I am an atheist,
not because I am angry at God.
not because I’m rebelling against organized religion.
not because I enjoy sinning.
not because I’ve been brainwashed by college.
not because I’ve been possessed by the devil.
not because I like offending people.
not because I’m any less of a good person than I was.
not because I’m just going through a phase.
You know, I’m a regular columnist for that magazine, and if you open up the August/September 2012 issue, you’ll find my latest article, titled Atheism’s Third Wave…which is really eerie given Jen McCreight’s recent post. I don’t think she read it first, I’m pretty sure she’s just psychic…either that, or a whole lot of us are converging on similar ideas right now.
I’ve got a contract with Free Inquiry so I can’t just post it here, but I’ll ask Tom Flynn if he’ll give me a special dispensation, because I think it is part of an important trend in atheism — we need more people speaking out for an atheism that heeds social concerns. If he doesn’t, well, why aren’t you people subscribing?
(Also, take a look at the other articles in that issue…it’s full of stuff about broadening the reach of atheism.)
Gay marriage is a useful marker. It’s an issue that’s rather orthogonal to atheism, but we can still use it as a parameter to help us identify our allies (it is not, of course, a perfect or even entirely sufficient marker, but it’s still kind of cool to see how it splits the country into the the America I want to live in and the America I hope to see in the dustbin of history). Here’s a poll on legalizing gay marriage that breaks respondents down into various categories.
The proponents of Bad America: the Tea Party and religious-values Republicans.
The vanguard of Good America: Urban liberals and the agnostic left.
Maybe I should flip my metrics around. The real marker for regressive, bad ol’ Americans is their conflation of God and country.
Just so you know, I’m planning another podcast for next Sunday. Time is a little bit in flux, but we’ll work it out in the next day or two.
The topic: “Is there value in the sceptical/skeptical movement?”. I think we’ll probably also talk about the direction the atheist movement must take in the future.
I’ve lined up a couple of people to lead the discussion: Brownian and Louis.
If you’ve been on my invite list for a podcast before, you’ll get an invite to this one, too. If you’ve never joined in before, email me you google+ name and I’ll put you on the list.
This is the lounge. You can discuss anything you want, but you will do it kindly. The puppy would like a snuggle.
Status: Heavily Moderated; Previous thread
I was asked to prime a panel discussion on The Point, so I sent them a 2’30” video on whether we should be criticizing Romney for his religion, and then they just cut loose for 15 minutes. James Randi and AJ Johnson and also contributed questions; Michael Shermer, Sean Carroll, and Edward Falzon chewed ’em over, with Cara Santa Maria leading the conversation.
I’ve decided that Sean Carroll is right about everything.
Hey, little Golden Tortoise Beetle, you’re looking adorable!
That’s a nice shiny Golden Tortoise Beetle, I love that little transparent shell over your shiny goldenness.
Golden Tortoise Beetle, you’re so shy and cute. Peep out from under your shiny carapace. Yes, you peep out, you little buggy-wuggy.
Watcha doin’, Golden Tortoise Beetle?
Golden Tortoise Beetle, you’re looking adorable!
I like Golden Tortoise Beetles!
On 15 September, you could attend the Feminine Faces of Freethought Conference in Dallas for only $20. Check it out!
Women of Reason–Dallas presents Feminine Faces of Freethought, a conference featuring women speaking about topics that affect the freethought community as a whole.
Join us for a day of talks by
- Noelle George, coordinator of Volunteers Beyond Belief and founder and past president of SECULAR Center;
- Dr. Jean Kazez, author of Animalkind, The Weight of Things, and the blog In Living Color;
- Elyse Anders, blogger at Skepchick, founder of Women Thinking, Inc, and leader of Hug Me! I’m Vaccinated;
- Bridget Gaudette, Co-Founder and Vice President of Outreach of Secular Woman;
- Dorian Mooneyham, blogger at http://transandgodless.blogspot.com and youtube.com/transandgodless;
- Anne Crumpacker, author of the blog Socratic Mama;
- and other members of the freethought community.
Panels include
- Secular Parenting,
- Diversity in the Freethought Movement,
- and What Atheist Women Really Want.
We welcome people of all genders.
Childcare will be provided. Please reserve childcare while purchasing your tickets.
There have been various accusations in recent months that blogs are all about generating controversy to bring in more hits. These accusations have come, largely, from people who don’t have a clue about how to grow a blog, and have been total nonsense.
Now Shane Brady actually looks at the evidence. He looked at the Alexa (not a particularly good service, but it’s what he’s got) traffic data at Skepchick and FtB during the recent rounds of battling with the anti-feminists. The conclusion: yes, some spikes are seen in Skepchick’s traffic, not really seen at FtB (we’ve got enough diversity here that we’re pretty well buffered against transients), and none of it translates into sustained increases in traffic.
This post cannot possibly answer all the questions on this subject, but I do think it offers some perspective on the effects of controversies on website traffic. Controversy does not appear to be a valid strategy for increasing long term web traffic on skeptical websites. Furthermore, people (including myself) should put to bed the criticism that web traffic is a motive for generating controversy. Intentions are hard to know, but the results tell me that it’s not worth discussing any more. Of course, I could be way off base, and all criticism is welcome.
I could have told him that. I’ve been at it for about ten years, with my share of controversy, and none of it really contributes to long-term growth: not Expelled, not the cracker, not every little sudden surge from Reddit and Fark and Digg. Those give little bursts of attention from people who weren’t interested in your blog in the first place; they visit to see the source of all the commotion, and then they leave.
What makes a blog grow is 1) regular updates, 2) consistent themes, 3) maintaining the attention of other blogs out there, 4) cultivation of an interactive readership that adds value to your blog, and 5) time (slow steady growth is best, and it can’t by definition happen overnight). Probably also good writing, but I wouldn’t know much about that, and I’ve also seen some gloriously well-written blogs that idle along with light traffic because they ignore my top 5 suggestions.
Now can the dweebs who dismiss blogs as noise generators for traffic please shut up?
