Societies Worse Off 'When They Have God On Their Side'

[Nbadan]

The dark side of faith
By ROSA BROOKS
IT'S OFFICIAL: Too much religion may be a dangerous thing.

This is the implication of a study reported in the current issue of the Journal of Religion and Society, a publication of Creighton University's Center for the Study of Religion. The study, by evolutionary scientist Gregory S. Paul, looks at the correlation between levels of "popular religiosity" and various "quantifiable societal health" indicators in 18 prosperous democracies, including the United States.

Paul ranked societies based on the percentage of their population expressing absolute belief in God, the frequency of prayer reported by their citizens and their frequency of attendance at religious services. He then correlated this with data on rates of homicide, sexually transmitted disease, teen pregnancy, abortion and child mortality.

He found that the most religious democracies exhibited substantially higher degrees of social dysfunction than societies with larger percentages of atheists and agnostics. Of the nations studied, the U.S. — which has by far the largest percentage of people who take the Bible literally and express absolute belief in God (and the lowest percentage of atheists and agnostics) — also has by far the highest levels of homicide, abortion, teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. <snip>

Although correlation is not causation, Paul's study offers much food for thought. At a minimum, his findings suggest that contrary to popular belief, lack of religiosity does societies no particular harm. This should offer ammunition to those who maintain that religious belief is a purely private matter and that government should remain neutral, not only among religions but also between religion and lack of religion. It should also give a boost to critics of "faith-based" social services and abstinence-only disease and pregnancy prevention programs.

LA TIMES

More fuel for the thread fire.

[jochhejaam]

=scott
My study doesn't indicate that Christians are more prone to crime because they are Christians, just that they are more prone to crime,

That's messed up scott, you say that your study indicates that Christians are more prone to crime then come back and say that it's not because they are Christians. So what's the purpose of the study?
If credibility is what you want you're going to have to do a lot better than that! Clarify that please!

scott: Certain groups (see: Christians) do not have a very good track record of believing things when evidence is right in front of them.

(see: Christians) But that's not because they're Christians, right scott?
A broad and bigoted statement scott.

[Jelly]

I'd like to close the thread out by thanking Jelly for coming along, posting incorrect statistics, defended said statistics when questioned, and then disappearing when questioned again. I'd also like to thank Jelly for doing all this after questioning my credibility.

Have a nice day.

You're welcome! But I haven't visited this thread for a while, so I'm not sure what "questioning" I was subjected to. Will have to review this thread before answering your question. No need to get smug.

and, I will have a great day. Thanks!!

[Useruser666]

God bless you all!

This message was supported by Useruser666

[bigzak25]

Societies worse off 'when they have God on their side'
By Ruth Gledhill, Religion Correspondent



Times Online

The author of this study, Greg Paul is a s bag, so it is unfortunate that such a fascinating study could come from such a tact-less person. Paul is a highly accomplished paleo-artist, and an ameteur paleontologist that actually writes real works in paleontology. He's a smart guy, but also a social nightmare.

I read the article. Lots of truth. Biased spin. I'm glad you said the author was a s bag, I could tell by reading the article, but I'ts good to have my opinion backed up with someone that is more knowledgeable of the man.

When i click on the link, it says 'Britain' on top...

that says it all right there. There is much hate for the US in Britain right now. They are fighting with us in a war they feel is unjust. AND they are VERY INSECURE of their Standing When compared to the United States, so they have a NEED to put us down repeatedly to make themselves feel better.

Why do you think the alot of French hate Americans so much? They resent us cuz they didn't have the power to save themselves. Then America reciprocated and said, you ungrateful bas s, we hate you too now...it's a sad cycle...

but anyway, i digress...

What does America Have More of THAN ANY OTHER COUNTRY?

FREEDOM.

With Freedom, comes RESPONSIBILITY.

We all have the freedom to do good. We all have the freedom to do bad.

Too many children out there are LOST because their parents never showed them the Love they desperately needed. Pain leads to the bad things. There is much pain in America.

GUNS, Drugs, Money, Lust!

They are they main cause of such a high murder rate.

And they are all things that Our Blessed Country has in ABUNDANCE!

, even I have Tony Montana as a screenname....WHY?

He is a character that chose Violence, Drugs, Money, and Lust and used it to destroy others for his own sinful pleasures....and what happened to him?
He had a 'little friend' instead of a BIG ONE and he was destroyed. Tisk Tisk.
It happens to many of us.

[xrayzebra]

lol

citizens of a lot of other countries enjoy a better lifestyle than america

which is not a bad thing

it pisses me off when ppl identify america as being about having the best stuff

Depends on how you define "lifestyles". Most "other countries" style themselves after America. America=USA. Thier lifestyles are not better, just different. I enjoyed many of their "lifestyles", but I also enjoy many of our lifestyles. I prefer our, USA, lifestyles. But to each his own.

[gtownspur]

I'd like to close the thread out by thanking Jelly for coming along, posting incorrect statistics, defended said statistics when questioned, and then disappearing when questioned again. I'd also like to thank Jelly for doing all this after questioning my credibility.

Have a nice day.

TO even provide alternative statistics to counter what you're spouting out of your second anus, you've been deceptively been taught by your parents to think its your mouth, would prove to be just as idiotic on the part of your opponent.
I then have decided to just use your own ass-chocolate corn mousse you call a conclusion to derail your whole premise.
Your own data concludes diddly squat! all it confirms is that there are a minute 10% small percentage of atheist in this country. Christ! if one were to hold an atheist rally, the atheist to no surprise would be outnumbered by noodle spined liberal christians who support their political agenda.

Wait! on second hand, maybe your right after all. There are more christians in prison than there are atheist. My God! that also means that if a ship sunk in the ocean somewhere more christians would die than atheist. Kind of like if a missile was to strike Yankee stadium and kill 90 pecent of yankee fans and only 10 percent of REd Sox fans that would mean Boston Red Sox's are more prone to survive castrophe's.

Hey Scott! i bet if you were to go to iraq,... There'd be more muslims than christians in prison.


wow interesting analysis. RE !!!

[bigzak25]

elPimpo, you are very smart, but you do drive by comments with no substance...

bring some Facts, Jack.

Thanks in advance!

[scott]

TO even provide alternative statistics to counter what you're spouting out of your second anus, you've been deceptively been taught by your parents to think its your mouth, would prove to be just as idiotic on the part of your opponent.
I then have decided to just use your own ass-chocolate corn mousse you call a conclusion to derail your whole premise.
Your own data concludes diddly squat! all it confirms is that there are a minute 10% small percentage of atheist in this country. Christ! if one were to hold an atheist rally, the atheist to no surprise would be outnumbered by noodle spined liberal christians who support their political agenda.

Wait! on second hand, maybe your right after all. There are more christians in prison than there are atheist. My God! that also means that if a ship sunk in the ocean somewhere more christians would die than atheist. Kind of like if a missile was to strike Yankee stadium and kill 90 pecent of yankee fans and only 10 percent of REd Sox fans that would mean Boston Red Sox's are more prone to survive castrophe's.

Hey Scott! i bet if you were to go to iraq,... There'd be more muslims than christians in prison.


wow interesting analysis. RE !!!

I'll leave you to the intelligent insults that obviously prove that I'm a re .

Instead, I will just say that you clearly do not have a very good understanding of statistics.

[scott]

That's messed up scott, you say that your study indicates that Christians are more prone to crime then come back and say that it's not because they are Christians. So what's the purpose of the study?
If credibility is what you want you're going to have to do a lot better than that! Clarify that please!




(see: Christians) But that's not because they're Christians, right scott?
A broad and bigoted statement scott.

jochhe, I am absolutely positive you are smart enough to know the difference between correlation and causation. There is a much higher correlation between inprisonment and being a Christian than there is inprisonment and being an Atheist. There is also a much higher correlation between being a Christian and a Republican, being a sexual and a Democrat, being black and poor, etc. None of those relationships are causal, however. The purpose of my study was not to assign blame for crime, but rather to understand statistics.

I'm not a politician, and I'm not out to destroy Christianity, so I don't have an agenda that requires I make bombastic statements like "people commit crime because they are Christian" when in fact that may not be true.

For all the dismissing you do of opinions because of the purported agendas of those who hold them, I find it awefully curious that you want to dismiss the conclusions of my research because I don't have an agenda that leads me to draw unsupported conclusions. It appears that the only thing you are willing to lend credibility to is those opinions which already reconcile with yours. That's your choice, and more power to you for already having superior knowledge to the rest of civilization.

[Jelly]

Can you provide a link to that data then. The table you presented happened to match exactly with the CUNY study of the Religious Affliiation of Adults, not the prison study.

It's been too many days and I can't find the original site. But if they match the Cuny study, than I'll accept that I got the numbers wrong (or maybe the site did, who knows). Either way, my mistake. There. Feel better?

My study doesn't indicate that Christians are more prone to crime because they are Christians, just that they are more prone to crime, which the statistics show.

Then why offer it up as a point of debate on a discussion of whether societies are worse off "When they have God on their side"? That's a cop-out. Whether your study indicates it or not, I suspect that is exactly what you meant to imply, whether you admit it or not.

Why would you believe an atheist site or a Christian site? I used the US Bureau of Prisons, who conducted a scientific study. I don't care if godsucks.com thinks that all murderers are priests or jesussaves.com thinks they are all atheists.

I didn't go to a site that was obviously pro or anti religion. I googled a few words related to prison demographics and checked out the sites that had relevant data. These sites were seemingly neutral "research oriented" sites... until I looked at some of their links and affiliations. That's when it was obvious that they had an angle or belief to promote, whether it be Christianity or Atheism. Regardless, they all (yes, even the atheists) used, misused, and massaged information from various government sources, included the U.S. Prison Bureau, to make atheists or Christians look more prone to criminal activity. Even scientists, academics, and statisticians can be biased idealogues prone to do a lot of cherry picking and distortion in the name of "research". Comments like "Certain groups (see: Christians) do not have a very good track record of believing things when evidence is right in front of them." reveal your own bias on this topic. But yes, if I cared enough to investigate this more thoroughly, than I would sift thru the prison bureau stuff. But I don't. So I'll concede this argument to you. (just the prison stats, not the implication that atheists are more law-abiding.)

[scott]

Then why offer it up as a point of debate on a discussion of whether societies are worse off "When they have God on their side"? That's a cop-out. Whether your study indicates it or not, I suspect that is exactly what you meant to imply, whether you admit it or not.

It is clearly relevant. While I may not be willing to make the claim that Christianity is the reason for more crime, I can say quite sure handedly that Christianity certainly isn't helping to make society any better, if incarcerations is your guide.

Comments like "Certain groups (see: Christians) do not have a very good track record of believing things when evidence is right in front of them."

The Sun revolving around the Earth, witch hunts and the fight against evolution support my statement. Even if I have a bais, that in itself doesn't invalidate my research. You at least appear to be more open to divergent opinion than jochhe.

[bigzak25]

I'm not religious in fact I think it's ridiculous, but nobody is Christlike except Christ no matter how hard they try.

nobody is PERFECT. we are ALL SINNERS. but you can be 'Christlike' if you walk His path of rightchousness and integrity.

you hold onto Lennon's Imagine No Religion a bit too much.

Lennon's Imagine song was all about Peace and Love. Which IS Jesus.

Look at one of the Beatles Albulm Covers...i don't know which one...but Lennon is in White, and he is leading the others. It is CLASSIC.

Then what happened? Lennon, an ANGEL sent from above, was murdered by Evil. Satan does NOT LIKE Angels that SPREAD THE WORD. He might DESTROY me one day...not that i'm an Angel, far from it, but I do speak the Truth!

I think if we all stopped adhereing to Christian values the world would be a better...people would be over sexed and loving it.

Do you know what DESTROYED GUNS N' ROSES?

AXEL HAD A DRUG AND LUST PROBLEM. HE HAD/HAS Alot of problems. It DESTROYED A GREAT BAND! What was their best selling Album? APPE E FOR DESTRUCTION. They got all the money and fame. But it was fleeting. IT DESTROYED THE BAND!

[bigzak25]

oh and one more thing, one of their biggest songs...Paradise City.

TAKE ME DOWN TO PARADISE CITY WHERE THE GIRLS ARE PRETTY, OH WON'T YOU PLEASE TAKE ME DOWN!

he got his wish.

[jochhejaam]

[

QUOTE=scott] While I may not be willing to make the claim that Christianity is the reason for more crime, I can say quite sure handedly that Christianity certainly isn't helping to make society any better, if incarcerations is your guide.

When honesty, integrity and perception are a factor in collecting data how much weight can be put into the conclusions of a study? Do you honestly believe that 90 percent of the prison population are practicing Christians? These studies are asking for truth from the criminal mindset, how naive to believe they are coming up with factual data that can be processed into credible studies!
Is it really a case of naivette or just a blatant attack on the actual transformation that takes place when a person is truly converted to Christianity which translates into another attack on the merits of Christianity itself.
Am I questionity your credibility? Only to the extent that you believe that accurate conclusions can be drawn from unreliable sources, in this case the trust put in the words of those (criminals) that have shown they are not worthy of trust.

The Sun revolving around the Earth, witch hunts and the fight against evolution support my statement. Even if I have a bais, that in itself doesn't invalidate my research. You at least appear to be more open to divergent opinion than jochhe.

There you go again scott, so it was Christians that were fighting for the "sun revolving the earth" theory...??
Witch hunts? how relevant is that to today? Come up with something that is not so preposterously outdated scott. And those that were burning people at the stake weren't Christians regardless of their professions.
The fight against evolution was a fight that was generated and initiated by evolutionists not by Christians. Unfortunately evolutionists purposefully injected agnostic/athiestic beliefs into their theory. Was that actually necessary to fulfill their quest to find the origin of our species?
They picked a fight and a fight they have, it didn't have to be that way.

[scott]

So basically your argument is the old classic, "they aren't real Christians, so they don't count"?

When asked, X% of the incarcerated said they are Christians. It isn't my duty to judge whether or not they are "real" Christians or "real" Muslims or "real" atheists. I'll leave you to make assumptions and judgements to explain away the data.

[MannyIsGod]

umm...have you ever heard of quoting sources? Or should we just accept your ambiguous "research" as fact?

If that's the case, let me join in on the fun......
My research indicates that Canadians commit adultery at a rate of over 200 times that of Peruvians.

I'm catching up on this thread right now, but I had to stop reading just to post that this made me laugh out loud and made the people in my office wonder what the was going on.



Jelly, don't call out Scooter. Ever.

[MannyIsGod]

If you are truly a statistician than you would surely have trouble drawing such conclusions amidst the American population, where something like 80 to 90% identify themselves as Christian. If close to 90% of a population identifies with a particular group, how in the can you make logical, unskewed comparisons between that group and the remaining 10%? You can't. Any results would be utterly useless and misleading. You would have to find a society that has a reasonably balanced representation of atheist/Christian. Do you have data on such a society?

because it continues!!!

[MannyIsGod]

Jesus!



This thread was great. Good job, Scott. You gave me my laughs for the morning. Maybe tomorrow Jelly will challenge Jim on teeth pulling or FWDT on Texas law.

Good .

[Spurminator]

Scott, I think your study (or at least the portion you've discussed here) ignores the relationship between prison and poverty, and between poverty and Christianity. Given that a larger percentage of those below the Poverty Line identify themselves as "Christian" than those above the Poverty Line, it's natural that the same trends would be seen among prison populations. That's to say nothing of other issues like education and profiling.

And if you're not making an argument that Christianity and Crime are related, then I question the relevance of the study anyway. If data citing the disproportionate amount of blacks in prison is dismissed as incomplete and misleading, then so is data concerning Christians in prison, I think.

[FromWayDowntown]

I may be wrong, but I see Scott's point to be that the predominance of Christians does not, standing alone, decrease crime or, more broadly, eliminate social problems that we see in our society. Again, I might be wrong, but it seems to me that one conclusion one might draw from Scott's study is that we won't see wide-spread reductions in crime or whatever based on broader willingness to self-identify as a Christian. Part of that, it seems, doesn't account for the idiosyncracies of individual behavior and the hypocrisy of some who claim to be Christian but act contrarily.

But if the point of one argument is that society is better served if its people are religious, and more specifically, Christian, then Scott's data would certainly seem to present a counterpoint to the idea of any such correlation.

[Marcus Bryant]

Yeah? Well,



So there.

[Spurminator]

I may be wrong, but I see Scott's point to be that the predominance of Christians does not, standing alone, decrease crime or, more broadly, eliminate social problems that we see in our society. Again, I might be wrong, but it seems to me that one conclusion one might draw from Scott's study is that we won't see wide-spread reductions in crime or whatever based on broader willingness to self-identify as a Christian. Part of that, it seems, doesn't account for the idiosyncracies of individual behavior and the hypocrisy of some who claim to be Christian but act contrarily.

But if the point of one argument is that society is better served if its people are religious, and more specifically, Christian, then Scott's data would certainly seem to present a counterpoint to the idea of any such correlation.

True, I would probably agree with that. But I do think there is a difference between suggesting societies "are not necessarily improved" and suggesting that they are "worse off."

[bigzak25]

WHAT POINT ARE YOU TRYING TO MAKE WITH THAT PIC MARCUS?

please explain. Thanks.

[FromWayDowntown]

WHAT POINT ARE YOU TRYING TO MAKE WITH THAT PIC MARCUS?

please explain. Thanks.

That a woman preaching the word of God to a man who had murdered three others, did so while providing him with methampehtamine, which is a crime?

That people claiming to be Christians don't always act like Christians?