A Hymn for our Time

Evolution Made Us All from Ben Hillman on Vimeo.

Paul Haggis Humbly but Heroically Stands up to Scientology

I've met the guy several times, I assisted in designing his loft here in NYC.  He's a passionate, thoughtful, thorough guy.  He wrote Crash, In the Valley of Elah, Million Dollar Baby, and others.  After having lived in LA for seven years, I'm still not sure quite what the "Hollywood Type" is --  I've heard so much false testimony and seen various and met many glorious -- but I don't think you could give him any of the derogatory aspects of that title.   He has, recently proven his thoughtfulness, compassion, and bravery by breaking with his church of many years over it's treatment of gays.  His story is chronicled finally and wonderfully in the New Yorker and here is the LINK.  Enjoy.

Terry Gross interviewed the article's author on NPR's Fresh Air and that interview is shorter and HERE.

Bill O'Reilly and an Athiest Talk at One Another

So, let's see. This is great. The outrageously bigoted, routinely offensive man who fancies himself the voice of conservative America can't tell you how tides work, and is offended when his religion is questioned. Are we a nation of big babies (With guns)? Now this Atheist isn't exactly a whizz-bang either, so it's kind of a car wreck, but at least he's trying to use his gray matter.


And then this happened:

Peg a point for the Pope!

 

Those of you who peruse these pages perennially know that I'm not the biggest pro-papacy-pundit, but I'm also not above passing out Pope props in a post when it's appropriate.

The Vatican has become the "greenest" nation-state in the world.  With the bringing on-line of it's massive photo-voltaic array, it has surpassed Germany (the leader in such awesomeness) with it's now 200 watts/capita at peak times (DL has 80/per, but WAY more capita)

From yahoo:

"As Vatican City is the smallest state in the world, it does not exactly require a large amount of renewable energy to achieve this title. However, the city’s solar installations, which include solar panels installed on the rooftop of Paul VI’s conference hall, mean that the city can now generate enough energy to power all of its 40,000 households."

So there you go, Pope.  For the next 15 minutes, I'll look the other way on homos, AIDS, greed, molestation, the Holocaust, the Crusades . . . am I rambling? . . . and thank you for leading the charge to charge with the sun.  Small "s" . . . and a "u".

Noah Knew, who knew? Well, Noah . . . and the Magi.

So just YESTERDAY, I was walking in SoHo and came face-to-face with a billboard on wheels that said exactly this: "Noah Knew" wecanknow.com.  The words were submerged in what looked like rising water.  I thought, "dang, that's interesting . . . appeal to the fundies' sense of dread about floods to educate them about rising sea levels, or fresh water depletion, or scarcity in general . . . great idea!"  But no.  no no no no NO.  It was just one of HUNDREDS of billboards (40 in Nashville alone) about the Apocalypse next May.  Yep, that one.  On the 21st?   You hadn't heard?  Pencil it in. 

So, as it turns out, this:

and my "Noah Knew" street level encounter are just part of a nationwide media push by our darling friends at Family Radio.  One look at their website, and a kindergartner would roll his eyes and go back to Facebook.  Try this nugget:

"Some scientists predict that Global Warming could wipe out life on Planet Earth within a certain number of years."

You. Are. Shitting me.  A "certain" number?  Oh my GOD, that does sound JUST LIKE NEXT MAY, doesn't it?  Like, around the 21st?  [shudder]

I can't even go on.  I, of course, "liked" their site on Facebook.  For giggles.  12,000 others have liked it too.  [faints]

Satan, Colleges, Tongues, and a Double-edged sword - or - Jesus is thrilled.

To Stand with Like-minded People

These are the people for whom we must design our sound bites?!
What a sad freaking state of affairs.  Not one of them has more than a passing knowledge of the issues . . . not one can defend a statement, not one knows anything about government, and every one turns to god for answers.

Great.  FN great.           From NewLeftMedia

Documentary trailer -- Execution of Gays in Uganda (VIDEO)

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Some notable quotables to keep in mind when considering your god or mine.

I feel like a bit of a rant today, but rather than use my own words, let's look to some Founding Fathers, some church leaders, some great thinkers of the last, oh, few thousand years:

"The most detestable wickedness, the most horrid cruelties, and the greatest miseries that have afflicted the human race have their origin in this thing called revelation, or revealed religion…Of all the systems of religion that ever were invented, there is none more derogatory to the Almighty, more unedifying to man, more repugnant to itself, than this thing called Christianity...My mind is my own church."
-Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason (1794):


“In no instance have . . . the churches been guardians of the liberties of the people.”
-James Madison


"History, I believe, furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government. This marks the lowest grade of ignorance of which their civil as well as religious leaders will always avail themselves for their own purposes"


“Millions of innocent men, women, and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burned, tortured, fined, and imprisoned, yet we have not advanced one inch toward uniformity. What has been the effect of coercion? To make one half of the world fools and the other half hypocrites.”
-Thomas Jefferson

"Lighthouses are more helpful then churches."
-Benjamin Franklin

I'm troubled on "Everybody Draw Mohammed Day"

I've just watched a video of a recent uprising at a university lecture hall.  During a lecture on the limits of free speech.  In Sweden.  It is shocking and frightening, and utterly stark raving mad.

I'm troubled because I feel like sharing the video here, but I don't want to unfairly prejudice anyone who isn't familiar with immigration and assimilation in Northern Europe, so if you don't consider yourself that up-to-date on the massive struggles with national identity and religious freedoms that are taking place in the EU right now, get your salt grain ready.

If you're wondering about the Everybody Draw Mohammed Day, here is the FB page for it.  If you've been living under a rock, HERE is the recent caterwauling over South Park's recent episode and it's being censored.  And here is the story about the video you're about to see, but the basics are:

Man sketches Mohammed (there are over seven MILLION "mohammed" results on google image)

Man gets threatened repeatedly, including by an insane American woman who plots his murder.

Man gets physically attacked during a lecture on freedom of expression, pepper spray is necessary to subdue the crowd chanting and screaming for allah. The scene is unbelievable.  I post it as a cautionary tale.  Religion is a dangerous drug.  For more on that, if you're interested, HERE.

the video after the jump...

Porn for Bibles on campus.

At the University of Texas San Antonio, an atheist group is having a "smut for smut" exchange, offering porn for traded-in bibles.  You have to wonder if a nice copy of Darwin wouldn't be more to the point, but I guess it wouldn't have the same appeal . . . UTSA is complying with their stunt saying:

"As long as students are not violating laws or violating the Constitution, they have the freedom of speech and assembly."

Good for them. More from the AP HERE.
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Are education and religion both only good in doses?

(click the pic for larger)
The similarities between education and faith are explored in this essay from the HuffingtonPost HERE from it:

"[L]iberal learning is, after all, supposed to make us aware of how little we know. That's what Socratic insight is all about: we need to learn because we understand so little. Education should lead to intellectual humility as we become more aware of our own ignorance. Conservatives also prize education, after all, but they do so because it should deliver the lesson of intellectual humility. Education should . . .

Fundamentalism is alive and well - or - Now who's the Army of One?

Don't Ask Don't Tell is going to be repealed.  The nation's two top defense officials are seeking it's end.  Heroes in our armed forces will no longer have to live lives of secrecy, and another shameful wall will come tumbling down.

“No matter how I look at the issue, I cannot escape being troubled by the fact that we have in place a policy which forces young men and women to lie about who they are in order to defend their fellow citizens,”

Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the Senate Armed Services Committee.  Amazing video after the leap . . .

Congratulations Wingnuts!!! Take out your OWN trash.

I wonder if these THOUSANDS of Christians are praying for trash collection?  I don't think Jesus does that, but Colorado Springs -- home of freakishly popular and dangerous fringe operations like Focus on the Family and the Teabagger Revolution, is beginning to see what it means to have no taxes to bolster public services.  From the Denver Post:

"More than a third of the streetlights in Colorado Springs will go dark Monday.

The police helicopters are for sale on the Internet. The city is dumping firefighting jobs, a vice team, burglary investigators, beat cops — dozens of police and fire positions will go unfilled.

Tricky Topic Needs Un-Lidding - or - Take the Log out of Your Eye

It's difficult to talk abuse and molestation.  That's probably why we SHOULD talk about it.  For one thing, at the heart of much of popular mainstream homophobia is the misguided notion that gay men are responsible for molesting boys and straight men are responsible for molesting girls.  It's just not true.  And if the reasons for denying marriage rights, adoption, and equality of citizenship are, at their base, false . . . well we need to talk about it.  Rob Tisinai has made a video that even a wing-nut could understand.  Take a second to check it out, and PASS IT ON.  It's important.

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Bilble verses printed in rifle scopes give enemy every reason to believe we're in a religious war.

The last thing we want is to broadcast to the world that our army is marching and bombing and killing in the name of Christ.  That's their bag -- we're supposed to be reacting to that kind of kookery with a force for justice and freedom to worship any or even NO god.

So what are we doing paying ONE COMPANY 660 MILLION DOLLARS to manufacture rifle scopes with Christian Bible verses in them?  And the company (not surprisingly) unrepentant.

Rachel Maddow  and ABC discuss this mess after the jump:

Kill the Gays legislation in Uganda linked to American Ex-gay freakazoid

If you're unfamiliar with the proposed legislation in Uganda that makes homosexuality a death penalty crime, or with the links its proponents have to American evangelicals like Rick Warren or Richard Cohen, Read up on it HERE from towleroad.

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Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Thanks Rachel for keeping this in the news.

NYS Senators Ruth Hassell-Thompson and Diane Savino speak on marriage equality

Really start listening at 3:13, she lays the issue out so clearly.

"We in government do not determine the quality or validity of peoples relationships -- if we did we would not issue three quarters of the marriage licenses we do"

"we're giving away husbands on network TV"

"or . . . the littlest groom, where thirty desperate women competed to marry a dwarf."

"they stand up there before god and man, even in Senator Diaz's church, and swear to love honor and obey, and they don't mean a word of it."

She really hits the nail on the head. Please forward this to anyone and everyone, and let the argument speak for itself. And let the hysteria abate.

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Over my dead body. Literally.

The Catholic Church has issued an "Ethical and Religious Doctrine" banning the removal of feeding tubes under any condition in every Catholic Hospital, Nursing Home and Hospice. From firedoglake:

"The Bishops’ directive even notes that patient suffering is redemptive and brings the individual closer to Christ."

The kicker is that nothing -- not a signed will, not family, not government can intervene. In many communities, Catholic health services are the ONLY health services. So their religion is determining my rights. Time to stop government funding, if you ask me. Read the whole insane inhumane medieval story HERE.

Put your hands together for WHAT?

Holy crap, check it HERE.

"Leaders of the Church of Christ, Scientist, are pushing a proposal that would help patients pay someone like Lewis for prayer by having insurers reimburse the $20 to $40 cost.

The provision was stripped from the bill the House passed this month, and church leaders are trying to get it inserted into the Senate version. And the church has powerful allies there, including Sens. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.), who represents the state where the church is based, and Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah), who said the provision would "ensure that health-care reform law does not discriminate against any religion.""

Now I'm all for regrouping and looking inward every so often, and if it helps to still your hands from action by folding them together -- then be my guest, but if I can't get coverage for a massage, then you can't get reimbursed for your magic.