Marathon runner Ryan Hall has had a rough year. He developed plantar fasciitis on his left foot, which lead to a hamstring injury (causing him to drop out of the Olympic Marathon), which lead to a quad injury, which means he’s missing the New York City Marathon this November. He hasn’t been able to run for three weeks which, for a serious runner, sucks. But lets back up a bit to see if we can figure out what happened… Hall is even… Read more
This weekend, BBC World Service is airing an audio segment on “Atheists in Black America.” Today, many African-Americans see anything short of embracing religion as not just heretical but a denial of one’s very blackness. But there are a growing number of African-Americans who openly don’t believe in God or the church. We find out how they are trying to make their voices heard and seeking acceptance in their community. The segment’s about 23 minutes long. A lot of familiar… Read more
As we’ve mentioned before, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal wants to give $11,000,000 of taxpayer money to religious schools that may teach Creationism. In today’s Doonesbury, Garry Trudeau takes us inside one of those classrooms… Read more
Oh, Rick Santorum, I was at once giddy about and terrified by your run for the presidency. While the prospect of having a President Santorum was shudder-inducing, you just kept coming up with just the silliest, most stereotypically clueless nonsense. Highlights include: One of the things I will talk about, that no president has talked about before, is I think the dangers of contraception in this country… Many of the Christian faith have said, well, that’s okay, contraception is okay. It’s not… Read more
About a week ago, I talked about Minnesota Vikings punter Chris Kluwe and his amazing letter about gay rights. I didn’t get terribly far into how Kluwe came to write that letter, and in doing so, I only briefly touched on the other hero of that story, Brendon Ayanbadejo. Here’s a recap: Ayanbadejo had participated in a video for a series of spots called “Marylanders for Marriage Equality” (Maryland is one of four states where gay marriage is going to be put to… Read more
Trevor Treharne has written a new book called How to Prove God Does Not Exist. In addition to his rebuttals of the standard canon of Christian arguments for god’s existence, Trevor has a few interviews with notable atheists (including Victor Stenger and Michael Shermer). He also includes, for good measure, interviews with a few Christians, including Intelligent Design proponents Michael Behe and William Dembski. One of the Christian interviews is with Peter Hitchens, the religious brother of the late Christopher… Read more
Last Monday, Alber Saber posted the infamous “Innocence of Muslims” movie on the Egyptian Atheists Facebook page, which he administered… On Wednesday, a “Muslim friend and neighbor” made the connection that Saber was the administrator of an atheist page… and that he was criticizing Islam. By Thursday, this was the scene outside his house: When Saber arrived at the police station, he was charged under an infrequently used law that prohibits insulting religion, according to his lawyer, Ahmed Ezzat, who… Read more
It’s been a long while since I’ve asked something like this but I was reminded that there are so many podcasts about atheism out there and most of us probably know of only a handful of them (if any at all). So if you run a podcast or listen to one that we should all be checking out, please leave a link to it in the comments! Read more
Andrew Seidel is one of the attorneys at the Freedom From Religion Foundation and one of my go-to people for advice on legal issues. At the 2012 Secular Student Alliance conference, he gave a great talk on finding jobs in our movement — what you should be doing when you’re in college, what skills employers are looking for, etc. Turns out good writing and public speaking skills (mixed with tech-savviness) can get you far. That may only be outweighed by… Read more
Suppose you’re a parent in Malaysia and you’re thinking to yourself, “I really think my kid might be gay, but I have no handy checklist to assist me in my prognosis! What will I do?” Worry no more! The Malaysian Education Ministry has come to the rescue! They have released a helpful “How-To” guide to help you identify the homosexuals: I have a couple questions, as I feel like their guide is far from comprehensive. First of all, how the hell… Read more
