Author: Ophelia Benson

The Freedom House report on blasphemy laws gets it right.

[A]n examination of the application of blasphemy laws indicates that they typically give rise to the violation, not the protection, of fundamental human rights.

…

 

By definition, these laws, which are designed to protect religious institutions, doctrines, figures, and concepts—in other words, nonhuman entities and ideas—from insult or offense, impose undue restrictions on freedom of expression.

As you saw if you keep up with the News here, Marc Alan Di Martino helpfully translated some theocratic bullying from Italy’s Foreign Minister Franco Frattini in the Vatican’s house rag the Osservatore Romano.

Christians also must be able to forge an agreement with Muslims on how to fight those aspects which, like all extremisms, threaten society. I refer to atheism, materialism and relativism. Christians, Muslims and Jews can work together to reach this common objective. I believe it’s time for a new humanism in order to struggle against these perverse phenomena, because only the centrality of the human being is an antidote to fanaticism and intolerance.

Very papal, isn’t it. Also stupid and deceitful – the whole point of theocracy is that it is not about “the centrality of the human being,” it’s about the centrality of that thing way way above the human being: good old God.

Frattini has form when it comes to theocratic bullying. He was on the job during the Motoons fuss (when he was justice commissioner for the EU), telling the European media to “self-regulate.”

Frattini is appealing for the European media to agree to “self-regulate”. “The press will give the Muslim world the message: we are aware of the consequences of exercising the right of free expression, we can and we are ready to self-regulate that right,” he said.

Yet that man has the gall to talk about theism as giving a rat’s ass about the “centrality of the human being.”

The loveliness of the religious mind.

Seriously they want me to wear purple because five queers committed suicide. The only way im wearin it for them is if they all commit suicide. I cant believe the people of this world have gotten this stupid. We are honoring the fact that they sinned and killed therselves because of their sin. REALLY PEOPLE

Ooh ick – who’s that – some high school kid, right?

No, it’s a school board member at Midland School District in Arkansas. It’s a grown-up male adult mature citizen over the age of 16.

being a fag doesnt give you the right to ruin the rest of our lives. If you get easily offended by being called a fag then dont tell anyone you are a fag. Keep that shit to yourself. I dont care how people decide to live their lives. They dont bother me if they keep it to thereselves. It pisses me off though that we make a special purple fag day for them. I like that fags cant procreate. I also enjoy the fact that they often give each other aids and die. If you arent against it, you might as well be for it.

An adult, and a school board member. He’s a member of a school board. He plays a role in education.

I would disown my kids if they were gay. They will not be welcome at my home or in my vicinity. I will absolutely run them off. Of course my kids will know better. My kids will have solid christian beliefs. See it infects everyone.

And a Christian.

However, not everyone disagreed with McCance’s comments, which he had defended on his page by citing his religious beliefs.

Gays and lesbians are “thinking they’re all right, and [God is] going to let them think that and go to hell for believing what they’re doing is right,” pastor Harry Craig, of Pleasant Plains Full Gospel Church, told CNN Little Rock affiliate KARK.

God is love; God is compassion; what would Jesus do.

I was very chuffed to see that Time did a story on Freethought Kampala. Uganda needs all the freethought it can get, so publicity is good.

A study by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life found that 97% of Ugandans are believers, and the fact that professions of atheism are invariably met with incredulity has prompted most of Uganda’s freethinkers to keep their skepticism in the closet.

But James Onen, a former Pentecostal Christian who once spoke in tongues, is not among them.

Onen, 35, had abandoned his once fervent Christian beliefs by the age of 20, after reading the Bible cover to cover and noting what he said were its logical inconsistencies. Hoping to promote reason and logic, the organization initially focused on the widespread belief — even among Uganda’s Christians — in witchcraft, but it has since taken aim at religion too. Pentecostal Christianity is a particular concern, Onen says, because it promotes the belief that “we are living in a time of spiritual warfare involving evil spirits,” which he says has reinforced the practice of witchcraft.

Victor Stenger sends encouragement.

It’s time for secularists to stop sucking up to Christians–and Muslims and Jews and Hindus and any others who claim they have some sacred right to decide what kind of society the rest of us must live in–what a human being can do with her own body. The good news is that young people are joining the rising atheist movement in increasing numbers. I have not met one yet who is an accommodationist.

That is indeed what it is time for. This does not mean, contrary to what accommodationists keep saying (whether they believe it or not, and I suspect they mostly don’t), it is time for us to call believers idiots whenever we encounter them. It means it is time to stop sucking up to them by pretending to think their religious beliefs are entirely reasonable and well-founded.

I think there is room, indeed a need, for both the accommodationist and confrontationist approaches. If you look at the history of every great social movement–the abolition of slavery, women’s rights, civil rights, gay rights–you will see both components. There are people who try to work within the system to make changes. They often succeed, but usually at a snail’s pace–too slow to satisfy the millions who are impatient to have their inherent rights recognized by the power structure.And that’s where the rabble-rousers come in. They confront the system and eventually win the hearts of a majority that becomes awakened to the basic justice of the cause. They also give more power to those trying to work within the system.

We’re needed. We have a part to play. We’re not leaving.