World better without religion
It's been said before, but it bares repeating. For the good some people claim religion provides us, the cost to society down the lines is just not worth it. Studies prove that the more religious a country is, the lower its standard of living is. But we didn't really need a study to see that. Just name me one highly religious country with a high standard of living. And if you think the USA is the exception, it's not. When compared to western industrialized countries, the USA ranks poorly. And remember that it's the blue states who carry on its shoulders the economical bottom of the barrel that are the red states (in before wingnut bitch).
That's from an article in the Jerusalem Post (Oh noes, secular Jews! Run for your life Bill Donohue...) about a British opinion poll where 82 percent of the people thought religion does more hard than good.
And if that wasn't enough.
hat tip Elmer Pérez. Cross posted at Liberal Avenger.
"the strongly theistic, anti-evolution South and Midwest" have "markedly worse homicide, mortality, sexually transmitted disease, youth pregnancy, marital and related problems than the North-East, where societal conditions, secularization and acceptance of evolution approach European norms."
That's from an article in the Jerusalem Post (Oh noes, secular Jews! Run for your life Bill Donohue...) about a British opinion poll where 82 percent of the people thought religion does more hard than good.
And if that wasn't enough.
As the most religious country of the 18 surveyed, the United States also comes in with the highest rates for teenage pregnancy and for gonorrhea and syphilis.
(A sidelight: boys who participate in sexual abstinence programs are more likely to get their partners pregnant, presumably because they are in denial about what they are doing.)
hat tip Elmer Pérez. Cross posted at Liberal Avenger.
posted by Sirkowski at 2:28 PM
18 Comments:
i don't even have to read it to know i agree.
I only one person who's deeply religious and happy with themselves, and he made up his own religion where just about anything goes as long as you don't hurt anyone else.
Everyone who practices a major religion always seems to be struggling between what they want to do or be compared to what their told they have to be doing or being by whichever religious figure their religion focusses on.
Invariably this leads to feelings of guilt, persecution, alienation and just depressed in general. That in turn can lead to substance abuse (including alcohol and tabacco!), deviant sexual behaviour, aggressive tendancies, anti-social behaviour, racism... need I go on?
It's clear enough. :-)
OK so I normally Dont like getting into politcal or religious debates, because I'm usualy not educated enough to carry on a debate for to long.
But the only thing I dont like about this article is how its comparison is being based on such a large group at once. true america is lacking in values. but alot of the people I witness go to church could really even give a danm about it. they go to church or whatever for one day a week for only a couple hours and consider themselves saved, so as soon as they walk out the door they continue on with they,re horrible lives. Now the ones who actualy go and apply their practices to their lives, for the most part (atleast in my observations) are ok and good people. I wouldnt consider them harmful.
But you do have your extreme religion goers who are just completly blinded by their faith, and restrain not only themselves but those around them including family. which leads to everything jezebal said.
now I Hope I dont regret saying this here but I am religous. But I hate seeing everyone so BLack and white. Ive always considered myslef one of the few to step into the grey area. I know im not perfect and I definatly have sin. but knowing I have room for improvment, im still proud of who I am today. but there are so many who think faith is enough and dont bother actualy looking for knowledge or real answers and just strain themselves and everyone around them, which leads them to destruction.
But anywyas like I said I normally dont like these debates cause I know I dont have the answeres and I for one believe that no one will know any of the answers truthfully till were dead. at which point its too late. so choose your path and walk it, and hope for the best =P.
the world is always gonna be imperfect. you cant hope to fix it. but only to maintain the balance.
JESUS IS COMING!!
.
.
(everyone look busy.)
I know well the dangers of religion. Though the one my parents tried to raise me in was a little bit tame in comparison to some description of zealots (I admit that I'll still peek at an Awake! from time to time) I can't help but feel a little hypocritical irony when I see the innate wrongness of the majority of views. A lot of it is self-inflicted, too. The instant that I log into my favorite game I know that the only place I can play relatively peacefully will be run by a group of "christians."
Which is why I feel the irony and the hypocrisy. They tout to follow god's rules and Jesus' example, but they are playing a violent game centered around blowing E.T.s to hell and gone. They hold their bibles in one hand and their pistols in the other, and forbid anyone from correcting them. In a sensible world, if someone brought up an issue of dispute I'm sure that each party involved would first furiously scan their copy of their translation of choice for an appropriate response, but in this real world all I ever get is dogmatic parroting of words straight from Satan's mouth.
Blind leading the blind I suppose. I don't tout myself as qualified to teach by any meaning of the word "quality" yet when I see an error I still try to correct it.
A little religion isn't bad; for some spirituality has done more good than harm, but for the rest of us, well we're probably getting well sick and tired of dialing God's answering machine and finding out his kids (namely the priests and reverends and fathers and ministerial servants and imams and rabbis and what have you) have replaced the nice and welcoming message with one that would make us want to rip the phone out of the wall.
And though it's off-topic I commend some of the soldiers going over to fight and die because a man with a monkey-face told them to; but the road to hell is paved with good intentions and the messy bits of islamikazes and mercenary fighters.
Sonicdude135, the study looked into the effect of collective religiousness, not individual. Of course most religious people are good people. The problem is when you reach a critical mass of believers, even in good spirit, that's when the shit seems to hit the fan according to the study.
lets make a philosiferz stone and get stoned cuzz all will die by their foolish behavior and call it rashanol thinkin'everyone is stupid to think the one they worship will ever listen might as well just kill yourself now then suffer the wrath you made for the world you live in... uh it not earth its hell your in now deal with amerikan pig dogz heh all of a suden i wanna listen to ramstein hmm burch dis
Here's an example for ya' - If Sweden were suddenly to become the 51st state, 40% of Swedes would be classified as living in poverty or "low income". Sweden has a terribly high actual rate of unemployment, a significant fraction of which is effectively permanent unemployment. Thus, Sweden's really high rate of suicide.
As a matter of fact, by reviewing the 12 different measurements of "Standard of Living" rankings I can find online or through my university library links, I see the US in the top 8 on 9 of those lists and in the top 15 of all the rest! That differs from my definition of "ranks poorly". Especially when the UN ranks the US living conditions (which includes standard of living, access to health care and education, etc) as being a better place to live than Switzerland, the Netherlands, Finland, Luxemburgh, Belgium...
Well, you get the idea.
yes. It made a little more sense coming from you =P
But I was merely tring to say how I Dont like the fact of them basing there thesis on such a study. Especialy using americans as an example since there tring hard to keep religion and state seperate.(Whether or not they're doing a good job, I leave for you to decide)
But what kinda upset me was that they threw america in the statistic of one of the countries with poor living standards. yet we arent as much a relgious country as we USED to be. and yet from what I have seen our living standards are only getting worse, ironically at the same time that our country goes further from its christian roots. and I may be reading it wrong but im pretty sure thats opposite to what this article is saying.
Correct me if im wrong cause im not as well educated as Id like to be =P
I'm not sure people are less religious in the red states though.
duh hello washing ton state rep hoo is not any religon you ask me a religen and i will fuck you in the anus with rashonal thinking of corse i iz a juggalo i beleve what i want when i want how some retardid fuckin ass well let say hold on skinimax distracted from soft core porn oh wait family guy...
meh I cant say anything. That would require a whole another poll. but even so, thats still not all of america. and doesnt change the fact they they are constantly pushing to sepreate religion and state.
and is that a bot or just some dude typing random stuff that makes no sense to me??
I dunno, but he's starting annoying.
where is my post?
um..
however I repeat it, that's a bull shit, they attempt to focus on religion accusing it to be the problem of people's suffer in poor states, when is the suffer that led the people to fanatical believe in a religion and, out of that, it isn't neither based on an census, I don't know how they take their data about the western country inhabitants, however I know that about 80% Italians are chattolic, and Italy isn't a bad living state...
I forget something:
the real problem with religion and fanatism states is that the state must be separate from any religious believe, and this is written also in bibble, and forget during medieval time, "give to caesar what is of caesar and give to god what is of god", and this is the problem in foundamentalist states...
oh shit now i'm mad. well i don't like typing but here it gose... ahem. good thing i had a bunch of pot to smoke a bit ago now i'm down to rashan ol' thinking. dickhead #1, fuck you been readin' this comic since '99 and shit so fuck you and your cliche's (or maybe shit)but then again that the only language i know so i'll call even on that. as mr. dichead#2 over there just be glad i don't bother with the mesage bored EVER! so suck my cock to you all hope see how far i'm jamming into my skreen because i've never meant this anymore than i've had in a while and i just had some muthu' fuckin' bible thumping mother fucker try to force me into muthu' fuckin' prayer and i come to one of the few site i bother with anymore and see bul shit on my skreen that windex won't cure fuck you I'm goin' ta' newgrounds. bitches
What the fuck was that?
Post a Comment
<< Home