A country where both are allowed to practice their religion or non-religion, without fear of reprisal from the other group.

__________________
Poor Spot! He was tired of being thought of as stupid. "I'm gonna join Mensa," he said to myself, "and then I'll be legally permitted to wear the society's insignia--a tattoo of a little map pin pushed into my flesh--and then everyone'll know that I'm not dumb at all!"
Spot Joins Mensa
by James "Kibo" Parry

Well, statistics do show that atheist commit less crime per capita than those that call themselves "christian."

Of course when Atheist do commit crimes they normally kill quite a few people.

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∙ Nuclear War: The quick and efficient means of chlorinating the gene pool.

What would be better for the US? A country full of Christians or a country full of Non-Christians?

I don't care, just give me the contract to round up the losers and ship them out before bloody Halliburton gets one of those no-bid contracts and gazumps me.

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Blowhards-R-Us

Is that a question? If so it would be Sweden, Denmark maybe, as the most tolerant Christian/secular nations. I don't know how Buddhists or Hindus handle religion, although Hindus tend toward caste classifications. I would rate America similar to Iran in that being a free thinker in either society places you outside the mainstream power system.

Darn, I'm answering a comment. Religion will always create problems, as it has the answers, and when you have the answers why question. But secular has its problems too as while most of us consider ourselves rational and reasonable many aren't. So secular would be like the free market zealots - full of crazies - in the end tolerance and a clear recognition of pluralism are best traits.

Iran, is that like near Persia or something?

__________________
∙ Nuclear War: The quick and efficient means of chlorinating the gene pool.

actually most murders are committed by people who claim to be chrisitians in the us. remember many are ones that were told by god to kill.....

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There is no greater sorrow
Than to be mindful of the happy time
In misery.

Dante

That's fascinating.

I'm fairly familiar with the DOJ statistical database, and don't recall any stats on religions of those convincted of crimes.

Can you point me to that statistic, please?

I dont have a link, but such statistics have, in cases of Atheists, some significant confounders:
1: Atheists tend to have a decent degree of education, otherwise one is not really going to make up his mind.
2: With Education usually comes money (or vice versa)

In the end we have rich and relativly smart people. This means: More to loose (beeing rich) more difficult to convict (No legal system I know treats the Rich and Poor equally) more difficult to catch in the first place (beeing smart increases you chances of getting away).

My gripe is not with religion, but with any ideology that says "we are the only ones who KNOW" everyone else is a "Heathen", "Heretic", "Untermensch", "Imperialist Swine" and will "Burn in Hell", "Be eradicated", "Be defeated by the arms of the working class".

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"Americans always do the right thing, after they tried everything else"

Winston Churchill


"The less people know about how Sausages and Laws are made, the better they sleep."

Otto v. Bismarck

Wouldn't that depend on a definitive definition of "Christian". If we are talking about people who hold the ten commandments in high regard and as the bible says obey the laws of the land then statiscally would that classification of Christians have the lower crime rate? So we can't fault Christianity for its "extremist" the same way we don't fault the muslim/islamic community for its "extremist".

What a load of crap. And some are told by their dogs to kill.

I get so sick of the bigotry in here, in the guise of liberalism. Shut down industry, shut down freedom of religion, brand those who believe as "evil" "stuipd" "corrupt" and what do you have?

Why you have Russia under Stalin. How many of his own people did he kill in the name of "the working man"? He was also successful at villifying those who clung to their religion and their guns:


Stalin - MSN Encarta
"Stalin’s historical legacy is overwhelmingly negative. Although his policies transformed the USSR from an agrarian-based society into an industrialized nation with a powerful military arsenal, the transformation was accomplished at the cost of millions of lives. Stalin’s militant distrust of the West and his assertion of Soviet dominance in Eastern Europe gave rise to the Cold War. His purges of society through violent police terror left a permanent scar on the collective memory of the people under his rule. Although admired by some Russians, most would agree with the assessment in the West that Stalin was one of the cruelest dictators in history.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
."

__________________
Poor Spot! He was tired of being thought of as stupid. "I'm gonna join Mensa," he said to myself, "and then I'll be legally permitted to wear the society's insignia--a tattoo of a little map pin pushed into my flesh--and then everyone'll know that I'm not dumb at all!"
Spot Joins Mensa
by James "Kibo" Parry

Or Germany under Hitler. Shall we discuss how he described Jews, Poles, Gypsies?

Pretty much the way the assholes in here who mindlessly hate all Christians, and who believe any pap they're fed about them.

__________________
Poor Spot! He was tired of being thought of as stupid. "I'm gonna join Mensa," he said to myself, "and then I'll be legally permitted to wear the society's insignia--a tattoo of a little map pin pushed into my flesh--and then everyone'll know that I'm not dumb at all!"
Spot Joins Mensa
by James "Kibo" Parry

Well I understand your logic, of course. But I believe that your presuppositions from whence that logica flows are as sketchy as your conclusion.

Do atheists really have a significantly higher educational level than believers?

I don't know for sure...do you?

I think you are assuming they do, but without any supporting evidence for that assumption.


It is, huh? Mine, too.

Yet you assume, with no support other than your imagination, that you know a lot about the educational levels of two very diverse groups.

You assume, again, with no supporting evidence, that believers are more criminal than non-believers.

And yet you do not see how your ideology is so similar to those other arrogant ideologies you eschew?

Forest meet trees.

Atheists have a higher degree of education...let's see a link that proves that.

I've run across very few educated atheists in my lifetime, but innumerable ignorant idiots who are so incredibly uneducated it's almost impossible to communicate. But the one thing they do know is there ain't no god, nohow.

Let's see some numbers about the education level of atheists. I'm dying of curiousity.

__________________
Poor Spot! He was tired of being thought of as stupid. "I'm gonna join Mensa," he said to myself, "and then I'll be legally permitted to wear the society's insignia--a tattoo of a little map pin pushed into my flesh--and then everyone'll know that I'm not dumb at all!"
Spot Joins Mensa
by James "Kibo" Parry