> From: Richard Baker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Julia said: > > > Can anyone come up with that data? > > I'll have a go at calculating rough figures. A quick Google finds that > the population of India was about 300 million in Moghul times (I'm sure > Ritu will correct me if this is wrong), the population of the Aztec > empire was about 20 million; in the 1930s, the Soviet population was 190 > million. These gives us the approximate death rates due to religious or > state murder: > > Soviet regime 500 per 100,000 per year > Aztec Empire 100 > Thuggee Cult 13 > > (Figures for the Soviet Union assume the 50 million died over 50 years. > As before, I'm excluding war dead.) > > For calibration, the US murder rate is around 10 per 100,000 per year.
AFAIK the Aztec empire was the state religion. The communist system in the U.S.S.R. was the state religion. The thugs were a very small religious cult, probably never having more than 5000 members at a time. 40000 / 5000 = 8 murders per member per year. An average lifespan of say 20 years being a member, gives each member a murder rate of 160 murders per member. _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
