Talk:Bible Belt
Cut from intro:
- To be a true Bible Belt Christian, you must have a clear understanding of the things you don't do, like smoking, dancing, going to the pool hall, drinking, or making a public appearance without a Bible in hand. You must believe that your actions are controlled by the Holy Spirit and that doing God's will is the most important part of your life.
Bible in hand? Be serious. --Ed Poor 18:24, 29 March 2007 (EDT)
Illinois? Don't think so. MountainDew 02:51, 13 April 2007 (EDT)
A serious question that may at first glance seem flippant - how, actually, is the Bible Belt defined? Obviously we all understand it to be the strongly religious swath of the Southern States, but is this fairly vague and anecdotal description as precise as the definition gets? Or is it ever qualified? e.g. "Counties with > XX% churchgoing Southern Baptists?", or some such similar demogrpahic delimiter?
What about the liberal belt? -- 
23:03, 22 April 2008 (EDT)
Bible Belt Statistics
The Bible Belt lands in the U.S are also known as the 'obesity belt, divorce belt, STD belt, homicide belt, poverty belt, crime belt, premarital births belt', teenage pregnancy belt',sometimes known as the 'abortion belt.' This means the crime and immorality rate in those 'Bible belt' land are above U.S average and are statistically much higher than the nonreligious(or liberal) states. For example Louisiana is one of the most religious states in the U.S with about %90 of them say that religion is important. Louisiana however has the highest homicide rate and incarceration rate in the U.S Louisiana has the homicide rate of 10.8 per 100,000 people and while the more nonreligious(and liberal)state, New Hampshire has a homicide rate of only 0.9 per 100,000 people. Coolguy|talk
- That claim means nothing. Louisiana is predominantly French Catholic, a far cry from the Southern Baptists of the Bible Belt. Here you're trying to confuse 'religion' with 'bible' in the typically prejudiced and offensive manner of most liberals. Even what few African-American, non-evangelical Catholics exist in the United States, most all, with exception of a few from Maryland and Baltimore, trace their roots to the French Catholicism of Louisiana. Mardis Gras is still celebrated, a distinctly Catholic holiday, Fat Tuesday before Ash Wednesday. Don't tell me they are secularized, because I've witnessed myself Mardis Gras revelers receive ashes the next day.
- So any vulgar stereotypes of what is and what is not the Bible Belt won't get past me. RobSThe coup plotters won, for now 20:24, 5 May 2017 (EDT)
- Yes, Louisiana has a high homicide rate, but so do Alaska and Maryland, outside the belt; New Hampshire has a low homicide rate, but so does Iowa, inside the belt.[1] Also, I've never heard any of those other belt terms, only "Bible belt" and "black belt."--Abcqwe (talk) 19:03, 5 May 2017 (EDT)
- Coolguy, many things are driven by culture/history. African Americans have a large presence in the south due to the history of slavery in the American South. Africa is new on the Christianity block. It takes hundreds of years for a culture to be Christianized. But over time, biblical Christianity dramatically improves society (see: Protestant cultural legacies and Religion and crime reduction and Christianity statistics). On top of this you have Johnson's war on poverty undermining African-American American families, many years of African-American slavery where black families were broken up and many years of Jim Crow laws.
- Also, you have the rural/urban income divide of today's information economy and much of the south is rural. An let's not forget that the south lost the American civil war and much of the war was fought on southern soil.
- In addition, we know that irreligion has a deleterious effect on society and we have an enormous amount of data to support this matter (see: Atheism statistics).
- The glaring mistake you are making here is making an overly simplistic view of the data and failing to recognize that we live in a multiple variable world. Conservative (talk) 19:51, 5 May 2017 (EDT)
- The glaring mistake you are making here is making an overly simplistic view of the data and failing to recognize that we live in a multiple variable world. Conservative (talk) 19:51, 5 May 2017 (EDT)
