Center For Inquiry Uses Manufactured Outrage For A Payday

image of Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins

Richard Dawkins, an evolutionary biologist, had a recent book tour appearance in California canceled because of past insensitive remarks about Muslims. It fanned the flames of misunderstanding about ‘free speech’ as a concept. No matter how many times it’s explained, some people refuse to understand. It also doesn’t help when a freethought group tries to make some money on that misunderstanding.

I thought it was cute to get a fundraising email from the Center for Inquiry (CFI) last week complaining about Dawkins having his free speech blocked by a California radio station. It seems that the station came across some abusive comments Dawkins has made over the years about Islam. The weird neo-con/alt-right/Christian conservative/angry atheist intersection showed how easy it’s for people, including those who should know better, to get the “free speech” concept wrong.

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The Reason Rally Downplays The Reason For The Rally

logo for the 2016 Reason Rally

The Reason Rally is being held on Saturday. It will be a great opportunity for Nontheists need to show our growing numbers, on a public stage, as a counter to the religious privilege we have to deal with every day in our local, state, and national government. However in a big write up on the event at CNN, the organizers seemed to be diluting the chief idea behind the rally – celebrating our nontheism. It seems like they missed an opportunity to be more direct in, I guess, a futile effort to change the minds of people who hate us anyway.

I support the rally 100% and even donated to it even if I couldn’t attend myself. I love the idea of the rally and the reasons behind it. 

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Amy Roth Joins the Tone Police and ‘Dear Muslimas’ Atheist Billboard

created image with word Atheists!!!

A freethought group in the Cincinnati area raised $10,000 to pay for a billboard to counter the taxpayer funded Ark Encounter amusement park, sprung from the mind of serial creationist Ken Ham and features a life size version of Noah’s Ark. Of course not all atheists are happy with the protest. I was shocked that blogger Amy Roth would try to protect Ken Ham’s feelings and use an argument she has rejected when directed against her.

Here is a screencap of the billboard rendering the Tri-State Freethinkers tried to have put up:

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Is It Time To Remove Richard Dawkins As The ‘Face’ Of The Atheist Movement?

image of Richard Dawkins
Supposed smart guy Richard Dawkins

Richard Dawkins is seen as a rock star by some in the atheist movement. He’s had best selling books, too many keynote speeches to count, awards and honors out the wazoo, he’s the media’s go to person on religious issues and atheism. He also has a problem with shooting his mouth off about some topics that cause distress and anger in the atheist and secular community. Dawkins seriously needs to join Twitter’s Anonymous because for a man known for thousands of words to explain his atheism he has a terrible time trying to express himself in 140 character bites on Twitter. After his latest foot-in-mouth maybe it’s time to remove Dawkins as the public face of the atheist movement.

Dawkins latest twitter war erupted after he retweeted a video that not only equated some feminists with ISIS but the cartoon also included a character based on a real woman who has been the subject of constant harassment and death threats online for THREE years.

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Could Fear Of Islamophobia Lead Atheists To Overlook Religious Bigotry?

image of Teen girls playing soccer

What started out as story about a soccer team invoking religious privilege, that was posted on an atheist blog, took a left turn as the author and many commenters didn’t seem to be concerned with an Islamic school soccer team forcing two Catholic girls to sit out half a match because the Muslim player’s religion wouldn’t allow them to mix with strange females. Could the fear of Islamophobia lead some atheists to overlook obvious religious bigotry? Looks like it can.

Hemant Mehta, over at Friendly Atheist, posted a story about two girls who played on a boy’s soccer team in Ontario Canada:

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