Pat Robertson thinks putting up a pro-atheist billboard is just like putting up a billboard showing two teenagers having sex.
Dave? Dave Silverman? Boy, do I have a great idea for an atheist billboard now.
The new American Atheist billboard designs are now online, and I don’t want to disappoint Dave Silverman, so I’ll give my usual review: better than the last set, but still needs work.
Stuff I like: it’s a strong, assertive message, and that’s what I want from AA. The “Atheism: Simply Reasonable” slogan is clear, short, punchy. They’ve gotten away, mostly, from the blocky multi-colored Mondrian look of previous signs.
Stuff I don’t like: the text on the left is 5 lines long. That’s too much for a billboard. The central image is sort of arbitrary — it says religion is silly, but it doesn’t contribute much to the message on the left. The other billboard, on Mormonism, is worse in this regard; why is there a guy in his underwear there? Really, on a billboard, everything must be distilled down to deliver one clear, simple argument.
I know Dave is rolling his eyes right now and wondering why he’s even trying to lead those fractious, critical atheists at all…wouldn’t sheep be so much easier?
See? It’s a plant that looks like a baseball! And on Friday, the Minnesota Atheists Regional Conference will be sponsoring a baseball game in St Paul, the Mr Paul Aints vs. the Amarillo Sox. You should come. Here’s the schedule for the meeting: Dave Silverman, Hector Avalos, Ayanna Watson, Robert Price, Teresa McBain, J. Anderson Thompson, and me. Probably no baseball plants, though. They’ve been wiped out in the wild.
(via WebEcoist)
She’s been hired as the new Public Relations Director for American Atheists.
You know who we’re going to be griping at over the next round of AA billboards, right? Dave Silverman is sighing in relief that he now has someone to duck behind. Did he tell her that her job involved being a target?
That’s good news. Dave Silverman gives them the aggressive edge, but someone to shape the message more effectively would be a valuable asset. Check out the qualifications, maybe this is a job for you.
Oh, wait. You’re reading Pharyngula? Maybe you aren’t the cooperative diplomatic type they need.
I also notice the description doesn’t specify long-term association with the radical right wing of the Republican party and a complete absence of prior affiliation with the secular/atheist movement. That’s a good start.
I am a terrible person. After my busy weekend of travel this weekend, I get a phone call this morning to remind me of a planned doctor’s visit this morning…a visit I had to cancel because I’d completely forgotten to do the preparation.
That’s right. I gave up a colonoscopy in order to attend the Reason Rally and AA convention.
I hope David Silverman appreciates my sacrifice.
(Don’t worry, I’m rescheduling it for next month.)
Oh, joy. Senator Tom Harkin will appear in a video message at the Reason Rally. While he may be a lifelong Catholic, as he declares in the announcement, and while he is one of the biggest supporters of acupuncture, chiropracty, herbal and homeopathic ‘healing’, and all the alt med bullshit he can fling millions of federal funds at, we’re apparently supposed to grovel in gratitude that a sitting senator deigns to patronize us atheists.
Why?
This is a man who takes pride in being affiliated with a patriarchal, hierarchical, medieval institution that oppresses women, celebrates poverty, wallows in its own wealth and privilege, and has actively disseminated pedophiles into communities all around the world…and has worked hard to protect and defend these child rapists. This is an organization that is currently fighting for the right to refuse life-saving care to women, that even opposes making contraception available to men and women, that endorses discrimination against gay couples.
This is a man who pushed through the formation of the National Center for Complementary and Alternative ‘Medicine’, a gigantic boondoggle that sucks federal research dollars out of the hands of qualified scientists studying real phenomena and into the hands of quacks and con artists peddling bogus therapies. This is a man who so poorly understands science that, when his pet quackeries all failed when examined, declared his disappointment because he said NCCAM was supposed to “validate alternative approaches”, and instead was “disproving things rather than seeking out and approving things.”
Yeah. That Tom Harkin.
Was Deepak Chopra busy on 24 March? Did Oprah have a hair appointment? Maybe it’s not too late to sign up John Edward — he could channel Ingersoll and Russell and Sagan for us, although of course we’d have to be content with him guessing at their words one letter at a time. Aww, heck, let’s go all the way: the Phelps clan is going to be there picketing anyway, let’s give one of them a speaker’s slot right after Nate Phelps.
You know, I’ve been working on my 15 minute talk for the event, and I’m kind of peeved that now I have to toss in some stuff sniping at this dumbass video Harkin is phoning in…which is scheduled to be shown two hours after me, which makes it hard to address. I’m sandwiched in at 1:40, in between Jamila Bey (yay!) and…
Bill Maher?
WTF, man. W. T. F. Yeah, I know he’s said some great pro-atheist stuff, but I’m planning to promote science and reason, and that anti-vax/anti-medicine stuff ought to be a big red flag at a Reason Rally.
Dave Silverman is going to hate me.
(Also on Sb)
All the religious fanatics and Christian and Muslim weirdos who criticize atheists can take a flying leap — and when Bill Donohue rants and raves about atheist billboards, it’s a vindication and a triumph. But when one of our own, the black atheist Sikivu Hutchinson, speaks out in criticism, it’s a message that must be taken seriously and addressed.
But AA’s ahistorical paternalistic approach to “secular” public service messaging is one of the main reasons why New Atheism is still racially segregated and lily white. Clearly AA doesn’t give a damn about the reality of urban communities of color in the U.S. vis-à-vis the institutional role of organized religion in a white supremacist capitalist context.
David Silverman, are you listening? I know this is not the message you want to send, but it’s what people are hearing. Fix this. Don’t tell people of color what they want, listen when they tell you what they need.
So is AA on the frontlines of providing prisoner re-entry resources—the real regime of 21st century “enslavement” for millions of African Americans—to families and communities that are permanently locked out of the so-called American dream due to the legal disenfranchisement of former convicted felons in employment, housing, and voting? Did AA even deign to consult with local interfaith and secular, humanist or atheist people of color about the cultural and psychological impact of the legacy of slavery in a nation where black bodies are still the primary targets of violent police suppression, racist criminal sentencing and capital punishment?
Why, I do believe there’s a hint or two in there about what would win people over to our side…
I have confessed over and over again that I was wrong about the atheist bus signs. I initially raised an eyebrow at the innocuous messages that people were putting on those things, and thought they should be louder and more inflammatory to catch any attention. And again and again I had to be proven wrong: even the mildest and most positive statement, like “You can be good without god”, provoked vandalism and angry letters to the editor.
And now more atheists have to rub my nose in it.
NEPA and American Atheists got together to put this sign on buses:
It was rejected. Too controversial.
I give up. Point made. Just mentioning our existence is anathema to much of the American public, so my plan for an ad with Jesus and Mohammed having gay sex on an altar while rabid beavers gnaw on a crucifix, with the slogan, “WHERE’S YOUR GOD NOW, MORONS?” would probably be a little bit of overkill. Just forget I brought it up.
Also, another thing I have to apologize for: apparently, it is possible for American Atheists to be associated with a tasteful and well-designed billboard. (I know: David Silverman is the guy who will be doing the flogging now.)
Chris Stedman is at it again. Once more, he’s carping at atheists who dare to question the beliefs of the delusional theists he considers his dearest friends, his most important clients, and the people he wants to spend his life working among, the liberal Christians and Muslims. Unfortunately, he chose as his opening salvo a rather innocuous comment, which tells us exactly where the limits of his tolerance lie, and they’re pretty darned low. David Silverman of American Atheists said this:
The WTC cross has become a Christian icon. It has been blessed by so-called holy men and presented as a reminder that their god, who couldn’t be bothered to stop the Muslim terrorists or prevent 3,000 people from being killed in his name, cared only enough to bestow upon us some rubble that resembles a cross.
Yes. That sounds accurate to me. Do you have a problem with that, Stedman? It’s a very clear statement about the absurdity of sanctifying some random wreckage because it shares a trivial orthogonality with the simplistic religious symbol of Christians, and it’s good that Silverman was pointing that out — I want atheist leaders to be clear-headed and assertive.
But not Stedman. He seems to think that statement was divisive, and for backup, he cites Jon Stewart, who took offense at a statement of truth.
After sharing that statement, Stewart — speaking as if he were Silverman — added: “As President of the American Atheists organization, I promise to make sure that everyone, even those that are indifferent to our cause, will f-cking hate us.”
What neither Stedman nor Stewart mentioned, of course, was that Stewart is on the 9/11 Memorial and Museum board of directors, has a vested interest in the 9/11 museum, and that his organization was being sued by American Atheists for promoting sectarian religion in the museum.
But even ignoring that, I would ask both Stedman and Stewart this: was Silverman wrong? I don’t think so. What stings about that remark is the truth of it…that the museum and Stedman just want to let some stupid pareidolia have a place in a museum because it’s easier than actually pointing out the folly of it all. They don’t think it’s worth fighting for a reasonable response because it might alienate groups of unreasonable people.
It’s good to know that an atheist community under the thumb of Stedman would be asked to avoid comments as mild as Silverman’s, for fear of antagonizing Stedman’s favored clientele…the believers. It’s becoming obvious that Stedman also has a conflict of interest: he’s not really interested in working for atheism, but is more aligned with that weird pro-faith organization called Interfaith Youth Core. Could he please toddle off, work hard with them, and stop pretending to be one of us, please?
Stedman also does something unconscionable. Most of his post consists of a garbled, desperate twisting of a post by Greta Christina, on the different goals of the atheist movement. Greta is a firebrand, someone who promotes a strong, aggressive atheism, and somehow, Stedman mangles her words to pretend that it all somehow supports his position of passive-aggressive self-adulation. And he doesn’t even understand Greta’s argument, which doesn’t say much for Stedman’s ability to empathize with different positions. He simply doesn’t comprehend the New Atheist position at all.
I’ll help. As Greta says (and I’ve said before, too), there are a lot of different reasons to be an atheist, but the reasons of the New Atheists (and myself, specifically) are quite clear and simple. They’re so simple that stupidity can’t be Stedman’s excuse for not grasping them.
And here it is: our first priority is the truth.
When someone makes a statement about gods — and here’s where Stedman is really incomprehending, because we aren’t focused on just the fundamentalists, but also include the liberal religious persuasions in this criticism — the question right at the top of our heads is, “Is that true?”
Someone says, “God will cast you into eternal hellfire!”, and we wonder, “Really? Is that true? Can you back that up with evidence?”
Someone says, “God is love,” and it’s all the same to us. “Is that true? How do you know? Is there a way to confirm that, or even say it with less mush in your mouth?”
Somebody sees a couple of girders at right angles to one another in the rubble of the WTC towers, and thinks it’s worth putting in a museum. We ask, “Why? Does this make sense, even in the context of your own religion, that this tragedy is marked with a symbol of your faith?” It’s a good question. Jon Stewart didn’t answer it. Stedman sure as hell didn’t.
No, not Stedman. Stedman is one of those guys who’d happily sacrifice reality on the altar of let’s-just-get-along.
That’s not where I stand. If Stedman had actually read Greta’s post with comprehension, he’d know that there are a lot of different atheists out there, and some of us have science and an attitude of unrelenting criticism and doubt seared into us, right down to the bone. We’re not surrendering it to make some hippy-dippy narcissistic appeaser happy, or to reconcile jesus-worshippers to us. That’s a compromise we aren’t going to make. Especially when Stedman’s only alternative is to shut up about the incoherence of faith.
