My upcoming adventures

I’m going to be a busy little atheist the next couple of months. If you’re coming to these events, make sure to say hello! I don’t bite, I swear. And if you’re not coming to these events…why not?
Wed, July 14 to Sun, July 17
The Amaz!ng Meeting 9
Southpoint Casino – Las Vegas, NV

I am so excited for TAM9! In addition to seeing all of my old skeptical friends, I also get to meet Neil deGrasse Tyson and Bill Nye. Bill. Nye. His show is one of the main reasons I fell in love with science as a kid. I’m pretty sure all I’m going to be able to do is flail at him.

And I’m not just going for fun (though I totally would). I’m going to be on the panel Getting Things Done (For Science and Skepticism) at 9:30am on Saturday. Because I apparently get shit done, or something. …Can I say “shit” on the panel? Or worse, the Hoosier in me may unleash and say “Git r done.” This may be difficult and embarrassing.


I’m sure there will be other fun shenanigans at TAM (Pssst, Phil, you know you want to do Skeptics in the Tub again). But one that I’m really excited about?

HARRY POTTER MIDNIGHT SHOWING ABHABFAABLFBAL!!!!

Anyway, I got my ticket. Join me, Greta Christina, Sara Mayhew, and other skeptics in ushering out the era of Potter. I have my Ravenclaw shirt ready. I will probably cry. And then be unable to wake up for the beginning of TAM on Friday. Whoops.

Fri, July 29 to Sun, July 31
Secular Student Alliance annual conference
Columbus, OH

Okay. This may not be in Vegas or have 1,500 attendees…but I’m not going to lie, I’m just as excited for this conference as I am for TAM9. …Maybe even a little more. Because I’ve always had the best time hanging out with fellow student leaders in the movement. I’ve made so many close friends coming to this conference. (And to be honest, it’s the one con where I’ve experienced no sexual harassment, stupid sexist comments, or plain ol’ awkward crap) Plus it’s great for networking and getting ideas for running your student groups – I always leave feeling super motivated.

And the speakers are always awesome. Dan Barker, Greta Christina, PZ Myers, Hemant Mehta, David Silverman, Jamila Bey, Debbie Goddard, JT Eberhard, (me), and high school activist Jessica Ahlquist? Why aren’t you coming yet?!?! You don’t need to be a student to enjoy this!

Did I mention Friday is a big video game party? You know you want to have me crush you in Mario Kart.

Fri, Aug 12 to Sun, Aug 14
Midwest Humanist and Freethought Conference
Omaha, NE

Have you not successfully escaped the Midwest like I have? Then you likely need something to restore your sanity. That’s why you need to come to this conference, where you’ll see me, Hemant, Greta, JT, Fred Edwords, Mr. Deity, and Sam Singleton talk about…stuff. I’m not sure what I’m going to talk about yet, but I’m sure it’ll be awesome, right? Maybe I’ll title it “How you too can move to the Pacific Northwest!”

And that’s it for now. Hopefully. So I can actually get some research done.

Indiana does something right for a change!

They’re no longer requiring students to be taught cursive writing in public schools. Instead, students will learn to be proficient at typing.
The smug 5th grader in me wants to write my former teacher and say, “Ha! So much for ‘You need to know this if you want to get into college. You’ll have to use cursive every day there!'” Preferably I’d write it in cursive, to illustrate how my cursive handwriting still looks like that of a 5th grader thanks to never using it.

Anyway, congratulations Indiana on this progressive achievement. Now, if only you’d join us in the 21st century in regards to other issues. You know, little things like women’s health, gay marriage, fair teacher pay…

(Via Joe My God)

Attention Seattle science fans!

The Department of Genome Sciences at UW (aka, mine!) is starting its summer public lecture series, Wednesdays at the Genome. Tonight is the first talk on “Recent adventures in human evolution” by Dr. Josh Akey. I did one of my lab rotations with Josh, and I can assure you it’ll be an interesting, fun presentation. Here’s some more info:

The UW Department of Genome Sciences played an important role in determining the sequence of the 3 billion letters of DNA specifying all of our hereditary information and is now one of the leading centers where the human genome is being interpreted and where new technologies for this analysis are being developed.

To share these advances with the public the Department of Genome Sciences hosts a ‘Wednesday Evenings at the Genome’ public lecture series each summer. These exciting discussions assume no background knowledge in genetics or other biological subjects and provide opportunities to chat with our presenters.

Presentations begin at 7:00 pm in the W.H. Foege Building Auditorium (S060) and will be followed by refreshments at 8:00 pm just outside the auditorium.

ADMISSION is free and the public is especially encouraged to attend!

SPEAKERS TO COME:

• July 13 – Mike Bamshad – Confessions of the genome: solving rare disease mysteries

• July 20 – Elhanan Borenstein – Meet your tenants: A genomic tour of your inner microbial zoo

• July 27 – Harmit Malik – Paleovirology: ghosts and gifts from ancient infections

Hope you enjoy it!

SSAcon’s new sticker code

Joe Foley, Chair of the Secular Student Alliance Board of Directors*, was inspired by my post on Mensa’s sticker system for hugging. Here’s the proposal he just sent me for the SSA conference in July:

I know we already use stickers to keep track of conferencegoers who decline to appear in photos (since students might not be “out” to their families), but I wonder if we could expand that system to a more comprehensive set of boundaries and expectations. Here is a proposal:

Black circle: Please don’t take my picture
Red circle: Please don’t hug me
Red octagon: Please don’t take the elevator with me
Orange circle: Please don’t talk to me about “interfaith” activities
Blue circle: My group is a member of our local interfaith alliance
Light blue circle: My group is recognized by my school as a religion
Yellow circle: I disapprove of Humanist chaplaincies
Purple circle: I am a Humanist chaplain
Green circle: Please don’t call me an atheist
Light green circle: Please don’t call me a Humanist
Jade circle: Please don’t call me an Atheist
Chartreuse circle: Please don’t call me any specific term except the full paragraph I use to describe myself… especially not atheist
Red and white concentric circles: I’m actually religious

JWF

I’m sure JT is out buying stickers as we speak.
Seriously though, I hope you’re coming to the conference. We have great speakers like usual – Dan Barker, Greta Christina, PZ Myers, David Silverman, Jamila Bey, Debbie Goddard, Hemant Mehta, and yours truly. Everyone is welcome, though students especially should come. I always have a blast – you get tons of practical skills for running a group, and it’s great networking with other student leaders. And usually we don’t even need a sticker system to interact with each other!

*And epic troll

Happy 4th

I’m going to take the afternoon off from breaking atheism to drink some beer and watch stuff explode in the sky. Because that’s what being an American is about, or something.

Consider this an open thread to discuss everything except Elevator Guy Gate. 650 comments about it here alone is enough. Instead, rage about something that can bring us together – like how illogical this kitten is for praying to Ceiling Cat:

My day with Mensa

On Friday I drove down to Portland for the Mensa Annual Gathering, a conference of nearly 2,000 Mensans. I was invited by the Mensa Atheists group (thanks Darlene!) to give a talk on my visit to the Creation Museum.

I’m not going to lie – I had no idea what to expect speaking for Mensa. I had been warned – by Mensans – that they tend to be quite the eclectic, eccentric bunch. But as a nerd who’s visited her fair share of atheist/skeptical/biology/anime conventions, it wasn’t too odd for me. In fact, it reminded me a lot of my experience at TAM – being surrounded by really bright people, remarking on the occasional odd personality that makes the night more interesting, and skipping talks to go drink alcohol instead.

But there were certain instances of nerdery that really stood out. For example, walking through the hallway and finding a Star Wars photo op:People in Star Wars costumes

Or the ginormous selection of games in their 24 hour game room:Three tables with hundreds of board games on themThe most odd and intriguing bit of Mensa culture to me was their sticker system for the name badges.

Green = Hug me!
Yellow = Ask me first
Red = Don’t touch me
Blue = Single
Ring = Atheist (the hole represents our lack of souls)

Some people’s badges got fairly intricate (Red over green = hug me if you know me, but not if you don’t, etc). I originally didn’t put any stickers on because I had no idea what they meant, but after being hugged out of nowhere by a complete stranger, my badge quickly looked like this:My name tag with two red stickers on it
I giggled at this at first, but honestly, it’s not a bad idea. Especially in a group of highly intelligent people, where some may not be the best with social graces. Just think how this could reduce drama at atheist meetings. Seriously considering making a “Now you can flirt with me” pin for TAM.
Saturday was my talk. I was a little nervous going in, since this was my first time talking about the Creation Museum to a group that wasn’t explicitly atheistic. I could tell from flipping through their event program that Mensa was an eclectic bunch. While there were talks on science and forensics and godless people going to creation museums, there were also Bible studies and talks on spirituality and climate denial.

But it ended up going great – the audience was super receptive. And man, did they pack in. There were only 56 chairs, but probably 100 people squeezed into the corners, sat on the window ledges, sat behind me, or spilled out into the hallway. This photo doesn’t even catch about 20 people hanging around the sides:
A crowded room full of people
Some people had to be turned away, and a bunch even asked me if I would repeat the talk again later for those who couldn’t fit – but unfortunately I had to get back to Seattle soon after.

I’m not going to lie – it was a pretty nice compliment having people from Mensa asking when I’m going to write a book (When I have time, so probably never) or when I’m going to join Mensa (when someone comps my fees because I’m a graduate student). Though honestly, I don’t really feel the need to join Mensa, even though my past test scores could get me in. I understand why people do – but I get my fix of intellectual interactions through atheism, skepticism, and biology.

…And a lot of those don’t charge a membership fee. Yes, I’m cheap.

Thanks again to Mensa Atheists for inviting me! And hello to all the blog readers I got to meet, hang out with, and destroy at Carcassonne.

Richard Dawkins, your privilege is showing

Unless some clueless cad is impersonating you, in which case ignore this post. EDIT: PZ confirms these comments are from Dawkins.
But I’m fairly certain it is you making these profoundly ignorant comments on Pharyngula (mainly because I’ve seen you say similar things before, in both style and topic). You began with:

Dear Muslima
Stop whining, will you. Yes, yes, I know you had your genitals mutilated with a razor blade, and . . . yawn . . . don’t tell me yet again, I know you aren’t allowed to drive a car, and you can’t leave the house without a male relative, and your husband is allowed to beat you, and you’ll be stoned to death if you commit adultery. But stop whining, will you. Think of the suffering your poor American sisters have to put up with.

Only this week I heard of one, she calls herself Skep”chick”, and do you know what happened to her? A man in a hotel elevator invited her back to his room for coffee. I am not exaggerating. He really did. He invited her back to his room for coffee. Of course she said no, and of course he didn’t lay a finger on her, but even so . . .

And you, Muslima, think you have misogyny to complain about! For goodness sake grow up, or at least grow a thicker skin.

Richard

Thankfully another Pharyngulite said exactly what I was thinking:

Did you just make the argument that, since worse things are happening somewhere else, we have no right to try to fix things closer to home?

And that’s when you tried to backpedal with a clarification, but just ended up digging your hole even deeper.

No I wasn’t making that argument. Here’s the argument I was making. The man in the elevator didn’t physically touch her, didn’t attempt to bar her way out of the elevator, didn’t even use foul language at her. He spoke some words to her. Just words. She no doubt replied with words. That was that. Words. Only words, and apparently quite polite words at that.

If she felt his behaviour was creepy, that was her privilege, just as it was the Catholics’ privilege to feel offended and hurt when PZ nailed the cracker. PZ didn’t physically strike any Catholics. All he did was nail a wafer, and he was absolutely right to do so because the heightened value of the wafer was a fantasy in the minds of the offended Catholics. Similarly, Rebecca’s feeling that the man’s proposition was ‘creepy’ was her own interpretation of his behaviour, presumably not his. She was probably offended to about the same extent as I am offended if a man gets into an elevator with me chewing gum. But he does me no physical damage and I simply grin and bear it until either I or he gets out of the elevator. It would be different if he physically attacked me.

Muslim women suffer physically from misogyny, their lives are substantially damaged by religiously inspired misogyny. Not just words, real deeds, painful, physical deeds, physical privations, legally sanctioned demeanings. The equivalent would be if PZ had nailed not a cracker but a Catholic. Then they’d have had good reason to complain.

Richard

Actually, yes, that was the argument you were making. But you chose to cover up that argument with an even stupider argument. Congratulations!

Frankly, this is disappointing for a number of reasons. One, because it was so refreshing to read PZ’s post and knowing a guy out there “gets it.” Two, because you’re kind of an idol of mine, and it makes me want to cry a little when you live up to the stereotype of a well-off, 70 year old, white, British, ivory tower academic. But let me spell it out for you instead of just getting mad (though I’ll do that too):

Words matter. You don’t get that because you’ve never been called a cunt, a faggot, a nigger, a kike. You don’t have people constantly explaining that you’re subhuman, or have the intellect of an animal. You don’t have people saying you shouldn’t have rights. You don’t have people constantly sexually harassing you. You don’t live in fear of rape, knowing that one wrong misinterpretation of a couple words could lead down that road.

You don’t, because you have fucking privilege.

And you’re not going to “get it” until you sit down and actually put forth the effort. I know you’re a busy man, so here’s a quick little parable on why you currently don’t get it. And if you still don’t get it – which is probably true, since these things take a long time to understand – I will happily sit down with you at TAM and try to explain it. I’m sure lots of other Skeptical ladies will be happy to help me.

Any Seattle people want to help me find an apartment?

I feel like this is an abuse of my blogging powers…but oh well, what fun is having lots of readers if you don’t ever try to crowd source them?

The lease on my spider-infested apartment ends August 31, and I’m moving to Capitol Hill with my friend. We’ve been doing the typical internet searching, but a lot of places in Capitol Hill don’t advertise online because they’re in such high demand. So please let me know if you’re moving out of a great place, your friend is, or maybe you just saw a vacancy sign while walking around. We’re looking for a two bedroom place for less than $1500 a month that at the soonest is available Aug 1.

And if you have any general tips about moving, moving in Seattle, or Capitol Hill, feel free to leave those too! Thanks :D