Just because. I like the picture. I like the moment. Pieter Breitner in the kilt.

Photo by Brian D. Engler.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Mark Urban at the BBC explains the ways the Woolwich murder is different from other such murders – it’s not networked, it’s just a couple of guys with everyday tools, so it’s not the kind of thing that intelligence services can prevent; the guys look ordinary; there’s no way to prevent their “message” from spreading; responses have changed…

Governments have become better at calibrating their response to these acts and so has the public. After Boston and Woolwich, for example, they were careful not to leap to conclusions or to issue responses of the “War on Terror” kind that would have inflamed communal tensions.

There are still some who are defaulting to stereotypical responses to such situations, and certainly in Boston after the marathon bombings, I witnessed a small quantum of media-fanned hysteria, but in general people have become better at accepting that such incidents are a melancholy part of modern life and should not alter their view of other cultures or religions.

Excuse me. That last item is one thought too many. It’s pretty typical BBC bullshittery in its careful vagueness, but given our knowledge of typical BBC bullshittery, we can be pretty sure we know what it means: don’t think of the Woolwich attack as anything to do with Islam. If that is the thought, it’s one thought too many. It is anythiing to do with Islam. If it were Catholic fanatics doing this kind of thing, that would be anything to do with Catholicism. When anti-abortion fanatics murder doctors who provide abortions, that is anything to do with anti-abortion fanaticism, and sometimes with a particular religion that underpins or prompts the anti-abortion fanaticism. This incident on a London street is anything to do with Islam. The murderers said so themselves. Yes, other people follow a better Islam (one that ignores much of its own “scripture”); yes it’s theoretically possible to have a better Islam; but no, it is not the case that this murder has no implications for how people should view Islam.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

I’m belatedly listening to Citizen Radio on Women in Secularism 2. It starts 16 minutes in. It’s as good as everyone said it is.

Update. Great line. Jamie Kilstein:

If Ron LIndsay was opening an NAACP conference, he’d be the guy who’s like, “Welcome! WHERE’S WHITE HISTORY MONTH?”

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

I mentioned PZ’s post about Silverman v Vacula on Twitter. (PZ is on his way to Romania. Jeez. I felt all exotic going to DC.) Dave Muscato also mentioned it. First he quoted this part.

How much do I appreciate it? With my dollars. My wife is going to sign us up for a lifetime membership in American Atheists while I’m away. It’s not a casual investment, so not everyone can do that, but you could send them a donation to let the organization know that you like a leader with a spine.

That’s a big deal, a lifetime membership. They get special treatment at the AA convention. (Like what? Well, I forget. A shout-out, I think. Applause. Admiration.)

Dave M went on:

The staff at American Atheists headquarters wants to take a moment, on behalf of our volunteers, Regional Directors, members, and atheists nationwide, to thank PZ publicly for his support of our president and our organization, and for standing up for positive values in the broader atheism movement.

One of the things that attracted me to working for American Atheists is our overwhelming dedication to equality, including feminism, within the broader context of the atheism activism work that we do but also in general. American Atheists was the first major atheist organization to adopt a harrassment policy for conferences, and it’s something we take very seriously. We care about all of our members and want everyone, atheist or not, activist or not, to feel comfortable at all times.

We are very proud to welcome PZ and his wife as Life Members. Although American Atheists’ mission is fighting discrimination against atheists, advocating for atheist civil rights, and addressing issues of First Amendment public policy, we care very much about feminism & social justice in the atheist activism movement and how these issues relate to and involve individuals involved in our collective efforts.

Yeah. Well, you know what? That makes me feel good.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Juan Mendez! Yes!

On Tuesday, May 21, Juan Mendez, a 28-year-old Democratic State Representative from Tempe, Arizona, was given the task of delivering the opening prayer for the afternoon session of the House of Representatives. Instead of offering a prayer, Mendez spoke of his secular humanist tradition, while asking those in the room to recognize their shared humanity. 

Mendez said:

Most prayers in this room begin with a request to bow your heads. I would like to ask that you not bow your heads. I would like to ask that you take a moment to look around the room at all of the men and women here, in this moment, sharing together this extraordinary experience of being alive and of dedicating ourselves to working toward improving the lives of the people in our state.

This is a room in which there are many challenging debates, many moments of tension, of ideological division, of frustration. But this is also a room where, as my secular humanist tradition stresses, by the very fact of being human, we have much more in common than we have differences. We share the same spectrum of potential for care, for compassion, for fear, for joy, for love.

Well…I’m not convinced we all share the same spectrum of potential for compassion, but saying it may help to create the potential, so I won’t argue the point.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

PZ has a post pointing out that Dave Silverman has been telling off Vacula and co on Twitter. David Silverman, a principled atheist, is the title. Commenters who don’t do Twitter found the discussion hard to follow and I just happen to have grabbed some screen shots, so I thought I might as well make them available.

Yeah.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Good old mass media and conformity and assuming everybody thinks the same thing. Wolf Blitzer chats with a woman who just barely escaped the tornado and simply assumes that a lot of god-blather will be welcome.

 At the end of the interview, Blitzer told her, “You’re blessed. Brian, your husband is blessed. Anders is blessed… I guess you got to thank the lord, right?” When the woman shrugged off the question, he repeated it, asking, “Do you thank the lord for that split-second decision?”

“I–I’m actually an atheist,” she responded. After the awkward laughter that followed, she added, “We are here and you know, I don’t blame anybody for thanking the lord.”

“Of course not,” Blitzer replied.

Awkward!

Not. Why should it be awkward? Unless awkward for Blitzer – that would be good.

And I do blame people for thanking the lord, because why couldn’t the lord just divert the tornado to a fallow field, instead?

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

I had no idea anyone was taking pictures. Candids!

Photo by Beth Zucker

I was talking to Michael DeDora about Imad and Waleed and the Bangladeshi atheists, or rather he was talking to me about them, since his office (CFI’s Office of Public Policy) works on these issues.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

It’s like this, you see…

Also by Monica Harmsen.

That’s the panel I was on.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Dave’s turn to demonstrate throttling techniques, this time from below.

Also by Monica Harmsen.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

But we don’t want to let all this mishegas overshadow the brilliance of the actual conference, do we. No we don’t. So time to post some happy place stuff. Like pictures for instance.

Monica Harmsen took this. She’s a friend and a CFI intern.

I really don’t remember what I was saying to Dave Silverman that could be illustrated with a throttling gesture.

I know what we were talking about though: Rebecca Goldstein’s magnificent talk, and mattering, and the implications of mattering for atheism -

Maybe that’s where the throttling gesture came in. I was talking about the fact that for people who don’t feel as if they matter there is one obvious remedy, which is theism. Even if nobody else thinks you matter, God thinks you matter. God’s eye is on the sparrow. Maybe that’s actually an eye on the sparrow gesture.

Anyway, that’s the reception on Friday evening, after dinner with a bunch of friends and before a long talk with Michael DeDora in the lobby about all the threatened atheists all over the world and how his Office of Public Policy works on their behalf. Maryam arrived at the hotel while we were talking. I jumped up to give her a hug and then she went off to take care of her cold-and-cough.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Update May 21 see update below.

Oh good god. Really?

Three posts on CFI about the Women in Secularism Conference – May 17-19

That’s on the Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science website.

But we’re the bullies. Never forget that. We use our immense ruthless power as bloggers to argue with other bloggers, while poor tiny powerless meek obscure humble shoemaker Richard Dawkins simply tries to stamp Rebecca Watson into the ground a little bit more by re-posting Ron Lindsay comparing her to North Korea.

We’re the bullies. How does that work again?

And no those are not “three posts about the Women in Secularism Conference” – that’s false advertising. They’re three posts about Ron Lindsay’s dislike of feminism and then his fury at uppity women who dislike his thrusting of his dislike of feminism on a conference that wasn’t meant to be about his dislike of feminism. Those posts aren’t about the conference at all. You won’t find out by reading them that Maryam Namazie was a speaker and on a panel about leaving religion. You won’t read anything about Rebecca Goldstein’s talk or Katha Pollitt’s or Susan Jacoby’s. You won’t see anything about Debbie Goddard or Jamila Bey or Amanda Marcotte. The posts are not about the conference! They’re about spite and anger.

There’s nothing about the conference on the website. Do a search and the above item is the only one you’ll find.

Brilliant. I guess Ron was so pleased with the results of his three blog posts at the conference itself that he felt it would be even better to trash the conference afterwards with the help of Dawkins. What’s he going to do for an encore? Post photoshops of all the speakers? Is it heads on goats time?

Update May 21 No, that last para is not right, because Ron didn’t ask RDF to publish those posts.

Also, I of course know perfectly well that he wouldn’t actually post photoshops of all the speakers. On the other hand – if you had asked me, I would have said he would never attribute “the most intellectually dishonest piece of writing since the last communique issued by North Korea” to one of the speakers, either. I would never have guessed beforehand that he would write a thing like that about a speaker at a CFI conference. So, yes, in a sense I know he wouldn’t post photoshops of us, but in another sense, I don’t really know that I do know that. Yet I feel as if I do know it, hence phrasing it as “I know perfectly well that” he wouldn’t.

At any rate, I freely admit that was hyperbole. But then so was North Korea, and I’m not the CEO of anything.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Amanda Marcotte on a post of Stephanie’s:

(By the way, Amanda was at Women in Secularism 2, as you probably know, and she rocks.)

I’m sick of being targeted by people who confuse their own unwillingness to say stupid things with feminists using magical powers to stop them from saying it.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Now to look at some of the claims as claims. For instance in A Few Examples of “Shut Up and Listen”:

By the way, I am well aware that our communications director in his personal capacity quoted Myers approvingly. Obviously, I disagree with him on this point. The fact of that disagreement does not affect our working relationship. Paul is a great communications director. Are there limits to what CFI employees can say? Sure, but the restrictions are fairly loose. At CFI, we do not follow the rule “shut up and listen.” Generally, employees can express their opinions. There is one requirement, however. They need to supply reasons and evidence. Invoking their racial/sexual/ethnic/class identity, whatever it might be, is not considered a substitute for argument.

See, that was the problem in the talk, too. Very few people consider invoking racial/sexual/ethnic/class identity a substitute for argument, and it is insulting to imply that the people you’re addressing do. Insulting, patronizing, belittling…like a daddy talking to a chaotic hormonal teenager. Nobody invited to speak – to donate their time, as Susan Jacoby reminded us – is stupid enough to think that “I’m a woman” is a substitute for argument. That is not the point.

This is the point. Suppose employees are gathered together to express their opinions and one employee keeps getting interrupted and ignored. Suppose that employee says something and is ignored and then a few minutes later someone else says the same thing and everyone cheers and says how brilliant. Suppose things like that. Maybe it’s just One Of Those Things – or maybe the employee has a despised identity. Either way – it is possible to have a meta-discussion about the talking and interacting themselves, and about how the respective identities of the employees might be making a difference. That is not the same thing as invoking identity as a substitute for argument. That’s what “meta” means here – as Ron, a philosopher, knows perfectly well.

And – as I tried to tell Ron yesterday – “shut up and listen” is not a “rule” in any normal sense. Ok, he cites a post where PZ generalizes it into a rule – but even there it is surely clear that what is meant is “shut up for long enough to listen and take in what is being said” – not shut up and never speak again. Basically it’s just a sharper way of saying “stop interrupting” – and please don’t make me drag out all the studies of patterns of interruption between women and men.

Is saying “stop interrupting” generally seen as a Giant Law Ordering Everyone to Wait Forever While I Talk? Of course it isn’t. Is saying “dammit you keep cutting me off, it’s more of a guy thing, will you please just shut up for two minutes so that I can finish a sentence?!” generally seen as the opposite of an argument? No. It’s trying to create the necessary conditions to make an argument. Being interrupted doesn’t help, and being patronized and insulted doesn’t help.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

A right-wing radio host gives us a look at his inner world.

Fringe right-wing radio host Pete Santilli made disturbing comments about Hillary Clinton last week, calling for sexual violence against the former secretary of state because of her alleged involvement in a bizarre conspiracy theory.

“Miss Hillary Clinton needs to be convicted, she needs to be tried, convicted and shot in the vagina,” he said. “I wanna pull the trigger. That ‘C U Next Tuesday’ has killed human beings that are in our ranks of our service.”

Santilli alleged Clinton was involved in drug trafficking in Arkansas and the killing of U.S. troops overseas.

“I want to shoot her right in the vagina and I don’t want her to die right away,” he added. “I want her to feel the pain and I want to look her in the eyes and I want to say, on behalf of all Americans that you’ve killed, on behalf of the Navy SEALS, the families of Navy SEAL Team Six who were involved in the fake hunt down of this Obama, Obama bin Laden thing.

“That whole fake scenario, because these Navy SEALS know the truth, they killed them all. On behalf of all of those people, I’m supporting our troops by saying we need to try, convict, and shoot Hillary Clinton in the vagina.”

That’s what that guy thinks about.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

I’m ignoring it but this one is just too weird (and I saw it because someone replied and replies always obviate blocking).

justin vacula tweeted

@AmandaMarcotte @OpheliaBenson Get out, Amanda, you not welcome here. Take your dogma elsewhere (you too, Ophelia) #WIScfi

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Point one. From the Open Letter to the Secular Community, April 2:

Our Approach

Here are some things that we plan to do to make our online secular community a place where we can exchange ideas and views instead of insults.  We hope that others may also find this approach useful.

• Moderate blogs and forums. Any organization or individual engaged in blogging or administering a forum has an obligation to moderate comments. Slurs, threats, and so forth beget more of the same. Keeping our online spaces free of these elements creates a civil climate that makes it much easier for people to engage issues productively.

Point two. From comment # 214, by one “MosesZD”, on Ron Lindsay’s “Rebecca Watson can be compared to North Korea” post, May 18:

Mr. Lindsay,

Do yourself a favor and read Paul’s (PZ Myers) blog and how he’s trashing Vacula who is at your conference.  Vacula is one of many people that he’s spent quite some effort and time demonizing and flaming over the years.  Doing his absolute best to destroy Vacula over something

See how he describes Vacula and his inability to get interviews for Brave Heart Radio.

Why is this?  Because PZ Myers, Watson, Benson, et. al., have spent close to two years lying about him and demonizing him because he doesn’t lockstep to their non-skeptical, non-atheist belief systems.

I don’t choose that comment because it’s the worst in terms of slurs and threats but because it makes a specific false accusation against me. I haven’t lied about Vacula. I have documented his harassment of me.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

I’m back, by the way. I’m catching up. There’s a lot of reading and scrolling to do. (That was only four days? Really? Two of which were mostly travel? Really? It feels like…I was going to say a week but actually it’s more like some unknown unit of time that’s open-ended, it’s just Way More Than The Literal Hour By Hour Time. Could be a year. Big. A big unit. A big non-specific unit.) (Wait, that sounds…oh never mind.)

I even managed to fit some high-speed touristing in there. Would you believe it? What I mean by “touristing” here is just walking as far as I can to look at the outside of as much as I can. Museums and the like have to be done with enough time or there’s no point…although now I’ve said that I remember that I did go to the Natural History Museum on last year’s high speed touristing adventure…but more just to go inside and get a quick look than to do a proper museum visit. I went to Georgetown and the canal and along the river a bit, then up between the Watergate (god damn that’s an ugly “complex”) and the Kennedy Center (which like so many buildings in DC looks as if it had been built for a species three times the size of our own) and past GWU on Friday morning. Saturday lunch break I went to the Capitol – past the National Archive which is emphatically one of those buildings designed for a much larger species of human, and the whaddyacallit, the Commerce department building, with the giant Stalinist guy fighting with a giant Stalinist horse outside it. Dang, DC is weird-looking in places. To the Capitol, I say, or rather to the edge of where the grounds begin and then up One Street, past the DC appeals court, which I found oddly exciting, and past the Museum of Buildings which is itself a glorious and weird building. I consider that a pretty heroic feat of touristing with only an hour to do it in.

Then later on Saturday with even less than an hour I went just up to Thomas Circle and along two sides of Franklin Square.

In a way I wanted to stay in the hotel and do more high-speed talking instead, but…balance, people, balance. I believe in being a balanced nerd. No, I don’t really. More like, I believe in being two kinds of nerd as opposed to just one.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

On the plane, DC to DFW leg. To my surprise, I have free Wifi. I don’t know how that happened. (Then again the Wifi at National refused to connect, so it all comes out even.)

Sarah Moglia and I had a conversation with Ron later in the morning, shortly before I left. I’m not sure how much progress any of us made but at least we had a conversation.

Apart from that whole thing – the conference was amazing. I have so many terrific new friends – Sarah, Monette, Jason, Kim, Miri, Steve – and had so many good conversations with existing ones – Maryam, Melody, Michael DeDora, Debbie, Seanna, Steve W, Ania – oh shut up, I’ll make you all barf at this rate. But our Community is a good Community, don’t let anybody tell you different.

The panel I was on was fun, I thought. Maryam as always rocked the place. We took a solidarity picture with everyone holding a sign in support of the Bangladesh atheists.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)