Episcopalians vs. Jews

Is "Favor or oppose gun permits" asking if guns should be permitted, or if permits should be required to own a gun? Either way, I'm kind of surprised it's so one-sided.

the variable is GUNLAW, the question is:

Would you favor or oppose a law which would require a person to obtain a police permit before he or she could buy a gun?

so the latter.

I've read that half of all Episcopalians these days are converts so there's some self-selecting going on.

One of the most interesting data points here is the set for the nature of the Bible. The Jews have a much higher level agreeing with it being a book of fables than the other categories even though they are close to the Episcopalians on the percentages for everything else. I'd be curious as to the breakdown of Jews in this study by Reform/Conservative/Orthodox/other and how much that data point changes along with the others.

66.4% in this sample were raised episcopalian.

I'd be curious as to the breakdown of Jews in this study by Reform/Conservative/Orthodox/other and how much that data point changes along with the others.

the breakdown is as you would expect.

do this

row: jew
column: bible
filter: relig(3)

The 'Bible' presumably means the Old Testament for Jews and the Old and New Testaments for Episcopalians. For a fair comparison, you would need to ask Episcopalians if they regard the Old Testament as a 'book of fables'. Seems a good description to me!

BTW, is there any comparison of IQ for Jews and Episcopalians after controlling for social class? Both groups are predominantly middle class.

looks about the same to me. here's the correlations

subjective class & wordsum = 0.24 for both groups
socioeconomic index & wordsum = 0.34 for episco, 0.31 for jews

There's a distinction by class between the various churches; Episcopalians are traditionally associated with more upper-class families and "old families" while Baptists, Pentecostals, etc. are associated with lower class families.

The older families often have a tradition of education, achievement and accomplishment and tend to attend these "upper-class" churches where they associate with members of the same group.

In a sense, the Episcopalian Church serves as a vehicle for the assortative mating of these upper class families.

This is perhaps less true than in the past, as children are more apt to defy these "guidelines."

Of course, I do not attend church or synagogue myself.

FWIW, the arguments of a right wing observant Jew gun nut:
I wasn't going to...

"The Jews have a much higher level agreeing with it [Bible]being a book of fables than the other categories even though they are close to the Episcopalians on the percentages for everything else."- Joshua Zelinsky

The Jews follow the Talmud which is unknown to most Christians. This data shows the ignorance of the Christian community who thinks that they have a real connection to the Jews through the Old Testament.

The Jews follow the Talmud which is unknown to most Christians. This data shows the ignorance of the Christian community who thinks that they have a real connection to the Jews through the Old Testament.

you don't know what you're talking about. reform jews don't emphasize the talmud, while conservative jews are informed, but not nearly as talmud-centric as orthodox jews. only 10% of american jews are orthodox.

The last graph is the most interesting. Is it wrong to cheat on taxes?

Oftentimes the ones (liberals) who propose the most government spending are the same ones who try their best to avoid them. They give the least to charity.

Altruism is fine, just as long as it's someone else who provides it. Rhetoric is the alms of hypocrites.

Gary, that's not how it works at all. Jews generally rely on the Talmud as a commentary and transmission of oral law and associated stories related to the Biblical text. But that entire edifice has Tanach as its center. It might be somewhat more accurate to say that the Jewish attitude towards the Biblical texts is in some ways closer to Catholicism's attitudes than the rest of Christianity but that's not quite accurate.

joshua, neo-karaitism is prominent in the reform movement. i think you need to distinguish that from the norm in the mainstream of rabbnical-orthodox judaism. in One People, Two Worlds: A Reform Rabbi and an Orthodox Rabbi Explore the Issues That Divide Them the orthodox interlocutor repeatedly admires the reform rabbi's mastery of the tanakh, implicitly admitting that this is a function of investment of time (he does note that the women in the orthodox community are relatively well versed in the tanakh though since they do not invest as much time in the talmud).

One of my great-uncles, an Ashkenazi Jew (like the rest of my family) converted to Episcopalianism. His brother, my grandfather, converted to Communism. Episcopalian convert great-uncle made a ton of money, became a multimillionaire, pressured his mother (my great-grandmother) to convert to Episcopalianism too, and joined the John Birch Society. Communist grandfather bought a small farm in Indiana in the 1950's, accidentally amputated his thumb in farm machinery, severely injured his back, gave up and moved back to the city and got a modest middle-class job.

So there's another Episcopalian-Jew connection for you.

White Protestants includes Southern White Protestants. I'd be interested to know whether the survey has only ended up uncovering differences between Northern USers (mostly NE, which have significant numbers of Jews) and Southern USers, differences we mostly know about; so is the takeaway just that Northerners (whether Jewish or Protestant) are more like each other, and significantly different from Southerners. I once had two colleagues, one Orthodox NE US Jewish, the other Southern Baptist. But it was the Orthodox Jew, with his Columbia-educated wife, who had 5 kids. The Baptist had just moved north, and hadn't had much contact with Jews at all - and so he asked me, a South Asian, who's that guy (with the yarmulke); and when I told him, so is that why he has so many kids? (His desk photo showed all 5 kids. Your chart shows Jews with 5 kids about 0%; White Protestants with 5 kids about 5%. So that was funny when he said it, and even funnier now.)

I assume that we are talking about Americans. In America it's all about choice and who you want to be. My grandfather came to this country as a Jew. He took his children to the Episcopal Church. I was raised as an Episcopalian. When my church left me I became a white protestant. I do not believe in corporate guilt and have no desire to be a victim. We are all free to choose. As far as the IQ tests are concerned it could be that in great numbers the Jews and Episcoplians are from the same genetic strain. This does not mean that they are smarter,but have a particular type of intelligence that tests well.

The most striking difference is the attitude toward Israel. Jews are clearly massively committed. That's why the US is in such trouble today. The Muslims are mad at us because the US supports the settlements. The settlements stand in the way of peace. Our cities may be nuked as a result of the settlements ... which are, of course, counter to the Geneva Convention.

The taxes are next. I've heard this statistical analysis before and am always depressed. How unusual is Madoff after all? Tolerance of illegality in money matters seems to be far too common among Jews.