The naturalistic fallacy is only to be deployed when favorable to your cause

Ken Ham is relieved that a gay penguin has died. Sphen and Magic, two male penguins in an Australian zoo, have had their unholy pairing broken up by the death of Sphen. Did you know that they’ve been used by secularists to claim that gay sex is natural and moral? (I don’t think so — it’s more that it’s clear same-sex behavior is not unnatural, since it occurs in, you know, Nature). According to Ham, though, it doesn’t count! Because they’re animals.

Yes, these penguins have been used to teach children that same-sex attraction is “natural” and therefore it must be moral. But animals are not moral creatures! And to impose human characteristics on animals is a fallacy called anthropomorphism.

I kind of agree. The relationship between Sphen and Magic does not say that this is how humans should behave; it only says that the rules various cultures have imposed on people are not universal and immutable…but then, that’s exactly what fundamentalists object to, that their rules are not absolute.

But ol’ Ken goes on to say his Bible does insist that monogamy between a man and a woman is the only allowable relationship.

Now, unlike penguins and other animals, humans are moral beings as we are made in the image of God. And God has written his laws on our hearts (Romans 2), which is why we have a conscience that knows the difference between right and wrong. Furthermore, God created marriage, so God defines marriage, and true marriage is one man for one woman as we learn in Genesis 1:27 and Genesis 2:24.

One man and one woman? His patriarch, Abraham, had one official formal wife, Sarah, and two concubines, Hagar and Keturah. King David was married to Michal, Abigail, Ahinoam, Maakah, Haggith, Abital, Eglah, and Bathsheba, and others that we don’t have names for. That last one is an appalling story of sexism, misogyny, and murder that, we’re told, is a shining example of God’s forgiveness.

David first caught a glimpse of Bathsheba one evening while she was bathing on her rooftop. Lust overtook him, and even though Bathsheba was already married to a soldier named Uriah, David slept with her. When David found out she was pregnant, he tried to cover up his sin by calling Uriah home from the battlefield so that he could sleep with his wife. When Uriah refused to have relations with Bathsheba, out of duty and respect for the men still in battle, David sent him back into the war and had him killed so that Bathsheba would be free to marry him.

God sent the prophet Nathan to confront David about his grievous sin. David wholeheartedly repented and God mercifully forgave him, but the consequences of David’s sin plagued him for the rest of his days. Bathsheba’s first son died as a result of David’s transgression, but God gave them Solomon soon thereafter—who would one day take the throne and be listed in the lineage of our Savior.

Everything is OK if you make a show of repentance. That’s the lesson I learned from the Bible.

Oh, what a catastrophe the New Atheism was for lower-case “a” atheism

Fuck all of these guys

There is no doubt but that the New Atheism was a channel that directed people towards right-wing, conservative, anti-immigration politics. Eiynah explains it all, and I think she’s right.

This link between New Atheism and the far-right is a dangerous and an under-discussed one. This has never been demonstrated so starkly as when Richard Dawkins tweeted out a recommendation for a book by fellow atheist Douglas Murray.

The day after the mass shooting in Buffalo that was explicitly motivated by great replacement theory, by ideas like there being an outright “war on white people,” Dawkins chose to tweet praise for a book titled The War on the West. He called it “utterly superb” and urged his nearly three million followers to read it with an open mind and “forget about labels like right wing”…Because surely, among us secular friends, we can overlook an inconvenient term like that, even in the aftermath of a mass shooting underpinned by the same ideology.

I’ve been listening to the audio version of Murray’s book myself, and it is reminiscent of the incendiary rhetoric of former KKK Grand Wizard David Duke. In his promotional podcast tour for this book, Murray talks repeatedly of an “outright war on white people.” He is losing patience, he says, done being polite with people who don’t “respect [his] ancestors, history and culture” – while disparaging other cultures for supposedly not contributing to “mathematical, scientific or artistic discoveries”. The combination of ignorance and arrogance is staggering, as this is patently, overwhelmingly untrue.

This is no dog whistle, it is an airhorn.

While I was attracted towards Dawkins’ ideas, at least I was never tempted by Murray. I was actively repulsed by Douglas Murray — he was just a garden variety Nazi wanna-be, fed on racist literature and never questioning it. It was one of the factors driving me away from New Atheism and the Dawkins fandom, evidence that he was losing it altogether with his fawning over Murray. Sure, Murray is an atheist — but he’s a cultural Christian atheist who values his local religion as a tool to bludgeon those foreign people with different traditions.

Of course, Douglas himself is no outsider to the atheist scene. He too is a well-known and prominent atheist figure, one who happens to lament the loss of Europe’s Christian heritage and the supposed identity-crisis caused by increased secularization. Despite this, he has been propped up in vocal anti-theist circles because, rather than consistency on the matter of critiquing religion, it is his views on Islam and immigration that are appealing to a certain crowd. Murray has a long history of cloaking extreme statements in a posh accent, his rhetoric has been described as gentrified xenophobia. Which is putting it mildly.

Remember Dawkins’ declaration that he was a “cultural Christian” because he like hymns and church bells, and hated Islam because it was “indecent”? That sounds like he’s been hanging out with Douglas Murray too much.

Any much is too much.

Let’s not forget Sam Harris, who has also been sipping from the chalice of Douglas Murray.

Harris often claims that ‘woke identity politics’ is destroying the path to a harmonious ‘colourblind’ world. But his actions and endorsements do not paint a picture of someone who truly prioritizes colour-blindness, as seen by his repeated promotion of race and IQ, or his endless propping up of Douglas Murray.

The War on the West is overflowing with racialized language. The first chapter is even called “Race.” It wouldn’t be unbelievable as a parody of a far-right book featured in The Onion. But colourblind Harris has been filled with praise, referring to it as a “fantastic read and a doubly fantastic listen.”

Interestingly, Harris’s attitude changes completely when it comes to anti-racists like Ta-Nehisi Coates whom he refers to on several occasions as a “pornographer of race”—not Douglas Murray who talks obsessively of race, or even Charles Murray, author of The Bell Curve, a book funded by the white supremacist organization Pioneer Fund. In fact Harris is also a dedicated defender and promoter of Charles Murray, referring to him as a “deeply rational and ethical thinker” and “the intellectual who was treated most unfairly in my lifetime.”

Has anyone else noticed that all of the worst people associated with atheism have been gravitating together into one horrible toxic clump? And that they’re all making apologies for conservative Christianity nowadays?

“Iles” is an anagram for “lies”

Martyn Iles, the heir to the pile of dishonest shit that is Answers in Genesis, has posted a tirade about the sin of lying.

One of the biggest changes | have seen over the course of my not-that- long life is the normalisation of lying.
Yes, at the level of worldview and culture . .. “woke” is effectively an “objective truth is evil” belief system. Politics is a festival of lies to the point of being a depressing joke. The media lied so much they’re dying. But also at the level of relationships. People actively deceive each other, deny their behaviour, say whatever is expedient to the moment, or hide their true agenda, simply as a way of life.
And when you catch them out, they kick you out of their life.
It’s become shockingly normal.
Effortless, brazen, easy liars, and deceivers are multiplying. People who have become so calloused in their own self-interest and self-serving that they say whatever it takes.
I have sat in rooms where apparently reputable people tell outright lies to get what they want or avoid scrutiny. It’s so shocking that your first assumption is to imagine that you must be mistaken.
Are you a Christian? Then you tell the truth. Ruthlessly. Consistently. Without fail. Without fear. Every time. Because truth is good, no matter what. .. even when we feel like it will cost us. The cost will ultimately be for good.
The closest you will ever come to a lie is remaining silent in those exceptional situations where wisdom demands it.
And if your goals cannot be achieved with honesty, then your goals are simply wrong, and you are on a wrong path, no matter how self- righteous you may feel about it.
Remember, the Holy Spirit is called “the Spirit of truth™—and Satan is called “the father of lies.” Your denials, misrepresentations, masked agendas, and self-serving deceptions only serve one of those two. Really, this issue is a barometer for measuring how active Satanism is in a given place or situation. If there is a pattern or system of deception, you know what’s up.
Stay true.

The most brazen, easy liars I’ve ever met have all been creationists. I am reeling at the level of projection and the lack of self-awareness in his post.

If this is an admission that Satanism is active at Answers in Genesis, I might agree with some of it.

Finally, a cause to unite the Right and Left

Who knew we could find unity in the cause of killing children? Right-wing loonies and left-wing moonbats have been working together to erode food safety and loosening milk pasteurization laws and allowing ideological weirdness to be poured down the throats of innocent children. But at least it’s bipartisan!

The contentious belief that raw milk may be healthier than pasteurized is a bipartisan one, however, it has captured the imagination of, as the Atlantic put it in a 2014 story, “urbanite foodies (read: progressives).” That same year, Joel Salatin, which the publication referred to as a “food and farm freedom celebrity,” told Politico that it was nice to have some liberals join the fight for the mainstreaming of raw milk.

“When I give speeches now,” he said. “The room is half full of libertarians and half full of very liberal Democrats. The bridge is food.”

You know, we actually have data. We know that childhood mortality was greatly reduced when we required that milk be pasteurized. It’s a simple and relatively easy parameter to measure: when you require pasteurization vs. allow raw milk to be sold, how many dead kids do you stack up in each category? We know the numbers.

The CDC would want us to remind you here that, yes, you are allowed to take risks in private, but raw milk is 150 times more dangerous than pasteurized milk.

When we were raising kids, we made the decision to exclude Salmonella, E. coli, and Listeria from their diet as much as possible. It wasn’t just the cost and trouble of paying for funerals, but the nuisance of infants with diarrhea. Trust me, it’s no fun for anyone.

If you’d like to see an entertaining discussion of the thrills of raw milk, Talia Lavin has you covered.

Pasteurization changed the dairy game. By 1911, Chicago and New York had mandated milk pasteurization in commercial operations, with other major cities quickly following suit; by 1936, 98% of milk in the United States was pasteurized. This coincided with lots of other medical discoveries and improvements in public hygiene, but the milk-pasteurization push had particularly drastic effects: between 1890 and 1915, infant mortality dropped by more than half. By midcentury, babies drinking swill milk and dying of diarrhea was largely a thing of the past. Most people would agree that this is, generally, a good thing. I personally drink milk daily with my coffee; I am glad it doesn’t come with a side of typhoid.

I said that this movement was bipartisan, but now it’s fueled by a lot of right-wing “own the libs” influencers and nutcases.

It’s just that the contemporary opponents of pasteurization—the “raw milk” movement, as they call themselves—are so fucking dumb, and so knee-jerk about it. The movement is endorsed by such disparate grifters as Gwyneth Paltrow; RFK Jr.’s erstwhile running mate, Nicole Shanahan; Christian TikTokers; the existentially stifled Mormon tradwife that is the wanly smiling face of Ballerina Farm. The overwhelming number of recent raw-milk converts—and its loudest current evangelists—are on the far right: over in the raw milk aisle you’ll find an assortment of right-wing Fitness Guys with steroidal vasculation filming themselves chugging raw milk, alongside Alex Jones, QAnon influencers, the CEO of racist Twitter clone Gab, and a motley assortment of also-ran far-right Congressional candidates, plus organizations like the Farm to Consumer Legal Defense Fund and the Farm and Ranch Freedom Alliance.

Now normally I might be willing to shrug off this suicidal insanity — let the kooks voluntarily weed themselves out of the population by swilling contaminated food — except that the primary victims of this lunatic movement are kids who have no idea of the risks, and who are simply expressing a natural trust in what Mommy and Daddy tell them. The problems arise when Mommy and Daddy are named Gwyneth Paltrow and Alex Jones. That’s who the food safety laws are aimed at.

I’m getting flashbacks to the internet atheism of yore

Russian deep state operatives

In the aftermath of the disclosure of Russian disinformation agents sponsoring right-wing YouTube, I kept seeing this name, Lauren Chen, that sounded vaguely familiar. She’s the person behind Tenet Media, and was also attached to Blaze TV, and then I remembered…oh yeah, she was also a player behind the right-wing takeover of a big chunk of internet atheism. Yuck. I detested her before it was popular to dislike her!

She was associated with MythCon and that horrible collection of regressive assholes, and spoke at various right-wing atheist conventions, despite the fact that she is openly a Christian nationalist. She was sorta big on YouTube, although now her channel has been taken down. She spoke at a MythCon adjacent event in 2019. Look at this lineup of dreadful people:

The Great Migration: A discussion on digital and physical immigration
Moderated by: Stephen Knight

Panelists include:
Lauren Chen, aka Roaming Millennial
Claire Lehmann
Daisy Cousens
Tara Devlin

12:25 PM – 1:25 PM
NSFW: How Prohibition Amplifies Problems
Moderated by: Melissa Chen

Panelists include:
Aydin Paladin
Karen Straughan
Brittany Simon
Meghan Murphy

1:30 PM – 2:30 PM
Demonetized: What Role Should Corporate America Play in Activism?
Moderated by: Bill Ottman

Panelists include:
Rucka Rucka Ali
Josephine Mathias
Jeff Waldorf
Graham Elwood

3:20 PM – 4:20 PM
Nuance, Context and the Future of Comedy Online
Moderated by: Stephen Knight

Panelists include:
Gregory Fluhrer, aka Armoured Skeptic
Mark Meechan, aka Count Dankula
Blaire White
Hunter Avallone

4:25 PM – 5:25 PM
Changing Minds: How to Admit When You’re Wrong
Moderated by: Lauren Chen, aka Roaming Millennial

Panelists include:
Tim Pool
Melissa Chen
Carl Benjamin, aka Sargon of Akkad
June aka Shoe0nHead

5:30 PM – 6:00 PM
Ending Racism, Violence and Authoritarianism
Moderated by: Bill Ottman

Panelists include:
David Pakman (via Minds Gatherings)
Tim Pool

Stephen Knight, aka Godless Spellchecker; Claire Lehmann, chief Nazi at Quillette; Karen Straughan, denizen of the Manosphere; Armoured Skeptic, major asshole; Count Dankula, training dogs to give Nazi salutes; Blaire White, evidence that being trans does not make one smart and pleasant; Carl Benjamin, dear-god-who-gave-that-jerk-a-platform; and of course Tim Pool. There also all those other lesser jerks and bigots I struggle to remember, and don’t want to remember. Internet atheism was (and still is) infested with these nasties back in 2019.

Since the Justice Department has started striking down a few of the big grifters, may I suggest that that list is a pretty good hint at who else needs to be investigated? So many useless, horrible people with surprising popularity and an overblown income stream…

“Being a pedophile, a molester, that’s not OK.”

Remember Robert Morris? Pastor at one of the largest megachurches in the country, Gateway Church, that draws in a 100,000 suckers every week? Or did you manage to erase him from your memory after learning that he was guilty of molesting a 12 year old girl? If so, good for you, and stop reading because I’m going to remind you of the man.

There have been developments.

Last week, a pastor who oversaw all of Gateway’s campuses departed amid an undisclosed “moral issue,” becoming the latest in a series of changes for the church: The cancellation of its annual conference. The departure of Morris’ successor. The renaming of its Houston campus and an exodus of worshippers.

An “exodus of worshippers” sounds great, and is what I’d expect: empty megachurches as parishioners wake up and realize that it’s all a sham run by con artists and that they can do better with their life than getting their morality from a pedophile. I’m relieved to see that some people did exactly that.

For Emily High, the 17 years she spent as a church member came to a halt because she felt betrayed, she said.

“It’s anger, it’s all the range of emotions,” High told WFAA. “Being a pedophile, a molester, that’s not OK.”

Yes! Except…Ms High represents a minority.

The church has seen a decrease of 17% to 19% in weekend services attendance, a church spokesperson told CNN.

I can do math. That means there are still 80,000 fools and tools shuffling into those churches every weekend. The Christian grift continues!

It’s always a good time to be an atheist

The Intelligent Design creationists had a discombobulating conversation that they thought was brilliant, but just left me wondering what planet they live on. They were discussing when it was a better time to be an atheist, and apparently it was in 1890, when being an atheist would prohibit you from entering a major university.

Jay Richards: The fact that we now talk about the universe as having an age is a significant update from a century and a half ago. It leads to new questions. Is it unique? Was there one beginning? Can we talk about the beginning? But that’s a different sort of situation. And so, I think if you’re thinking in terms of worldviews, I would much rather be a materialist where everyone assumed the universe was eternal than be at a moment in which virtually everyone, whether skeptic or believer, says, “Well, the universe has an age, so it’s got a finite past.”

Peter Robinson: You’d rather be a materialist in the 1890s…

Jay Richards: Exactly.

Peter Robinson: Than today?

Jay Richards: Yes, and I think it’s much easier to be a theist when standard cosmology says “Well, the universe hasn’t always been here.” It’s no longer a good candidate for an ultimate explanation if it had a beginning.

Jay Richards is not an atheist, of course, which makes one wonder about his ability to see the world from the perspective of an atheist. But OK, he considers himself an authority on the godless. That does not surprise me at all.

As an atheist and a materialist, though, I can say pretty definitely that the better time to be a materialist is when we have more information about the material world, which ought to be obvious. The big difference between scientists and the clowns at the Discovery Institute is that we welcome new information and aren’t trying to force-fit the universe into a mold decided upon by ancient civilizations.

So our universe had a beginning? We happily filed that data away with all the other facts about the material nature of the world. There’s nothing in that observation that implies a supernatural or magical origin — in fact, to the contrary, what led to that conclusion is physical observation and measurement, and physicists, not theologians, are exploring the 13.8 billion years of its existence.

News for Jay Richards: the Big Bang is not evidence for Jesus. It’s a bad time to be a theist when your god is getting squeezed into smaller and smaller gaps, and godless science is doing a better job of explaining how the world works than your holy book.