Thread: Happy Easter bitches

I'm a couple of weeks late, but would prefer to add...Happy Equinox

Happy Easter everyone.

All in the name of religion what retards there are in this world.

"An interesting thing to ponder, this Easter weekend: religious and church-going folk in America tend to be richer and more educated. From the always-fascinating Joel Kotkin in New Geography:

Many in the pundit class identify religion as something of a regressive tendency, embraced by the less enlightened, the less skilled, intelligent and educated...

Some might be surprised to learn that religious affiliation grows with education levels. A new University of Nebraska study finds that with each additional year of education, the odds of attending religious services increased by 15%. The educated, the study found, may not be eschewing religion, as social science has long maintained, even if their spiritual views tend to be less narrow, and less overtly tied to politics, than among the less schooled.

And within religious groups, there are big differences:

Overall the most cohesive religious groups — such as Mormons and Jews — still outperform their religious counterparts both in educational achievement and income. Both Jews and Mormons focus on helping their co-religionists, providing a leg up on those who depend solely on the charity of others or the state. In countries with a substantial historical Protestant influence such as Germany, Denmark, Sweden and the Netherlands continue to outperform economic the heavily Catholic nations like Italy, Ireland and Spain, according to a recent European study. The difference, they speculate, may be in Protestant traditions of self-help, frugality and emphasis on education. None of this, of course, would have been surprising to Max Weber.

Overall, though, we shouldn't be surprised to learn that a cohesive religious framework helps not only to hold families together, but to encourage them to grow. And family growth is key to economic progress:

Religious people, prepared to be seen as uncool, are more likely to seek to produce more offspring. In the United States 47% of people who attend church regularly see the ideal family size as three or more children compared to barely one quarter of the less observant. Mormons have many more children than non-Mormons; observant Jews more than secular. “Faith,” the demographer Phil Longman concludes, “is increasingly necessary as a motive to have children.”

This pattern is reflected in the geography of childbearing. Where churches are closing down, most particularly in core urban areas such as Boston or Manhattan, as well as their metropolitan regions, singletons and childless couples are increasing. In more religiously oriented metropolitan areas like Houston, Dallas-Fort Worth, Salt Lake City and Phoenix, the propensity to have children is 15% to nearly 30% higher (as measured by the number of children under the age of 5 per woman of child bearing age– 15-49).

In the future, many high-income societies, whether in East Asia, Europe or North America, may find that religious people’s fecundity is a necessary counterforce to rapid aging and eventual depopulation of the more secular population . The increasingly perilous shape of public finance in almost all advanced countries — largely the result of rapid aging and diminished workforces — can be ascribed at least in part to secularization’s role in falling birthrates.

It's the churchgoers -- the "bitter clinger," according to our misguided president -- who will lead us all out of the mess we're in.

Happy Easter. Happy Passover."

Originally Posted by LDMA

Happy Equinox

Pretty bland. Give me the tinsel wrapped bullshit.

---Update---

Originally Posted by University of Nebraska VIA Papa

Some might be surprised to learn that religious affiliation grows with education levels.

As they move more towards positions of responsibility and power they need to conform more to societys expectations of "proper" behaviour. Especially in bible "belted", politically correct America. It's all for show. I'm sure many of them even believe that they REALLY believe though. The boffins at Nebraska Uni are clueless twits.

EDIT: My mistake. "religious affiliation" ... So they "go with the flow", they "fit in", they "do the expected thing" like I said above. Sorry NebUni.

Originally Posted by re_fuse

Another brilliant cut and paste by Papa

he gets a zero for his essay, all points go to the actual author (which he, too, cribbed from another source but at least he was open and clear about that).

What a pillock. Hanging about wasting his time, must be a time wasting masochist I suppose.

Originally Posted by re_fuse

(except Thailand)

key words. still allowed to give zeroes though, as long as 0+0+0=50.

ooooohhh...I love Thai math...