Via blog reader Tim, I learned that yesterday about 150 Mormons in Salt Lake City publicly declared that they were leaving the church. They committed a mass symbolic act of filling a basket with formal letters asking that their names be removed from church rolls. [Read more…]
Those who defend the practice of circumcision tend to fall into two camps. The first argue that to forbid it is to violate the religious freedom of the groups (mainly Jews and Muslims) who practice it. This is absurd. No one is saying that people should be forbidden from getting circumcised. What we are saying that circumcision should not be forced on anyone else. If any adult wants to get circumcised, they should be allowed to do so. But to allow parents to mutilate their babies to satisfy their own religious beliefs is simply wrong. You shouldn’t be allowed to establish your bona fides with god by mutilating your children. [Read more…]
Following the surprising alignment of Chief Justice John Roberts with the so-called liberal wing of the US Supreme Court to hand president Obama a victory on the Affordable Care Act, there has been much speculation as to why he ruled the way he did. Speculating on the private motives of public figures is usually a waste of time (but fun!) and we will have to wait for his memoirs to find out if his reasons were different from his stated ones. But the nature of such speculations do tell us a lot about the state of our political discourse. [Read more…]
Via Jerry Coyne, I came across this site that gives a series of photographs that ‘will restore your faith in humanity’ just in case it needed to be done. [Read more…]
I find it surprising that male circumcision is still considered to be an acceptable practice although female circumcision is not. I am well aware that the latter is far more serious than the former but both irreversibly violate the bodily integrity of a child and should not be allowed. Those who believe that the practice provides some benefit can choose to do it for themselves when they become adults. [Read more…]
The fact that CNN and Fox News initially reported the wrong verdict was, in my opinion, a trivial matter that merely told us something about the absurd premium placed on being first with news by even a few minutes, as if news was some kind of Olympics event where only the first place finisher got the coveted gold medal. [Read more…]
The artist Nagai Hideyuki plays with our sense of perception by drawing figures on two flat pieces of paper that, when they are held at right angles and viewed from a certain direction, give the illusion of being 3-D constructions. [Read more…]
As if the betrayal by Nabisco (and by extension its parent Kraft Foods) in creating a gay Oreo cookie was not bad enough, another food giant General Mills has come out in opposition to the proposed constitutional amendment on the November ballot in Minnesota that would ban same sex marriage, saying that such a ban would be bad for business. [Read more…]
Thomas Euteneuer, a Roman Catholic priest who was described as a ‘rock star’ in the anti-abortion movement and the president of Human Life International, reportedly one of the nation’s largest anti-abortion groups, resigned after a woman alleged that his exorcisms to rid her of her demons were actually a series of sexual molestations. The woman has now filed a lawsuit seeking $5.35 million in damages against the Catholic Diocese of Arlington, Virginia, its bishop and HLI. [Read more…]