You know what else is an abomination, Maine? Lobster

Dear 53% of Maine,

Today you decided that homosexuals are lesser human beings who don’t deserve the same rights as heterosexuals. You have just illustrated to the nation that you, like California, believe popular vote is a valid and moral way to decide human rights. I’m really glad we didn’t use this method back when legalizing interracial marriage, but I guess the whole majority rule, minority rights thing isn’t too important too you. But if you’re going to go and base your legal decisions on the Bible, I thought I’d like to point out one little thing to you so your logic is at least consistent. In the same book that condemns homosexuality, there’s another verse that you may find important:

Leviticus 11:9-12 says:
9 These shall ye eat of all that are in the waters: whatsoever hath fins and scales in the waters, in the seas, and in the rivers, them shall ye eat.
10 And all that have not fins and scales in the seas, and in the rivers, of all that move in the waters, and of any living thing which is in the waters, they shall be an abomination unto you:
11 They shall be even an abomination unto you; ye shall not eat of their flesh, but ye shall have their carcases in abomination.
12 Whatsoever hath no fins nor scales in the waters, that shall be an abomination unto you.

Deuteronomy 14:9-10 says:
9 These ye shall eat of all that are in the waters: all that have fins and scales shall ye eat:
10 And whatsoever hath not fins and scales ye may not eat; it is unclean unto you.

I know the Bible can be a little hard to understand, so let me spell it out for you: God hates shellfish. You know what’s a shellfish? Lobster. Because of this, I fully expect a ban on Maine’s lobster industry ASAP. I know that’s a major facet of your economy and all, but you’ve illustrated that God’s word is more important than the well being of your citizens. I’m sure they’ll understand the dip in the economy, since getting into heaven later is more important than this life.

So, get cracking on that next referendum. I mean, you don’t want to be hypocrites, do you?

Purdue Professor: Gays wasting our money on AIDS research

Multiple Purdue students have alerted me to a blog post by Bert Chapman, Government Information & Political Science Librarian and Professor of Library Science at Purdue University. He’s caused quite a stir amongst progressive students at Purdue after making a blog post claiming homosexuals are hurting the economy by making us fund AIDS research and making insurance companies and businesses acknowledge their partnerships. To fully appreciate his woeful ignorance, let’s go through his post with some commentary by yours truly:

An Economic Case Against Homosexuality

As a Christian, I agree with the biblical condemnation of the homosexual lifestyle. However, we are living in a nation and world that increasingly rejects biblical norms. To defend traditional sexual morality against the encroaching threat of homosexuality and other aberrant forms of sexual expression, we need to be able to do more than cite Bible verses. Fortunately, there are plenty of economic reasons for being against sodomite degeneracy and I think as conservatives we need to be able to articulate why our nation cannot afford the extremely high financial costs of this lifestyle at a time when we are confronting dangerously high budget deficits, national debt, and personal debt.

First, I want all you gay-rights supporting Christians out there to hang your head in shame for being associated with this man. Done? Okay, good. Hurray for a world that is increasingly rejecting biblical norms – that’s a good thing when people wake up and see these ancient, bigoted ideas as immoral and unfounded. At least Professor Chapman recognizes that Bible verses aren’t going to fly when it comes to public policy – especially public policy that is trying to remove rights from minorities groups. This may just be me…but using money as a guide to what rights to give what people seems pretty fucking morally bankrupt. Oh, that’s right, I’m a hippie liberal. Sorry, forgot.

Let’s start with AIDS. U.S. Government expenditures on this disease have risen from $200,000 in Fiscal Year 1980-1981 to $23.3 billion for Fiscal Year 2008. These figures have increased steadily over nearly three decades and probably exceed $100 billion. When you factor in what countries all over the world have spent on seeking to diminish this disease, without recognizing the morally aberrant sexual behavior causing its spread, we are probably looking at expenditures of over $1 trillion dollars. Think of how much constructively such money could have been spent on public health issues such as improved sanitation, immunizations, and other more worthwhile programs instead of promoting immoral and self-destructive behavior through needle exchanges and widespread condom distribution. The money wasted on AIDS research could be returned to taxpayers or transferred to more worthwhile areas of public health research such as cancer, heart disease, and combating pandemic conditions like H1N1 flu. Our ongoing U.S. political debate over health care reform also needs to factor in the economic costs of homosexual and other sexually deviant behaviors on our health care system in terms of pharmaceutical drugs, tainted blood supplies, and requiring doctors and nurses to treat sexually transmitted diseases which would not occur if people practiced chastity outside of heterosexual marriage and monogamy within such marriage.

…I’m just take this one step at a time.

1. “Probably” exceeds a $100 billion? “Probably” over $1 trillion? I understand this was probably just some spontaneous blog post, but it doesn’t really help your argument when you’re just making up numbers.

2. AIDS IS NOT A GAY DISEASE. Sorry for the caps lock, but this is so ignorant that it makes me scream. AIDS infects all people regardless of sexual preference – heterosexual, bisexual, homosexual. Of course, he thinks anything outside of monogamy within a heterosexual marriage is deviant, so I’m not sure he would care. Just don’t go blaming the gays for AIDs and make that your major point.

3. Condom distribution decreases the spread of AIDS and other sexually transmitted infections. Study after study has shown that abstinence only education simply does not work.

4. It pretty much terrifies me that this man is fairly obviously suggesting that anyone with AIDS or any other type of STD should just suffer or die. We shouldn’t research these diseases, we shouldn’t pay doctors to treat these diseases, we shouldn’t develop drugs for these diseases. Unfortunately, this horrifying world view isn’t new, especially among the religious right (Remember when Jerry Fallwel said, “AIDS is not just God’s punishment for homosexuals, it is God’s punishment for the society that tolerates homosexuals”?). I guess it doesn’t matter if a quarter or more of our population (people with STDs) suffer or die, since they’re all the heathen liberals that deserve it.

Anyone who studies prison conditions knows that AIDS is a reality in many correctional facilities due to the occurrence of rape. I’m not sure if the Justice Dept’s Bureau of Justice Statistics keeps track of prison rape statistics or other instances of same sex sexual assault, but that also has economic implications not to mention the psychological trauma experienced by all rape victims.

I’m honestly not quite sure what this has to do with gays. Shouldn’t we be worried about, oh I don’t know, stopping rape?

The sad practice of so many companies and universities adopting domestic partner benefits in a misguided effort to attract employees drives up insurance costs for these companies and prevents them from providing additional coverage to those of us adhering to traditional sexual moral standards. It also requires these companies to pass on the costs of their goods and services beyond normal inflationary trends. Additionally, it also probably makes it more difficult for them to expand their businesses and create additional jobs in an economy coping with near double digit unemployment rates.

Yes, how dare companies give all of their employees equal rights instead of giving special privileges to the group you happen to be in. I have an idea: Why don’t we just make it so only Christian employees can receive partner benefits? According to your traditional morals, only those marriages are seen as valid in the eyes of God, so we can ignore everyone else. Yes, that seems like a lovely place to derive our reasoning. Definitely shouldn’t give benefits that promote monogamy and stable relationships.

The homosexual lifestyle also affects areas such as life insurance, estate planning, real estate, and investments as firms providing these services have to factor in how to treat same sex domestic partner issues into their cost calculations. Guess who has to pay for these increased costs and potentially lower investment returns? We do, regardless of whether or not we approve of the homosexual lifestyle. The next time some one tells you how wonderful is the “progress” gays have made in recent decades ask them if they have ever thought about the multiple economic consequences of this “progress” as described in this posting. I welcome suggestions from readers as to other possible economic costs of the homosexual lifestyle which I have forgotten.

Again, heaven forbid that everyone has equal rights. I’m not up on my fiscal policy so I don’t know if what he’s saying about rising costs is true or not, but who cares? Do we really take away the rights of a minority because it’s cheaper for the majority? Well then, better go back and institute slavery. It’ll be so much cheaper if we don’t have to pay black people wages!

I’m seriously disappointed that such a ignorant and homophobic piece could be written by a professor here at Purdue. It makes me ashamed to also call myself a Boilermaker. Much of the controversy is where his rights lie as a Purdue employee to publish such a thing. I support everyone’s freedom of speech, regardless if I agree with what they’re saying or not. However, I also believe one must be accountable for what they have said – he deserves criticism and messages of outrage. Purdue stresses tolerance and diversity, but to have a Purdue professor (a fact made available in his Bio) saying such hateful things… how would a gay student feel in one of his classes? Would gay students want to come to Purdue with such bigotry being represented?

What do you think? Should Professor Chapman just face the negative opinions of the public, or should Purdue reprimand him? Should what a professor say on his private blog have any connection to what he does at work?

Other Purdue students have also voiced their opinions on the matter:
Boilercrat Junction
The Dark Matter Effect
NEW: Politics and Pucks

Being gay is a choice, but religion is in your genes!

No, I didn’t suddenly make a big discovery while working in my genetics lab – you can thank House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) for the insight:

In an email, Boehner spokesman Kevin Smith said Boehner “supports existing federal protections (based on race, religion, gender, etc) based on immutable characteristics.” …”He does not support adding sexual orientation to the list of protected classes,” Smith continued.

What the hell, really? How many scientific studies do we need to throw at you ignorant bigots before you’ll accept that homosexuality has a genetic basis?! This is not a matter of opinion – homosexuality is not a choice. That assertion is usually enough to make me want to bash my head against a wall, but coupled with the ludicrous claim that religion is immutable? Yes, because people never ever change religions, and adopted children always grow up to be the faith of their biological parents. Thanks for submitting that Christian gene sequence to GenBank, really interesting to know a single point mutation can make someone phenotypically Muslim!

Yes, I know – sexuality is fluid. There are definitely cases of people who once identified as straight as later identifying as gay and vice versa. There are bisexuals whose attractions skew back and forth over time. But immutability shouldn’t be the sole deciding factor for what becomes a protected class. Even if people change their religion, gender, and sexual orientation, they shouldn’t be discriminated for it. Regardless, it’s obvious this man isn’t talking about fluid sexuality – he’s talking about homosexuality being a “choice,” and that what annoys me so much.

It terrifies me that people like this get elected to public office.

(Via Pandagon)

Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize

Just one word:

Wow.

Discuss?

EDIT: Okay, more words since I am a blogger after all and I can’t shut up about my opinion.

To the Obama Nobel Prize haters saying he hasn’t done anything yet – inspiring hope in not just the US, but the entire world is an amazing feat. Making many nations stop utterly loathing the US is an amazing feat. Averting possible new wars is an amazing feat. He has been trying to do so much, but when stubborn, uncompromising Republicans do nothing but stop progress, what do you expect? If anything, receiving this prize will give him even more clout, and make the path towards the goals he envisions even easier. Remember, the Nobel Peace Prize isn’t necessarily given out for successful accomplishments – it is also given to people with great visions who are working hard for human rights and democracy. It is used to help them achieve their goals.

Okay, continue discussing.

Tony Blair: Atheists as bad as terrorists?

The Times reports on Tony Blair’s recent speech at Georgetown University, where he had some strong words to say about the irreligious:

“We face an aggressive secular attack from without. We face the threat of extremism from within.”

Arguing that there was “no hope” from atheists who scorn God, he said the best way to confront the secularist agenda was for all faiths to unite against it.

He said: “Those who scorn God and those who do violence in God’s name, both represent views of religion. But both offer no hope for faith in the twenty first century.”

Yet another example of “As long as you’re believe in something, that’s okay.” It’s troubling when such a prominent politician feel the need to attack non-theists and compare us to religious extremists. When’s the last time an atheist has flown a plane into a building, or performed a suicide bombing? The only thing we attack is illogical, delusional thinking, and in that regard he’s right – we’re a threat. For a man in the running for the President of the European Council, you think he’d be a little more sensitive…you know, since Europe has a gigantic amount of nonbelievers.

(Via Gulf Stream Blues)

Colbert wants to be in the conservative bible, Conservapedia explodes

By now you’ve probably heard of Conservapedia’s hilarious idea to edit the Bible to remove liberal bias. Because you know, gender inclusive language, using the word “comrade”, and a lack of parables about free market are horrible things caused by the liberal media. While most people have been ridiculing this, they do have one strong supporter: Stephen Colbert. He supports it so much, that he asked his viewers to go edit Conservapedia so he can be a Biblical figure.

The Colbert Report Mon – Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Tip/Wag – Conservapedia, Louvre & Honda Unicycle
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Michael Moore

His fans were so excited to spread the conservative gospel of Stephen Colbert that Conservapedia crashed within minutes of his request. Unfortunately, Conservapedia didn’t keep any of their edits. How sad. I mean, Stephen Colbert as a biblical figure is just as accurate as what they plan to do with the Bible – why not let us help out?

Blasphemy Day at Purdue

Wednesday the 30th was International Blasphemy Day, and Purdue was one of the many campuses where an event took place. What the heck is Blasphemy Day, you ask? Well, here’s the information the Society of Non-Theists had on the flyers we handed out:

Blasphemy Day International is a campaign seeking to establish September 30th as a day to promote free speech and stand up in a show of solidarity for the freedom to challenge, criticize, and satirize religion without fear of murder, litigation, and reprisal. The primary focus of the Blasphemy Day movement is not to debate the existence of any gods or deities, to promote hate or violence, or to insult or offend. Nor is it a movement of atheists – the tenets of one religion blaspheme against another if they disagree. The main objective of Blasphemy Day is to open up all religious beliefs to the same level of free inquiry, discussion and criticism to which all other areas of academic interest are subjected.

Why September 30? It is the anniversary of the original publication of Danish cartoons in 2005 depicting the prophet Muhammad’s face. Any visual depiction of Muhammad is considered a grave offence under Islamic law. The fury which arose within the Islamic community following this publication led to massive riots, attacks on foreign embassies and deaths.

So what did the we do? Like it stated, our goal isn’t to offend just to get our rocks off. And since Purdue is a fairly conservative campus, we went the safe route of just celebrating freedom of speech. We put up blank posters that anyone could write or draw on, with no censorship at all.When I set up the event at 9am, we had 6 starkly blank flyers. At 11:30 I walked by on the way to my next class, and they were already full. By 12:30 when I returned, six more posters had been purchased by a new member (a friendly theist, actually!) and were already filling up. By 1:20, we had a total of 18 posters up, and by the end of the day people were having a hard time finding space to write anything new.The messages ranged from politics, religion, and philosophy to potty humor, penis drawings, and internet memes. Some messages were deep, some were hilarious, and some were downright strange. Some I agreed with, and some I definitely did not. But that was the great thing about the day. I wasn’t offended if someone wrote about Jesus or Glenn Beck because our goal was to show everyone has the right to free speech, even if it’s criticizing others, including myself.Throughout the day we attracted quite the crowd. Many random students wanted to add their opinions, and many more just wanted to read what others had said. I didn’t hear a single negative reaction through the day. Everyone was smiling and saying what a cool event it was, and people were asking if we could leave it up for the rest of the week. Unfortunately we couldn’t, especially since we later found out taping things to buildings is a no-no.
Yes, I had about a 30 minute conversation with the police about tape (I guess that’s how I pantomime adhesives). I think I scared the crap out of my members, because they had no idea what I was talking to the police about for the longest time. Effectively there was a miscommunication between me and the people approving the event (they didn’t realize we were taping it to the pillars), so it ended up not being a big deal at all, especially since we only had an hour of the event left. Pablo, the Dean of Students who I know from doing club stuff for the last three years, basically just had to come and make sure it was okay.

Pablo: Tape, that’s it? Man, I was ready to march down here and defend you guys and your freedom of speech and it’s just about silly tape?

All we had to do was promise to clean it up, so all was right with the world!

All in all, I’d call the day a success! Who knows, we probably offended someone (I think our mere existence offends some people), but the most common reaction was very positive. Let this be a lesson to all the atheist activists out there – you can be outgoing and controversial while still being nice!

Tomorrow I’ll have time to photograph each of the signs, and I’ll post them here for your viewing pleasure. But other than that, what should I do with them?! Art exhibit? eBay? Wallpaper to cover the hideous wood paneling in my apartment?

Religious fanatics and 9/11

Science flies you to the moon. Religion flies you into buildings. – Victor Stenger

I posted this as my facebook status, fully knowing that it would probably turn into a flame war. And of course, it did. But I wasn’t just trying to piss people off – I think this is something people seriously need to think about, especially on 9/11.

A mildly religious friend responded that this wasn’t all religion, just the fanatics. This sort of view is a problem, really just a one true Scotsman fallacy. They say, bad people of religion aren’t really religious – they’re just abusing real religion, which is good. But do you just get to conveniently draw the line between religion and fanaticism so it arbitrarily suits your needs?

You simply cannot deny that so many atrocities have been committed in the name of religion – to do so would be delusional. This is different than a religious person just doing something bad, or someone who happens to be an atheist committing a wrong. There are good and bad people whether you look at theists or atheists, but who has ever heard of killing in the name of atheism? Religion doesn’t corrupt all to the point of suicide bombings, but the fact that it occurs at all should make us care.

The thing I find most interesting is that these so called fanatics – the evangelical Biblical literalists, the fundamentalists of Islam – they are the ones most accurately representing their religion. They take their holy books at face value and don’t allow for metaphorical interpretations or loop holes. They’re not the ones who use doublethink to tell themselves God is good when he’s ordering genocides, that slavery is bad even though it’s condoned in the Bible, that anal sex doesn’t really count as losing your virginity (yay saddlebacking). While I’m glad these people aren’t subscribing to archaic views, they’re also being hypocritical in saying that certain groups aren’t “real” religion.

September 11th certainly was caused because of political reasons, but we cannot ignore the religious aspect. Would these people go fly planes into buildings if there was no reward of eternal afterlife? Would we have had the initial political divide if we didn’t have this mentality of Christian nation versus Muslim nation? If anything, being an atheist makes it all seem sadder to me: people who believed in something that doesn’t exist died and murdered thousands for a reward that doesn’t exist, and the one solace of their families is that they’ve gone to a better place…which doesn’t exist. To say religion played no part in the deaths of thousands of Americans cheapens that tragedy.

More Indiana Fail: Rep Baron Hill

Baron Hill (D) is the US Representative for the 9th district of Indiana (south eastern Indiana). He recently had a town hall meeting on the health care debates, and someone recorded this troubling clip:

Hill, do we have to remind you what the definition of Representative is? You are a public servant elected by the people, not a dictator. You don’t get to do whatever you want. It’s not your town hall meeting, it’s our town hall meeting. We most certainly will tell you how to run your congressional office because you’re supposed to freaking listen to us! That is your job.

At least he was right about one thing: videos end up on YouTube and put him in a compromising position…because he was being a jackass and deserves to be in that position. Maybe instead of censoring everything, you should think before you speak, Representative.

(Thanks to Shawn for the news tip)

I take it back: Screw you, Indiana

Just when I found a reason to give Indiana some brownie points, I’ve found a reason to take them away. Goshen, IN voted against changing an anti-discrimination ordinance to include sexual orientation. Yep, it’s still a-okay to discriminate the gays.

“Some speakers discussed religious reasons for their stance on the law.

“This is an issue of morals, if we start telling people in our schools everything’s okay, where do we draw the line? I want to know where do we draw the line,” said one resident who said he talked with his pastor about the ordinance.””

Oh no, the slippery slope of being an understanding, kind person! …Yep, this sure is an issue of morals: if you want to discriminate against the GLBT community because of your bigotry, then you sir are the immoral one.

It really doesn’t surprise me, though. Western Indiana is fairly religious, with very high numbers of Amish and Mennonites. I’m not saying those particular groups were behind this, but that area has a very small town, country, simple living kind of feel. I complain about Indiana a lot, but to hammer the point home, let me just quote some of my favorite comments from that article:

Want is happening to the morals of this country. Just because Christians choose to honor God and respect the fact that the Bible teaches that a man and woman belong together not a woman and woman or a man or man doesn’t mean we are bigots. A sin is a sin and to say you were born this way is just your way of justifying your sin in your mind. As a christian if I would agree that God made you this way than I would be responsible for your sinning. It doesn’t mean that I hate that person. It just means I hate your sin. Next we will have to make special concessions for sex offenders because they could use the same argument and same hey I was born this way. I’m glad I live in Goshen where the city officials stand up for what is morally right. Do you expect God to keep blessing up if we keep forgetting to follow the Bible.

If we made laws to protect Socially unaccepted behavior then we would have to protect All socially unaccepted behavior opening a Pandora’s box. There are already discrimination laws that cover these things. Let Goshen pass this ridiculous law and they can be the San Fran of Indiana because this behavior is SOCIAL and will attract all that want to engage in it.

Wow looks like the Sodom and Gamorra aficianados lost this one. Score 1 for decent family people.

I do not see where discrimination comes into play because the ordinance changes did not pass. The City of Goshen decided not to add on extra protection for people who have different preferences. There is NO discrimination in that. If I have a preference in having body piercings or a tatoo, I do not expect a town to add an ordinance to protect me. The “small town thinking” and “hypocricy” comments; give me a break. Your use of guilt and put down tactics on people who do not agree with you is sad. It is amazing the ugly ways people have responded to this ordinance not passing. Wow! Stop slamming God and anyone who does not agree with you. Just because Goshen choose not to add special protection for a lifestyle choice does not mean we are filled with hate. I don’t agree with the lifestyle choice, I can still love the person making the choice. We are all human beings and the current ordinance protects those rights. I strongly believe in Christ’s love, for ALL of us.

Everyone else seems to want to talk about how Goshen is so closeminded…Your asking us not to discriminate bc of your opinions and CHOICE to be homosexual…so guess what…if you expect to be heard…so do we. Just because we can actually back our beliefs up with the Bible…and your backing up homosexuality by what?? Bc it feels good? Excuse us all for still having some moral fiber in this sick world!

Where did the morals go? Just because your “gay” everyone else should deal with your problem? ITS WRONG, always has been, always will be – no matter how many laws are passed. Get some help, or keep it to yourself.

I’m just going to stop there because about all that’s going through my head is constant screaming of “IT’S NOT A LIFESTYLE AARRRRHRGGGHGHGHGHHH!!!!”

(Via Friendly Atheist)