Here’s a thing. A very small thing, but a thing.

I just saw it for about the 87th time and realized what’s so annoying about it.

It’s != or |= for ≠

Here’s what so annoying about it.

What the hell is the point? Just say “doesn’t equal.” If you don’t have the actual ≠ handy then just type the words, for godsake.

I know another one like that. DFW for Dallas Ft Worth. If you’re writing or typing, by all means say DFW, but if you’re talking – well do what you want, but DFW is more syllables than Dallas Ft Worth.

I know this because Martin Amis pointed out another one in The Information – someone talking referred to the MW for microwave. Count them.

Here’s another: the BBC always says WWF, never World Wildlife Fund. Both longer and more cryptic. Stupid.

Always be careful of the W.

Also – I don’t want to point fingers, but four twenty ten is a silly way to say ninety.

This has been Sunday Advice, brought to you by the Milk Marketing Board.

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

One of the current hot memes in the “let’s hate on FTB and feminazis” campaign is to announce that we’re “infantilizing” women and that it’s disgusting, outrageous, appalling. What’s up with that?

How are we infantilizing women? I don’t see it. By thinking conferences should have anti-harassment policies?

Surely not. Having a policy doesn’t “infantilize” any more than laws do. Having a policy lets people know where they are, instead of forcing them to try to figure it out on their own. It lets people know they have some rights (and some obligations). It lets people know what’s expected of them. If anyone is being infantilized surely it’s people who have to be told not to make unwanted sexual moves.

In a way, anti-harassment policies de-infantilize women, in the sense that women who want sexual moves will probably have to do some initiating. What’s wrong with that?

Or is it by objecting to being called cunts and bitches all the time?

Come on. Is it “infantilizing” for people to object to racist epithets? I don’t think I’ve ever heard that suggested. If it’s not, why would it be so for women to object to sexist epithets?

Or maybe it’s neither of those, but then I have no idea what it is.

Anyone?

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

Atheism is easy for me in a way it’s not easy for people in (for instance) small towns in the South or Midwest – people like Jerry DeWitt of DeRidder, Louisiana, for instance.

DeWitt is something of a reality check for many atheists, whose principles rarely cost them more than the price of “The God Delusion” in paperback. DeWitt refuses to leave DeRidder, a place where religion, politics and family pride are indivisible. Six months after he was “outed” as an atheist he lost his job and his wife — both, he says, as a direct consequence. Only a handful of his 100-plus relatives from DeRidder still speak to him. When I visited him, in late June, his house was in foreclosure, and he was contemplating moving into his 2007 Chrysler PT Cruiser. This is the kind of environment where godlessness remains a real struggle and raises questions that could ramify across the rest of the country. Is the “new atheism” part of a much broader secularizing trend, like the one that started emptying out the churches in European towns and villages a century ago? Or is it just a ticket out of town?

That’s very poignant - he’s lost nearly everything but he refuses to leave.

When I first met Jerry DeWitt, I half expected a provincial contrarian hungry for attention. Instead, he was mild and apologetic, a short, baby-faced man with a gentle smile and a neatly trimmed dark beard. He was earnest and warm, and I soon discovered that many of his fellow townspeople cannot help liking him, no matter how much they dislike his atheism. He appears to have reached his conclusions about God with reluctance, and with remorse for the pain he has caused his friends and family. He seems to bear no grudge toward them. “At every atheist event I go to, there’s always someone who’s been hurt by religion, who wants me to tell him all preachers are charlatans,” DeWitt told me, soon after we met. “I always have to disappoint them. The ones I know are mostly very good people.”

But he’s a pariah in DeRidder – and a resource for other pariahs.

But DeWitt also hurled himself into his new role as a faith healer in reverse. He became the first “graduate” of the Clergy Project, discarding his anonymity and giving the clandestine preachers’ group its first dash of publicity. It was formed in early 2011 with a few dozen members, mostly recruited through Dan Barker, a former pastor who is co-president of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, and through Linda LaScola, who in 2010 co-conducted a study of nonbelieving pastors with Daniel Dennett, the atheist philosopher. The project now has more than 300 members, with about 80 applicants awaiting clearance (the group is very careful about admissions, to secure the members’ privacy).

DeWitt also became the executive director of Recovering From Religion, formed in 2009 by Darrel Ray, a Kansas-based atheist proselytizer. The group grew quickly under DeWitt’s leadership and now includes at least 100 local chapters scattered across the country, each one typically with 10 to 12 participants. Like other public figures in the movement, DeWitt also serves as a one-man clearinghouse for religious doubters via Facebook and e-mail. During the four days I spent with him in DeRidder, he was almost constantly checking his cellphone and tapping out messages.

Teresa MacBain is on the same trip.

One former pastor named Teresa MacBain told me that when she began doubting her faith last year, she ran through her list of friends and acquaintances and realized that every single one of them was religious. With no one to confide in, she began recording her thoughts into her iPhone when she was alone in the car. “It was a huge encouragement when I finally found other people to talk to online,” she told me. Like DeWitt, MacBain joined the Clergy Project. Then, earlier this year, she resigned from her pastor’s position in Tallahassee and went public as an atheist. She was promptly defriended (in the literal and Facebook sense) by almost everyone she knew. But like DeWitt, she has begun receiving frequent messages from doubting pastors and churchgoers, seeking her help in making the leap away from God. “It’s all new friends now,” she said.

It must be a little like living through a plague, or a huge natural disaster. All new friends now.

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

Goodbye Neil Armstrong, and thanks for everything.

Did you know he was a Muslim? The Zionist media won’t be telling you that, of course, but it’s the truth.

What happened is, he heard the call to prayer while he was strolling around on the moon, and that was so awesome that he was all “O Allah” and he totally converted.

Ok no it’s not the truth, it’s an urban legend.

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

And speaking of videos…I didn’t watch all of that one on The Point the other day, and yesterday a Facebook friend, Mavaddat, pointed out a later segment when they talked about Y no women. Michael Shermer explained.

It’s who wants to stand up and talk about it, go on shows about it, go to conferences and speak about it, who’s intellectually active about it, you know, it’s more of a guy thing.

Screeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeam.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5pmvv_-Lew

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

There has been another hangout. This one was hosted by Alex Gabriel, and had Debbie Goddard, Jason Thibeault, and Stephanie Zvan along with me. It was to discuss atheism+ and humanism and “divisiveness” and the fact that it’s not a coup or a usurpation.

To me, in fact, it’s mostly a label for a stance or point of view, a useful shorthand. I don’t think that’s terribly divisive.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l-3JkhuOQ7A

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

Another party heard from – Pat Condell explains about atheism+ on Twitter.

Atheism+ Whiney selective feminism that ignores Islamic misogyny. I almost hope God exists so he can piss in their eye.

Really! Is that a fact?!

No, it is not.

Whiny selective standup comedian.

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

There’s always the definition problem. We’re all against BadThings. That’s why they’re called Bad, isn’t it – because they’re Bad and we’re all against them. It’s just that we disagree on which things are Bad.

Caroline Criado-Perez looks at an example of this in the arguments over rape.

A couple of days ago on Twitter, the hashtag “MenAgainstRape” started to trend. Some people found this a positive and heartening response to a week where the hashtag “RapeApologist” also got some traction.

Because Aikin and Galloway and their cognates said the things they said.

Others, however, saw the hashtag as problematic. A typical response was that men being “against rape” should be considered the default position: the need for a hashtag was in itself disheartening. They also felt it demeaned the majority of men, who were, of course “against rape” – who wouldn’t be? It would be like coming out in favour of kicking puppies. Or murder. Of course as a society we are, by default, “against rape”.

A more significant problem with this hashtag was that, as was demonstrated by Akin’s desperate back-pedalling, even these new hate-figures are “against rape”; they just reserve the right to dictate, in defiance of law and science, what actually constitutes rape. Since Galloway denied that Assange’s actions fitted in with what “most people” understand by the term “rape”, he could also join the “MenAgainstRape” Twitter-fest – why not? He’s surely against rape too – whatever it is he considers that to be.

Quite so, and this is and always has been part of the problem. Until recently there was no such crime as marital rape, for instance.

We see the same thing with misogyny. Of course we’re all against misogyny; what serious atheist is not against misogyny? It’s insulting even to say it has to be spelled out. But the trouble with that is…we don’t all agree on what misogyny is, and it turns out that quite a few people define it so narrowly that it’s defined out of existence.

Naturally it’s possible to be wrong in the other direction – to label every cross word or disagreement or joke as misogynist. (The same is true, mutatis mutandis, for other categories – racial, national, professional, political, you name it.) So what to do? Keep arguing, I suppose, until the sands of time wash over us and new people are arguing about new things.

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

A new campaign ad: Kate Beckinsale, Judy Greer and Andrea Savage “spread” the message that the one thing women really want in their vagina is the government.

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

Health Canada has this thing where it solemnly approves homeopathic stuff as safe, effective and of high quality. What kind of stuff? you ask with your inquiring minds. Oh, nothing much. Just insulin and things.

Insulin?

Yes.

Pharmacist Scott Gavura tells us about it:

The Natural Health Product Regulations, under Canada’s Food and Drugs Act, regulate products such as nutritional supplements, probiotics, traditional Chinese medicine, vitamins, herbal remedies, and homeopathy. They are a deliberate shadow of the regulations that govern drug products — requiring some manufacturing quality and safety standards, while effectively removing the standards for product efficacy claims. Standards were dropped because there was no possible way that many of these products could ever meet the rigorous standards established for drug products.

So they dropped the standards to match the quality? That’s scary.

 The most problematic in the group was homeopathy. Homeopathy is an elaborate placebo system, where the “remedies” lack active ingredients. As would be expected with inert products, clinical trials confirm what basic science predicts: homeopathy’s effects are placebo effects. Yet Health Canada insists that this doesn’t compromise quality, safety, or efficacy:

Through the Natural Health Products Directorate, Health Canada ensures that all Canadians have ready access to natural health products that are safe, effective and of high quality, while respecting freedom of choice and philosophical and cultural diversity.

Oh dear god are you kidding me. Never mind philosophical and cultural diversity! Inappropriate! There isn’t useful diversity in medical standards and regulations. Poison doesn’t become not poison in a different culture. A glass of water doesn’t become insulin because cultural diversity. If you’re certifying something as effective then you have to use the right – universal – standards.

The consequence? Regulation of the absurd. Health Canada reviews every remedy, and explicitly attests their safety and effectiveness. In Canada you can purchase Health Canada approved (Search each product by number here):

• homeopathic sea water — DIN-HM 80017767
• homeopathic insulin — DIN-HM 80016480

There it is – homeopathic insulin. How many diabetic comas has that caused?

There’s also a homeopathic insect repellent.

For many of us, insect bites are an occasional annoyance that we can largely avoid. Yet insects can transmit over 100 diseases, including malaria, West Nile virus, yellow fever, Dengue fever, Lyme disease and even plague. Malaria alone kills 1.2 million people, mainly African children, annually. And now that we have West Nile and Lyme disease in Canada, there is a bigger impetus to minimize bites.

Yes but respect for freedom of choice and philosophical and cultural diversity is even more important than preventing malaria or West Nile virus. Apparently.

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

In the spirit of learning from the sciencey knowings of Todd Akin, the artist Kit Cameo created an artistic yet medical bottle in which women can collect and store their Magical Vaginal Death Venom.

It was for sale on ebay, and the subject of funny Q&A, but then ebay decided whoops, venom, two people complained (about “vagina”?) and ebay whisked it all away. Details pending.

So that’s crappy.

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

Michael Nugent has a draft manifesto to promote ethical atheism. I see this as a companion to atheism+ – as the same kind of thing, and compatible, and equally reasonable and unthreatening. I also see both as companions to other related campaigns and organizations and platforms and statements. I’ve seen a good deal of panic and hair-clutching about atheism+, which seems bizarre. There are no gulags.

The ideas in this draft manifesto are not new. Many atheist activists already promote many or all of them. This manifesto tries to combine the best of our existing ideas into a set of principles and aims that all ethical atheists can promote, regardless of our policy differences on how best to implement them.

See? Not new. No need to panic.

You know, the idea that sexism and racism and homophobia are really bad things and should be socially discouraged has been around for quite awhile. Atheism+ is much more of a reminder than it is a Giant Wall. Are all your friends sexist homophobic racists? Well then you’re already kind of restricted in your pool of friends, aren’t you. If you’re a frank unabashed vocal sexist or racist, the chances are very good that you’ve already alienated a lot of thoughtful clever interesting people, because people like that mostly aren’t fond of unabashed racism and sexism. If you’re a secret sexist or racist – well then what’s the problem? We don’t have magic radar to disclose your secret views.

So relax. Nobody’s coming to gitcha.

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

Yulia Latinina, who hosts a political talk show on Ekho Moskvy radio, explains the religious views of many Orthodox Christians, whom she calls Homo Orthodoxus. They sound quite similar to fanatics in the US, Pakistan, Rome, northern Nigeria – you get the idea.

First, this belief holds that God does not forgive. A typical example: During a recent demonstration against Pussy Riot, an Orthodox activist screamed “God does not forgive, and to claim otherwise is blasphemy,” while  beating a female supporter of the punk group.

And notice one other thing about that – it clearly includes the belief that the Self is authorized to assume it knows exactly what God does not forgive, and to punish people for that unforgivable thing. That’s a lot to assume! Even if the Orthodox activist were right about “God,” why would that justify the activist in beating someone up?

People so easily forget that the first does not lead to the second. “God does not forgive, so I get to beat you up.” No. That doesn’t follow.

The second belief of Homo Orthodoxus is that God bestows lavish  material gifts on the church’s leadership: luxury apartments, fancy cars  and expensive Swiss watches. For the Homo Orthodoxus, such perks are  part of being close to the Godhead.

Vatican.

Third, this God does not make any moral demands on his chosen followers but gives them full authority to make such demands on everybody else.

Aha, there it is. I would love to know exactly how they convince themselves of that…Although I suppose they don’t, really, they just assume it. It’s such a dangerous belief.

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

Hey, the Staggers blog is onto Atheism+.

Let me introduce you to Atheism+, the nascent movement that might be the most exciting thing to hit the world of unbelief since Richard Dawkins teamed up with Christopher Hitchens to tell the world that God was a Delusion and, worse than that, Not Great.

Less than a week old in its current form, Atheism+ is the brainchild of Jen McCreight, a Seattle-based biology postgrad and blogger at the secularist Freethought network. She has called for a “new wave” of atheism on that “cares about how religion affects everyone and that applies skepticism to everything, including social issues like sexism, racism, politics, poverty, and crime.”

Nelson Jones (for it is he) got that a bit wrong – you’re not supposed to say “the secularist Freethought network” like that, you have to add a minimum of two pejoratives and a parenthesis saying we hunt down dissenters and have been officially registered as a hategroup by The Coalition of Furious Tweeters.

In this early phase Atheism+ is fired by anger as much as by as idealism. And, at least initially, much of this anger is directed inward towards the world of atheism itself.

Any community, new or old, has its tensions, and in the past year the atheist/sceptical community has been rocked by a divisive and increasingly bad-tempered debate over sexism and, more generally, a sense that the dominant voices have tended to be white, male and middle-class.

And additionally that that wasn’t because there were no women qualified to be dominant voices, but rather because of sheer lazy forgetting to include them.

A number of incidents have served to crystallise the sense that all is not right in the world of unbelief.  Most notoriously, there was “Elevatorgate”, an late-night incident in a lift during an atheist conference in Dublin during which the blogger Rebecca Watson was propositioned. Her subsequent public complaint about the man’s behaviour and sexual harassment within the Skeptic movement drew criticism from Richard Dawkins himself and fuelled an ugly flame war.  She received, and continues to receive, rape and death threats.

…

The first item on the Atheism+ agenda, then, is a cleansing one. McCreight herself says: “We need to recognize that there’s still room for self-improvement and to address the root of why we’ve been having these problems in atheism and skepticism.” Greta Christina has gone so far as to devise a checklist of goals to which atheist organisations should aspire, including anti-harassment policies and ensuring diversity among both members and invited speakers. “To remember that not all atheists look like Richard Dawkins.”

That sounds like, at least partly, a negative programme – “getting rid of the garbage”. Yet the name – or at least the symbol – is pleasingly double-edged. “Atheism plus”, the natural reading, implies incompleteness: that other, associated principles need to be added to the core idea to produce a rounded philosophy. But it can also be read as “Atheism positive”, going beyond the mere negation of belief. Time will tell whether McCreight’s initiative leads to permanent changes in the atheist and sceptical movement, or to the formation of a new and distinct nexus of atheism and progressive politics, or is soon forgotten. But I’d bet against the latter. Whether or not the name sticks, there is an energy behind this new wave that makes it hard to ignore.

He forgot the pejoratives again!

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

Seen on Frans de Waal’s Facebook page – a problem is solved.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2yvp4SZS3M

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