Hellkat9940
Student
- Joined
- Nov 12, 2006
- Messages
- 27
Quite frankly, I have no idea how I've managed to remain as sane as I am, likely being watched over by Cthulhu or Xenu, or some other such dark power in order to accomplish fiendish perversions later in life, or something. But sane I am, as I am a skeptic, though I fail to see how as both nature and nurture in this case are filled with woo. My father dabbled in dowsing (to little effect), and my mother is a fundamentalist Christian who believes in several kinds of alternative medicine and is decidedly a sheep-ostrich creationist. Meaning she doesn't form her own opinions on the matter and will stick her head in a hole in regards to anything that might go against her own little fictional world.
I've never liked the church, or as I've always referred to it online 'teh cult' with the intentionally misspelled. My first exposure was a birthday service for the church, when it was revealed that it was viewed as ******* loco by those in the surrounding area. Though that wasn't the first thing that set me off. It wasn't even the second thing. Or the third.
The first thing was the expensive, white leather couches in the church lobby. The second was the collection of $200 office chairs in each office and the conference room. The third was a book lying around called "Evolution Crusher" which featured a back cover blurb extolling the fact that you could buy them in bulk and make a 400% profit by selling them to the patrons of your church/cult.
Other flaws included that he looked like a rather scummy guy, talked during sermons about his plane, HIS PLANE, not the church's plane, HIS (church in the middle of nowhere, 200 members, and the PASTOR HAS A ****ING PLANE!), and the fact that he screws up words, misquotes, bends the truth to fit his sermons, and pulls statistics out of his ass. "Europe is 1 percent Christian" style out-the-butt.
So it's no surprise that once again I had to bite my tongue to prevent myself from likening his figures to what falls out of the south end of a north bound bovine. He quoted a number, and I got 'the feeling.'
I don't know what to call the feeling I get when something like this happens. It's kind of like a shock, a cold chill, and being unable to breath for a single moment all put together. It feels kind of like being punched in the gut.
The number this time? 500,000 assaults on teachers per year. I went up after the service, to make sure I heard that number right. And he confirmed it. 500,000. Up from 115,000 when he mentioned it LAST MONTH, along with a figure that would mean that half of all the reported rapes in 2005 took place in a school.
I knew that didn't sound right at all, and not having much data, I made a few estimates in regards to some things, and overshot on them all.
My estimates:
350 Million, US Population
175 Million, US Students (Cut the Population in half)
7 Million, US Teachers (Assumed 1:25 Teacher/Student Ratio)
8 Million Assaults Per Year in the US (Recalled the number from Google check back in May)
I wound up with a rate of about 1:44 for the ratio of assaults per population. His number would make the amount for teachers 1:14, three times the amount for the general population.
Rather than just pulling numbers out of my ass, I've spent the last 45 minutes or so plucking data from the various government websites. Census.Gov, FBI.Gov, USDOJ.Gov, and the USDOJ's Bureau of Justice Statistics page. This is all data from 2005.
300 Million, US Population (Census)
6.2 Million US Teachers (Census)
6 Million Assaults in the US (DOJ/FBI, extrapolated from 1996 number, and rate of fall in other violent crime categories, Approx 5.1 Million Simple, and .9 Million aggrevated assaults)
So that gives and even higher ratio than my guesses gave me. 1:50 assault to population rate. With these numbers the teacher's assault rate becomes 1:12.4, more than FOUR TIMES the national rate!
It would mean that 12 percent of all assaults in the US are committed against teachers and that one of every 8 teachers will be assaulted.
As you can obviously see, his number is complete and total ********.
I came up to him after the service, and told him his numbers were too damn high, and gave my figure of 8 million assaults, and that it would mean that 12.5 percent of all assaults would have been inflicted on teachers.
He told me that sounded about right, and if anything, it ought to be higher. I gave him a complete look of disbelief. He then asked me "Well, then what's you definition of assault? And where are you getting your numbers?" I replied that mine was the definition provided by the legal system and my numbers given by the US government.
I don't recall exactly what he said, but it was pretty dismissive, and I replied that if he's inflating the numbers and changing the definition of words, then he's doing nothing more than fearmongering and doomsaying. He basically said "Am not!" and I told him to find where he got his information from, then turned and left.
And what's the worst is that I appear to be the only one who cares in the slightest about checking to see if what he says has any sort of basis in reality. Outdated morality from a committee created, 20 century old political document aside, that is. If he lies about numbers, and is most certainly lying about a wild, drug filled youth (between the age when he could drive a car and the age when he was doing ministry while he was in high school), how the hell can somebody really trust him with spiritual salvation?
It's incredibly frustrating. Her increasingly fundamentalist ways contributed greatly to her divorce from my father, as well as my older sister moving out the first chance she got. Unfortunately my inability to drive and equal inability to be able to hold onto a job without my employer going out of business, or my mother dragging me to yet another incredibly tiny town with no opportunities for employment. Small town vicious circle. No job because I can't drive to where the jobs are, can't drive to where the jobs are because I don't have a car, no car because I don't have any money, and no money because I can't have a job.
I apologize if this doesn't really pertain to anything, but I need to vent where I won't get a half smile and told "Well, his heart is in the right place."
I've never liked the church, or as I've always referred to it online 'teh cult' with the intentionally misspelled. My first exposure was a birthday service for the church, when it was revealed that it was viewed as ******* loco by those in the surrounding area. Though that wasn't the first thing that set me off. It wasn't even the second thing. Or the third.
The first thing was the expensive, white leather couches in the church lobby. The second was the collection of $200 office chairs in each office and the conference room. The third was a book lying around called "Evolution Crusher" which featured a back cover blurb extolling the fact that you could buy them in bulk and make a 400% profit by selling them to the patrons of your church/cult.
Other flaws included that he looked like a rather scummy guy, talked during sermons about his plane, HIS PLANE, not the church's plane, HIS (church in the middle of nowhere, 200 members, and the PASTOR HAS A ****ING PLANE!), and the fact that he screws up words, misquotes, bends the truth to fit his sermons, and pulls statistics out of his ass. "Europe is 1 percent Christian" style out-the-butt.
So it's no surprise that once again I had to bite my tongue to prevent myself from likening his figures to what falls out of the south end of a north bound bovine. He quoted a number, and I got 'the feeling.'
I don't know what to call the feeling I get when something like this happens. It's kind of like a shock, a cold chill, and being unable to breath for a single moment all put together. It feels kind of like being punched in the gut.
The number this time? 500,000 assaults on teachers per year. I went up after the service, to make sure I heard that number right. And he confirmed it. 500,000. Up from 115,000 when he mentioned it LAST MONTH, along with a figure that would mean that half of all the reported rapes in 2005 took place in a school.
I knew that didn't sound right at all, and not having much data, I made a few estimates in regards to some things, and overshot on them all.
My estimates:
350 Million, US Population
175 Million, US Students (Cut the Population in half)
7 Million, US Teachers (Assumed 1:25 Teacher/Student Ratio)
8 Million Assaults Per Year in the US (Recalled the number from Google check back in May)
I wound up with a rate of about 1:44 for the ratio of assaults per population. His number would make the amount for teachers 1:14, three times the amount for the general population.
Rather than just pulling numbers out of my ass, I've spent the last 45 minutes or so plucking data from the various government websites. Census.Gov, FBI.Gov, USDOJ.Gov, and the USDOJ's Bureau of Justice Statistics page. This is all data from 2005.
300 Million, US Population (Census)
6.2 Million US Teachers (Census)
6 Million Assaults in the US (DOJ/FBI, extrapolated from 1996 number, and rate of fall in other violent crime categories, Approx 5.1 Million Simple, and .9 Million aggrevated assaults)
So that gives and even higher ratio than my guesses gave me. 1:50 assault to population rate. With these numbers the teacher's assault rate becomes 1:12.4, more than FOUR TIMES the national rate!
It would mean that 12 percent of all assaults in the US are committed against teachers and that one of every 8 teachers will be assaulted.
As you can obviously see, his number is complete and total ********.
I came up to him after the service, and told him his numbers were too damn high, and gave my figure of 8 million assaults, and that it would mean that 12.5 percent of all assaults would have been inflicted on teachers.
He told me that sounded about right, and if anything, it ought to be higher. I gave him a complete look of disbelief. He then asked me "Well, then what's you definition of assault? And where are you getting your numbers?" I replied that mine was the definition provided by the legal system and my numbers given by the US government.
I don't recall exactly what he said, but it was pretty dismissive, and I replied that if he's inflating the numbers and changing the definition of words, then he's doing nothing more than fearmongering and doomsaying. He basically said "Am not!" and I told him to find where he got his information from, then turned and left.
And what's the worst is that I appear to be the only one who cares in the slightest about checking to see if what he says has any sort of basis in reality. Outdated morality from a committee created, 20 century old political document aside, that is. If he lies about numbers, and is most certainly lying about a wild, drug filled youth (between the age when he could drive a car and the age when he was doing ministry while he was in high school), how the hell can somebody really trust him with spiritual salvation?
It's incredibly frustrating. Her increasingly fundamentalist ways contributed greatly to her divorce from my father, as well as my older sister moving out the first chance she got. Unfortunately my inability to drive and equal inability to be able to hold onto a job without my employer going out of business, or my mother dragging me to yet another incredibly tiny town with no opportunities for employment. Small town vicious circle. No job because I can't drive to where the jobs are, can't drive to where the jobs are because I don't have a car, no car because I don't have any money, and no money because I can't have a job.
I apologize if this doesn't really pertain to anything, but I need to vent where I won't get a half smile and told "Well, his heart is in the right place."
