When it comes to the pernicious influence of religion, I consider myself fortunate to live in the western world. I get to write about the Evansville crosses without any fear of Christian mobs administering a beating. I can say what I want about the disgusting and disgraceful practice of ritual baby-penis-sucking among Hasidic Brooklyn Jews, and no armed posse of YHWH fans is going to come to my home to teach me a lesson. I may publish whatever strikes me as truthful about the so-called prophet Muhammad without incensed Islamists threatening to butcher m–oh, wait, not that one. I forgot: Islam is special. … No organization drives home the point quite as well as the degenerate Nigerian group Boko Haram, whose name means “Western education is sinful.” So Boko Haram’s fighters love targeting schools and students, in a series of loathsome acts not seen since Muslim terrorists killed almost 400 pupils and teachers in Beslan. [Click headline for more…] Read more
The video below, part of The Atheist Voice series, answers the question: What is Humanism? The American Humanist Association has a wonderful, detailed description of what constitutes Humanism on their website. 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
We have an update on the Lake Elsinore Christian Monument! You can read a full recap of what happened here, but the short version is that the City Council of Lake Elsinore, California unanimously approved a $50,000 veterans’ monument to be placed in front of Diamond Stadium, a city-owned minor league baseball stadium (a mockup of what it would look like is below): If you can’t tell, the soldier is kneeling in front of a whole bunch of Christian crosses… and one Jewish star. Because only Christians have died in our country’s wars. And one Jew. And no one else, ever. [Click headline for more…] Read more
A couple of weeks ago, I posted about “Marwa,” an ex-Muslim woman from Lebanon, who moved to the United States a year ago. She had written a beautiful post about what the transition to America was like. It turns out a lot of people read Marwa’s post. She has responded by writing about what she’s up against and why she’s not giving up anytime soon: [Click headline for more…] Read more
If that headline makes no sense, here’s the luddite version: Reddit is a website that gets *tons* of hits. Reddit is made up of thousands of “subreddits” that focus on different things. If any random person visits Reddit, they see popular posts from the most popular subreddits. Reddit Atheism (r/atheism) was one of those subreddits for the past few years. [Click headline for more…] Read more
After a patchy couple of years that have seen a canceled convention and the resignation of its president, the National Atheist Party has decided to forge ahead with a new identity it hopes will be a little more inclusive: [Click headline for more…] Read more
If you’re looking to get a personalized license plate design in Rhode Island, there are a number of charities you could benefit: veterans, firefighters, groups fighting breast cancer, etc. Until recently, though, no religious group ever received money. Thanks to Governor Lincoln Chafee, it’s going to stay that way. [Click headline for more…] Read more
Foundation Beyond Belief just released the results from the Second Quarter of 2013. Check out the donations — $100,125 in total given by atheists — to the following organizations: [Click headline for more…] Read more
LifeSite News, a Canadian-based online news outlet with a heavily Catholic focus on abortion, contraception, and the evil gays, has just released a pair of interviews with Pope Francis’ personal theologian (initially appointed by Benedict XVI), Reverend Wojciech Giertych. If you’re wondering why the Pope has his own personal theologian, you’re not alone. This is the guy, after all, who’s doing his very best to act as the entire world’s personal theologian. You’d think he’d have enough of a grasp on the doctrines of his own religion to get by without needing a consultant. Apparently not. Giertych (apparently pronounced like “GEAR-tack”) reads over the speeches other, lesser Vatican staffers write for Pope Francis to deliver, checking them for theological inconsistencies so the Pope doesn’t accidentally say something contrary to Catholic teaching. He’s also the person the Pope consults for theologically sound advice or when he feels like bouncing some ideas off one of his colleagues. Based on the interview videos LifeSite released, it seems pretty safe to assume that the next really offensive thing the Pope says will probably have gotten the green light from Giertych. The first video, addressing the worldwide same-sex marriage controversy, is entitled “Treating homosexuals with dignity means telling them the truth.” Pretty obvious trigger warning for homophobia here: [Click headline for more…] Read more
Daniel is back with another montage of some of the awful things done in the name of God over the past month: (via ConversationWithA) Read more
