godlessness
pharyngula | July 9, 2011The town of Bolungarvik, Iceland has been engaged in a lot of public works construction projects, like a new road and building a barrier to protect them from avalanches. Unfortunately, there have been delays and accidents, and they've decided what's causing the problem: Elves. Pissed-off, cranky elves.
Some people pointed the finger of blame on angry elves who had finally snapped. The dynamiting for the town's new avalanche defence barrier comes less than a year after a new road tunnel through the Oshlid hill was completed — neither of which with the prior blessing of the hidden people.…
pharyngula | July 7, 2011On 12-14 August, you could be attending the 3rd Annual Midwest Humanist and Free Thought Conference. I wish I could, but I have to be in Oslo rather than Omaha on that date — but nothing is stopping you.
pharyngula | July 5, 2011The date for the Reason Rally in Washington DC has been set: 24 March 2012. I'll be there! So will everyone else, I hope.
Also, the Center for Inquiry in DC will be hosting the first ever Women in Secularism conference on May 18-20, 2012. That's another good one to attend!
There. I've taken care of your Spring for you.
pharyngula | July 4, 2011American Atheists is sponsoring banners to fly over select areas in 26 states to celebrate the Fourth of July. The banners read:
God-LESS America -- Atheists.org
and
Atheism is Patriotic - Atheists.org
These are perfectly pleasant, inoffensive messages — that Silverman guy is such a timid, inoffensive fellow, I'm going to have to school him next time I see him — and simply affirm that the unbelievers are also part of this country, a good thing to remind people of as they listen to "God Bless America" before setting off small explosive devices.
But of course, panties are being wadded, pearls…
pharyngula | July 3, 2011This is your last gasp on the topic of the proper way to make a sexual advance. I'm just going to wrap up a few dangling bits.
Jen has slammed Richard Dawkins for some comments here. I can confirm that those comments were actually from Richard Dawkins. I also have to say that I agree with Jen and disagree with Richard.
Richard did make the valid point that there are much more serious abuses of women's rights around the world, and the Islam is a particularly horrendous offender. Women have their genitals mutilated, are beaten by husbands without recourse to legal redress, are stoned to death…
pharyngula | July 3, 2011There are so many clueless comments in this thread that Old Man PZ, grizzled veteran of the sex wars, successful lothario who has managed to reproduce three times, and champion who successfully landed a Trophy Partner in an extremely long and happy relationship, feels like he needs to step in and give some friendly advice. So here you go, the short sweet simple Decent Human Beings' Guide to Getting Laid at Atheist Conferences.
The first thing you must know is that you haven't failed when the object of your desire says "no". That's a perfectly reasonable response, and even if you do everything…
pharyngula | July 2, 2011Greta Christina has written some alternative lyrics for Lady Gaga's "Born This Way" to remove all the bad religion references and update it to something more scientifically sound. It's called "Evolve This Way", and now it just needs somebody to actually sing it. In a perfect world, Lady Gaga herself would see it and rerecord the whole song, but at the revised song points out, this isn't a perfect world, so maybe somebody else out there with some musical talent will pick up on it and give us a rendition.
It's perfectly legit as a parody, you know.
pharyngula | June 24, 2011The Exhibition is going on in Winnipeg right now and through the weekend, and the Humanists of Manitoba are out in force. Stop by and say hello and tell them I sent you.
pharyngula | June 24, 2011Taner Edis is uncomfortable with the label "atheist", even though he agrees that he is one.
One problem is that I know how far too many Muslims react to the word; "atheist" has connotations of "enemy" as well as someone opposed to all that is True and Good. I would like Muslims to allow scientific institutions more autonomy in their countries. Once I am identified as "an atheist," my arguments to that effect become worse than irrelevant--they actually harm any cause I would be seen to support.
But also among non-Muslims, the "atheist" label can poison the well. Even in academic writing, I…
pharyngula | June 23, 2011A new umbrella organization, the Kansas City Atheist Coalition, is forming up and they need help and donations. Check them out, contribute, conquer!
pharyngula | June 21, 2011This apologist for religion, James Scofield, has written a bizarre essay titled 5 Myths Atheists Believe about Religion. It's a peculiar screed that assumes atheists are somehow aliens outside religious culture, looking in uncomprehendingly, needing some kind of correction in our perceptions — more so than the religious members of our culture, who are privileged to possess the true and secret information we do not have. Never mind that here in America we are deeply entangled everywhere in religion, tripping over it in our media, our politics, our commerce, and that many of us were brought up…
pharyngula | June 20, 2011The Secular Student Alliance is having their annual meeting in Columbus, Ohio on 29-31 July. You should go — it's relatively cheap, it has some cool atheist leaders and me giving talks, and it's a fantastic opportunity to network and find out how other student organizations are operating.
I'm a college professor, so it'll just be like my regular year. I'll drone on, smack a few of you with a ruler, and make you take a test before I let you leave. Doesn't that sound like fun? People pay thousands of dollars for that privilege!
pharyngula | June 20, 2011Some team in Canada won the Stanley Cup, which prompted happy revelers to…riot and destroy public property? I have never understood that behavior; when something good happens in my life, I've just never felt the slightest desire to celebrate by setting a police car on fire.
I shall now embarrass all the good Canadians by showing a video of Canadians behaving very, very badly.
All honor is not lost, however: one reporter documented the Vancouver riots, and then found refuge in a bar full of sensible atheists.
I walked to the back toward windows looking down on the street and met a posse of…
pharyngula | June 19, 2011Here is a sad, sad story: it's the tale of Michael Glatze. He was a gay man, a gay activist, someone who supported and helped gay kids. Now he's straight and crusades for gay conversion therapies. How, you might wonder, did that happen? You won't be surprised to learn that it was that potent combination of fear and the Bible.
Michael didn't begin to question his life path, he told me, until a health scare in 2004 that led to what he calls his "spiritual awakening." That year, when Michael was 29, he experienced a series of heart palpitations and became convinced that he suffered from the same…
pharyngula | June 18, 2011Tomorrow at 9am central time (you can use the 56267 zip), it's Jamila Bey. She's good. You should listen.
pharyngula | June 18, 2011Oh, jesus…Chris Stedman is coming out with a book titled Faitheist, all about "How One Atheist Learned to Overcome the Religious-Secular Divide, and Why Atheists and the Religious Must Work Together", which leaves me with a strange gagging sensation in the back of my throat. My response is that people must work together on shared goals, but that faith and reason will always be deep and bitter enemies…and unlike Stedman, I am not confused about what side I'm on. I can share secular aspirations with religious people, but the moment they use me to rationalize or endorse faith-based folly, I'm…
pharyngula | June 15, 2011As one of those geezers in his grey, tired, wizened 50s, I'm torn between the cranky get-offa-my-lawn attitude and a patronizing bless-their-little-hearts when I see all these young'uns romping about at meetings nowadays. And the internet is even worse: look, it's a literate 13 year old atheist and a hardnosed 16 year old skeptic!
I'm going to have to combine my views — it gets easier as senility looms — and kick their little hearts around on my lawn, I guess.
pharyngula | June 14, 2011Oh, no. This is the first I hear of the Black Atheists of Atlanta, and what do I discover: they're pushing the same bigoted, homophobic nonsense that I'd expect to hear from a white Republican teabagger. It's a choice, it's unnatural, science has something called the "law of reproduction" that means homosexuality is unscientific, it is justified by tradition to exclude homosexuals. They do have one difference: they claim homosexuality is a wicked Greco-Roman nastiness that afflicts Western civilization, but isn't part of good African culture. Oh, and gay people in modern Africa are a product…