they settled and fought for the U.S.

The East Asian classification stings because their trek through China led to persecution. Their written language was banished. They were not allowed political standing. They kept searching for a home and fled south into Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia—places in Southeast Asia. Having never had an opening to establish a homeland of their own, Southeast Asia is the closest thing Hmong people have to one.

The issue is about far more than history and identity, which are important in and of themselves. Given the way the U.S. government uses Census data to allocate federal resources there is a practical reason to be correctly classified. According to the bureau’s 2022 American Community Survey, income among Hmong people in the United States was about $26,000 per person. For East Asian Americans, it was almost double that. Being put into the East Asian category buries this important disparity and could cost Hmong people opportunities once again.

In AsAmNews, Valentina Lewis quoted Southeast Asia Resource Action Center Executive Director Quyen Dinh: “One of the biggest harms is the mistrust that now exists within the community from the youngest generation to the elders, who don’t even want to be counted in the next census 2030.”

The Census Bureau reports it is reviewing decisions about how Hmong people will be classified by the 2030 census.

“100 Questions and Answers About Hmong Americans: Secret No More,” will be available on Amazon on July 2. It addresses many questions tied up in Hmong identity and history and the U.S. Census Bureau’s decision. The guide is published by the Michigan State University School of Journalism as part of its Bias Busters series of guides to cultural competence

With the Michigan State University Bias Busters, we are celebrating the Hmong among us!

June 17, 2024 by

Click on this cover to visit the book’s Amazon page, where you can pre-order a copy to arrive on July 2, 2024.

Community Contributions of these Resilient Survivors are ‘Secret No More’

In fact, Secret No More is the subtitle of this new 100 Questions and Answers book from the Michigan State University School of Journalism Bias Busters project.

“Hmong Americans have traveled a long way in a very short time,” says the Preface to the newest volume in this award-winning series of books used nationwide to help reduce bigotry through education—in both text and video formats, in this case. As the Preface explains, “Very few Hmong people lived in the United States until its 1975 pullout from Vietnam. That put Hmong people, recruited by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency to fight in a secret war against the Viet Cong, in grave danger.”

This newest Bias Busters book will ship soon from Amazon, so please read (and share with friends via social media) this story (and videos) about the new book. Let’s collectively spread awareness of this remarkable yet little-known minority among us.

As the war was ending, thousands of Hmong were killed; thousands were evacuated to the United States to build new lives. They came from Southeast Asia and were scattered among states including California, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan and North Carolina.

Most Hmong people arrived with only what they could carry. They had little formal education, savings, warm clothing or any connection to these new places. Their English was limited. Return was impossible because the nomadic Hmong people did not even have a homeland. As Joseph Yang, one of the people you will meet in this guide, said, his people have had to “carry our culture and our religion on our backs.”

Now, in fewer than 50 years, Hmong Americans have traveled further still. Today, this population has very high rates of U.S. citizenship. They are succeeding in college, business, government and the arts. They have been elected or appointed to local, state and federal offices. They are judges, doctors, college students and professors. Many work in agriculture, as their families did in Southeast Asia before they were recruited to fight. Others work in U.S. health, education and media.

Hmong artists have enriched the tapestry of their new country with traditional music, song, poetry and visual arts. Some are excelling at U.S. forms of writing, dance and music.

But, to this day, Hmong people are little known, so this new book is a perfectly timed opportunity—as the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War approaches in 2025—to learn about these resilient survivors who are contributing in so many ways to American life.

First, how did the Hmong people get out of Laos?

Here’s one of the videos included in this book (accessible through QR codes in the book’s pages). In this short video Julie Xiong explains how Hmong people escaped from Laos.

How are Hmong families organized?

Julie continues in this short clip about the strong family networks that are an essential part of Hmong communities.

A unique cultural archive: ‘Story cloths’

In this video, Joseph Yang explains a bit about Hmong story cloths at an “Ask a Hmong” event held to spread news about this upcoming book.

Why are coins worn on traditional Hmong clothing?

Joseph continues with a brief description of this custom.

Care to learn more?

The Michigan State University School of Journalism Bias Busters project has produced about two dozen volumes in this award-winning series. Each volume is prepared by student-reporters who research 100 common questions people ask about each of the minority groups featured in a volume. Their work is overseen, in each case, by national panels of noted experts who work with the students to ensure the accuracy and balance of each book.

“In these books, we answer the questions every is asking—but no one is answering.” That’s been one of our guiding mission statements since we started this project. These guides are not in-depth histories. They are intended to provide basic information for Americans who want to understand more about our friends, neighbors and co-workers.

Please, share this story with friends to help us continue to foster this mission to help Americans understand each other in these often turbulent times.

Want to see all the guides? Here’s a link to Amazon’s overview page. (Note: The Hmong guide will appear in that list after its July 2, 2024, publication date.)

And once more, here’s a direct link to order the Hmong guide, which will arrive July 2.

Have a meaningful Memorial Day! And, consider these tips for conversations with veterans.

May 25, 2024 by

By JOE GRIMM
Director of the MSU School of Journalism Bias Busters

Memorial Day, the last Monday in May, is a federal holiday that honors U.S. service members who have died in wars and military actions. The millions of living veterans who have served have a different federal holiday: Veterans Day. That is always on Nov. 11—and recognizes Armistice Day, the end of fighting in World War I at 11 a.m. on the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918.

Click the cover to visit Amazon.

Our entire community of authors, columnists and editors at Read the Spirit magazine is grateful for service members past and present. So, the first purpose of this column is to explain the difference between these holidays.

It is only natural that, as you encounter veterans around Memorial Day, you might want to recognize them for their service. But Memorial Day is to remember those who have died.

According to the Veterans Administration, there were 18.6 million U.S. veterans in 2023. Each year, about 200,00 people transition from active duty to civilian life.

When we thank military people, the gesture is filled with goodwill. That’s a good thing. But when we don’t know their personal experience, this can sometimes lead to misunderstandings.

Misunderstandings?

Think about it for a moment: One person’s military service is not like everyone’s service. Some prefer to talk about this; some prefer to remain quiet about it. Think about those veterans who sometimes wear their service like a badge on their sleeve, lapel or hat. It may seem like they’re actively advertising their service in the hope of sparking conversations. However, many who wear those badges on caps or coats explain that they wear them not to brag, but just in case someone else from their branch or unit might spot the symbol and reconnect. Those connections can be strong, even among people who have not met before.

So, rather than a hit-and-run thank-you, engage people if they are open to it. Rather than thanking them, ask a small question that shows you recognize the complexity of military service. An expression of interest can say more than a thank-you.

Maybe start with: “I see you are a veteran.” And watch the response.

If it’s welcoming, you might ask: “Which branch did you serve in?”

“When did you serve?”

“Where did you serve?”

These straightforward questions signify recognition and respect, but even they can uncover sensitive areas. They might surface painful memories or regrets. If they want to tell you more, you will learn something about their individual experience. If they don’t, that is OK. At least you took the time to look beyond the label to see the person.

Good starting points for learning about veterans—on any day of the year—are in “100 Questions and Answers About Veterans,” a guide in Michigan State University’s series on cultural competence.

This one describes the branches of the U.S. armed forces, what members are called, training, transitions, deployments and even a little military slang.

Hate crimes against gay and transgender students are way up! And—we’ve got helpful resources.

March 25, 2024 by

In a rising tide of hate crimes—

Our authors are publishing, teaching and speaking out for equality and inclusion

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(EDITOR’s NOTE: Special thanks to MSU School of Journalism Professor Joe Grimm for writing about this alarming new report on the steep rise in hate crimes among our most vulnerable young people. Joe is one of many authors in our publishing community concerned about equality and inclusion. Right now, for example, Christian ethicist Dr. David Gushee is preparing to deliver the April 14 keynote at the Parent & Family Summit—”Interwoven: Uniting Kids, Parents and Community.” Follow that link to learn more about the event, which you could attend online.)

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By JOE GRIMM
Founder of the MSU School of Journalism Bias Busters

Click the cover to visit the book’s Amazon page

Hate crimes against gay and transgender students are way up, especially in states with laws against transgender rights or teachers’ speech about gender and sexuality, according to The Washington Post. And the crimes are not up by just a little.

FBI statistics on anti-LGBTQ+ school hate crimes doubled from 2015-2019 to 2021-2022. But in the 28 states with new anti-LGBTQ+ laws on the books, such crimes quadrupled, The Post reported.

FBI stats show the most common crimes associated with LGBTQ+ school hate crimes are simple assault, intimidation and vandalism. Forms of bullying, which are lower on the aggression scale, might not rise to the level of being a crime. Recently, however, news stories have linked bullying of LGBTQ+ students to suicide.

On March 13, a summary autopsy report said Oklahoma high school student Nex Benedict died by suicide after being bullied in a restroom at their school because they did not identify as strictly male or female. The Washington Post report came out against that backdrop.

The Post looked at laws that bar students from sports teams or school restrooms that differ from the gender they were assigned at birth. Other laws limit or forbid teachers from talking about gender identity or sexual orientation.

How are state laws related to bullying?

The Post quoted Amy McGehee, an Oklahoma State University doctoral student who researches LGBTQ+ health and well-being. She said, “Policy sets the tone for real-world experiences [and] discriminatory policy just creates a hostile environment.”

The Post also quoted California high school student Max Ibarra, who identifies as nonbinary and transgender: “The school board has made it very clear we’re not welcome here. It’s very clear they don’t want us to exist.”

3 Valuable Books to Help Change Community Thinking

The Michigan State University Journalism School’s Bias Busters series has three guides that address basic questions for people who seek greater understanding.

One book is titled: “100 Questions and Answers About Gender Identity”

Here’s an example of a common question we ran into for that guide:

Do all transgender people have gender-confirming surgery?

The answer:

Most do not. According to the U.S. Transgender Survey, only 25 percent of respondents said they had some type of gender-confirming surgery. Transgender men were more likely than transgender women to have had surgery, 42 percent to 28 percent. Nine percent of nonbinary people have had surgery. Fourteen percent of transgender women and 21 percent of transgender men said they never wanted surgery. Surgery is expensive and insurance doesn’t always cover it. Even if a transgender person does not have or want surgery, their identity is still valid.

A second book is titled: “100 Questions and Answers About Sexual Orientation” https://www.amazon.com/Questions-Orientation-Stereotypes-Surrounding-Sexualities/dp/1641800275

And a third closely related book is: “The New Bullying: How social media, social exclusion, laws and suicide have changed our definition of bullying, and what to do about it”

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Joe Grimm is an MSU journalism professor and founder of the series.

We clearly have questions about the ‘Nones’ among us. MSU Bias Busters have the answers!

March 18, 2024 by

Click the cover to visit the book’s Amazon page.

By JOE GRIMM
Head of the MSU Bias Busters project

Whew! Our team of Michigan State University School of Journalism students—known as the Bias Busters—produced our latest book just in time!

For weeks now, journalists and religious leaders have been running in every direction after the latest reports on the number of religiously unaffiliated Americans.

The same new Pew research data is being described in seemingly opposite ways. Headlines have included:

Fox: Religious ‘nones’ decline for first time since 2016, Pew study finds

NPR: Religious ‘Nones’ are now the largest single group in the U.S.

Nether headline is wrong.

While the proportion of religiously unaffiliated people in the U.S. population has declined slightly, other groups, notably Christians and Catholics, declined more. So, everybody wins— or loses.

Reactions within Christian religions to bringing people into churches varied as much as the headlines.

In The Baptist Paper in Alabama, Mark MacDonald wrote, “As believers, we need to decide if we try to reach this unchurched group, who are ‘characterized as morally directionless,’ or shake our heads and not even attempt the challenge. I would argue the question is not ‘if’ but ‘how.’ Remember, nones are not all the same, but they all need Jesus.”

MacDonald is executive director of the Center for Church Communication. He is also a speaker, consultant, author, church branding strategist for BeKnownforSomething.com. MacDonald proposes building bridges with community-helping ministries, sharing stories, leveraging social media, extending inclusive invitations and demonstrating relevance to daily life.

Michael Pakaluk, a social research and business professor at the Catholic University of America, took a harder line in an interview with the Catholic News Agency. He told CNA, “The fields are there and are ripe for the harvest. People recognize that atheism is its own form of religion. It’s harsh and unattractive. Agnosticism was never widespread and has always been limited mainly to educated classes.”

He said that if people identify as “nothing in particular”—“then in my view they are right back where the church started, among pagan nations, and that is great for us, for evangelization.” Pakaluk told CNA the rise of religious unaffiliation is due to “secularized education and the trauma and poor example of divorce.”

Despite his concerns, or maybe because of them, Pakaluk said now is a great time for evangelization. He said, “Catholic parents should think twice, or three times, before they send their children to any colleges except faithful, vibrant, Catholic colleges.”

Writing for Crisis magazine, historian and author W. Crocker III took a harder line. “Before we can reach the adult nones with the good, the beautiful, and the true, we need to shake them out of their willed imbecility. … Until that is achieved, arguments about truth will miss the mark. Christian humility, charity, and generosity will not move them. … You want to win the nones? Treat ’em rough.”

The evangelical Christianity Today ran this headline, “Why Evangelicals Aren’t Afraid of Being Outnumbered by Nones.” In the article Erik Thoennes, professor and department chair of biblical and theological studies at Biola University, said his Generation Z students are turned off by church marketing or bids to make it cool. They want authenticity.

He said he goes with traditional strengths such as the power of Christ. As the article concludes, he is quoted, “I don’t have to stay atop of the latest trends to make sure dechurching doesn’t happen at my church.” He is pastor of Grace Evangelical Free Church in La Mirada, California. He said. “It’s simple: Stay focused on Jesus.”

Got questions about our minority friends, neighbors and coworkers?

There are now more than 20 guides in the Bias Busters series. Which ones would you like? 

PBS network’s wonderful ‘Gospel’ series is a ‘multimedia experience with wall-to-wall music’

March 3, 2024 by

Click on this poster for the PBS series to visit the extensive website PBS has set up with supplemental materials.

By JOE GRIMM
Director of MSU’s Bias Busters

Hop aboard the PBS network’s four-part Gospel docuseries that sweeps through the origins, expansion and future of gospel music. (Click here to visit the extensive PBS website related to this series.)

Host Henry Louis Gates Jr., drives this expedition from The South through the Great Migration to Chicago, then to Detroit and eventually everywhere. Gospel music evolved and picked up steam as it grew out of safe hush harbors to small Black churches to “race music” to choirs, radio, recording contracts, television, mega churches, clubs and white and international audiences.

This project is a layered multimedia experience with wall-to-wall music. It is rare to find moments where there is not both narration or interviews and music. Video and photography as well as crawling lyrics illustrate the story and music. It commands attention.

Gates and a choir of sources—some of whom sing—tell how spirituals, blues and jazz became gospel music and how the art forms continued to change and meld. The project details the ongoing struggle between spiritual and secular performance and settings for gospel music. The dynamic tension between whether to praise or be paid, whether to play the churches or the juke joints, accelerated some careers and stalled others.

With rich archival footage and contemporary interviews, the series goes beyond the headliners—so many stars are featured—to show how the writers, ministers of music, producers, entrepreneurs and business people made gospel grow from churches to communities to the country to the anthem track for the Civil Rights movement. The series drives vertically through time and horizontally through what has become a global audience.

In framing the history, Gates says, “The Black Church has been the home of creative expression and experimentation for more than 300 years. From the beginning, this creativity was driven by the one instrument that Black people could count on when nothing else was available: The human voice.”

Gates is a professor and the director of the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research at Harvard University. He has authored dozens of books and films.

Gates is always on a roll, and that is true today. His newest book, The Black Box: Writing the Race comes out March 19. His PBS Finding Your Roots show is in its 10th season. A profile in the current February-March AARP magazine says, “Some public intellectuals win their place in society through fierce debate, showing off the sharpness of their minds during verbal attacks. But Henry Louis Gates Jr. took a slightly different path. He did it by being charming.”

That charm—Gates’ knowledge and laughter—make the Gospel docuseries engaging.

Click on the cover to visit the book’s Amazon page.

When my Michigan State journalism class was working on our book, 100 Questions and Answers About the Black Church: The Social and Spiritual Movement of a People, we provided the students copies of  Gates’ The Black Church: This Is Our Story, This Is Our Song (2021) for them. His influence, of course, means that the MSU guide spends some time with gospel music.

How I wish this PBS series had been available to the student authors then! They would have loved this.

Even so, their guide can supplement PBS’ Gospel. The guide focuses on the Black Church more broadly, of course. Among the 100 questions we answer:

Why were Black Churches created?

What characterizes a Black church service?

How did the Black migration to the North affect the church?

How are Black Churches sanctuaries?

What is the minister of music’s role?

What is the Black social gospel?

What role did the Black Church have in the Civil Rights movement?
Why are movement, energy and emotion important to praise?

What is modern gospel?

How do sacred and secular music interact?

Our modest guide includes the briefest but diverse list of gospel artists, a timeline and video in which the Rev. Robert Jones demonstrates how the sacred “I Shall Overcame” became the Civil Rights anthem, “We Shall Overcome.”

The PBS series began streaming for free in February and that free version ends March 11 and 12. The DVD of the docuseries will ship from Amazon on March 19. It has lots of goodies including a Gospel Live! concert companion, trailers, behind-the scenes photos and a Spotify playlist of 162 songs.

 

 

Michigan State University Journalism School’s Bias Busters Explain One of America’s Largest ‘Religious’ Groups

February 11, 2024 by

The ‘Religiously Unaffiliated’ are far more diverse than the label ‘None’ suggests

Click the cover to visit the book’s Amazon page. Copies will arrive shortly after the March 5 publication date.

MARCH 2024 UPDATE: This new Bias Busters book now is shipping from Amazon!

By JOE GRIMM
Director of MSU Journalism’s Bias Busters project

So-called religious “nones” are clearly more than nothing.

The number of people in the United States who do not publicly identify with an organized religion is driving headlines again. Researchers and journalists sometimes reduce them to the one-word label “nones”—referring to their choice of the “none of the above” option in surveys about religious affiliation. But the truth is: The unaffiliated are a vast and diverse group.

First, the sheer size of this group of people who prefer not to label their spiritual-religious lives in traditional ways is fascinating to researchers, authors, journalists—and, of course, community and religious leaders nationwide.

We keep asking: Who are all these people?!

We wonder: How do these people see the deeper or more transcendent aspects of their lives, their communities and the cosmos without adopting our long-standing labels for religious membership?

And, what exactly do they believe?

One major milestone in American life that is easy to miss in many of the press reports about the unaffiliated is this: Rather than a shrinking of America’s religious diversity, this huge group of people who reject our most common religious labels seems to represent an expansion of America’s spiritual diversity.

In fact, we are realizing that those traditional survey check-lists of “religious affiliation” don’t tell us much about the religious-spiritual lives of a huge portion of our population. The old way of gathering and reporting this data doesn’t seem to be working very well.

That’s why our Michigan State University School of Journalism team of award-winning student journalists—who we call the Bias Busters—decided to step in and report on information that seems to be missing from the many headlines about “nones” in 2024. Especially if you are an educator, community leader, health-care provider, policy maker, media professional—or anyone else who needs to understand the makeup of our communities—you should pre-order a copy of Michigan State University’s latest Bias Busters book today.

What Do We Mean About Adding to America’s Religious Diversity?

The landmark January 2024 Pew Research report raises more questions than it answers about the hard-to-define spiritual-religious nature of these Americans.

Just a few excerpts from Pew’s report:

  • Most “nones” believe in God or another higher power.
  • But very few go to religious services regularly.
  • They are not uniformly anti-religious. … Most say religion causes a variety of problems in society—like intolerance or superstition. But many “nones” also say that religion helps give people meaning and purpose, and that it can encourage people to treat each other well.
  • They are far less likely than religiously affiliated Americans to say they believe in God “as described in the Bible,” but most do believe in God or some other higher power. Just 29% reject the notion that there is any higher power or spiritual force in the universe.
  • About half say spirituality is very important in their lives or say they think of themselves as spiritual.

And here’s one more fact to puzzle over: We know that many regular readers of our ReadTheSpirit online magazine are religiously unaffiliated—because we have heard from so many of you via emails, calls, zooms and in-person conversations over the past 17 years. In fact, we know that our publishing house serves people from at least a dozen traditional religious groups—from Christians, Jews and Muslims to Buddhists and Native Americans—but we also count “nones” among the major supporters of our publishing projects.

That’s true of the team behind ReadTheSpirit—and that’s true of the diverse student body behind our MSU Bias Busters project over the past decade. Some students proudly describe their religious affiliations; some students are—unaffiliated.

And, here’s why that’s so important: Over many years, we have figured out ways to work together for the common good.

Now, do you have more questions about how this undefined “group” plays a role in our incredibly diverse religious-spiritual landscape?

Well, just to make it easy: Here’s that link again to the new book’s Amazon page. Pre-order your copy today and it will arrive just after March 5.

This Isn’t the First Time the Unaffiliated Have Made Headlines

Today, we are experiencing an echo of earlier nationwide interest in this group. You can follow the waves by looking at the trend line in estimates of the group’s size.

In January, James Emery White explained, “When I wrote The Rise of the Nones: Understanding and Reaching the Religiously Unaffiliated in 2014, it was in many ways a warning of a coming cultural tsunami. I was having to make the case that there actually was a rise in this particular religious demographic—and that it was going to matter.”

White added: “Ten years later, the wave of the nones has clearly crashed upon our spiritual shores.”

White, a prolific author who has described himself as a sometimes none, is a former professor of theology and the founding and senior pastor of Mecklenburg Community Church in Charlotte, North Carolina.

He wrote that book 10 years ago after Pew’s researchers noted an especially steep upward curve in the share of people who said they were religiously unaffiliated. A Pew team wrote in 2012, “In the last five years alone, the unaffiliated have increased from just over 15% to just under 20% of all U.S. adults.”

This set off a cottage industry of writing, posting and publishing about the phenomenon.

The number continued rising. This make-shift “group” identified by pollsters hit 30%, eclipsing “evangelical Christians” and “Catholics”. People speculated answers and tracked down motives. Other research indicated that maybe the rising number just meant people were coming out of the closet about their non-affiliation.

A Diverse Group That’s Challenging to Chart

After a while, public discussion of this group quieted and, in recent years, many scholars who study religion at universities and research centers nationwide have focused more on the rising tide of politically conservative Christians, the rise of the so-called “Christian Nationalists.” ReadTheSpirit reported on that trend in October.

Then, Pew gathered new data on the unaffiliated—and one particular finding suddenly leapt into the national conversation in early 2024: Perhaps the total number of religiously unaffiliated folks is stabilizing—or even shrinking.

In January 2024, Pew reported, “28% of U.S. adults are religiously unaffiliated … That’s marginally lower than our surveys indicated in 2022 and 2021, and identical to what we found in 2020 and 2019 …”

Pew concluded that sentence by saying this “raises a question: After decades of sharp growth, has the rise of these religious ‘nones’ ended?”

Pew’s answer? “At the risk of sounding wishy-washy, we think it’s too early to tell.”

“Too early to tell” does not deter people from writing, speaking, preaching and strategizing about this enormous group of Americans once again. On The Late Show one evening, Stephen Colbert cracked a few jokes about how difficult it is to identify this group.

Even James Emery White isn’t quite sure what to make of this new data. This is how he concluded his January post about the nones: “They are not rising … they have risen.”

The Fact Is: Nones Are All Around Us

In fact, you may be a “none” yourself—although, one thing we have learned about these Americans is that the vast majority don’t like to be called “nones.” So, excuse us in occasionally dropping that word into this week’s ReadTheSpirit cover story, simply as a matter of clarity.

And, the fact is: It doesn’t really matter whether the trend line is going north or south. Whether 28% of the nation is religiously unaffiliated or the proportion is 30%—it is always a good time for people to understand each other better.

That is what this newest MSU Bias Busters guide is all about. In researching this guide, our students fanned out to ask unaffiliated people what they wish others knew about them. Some were deeply unhappy about being called “nones.” That label implies they are nothing, empty, zeroes. Many are deeply spiritual and moral. Many say they have a relationship with God—their problem is with churches or clerics.

Some believe in God. Some, included in this same group, say they do not believe in God at all. Some aren’t sure. Some are open to the idea but want proof.

And, missing from a lot of the reporting on this huge group is the fact that millions of these folks have found new labels they prefer, instead of the list survey researchers give them. What are some of those labels? The subtitle on this guide is “Nones, Agnostics, Atheists, Humanists, Freethinkers, Secularists and Skeptics.”

The 100 questions cover the wide range of Americans who wind up in the “unaffiliated” group. The answers might surprise you.

We already have listed some of the findings above. But here are a few more that are likely to surprise readers:

• Most nonreligious people believe in heaven.
• Unaffiliated people score higher on religious knowledge tests than most others.
• They have a strong belief in religious freedom because they want the right to be free from religion.
• Many pray and enjoy other spiritual practices.
• Pew reports that 87% of the religiously unaffiliated celebrate Christmas.

So, help us contribute to healthy communities

That’s our goal. “Good media builds healthy community” is the motto of the publishing house behind ReadTheSpirit and behind the entire Bias Busters series of books.

We can share that motto because it represents the best principles in American journalism.

The students who have contributed to the Bias Busters project know they are helping real people—family, friends and coworkers—to be more clearly understood in our diverse communities. And, with this particular minority group, we recognized that we’ve all got work to do. We found that religiously unaffiliated people report they are frequently judged, put down or misled by even well-intentioned people who want to save them. Sometimes the slights are accidental; sometimes not.

This new guide—like all of the guides we have published to date—shows how to engage with people in a respectful, mutually beneficial way to encourage healthy community life.

Just think about that for a moment: Healthy community.

Pew didn’t ask about that particular group—but I’ll bet nearly 100 percent of us would like to affiliate with that.

So, one last time: Preorder your own copy of this unique and timely new book right now.