Hemant Mehta is the founder and editor of FriendlyAtheist.com, a YouTube creator, and podcast co-host. He is a former National Board Certified math teacher in the suburbs of Chicago. He has appeared on CNN and FOX News and served on the board of directors for Foundation Beyond Belief and the Secular Student Alliance. He has written multiple books, including I Sold My Soul on eBay and The Young Atheist's Survival Guide. He also edited the book Queer Disbelief.
Earlier this year, I posted a series of concerns I had about a group called We Are Atheism. The group raised money from atheists after tragic events and natural disasters, supposedly to help victims and their families, but the money didn’t always make it there. In some cases, it was given to people completely unaffected by the tragedies, unbeknownst to the donors at the time. The co-founders said publicly they weren’t taking a salary, even though they were. They said donations to the group were tax-deductible, even when they weren’t. Maybe you can chalk some of that up to people who were simply ill-equipped to manage a non-profit, but it seemed much more serious than mere sloppiness to me. Several former board members of We Are Atheism later spoke up about why they resigned; their reasons included a lack of financial transparency in the organization. Since all of that went down, Lee Moore took over as President of We Are Atheism and Amanda Brown stepped down from the board (she no longer has a formal connection with the group). Moore vowed to get an independent tax firm to look over the group’s finances and pledged to make things right. I should say up front that I supported him in this matter. I like the idea of a group that can raise money from atheists in times of crisis — provided everything is above board and transparent. I want to see them succeed. … So what happened with that independent tax firm? Read more
Back in July, after the Supreme Court legalized marriage equality, one national poll found that, if they were in conflict, 56% of Americans wanted the government to protect religious liberties over gay rights. Only 39% wanted it the other way around. Not good. The same poll said 49% of Americans agreed local officials should be able to do what Kim Davis just did and deny marriage licenses to gay couples. Oh, how the times have changed. An ABC News/Washington Post poll out today finds that large majorities of Americans now back equal rights over religious privilege and say Kim Davis needs to do her damn job: Read more
