Maybe We Should Call it the “Sin Cinch”

May 19, 2009

In a story titled "How do You Spell Lust? M-I-S-S-I-S-S-I-P-P-I," Internet spirituality Web site Beliefnet cites a new study by Kansas State University, saying: "Las Vegas may be known as "Sin City," but when it comes to transgressions per capita, parts of the Bible Belt may burn much hotter."

The researchers looked at a federal statistics and mapped sinful "hot spots" to Christianity's seven deadly sins: lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, wrath, envy and pride. The Las Vegas Sun reported on the study last month, publishing a number of full-color graphics.

"This is a precision party trick—rigorous mapping of ridiculous data," the Sun reporter wrote.

For the sin of envy, researchers looked at theft, including robbery, burglary, larceny and stolen cars. Violent crimes—murder, assault and rape—made up the wrath index, while rates of sexually transmitted disease fed into the lust count. Gluttony was determined by numbers of fast-food restaurants, and sloth by comparing money spent on arts, entertainment and recreation. Greed was represented by comparing average incomes to the number of residents living below the poverty line. The final sin, pride, was an aggregate of all the data.

The project, undertaken by the Kansas State geography department, then mapped the data across the U.S. and against the country's top 10 casino markets. That's where the South, particularly Mississippi, came out on top, with Lula and Biloxi leading the pack.

"Every city is Sin City nowadays, with the availability of everything online and the world we live in," Rev. Craig Gross of XXXChurch, a national anti-pornography mission told Beliefnet. "It's on display more here in Las Vegas, but the temptations are everywhere. It doesn't surprise me that in the Bible Belt, where you're keeping it more from other people, that it's going on more than people think."

posted by golden eagle on 05/20/09 at 08:55 AM