Now here’s a huge surprise – Saudi Arabia isn’t “allowing” “its” women to participate in the Olympics. It has excellent reasons, of course.

Beans on toast are a powerful female aphrodisiac.

No, that’s not it. Rain makes Arab women go a funny greenish color.

No, Arab women are allergic to chips.

I’m being silly, I know this one – London streets are full of litter and coughed-up phlegm, so the women might slip and fall and get pregnant.

Wait. It’s high heels worn with jeans, that’s it – high heels worn with jeans are apostasy.

No actually it seems to be not about the UK at all, but about sports, and not to put too fine a point on it, any physical activity at all. Saudi women and girls are a kind of mushroom, raised in a dark corner of the basement.

Discrimination against women and girls in sports in Saudi Arabia – as in so many other areas of their lives – is entrenched in government policy, including:

·         Beginning from childhood, the government bans millions of Saudi girls from participating in physical education classes in state schools.

·         The kingdom discriminates against women by denying them access to sports facilities, including gyms and swimming pools.

·         The government has shut down private gyms established by women in recent years on the pretext that they were unlicensed.

·         There are no sports clubs for women, compared with 153 government-supported clubs for men.

·         The Saudi National Olympic Committee has no women’s section and does not hold sports competitions for women to allow them to qualify for national teams and international competitions.

See? Nothing. And it’s not as if they can go out running, is it. Fancy running in an abaya?

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

Stephanie Zvan has a pair of great posts on…well I’ll let her tell you, in the first one:

It had its genesis on stage, when Jen McCreight mentioned that, when she started speaking at conferences, multiple people contacted her behind the scenes to tell her which male speakers she should steer clear of.

That.

Stephanie summarizes via a FAQ:

Q: Do famous atheist speakers really act like assholes to women?

A: Yes.

Q: Really?!

A: I said, “Yes.” I’ve experienced some of it, in front of witnesses. I’ve talked to other women who’ve experienced it personally. I’ve talked to conference organizers who have strategies for minimizing the damage when they have to invite one of these men to one of their conferences.

Also, did you just express “skepticism” over this? It’s a completely uncontroversial statement. Unaccetable gendered behavior exists. Our movement is not immune. Men don’t become immune to bad behavior just because people like how they speak or write or organize. Yes, it happens.

Unwanted sexual overtures, is what this is about. Lunging, grabbing, cornering, flashing, leering, following. Not ”romance”; not “flirtation”; sexual harrassment; hostile work environment.

And then there’s who are they. (I knew one name before the conference. I now know three.) We’re not in a position to say.

Q: Why aren’t you naming and shaming?

A: Until a year ago, this was harder to explain succinctly. Now, sadly, it’s much easier.

Did you see what happened to Rebecca Watson? Have you seen what’s still happening today? That’s why.

And Rebecca didn’t even name.

Q: How bad can these guys be if they keep getting invited to speak?

A: As bad as they’re allowed to be. As I already pointed out, you’ve probably seen the public behavior of some of these guys already. Has it kept them from getting audiences and invitations? Has it kept them from getting jobs? Has it kept them from being treated as the cool kids?

No. It has not.

Not only are these speakers still allowed to show up, but they’re still in demand. Conferences need to sell tickets and fill seats. When organizers stop inviting some of the people on this list, unless sexism is a primary concern for donors, unless experiences are allowed to be made public, organizers get overruled. If the speaker is a draw, there is a limited amount organizers can do.

That’s the part that really bites. “Oh hey, so he makes a few women miserable, big deal – he’s a name and we can get him, so he’s in.”

Stephanie got the comment she needed, so that’s the starting point for her second post. Read Erista’s comment. It’s a scorcher.

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

Brian Engler has a bunch of photos from the WiS conference at Facebook, and I want to share one I particularly like. I might share others, too – I have Brian’s permission.

I give you Jamila Bey and Debbie Goddard, courtesy of Brian D. Engler:

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

Why women need freedom from religion, item #3,985,431.

A Sudanese judge, Sami Ibrahim Shabo sentenced to death by stoning a young woman accused of committing adultery.

Intisar Sharif Abdalla, believed to be between 15 and 17 years of age (although prison authorities claim she is 20) was sentenced to death in accordance with Article 146 of the Sudanese criminal law albeit without legal representation.

The judgment was made on May 13, 2012 after just one hearing and came after an “admission of guilt” plea following torture and brutal beatings by Sharif’s brother who instigated the case. Her co-accused however remains un-convicted and walks freely.

She denied the accusation. But.

Her lawyer, only able to access her after the judgment was made, understands that following her initial denial she was beaten up and tortured repeatedly by her brother forcing her to confess to committing adultery. With the ‘coerced’ confession, Judge Sami Ibrahim Shabo of Ombada General Criminal Court, Khartoum state, sentenced her to stoning after just one court session.

Brilliant. Her brother tortured her into “confessing” that she had sex without being married, and the judge seized this torture-compelled “confession” to a non-crime and ruled that she should be stoned to death.

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

60 Minutes had a segment on the death industry and oversight of cemeteries last night. Guess who was the official voice of the consumer who told Anderson Cooper (Anderson Cooper!!) what’s what.

Our friend Josh Slocum, that’s who.

Anderson said the industry says these unfortunate incidents in which bodies get dug up and thrown out so that people can re-sell their plots are just a few bad apples. “Oh nonsense,” says Josh very briskly indeed.

I wanted to embed it but it doesn’t work the way YouTube does so I don’t know how to do it. Click the link.

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

I’ve just learned that Leo Igwe is going to be at TAM this year.

Well so am I. I get to meet Leo!!

I’m jealous of myself right now.

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

Paul Fidalgo reports on the conference for The Morning Heresy. (He’s another one of those people – like Rebecca – who are just consistently very funny. He did a tweet that cracked me up – approximately: “I could do a ‘this is what an atheist looks like’ ad but no one would be surprised.”)

Now that was a conference!

This was no egg-headed snoozer, this was no reiteration of why we like Darwin so much (not that there’s anything wrong with those). The Women in Secularism conference was as fantastic, fulfilling, and enlightening an event as we could ever have hoped.

I think that too. Also.

Susan Jacoby did the first talk. I didn’t liveblog that one because the panel I was on was next and I didn’t want to cross wires, if you see what I mean. I’m not good at multitasking. (Neither is anyone else. People think they are, but they’re wrong. Studies show this. People are confused because they can physically multitask, but they do the tasks badly. The fact that it’s physically possible to hold a book in front of your eyes while talking on the phone doesn’t mean you can read a book and talk on the phone at the same time. But that’s by the way.) I’m a plodder. I need to concentrate. I could listen to Jacoby’s talk without crossing wires, but liveblogging it too seemed a wire too many. Or maybe I was just being lazy.

Anyway: she said among other things that it has happened that when someone asks “why no women in atheism?” some men will cheerfully reply that it’s because women are too stupid.

Well, you know, that is what it is at bottom: that people think that. Too stupid and too Nice, which is perhaps the product of being too stupid.

That’s what I talked about for my opening remarks for the panel. The perception of women, and the fact that in some ways a certain kind of feminism – difference feminism – has enforced it rather than undermining it. We are seen as too stupid and too Nice (or, in an exciting twist, too bitchy) for pretty much everything. We must be, or we wouldn’t be so conspicuously missing from popular culture, and we wouldn’t be so staggeringly vapid when not missing.

This is not something it’s easy to change. I know this, because I know feminists have been trying to change it since at least 1970, and in some ways it’s worse than it was then.

Younger generation – your task is plain. Get to it. Thank you.

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

Ways to be not a good polite considerate air traveler.

Take advantage of your aisle seat to extend your leg all the way out into the aisle and then wave your enormous dirty bare foot with its smashed toenails up and down up and down up and down.

Take advantage of your aisle seat to cross your right leg over your left knee so that your enormous dirty bare foot with its smashed toenails is almost in the lap of the politely restrained atheist woman in the other aisle seat, and then keep inching it closer and closer.

Put your enormous dirty bare foot with its smashed toenails on your knee and clean it out between the toes, carefully dropping whatever you find onto the aisle floor.

Put your enormous dirty bare foot with its smashed toenails back into its sandal for awhile and stick it out into the aisle in order to stamp it heavily at irregular intervals.

Seize your enormous dirty bare foot with its smashed toenails and weave your fingers into the toes as if you were holding hands with your own foot.

Do all these things without ceasing for 5 hours on a completely full flight.

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

The pushback has started. Well you knew it would.

Catherine Dunphy has an article on the Women in Secularism conference at RDF – an original, not a link. There are sneery how dare you comments from some usual suspects (like Geoffrey Falk, for instance, who has been shouting at me for years for glaring faults like having no tits). It’s all so reflexive, you know? “How dare you say there’s sexism in the atheist movement, you shrill strident hysterical ugly bitch with no tits?!!”

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

Oh fuck. Plane broken, of course. Delay of hour and fifteen minutes. I’ll get in WAY LATE at night.

No, now it’s an hour and a half.

Blargh.

I shouldn’t be posting this. It’s a tweet at most. Very self-indulgent.

But blargh.

Update. Well that was a quick reversal of fortune. They changed their minds and decided to give us a different plane, instead, at a different gate, so suddenly instead of being in a smelly faux-leather chair surrounded by smelly people with a view of smelly people (no offense – we’re all smelly) I’m in one of those airport rocking chairs (what a great idea!) facing a huge bank of windows with a view of the office towers of Charlotte and planes taking off, and people sparse and at a much pleasanter distance. Gosh.

Who knew Charlotte had office towers? To be perfectly honest I don’t even know where Charlotte is, despite having spent some time in NC a mere couple of decades ago. It’s…middleish, I think. It’s fer sher not in the mountains (which are beautiful, by the way), nor is it on the coast…so that leaves middleish.

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

Charlotte airport. Yes right, flying due south is just the way to get from DC to Seattle – sigh.

I’m processing it all. It was terrific fun.

Rebecca’s great. Don’t let anybody tell you different. She’s funny as hell – that’s not a big surprise, but it’s not something she can do only when facing a webcam or at a podium or on Twitter…wait…that’s too many only ins…Ok it’s something she can do in all the places.

Jamila’s like that too.

Lauren Becker is a genius at keeping things on time without being even a little bit obnoxious. Melody thought of the whole thing. Ron, as he said, approved it.

Boarding. Ah me. Six hours of fun.

Catch you tomorrow.

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

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 her on the stage so that she can answer questions later.

“Many public officials simply do not comprehend what ‘secular’ means.” They think non-denominational is secular, so “holy matrimony” and “in the eyes of god” are ok for civil marriage. Wrong!

Reba Boyd Wooden takes the stage. Secular Celebrants at www.secularhumanism.org

“Or the bride has to promise to obey. I think I did this 50 years ago, but I didn’t mean it when I said it.”

Indiana is well represented here. Reba at the mic right now, Jen in the audience a couple of rows in front of me.

Fox News in Indiana have been very good to CFI Indiana – very fair. Huh. Whaddya know.

Writers for secular ceremonies: Ingersoll, Keats, George Eliot, Thoreau. (Jennifer Michael Hecht name-checked Keats in her poetry reading last night. High five!)

“Our legacy is our afterlife.”

Question: does the trend for same sex marriage help or hinder the movement for secular celebration? Margaret and Reba: it helps!

Linda LaScola on what clergy are like. The one thing the ones she knows have in common: wherever they started out, they all end up as liberal.

Celebrating non-superstition. Friday the 13th. The Museum of Superstition. Great because the press love it. Next bash: September 13, 2013, in Pennsylvania. Mark your calendars.

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

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!

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

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 Secular Students are growing hugely while Cru (as secular students call Campus Crusade for Christ) is going in the opposite direction…and they have WAY more money. Go us!

Greta says if the LGBT movement had had the internet in 1969 – wo.

When the internet blows up, it’s different. Hmmm. When the internet blows up about sexism, at least people think sexism is bad. Hmmm. I’m not sure about that.

(What do you think, Linda? I think the internet is [at least also] enabling sexist discourse, and fanning enthusiasm for it and a “community” of it the way it is for, say, atheists and secularists.)

Jamila: “Frankly, I’m a loudmouth and I like words.”

The future should be informed by the past.

“You don’t want to use birth control? Well be Quiverfull and get a show on the Discovery channel.”

Debbie: “So we weren’t really serious about that two minute thing, right?” [laughter]

The movement is broadening as the people involved become more varied. “As the scope broadens we’ll see more people involved.”

Jennifer says her next question is about coalitions. Is it a good idea for us to make coalitions with more liberal kinds of religion? Jen says it’s fine to work with religious groups but we don’t want to do “interfaith” because faith is not a good thing. Yeah.  

Jamila’s little boy is upstairs at the daycare. At his school 13% of the kids are at grade level in science. She’s willing to show up at his school. She might not wear her “show me on the doll where Jesus touched you” T shirt. But there are going to be times when the price is too high. There are going to be times when if you can’t sign the statement of faith you can’t participate. “You can’t come in unless you’re willing to cover. Your name is ‘Bey,’ what’s the problem?”

Debbie: we realize sometimes that there are groups who don’t want us there, because we’re atheists. Some feminist groups are full of woo, so that’s another kind of coalition-building – atheist feminists working with feminist groups and bringing along some skepticism. Ohhh yes.

Debbie: “the problem comes when people assume they know what everybody wants.” Everybody wants to hold hands; nuh uh. Everybody wants to talk about science all day; nuh uh.”

Jamila is invited to a secular inquiry parents group. “Wow, a parents’ group; I have a child; that’s really convenient.” And then – “Nobody starts a sentence with, ‘My child is an indigo child.’”

“This is why I’m so big about ‘be who you are, wear a button.’” We need to do more family stuff and bring kids so they get good memories and they will grow up in the movement.

Greta: “When it’s hard to come out, the people who come out are people who don’t care that much what people think of them.” That’s going to change. Now the movement is growing we’re going to get more people who are social, and do care what people think of them.”

Simon’s battery is about to die. I can’t spot him in the room. Will fall silent in a minute.

Or maybe 19 minutes, which might get me through.

Debbie: was there a world before YouTube? We all need more history. Yes we would benefit; no that’s not why people come to meetings.

Jamila: “We need to let people know there were always people who doubted.”

“I wish we did more reading as a society, especially since I’m a journalist. But then I’m a journalist on the radio…”

Greta: a focus on history shouldn’t mean getting stuck doing things the way they’ve always been done.

Jamila answers audience question: “As a journalist who covers women’s health issues, I’m a little pessimistic.” A journalistic shout-out. “Women don’t do op-eds.” There’s a thing called the Op-ed Project; google it and act accordingly.

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

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 niece was forced to marry her cousin when she was 11, and he was over 40. This was allowed because the prophet married Aisha when she was 6.

Ok going to lose it now.

She’s choking.

This is hard. Deep breath.

Her niece kept begging her father to let her leave. He always said it was shame; he would talk to him.

At the age of 28 she killed herself by setting herself on fire.

The whole room lost it. Quietly.

Now it’s her patient.

Pregnant. Frantic. Husband dead 2 years. Husband’s brother having sex with her in exchange for money to feed her children. Returned after an abortion looking ill – she almost died – she had the op with no anaesthetic. Why? She didn’t have the money.

She used to cry all the time. Now she is free – but she still cries for all the Muslim women.

Not an eye in the house was dry.

“I was born in hell, I moved to paradise. Most Americans take it for granted, they don’t know how lucky they are.”

“Just walking to Starbucks by myself in the morning without being called a whore.”

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

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 rules of interruption:

The more powerful person gets to interrupt.

Men use the Voice of Authority. Women talk more softly and often in a higher register, and they apologize.

But hey – there’s research that shows talking softly encourages others to speak. Here’s the deal: everybody needs to be able to do both.

Informal rules. You learn them by talking to people. Relevant to going to lunch.

Men determine the subject of conversation. Women don’t.

We all do these things. Sandler once found herself looking at a watch repeatedly during a meeting – and suddenly noticed she was looking only while a woman was talking, never while a man was.

Women are treated in these ways because they are devalued.

A lot of us have trouble being direct.

[Battery at 38%]

Adapted biblical passage for the end.

[Battery at 44%]

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

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.

Wafa Sultan got some fame as the first woman to tell a Muslim man to be quiet on tv. “I didn’t tell him to be quiet. I told him to shut up.”

“The more religious people are, the less creative they can be.”

Greta notes that being many kinds of outlaw is difficult.

Liz: “the secular movement cannot replace family.” The costs are extraordinarily high for women.

Annie Laurie: “Maybe we’re giving the church too much credit. Churches often get the credit, and taxpayers get the bill.”

Sultan points out that Hamas won that election because it had such good social programs – funded by the Saudis. (Not Iran?)

Greta suggests that if religion benefits from an unequal society, gee maybe let’s create a more equal society. [applause line]

Wafa Sultan tells us about a friend of hers who is a psychologist, and is veiled from head to toe. She considers herself a whore. Why? Because she was forced to marry a man not of her choice. She’s been married to him three years and not had a child; she hopes that will be his reason to divorce her.

We need to inspire young people, Jacoby says. Support the Secular Student Alliance, Greta says. Liz says there’s nothing like the religious right to get people passionate. “We have to ignite this passion in young people, and remind them what is at risk.”

“How fragile these gains are.”

“It’s a long game,” Greta says.

Audience question: what do you say to people who say concern about women’s rights in distant countries is “cultural imperialism”?

Someone in the audience two people away from me – “That’s bullshit – nobody says that.”

Greta: “Tell that to the girl who’s had her clitoris cut off, tell it to the girls who’s had acid thrown in her face – and then, fuck you.”

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

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.

Ernestine Rose: “I asked God if it was a sin and he didn’t say a word.” Big laugh line.

“Any family that has such a book [the bible] should be ostracized by all respectable families” – Annie Laurie quoting another firebrand from the 19th century.

“Give me truth: cheat me by no illusion.” Margaret Fuller.

“She warned about the Christian who preys.”

“I cannot understand why they have not rebelled.”

“We have heard enough about a paradise behind the moon.”

Vashti Cromwell of McCollum of McCollum v Board of Education.

“Denied the luminescence of her mind.”

Katha Pollitt – yessssss!

Taslima – our fellow FTB blogger.

“Denied the luminescence of her mind.”

Wendy Kaminer, Ann Druyan, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Julia Sweeney…Jessica Ahlquist.

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

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!

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