The Oklahoma Freethought Convention took place at the very end of July and some of the videos are now available. The quality is *fantastic*, better than most speaking videos I’ve seen. Here are the videos up so far: Dr. William Morgan talking about his journey from Faith to Agnosticism: Abbie Smith talking about evolution and vaccines: TheThinkingAtheist talking about challenging faith claims: Aron-Ra talking about what people believe: Matt Dillahunty talking about changing minds: I haven’t had a chance to… Read more
This is a guest post by Ian Cromwell. Ian is an African-American atheist who blogs at The Crommunist Manifesto. He is also a member of CFI Vancouver. Some background: After Derek Miller wrote a piece about “Inviting Black Americans to the Secular Table,” Cromwell posted a response on his site indicating his frustration with what Miller had written. I’ve asked Cromwell to expound on that piece here and lay out his own vision of how the secular community can get… Read more
Ross Blocher and Carrie Poppy have an excellent podcast in which they try out all the skeptical things you always hear about. In recent months, they’ve gotten ear-candled, visited a Sikh Gurdwara, and — this is impressive — gone through five months’ worth of classes in order to become official Mormons. In Part 1, your favorite co-hosts spent more than five months learning about Mormon doctrine, taking classes with their missionaries, and attending three-hour church services before biting the bullet… Read more
Jack Jenkins of the Religion News Service wrote an interesting article about whether the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster is purely parody or whether there’s any more to it than just that. I’m mentioned in the piece because I fall in the latter category. Greg Epstein doesn’t go quite that far. For many atheists like Mehta, the satire is a positive part of the atheist experience and provides a safe haven for nonbelievers. “If I go to a Christian… Read more
This is a really neat fundraiser started by someone who just wanted to pitch in. Cody Barnes is a professional portrait artist from Birmingham, Alabama. He’s offering to donate a percentage of his fees to American Atheists for any atheist customers who want to get work done: Cody’s portraits are $200 for a charcoal, $350 for a sepia painting, and $500 and up for a full color oil painting. Cody will donate $40 to American Atheists for every charcoal, $70… Read more
In case you missed it last week, a judge ruled that the Central Arkansas Transit Authority (CATA) and its advertising agent, On the Move Advertising, had to put up atheist bus ads that it had previously rejected: One of the weird parts of the ruling, as I had mentioned before, was that the United Coalition of Reason would be forced to put up $15,000 toward “damage” costs if they wanted their ads to go up. Basically, I took that to… Read more
This is a guest post by Michael Tracey. He is a writer based in New Jersey and a former Secular Student Alliance group leader. *** Some are wondering aloud about whether Gov. Rick Perry of Texas is a sincere religious believer. The man who will probably secure the Republican presidential nomination has certainly made it clear that he’d pursue a biblically-inspired agenda while in office, but I’ve seen a number of people nevertheless assume that Perry’s just another showman –… Read more
Here’s a new podcast featuring the women of the Atheist Experience TV show: Beth Presswood, Tracie Harris and Jen Peeples. It’s called Godless Bitches. The first episode, covering topics like sex education and reproductive rights, was just released. You can subscribe to it on iTunes using this link. (via Atheist Experience) Read more
Wednesday night’s Primetime Nightline on ABC will focus on “psychic abilities.” Besides interviewing “psychics” like James Van Praagh, though, ABC producers also spoke with the folks at JREF — James Randi, DJ Grothe, Banachek, and Jamy Ian Swiss. Smart move. They also taped the “first-ever open Million Dollar Challenge event where hundreds of New York City psychics were invited to take [JREF’s] tests.” (And you would think news would’ve broken if anyone won the prize…) The preview clip is below:… Read more
