Thanks for all the whatever that was

Tauriq Moosa has a beautiful, and deeply sad, post on a goodbye to all that about the atheist movement and what it had meant to an ex-Muslim.

I can’t escape the weird identity I have and it’s this identity which makes me so angry at the leading figures – i.e. white men – of a movement that changed my life. But I’m more fucking angry at the sycophantic nature of a movement that was supposed to have abandoned sanctity for reason and evidence.

I wanted to never speak about Richard Dawkins – or rather the environment that views him with infallibility. [Read more…]

Perhaps publicity trumps

Ew. Michael Nugent tweeted a link to an article about how to deal with online harassment a few hours ago.

Michael Nugent ‏@micknugent
How the Irish police helped a victim of online harassment and abuse http://bit.ly/1v81OqE

The article is by “Doctor DooM.”

I am the only person who writes for this website regularly who uses a pseudonym.  I do so for reasons that are my own, but there are many valid reasons why someone would want to do this. [Read more…]

Known for her pro bono legal and humanitarian work

Islamic State in Iraq publicly murdered a human rights lawyer in Mosul last week.

Samira al-Nuaimy, known locally for her pro bono legal and humanitarian work, was executed last week, according to rights activists and residents. The United Nations said that she was killed in a public square and that her body showed signs of torture when it was returned to her family.

[Read more…]

Because of the feministic culture we live in

A loving father.

Meet Annalise. She is my only little princess. She is a gift from God (Ps 127:3) and I do my best to savor every waking second with her. Even as I type this post, she is sitting on my lap. She’s five years old and, like every loving father, I’ll be forced to give her away one day. Until then, my wife and I have the immense opportunity to train her and prepare her to be a woman of God. More specifically, we have the mandate to prepare her to be a wife and mother. To be honest, I have a deep concern for her because of the feministic culture we live in. [Read more…]

Guest post: Nothing to compensate for the exclusion of multitudes of diverse and valuable people

Originally a comment by Jennifer Phillips on Whom you name, and he won’t.

I hate “the atheist movement.” If this is what it is, I hate it and want nothing to do with it. If it’s going to act like a mirror image of the fucking Vatican, I want nothing to do with it.

I completely agree, and would go further to say that, as it stands, it’s professionally damaging to me to be associated with Movement Atheists, as represented by Dawkins, Harris, Shermer and their supporters.

It’s paradoxical, because when I first discovered ‘the movement’, the science and reason elements embedded within lit a fire in me. I had already been involved in science outreach throughout my academic pursuits, but listening to DJ Grothe interview the denizens of the Reality Based Community on POI made me aware of how much more I wanted to invest myself in science education and science literacy.

The intervening years have been wonderful in that regard, and I’ve tapped into many local, national, and international science outreach opportunities, particularly focusing on outreach to women and underrepresented minorities in science. Therein lies the obvious problem: By publicly associating with the movement most closely identified with Dawkins, Harris, Shermer and their allies, I risk alienating the generation of young women and minorities that I’m trying to bring into the realm of professional science and reason.

It’s not worth it. Those ‘leading lights’ offer nothing to compensate for the exclusion of multitudes of diverse and valuable people.

Dana’s advice for Coyne Dawkins and Harris

Dana Hunter has a brilliant post on all this. It draws on brilliance from Libby Anne and from Hiba Krisht, for a hat trick of brilliance.

I’d like to ask a favor of anyone who can manage to get a critical viewpoint through the defenses of atheist celebrities like Harris and Dawkins: please get them to read Libby Anne’s infuriating and heartbreaking post, Do They Care about Women, or Simply Bashing Religion? Because it’s a question they need to address. They’re driving people like Libby Anne away from movement atheism. That is very much to the detriment of the movement.

It most certainly is. And Libby Anne is very far from the only one they are driving away. [Read more…]

Sometimes you need this

Like today, for instance.

[Cartoon removed because trolls exist.] [Or, less facetiously, because people told me it was from a transphobic site.]

Update
I’ll just replace the cartoon with a screen grab of a comment on Michael Nugent’s 4,839-word post rebuking Adam Lee yesterday, the fourth in his series of posts rebuking Adam Lee for writing an article that criticizes Richard Dawkins. [Read more…]

Whom you name, and he won’t

Michael Nugent has yet another endless wordy tedious post chastising Adam Lee for writing an article that’s critical of Dawkins. It’s nearly 5000 words.

One part is exceptionally outrageous.

You then engage in detailed speculation about why you believe Richard was trying to convey a message that a specific person (who you name, and I won’t) should be considered an untrustworthy witness in a specific allegation of rape (which you give details of, and I won’t) against another specific person (who you name, and I won’t). [Read more…]