Lust, Gluttony, Greed, Sloth, Pride, Envy, and Dopey

April 27, 2009 11:57 AM

The seven deadly sins, mapped across the USA
posted by jtron (61 comments total)

via Catholicgauze
posted by jtron at 11:59 AM on April 27

Ooh. Now do a time lapse from 1800-present!
posted by Burhanistan at 12:02 PM on April 27

Pretty damn funny. This only confirms what we already know about what goes on in small towns.
posted by Xoebe at 12:03 PM on April 27

I assume torture gets classified as Wrath. And where might we see an unusual density of that?
posted by Joe Beese at 12:04 PM on April 27

I guess Faulkner was on to something.
posted by total warfare frown at 12:05 PM on April 27

The awesome thing about sloth is that it has a moderating effect on the other 6 deadly sins. I can't be bothered to get my wrath on.
posted by GuyZero at 12:05 PM on April 27 [12 favorites]

Awesome. My eye was particularly drawn to the concentration of Lust, Pride, and Wrath in South Carolina.
posted by hellogoodbye at 12:05 PM on April 27 [2 favorites]

Kentucky is apparently the most upstanding state.
posted by sciurus at 12:05 PM on April 27

Remember kids: it doesn't count as lust if you don't catch anything, so wrap it up!
posted by small_ruminant at 12:08 PM on April 27 [3 favorites]

My favorite is the "hot-spot" map. I can only speak for Washington State, but I'm absolutely tickled that all the greed seems to be on the side of the cascades with all the cities, where I live now, and that all the pride seems to be on the agrarian eastern side of the cascades, where I come from.

Most curious, however, is the spread of envy in my dear state - according to this map, every county in Washington seethes with envy except the northeastern corner of the state, where we keep Colville and Kettle Falls and whatnot. I wonder what they're doing that the rest of us aren't? Aside from coveting, I suppose.

I'm a bit surprised to see that Washington has no spikes when it comes to gluttony. Clearly, these researchers have never followed me to the crab shack in Seattle, nor been to my house on nacho night. As for the flatlined lust reading, well .. yeah. We don't tan so well up here.
posted by EatTheWeak at 12:10 PM on April 27 [1 favorite]

They don't call it the dirty south for nothin'.
posted by solipsophistocracy at 12:13 PM on April 27 [1 favorite]

Lust was calculated by compiling the number of sexually transmitted diseases — HIV, AIDS, syphilis, chlamydia and gonorrhea — reported per capita

Wouldn't an area prone to lust actually be less diseased due to the twin effects of Darwin and planning ahead?

Also, does sin really work on a "per capita" basis? Is a town with only one resident, who happens to be a murderer, really more sinful than a town with 100 residents, 99 of whom are murderers?
posted by DU at 12:13 PM on April 27

My part of Michigan is apparently entirely without sin. And here I thought it was just my house.
posted by FelliniBlank at 12:14 PM on April 27 [2 favorites]

Put me down in the Sloth column with GuyZero.
posted by LeLiLo at 12:18 PM on April 27

Both sloth and gluttony could have some factor from obesity rates. Health code violations at restaurants and citations for unkempt lawns could add to sloth. Heroin use could add to sloth; meth arrests could subtract from it. Gluttony, I think, should have extra weight given to restaurants which are all-you-can-eat buffets.

Lust clearly could be helped by a faint touch of birth rates and divorces due to infidelity, as well as a number of crimes: public exposure, having sex in public, etc. I'd take a portion of the rapes away from wrath and donate them to lust.

Greed could have another input: pork barrel earmarks in a Congressional budget.

Envy would benefit by having an additional factor, which would rise as the variance in nearby home prices drops. The more your house costs the same as other houses nearby, the more you are keeping up with the Joneses. Envy.

Pride could be mapped by density of local landmarks. Perhaps buildings and parks named after someone.

Dammit, I want a more accurate accounting of local evil!
posted by adipocere at 12:19 PM on April 27

My eye was particularly drawn to the concentration of Lust, Pride, and Wrath in South Carolina.

And we're damn proud of it, are you tryin' to pick a fight, mofo?
posted by 1f2frfbf at 12:21 PM on April 27

>Put me down in the Sloth column with GuyZero.

put your own damn self in the Sloth column, you lazy fu- oh, wait.
posted by xbonesgt at 12:22 PM on April 27 [3 favorites]

I suddenly have an excellent idea for a sequel to Afterlife.
posted by The Whelk at 12:23 PM on April 27

Also, does sin really work on a "per capita" basis? Is a town with only one resident, who happens to be a murderer, really more sinful than a town with 100 residents, 99 of whom are murderers?

You'd probably want to throw the sample size of one out given that it isn't statistically significant. But, from a practical perspective if you went to that one-person town and knocked on a door, there would be a 100% chance that you'd be talking to a murderer, as oppposed to a 99% chance in the other town. I like the odds on the latter town better - so it's less sinful in that it's not 100% sinful.
posted by jimmythefish at 12:24 PM on April 27

Man, that's so unfair. I want to be as envious as the upper North-West. They get all the good stuff; nice weather, cool people, lives filled with envy...

I should have that.
posted by quin at 12:28 PM on April 27 [1 favorite]

Oh, that's right. Just help that serial killer from 7 pick his targets.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 12:29 PM on April 27 [2 favorites]

My part of Michigan is apparently entirely without sin.

Hey, what are you doing with that stone? Ow!
posted by Horace Rumpole at 12:35 PM on April 27 [4 favorites]

There has got to be some effect from reporting standards, no? Otherwise why would certain states be so different from their neighbors? I'm looking particularly at Kentucky and South Carolina, as opposite sides of the coin.
posted by Rock Steady at 12:38 PM on April 27

That one's gotta be a candidate for an Ig Nobel Prize!
posted by Chocolate Pickle at 12:43 PM on April 27 [1 favorite]

Either New Orleans is such a sinkhole of debauchery that it literally blinded the mapmakers with it's intensity or that Kansas State logo just cut it off. But I'd like to think the former.
posted by ColdChef at 12:44 PM on April 27 [6 favorites]

So Vought and colleagues plan to continue their national study of evil.

Abyss Safari!
posted by doobiedoo at 12:49 PM on April 27 [1 favorite]

My eye was particularly drawn to the concentration of Lust, Pride, and Wrath in South Carolina.

A good portion of that is my fault actually...
posted by LordSludge at 12:55 PM on April 27 [2 favorites]

OK, I know this is a "just for fun" thing and not to be taken seriously, but still:

And pride, lastly, is most important. The root of all sins, in this study, is the aggregate of all data.

Um, no. Pride is a sin all its own, independent of the other six. The fact that they just took an aggregate of the others because they couldn't figure out a good way to measure pride smacks of, well, sloth.
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 12:58 PM on April 27 [9 favorites]

Lots of greed here in Arkansas, but no pride about it.
posted by Ugh at 1:08 PM on April 27

Also, does sin really work on a "per capita" basis? Is a town with only one resident, who happens to be a murderer, really more sinful than a town with 100 residents, 99 of whom are murderers?

Well, that town had a population of 150,000 before the one murderer moved in.
posted by FatherDagon at 1:10 PM on April 27 [4 favorites]

"Lust" was determined by STD rates?

That doesn't really make a whole lot of sense. I assume that the fact that the South has higher STD rates is due, at least to some degree, to things like "abstinence only sex ed", and "poor general education system", and "Republican", as opposed to "lusty".
posted by Flunkie at 1:20 PM on April 27

And here I thought pride would be measured by the number of cosmetic surgeons and tanning salons or something along those lines.
posted by mandymanwasregistered at 1:34 PM on April 27

Man, people need to quit hating on these supposed sins. Greed, envy and sloth are responsible for half the technological progress in the world.
posted by lysdexic at 1:35 PM on April 27

I'm pretty sure lust fueled the VCR revolution as well as driving about half all internet traffic.
posted by GuyZero at 1:39 PM on April 27

"Lust" was determined by STD rates?

Maybe in that it implies an urgency which supersedes rational thinking about things like condoms and getting to know your partners history?

Personally, I would think that tracking porn usage would be a better and more pervasive metric.
posted by quin at 1:41 PM on April 27

Maybe in that it implies an urgency which supersedes rational thinking about things like condoms

Yeah, but again, there are things other than "urgency" which supersede rational thinking about things like condoms. Fundamentalist Christians in control of school boards imposing abstinence only sex ed upon teenagers, and parents who do the same (at best) for the same reason, for example.
posted by Flunkie at 1:46 PM on April 27

MetaFilter: Rigorous mapping of ridiculous data.

(I'm not doing any more of these)
posted by Bokononist at 1:56 PM on April 27

Man, what the fuck am I doing in the Northeast? I gotta move me down south!

The Southern States : The New Lust Belt
posted by Afroblanco at 2:10 PM on April 27

I have to say that had I been asked to speculate on the most gluttonous places in the U.S., I would not have picked Odessa, TX, Charleston, WV, or the Norfolk/Newport News/Virginia Beach area.
posted by Johnny Assay at 2:18 PM on April 27

I have to say that had I been asked to speculate on the most gluttonous places in the U.S., I would not have picked Odessa, TX

I lived in Odessa. There's nothing else to do there.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 2:24 PM on April 27

Lust is measured by STD rates? Aaugh! This makes their maps completely useless when trying to decide where you should move to if you want to get it on more.
posted by namespan at 2:31 PM on April 27 [1 favorite]

All these people here in Alabama getting them some and I'm single. I must be doing something wrong.
posted by robtf3 at 2:33 PM on April 27

This is mapmaking for the sake of making maps. The data choices are ridiculous and meaningless. Nothing useful can be derived from this, so I wish they'd just come out and say HEY WE WERE FUCKING AROUND WITH ARCGIS AND OOOH LOOK AT THE PRETTY MAPS.

because that's what i do when i'm bored
posted by desjardins at 2:39 PM on April 27 [6 favorites]

South Dakota? Lust? Seriously?
posted by bibliowench at 2:43 PM on April 27

They totally screwed this up. STD rates is a measure of sloth, not lust. Lust is measured by kittens per capita.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 2:56 PM on April 27

South Dakota? Lust? Seriously?

They put the "mount" in Mount Rushmore?
posted by maxwelton at 2:57 PM on April 27 [1 favorite]

You'd think that Carson City would score much higher on the envy scale. After all, it is the capital of NV.
posted by googly at 3:05 PM on April 27

My Kentucky home county is way, way, WAY more slothful and gluttinous than they're getting credit for here.
posted by little e at 3:06 PM on April 27

gluttonous, that is.
posted by little e at 3:08 PM on April 27

From wikipedia: Pride is a desire to be more important or attractive than others, failing to acknowledge the good work of others, and excessive love of self (especially holding self out of proper position towards God).

It's probably pointless to measure that, in a similar way that it is pointless to measure relative humidity inside a swimming pool.
posted by aeschenkarnos at 3:16 PM on April 27

Shreveport, LA, A town that has converted an entire indoor shopping mall into one giant mega-church, is in the top 10 in each category and places first in two of them.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 3:45 PM on April 27

is there any way to see all of the US maps on a larger scale? Like the wrath one on catholicgauze? It's pretty poor that the announcement from the university where the research was done only links to the Nevada newspaper story. Cool work.
posted by cogneuro at 4:06 PM on April 27

Shreveport, LA, [...] is in the top 10 in each category and places first in two of them.

Those lists only contain casino markets, so that's not so amazing.

is there any way to see all of the US maps on a larger scale?

If you hover over the graphics on the news article, there's a full screen icon in the lower right corner.
posted by desjardins at 4:22 PM on April 27

I had no idea Delaware was so wrathful.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 4:58 PM on April 27

Also, does sin really work on a "per capita" basis? Is a town with only one resident, who happens to be a murderer, really more sinful than a town with 100 residents, 99 of whom are murderers?

I would wonder about the hundredth person. Is he an exemplar of sloth? Or if there were an equivalent map for the seven virtues, I suppose we would see an example of Fortitude ("forbearance, endurance, and ability to confront fear and uncertainty, or intimidation") here.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 5:02 PM on April 27

My Kentucky home central Pennsylvania county is way, way, WAY more slothful and gluttonous than they're getting credit for here.

Mine too, based on a random sample of the size of the asses in my local supermarket relative to the size of the economy-size box of krunchy cheezballs.
posted by scratch at 5:31 PM on April 27

Lust: HIV rates
Sloth: Investment in the arts
Pride: Mix of a bunch of unrelated stats
Methodology: Retarded
posted by justkevin at 6:16 PM on April 27 [1 favorite]

My county appears to be a hot spot for Wrath, so good work, Catholics!
posted by Pope Guilty at 10:15 PM on April 27

As I suspected, Florida is the root of all evil.
posted by ScotchRox at 7:05 AM on April 28

Kentucky is apparently the most upstanding state.

Yeah, when we aren't producing most of the region's weed, organizing large horse races, or distilling bourbon.
posted by phrontist at 11:45 AM on April 28

Afroblanco: "38Man, what the fuck am I doing in the Northeast? I gotta move me down south!

The Southern States : The New Lust Belt"

I believe you mean "The Antichastity Belt"

Though that makes me think of an antigravity belt.

Perhaps a combination...
posted by mindless progress at 4:35 PM on April 28