The video of my talk from the recent Secular Student Alliance conference is now up on YouTube! I had planned to talk about my confrontations with a Religious Right group last year, but as I say in the beginning of the video, I decided to discard that and focus on how it can be useful to reach out to those who disagree with us: I’m not saying I always reach out to Christians as I should, but in a lot… Read more
Sam Harris is making a lot of stops on the coasts this fall during his upcoming book tour for The Moral Landscape. (I see nothing in Chicago. *sniff* I see how it is, Sam. I’ll take the hint.) One of his stops, though, will be an event for my Center for Inquiry DC friends on Tuesday, October 12th at 7:00 p.m. It’s his only stop in that area, and “Friends of the Center” get discounted tickets. All the information is… Read more
I posted about the Secular Student Alliance fundraiser a few days ago and said that my goal was to beat Jen McCreight — she raised $2859 with her blogathon. Well, we’re almost there! One additional person gave $100 outside of ChipIn, so we’re at $2602.02 as I write this. SO CLOSE! There are awesome prizes depending on how much you give and I’ll be picking the winners this Wednesday night! So if you were thinking about donating, now’s the time… Read more
You all remember notorious campus preacher Brother Jed, the victim of The Boot Protest, and his colleague Sister Cindy: (Sister Cindy has nothing to do with this posting… I just love that image.) Anyway, Jed showed up at the University of Kansas on the first day of classes. Sounds like a crappy way to begin the school year, but there’s a happy ending to this story. KU student Conrad Hudson explains on Facebook what happened (he refers to the president… Read more
You may have heard of Randy Forbes. He’s the Republican representative from Virginia’s 4th Congressional District. And he’s a notorious opponent of church/state separation. He founded the Congressional Prayer Caucus. He introduced legislation to reaffirming “In God We Trust” as our National Motto. He also wanted “In God We Trust” put on the Capitol Visitor Center: I have introduced H.Con.Res.274, to reaffirm our national motto. If we can succeed in getting ‘In God We Trust’ engraved in the United States… Read more
I know it’s short notice, but I’ll be in Minneapolis tonight and a bunch of awesome atheists are getting together for dinner. If any readers want to come, you’re welcome to join us 🙂 I’m considering it my last vacation of the summer. I’ve already been back at school for two days, going to meetings and prepping for the new year. Students will be in my classroom come Tuesday. (Side note: I’m teaching a section of AP Statistics this year…. Read more
The Pitch has some fantastic scans from “My Coloring Book of Old Testament Bible Stories”: … during the story of Joseph five year-olds might get distracted with questions like, “Where’s that other camel’s head?” … A perilous desert crossing is no time to attempt a Camel Centipede! Calmed an angry sea or jazz-handed at his high school’s track? Got any suggestions for that one? You can see a few more scans here. (via Boing Boing) Read more
Dave Silverman, the spokesperson for American Atheists, is all over the media the past couple days. A couple appearances stand out in particular: He appeared on FOXNews yesterday to discuss the recent Utah Memorial Crosses. It took a while before he could get some words in opposite Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff but Dave nailed him toward the end (7:45 mark): Dave also appeared in a Nightline webcast on the subject “Is Atheism A Positive Force in America?” (There’s Nightline… Read more
If you want any proof that non-Christians are discriminated against in the military, Chris Rodda has an incredible story to share. First, some background: For the past several years, two U.S. Army posts in Virginia, Fort Eustis and Fort Lee, have been putting on a series of what are called Commanding General’s Spiritual Fitness Concerts… These are (not surprisingly) concerts featuring Christian bands. But at least they’re not mandatory, right? Well… there’s the problem. According to one of the 80… Read more
