Margaret Downey makes the undeniable (surely!) point that holidays are fun, and secularists should take over the work of Doing Fun Holidays.

Let’s celebrate with a Tree of Knowledge.

Even Tom Flynn says that’s a good plan!

Hang books on the tree. Celebrate knowledge, and reading, and free speech.

Chester County: the human tree of knowledge.

Too often the non-theist community disappears in winter. If we don’t show up, it looks as if we’re not welcome.

Visit www.secularseasons.org. “It’s up to us to make sure that secular celebrations are meaningful and honest.”

Children from a non-theist home are faced with a lot of peer pressure.

www.secular-celebrations.com

This is a helpful thing for ex-clergy.

Margaret calls Linda LaScola up to join … Read the rest

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Yesssssssss.

After I talked to Wafa last night at dinner I had an urgent need to talk to Liz Cornwell about connecting Wafa with the RDF so that Wafa will no longer need to broadcast her Arabic-language tv show via a Christian station. I just – in the last few seconds of the break – found Liz, and she’s already on it. Yesssssssss!

Wafa needs to be in the secularist movement; the secularist movement needs Wafa on board.

Welcome aboard, Wafa!… Read the rest

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It’s 9:03. People are milling. I can’t mill because I’m tapping on Simon’s laptop.

Last night at dinner I sat between Wafa and Annie Laurie. Jen, Ingrid, Greta, Simon, and Melody finished the circle. Good company.

Wafa asked me about penalties for being atheist, legal and social. (She says she always asks about that; she’s gathering the big picture.) I was able to point out Jessica at the next table and say what her penalties had been.

I also got a chance to talk to Jessica for a few minutes. She’s looking forward to the post-high school phase of her life.

Jennifer Michael Hecht is introducing the panel. The panel is Jen, Greta, Jamila, and Debbie.

Jen points out that … Read the rest

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She faced restraint which stifled her life and virtually imprisoned her.

“My unfit mind devised a plan.”

She bribed an untrustworthy male acquaintance to be her children’s guardian, because she was not fit to be their guardian – being a woman.

“Liberty like mine was scarcely even imaginable.”

“Little by little, guilt and freedom inspired me to fight back….I began to fight for those I left behind…The road I have taken is dangerous…Even if I wanted to, I wouldn’t be able to peel off my skin.”

“I am here to unmask the true face of Islam…The abuse of women in Islam is legal…Can you imagine my frustration when people who have never lived under Islam deny the truth?”

Her own … Read the rest

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The chilly climate.

Women get interrupted a lot more than women men. Men get substantive, useful interruption; women get subject-changing interruption. This is true of all outsiders.

Women get much less eye contact.

Men get asked idea questions, women get fact questions.

Men get praised for being smart; women get praised for working hard.

Women don’t talk as much at meetings.

Surprise! – this woman has something interesting to say.

Pay attention when women are talking. Often what you see when a woman is talking is people looking around, finding a kleenex…

[I'm liveblogging! I'm totes paying attention, and Melody asked me to (and I'm happy to). I'm listening. I'm looking down most of the time because I'm typing.]

The … Read the rest

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Susan Jacoby has introduced the panel – Why Women Need Freedom From Religion.  From Jacoby’s left on the stage: Wafa Sultan, Greta Christina, Annie Laurie Gaylor, Elisabeth Cornwell.

Annie Laurie wrote a book on the subject; probably the book on the subject.

Liz asks: what does religion offer that makes it worthwhile for women and other religion-oppressed groups to belong?

Once we know that, we can make it possible for people not to need religion.

If we re-frame the question we can get somewhere.

Greta says religion is women’s work; it’s part of the performance of being a woman.

Lots of us like being gender outlaws. Show of hands? Show of hands. Not every woman can be a gender outlaw.… Read the rest

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Get me I’m live blogging!

Edwina Rogers just did a quick talk about what the Secular Coalition does and is going to do. She had to dash off to get a train, so no discussion.

Now it’s Annie Laurie Gaylor. She is – as she said – bragging about FFRF’s latest win: a Colorado judge said yes an official state day of prayer is Not Ok.

[Interjection: naturally: by the time I got to the coffee urns during the break, all the regular coffee ones were empty. Only decaf. Yeah thanks but I want the caffeine.]

Women have been left out of the history of freethought.

The women’s movement was founded by the women freethinkers. Religions opposed every reform suggested.… Read the rest

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Reception last night. I met all these people – Brian Engler, Whose name I’ve been seeing/hearing forever. Dave Ricks, who sees the point of B&W perhaps even more than I do. Mya Riemer, who comments here occasionally and whom I met originally at Readerville.

Rebecca. We have a lot in common. We were both editors of our high school literary magazine. We were both assholes in high school. High five! Stephanie Zvan, FTB colleague. Brianne Bilyeu, ditto. Skatje Myers, who will be observing us with a very skeptical eye. Alyson Miers, who’s written what sounds like a great speculative fiction-type novel. Jamila Bey! Who needs no introduction. Greta, ditto.

Fun!… Read the rest

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The Old Post Office

Manchester Town Hall

… Read the rest

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Oh hai B&W reading peeples.

Washington!

Where’dja go, you ask eagerly.

Well to start I walked through part of Arlington, because I felt more like being outside and walking then I felt like getting on the Metro. At Pentagon City I decided to take a deep breath and try to figure out the Metro. I had about six internal temper tantrums in the process of doing so, but I did it in the end. Went to L’Enfant Square – don’t ask me why; it seemed like a good idea at the time – bumbled around for awhile getting oriented – then managed that and went to the Smithsonian “castle”, which reminded me pleasantly of Manchester Town Hall – the Natural … Read the rest

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And I’m at it – on the way to DC to talk about women in secularism.

It’s cloudy. Phooey. It’s been cloudless for days but now it’s cloudy. Seattle is interesting from above, and I always like being able to look at it. Oh well.

On the airport train I saw a LOLcats ad that started “Oh hai train peeples” – which made me laugh despite boredom with LOLcats in general.

Oh hai airport peeples.

Soon it will be airplane peeples. Then hotel peeples. Then conference peeples. If you’re one of the latter, say hello. Or oh hai.… Read the rest

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Yikes. One of those days.

Two tweets right on top of each other but arbitrarily…and yet how connected they are.

London Complains‏@LondonComplains @CathElliott Well grumble ye not. When London’s declared a commie femicunt-free zone you won’t be able to get past the barricades anyway. x
Retweeted by CathElliott

Jessica Ahlquist‏@jessicaahlquist“@tmsmith123: @jessicaahlquist it would so make my day if I heard you got gang rape by a bunch of black guys with AIDS.”

[Jessica quoting @tmsmith123]… Read the rest

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Uh oh…

A 15-year-old housewife lied to her husband when she told him she was having an affair with her uncle, a court heard today.

The husband of the Syrian teenager lodged a complaint at Al Qusais Police Station on November 14 after noticing the uncle’s number on her mobile phone.

When he confronted his wife she said her uncle often called her to flirt and that the two had been meeting for sex while he was not at home.

When investigators questioned the teenager she told them that her uncle – a 38-year-old from Saudi Arabia – had taken advantage of her young age and the problems she was experiencing in her marriage to convince her to have sex

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I’ve talked about Sally Haslanger’s “Changing the Ideology and Culture of Philosophy: Not by Reason (Alone)” before – last October – but I’m off to DC tomorrow for the Women in Secularism conference so I feel like talking about it again.

In graduate school I was told by one of my teachers that he had “never seen a first rate woman [in] philosophy and never expected to because women were incapable of having seminal ideas.” I was the butt of jokes when I received a distinction on my prelims, since it seemed funny to everyone to suggest I should get a blood test to determine if I was really a woman. In a seminar in philosophical logic, I was asked

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You know Rawls and the veil of ignorance?

John Scalzi offers the same metaphor but in a different vocabulary.

Dudes. Imagine life here in the US — or indeed, pretty much anywhere in the Western world — is a massive role playing game, like World of Warcraft except appallingly mundane, where most quests involve the acquisition of money, cell phones and donuts, although not always at the same time. Let’s call it The Real World. You have installed The Real World on your computer and are about to start playing, but first you go to the settings tab to bind your keys, fiddle with your defaults, and choose the difficulty setting for the game. Got it?

Okay: In the role

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One of the most painful passages to write in Does God Hate Women? was the one about women accused of being witches in Ghana. It drew on news reports, like this from the New Jersey Star Ledger:

Near death after a 30-mile, weeklong walk, Tarana says she arrived at the Gambaga camp, which has sheltered accused witches since the late 18th century. Chief Ganbaraaba, she says, took her in, had her wounds tended to, and sent for Tarana’s children.

Not one has come.

You can see why that segment was tough going.

Another one:

While Adijah Iddrissu’s doll-like hands busy themselves shelling groundnuts, her large piercing eyes track her grandmother.

At 7, Adijah already has put in a year at

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