It was not my intent to insinuate anything. But one only need look at a few realities to see that there is some correlation between societies who believe in God and those who do not. Right here in America, for example, if you establish timelines for societal shifts, you can see a pattern. You can reject that the pattern means anything, but it does exist. Sometime near the middle of the 20th century, Atheist activists succeeded in beginning the removal of God and God oriented ideas from public life. That trend has grown and the vitriol and venom of Atheists against Theists caught on in the liberal political realm. If one maps those changes on a timeline and then does the same with things like drug use, child abuse, teen pregnancies, crime rates, etc., etc.; and then overlay those timelines, the picture begins to clear some. You can deny all you want that lack a lack of God in people’s lives is the cause of this, but since the facts are visible, your denial is only a belief, much as mine to the contrary. To ignore the implications of this is in and of itself a form of faith. Just a faith in something else.
41 comments
CORRELATION MOTHERFUCKER! DO YOU UNDERSTAND IT?
And as long as where rubbing our ass with statistics, care to give us godless Europes rates of those bad things compared to America? the most religious first world nation should do better if your not pulling stuff out of your ass.
Sometime near the middle of the 20th century, Atheist activists succeeded in beginning the removal of God and God oriented ideas from public life.
Ah yes, the mid-twentieth century. Those godless years when 'In God we Trust' became the national motto (1956) and was was first put onto paper money (1957) and '...under God' added to the Pledge of Allegiance'(1954).
Mike, you ignorant slut.
This country was established as a secular nation. God didn't enter the public arena until the offspring of the founding fathers forgot their ancestors' warnings about theocracy. The inclusion of those things you hold so dear barely started before the middle of the last century. Most religious leaders didn't involve themselves in politics before the "Red Scare" of the cold war. In fact, religion wasn't given much voice in politics until Ronnie Raygun had Fallwell drum up fundy sheeple.
Alas, since that time, we have seen religious freaks of the worst kind insidiously infiltrate public debate and policy. Thankfully it appears as though reason is starting to win out due to the utter failure of the Psychochristian's attempts to govern. Stupid people make for terrible leaders and no amount of religious furor can hide that simple fact.
P.S. Truly secular nations, like in Western Europe, have considerably less crime than the U.S. and considerably better records on drug abuse and teen pregnancy. Plus, though no fundy would believe it, per capita violent crime in the U.S. has steadily decreased since the early 1990's.
So? Mike is not just ignorant, he's a liar.
"But one only need look at a few realities"
Umm...how high did you get? There ONE reality.
"the same with things like drug use, child abuse, teen pregnancies, crime rates, etc., etc"
And if you look at who did that...
Middle of the 20th Century... that was when "In God we trust" came on the money, AFAIR.
Anyway, it disgusts me how people cling to the voices in their heads. I mean, to believe in God is one thing. But to believe that another person/consciousness (God) expresses itself inside of one's head... THAT IS SCHIZOPHRENIA.
Really. We live in some kind of Nazi Germany: The masses are doing something *very* wrong, but because it is the masses and not just a weird inaccepted club, it is regarded to be normal, ok, the right way.
MASS-SCHIZOPHRENIA.
I assume you have studies that document this trend of venom and vitriol. I further assume that you also have consistent records of drug use, child abuse, teen pregnancies, and crime rates before the trend and after in order to prove correlation.
Or do these fall into the 'They say...' or 'It stands to reason...' type of argument? This could also be classified as a 'Load of Horseshit."
(God)
"Middle of the 20th Century... that was when 'In God We Trust' came on the money, AFAIR."
For the paper money, that's true. The coins, however, got that motto on them near the end of the Civil War.
You can learn more about it by clicking here .
With the advent of the religious right and their abstinence only method of sex education, yes, teen pregnancies have skyrocketed in the areas where abstinence only has been taught. And Bush with his faith based initiatives, it has gotten even worse.
The US was never a "Religion based" country, and repeating that like will not make it true.
You know nothing about statistics. Have you also traced back beyond your mid 20th century time point to show that those things weren't already on the rise?
You could map life expectancy, average wage and exam results the same way to 'prove' that these things have all increased due to lack of God in American public life.
The earth rotates. While the earth rotates, I breathe. Therefore the earth causes me to breathe.
Citation needed to top it off.
That place gets even better. People are claiming that "true" Christians are often able to levitate when they pray and raise the dead. When I encounter people with this mixture of superstition, madness and stupidity all rolled up into one it makes me feel utter disdain for all humanity for at least an hour after.
Dangerously stupid people are scarier than any Hollywood monster and all too rampant. I wish we could just give them their own state so they wouldn't infect the rest of us with their douchebaggery.
" one only need look at a few realities to see that there is some correlation between societies who believe in God and those who do not."
Societies who believe in god have lower educational levels, lower life expectancy, higher infant mortality rates. Compare Americas belief in god with western Europe, and Americas quality of life indicators with western Europes. Then go fuck yourself.
"drug use, child abuse, teen pregnancies,(higher) crime rates, etc., etc"
All of the above highest in the American Bible Belt. While not new to FSTDTers a new study has shown America again the worst in the world for these ills and with comparitive statistics can show a direct correlation between these problem being related to faith. As a country becomes less connected to religion all these problems lessen.
Just a faith in something else.
Yes, we have faith that the science we do is not lying to us, and that faith is backed up by A MOUNTAIN OF FUCKING EVIDENCE YOU BRAIN-DEAD MORON!
So, since the middle of the 20th century, millions of theists turned to non-theism? I was under the impression that the majority of Americans were still theists. It has nothing to do with prayer in schools, etc. It has everything to do with the attitude of those theists. If "evil and sin" is on the rise, it's mostly amongst the theists, not the non-theists. And I don't remember any non-theist forcing theists to do these things. If people's theism hinges on it being a public spectacle, that's a pretty weak faith to me. Why would I, or anyone else, want to be a part of a religion that is based on politics or culture rather than individual opinion?
Let's correct this a bit and now we've got:
It was not my intent to insinuate anything. But one only need look at a few realities to see that there is some correlation between societies who believe in God and those who do not. Right here in America, for example, if you establish timelines for societal shifts, you can see a pattern. You can reject that the pattern means anything, but it does exist. Sometime near the middle of the 20th century, Atheist activists succeeded in bringing awareness that the private matter of religion does not belong in the public sphere. That trend has grown. If one maps those changes on a timeline and then does the same with things like racism, women's rights, poverty levels, national GDP, technological advancement, etc., etc.; and then overlay those timelines, the picture begins to clear some (i.e. some see the improvement in all of these areas). You can deny all you want that a lack of God in people’s lives is the cause of this, but since the facts are visible, your denial is only a belief, much as mine to the contrary. To ignore the implications of this is in and of itself a form of faith. Just a faith in something else.
You can deny all you want that lack a lack of God in people’s lives is the cause of this, but since the facts are visible, your denial is only a belief, much as mine to the contrary.
No, the "fact" is visible only if you look at the US. If lack of God in people’s lives was the cause, we would expect to see a social decline only in countries that prohibit school prayers and Bible readings and religious displays and ceremonies on public property and at public events. For the US, that happened in the 1960s; but in France, it happened after the Revolution around 1790, and Turkey, it's been true since Ataturk after the First World War. For England and Ireland, it has never happened, and Christian school prayer and public religious displays are not only legal, but encouraged. Yet many of these same problems have been seen rising all over the world.
figures don't lie
liars figure
The secular nations of Europe have far lower rates of social dysfunction than the "god-fearing" U. S. And, as others have pointed out, if we are going to hell in a hand-basket it must be Christians leading the way, since they still constitute 85% of the population.
PirateBay is responsible of Global Warming!
They are all dirty pirates, they are fucking making torrentz of ozone!
Like that "under God" was added to the pledge of allegiance in 1956?
Heroin use peaked at the end of the seventies, but cocaine skyrocketed in the '80s.
Violent crime was at an all time high during 1978-1993, mostly due to drug use and high unemployment.
All kinds of crime decreased merkedly during the '90s, though they were by most measures less culturally coservative than the '80s.
The end of the crack wave, and the fact that the prison population swelled from 500.000 in 1980 to 2 million in 2000 probably explain that a lot better than an arbitrary
"liberalism-->crime" model.
Not to mention, most countries in western Europe have much more liberal cultures and policies than the U.S.A., and much lower rates of drug abuse and crime. And in America, crime affects black communities mch harder than average, despite the fact that blacks are much less likely to declare themselves as atheists.
And by the way, the relation between faith and behaviour does nothing to change the number of gods out there.
"there is some correlation between societies who believe in God and those who do not."
Yeah, they are both filled with human beings.
Vitriol and venom seldom flows in the direction from atheist towards fundamentalists.
I don't remember a single girl, in any of the schools I went to while I was a teenager, becoming pregnant . There probably were one or two, but out of over 1000 pupils, that's to be expected.
Child abuse (including slaps and violent shakes) is prohibited in Sweden, and looked down upon very severely.
I've never been offered any drugs, as far as I remember, and I can't say I noticed any drug use in my acquaintance. I'm not fool enough to believe it's never happened, but it's certainly not a problem.
I'd guess that the crime rates in Sweden is lower than the crime rates in the US.
Oh, and Family Values, Liberal states vs Conservative states:
http://www.liberalslikechrist.org/about/familyvaluesparty.html
Confused?
So were we! You can find all of this, and more, on Fundies Say the Darndest Things!
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