Joseph Farah has yet another column full of contrived statistics and illogical explanations for those numbers. He begins by noting that “the American Journal of Public Health reported than more Americans now commit suicide than die in automobile accidents.”
Wow. How shocking. Is this because suicide is going up? Not really. The suicide rate in America has vacillated between 10.2 and 12.7 deaths per 100,000 since 1955. The latest numbers I could find are from 2009, the height of the recession, when the rate was 12.0. And most of the recent increase can actually be attributed to the high numbers of military members killing themselves after too many tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan. The number of deaths from auto accidents, on the other hand, has been going down for a long time. Since 1996, that rate has declined every year but two, both of them minor blips of less than 1%. Overall, the number of deaths by auto accident have dropped about 30% in the last 16 years. So the comparison he’s making is a statistical mirage. But he has an explanation for that mirage, and I’m sure you know what it is:
Judging from the latest statistics, more people are actively and willingly choosing the grave than life in a country in which liberty is waning…
I believe the trend reflects a deep and growing spiritual emptiness in a culture that is more depraved than ever before.
Too many people just don’t find any meaning in life…
We are told from the youngest age in state-run schools that human beings are merely the result of billions of years of evolution from lower life forms and random mutations. There is no Creator God who loves us and to whom we are accountable. There are no laws higher than those government imposes on us – no sin, no ultimate, objective moral code. In fact, human beings are a blight on the planet. It would be better off without us – or at least with a lot fewer of us polluting the air with carbon dioxide and overheating the earth…
Furthermore, prayer and Bible reading are prohibited, but explicit instructions on how to have promiscuous sex without consequences is mandated…
When government replaces God in the lives of people, their lives become empty. They become subjects of the state, rather than citizens endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights – among those being life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness….
Americans need to get right with God.
They need to find out what He requires of them – why He created them and how much He loves them. They need to be in genuine repentance for having turned away from Him and whored after other false gods and pursuits.
If Americans did this, they wouldn’t be taking their own lives in record numbers.
In other words, that fake statistical comparison is easily explained by all the things he was against anyway. And if we’d all just believe in God and creationism, it would all go away. Well, what else would he say?
33 comments
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Nepenthe
September 28, 2012 at 1:43 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Cars get safer. Wingnut blames evolution for the tragic decrease in mortality.
oranje
September 28, 2012 at 1:46 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I love how, without his religious beliefs being the source of authority, government has to be the source. How authoritarian. Is this a Cold War thing or something? God or Government?
DaveL
September 28, 2012 at 1:56 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I don’t suppose it has come to Farah’s attention that before Charles Darwin published his theory of evolution, suicides outstripped automobile accident fatalities by a factor of roughly… infinity?
Randomfactor
September 28, 2012 at 1:58 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
merely the result of billions of years of evolution
“Merely”? That’s a pretty damned good accomplishment. We’re the offspring of the winners going back a billion years. I suspect in Farah’s lineage that win-streak ends with his generation.
Ace of Sevens
September 28, 2012 at 2:01 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
@3: So what you’re saying is the theory of evolution causes automobile accidents?
Chiroptera
September 28, 2012 at 2:06 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
…no ultimate, objective moral code.
Funny thing about this, is that if there is an “objective moral code” (and that has always seemed like an oxymoron to me), then God is no longer omnipotent — he then becomes subject to laws that precede him.
On the other hand, if God himself determines the moral code, it’s no longer objective — it is determined by the opinions of a particular being, which is what is meant by subjectivity.
Chiroptera
September 28, 2012 at 2:08 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
They need to find out what He requires of them – why He created them and how much He loves them. They need to be in genuine repentance for having turned away from Him and whored after other false gods and pursuits.
Because if they aren’t in genuine repentence, they’ll find out just what kind of “love” God has for them.
imrryr
September 28, 2012 at 2:11 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Some genius in the comments section linked the increased rate of suicide in the armed forces to the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.
umlud
September 28, 2012 at 2:12 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I cringe in thinking how Farah will explain this new finding from the University of Michigan:
Of course, Farah’s likely not going to give a real-life explanation, since the evils of evolution or teh gay or atheism is likely what’s causing it.
Source of above quote:
http://phys.org/news/2012-09-trend-decreasing-traffic-deaths.html
Abby Normal
September 28, 2012 at 2:16 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
There was a time in my mid teens when I was Christian and suffering from severe depression. Fear of Hell was indeed one of the major factors that prevented me from attempting suicide, or more accurately, helped stave off any attempts for a while. Today that memory does nothing to convince me that one or more gods actually exist. That I used religion as a crutch to support me when I was unwell is not a good reason to keep using it when I learned to walk on my own.
Phillip IV
September 28, 2012 at 2:17 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Personally, I blame rising suicide rates on people losing all faith in humanity after being confronted with Joseph Farah’s stupidity in editorial after editorial.
But I found this passage interesting:
So when people stop believing in God, they lose the unalienable rights their Creator endowed them with? I don’t think he’s properly understood the word “unalienable” here.
cjcolucci
September 28, 2012 at 2:24 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
For a second there, the headline got my hopes up — though it would have challenged my belief that evolution is an amoral process.
roggg
September 28, 2012 at 2:43 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Hey! I didn’t get explicit instructions on how to have promiscuous sex without consequences. I feel cheated by my public education.
Synfandel
September 28, 2012 at 2:53 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
What’s wrong with “promiscuous sex without consequences”? If there are no consequences, what’s it to him?
Synfandel
September 28, 2012 at 2:55 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I suppose he figures if you have promiscuous sex, it would be better if you ended up with an unwanted pregnancy or a social disease. Much better. We don’t want people enjoying sex and not being punished for it.
Sastra
September 28, 2012 at 3:12 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Right you are! Philosophy classes for everyone!
It would certainly be more useful than finding out that your purpose in life is to live in a state of mindlessly obedient toddlerhood eternally clapping your hands because Daddy is sooooo big and impressive. They never think these things through, philosophically or otherwise.
slc1
September 28, 2012 at 3:17 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Re Sastra @ #16
They never think. There, fixed that for ya.
Modusoperandi
September 28, 2012 at 3:23 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Now, look, if men think they’re descended from monkeys, then they’ll act like them. By committing suicide. Just. Like. Monkeys. Do.
whheydt
September 28, 2012 at 3:36 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
The statistics probably also overlook the very real suspicion that some fraction of single-vehicle automobile “accident” deaths are, in fact, actually suicides.
steve84
September 28, 2012 at 4:51 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
How does being the plaything of a capricious, malevolent and psychopathic god give one’s life meaning?
lofgren
September 28, 2012 at 4:56 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I worked as an escort for God for a few months to help pay for college, and I can tell you it never brought me much closer to understanding Him, other than a sneaking suspicion that he has some serious Daddy issues.
argos
September 28, 2012 at 5:14 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Farah is a liar.
“It isn’t that the government has been so successful at reducing auto accidents. Rather there has been an explosion in the number of suicides.”
The original paper:
http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/pdf/10.2105/AJPH.2012.300960
See the figure 2.
Big Boppa
September 28, 2012 at 5:28 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Steve84 @20
+10
I will be stealing that — perhaps for an inspirational poster.
F
September 28, 2012 at 6:34 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
People have all damn day long to be religious as they please. I don’t see how hearing about something which conflicts with your religion, or not being allowed how have group religious activities sponsored by the state, such as in schools, or by your employer or whatever, can harm a person so much that they commit suicide. Patently ridiculous.
iainr
September 28, 2012 at 6:37 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
“human beings are merely the result of billions of years of evolution from lower life forms and random mutations”
I can never get my head round how people can use the word ‘merely’ in a sentence like that. Every time I stop and think about that for a second it’s just so mind-bogglingly freaking awesome, to merely say ‘goddidit’ seems a terrible disservice.
shripathikamath
September 28, 2012 at 7:12 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
If only evolution could convince millions of denying theists to follow course.
cry4turtles
September 28, 2012 at 9:33 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Finding meaning to life is over rated. Time is much better spent finding a career one loves, and a mate whose love is mutual. Meaning will then find you.
d cwilson
September 28, 2012 at 10:30 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
So, the reason automobile deaths are going down is because Jesus loves cars then?
I bet he has a bitchin’ ride.
latecomer
September 28, 2012 at 11:21 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
What’s funny about this evolution causes [murder, suicide, etc] meme is that wingnuts often proclaim with glee how about 45% of Americans don’t believe evolution is true, yet they still claim evolution is to blame for all of society’s ills.
dingojack
September 29, 2012 at 1:35 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
When I read the headline I immediately thought of these two incredibly prescient characters:
and
But then I read on. Shame, it was such a good effort.
:( Dingo
timgueguen
September 29, 2012 at 3:52 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Last time I checked my mother and father created me, not Invisible Skydude. You’d think someone of Farrah’s age would have heard the birds and bees speech by now. “When a mommy and a daddy love each other….”
Subtract Hominem
September 29, 2012 at 1:27 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Who edits the editors?
Rorie
September 30, 2012 at 12:28 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
@28
Well there was this one he built…
That was the first thing that sprang to mind anyway. The rest is just standard manipulation of statistics that only serves to affirm the validity of the conclusions he established years ago, at least in the minds of him and his followers.
As opposed to being created to worship a sadistic tyrant in the sky. I think I prefer the former.