I've been yapping a lot lately about how misguided opponents of gaysexuality are. Maybe I'm a gay rights advocate by default since, in a broader sense, I always stand in opposition to ideas that both restrict the lives and liberties of others and are not supported by a shred of evidence. Religious opposition to gaysexuality is a great example because, as people who have followed this blog for a while know, I've asked various anti-gay interlopers to offer a consequentialist argument against gay civil unions and the like, and regardless of their purported platform, they're a collective 0 for 1.2 shitloads on that score.
Anyway, PZ links to a nice blog post about the evolutionary basis of homosexuality. The key message here is that not every behavior or trait that becomes common in a given species is oriented toward maximizing reproductive behavior. Hell, look at us 21st-century humans: Our brains have evolved to the point at which we're clever enough to use condoms and invent birth-control pills. What could be more antagonistic toward any workaday notion of evolutionary success?
PZ also posted a map depicting the degree of religiosity by county in the United States. For reasons I noted in a comment, I don't believe it accurately represents religiosity as most here would frame conceptualize it. Declaring oneself to be a Catholic on a survey form doesn't mean the same thing in terms of the day-to-day interplay between faith and action as declaring oneself to be an evangelical Christian or a Seventh-Day Adventist.
I think the map below (click on it for a larger image) is at least as instructive. I can't figure out what the story is with Roanoke County (the one just southeast of the only yellow blotch in the state), as it appears to be mostly dark gray -- not a color included in the map legend -- with a couple of red dots thrown in for fun. New England is virtually all Catholic, meaning about as religious as I am for most purposes.
Finally, because I anticipate a rapid interblog metastasis, I'll go ahead and link to Rob Knop's post in which Rob expresses what appears to be, at least on the surface, a modicum of vague dissatisfaction with PZ's characterization of religious believers in the above-linked post as "ignorant, deluded, wicked, foolish, or oppressed victims of obsolete mythologies," which in turn appears to be something of a thumbs-down review of faith in general.
Comments
you're right -- i think this map is much more informative
(but for even more fun, i'm comparing Alaska on both -- the area of highest religiousness in Alaska corresponds to a high Lutheran population)
Posted by: skyotter | July 12, 2007 6:39 PM
One problem with this sort of map is that it doesn't account for the vast differences in population between counties. For example, even though I know that Alaska only has about half a million people among all its boroughs and that a bunch of itty-bitty counties in Massachusetts and southernmost NH have ten times that, there's still an inevitable "at-a-glace" tendency to assign weight based on sheer geographic size.
So, while the Southeast is obviously plagued with an out-of-control incidence of Baptardation (a pandemic, really), there are actually only a few truly populous metro areas there: South Florida, Atlanta, Charlotte, and I suppose Central Florida. (If you want to be generous you can throw Memphis and Hamption Roads -- the Virginia Beach area -- in there too.) Meanwhile, in the bluey Northeast, you have New York, Boston, Philly, and Baltimore-Washington, plus all the built-up shit in between like Hartford and Wilmington. It is on these latter shitholes that I predicate my future hope for the nation.
Posted by: Kevin Beck | July 12, 2007 6:58 PM
Kevin,
Love the second paragraph of your comment. After the Election, when the red-state/blue-state map came out, I had a rethuglican friend who just loved it. Until, I pointed out that what it really was was a population density map.
Posted by: Jeb, FCD | July 12, 2007 8:30 PM
The evidence for homosexuality being genetically determined is faint at best.
The evidence for it being a result of variations in utero is abundant, especially in Europe, and this has been known for centuries by farmers and herders. To see that this is so, check into freemartins, noting that they are genetically normal, yet physiologically nonfunctioning as females, and are reliably homosexual females. If uterine hormones can produce so pronounced an oddity as a freemartin, how can a less pronounced result be so hard to understand.
The irony of it is that here in the USA the Bible Belt is mostly farm country, and farmers all know about freemartins, so when they claim homosexuality is a lifestyle choice they know they are lying through their teeth, and shamelessly so.
Posted by: Clootie | July 12, 2007 8:40 PM
Clootie,
Some anti-homo could have a field day quote-mining you:
"The evidence for homosexuality being genetically determined is faint at best...homosexuality is a lifestyle choice"
So could I:
"farmers and herders...are reliably homosexual"
Anyway, I guess the more encompassing term "congenital" would be appropriate when positing at least part of the basis for gaiety. But the entire topic is bullshit anyway, because from a civil rights standpoint it doesn't matter if gay people are inescapably so or actively convert from 100% hetero to homo on a damned whim; if they continue to engage only in consensual sex acts that harm no one, there's no defensible reason for discriminating against them in either case.
Posted by: Kevin Beck | July 12, 2007 9:32 PM
Kevin:
Gays and homosexuals need a delineation; gays flaunt a life-style (and have fun doing so), whereas homosexuals are a bit more discreet with their proclivity.
Civil unions are a must but can be circumvented by signed documents that are already available and legal all the way.
That is, any two people can sign powers-of-attorney and other papers that allow hospital visitations, legal possession and ownership of property, et cetera.
So the brouhaha about civil unions is a propaganda move pretty much -- one that tries to get society to accept gay-coupling on its face.
Why gays want to perpetuate a marriage contract baffles me, in that (aside from the sanctity of that contract or its intent to be sacred) gays shouldn't try to emulate what heterosexual couples do.
Gays -- homosexuals as a separate category are not involved -- who want to make a public statement of coupling merely exacerbate the irrational hate that dumb-asses have towards them.
Some of us understand that being gay (or homosexual) is a unique kind of thing, and shouldn't be caricatured by marriage or other hetero-accoutrements.
If gays are anything, they are, as indicated by all the famous persons who are so endowed, imaginative and creative, whereby they can come up with other ways to co-join and live within the context of a purportedly hetero-society without the opprobrium that they are subjected to.
Tocqueville cited the American ignorance about "strange" behavior, and that way back in the mid-1800s.
Why do we think that people today are more enlightened?
Smart gays should, like their homosexual (closeted) brethren, not play in the hetero-arena. It's demeaning and besmirches the glory that being gay (or homosexual) exudes.
But I ramble...
RR
Posted by: Rich Reynolds | July 12, 2007 10:30 PM
I'll mention that I did put an addition on that post with the map: the source is self-reporting by the churches themselves of about half the religious cults in America, so it's going to be afflicted with inflated numbers for some churches, and diminished representation by the more paranoid or secretive sects. I've pretty much decided you can't determine anything from that map.
Except maybe the Mormons. They are such obsessive beancounters at heart that I bet the numbers in Utah and Southern Idaho are pretty darn accurate.
Posted by: PZ Myers | July 12, 2007 11:21 PM
You'd learn to count accurately too if you lived someplace where the average household included 19 kids and 5 spouses.
Much as I try to shy away from reflex conclusions, the overlap between Baptardation, lack of education, religiosity, and obesity is hard to ignore. I'll pretend religion is just a by-product of the same x-factor leading to the other ills and not a contributor.
Posted by: Kevin Beck | July 12, 2007 11:26 PM
Interesting categorization on that map. Since Latter-Day Saints is a separate category from "Christian," we know have validation of the claim that Mormons are indeed not Christians. Catholics are also apparently not Christians, which any Southern Baptist could have told you. But there's even more: Baptists themselves, along with Lutherans, Methodists, and a whole host of others are apparently not "Christian."
Posted by: Tegumai Bopsulai, FCD | July 13, 2007 10:05 AM
If only this map actually showed the true makeup of our great land. While I know it is not the case, the map shows no Jews or Islamists at all. Pray Jesus, maybe someday!
Of course the Gays don't show up on anyone's radar, except their own. Other wise, there would be a bog purple zone around Manhattan and San Francisco, ha-ha.
Anyway, nice to see that even you pinko liberal eggheads promote the idea that this is a Christian nation. God bless you for that.
Posted by: David Duke | July 13, 2007 1:54 PM
Male homosexuality shows an interesting correlation to greater-than-normal female fertility in the same family. That does look genetic.
No such studies seem to exist for female homosexuality...
Posted by: David Marjanović | July 14, 2007 6:51 AM
Have you considered the possibility that gay brothers help their sisters dress and act fabulously so that they attract more potent mates? Huh? Have you?
Posted by: PZ Myers | July 14, 2007 1:38 PM
Posted by: llewelly | July 14, 2007 2:04 PM
In the context of this map, 'Christian' does not refer generically to all Christians, or even all Protestants. Most likely it means a specific denomination or family of denominations. For example if you type 'christian church' into Google, the first thing you get is likely to be a specific denomination, also known as 'Disciples of Christ'.
PZ talks about being in the middle of religiosity, yet this map makes it clear that his area is mostly Lutheran. While there are fundamentalist Lutherans (mostly of the Missouri Synod), there are plenty of liberal ones, and more cultural ones. A rural Minnesota Lutheran parish that shares its pastor with three others is quite different from a mega-fundamentalist church in suburban Dallas.
paulj
Posted by: paulj | July 15, 2007 3:06 PM
What these comments collectively get at, especially paulj's is that it would be a lot more useful for purposes of most ScienceBloggers and their readers to see a map showing the percentage of people in each county who accept evolution, oppose gay unions, etc. Forget the labels, it's the symptoms that are of interest. It's a lot easier to accurately stereotype adherents of, say, Southern Baptism thenit is to make sweeping judgments about Catholics.
Posted by: Kevin Beck | July 15, 2007 3:22 PM
llewelly -- aren't the Mormons the ones who insist on "converting" the dead, too?
Posted by: Luna_the_cat | July 15, 2007 6:48 PM
Yes Luna. In Mormon theology, all non-mormons are consigned to an afterlife in which they are preached to unceasingly, until they go mad - er, join the Mormon church. At that point, the Holy Ghost will inspire a living member of the church to submit the dead member's name to the church, for a ceremony known as 'baptism for the dead', which makes the dead person a Mormon.
It doesn't stop there. Mormons believe those dead Mormons require every special ceremony that living Mormons do - but for some curious reason, those ceremonies must be performed by living Mormons, by proxy. So there are also marriages, sealings, and confirmations for the dead as well. Supposedly, the dead cannot progress until these ceremonies are performed by living.
Now - since people started dying an awful long time before the founding of the Mormon church, and Mormons have never been majority (well, at least not in any place much larger than Utah), the backlog must be staggering. (I recall that as a little boy, I read a Carl Sagan article in which he estimated the number of dead humans at about 30 billions, and I thought 'wow, that's a lot of baptisms for the dead ...' .)
Curiously, if a member submits a name for rites for the day, and the named person is still alive (like, for example, Schindler, of Schindler's list fame), the Holy Ghost neglects to tell the LDS bureaucrats that the person is still alive and thus not eligible for the ceremony. Curiouser still, if a person has already received (their term not mine) multiple baptisms for the dead (like, er, Schindler again), the Holy Ghost neglects to inform LDS bureaucrats that the ceremony is unnecessary, and thus a waste of their time (a precious commodity for those seeking to baptize essentially all corpses, in a world where new corpses are being made at a ferocious rate). I suppose the Holy Ghost has a sense of humor, if a rather nasty one.
By the way, did you know Stalin is a baptized Mormon? Yes. Several times. So is Hitler. And Pol Pot.
Posted by: llewelly | July 15, 2007 7:52 PM
The map's own definitions are iffy. Here in upstate New York, every community has at least 2 churches, but there are at least a dozen different types. The map has my county as being Catholic, which I might (might) buy if the color reflected the most populous sect, but according to the legend, a county is colored only if the lead sect has better than 50% of the population there! There is no way that, by that definition, any county around me should be anything but gray.
And there should be a lot more gray all over the map.
Oh, and as to the preponderance of blue - you did notice that the map source is a Catholic organization...?
Posted by: Darby | July 16, 2007 9:45 AM
According to the legend on the map, a county has a dot if the lead sect has more than 50%. In other counties the color just indicates the largest. Considering that Protestants are split among a number of different denominations, it is not surprising that Catholics are the 'leading' group in most counties.
I can think of reasons why certain counties have >50% Catholics. Some are Hispanic, either historically (north central New Mexico) or by recent immigration. Some are Indian reservations that probably had Catholic missionary activity. Some are close to Quebec.
More than anything this map reflects the religious and ethnic history of these counties. Lutheran counties had a lot of Scandinavian settlement. The spread of Mormons out of Utah is quite evident. Alaska shows the missionary activity by various groups, much of it sponsored by the US government via the school system.
The source of the data is ASARB, which represents a wide range of 'religious bodies'. The numbers are biased toward organized groups, i.e. historical denominations. Groups that emphasize the independence of a local congregation (non-denominational or independent Baptist or Bible-believing, for example) are under represented. It also does not reflect the influence of para-church groups - magazines, conferences, alliances, that are independent of any denominational supervision.
paulj
Posted by: paulj | July 16, 2007 12:04 PM
One thing to remember is that many churches lie about their statistics. For example, I am sure that I am still on record as a Southern Baptist at my parents' church, simply by virtue of the fact that I was baptized there at 9. I'm sure Catholic churches are the same.
Posted by: Daniel M | July 17, 2007 7:23 AM
I'm just stoked that my former sect actually has a color instead of a number. I used to think it was small and beneath notice, but not any more!
Posted by: stogoe | July 17, 2007 12:32 PM