I saw this trailer for a Christian movie Every Young Man’s Battle yesterday… (Spoiler: All of you young men out there have to fight the evil, treacherous scourge of pornography.) Oh man… not BUZZ JUICE! SOMEONE SAVE HIM! The full movie is actually online and it’s even worse than the trailer. Like the part at 12:42 when a young woman blames herself because “men were stumbling because of some of the things” she was wearing. Or the part at 43:42 when James Dobson interviews serial killer Ted Bundy. Why? Because porn, that’s why. [Click headline for more…] Read more
Six years after I bought my home, the coffeehouse across the street was transformed into a Hard Rock Café. The new management decided to promote the place by affixing a couple of trunk-sized, weather-proof speakers to the roof and playing a one-minute rock medley several times a day, at such eardrum-shattering volumes that the din could easily be heard three or four blocks away. A trip to City Hall resulted in the town manager telling me his hands were tied, as there were special rules permitting the loud music, based on the interests of the hundreds who are clearly drawn to such places. So I had a talk with the Hard Rock Café business manager, first pleading and then demanding that she stop or reduce the ruckus. She heard me out while studying her nails, and said a bit nonchalantly that she had every right to do what she did, and that her clientele obviously enjoyed the thrice-a-day sonic bursts. At my wit’s end, last week, I filed a lawsuit, because the joint illegally interferes with my peaceful enjoyment of my property. The Hard Rock Café management, in response, put out the following statement: So many in the community have enjoyed hearing the snippets of rock music for years for but minutes a day. The Hard Rock Café believes such sounds are reasonable and well within its rights. The music-loving community is saddened that a sole individual would continue personal, inappropriate attacks harassing visitors and staff. … All right, time to come clean. If this story sounds vaguely improbable, it’s because I invented it. Sort of. (Last year I took this photo of my actual view — note the absence of noisy rock temples!). But the tale is very close to real for some people. Just substitute church for rock joint. Ask yourself why virtually no home owner would stand for the situation I described, but why it’s okay for a house of worship, as opposed to a house of rock to produce an ungodly number of decibels some 25 times a week. [Click headline for more…] Read more
The video below, part of The Atheist Voice series, discusses the Pledge of Allegiance case in Massachusetts: You can read more about the Pledge case here and here. We’d love to hear your thoughts on the project — more videos will be posted soon — and we’d also appreciate your suggestions as to which questions we ought to tackle next! Read more
Here’s an incredible new hip-hop song about God by Gary Gibson, Jr. (with producer Jay Bee). The rhymes just made me smile on this one: Check out some of the lines describing God: [Click headline for more…] Read more
I missed this whenever it first appeared, and I (obviously) can’t verify all this information, but here’s an amazing detailed “tree of world religions”: The full version, created by Dzvenislava Novakіvska and her team at Funk & Consulting, can be seen here. (Thanks to Brian for the link!) Read more
Last week, I posted about Joseph Herrera, the author of a book called God Doesn’t Exist: And Yes, I Can Prove It. It seemed like the Christian formatter for his book had stuck an anti-atheist message in one of the bookmarks and added in his own links in the appendix. I’m happy to say there are some positive updates to this story. [Click headline for more…] Read more
The Islamic Society of Tampa Bay Area has a request for public school teachers and administrators. They want children of Muslim parents to be dismissed from school early once a week so that they can attend a mandatory prayer service. Oh, and by early, they mean 12:30p until the end of the school day. Because that won’t disrupt student learning at all. They put this permission slip on their website for families to download and take to their kids’ schools: Let’s focus on the core of it: [Click headline for more…] Read more
Phil Robertson, the patriarch of the family featured on the reality show “Duck Dynasty,” was giving a sermon at White’s Ferry Road church in Louisiana last weekend and make a crack at atheists that really makes no sense whatsoever when you give it more than a second of thought: [Click headline for more…] Read more
In America, out voting scandals involve ID laws, hanging chads, and outright disenfranchisement. In the Maldives, their big voting scandal this year involves a coconut. A cursed coconut. A cursed 4-inch coconut inscribed with a Koranic verse written in Arabic. To quote Paul Fidalgo: A magic coconut has disrupted Maldivian elections and now there is an investigation into the magic coconut and OH GOD I WISH I WAS KIDDING So how is this coconut disrupting an election? [Click headline for more…] Read more
Following the oral arguments in the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court regarding the Pledge of Allegiance case, FOX News’ “The Five” reacted to the arguments made by atheist lawyer David Niose. Notably, Dana Perino (former White House Press Secretary for George W. Bush) argued that this was already a settled issue because the Senate and the House had already passed resolutions to keep “Under God” in the Pledge. In other words, a bunch of Christians had already agreed that we should pay homage to God… so how dare these atheists argue against it?! (Of course, the atheist argument here wasn’t that “Under God” was government promotion of Christianity, but rather, that saying the Pledge made atheist students look like second-class citizens, unpatriotic and not properly deferential to God. But, you know, facts… who needs them?) Then, Perino made an even more ignorant statement: [Click headline for more…] Read more
