Here’s my July column for the Freethinker, on the Freethinker’s shiny new website.

Ramadan clearly is widely treated as compulsory, sometimes at the state level and much more at the familial level (which tends to bleed into the neighborhood and the “community” – the notional, non-physical community as well as the literal neighborhood-surrounding one).

I consider this worrying, although I don’t think much can be done about it beyond a slow non-coercive persuasion. I do think it’s worrying that to obey a religious “command” parents can compel their older (past puberty) children to go without food and water from sunrise to sunset.

If that were punishment it would be considered abusive, and perhaps needing intervention by child protection agencies.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

All right, one piece of good news. Obama signed the tweaked ENDA today and it did not include a religious exemption. Woohoo!

President Barack Obama signed a highly anticipated executive order Monday, which amends the Employment Non-Discrimination Act to include LGBT workers. The executive order restricts all federal branches and federal contractors from discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. The order takes effect immediately for federal employees. Federal contractors will have provisions in place by early 2015, according to the Huffington Post.

…

ENDA, who has been expanded by several presidents, previously restricted the federal government from discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation, but the executive order added gender identity to that

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Cheerleaders for the professional football team the Buffalo Bills are mostly unpaid.

A Jill is paid next to nothing—no money for gameday cheering, none for practice, none for the bulk of her minimum 20 personal appearances, none from the tips she receives but must turn in during the mandatory Jills Golf Tournament—and is classified by the team as a volunteer/independent contractor, though the thickness and thoroughness of the handbook makes you wonder just how independent she is.

They’re “volunteers” but they sure do have to follow a lot of rules for people who are volunteers.

The bottom document is the “NFL Buffalo Jills Cheerleaders Agreement & Codes of Conduct 2013-2014,” which is essentially the boilerplate rulebook for cheerleaders around

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

There’s a new residential high-rise going up in New York that will have separate entrances for rich people and not-rich people. No this time it’s not the Onion. It’s for real.

Extell Development Company, the firm behind the new building, announced its intentions to segregate the rich and poor to much outrage last year. Fifty-five of the luxury complex’s 219 units would be marked for low-income renters—netting some valuable tax breaks for Extell—with the caveat that the less fortunate tenants would stick to their own entrance.

The city’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development approved Extell’s Inclusionary Housing Program application for the 33-story tower this week, the New York Post reports. The status grants Extell the aforementioned tax breaks

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Hemant Mehta, the “friendly” atheist, is promoting a video by the “amazing” atheist now, the one who has such an “amazing” attitude toward women.

Not all that friendly to women, is he.… Read the rest

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They’re taking over. No not Martians, not gremlins, not chemtrails, but anti-abortion people going into health care work in order to undermine it.

As more states push bills to strip family planning funding from Planned Parenthoods, or relocate funding so that Planned Parenthood affiliates are last in line, other clinics that provide care to low-income and uninsured residents will be forced to shoulder the burden of reproductive health care services, especially when it comes to offering birth control.

Yet, as a case in Florida shows us, those clinics are now being drawn into the war on contraception thanks to “pro-life” medical specialists who are seeking positions within those networks with absolutely no intention of providing the full range of services

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

We saw yesterday that Jaclyn “stop all this divisiveness!!” Glenn is a fan or friend or both of The Amazing Atheist.

My knowledge of what exactly is horrible about the Amazing Atheist was a little rusty though (well there are so many misogynist ragers among the atheists) so I went looking for details. And found them.

RationalWiki has a useful entry.

What a guy…

As an example of his respect and care for his fellow humans, in his pompous and self-indulgent e-book Scumbag: Musings of a Subhuman (2007), Kincaid writes:[3]

Rape isn’t fatal. So imagine my indignation when I saw a chatroom called “Rape Survivors.” Is this supposed to impress me? Someone fucked you when you didn’t want to

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A pretty story from Afghanistan:

It was bad enough that the alleged rape took place in the sanctity of a mosque, and that the accused man was a mullah who invoked the familiar defense that it had been consensual sex.

But the victim was only 10 years old. And there was more: The authorities said her family members openly planned to carry out an “honor killing” in the case — against the young girl. The mullah offered to marry his victim instead.

Just gorgeous, isn’t it? The mullah said it was consensual – when the girl he raped was ten years old. And he’s a mullah. In a mosque.

Plus the bit about her family’s plans to kill her.… Read the rest

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Originally a comment by SC (Salty Current) on When a group is an acceptable target for hostility.

The suggestion that atheists privileged on other dimensions don’t face anything that could be recognized as oppression as atheists is wrong and unhelpful. Probably the element of anti-atheist prejudice that should be most concerning is the suggestion that atheists aren’t fully human* – that we lack some spiritual quality or knowledge or essence that limits us intellectually or ethically or even makes us dangerous. It should be easy enough to see the similarities with misogynistic and anti-Semitic ideas.

One problem, though, is that the insight that the treatment of atheists shares important features with that of other groups has been extremely difficult to … Read the rest

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It’s happening right now in Hyde Park.

The Bread and Roses team will be at Hyde Park across from Serpentine cafe at 1pm on Sunday 20 July to defy fasting rules during Ramadan in solidarity with the many beaten, harassed, flogged and arrested for eating and drinking during Ramadan in Iran and elsewhere. You can either join our picnic if you are close by or hold you own picnic of fast-defying event. Be sure to send us photos or videos of your day!

To show your support, also join the International Day to Defy Ramadan Fasting Rules on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/events/1426741134280903/

Onwards towards an international movement defying fasting laws!

You can find out more about the event here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrkXmUYaLIU

A media

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Oh shit I hadn’t seen this until just now. The Guardian yesterday:

As many as 100 of the world’s leading HIV/Aids researchers and advocates may have been on the Malaysia Airlines flight that crashed in Ukraine, in what has been described as a “devastating” blow to efforts to tackle the virus.

The Voice of America this morning, which is the most recent I can find:

The international AIDS community is reeling from the loss of many as 100 researchers who died when Malaysia Airlines flight 17 crashed in eastern Ukraine. They were en route to an AIDS conference that is about to begin in Australia.  Among the dead, a leader in AIDS research, Dr. Joep Lange.

Dr. Joup

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Stephanie makes a very important point in “You’re Not Oppressed, White Atheist Dudes”.

Mild forms of oppression don’t historically stay mild. When a group is an acceptable target for hostility in normal times, this increases their acute risk under more unusual circumstances. Marginalized groups are more likely to be scapegoated in times of economic stresses or societal upheaval. People from marginalized groups are more likely to be considered “safe” targets of random aggression or to be the object of the rare dangerous paranoid delusion.

That that that that that.

I think that’s what’s happening right now with respect to women, and it scares me. Not for myself, but for women and girls in worse circumstances.… Read the rest

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Another variety not to give.

… Read the rest

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Ha! So now they’re actually emailing PZ with this drivel – this “you allow no dissent / you are divisive” drivel that people mutter like a prayer in some rank places.

You seem to start arguments in the atheist community, which largely serve to divide the community and make it harder for us to get in a position to actually do something about the harm that religion causes humanity. You have people on other websites talking bad about other atheists and scientists in your name.

In MY name? That doesn’t even make sense. I’m a guy with a blog and a teaching position, with zero power and authority. I write what I think, and many people agree, and many disagree.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Why I don’t love the “atheist community” chapter 782. A public Facebook post by “The Amazing Atheist” who is sadly unamazing. Jaclyn Glenn shared it in a public post of her own.

PZ Myers is a pile of shit in a man suit. So here he is attacking Jaclyn Glenn for daring to not identify as a feminist. That’s feminism for you: “Women can make any choice they want! Except the choice not to be feminists!”

His main argument is the Jaclyn’s video fails because she uses some comedic exaggeration in it that he feels distorts a position. Was the position distorted? I’ll let you guys watch the video and read PZ’s blog post and decide for yourselves.

Oh, and

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Well we all know the rules. Women are either fuckworthy, or killworthy. There is nothing else. (Just this morning on Twitter someone called me “old superfluous prune” – meaning, I should be dead, because I’m too old and ugly to be still alive using up resources. Old ugly men are ok because men have multiple uses but old ugly women are not ok because women have only one use.)

Hadley Freeman considers one instantiation of this universal law.

You’ll be thrilled to know – and I’m sure May will be absolutely delighted to know – that this week a male writer for the Spectator officially declared her to be hot; hotter, even, than Jemima Khan, just in case

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

So the Russian separatists are busily hiding and destroying all the evidence. If neutral parties show up and try to stop them doing that, they fire warning shots, and the neutral parties leave.

The OSCE was trying to gain access to one part of the large crash site but the commander of a rebel unit, known as Commander Glum, blocked them. After the warning shot, the OSCE convoy departed.

There is also confusion over the black boxes and other devices apparently salvaged from the plane. A rebel military commander initially said he was considering what to do with them, while another rebel leader, Aleksandr Borodai, contradicting his colleague, said the rebels had no black boxes or any other devices.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

There was a pretty good Fresh Air yesterday based on a book, Trans Bodies, Trans Selves.

The new book Trans Bodies, Trans Selves is a collection of essays describing the varied experiences of transgender people — and the social, political and medical issues they face. It’s written by and for transgender and gender-nonconforming people.

The idea was inspired by the groundbreaking 1970s feminist health manual Our Bodies, Ourselves.

That book “was put together … by a group of women who … weren’t getting the care that they needed from what was mostly male physicians at the time,” the book’s editor, Laura Erickson-Schroth, tells Fresh Air‘s Terry Gross. “And so they put together this really radical book that included

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

And I’ve been trying to get to this all day. Honestly, Jaclyn Glenn and Dave Muscato between them have ruined my schedule.

Bill Maher @billmaher 23h

Dealing w/ Hamas is like dealing w/ a crazy woman who’s trying to kill u – u can only hold her wrists so long before you have to slap her

It’s so cool that the best way to talk about Hamas turns out to be to talk about hitting a woman. Hey, coincidence, Hamas like to hit women too!

It’s so cool that more than 26 hundred people have RTd that already and that there will be more.

It’s so cool that nearly 2 thousand people have favorited that.

It’s so cool that … Read the rest

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