Atheist Convention to Feature “Dinner With The Stars,” Live Auction

Cranford, NJ—American Atheists will host some of the leading national and international atheists at a fundraiser dinner and auction on the eve of its 50th Anniversary Celebration and National Convention in Austin, Texas next week.

The event is scheduled for 7:00 PM on Thursday, March 28, the night before the convention weekend begins.

Attendees will be able to dine with many star speakers including former California Congressman Pete Stark, Twisted Sister lead guitarist Jay Jay French, British philosopher and author A.C. Grayling, blogger and activist Greta Christina, author Katherine Stewart, Biblical scholar Dr. Hector Avalos, President of the Atheist Community of Austin Matt Dillahunty, former preacher Teresa MacBain, international video blogger Cristina Rad, and American Atheists President Dave Silverman.

Among the items up for auction are a rare first-edition work by the 19th-century American orator and statesman, “The Great Agnostic” Robert Ingersoll; an illustrated copy of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy signed by its author, the late Douglas Adams; and a copy of the late Christopher Hitchens’ final work, Mortality, with the author’s original signature on a card.

Also for auction is a weeklong stay at the vacation villa Paradise Costa Rica for up to six guests. Information about the villa is available at http://www.paradisecostarica.com. A noteworthy past guest was atheist philosopher Daniel Dennett, who recently finished a manuscript there.

American Atheists’ 50th Anniversary Celebration and National Convention will feature such speakers such as former Congressman Pete Stark, Twisted Sister lead guitarist Jay Jay French, authors A.C. Grayling and Katherine Stewart, popular debater Matt Dillahunty, former pastors-turned-atheists Teresa MacBain and Jerry DeWitt, and American Atheists President David Silverman. The convention will also feature a costume dinner, free concerts, a comedy show, an art show and silent auction, more than 25 national and local exhibitors, and childcare options for attending families. The convention takes place the weekend of March 29.

AMERICAN ATHEISTS is a national 501(c)(3) organization that defends civil rights for atheists, freethinkers, and other nonbelievers; works for the total separation of religion and government; and addresses issues of First Amendment public policy.

Well guess what the LSE Student Union has spent its afternoon doing. It spent it discussing a Motion to “Twin the LSE with the Islamic University of Gaza.” Abhishek Phadnis was there.

I spoke against the Motion, saying I was non-committal on the support of Palestine but strongly opposed to any alliance with the Islamic University of Gaza, on account of it being inseparably intertwined with Hamas and having as its stated aim the reformation of Islamic societies “in line with the revolutionary side of religion”; the wish of its founder, Hamas’s Ahmed Yassin.

Yes the “revolutionary side of religion” that’s all about stripping women of all rights while muffling them in yards of cloth.

But Abhishek might as well have saved his breath to cool his porridge; the motion passed with only five No votes.

Secular education? Pffffff. That’s only for “Westerners; everyone else needs theocracy. Maryam calls this the racism of low expectations.

Oh, god, another one. A girl of 16 in Morocco was raped, and the judge ruled that she had to marry her rapist, which was nice for the rapist because it allowed him to stay out of jail, but was a bucket of rancid liquid shit for the girl. The rapist, to show his gratitude to Amina Filali, beat her severely – so she ate rat poison and died.

The girl’s father said he “did not want to accept this marriage,” which some have said was pushed in order to protect the family’s honor. But “my wife, my family and the court of the city of Larache” wanted the union to proceed, as it did.

“The judge decided he must marry her, and I had no opportunity to refuse the judge’s decision,” the father said. “I wanted to send (the eventual husband) to prison, and have my daughter stay with me until she became (an adult).”

That seems like a better arrangement than tying her for life to the man who raped her, but then again, “the family’s honor.” [Read more…]

Zinnia reports –

It was exactly three months ago that Richard Littlejohn published a piece in the Daily Mail viciously attacking Lucy Meadows, a primary school teacher in Britain. Littlejohn targeted Meadows because she’s transgender and had chosen to remain in her job as a teacher after beginning to present as a woman – this was the entire basis for his outrageous, unprovoked assault on her identity, her career, and her very life. It was vile and hateful in all the ways we’ve come to expect from a publication that, like much of the press these days, treats trans women as alternately ridiculous or a threat to society. It was quite literally intolerant of everything that Lucy Meadows was.

So it came as a surprise today that the Daily Mail has completely removed any mention of Meadows from Littlejohn’s column. What happened? Did they suffer a sudden attack of morality, three months later? No. Their decision was based on something much darker than conscience.

Lucy Meadows killed herself this week.

Read the rest of what she says.

I’m shivering a bit, myself. I’m so tired of human malevolence.

 Update: via Bernard Hurley:

A petition to the Daily Mail to fire Richard Littlejohn

A candlelight vigil for Lucy Meadows –

David Cameron threw an “Easter reception” (a whut?) at 10 Downing Street, at which he promised to support theocracy.

The Prime Minister promised Christians that the Government “cares about faith” despite clashes with religious groups over gay marriage and welfare cuts.

At an Easter reception in Downing Street, Mr Cameron pledged the Coalition is committed to Britain’s links with the Church of England.

“It does care about the institutions of faith and it does want to stand up and oppose aggressive secularisation that can sometimes happen in our society,” he said.

“Wherever we go, we stand up for the right of Christians to practise their faith.”

Eric has a reading post up, and it suggested some thoughts to me, which turned out to be thoughts I want to expand on a bit, so I took the bus back.

Typically, in my magpie way, I zoomed in on the meta part of what he said at the expense of the substantive part. Never mind. The substantive part is also interesting, but for the moment – it’s about reading and thinking and blogging.

Eric’s introductory meta:

As usual, I am trying to read two or three books at one time, and that means I have several different lines of thought running in my head all at the same time. Lately, this has been especially true, since I went through a flurry of book buying which will lead to bankruptcy if I don’t take myself in had. All this diverse reading doesn’t really help a lot with blogging, because I have a tendency to jump back and forth along the trains of thought that occupy my mind, and what comes out sometimes looks a bit more like a word salad then carefully thought through argument — and then, of course, it simply gets trashed.

I do that too, but I have a different take on it, which I started to say there.

I don’t altogether agree with you that reading several books at once doesn’t help with blogging – if only because I think blogging is an ideal medium for the scrappy, the incomplete, the in progress, the brief – for the process of thought itself. [Read more…]

Aw. I got a present. A surprise present. It came in the mail.

Cupcakes! Fancy gourmet cupcakes from a fancy gourmet cupcake place.

As a surprise!

In the mail!

Unexpectedly!

Who sent me a present as a suprise in the mail unexpectedly as a surprise?

“Everyone at Skepchick”

Are they the best or what?!

A thing you should do if you’re in London. (There are a lot of such things. Well it’s London. London hogs all the things, or not quite all but a lot of them. That’s good. I do turn pale with envy sometimes thought.) You can have drinks with Nahla Mahmoud. I know this via Maryam.

I just wanted to remind you of the Council of Ex-Muslims of Britain’s evening drinks with Nahla Mahmoud this Friday 22 March from 6:30-8:00pm.

Nahla Mahmoud is a Sudanese atheist, researcher and human rights activist. In January 2013, an interview on Channel 4 featuring her as an ex-Muslim and a secularist opposing Sharia law triggered a heated debate within the Sudanese diaspora. She received numerous threats and has been declared a ‘Murtada’ and ‘Kafira’ on the official website of
the ‘General Administration of the Sudanese Armed Forces’.

Come hear the wonderful Nahla speak. There will be ample opportunity to mingle and meet up with like-minded individuals and friends as well as other members and activists of the Council of Ex-Muslims. The
location of the event is as follows:

The George on the Strand, 213 Strand, London WC2R 1AP:
http://www.georgeinthestrand.com/

Entry is £3; £1 for unwaged, which can be paid at the door.

All are welcome.

You really should do that. I would love to do that. If I were in London I would go like a shot. If I had to walk all the way from Balham or Muswell Hill, I would.

That’s Friday evening taken care of, and then on Monday you have to go hear Leo Igwe. (See what I mean about London?)

Leo Igwe, Nigeria’s most prominent humanist, and a human rights activist, will be giving a very welcome talk on ‘Breaking the Taboo of Atheism in Black Communities’ during a short visit to London to attend the NSS Secularist of the Year event before returning to Africa to continue his research into witchcraft. Humanists and secularists ’of all hues’ are encouraged to show their interest and support for this area of work as black non-believers, in London and elsewhere, start to become more confident and active in openly challenging the over-bearing presence of religion within their families and communities and its negative social, financial and educational consequences.

This talk is part of increasing efforts to encourage black atheists, humanists and secularists to ‘come out from the woodwork’, to find a supportive environment when dealing with family and social reactions, to voice their opinions and be more proactive in the humanist, secularist and atheist movements. To paraphrase the African saying “It takes a village to raise a child. It takes all of us to change this religious BS”.

Mr. Igwe, in partnership with the JREF, is working to respond to harmful and growing superstitious beliefs throughout Africa, including belief in psuedoscientific “medicine,” and witchcraft, which result in heinous murders of adults and children alike. A recent poll showed that about 55% of people living in Africa still believe in witchcraft and that this is correlated, unsurprisingly, with a lack of science education. Inevitably, this has had ramifications in London with its substantial African diaspora communities.

Leo Igwe reports regularly on the state of superstition and paranormal belief in Africa at randi.org, with his column, Skeptical Africa and is the author of the new A Manifesto for a Skeptical Africa, a call to arms for African skeptics, science advocates, humanists and secularists. The manifesto aims to promote skepticism in Africa and to help save lives. The manifesto has been endorsed by a number of leading figures, including prominent names in science and skepticism throughout Africa and globally.

Date: Monday 25th March

Time: 6.30pm

Cost £5 / £3 unwaged/students

Venue: The Attic, Hackney Picture House,

270 Mare Street London E8 1HE

Fabulous. More religious interference with public health – religious leaders in Kenya squawked, so a public service tv ad promoting condom use has been withdrawn. Thank you baby Jesus and thank you Mo.

Christian and Muslim clerics said the advert encouraged infidelity, rather than safe sex to curb HIV/Aids.

In the government-sponsored advert, a woman in an extra-marital affair is advised to use condoms.

Dr Cherutich told the BBC the advert had been launched because up to 30% of married couples had other partners.

Never mind that. The important thing is to monitor other people’s sex lives and punish them for doing it wrong, not to prevent fatal transmissable diseases. [Read more…]

Phil PlaIt tells us that Voyager 1 has apparently left the solar system. Wo.

The spacecraft Voyager 1, launched on Sep. 5, 1977, has apparently left the solar system.

A new paper has just been released showing that Voyager 1 has definitely breached the edge of the Sun’s heliosphere, the huge region around the solar system dominated by the Sun’s solar wind. This is essentially confirmation of what had already been announced in December 2012, so this isn’t exactly new news, but given the paper has been peer-reviewed and accepted for publication, this makes it official.