Oh looky here, what do you know…From an article titled Scabs: Academics and Others Who Write for Free by Yasmin Nair.

I want to return to a thread I introduced in that earlier piece with much greater force: That those who write for free or very little simply because they can afford to are scabs.  This would include not just academics with tenured or tenure-track positions, but adjuncts, professionals (like paid activists and organisers), as well as, really, just about anyone who writes for places like Guernica, The Huffington Post,open Democracy.net, and The Rumpus (and this is a very, very tiny list).*

…

Guernica and openDemocracy are both 501(c)3s. Where, in the case of the former,

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Watching that Newsnight segment again. One thing Maajid says in his film:

The media rightly sought to hear from the Muslim voice. But that voice tended to be male, middle-aged, and mostly conservative.

Then there’s a clip from Citizen Khan, then Adil Ray explains about Citizen Khan. I want Adil Ray for my new best friend. In the clip a guy asks Citizen Khan what he does and CK says “I’m a leader of the community.” Guy asks what that entails, exactly, and CK says “I lead the community.” I love that, because I’ve been putting “community leader” in scare quotes for years. If only the BBC would learn how idiotic that idea is.

He introduces us to Dr … Read the rest

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Hemant Mehta – the “friendly” atheist – has a post about a creationist complaining about not getting equal time with Cosmos. Mehta is scornful.

Of course, Faulkner has this crazy idea that Creationism and evolution are deserving of equal time even though only evolution is backed up by the evidence… and considering how little time is allocated to legitimate science programming these days, we should be seeing Neil deGrasse Tyson making the argument for equal time, not a Creationist.

Tell you what: I’m sure Cosmos will give you equal time on the show as soon as pastors start giving equal time to atheists in church. That makes just as much sense as whatever Faulkner said.

Or as soon … Read the rest

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Ah good, there’s a longer version on YouTube.

This time, they actually show the cartoon. The one they made a big show of refusing to show in January, thus drawing even more opprobrium (and threats) down on Maajid.

Update: 5 minutes in he talks to Maryam.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fb1LR6887cc… Read the rest

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Oh dear god. At 8 minutes in, Jeremy Paxman asks, slowly and with deliberation because all three of the dudes suddenly stop shouting over each other to let Paxo have the floor – he asks, I say:

Why is it that we don’t see a broader range of Muslim spokesmen?

Why?? Because the BBC doesn’t invite them!

The BBC does invite Maryam occasionally, but not nearly often enough. It doesn’t invite any women often enough, especially not ex-Muslim women, secularist women, atheist women, liberal Muslim women.

The BBC should invite Maajid back and invite Tehmina Kazi and Maryam Namazie and Yasmin Alibhai-Brown to talk with him. The discussion would be far more interesting and productive, and less shouty.… Read the rest

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Wo, here’s a gem – Maajid Nawaz, Mehdi Hasan and Mo Ansar going at it on Newsnight last night, with Jeremy Paxman presiding. The subject is That Tweet, the one about Jeus and Mo.

I’m four minutes in, and Mehdi Hasan has just said to Maajid, ”You have a long history of offending people in the Muslim community in a gratuitous manner.”

Mo Ansar said he doesn’t himself find the cartoon offensive. He’s meta-offended. What he finds offensive is Maajid tweeting something that other people would find offensive. It’s meta and pre-emptive. Also ridiculous – as Maajid points out to Mehdi H, some people are offended by campaigns against racism.… Read the rest

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Ok we allow women to do most things now, in Our Great Mercy, but there are limits. Women can’t be pope. Women can’t be intellectually active atheists. Women can’t be wait staff at the Nuclear Security Summit in the Hague.

The Nuclear Security Summit is in its second day in The Hague and has brought leaders from 53 countries together to discuss ways of combating nuclear terrorism. The catering company responsible for feeding the leaders and delegates has made a controversial staffing decision: No female serving staff are working in the plenary room where the main talks are being held. Instead, only men over 25 have been given the privilege of serving the working lunches at the World Forum. 

Gee, … Read the rest

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Dan Dennett and Massimo Pigliucci talk to Laurence Krauss.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9tH3AnYyAI8… Read the rest

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Louis Theroux looks back on the accomplishments of Fred Phelps. Theroux knows more about the Phelps family than most people, because he did two BBC documentaries about them.

An eternity in hell is the fate of anyone who doesn’t get baptised into the WBC and travel the country waving hate-filled placards at political events, colleges and places associated – even in the most tortuously oblique way – with tolerance of homosexuality.

While I was with them, they had a regular local picket of a hardware store that sold Swedish vacuum cleaners. The Swedish government had imprisoned a pastor for homophobic preaching, and for the WBC that made the store a legitimate target for a ritualised Biblical smackdown. For the

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I’ve been so grumpy today…

From @CuteOverloads

… Read the rest

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Author alerted us to this fine rant by Harlan Ellison on the theme of, “Pay me, motherfuckers.”

Pull quote:

I should do a freebie for Warner Brothers? What, is Warner Brothers out with an eye patch and a tin cup in the street? Fuck no!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mj5IV23g-fE… Read the rest

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Scalzi to scabs:

But of course the other reason to do it this way is that I have a voice and an audience, a non-trivial portion of whom are writers and other creative people, and I think it’s useful for someone who’s had a reasonable amount of success in his chosen creative field to say this sort of stuff out loud. The sort of person who expects work for free, and/or preys on creative people by trying to convince them that working for free “is how it’s done” benefits when creative people are publicly silent about this sort of crap. So this is me saying to creators: Guys, in fact this is not how it’s done, and you deserve

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As G Felis reminded me on Facebook – Scalzi has already written about this. Beautifully.

But what about charity and/or friends and/or [insert what you think is a good reason not to take money here]? Well, what about them? I’ll note that when I approach friends about doing work for me, I typically pay them for their time. I mean, you don’t think Paul & Storm or Jonathan Coulton wrote those songs for me for free, did you? No, I paid them. Do you think Jeff Zugale did that awesome Unicorn Pegasus Kitten painting out of the kindness of his own heart, or the writers of Clash of the Geeks did it for nothing? No, everyone was paid. Why

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I learned something today, or re-learned it. (I learned it once before, several years ago, but the learning faded, or the circumstances were different enough that I didn’t apply the learning.)

I learned that if someone asks you to write something for their website, for free, and you don’t really want to…don’t do it.

I didn’t really want to because I have other deadlines already, and because the request was oddly specific – it should have this quality, and this, and this. But it was for a branch of Open Democracy, and I like Open Democracy, so I asked if I could also post it here and was told yes, so I said ok.

But the specificity was a problem, … Read the rest

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Originally published at Secular Woman.

March 23, 2014

As mentioned in Rending the Tent: A Statement from The Secular Woman Community, Hemant Mehta of the Friendly Atheist published a piece by Kristine Kruszelnicki of Pro-Life Humanists without comment. Secular Woman offered to be interviewed by Mehta to allow his readers a different perspective on the human rights of women. Mehta initially refused to include a rebuttal or balance to his guest blog due to an admitted misunderstanding on his part. 

Mehta then invited a rebuttal of the previous post. Our submission was rejected by Mehta, since, apparently, it didn’t fulfill his requirement that we engage in debate.

Mehta set the table with anti-choice, anti-woman rhetoric, then dictated the … Read the rest

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Facebook restored the murderous Uganda Youth Coalition Against Homosexuality page and its murderous photos. It RESTORED them.

Unfuckingbelievable.

Status This photo was restored
Details Thank you for taking the time to report something that you feel may violate our Community Standards. Reports like yours are an important part of making Facebook a safe and welcoming environment. The account that posted this has been restored, so this post might be visible on Facebook again. If you still think it violates our Community Standards, please report it again.

Why do I have to report it again you stupid fucks? WHY DID YOU PUT IT BACK?… Read the rest

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A new Pew report on some 2012 data: there are at least 17 countries in the world where the police enforce religious norms.

in Malaysia, state Islamic religious enforcement officers and police carried out raids to enforce sharia law against indecent dress, banned publications, alcohol consumption and khalwat (close proximity to a member of the opposite sex), according to the U.S. State Department.

And in sub-Saharan Africa, two countries in the region (Nigeria and Somalia) have religious police. In Nigeria, the Hisbah (religious police) are funded and supported by governments in several states, where they enforce their interpretation of sharia law.

Pew’s graphic makes the situation rather vivid.

… Read the rest

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That was fast – reactions to the Law Society advice on Sharia wills already.

Barry Sheerman, the Labour MP for Huddersfield, cautioned against legislation on the issue but called for a joint investigation by the Commons Justice and Home Affairs Committees into how widespread the use of Sharia law now is in Britain.

“We need a serious look at this through the select committee system,” he said.

“I think it would be harmful to make it a party-political issue.

“This should be dragged out into the open and be discussed.”

Jeremy Corbyn, a member of the Commons Justice Committee said it was “very likely” the issue would now come up.

Louise Mensch, the former Tory MP, described the guide

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