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.
Back in July, I mentioned that Dr. Austin Dacey, author of The Secular Conscience, had written an article about how Skeptics need to branch out a lot more when it comes to issues we care about: The titles vary across skeptics meetings, but at the core are the now-familiar topics: psychics, monsters, ghosts, UFOs, creationism, alternative and complementary medicine, popularization of science, and, somewhat less reliably, false memory syndrome, communication with the dead, faith healing, doomsdays prophesies, conspiracy theories, climate… Read more
The Southern Poverty Law Center puts out a magazine called Teaching Tolerance a couple times a year. It’s aimed at educators, letting them know how they can be inclusive and accepting of all kinds of minorities. The Fall, 2011 issue has a wonderful article by Victoria Lim called “The Unaffiliated Unite” — it’s about the plight of secular students like Damon Fowler and Brian Lisco and many other high schoolers who had (and still have) a hell of a time… Read more
Bradley Johnson is a math teacher at Westview High School in the (public) Poway Unified School District in California. He’s been working in the district for decades. You know he’s a math teacher because he’s had these posters hanging in his classroom for decades now: In God We Trust One Nation Under God God Bless America God Sheds His Grace On Thee. … All Men Are Created Equal, They Are Endowed By Their CREATOR They remained in his room for… Read more
In case you missed him the last time he was here, Tim Minchin will be appearing at the Vic Theatre in Chicago on Thursday, November 10th at 8:00p. It is a fully seated show and general admission so you’ll get more choice of where to sit the earlier you arrive. There will be no opening acts so Tim will be on stage at 8pm. Don’t be late! Tickets go on sale this Saturday at 10:00a. They’ll be sold out fast,… Read more
Friend-of-the-blog Cecil Bothwell, an openly atheist City Council member in Asheville, North Carolina, is running for Congress in 2012. He’s also trying to win a scholarship to the Take Back the Dream Conference and he needs your help: Democracy for America and Rebuild the Dream have teamed up to send 30 progressive activists to the Take Back the Dream Conference. The conference is spearheaded by the Campaign for America’s Future in partnership with Rebuild the Dream and Moveon.org. On Oct… Read more
