Udo gets out in front of the war on Christmas rhetoric to reassure nervous Fox News addicts.

There is no war. Atheists like festivities as much as the next person. We just don’t pretend it has anything to do with god sending baby Jesus to carry presents to some wise guys.

One also can’t help but wonder how many the Muslims enjoying their Eid al-Adha celebrations would be willing to sacrifice their sons to their God, because Eid celebrations are actually celebrating a father’s willingness to sacrifice his son to demonstrate obedience to Allah – it goes without saying that the Bible offers similarly disconcerting stories of human sacrifice in the name of the Lord.

Seriously. Imagine a holiday celebrating Abraham’s willingness to cut Isaac’s throat by way of showing submission to god. What would be the right presents to give? What would be for dinner?

Well hahahaha homophobes, you lose and Dayna Morales wins – at least when it comes to her tip and to your reputation. CNN reports that tips for Dayna are pouring in from all over the world so yaboosucks The Hatefuls.

“I was offended. I was mad at first, and then I was more so hurt,” 22-year-old Dayna Morales told CNN.

Morales, who did a tour with the Marine Corps between 2009 and 2011, said she has been “out open and proud for years,” but “never discussed with them (the family) anything; it was their pure assumption.”

“It’s disrespectful and it’s hurtful,” she said. “I feel bad for their children because that’s how they are going to be raised.”

It is hurtful, but friendly counter-hurtful people all over the world should help with that. [Read more…]

About the server stiffed by the godbothering couple in Kansas. They too left a note saying they stiffed him for reasons, and holy reasons at that.

A pair of Christian diners stiffed their 20-year-old server at Carraba’s Italian restaurant in Overland Park, Kansas, on the grounds that his homosexuality is “an affront to God.”

How do they know? How do they know people who stiff servers aren’t an affront to god while people who do homosexuality are god’s favorite thing ever? Did god send them a notarized affidavit? [Read more…]

And speaking of random stupid undermotivated is-that-really-necessary petty hateful nastiness, there’s that couple that went out to dinner at Gallop Asian Bistro in Bridgewater New Jersey on Wednesday night.

Dayna Morales, a server at Gallop Asian Bistro in Bridgewater, N.J., said a family dining at the restaurant Wednesday night skipped the tip on their $93.55 bill and scribbled an explanation why, reported ABC News.

The note on the receipt, left by a couple with two young children, read: “Sorry, I cannot tip because I do not agree with your lifestyle and the way you live your life.” [Read more…]

Full name Sophia, Michelin-starred General of the First Mediterranean Iron Chef Batallion. Originally a comment on If you believe that good is a real and necessary part of the universe.

I disagree with the idea that if you believe good exists and is a necessary part of the universe in a religious context, you will be compelled to do good. In fact, I see it as potentially inspiring exactly the opposite.

Religious beliefs* tend to take concepts and try to form them into “things”. Love becomes a thing – god is love. Evil becomes a thing, the devil. Faith becomes the thing you must do all the time, sin and martyrdom and all those words becomes much more than their original concepts, they become monolithic constructs that have both meaning and grand, mysterious purpose. [Read more…]

Martin Robbins has, as he says, done a bloody petition. He hates them but did this one anyway, so you see how it is.

BBC Question Time: Please give scientists proper representation on Question Time

He provides a graph on it:

[Read more…]

Skepticon is this weekend. Half the people I know are there or on their way there.

So there must be outrage, right? Of course.

In chronological order, so bottom to top:

Sara E. Mayhew @saramayhew

@LaurenPants @Funkmon @RealSkepticon You do a disservice to skepticism by giving a platform to bullies and pseudo-skeptics. #sk6

@LaurenPants Seriously, there are tons of skeptics who do good work, Tim Farley, Doubtful News, Drescher, Susan Gerbic, Reality Check…

@LaurenPants

 …Bob Blaskiewicz, David Gorski, Hariett Hall, Daniel Loxton—why go for cheap drama bloggers like Watson Myers Benson? #sk6 [Read more…]

Part of why I’m interested in this claim of Conor Friedersdorf’s that

Nick happens to be one of the best people I know. Even though I don’t have faith in the same things that he does, I see how his faith makes him a better person. I see how he makes the world a better place, and how his belief system drives him to do it. And whenever I think about Nick, I think to myself, you know, I disagree with the Catholic faith on a lot of particulars, but there must be nuggets of truth within it if it inspires people like Nick to be this good.

is because I want to figure out how he gets there. I want to see if we can find a persuasive chain of reasoning, or if he’s just describing a feeling or hunch or intuition or association that he hasn’t thought about carefully enough – a bit of fast thinking with no follow-up slow thinking.

Minow offered one such chain.

There is no doubt that a disproportionately large number of religious people dedicate their lives to good works without expectation of any material reward. I think that you are more likely to do that if an institution exists that will help manage it (the church) and if you believe that good is a real and necessary part of the universe, rather than just a philosophical position or a utilitarian benefit. [Read more…]

The Guardian reports that the pope is tackling the mafia. Good on him if so, although he shouldn’t utter biblical death threats in the process.

In a fiery sermon on Monday, Francis railed against corruption and quoted the bible’s advice that practitioners be thrown into the sea with a millstone tied around their neck.

Yeah don’t do that.

But the article gives an interesting picture of the friendship between church and mafia.

“The mafia that invests, that launders money, that therefore has the real power, is the mafia which has got rich for years from its connivance with the church,” said [magistrate Nicola] Gratteri. “These are the people who are getting nervous.”

Gratteri attacked priests and bishops in southern Italy who legitimise mobsters. “Priests continuously visit the houses of bosses for coffee, which gives the bosses strength and popular legitimacy,” he said. [Read more…]