Hemant Mehta's Blog, page 1705

A Duggar Family Response to the Child Molestation Scandal, Courtesy of Funny or Die

Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar *finally* responded in some depth to the allegations that their son Josh molested his sisters severals years ago:

I’m just shocked they decided to do it at Funny or Die…

It’s never good when a parody is that close to reality, right?

(via JT Eberhard)

In Swing States, Christians are Fading and Nones are Rising

Maybe if we keep giving politicians reason to pay attention to those of us without religion, some of them (hi, Bernie Sanders!) will take the hint.

Using the Pew Research Center’s 2007 Religious Landscape survey and their own 2014 American Values Atlas, the Public Religion Research Institute took a look at the religious demographic changes in the political swing states.

They found that, down the line, every state is losing Christians and gaining people without religion.

Okay, so the religious st...

We Need More Liberals Willing to Critique Islam, Says Ex-Muslim Leader

The American Humanist Association just uploaded several videos from its recent conference in Denver. I’ll post a few of them over the next day or so, but the crown jewel so far has to be Sarah Haider‘s speech about the necessity of liberal critiques of Islam.

Haider, who works with Ex-Muslims of North America, wrote a guest post for this site last year rebutting arguments made by Reza Aslan that I thought was just fantastic.

She’s already getting some rave reviews:

Sarah Haider is my new hero. S...

Locked Out of My Own Facebook Page… Please Help?

***Update***: I appear to have control of the page again. Will write more soon. Thanks to everyone for your suggestions.

…

I don’t know what to do. Maybe someone out there can help me out?

Last night, my personal Facebook account was hacked. I went through the site’s security protocol and regained access to my account this morning.

But it looks like whoever got into my account removed both me and my co-administrator from the Friendly Atheist Facebook page. While it looks like the spam has stopped...

Young People Aren’t Leaving Christianity Just Because They’re Apathetic About Faith

Adam Ford, a Christian cartoonist, made this comic that I’ve seen several people sharing online:

The full strip is here and you should read the whole thing to understand his perspective.

In short, it acknowledges what the studies have been showing: Christianity is losing people while the “Nones” are growing. But Ford suggests that the shift has everything to do with people who never really cared about religion one way or another — the “cultural” Christians — and simply use whatever label is mos...

A YouTube Introduction to Street Epistemology

I’ve posted a number of videos by Anthony Magnabosco on this site, in which he speaks to strangers about their religious beliefs for just few minutes and then deconstructs the whole conversation afterwards.

Now, Socrates Jones has offered a lengthier introduction to how you can do this sort of “street epistemology” yourself:

The first half is a bit dry for my tastes, but it is a pretty good introduction to the subject.

The impetus for this series on street epistemology comes from Peter Boghossia...

India College Will Now Accept Openly Transgender and Atheist Students

This is pretty neat, especially in a country known for its traditional and cultural norms: India’s Jorhat College (Amalgamated) will now accept openly transgender and atheist students, becoming one of the first schools of its kind to do so (if not the first):

The admission forms of the college for the next academic year, starting July, will differ from other colleges in the Northeast as it will have an additional option in the gender column apart from male and female categories — transgender o...

Facebook Page Has Been Hacked

Quick note. The Facebook page for this site(along with my personal page) has been hacked. I’ve gone through the motions to regain access to it, but the security settings say I have to wait 24 hours to get back on.

If you know anything else I should be doing right now (or know someone at Facebook who can speed this up), please let me know. Thanks!

Christian Pastor Claims to Resurrect Man from the Dead, but Man’s Sister Tells a Different Story

This story has been messing with my head for the past several days for reasons you’ll understand in a moment, but I figured I should go ahead and post this now.

Pastor Robby Dawkins — no relation to Richard — was preaching in England several weeks ago when he saw something horrifying just as he took the stage: Matt Catlow, a member of the congregation, began twitching and convulsing. His pupils dilated. His pulse stopped. His mother was screaming for an ambulance.

According to an article on the...

A Creationist Just Made a Huge Scientific Discovery… Really!

Edgar Nernberg was excavating ground for his company in order to build a new home in Calgary, Alberta when he realized he was looking at something special:

The unearthing was astounding, as five nearly perfect fish fossil specimens were concealed in a block of sandstone in the Paskapoo Formation, a roughly 60-million-year-old rock formation that underlies Calgary.

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This latest find will allow researchers to appreciate and learn more about a time period following a major mass extinction that occ...