If you’re wondering what I’m babbling about this time, you’re not hanging in the same blogging circle that I am. Lemme explain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up.

Mooney and Kirshenbaum came out with a book,
Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatens our Future, wherein they bemoan the inadequacies of the science community to communicate effectively with the populace and lay the blame on the feet of the “New Atheists” for being too mean, i.e. telling the truth about scientific fact when it contradicts religious dogma.

I haven’t read the book and I’m probably not going to. This isn’t a book review. The book was drawn to my attention because of their direct attacks within it upon PZ Myers and his blog Pharyngula, a very popular pro-science, pro-atheism blog. PZ is known for being quite outspoken about the need to fight back against the growing incursion of religion into the science classroom and the government. He reviewed the book, per Mooney and Kirshenbaum’s request. The review was unfavorable, due primarily to the authors direct personal attacks and general lack of any sort of decent evidence to back up their claims.

So what this all boils down to is that there is a perceived schism in the atheistic community. On one side are the mean, disrespectful and damaging-to-the-cause loudmouth atheists, such as PZ and Richard Dawkins. At least, according to Mooney et al. On the other side are the mealy-mouthed accommodationists who think PZ and his ilk need to STFU and that the absolute worst thing for our cause is to piss off the Xians. At least, according to PZ.

Greg Laden and Lousy Canuck do a much better job covering the argument than I can. Tangled Up In Blue Guy weighs in as well.

So here’s my summary, now that I’ve babbled for a bit. By now you can probably tell which side of the discussion I’m going to come down on.

There has been an upsurge in the number of people willing to speak out on behalf of the godless; people striving to move atheists from the marginalized into the mainstream. People who are tired of being told that they are somehow less than moral, less than human, less than patriotic, because they see through the veil of mysticism that religion has draped over the collective eyes of a large part of the world.

Quite a few of those engaged on the side of godlessness are scientists. They have a large stake in the discussion since one of the primary forces of anti-science come from the sphere of religion. One only has to look at the reports of Xian extremists trying to force their way into boards of education and other public office in the hopes of imposing their theocracy upon the rest of us.

PZ was a big part of my “coming out”. I was never an active theist, more like an apathetic atheist. I just hadn’t felt the need to analyze or clarify my positions. Reading blogs like Pharyngula and seeing the kind of damage that the right-wingers were doing crystallized my thoughts and made me realize the importance of speaking out on behalf of the godless. I am an outspoken, sarcastic, snarky, obnoxious person, so PZ’s approach resonated with me. However, I realize that not everyone is like me (FSM help us if they were!). Not everyone will respond to such direct prodding. That’s where the accomodationists come in. Our movement needs the soft-speakers to hold the hands of those that aren’t quite ready to toss aside their entire world view in one fell swoop. There is absolutely no reason why they can’t be gradually brought into the light (to steal a phrase from the other side).

All that being said, Mooney et al are idiots. Rather than realise that there are multiple paths to reach the same goal (the goal being, not an eradication of religion, but rather the reduction of its prominence in society, especially government, and especially its interference with science), these fuckwits decide that anyone not following what they see as the correct path is not only wrong but is teh enemy, destroying their noble efforts to improve the world through bowing down and stepping aside for the religious fuckwits and not taking them head on.

Our organization has just viewed the upcoming ‘R-rated’ movie ‘Brüno,’ which is scheduled to come out in local movie theaters Friday, July 10.

Based on our screening of it, and the opinion of many other critics, BRÜNO is the most vile, perverse movie ever made by a mainstream movie studio. This disgusting, abhorrent movie contains (among other things) extremely graphic scenes of heterosexual and homosexual sex acts, explicit scenes and extended close-ups of full male and full female nudity, an extended scene of a totally nude heterosexual woman repeatedly whipping a homosexual man in his bikini briefs, partial nude scenes (including full rear male nudity) where body parts are partially covered up with black bars placed in strategic places, obscenely graphic verbal descriptions of perverse sex acts in dialogue and conversations with real people, and images of a male black baby from Africa in a hot tub with white adults who are clearly interested in doing some kind of sex acts with one another.

Vile, perverse, disgusting, abhorrent? Boobies and dicks? Sounds like a damn fine film to me. Right up there with “Casablanca” and “Gone With The Wind” and “Debbie Does Dallas”.

Pssst… hey, fundies. I gotta tip for ya’: Don’t like what’s in a movie? Don’t go to see it!

Those poor souls at Movieguide, being forced to watch such filth! The sacrifices they make in the noble name of protecting the community. I wonder how many erections they had to conceal during their private screening? Down boy! This is filth! Vile, vile, filth! Hot, steamy, luscious filth! Hey, dude next to me, why are you rubbing my crotch?

But, of course, they’re not doing this for themselves.

He tells those managers and district attornys[sic], “Studies have shown conclusively that movies like this will harm the psychological development of children and teenagers of all ages. Other studies have shown that almost half of all movie theaters do not card underage children who try to get tickets to such vile R-rated movies as BRÜNO by themselves, unaccompanied by adults.

“The physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual well being of your children and grandchildren is at stake!!!”

OH NOES, WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDRENS!!!!@1!!!!1!

Guess what? I wouldn’t let my kid go see this movie. But I’ll be damned if I’m gonna let some pack of frothing at the mouth, sexually repressed fundies try to tell me that I can’t see it.

WND is not providing a link to the movie’s website because of the explicit content.

Hell, I’ll provide a link because of the explicit content. Click away, my pretties!

LOLCat Bible Translation Project

The Brick Testament

Of course, if you really want to get geeky AND creepy, check out this version:

Ph'nglui mglw'nafh C'thulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn

ht: Jason

Anyway, this morning I saw probably the weirdest (read “awesomest”) use of the net I have yet seen. It started over at Almost Diamonds. Then it spread. If you’ve got a short attention span, or a really slow internet connection (you’re not still on dialup, are you? If so, please join us in the 21st century) you can get the synopsis at Pharyngula.

Modern-day electronic fairy tale dreams do come true

Jason, you’re one lucky dude. Or canuck. Whatever. Congrats!

Jodi, how awesome are you for conceiving and setting up a modern-day romantic adventure across the web.

Where Church and State really intersect

I couldn’t decide whether to LMAO or throw up. The EPIC FAIL that is fundies never ceases to amaze me. I stumbled upon one of their Facebook groups.

Let’s go ahead and take a look at the actual text of the 1st Amendment, shall we?

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

The first sentence is what the ignorant fundies are talking about: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;…” This is widely regarded as designed to prevent the establishment of a state religion by the government. It is also interpreted by the Supreme Court to mean that the government cannot promote one religion over another (Board of Education of Kiryas Joel Village School District v. Grumet, 512 U.S. 687 (1994), Justice David Souter, writing for the majority, concluded that “government should not prefer one religion to another, or religion to irreligion”.)

What this group advocating the return of “Christ” to the classroom is seeking is inherently unconstitutional. They make this clear in their position statements: “Allow Teaching of and only the Bible by teachers at any time to students anytime.” Right there, see that? They want the government to promote their bible over any other religious text. And just in case we missed it, they’ve got an asterisk note:

We believe every teacher should have the right to teach the Bible at any time. Please note: To clearify[sic], this group is for teaching of the entire Bible, and only the Bible.

C’mon, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that this is clearly discriminatory and blatantly unconstitutional. Why should your mythology get preferential treatment over any other?

According [sic] 1st Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America, every person has the right to religion. Why is praying/reading of the Bible not allowed in most schools?

Why is this so fracking hard to understand: every student has the absolute right to pray/read the bible in school. No one has argued that they don’t have that right or shouldn’t have that right. What we’re trying to avoid is having the schools (aka the government) impose your mythology in our institutes of education.

Let me put it in a way that even fundies can understand. Let’s say your kid came home and told you that their teacher was telling them that Odin created the world and that if they died in battle they would get to go to Valhalla. I can safely say that you would be mildly concerned. It’s the same thing for the rest of us when our kids come home saying that teacher said that their going to hell unless they worship some dude named Jesus. School is about edumacation, not indoctrination. Students should be learning about the factual realities of the world, devoid of any religious trappings.

*sigh*

I know I’m just preaching to the choir here (no pun intended). Any fundie who reads this isn’t going to get it. “That’s completely different,” they’ll say. “The bible is real, not like that other crap about multiple gods or (god forbid) no god at all!”

All we can do is to try to keep our voices heard and promote the strict enforcement of the separation of church and state. This isn’t just an atheist issue. It affects all of us who support a secular government and an educational system based on fact, not mythology.

Here are some resources:

Americans United for Separation of Church and State

ACLU – American Civil Liberties Union

NCSE – National Center for Science Education

Me, I liek mudkips

Jesus lieks teh little children

• Iran in chaos – #iranelection
• White supremacists weigh in on  Memo to the Right Wing: Put Up or Shut Up over at Orcinus

Carnival of the Godless

It’s over at The Sunny Skeptic. So why are you still here? Go check it out!

"Excuse me, sir, you're parked in a no-starcraft zone."

When a tiny peaceful world was invaded, they found themselves with a desperate need for armed starfighters. The only spacecraft they possessed that had a decent amount of speed and toughness were used by the Planetary Meter Service, or PMS. These “meter-maids” darted about the myriad orbital facilities, enforcing parking rules and issuing citations for improperly parked starcraft.

"Yes ma'am, I'll move it right away!"

With the addition of a hyper-booster, armor, maneuvering wings and twin laser cannons, the Meter-maid made quite a sturdy little starfighter. The enhanced speed combined with the PMS pilots in-depth knowledge of the intricacies of the orbital docking platforms made this squad extremely successful.

Dear Conservatives:

Your fellow Americans demand an answer — and we want it now. Just one simple question:

Are you deliberately trying to start a civil war?

Just answer the question. Yes or no. Don’t insult us with elisions, evasions, dithering, qualifications, or conditional answers. We need to know what your intentions are — and we need to know NOW. People are being shot dead in the streets of America at the rate of several per month now. You may not want responsibility for this — but the whackadoodles pulling the triggers make no bones about who put them up to this.

You did.

Damn straight. This shit’s starting to get scary out there. I talked a while back about the possibility of Civil War v2.0. Are we witnessing the next Fort Sumter? Canada’s looking better and better. Ok, not really. Too damn cold. But you know what I mean.

James von Brunn, the man who allegedly shot and killed a guard at the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., was a Darwin-lover who hated the Bible and Christians, and defies media efforts to classify him as a stereotypical “right-winger,” according to report.

As the kids say, that’s a bold statement (The kids do say that, right?). This report must have some concrete evidence to back up a claim like that. Where did that report come from?

The Moonbattery blog revealed von Brunn advocated the socialist policies espoused by Adolf Hitler and used Darwinian theory to support his anti-Semitism.

Holy shit. A paranoid, conspiracy theorizing, hate and fear mongering site using another paranoid, conspiracy theorizing, hate and fear mongering site to back up their paranoid conspiracy theories.

Dammit, my irony meter just asploded.

Darwin and Hitler used to hang out; smoking pot and planning the destruction of the lesser races

The best part is that they can call him a “Darwin-lover” is because he dug Hitler and, as we all know, Hitler was Darwin’s best-man at his wedding. They used to go down to the local bruehaus and knock back shots together, before crafting plans to further the dominance of the Aryan race through eugenics.

I’m torn between wanting to laugh my ass of at the incredible lack of any sort of reasonable thought process in these people, and wanting to weep with the futility of trying to maintain sanity while fricking idiots like these are doing their damnedest to twist the world into the sick fantasy that exists in their own heads.