Bible Belt



The Bible Belt is the part of the United States where strict fundamentalist Christianity dominates life. For those who live there, if you aren't a heterosexual, White, fundamentalist male you are already in hell. If you're lucky they just ostracise you or shun you. If you're unlucky they attack you physically or even attack your kids. This happens especially in the smaller towns and villages. People often think the Bible Belt is the same thing as the American South. Many people will think they're from the Bible Belt if their particular town or family followed a Bible Belt-style life.

Origin of the Bible Belt
The Bible Belt includes the areas where slavery was very firmly established before the American Civil War. Slave owners in former slave states preferred to devastate their native land rather than give up owning fellow human beings like cats and dogs. Others at the time respected these slave owners and thought they were God fearing men. Men usually owned and ran the big slave estates. Those who owned slaves or profited from other people’s suffering in different ways hired only religious leaders who taught what the oppressors liked. The Christian message became that slave owners could handle their property as they liked, that white men ruled while slaves, women, Native Americans and other non-whites should be obedient. Christian teachings about social justice were ignored while instead the rich gave money to religious organisations and the rest were required to obey those over them without question. Believers were expected to believe the Bible as those preachers hired by oppressors interpreted it however unreasonable that may be. Morality involved sexual fidelity for women and obedience for women and children. Rich and powerful people did not even have to follow all of that.

The Slave states changed into the Bible Belt
Up to the second half of the 20th Century the white racists of the former Confederate States treated non-whites as second class citizens or didn’t treat black people as citizens at all. In the course of the second half of the 20th Century African Americans in the Southern States fought to get the vote and to get equal education. The white racists gradually lost the battle to keep their part of America segregated and by the end of the 20th Century the white people of the Bible Belt were less inclined to say things like, “We’re superior because we’re white.” Instead they more often said things like, “We’re superior because we’re Christian.” And black Christians could join in when the KKK weren’t burning their churches down. Many people of the Bible Belt still imagine they’re superior and extreme racism is still there. 

Republican Conservatives
Bible Belt folk are politically Conservative and most support the Republicans. They think it’s good to give a little bit of money in charity to help poor people a little bit, therefore think it’s wrong to vote for political parties that will give a lot of tax money to help poor people a lot. Bible Belt folk often just quote the Bible and don’t think things through rationally. It is quite likely that deep in his closet, Andrew Schlafly has a Bible Beltbuckle.

In the Bible belt Atheists, Agnostics, non-Crazy Christians (Quakers, Catholics and Deists especially), and people who follow any non-Christian religion suffer a great deal of prejudice. Most people inside of the Bible belt claim to follow the bible while being complete assholes to everyone that is not a Christian (despite the fact that Jesus specifically said not to in the bible, but he was a Jew remember).

In many areas of the deep Bible belt there is discrimination against blacks and other non-whites, despite the fact that Jesus was of Semitic descent and Jews in the Middle East were darker skinned than European Jews, most likely as dark as modern Arabs. Bible Belt nasties wouldn't like anyone like Jesus in their churches because he wasn't white enough for them. The far right people in the bible belt don't follow the bible at all and just use it to justify their stupid beliefs. If anyone really follows Bible based morality people will despise that person.

People living in intolerant rural communities of the Bible Belt don't seem to have much democratic freedom. The law allows them free speech and allows them to do a great many things that their churches dislike. If they use these freedoms nobody will speak to them anymore. In the worst cases some more violent people from the fundamentalist community will smite them in the name of sweet Jesus. The Internet may be the only place where they can express themselves freely.

Intolerance may have peaked, see Even in Bible Belt states, gays say they begin to sense inexorable shift toward acceptance. The fundies can slow progress, but it would need god-power to keep tolerance out forever.

The "Buckle"
Many different places try to say they are the "buckle of the Bible Belt,". That usually means the most fundamentalist part. Some people think that Kentucky, Ohio, and Georgia are the buckle but others say that the Florida pan-handle is the strongest part.

Fortunately, there is an "anti-Buckle" - an area of the Deep South which is LESS fundamental than the rest. Ironically, it is the Southernmost part of the Deep South which makes up this anti-Buckle: Southern Texas, where many Irish, Mexican and Hispanic Catholics live; Southern Louisiana, where many Cajun Catholics live; and Southern Florida, which has many Catholics, but is also simply a liberal area. The city of Atlanta, remarkably, is also incredibly liberal, but if you leave the perimeter highway I-285 it's back to the sea of red.

The Anti-Buckle, together with Maryland, which used to be a haven for persecuted English Catholics, is often known as the "Rosary Belt".

Bible Belt Statistics

 * The divorce rate, the murder rate and the obesity rate are all higher in the Bible Belt than in the rest of the United States. Somehow the Bible Belt example isn't improving society.
 * The Bible Belt has a higher murder rate than other regions of the United States
 * The Bible Belt's teen pregnancy rates are some of the highest in the country.
 * There is more poverty in the Bible Belt than elsewhere.
 * Health overall is poor.
 * Sexually transmitted disease rates are also high.
 * Hate and intolerance is well represented.
 * Those who can't or won't take the Christian values where they live secretly subscribe to porn."The level of agreement in a state with the statement that “Even today miracles are performed by the power of God” predicted higher pornography consumption. States claiming to have old-fashioned values about family and marriage purchased substantially more adult-content subscriptions."

From a logical standpoint, the Bible Belt's strict Christian morals (often forced) are causing controversy amongst the local population. This evidence is quite useful in a debate against a Christian when the overused "Christianity makes people moral" point is brought up. It also brings up the point that shoving Christianity down kid's throats does not work, and causes them to have contempt for Christianity.

'''It's logical to assume that similar harm is probably happening in Christian fundamentalist Bible Belt type communities in other parts of America and the world. Statistics aren't so easy to get.'''

The rest of the world
Up to the 1990s, people in other countries could say, “It’s sad. Religious people in some parts of the United States are crazy. It’s nothing to do with us and we can’t do anything about it.” Not so today, in the modern world of teh innertubes.
 * The bad side: Today United States fundies from the Bible Belt and from the rest of the United States are active on the internet. Fundamentalists in other countries are vulnerable to infection with American fundamentalist ideas, as well, possibly, as are some more Liberal Christians. English speaking countries are especially vulnerable, since English is the only language most American fundamentalists are "fluent" in.
 * The good side: Today, rational people from the whole English-speaking world can contact Bible Belt people, and can tell them that their way of thinking doesn’t make sense. Many Bible Belt fundamentalists are too brainwashed to hear the message, but, hopefully, some will listen.
 * The completely flip side: Also, today, Americans can see that other countries have their own issues with religious extremists, despite their efforts to conceal it. (I'm looking at YOU, everywhere.)

Fundamentalism is wrong
Its fairly easy to show that bible belt fundamentalism is ridiculous. They claim everything in the bible needs to be taken literally. So just quote Judges 1:19

And the LORD was with Judah; and he drave out the inhabitants of the mountain; but could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron

According to Judges -- $$Iron chariots > god$$

Iron Chariots Wiki uses this as a main theme.

The trouble is, all too often Bible Belt fundamentalists and other fundamentalists ignore reasonable arguments and say things like, "La La La! The devil is speaking through you. You cannot shipwreck my faith." And so it goes on.

Reference and External links

 * Bible Belt
 * Atheists in the Bible Belt
 * Bible Belt Atheism Wiki artricle.
 * The Historical Roots of America's Christian Fundamentalism