…and this is a 
Faith hurts
Category: Religion
Posted on: November 22, 2008 11:41 AM, by PZ Myers
Since a Wall Street Journal editorialist has denounced secularism as the source of all of society's ills, it's only fair to get another opinion. Like, say, of a social scientist who has actually done a comparative study of different nations, looking for correlations between religiosity and superior moral values or stability or whatever. Surely, faith-based societies will have some virtues, won't they?
Uh-oh. The results don't look good for believers.
In general, higher rates of belief in and worship of a creator correlate with higher rates of homicide, juvenile and early adult mortality, STD infection rates, teen pregnancy and abortion in the prosperous democracies.
The United States is almost always the most dysfunctional of the developing democracies, sometimes spectacularly so.
Some of the problems that the religious most strenuously deplore are ones that are exacerbated by the beliefs they advocate.
The study concluded that the US was the world's only prosperous democracy where murder rates were still high, and that the least devout nations were the least dysfunctional. Mr Paul said that rates of gonorrhoea in adolescents in the US were up to 300 times higher than in less devout democratic countries. The US also suffered from "uniquely high" adolescent and adult syphilis infection rates, and adolescent abortion rates, the study suggested.
Mr Paul said: "The study shows that England, despite the social ills it has, is actually performing a good deal better than the USA in most indicators, even though it is now a much less religious nation than America."
He said that the disparity was even greater when the US was compared with other countries, including France, Japan and the Scandinavian countries. These nations had been the most successful in reducing murder rates, early mortality, sexually transmitted diseases and abortion, he added.
Now to be fair, these aren't causal relationships, and this is only a study of correlations, so religion might not be directly responsible — you aren't likely to catch gonorrhea by going to church. But with the state of American religion, you are very likely to catch a kind of pernicious ignorance by going to church, and that disability might make it more likely that you will make bad decisions with unfortunate consequences that will add to the roster of dismaying statistics.
Comments
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead | November 22, 2008 12:05 PM
Reminds me of seeing a couple of maps in USN&WR a while back. The first map showed the rate church attendance within the last month. The second showed rate of out-of-wedlock births. The maps were almost identical. Religion=problems due to ignorance.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | November 22, 2008 12:09 PM
Greg Paul a "social scientist?" He's probably better known as a dinosaur-ologist. (2 links)
Posted by: DenisC | November 22, 2008 12:12 PM
Wow! powerful stuff. A link to the Article is:
http://moses.creighton.edu/JRS/pdf/2005-11.pdf
Worth reading
Atheist & proud.
DenisC
Posted by: TSC | November 22, 2008 12:15 PM
However, societies that believe in Bigfoot tend to have better t-shirt sales. Just ask Medved.
Posted by: mockrin2 | November 22, 2008 12:17 PM
I'm surprised that gay marriage wasn't included in the reason for society's ills. To blame secularism and homosexuality for
the USA's or world's decline is, well, humorous. I give you, ta da, George W. Bush, a heterosexual, Christian who has been determined to completely destroy everything in his path.
Posted by: Noadi | November 22, 2008 12:18 PM
With a name as common as Greg Paul, I wouldn't assume it's the same person.
Posted by: Gotchaye | November 22, 2008 12:22 PM
I imagine that, if there's a causal relationship there, it goes the other way.
Isn't it more likely that prosperity and security erode religious belief? The US, while wealthier per capita than most other countries, has a higher poverty rate due to increased inequality (this is exacerbated by the more generous social safety nets in other countries), and a great deal of the US' higher crime, STD, and abortion rates is attributable to the activities of the poor. People living in and around these conditions are more likely to feel the need to embrace a religion.
No doubt religion makes some of it worse (abstinence-only sex ed, for example), but I don't buy that it makes people worse off in general - it just preferentially attracts the worse off (which makes sense since religion is largely about making sense of an unpleasant world with promises of an afterlife).
Posted by: Necio | November 22, 2008 12:22 PM
It might to some extent be a question of sosial problems leading to religion rather than the opposite. That is, if people suffer, they might turn to religion for support and comfort.
Likewise, it might be that people in well functioning societies are more likely to turn away from religion.
Posted by: Matt Heath | November 22, 2008 12:23 PM
These sorts of correlations are fairly old news, but I'm cheered by the fact that this article is the Tory-leaning, Murdoch-owned, Times> of London. It's like Darwin on banknotes; it makes me feel secularism is safe in my homeland.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | November 22, 2008 12:23 PM
I know it's the same person.
Posted by: Citizen Z | November 22, 2008 12:24 PM
Now to be fair, these aren't causal relationships, and this is only a study of correlations, so religion might not be directly responsible
It doesn't mean that religion is responsible, but it is evidence against the notion that religion increases morality.
Posted by: Michael Fonda | November 22, 2008 12:25 PM
Correlation is indeed not necessarily cause. I hate to bring it up, but if you've ever taken a look at abortion rates, to use one example, you'll not that the District of Columbia has far and away the highest-per-capita rate of any state or district in the country. I have to run out and don't have time to find the link but the numbers, last I checked, were quite staggering. DC is very liberal and very black. Therefore, it would seem that a crucial factor one should be careful to avoid minimizing would be the continuing psychological and sociological aftermath of 300 years of slavery and Jim Crow. One might reasonably wonder what the rates would be once blacks were excluded from the American sample.
Of course, slavery and Jim Crow were the handiwork of our ever lovin', Bible thumpin' southern states so I suppose it would be quite reasonable to bring it all back to religion's doorstep if one has a mind to.
Posted by: NeoDevin | November 22, 2008 12:27 PM
I suppose you could get gonorrhea by going to church if you're a Catholic altar boy.
Posted by: Matt Heath | November 22, 2008 12:28 PM
You mean like,Posted by: CRM-114 | November 22, 2008 12:36 PM
"Faith is believing in something you know isn't true." -Mark Twain
Posted by: John | November 22, 2008 12:40 PM
"But with the state of American religion, you are very likely to catch a kind of pernicious ignorance by going to church..."
Bullshit.
These correlations are associated only with a particular flavor of church, and I suspect you know that, PZ.
Posted by: melior | November 22, 2008 12:42 PM
I dare speculate that the religious are much more likely to suffer a loss of faith in god than we godless nonbelievers are.
It's true -- religion often leads to apostasy!
Posted by: spgreenlaw | November 22, 2008 12:50 PM
Matt Heath,
Personally, I think Marx was spot on with that assessment.
Posted by: cactusren | November 22, 2008 12:50 PM
Sven--The article linked to in post #3 says it was written by Gregory Paul in Baltimore, MD. Greg Paul the paleontologist works at Florida State University in Tallahassee, so I think we can conclude that these are two different Greg Pauls.
Posted by: tacitus | November 22, 2008 12:51 PM
I believe the cause of America's social ills is not religion, it's right-wing conservatism. The US is by far the most right wing democratic nation on the planet, and it's the only modern industrial nation not to have implemented progressive institutions like universal health care and an effective social safety net. That results is greater disenfranchisement, a larger poverty gap, and worst of all, a massive prison population (five times that of any other western nation) which further promotes violence and social instability.
One can argue whether fundamentalist religion begets conservatism, or conservatism begets fundamentalist religion, but am increasingly convinced that it's conservatism that's the root cause. What you believe, and how you believe tends to be determined by your political outlook, not the other way around.
Moving the country politically to the left and keeping it there is the most important way to close the gap on our competition around the world. Hopefully a successful two term Obama presidency will take us a long way down that road.
Posted by: SEF | November 22, 2008 12:53 PM
NB That's old news (check the date on it) - meaning (among other things) that the "Wall Street Journal editorialist" had no real excuse for remaining unaware of the reality of the situation, had he bothered to do the research part of his job.
That article has been in my collection of interesting links from before it even had that particular URL format (and has often been posted in rebuttal to false religious claims). The locations of things change from time to time and then I have to struggle to find the new one if the old one doesn't redirect properly. Perhaps, in future, I'm going to have to store representative strings of text from the content of pages.
Posted by: Matt Heath | November 22, 2008 12:57 PM
spgreenlaw: Me too; that's why I took the opportunity to repeat it. It's surprising how many people only know the second sentence.
Posted by: negentropyeater | November 22, 2008 1:03 PM
This must be God reducing the murder rates, early mortality, sexually transmitted diseases and abortion, of non religious countries such as France, Scandinavia, Japan.
It's obvious this is one of his tests, to check if Americans can resist the temptation of losing their religiosity.
Posted by: Andy | November 22, 2008 1:07 PM
Re #19: No, Greg *Erickson* is the paleontologist who works in Florida. The article PZ links to is indeed by Greg Paul the paleontologist from Maryland, because I know his opinions on religion & society quite well from the VRTPALEO mailing list.
Posted by: SimonG | November 22, 2008 1:07 PM
My own take on it is that the more secular societies are better able to make pragmatic decisions. Deeply held religious beliefs may inhibit a society from adopting policies that work if they are seen to offend those beliefs.
Secular societies are not immune from these effects, and religion isn't the sole source of them but it's one less disadvantage.
Posted by: spgreenlaw | November 22, 2008 1:10 PM
Matt Heath,
People just don't read their Marx and Engles like they used to.
Posted by: The Science Pundit | November 22, 2008 1:11 PM
I find that to be a fascinating correlation. I agree that we should be careful to attribute a causal relationship here. I would also add that the church folk and the "unvirtuous" in these countries (like the USA) aren't necessarily the same people. (They might be; I don't know.) In other words, not only might this be the result of a common cause (I vote for despair and insecurity about the future), but that religiosity and crime, etc. may be rival ways of coping with it. It would be interesting to see a more detailed demographic analysis that addresses this.
Posted by: cactusren | November 22, 2008 1:21 PM
@ 24
Agh...I'm embarrassed. For some reason I seem to switch around people's last names. I did the same thing recently with Larry Whitmer and Larry Martin. Stupid brain!
Posted by: Moses | November 22, 2008 1:25 PM
I got the biggest politics-shock of my life as a young white professional to that back in the 1980s. As we saw in California, from a SOCIAL standpoint blacks are a lot more conservative about many things than whites. Like it or not, black does not equal liberal, despite overwhelmingly voting for (pandering) Democrats over (racist pandering) Republicans.
Since then I've pretty much believed that it's best to not even try to classify blacks as "liberal" or "conservative" from the white political meme of what is either. It is, in this area, a significantly different population.
I have generally find blacks to be more 'conservative,' if you will, in their attitudes about law and order, religion and sex. Much of this is because of their situation in this fucked up country of ours.
Now, the correlation in DC, FWIW, happens to be around poverty. Which is, frankly, (at 75%) THE PRIMARY DRIVER OF ABORTION -- the inability to raise a child due to economic conditions.
I tell Christianist people all the time, you want to fix "abortion" as birth control? First, fix poverty. Second, fix sex education and make birth control easy to get. Those will put a HUGE dent in abortion.
And it's what 'Jesus' would do, not blow up abortion clinics or act like self-righteous assholes...
Posted by: Moses | November 22, 2008 1:28 PM
Man, my self-copy paste and editing sucks ass today... I just so cannot put together a narrative...
Posted by: Cliff | November 22, 2008 1:29 PM
This is absolutely correct. The author of the linked article and the palentologist are the same Gregory Paul.
Cliff
Baltimore, MD
Posted by: tomh | November 22, 2008 1:29 PM
John wrote: These correlations are associated only with a particular flavor of church,
And which flavor would that be? Any one you don't subscribe to, perhaps?
Posted by: Piltdown Man | November 22, 2008 1:30 PM
I'm not a sociologist or statistician (Deo gratias) but a few things strike me as dubious about this piece of research.
Firstly, the survey, by its own admission, deals only with the "quantifiable" (ie material) indicators of social wellbeing. But is social health measurable in purely quantifiable terms? Let's suppose for the sake of argument that the survey is right in its assertion that religious societies are more crime- and violence-ridden than secular ones. For all we know, religious faith might help make the populace more psychologically robust in coping with violence. For all we know, the prevalent religious attitudes might lead to more vigorous counter-strikes and stricter punishments against the criminal classes on the part of the authorities, thus boosting the general morale of law-abiding society.
Conversely, the survey might be right in claiming that secular societies have a greater level of material prosperity than religious ones - but does prosperity always equal happiness? What about the levels of stress and depression in these respective societies?
Secondly, the survey never really gets to grips with what constitutes a "religious" or "secular" society. How are these to be defined? One might assume Spain's Catholic heritage qualifies it as relatively "religious", but it's still considerably more secular than it was, say, in Franco's day. And Phillip II probably wouldn't even recognise modern Spain as being a Catholic country at all.
The fact is, most modern "religious" nations are half-secularized anyway. Consider the curious assertion that non-religious societies have "low" abortion rates - does that mean in comparison to religious societies? Which religious societies have higher abortion rates than non-religious ones? And suppose if could be shown that (to take a purely hypothetical example) Ireland has higher abortion rates than the UK, that would still only be modern, semi-secular Ireland. I don't believe De Valera's Ireland had higher abortion rates than Brown's Britain.
And what about France? The survey classes France as secular. Well, yes, there is a powerful current of laïcisme in post-Revolutionary France, but there is also a strong spirit of Catholic reaction that should not be underestimated. And I suspect an analagous situation exists in Japan, another "secular" nation according to the survey.
These hazy definitions allow the survey to play fast and loose. If the USA seems in many ways "dysfunctional" - well, that can only be because it is the "most theistic" secular nation (ie isn't really secular at all) - which is highly questionable. (BTW, I love the chutzpah with which low crime-rates in Catholic countries are dismissed as "statistical noise".)
Thirdly, the ultra-secular UK is conspicuous by its absence. Could that be because its high levels of crime, delinquency, teenage pregnancy and STDs give the lie to the survey's thesis?
Finally, as PZ concedes, even if we accept the claim that some religious societies are more dysfunctional than some secular ones, how can we be sure religion is the causal factor here? There might be countless other factors, economic, climatic, God knows what, that the survey doesn't take into account ...
Posted by: Jonathan | November 22, 2008 1:43 PM
"The study shows that England, despite the social ills it has"
Social ills? Huh? Compared to other countries we are hardly remarkable. We have far fewer cases of rampant fundie mentalism.
Posted by: Matt Heath | November 22, 2008 1:47 PM
@Piltdown man: Not vague, not at all. See original article linked @3. Lots of specific measures of religiosity plotted against lots of specific markers of social well-being and broadly the same story across them all. Britain is included in the data; it doesn't actually seem to far from "religion sucks" trend-line on most of the scales.
Posted by: negentropyeater | November 22, 2008 1:49 PM
I think there is an important feedback element here :
1. as long as religion keeps people, especially the more defavorised, into the mode of rationalization of inequalities, they don't demand as much welfare improvements
Typical example is of course the extremely low voter turnout in all postwar US presidential elections of the "bottom quarter", (the 25% lowest income have systematically showed up with less than 35% turnout in each election) : this helps to ignore their demands and explains why the US has never had any form of social-democratic alternance to the usual Republican//Democratic system.
2. A gradual decrease in religiosity should reduce the element of rationalization of inequalities experienced by the populations, thereby increasing their demands for welfare. As more welfare programmes are put in place, the need for religion decreases, whch accelerates the decline in religiosity.
The USA is now begining phase 2, whereas European countries started with it n the 60s.
The result will be the same, a very rapid and accelerated decline of religion in the next 25 years, andincreased demands for welfare and social benefits from the more defavorised.
Can't change the movement.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead | November 22, 2008 1:54 PM
Pilty, what's so hard about understanding religion keeps people stupid. A mind free of god and religion can ask the right questions to really solve problems.
Posted by: David Wiener | November 22, 2008 1:57 PM
#12
While African Americans vote liberal (its in their economic and basic social interests) they are also very religious. Often fundamentalist. This is why, among other reasons, there is still so much pandering to religion in the Democratic party.
Posted by: tacitus | November 22, 2008 1:58 PM
That isn't incorrect. If all those millions of right-wing fundamentalist Christians were faithful Methodists or Presbyterians then America would be a much different place. That's why I believe it fundamental correlation with the health of a society is with political belief, not religious belief.
If we moved America politically leftwards to the center of the political spectrum of a typical Western democratic nation, then we would all be much better off.
2/3rds of voters under the age of 30 voted for Obama this time around, which is a hopeful sign that we're beginning to move in the right direction. If he has a successful first term and is re-elected then a whole generation of voters will be left-leaning (much like Reagan did in 1980/84). If, at the same time we get meaningful healthcare and welfare reform (to bring us into line with other countries) then a permanent shift may well be within our grasp.
The right-winger know it. Just the other day, one of the leaders of the Cato Institute said that if the Democrats get universal healthcare passed into law, Republicans--as they exist today--are all but doomed.
Posted by: Kristinmh | November 22, 2008 2:02 PM
I can picture John Hagee right now, giving someone a cold reading - "Yessir! The Lo-ahd Jayzuss iz-ah telling mah! The name begins with an S...or a K...or an SK..."
Hee. Rampant fundie mentalism.
Posted by: Citizen Z | November 22, 2008 2:06 PM
Oh, goodness. The DI approach to social science, now?
Posted by: Matt Heath | November 22, 2008 2:08 PM
Are Presbyterians uniformly moderate on that side of the pond? In Europe we get fuckwits like Ian Paisley.Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | November 22, 2008 2:19 PM
Except that the part behind the "thus" doesn't follow from the part before.
I live in France, and I can tell you that the Catholic reaction can be safely ignored, even more so than the Bible Belt of the Netherlands. Yes, it exists, but it is much smaller than you seem to believe, and of course smaller than it portrays itself.
Voting for president in a safe state is completely useless, and many people understand that...
What does turnout in swing states look like?
Posted by: tacitus | November 22, 2008 2:31 PM
To be honest, I'm not sure. I just picked the first two mainstream denominations I thought of. I was raised a Methodist in the U.K. so I know they're liberal Christian lot (though that does seem to vary more in the U.S.) and I'd forgotten about Ian Paisley and his mob.
Suffice to say that if instead of fundamentalists and charismatics we had mainstream moderates in the Christian church in the U.S. then we probably wouldn't have half the number of social ills we currently have in America.
My parents are practicing Methodists and I am an atheist, but they are more liberal than I am in some cases! Oh for an America full of wishy-washy liberal Christians! (I would prefer non-believers, of course, but it would be a step in the right direction).
Posted by: negentropyeater | November 22, 2008 2:32 PM
Well, you must like plaisanteries
In case you speak french, here's a little article on some statistics summarising the situation :
http://atheisme.free.fr/Contributions/Religion_etat_des_lieux.htm
1. only 55% declared catholics left in France
2. of these 55%, only 50% of them believe in God !
3. that means only 22.5% true catholics (TM)
4. of these, only 4% (!!!) , practice regularly.
Strong Catholic spirit in France ?
Maybe in your dreams...
Posted by: negentropyeater | November 22, 2008 2:39 PM
What's the relevance to the point I was making ?
Posted by: Gotchaye | November 22, 2008 2:42 PM
Piltdown, while it's true that we do care about things that have thus far avoided quantification (happiness, say), unquantifiables aren't the only things that matter. Take the homicide rate. It's obvious that lowering it is a good thing for society, whether or not doing so increases average happiness.
You could speculate that religion is so good for the unquantifiables that religious societies are actually better off, even though they tend to have worse quantifiables, but you've really got nothing to go on here.
Posted by: Matt | November 22, 2008 2:47 PM
Piltdown, I have one thing to correct you on: Japan does not have a reactionary religious movement. The figures for religious people in Japan (i.e. those who actually regularly attend any kind of spiritual organization) are very low. They might have some reactionary Nationalist views lurking in the background, but religion is nearly dead there. Every Japanese teacher I have had has said that when asked what religion they belong to, they don't even know what the questioner means.
They come from a place where religious traditions are blended with about as much reverence as we have for tacky fads. Even Shinto, the native belief system, is not so much believed in, as it is inherited like a tradition. Sort of like someone who is culturally Jewish.
Anyway, everyone else seems to have taken care of the rest of your post.
Posted by: Piltdown Man | November 22, 2008 2:52 PM
David Marjanović @43:
Size isn't everything.
negentropyeater @45:
I'd rather dreams than nightmares.
Posted by: Matt Heath | November 22, 2008 3:08 PM
Ignoring the fact that this has no baring at all, on the fact that your previous claim (to which negentropy eater was responding) was pure wishful thinking: MOST ARBITRARY. PROJECTION CURVE, EVAH!Posted by: DavidONE | November 22, 2008 3:12 PM
Ugh - The Times. Not a pleasant use of trees or bytes - see their regular denial of climate change, amongst others.
The original article - http://moses.creighton.edu/JRS/2005/2005-11.html - provides some interesting conclusions:
Posted by: Dave Wiley | November 22, 2008 3:13 PM
...higher rates of belief in and worship of a creator correlate with higher rates of homicide,...
Repeat after me, "correlation does not equal causation." Faulty logic is faulty logic no matter what it is in support of.
Posted by: Piltdown Man | November 22, 2008 3:14 PM
tacitus @39:
Oy vey!
Posted by: tacitus | November 22, 2008 3:16 PM
Yes, and I suppose you believe all Muslims are active jihadists too? Give me a break.
Look, having a majority practicing Muslim population in France is no more appealing that having a majority practicing Catholic population, but there is no need to give in to hysteria. The key is to maintain a strong secular state and state institutions that will withstand an increase in the numbers of religious adherents, and institute policies of integration to ensure that the religious community doesn't become isolated and resentful.
There is nothing inevitable about the rise of Islam to be the dominant faith (politically) in Europe. In fact much of the religious-right's fearmongering about a majority Muslim population in Europe in a few decades has already been debunked many times. Religious extremism of all kinds must be fought at home and (where absolutely necessary) abroad, but being paranoid about it doesn't help at all.
Posted by: SC | November 22, 2008 3:16 PM
http://www.cnn.com/2008/HEALTH/07/02/nations.happiness/index.html
Posted by: negentropyeater | November 22, 2008 3:23 PM
Oh, the beautiful projection curve that shows that shows that muslims are going to take over France, and probably why not the whole of Europe.
One of the favourite myths of the ignorant American religious right.
The only problem with it, is that unfortunately for you guys, second and third generation muslims show EXACTLY the same secularization trends in France as the Catholics.
They just abandon the practice of the religion of their parents. They can't be bothered, in our society, there is no need for it, plus our Laïc schools where they learn the same things (Science, Evolution, History, Philosophy, etc...) just makes sure they get rid of their dogmas very rapidly.
So that curve, well, it had an ncrease for a while because we had an influx of immgrants for two generations, but that's stopped, and their chldren are as French and secular as may be.
Tough luck. You won't see no muslims invading Europe, just those damned Atheists.
Posted by: negentropyeater | November 22, 2008 3:27 PM
SC #55,
I have 0% trust in this kind of research !
Posted by: SC | November 22, 2008 3:35 PM
I realize you're on one of your anti-American tears today, neg, but that's really one of the favorite myths of the European right, and not much discussed over here. And I believe P. Scumbag is one of yours, too. :)
Posted by: SC | November 22, 2008 3:39 PM
The kind conducted by the University of Michigan's Institute for Social Research?
Posted by: raven | November 22, 2008 3:42 PM
This quote by Marx is no where near as anti-religious as people make it out to be. Nothing wrong with opium or its myriad of derivatives per se. These are among the most common and widely prescribed pain killers.
If you have continuous, untreatable pain from any number of causes, back dysfunction, cancer etc., you will be glad that the FSM invented poppies.
I guess quote mining dates back a few centuries at least.
Posted by: Ka | November 22, 2008 3:43 PM
From: http://edition.cnn.com/2008/HEALTH/07/02/nations.happiness/index.html, posted by SC # 55
I somehow doubt that the Icelanders are still so happy ...Posted by: SC | November 22, 2008 3:46 PM
I was thinking the same thing when I read it!
Posted by: mothra | November 22, 2008 3:46 PM
After Pilty was properly sliced and diced, s/he attempted to to redirect comments to disparage a different religion. Looks trollish, maybe we should ignore the comments.. s/he's a fake anyway.
Posted by: Matt Heath | November 22, 2008 3:48 PM
@raven#60: When it's quoted in full I don't think anyone takes it as particularly hostile. It's only without the first sentence it can be read as "they're all junkies"
Posted by: Nick Gotts | November 22, 2008 3:50 PM
Piltdown Scumbag,
You really are totally incapable of the most elementary intellectual honesty, aren't you? Certainly this survey is not (and does not claim to be) absolutely definitive, but the trends look quite clear: increased religiosity correlates with increases in multiple, measurable social ills. You are reduced first to pretending that France and Japan are not secular countries, and then to the pathetic "I'd rather have dreams than nightmares"! Where's your countervailing research, Scumbag? Time to shut up about the evils of secularism, until you can produce some evidence. And no, before you ask, the Pope's opinion is not evidence.
Posted by: SC | November 22, 2008 3:54 PM
Nor is any other random quotation, P.S.
Posted by: Piltdown Man | November 22, 2008 3:54 PM
"Who are you going to believe, me or your own eyes?" - attrib Groucho Marx
Posted by: SC | November 22, 2008 3:57 PM
Idiot troll.
Posted by: Capital Dan | November 22, 2008 3:58 PM
What kind of fucking retard posts links to pictures instead of answers to questions?
Really, man. Put some effort into it.
Posted by: Nick Gotts | November 22, 2008 4:02 PM
Is it not absolutely typical of the intellectual and moral coward such as Piltdown Scumbag that, when defeated in argument, they flail about wildly, trying to change the subject and land a blow - any blow- on the opponent? What on earth does a graph of the French Muslim population (without of course any hint as to how the projection for future figures was arrived at) or an Obama t-shirt, have to do with the subject under discussion? And for that matter, why is the Obama t-shirt linked to via a Yiddish expression. Obama is Jewish? Or just a tool of the worldwide Jewish-Muslim-Masonic conspiracy against the One True Religion?
Posted by: Capital Dan | November 22, 2008 4:06 PM
I have to admit, I got a kick out of the potatohead's link to a picture of the big, scary Muslim population growing unchecked and giving the sniveling little twit "nightmares."
I suggest not clicking on any of the links that idiot slaps up. They're just red herrings, and they're not worth the bandwidth. If the moron is too stupid to answer questions himself, ignore the troll.
Posted by: SC | November 22, 2008 4:07 PM
BTW, Puerto Rico isn't a country but a self-governing US territory.
Posted by: JStein | November 22, 2008 4:14 PM
PZ, I disagree that the relationship isn't causal (though I think you were getting at this, and know that already).
Look at STD rates, and you'll find that the rates are disproportionately high in religious communities (not simply, as religious people try and suggest, urban communities). Pregnancy and STD rates are highest among areas where "abstinence only" lessons are taught, whether at school, at home or in church.
The moral: kids have sex, and in order to be safe, they need to be made aware of all of their options.
In terms of homocide, again we find that those rates are high in poor, religious communities (which are often urban). There is a direct correlation between poverty and religiosity, and that should always be pointed out.
Why do religious people kill more people than non-religious people?
It's not because they have a jihad.
It's because religious societies don't encourage education, they encourage faith and ignorance, and it is uneducated people, as a general rule, that are responsible for homocides and other violent crimes.
Posted by: Nick Gotts | November 22, 2008 4:16 PM
SC@58,
Actually, I have heard the "Muslims are gonna take over in Europe" meme more from Americans than Europeans (although this may be because I argue a lot with Americans on the web). It's used as a taunt by a lot of right-wing Americans whenever any aspect of the US is criticised by a Brit.It's often linked with the invented term "Eurabia", coined by Bat Ye'or, a British historian of Egyptian Jewish origin, but has been publicised extensively by the Canadian Mark Steyn; and with the accusation that most Europeans are antisemitic.
Posted by: Piltdown Man | November 22, 2008 4:16 PM
Nick Gotts:
I'm sensing some hostility here, Nick.
Well, the Muslim thing just seemed tangentially interesting in the light of remarks about the Church's waning influence on an increasingly secularized French society.
The T-shirt was prompted by tacitus' enthusiasm for the Obama Nation.
Nah, the slogan on the T-shirt just reminded me of a famous Nazi slogan.
Posted by: Nibien | November 22, 2008 4:22 PM
God With us?
Yeah, that was pretty popular amongst Nazis, both during WW2 and today.
Posted by: Nick Gotts | November 22, 2008 4:22 PM
What kind of fucking retard posts links to pictures instead of answers to questions? - Capital Dan
A "traditionalist Catholic" fucking retard!
Posted by: SC | November 22, 2008 4:28 PM
It seemed I heard variants of it all the time in Europe (Spain and the Netherlands), but very rarely in the US (which I've chalked up to the more immediate concern of the right - "OH NOEZ! The MEXICANS! Soon we'll all be speaking Mexican!" - and to the fact that the news/pundits in the US generally pay little attention to anything occurring anywhere in the world that doesn't directly involve the US). I could be wrong, though - it's entirely anecdotal. I was somewhat taken aback by neg's reference (again) to the US in response to Scumbag's comment when I don't believe he's from the US.
Posted by: Feynmaniac | November 22, 2008 4:29 PM
Godwin's law...you lose.
Or do you need a picture?
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp, KoT, OM | November 22, 2008 4:31 PM
Which flavor would that be?
Posted by: SC | November 22, 2008 4:34 PM
Chunky Monkey?
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead | November 22, 2008 4:35 PM
I'm finding Pilty to be just as mentally disturbed as our poor PR. And about as truthful. In other words, he is too tied up with the lies of the church to see the real truth. Pilty, drop god and religion. That leads to rationality. Time to make the break.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp, KoT, OM | November 22, 2008 4:36 PM
I was thinking Tooty Fruity but Chunky Monkey works.
One is fruity and one is bananas. Both fit for religion.
Posted