[sandollars]

> Religious people commit less crime, get and stay married more, use less illegal drugs, donate and volunteer more... It would make more sense to fear people becoming less religious.

Citation please.

"A 2001 review of studies on this topic found "The existing evidence surrounding the effect of religion on crime is varied, contested, and inconclusive, and currently no persuasive answer exists as to the empirical relationship between religion and crime." - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morality_and_religion

The Nordic countries regularly feature at the top of the 'Best places to live' and 'most atheistic countries' lists. Correlation doesn't imply causation, but that should be enough to at least question your assertion.

[auston]

Doubling in with additional information relevant to discussion: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4187478

[spindritf]

> Citation please.

I can't make a proper citation from home but if you're really interested those guys http://www.amazon.com/Handbook-Crime-Correlates-Lee-Ellis/dp... have over a 100 studies on religious people being less criminal, and a handful on religious regions seeing less crime.

Also, "varied and contested" can describe all evidence ever gathered in social sciences.