Hemant Mehta's Blog, page 1998

But Four-Year-Olds Will Never Comprehend That!

You know where this cartoon is going… but it’s still funny:

See the punchline here.

(via Far Left Side)

An Ex-Muslim’s Project to Show Women After They Finally Took Off Their Hijabs

***Update***: The new site is right here.

…

Marwa Berro, who has written quite a bit about leaving Islam, is embarking on a new project to empower women who used to wear head/face coverings but who have since proudly taken them off:

It’s not just before and after shots of their faces. The project will also feature:

… ex-hijabis with awesome hairstyles and tattoos and piercings. Ex-hijabis in bikinis and little black dresses and cargo pants and hiking boots. Ex-hijabis who are femme and ex-hijabis who are butch. Ex-hijabis who are women and ex-hijabis who are men. Ex-hijabis topless and legsome and all decked out and minimalistic and with long hair and buzzcuts and everything. EVERYTHING.

Marwa has answered many questions about the project on her site — and she also has all the contact information there if you’d like to participate.

42% of Americans Are Creationists, but Don’t Lose All Hope Just Yet

The video below, part of The Atheist Voice series, discusses a recent poll that said 42% of Americans are Creationists:

You can read more about the topic here.

We’d love to hear your thoughts on the project — more videos will be posted soon — and we’d also appreciate your suggestions as to which questions we ought to tackle next!

And if you like what you’re seeing, please consider supporting this site on Patreon.

Gold Coins Without “In God We Trust” On It Aren’t Necessarily Valuable

Not too long ago, a bunch of old U.S. gold coins were dug up in a California couple’s backyard.

One of the coins — an 1874 $20 Double Eagle — fetched a reported $15,000 at auction.

All told, roughly 1,400 coins were unearthed, which are expected to pull in over $10 million when the dust settles.

Bidding for the most expensive coin, an 1866-S Double Eagle without the “In God We Trust” motto, started at $1.2 million.

That brief description has led to so much confusion spurred by collectors who have old coins without “In God We Trust” on it and who think they’re sitting on a goldmine, that the Certified Gold Exchange (a private company) had to issue a press release reminding people that the phrase wasn’t always on U.S. currency:

… Certified Gold Exchange spokesperson Janet Jones and her team in Fort Worth have fielded “innumerable” phone calls from individuals who, according to Jones, “either think they have hit the jackpot or are in possession of something completely worthless.”

Jones says the likelihood is that neither circumstance is true. “The U.S. Mint produced gold coins that did not say ‘In God We Trust’ during parts of multiple years, although the most widely distributed ‘no motto’ coin is the 1908 St. Gaudens Double Eagle,” Jones said. “Such coins trade at the same levels as other common-date gold coins which include the motto.”

I had an experience several years ago where a colleague realized he had a dollar bill without the phrase on the back of it. He thought it was a typo — a valuable typo — until I mentioned that no paper bills had the phrase before the 1950s. It wasn’t valuable. Just kind of cool.

(Image via Shutterstock. Thanks to Brian for the link)

I Guess Math is Harder Than a Mixed-Faith Relationship…

According to Dale McGowan, author of the forthcoming book In Faith and In Doubt (about relationships between atheists and believers), one in six “religiously unaffiliated” people have spouses who are religious.

One in six.

Think about that.

Then read this article’s subtitle and see if you can spot the math error…

Whoa! 59%? That’s quite the jump…

(For those curious, it’s actually 16.7%)

It’s in the piece, too:

Nearly one in six (59 percent) of the religiously unaffiliated say they have spouses who are religious. Susan Katz Miller, author of “Being Both: Embracing Two Religions in One Interfaith Family,” said her work among couples of different faiths shows there is a need for more information for couples where only one partner is religious.

I don’t even know how a mistake like that happens…

For what it’s worth, the one in six number comes from a self-selected group of people who chose to take an Internet survey, so take it with a grain of salt, but the point is still clear: It’s not exactly rare for an atheist to be married to someone who’s religious.

But it isn’t quite as common as the article suggests.

Christian Pastor: If Your Child is Gay, “You Don’t Have a Meal with Them”

Baptist Pastor John MacArthur of Grace Community Church in the San Fernando Valley, California wanted to give some advice to a mother who had a gay child. So he made a video… and his advice is about as awful as you can imagine:

His advice is broken up into two parts.

First, if the child is still a Christian, then you have to confront the child and get him to repent! If he doesn’t repent, bring a couple witnesses along. If he still doesn’t repent, tell the church! If he still doesn’t repent, kick him out of the church (and, presumably, out of the family):

If they profess to be a Christian, you have to alienate them. You have to separate them. You can’t condone that. It’s inconsistent with a profession of Christ. So you isolate them. You don’t have a meal with them. You separate yourself from them. You turn them over to Satan, as it were…

But if the child is no longer a Christian, then forget it. There’s just no hope.

How’s that for loving Godly advice? Brought to you by the guy who runs the ironically-titled “Grace For You” ministries.

Believe it or not, the YouTube comments are open and people are letting him have it.

On his moderated website, though, the response to critics seems to be, “We’re not assholes. We’re only talking about how you treat your gay children if they’re adults.” Because disowning them when they’re 18 is much better.

Not all Christians are like this, obviously, but a *lot* of pastors see homosexuality as a problem to fix. If Christians really want to make a point, they need to get the hell out of those churches.

Christian Benjamin Corey argues that MacArthur is a hypocrite who selectively chooses which sins are worth shunning family members over:

I wonder if MacArthur would also suggest you shun an adult child who makes $200,000 a year but doesn’t tithe or give any of their money to charity? Somehow, I doubt it.

I wonder if MacArthur would teach that we should isolate, alienate, and turn over to Satan our children who struggle with over-eating? That can be a form of greed because it is taking more than you need.

Or, what about the idolators mentioned in that same passage? I know a boat load of Christians who are trusting in firearms for their safety instead of God– which is idolatry. According to Paul, they should be shunned as well.

Amen to that.

(Thanks to Rocky for the link)

How One Student Uncovered Multiple Constitutional Violations at His High School

Isaiah (Issah) Smith just graduated from high school after a very eventful year in which he exposed all sorts of religious violations at his school. It’s as good a time as any to take stock of what he accomplished — and what he sacrificed to do it.

Earlier this school year, after being bullied for being gay, Isaiah decided to bring a Bible to school to explain to his classmates why the verses they cited didn’t actually condemn gay people. In the process, he ripped out the pages from Leviticus.

That caused Birdville High School Assistant Principal Glenn Serviente to pull Isaiah from class and warn him that he must not cause a “disruption” by ripping the Bible. (I guess the bullies were not seen as disruptive…?) Isaiah promised not to rip it up any more, but asked for (and received) permission to continue carrying that Bible with him.

But a couple of days later, Serviente summoned Isaiah back to his office:

He asked Isaiah, “how would Muslims feel if a student was tearing up the Qur-an?” and then told him he was suspended. He then demanded Isaiah to give him the book. Isaiah said no, informing Serviente that he did not tear the Bible since being told on Monday that he could not do so. The assistant principal clarified that Isaiah was suspended for merely carrying a ripped Bible at school. He then reached for Isaiah’s Bible without his permission and slammed it on his desk. First he said Isaiah was suspended from school for the remainder of the day, but then changed his mind and told Isaiah he was suspended for three days. He also confiscated Isaiah’s Bible.

At that point, Isaiah contacted church/state separation groups on Facebook like the ACLU and the American Humanist Association. The AHA wrote back and eventually sent the district a letter letting them know they were violating the law by suspending Isaiah when, in fact, he did nothing wrong:

Reprimanding Isaiah for ripping his Bible on Monday violated the First Amendment. Isaiah’s Bible was not the source of disruption, the bullying was. Instead of reprimanding the bullies, the school punished Isaiah for offering an alternative viewpoint on the Bible.

It took a month, but the district eventually cleared Isaiah’s record of any disciplinary problems. (They gave him his Bible back, too.)

…

After seeing how the Christians at school got away with bullying him while criticizing the Bible got him in trouble, Isaiah began paying special attention to other examples of his school endorsing religion.

And, wow, did he find examples… Not only that, he took pictures, too, which he sent along to the AHA because, as he told me last night, he doesn’t “go to school to go to church.”

So what did he find?

According to another letter the AHA sent to the district this past May, the violations were just piling up.

The school openly sponsored religious Baccalaureate ceremonies.

They placed information about the ceremony on the school’s public calendar, Facebook page, and website:

The principal, Jason Wells, also spoke at the ceremony, as did other administrators, both this year and in previous years and they liberally quoted Bible verses and threw in mentions of “God” and “Jesus.”

All of those things are illegal.

The school sponsored and promoted religious assemblies during school hours.

A proselytizing pastor was invited to speak earlier this year and the school district even sponsored overnight retreats at a local church.

Teachers had overtly Christian symbols in their classrooms.

It’s one thing for a teacher to wear a cross necklace or have a Bible in their desks. It’s another when teachers place visible crosses all over their rooms:

…

That’s what Isaiah helped uncover.

And, once again, district officials capitulated when faced with clear evidence of their wrongdoing:

After the Appignani Humanist Legal Center sent a letter in May to the school district reporting these violations, school officials responded promptly by collaborating with the AHLC to correct these violations while ensuring that students’ and teachers’ First Amendment rights are maintained.

“We are very pleased that the school has been willing to cooperate with us to correct these violations,” said Monica Miller, an attorney with the Appignani Humanist Legal Center. “These reasonable accommodations strike the appropriate balance between free speech rights and the Establishment Clause.”

…

The school and the legal center agreed that principals and other school administrators cannot participate in the Baccalaureate ceremonies, though they can still attend as spectators. The school has also agreed that it will no longer hold its retreats in a church but will instead use a local community center. The school will also remove the cross displays in classrooms, though teachers may retain small, personal religious items in or near their desk space so long as the items are not obvious to students. To ensure it maintains its neutrality on religious matters, the school drafted a series of guidelines on handling First Amendment Speech and Religion issues that will be part of the annual faculty training.

I asked Isaiah if he thought the problems would be fixed now. He didn’t think so, telling me, “I don’t trust my school district at all.” But he also added that other students would be keeping an eye out for possible violations next year.

Despite graduating, not all is well for Isaiah. He was kicked out of his house because of his sexual orientation, forcing him to work full-time while he attends community college this fall. His goal is to transfer to a four-year college at some point and eventually become an attorney that focuses on Constitutional issues and/or international affairs.

I asked Isaiah if he had any advice for students who might find themselves in a similar position, getting bullied by classmates for being gay, and he paused for a bit before saying: “It does get better after you move into a gay-friendly environment. Know that you have allies all around you, everywhere. It might be difficult to feel like you’re fitting in, in a conservative Southern school, but the world is much bigger than that and much more accepting of LGBT individuals and individuals who are minorities.”

I would add to that: Isaiah showed a lot of courage in seeking out help when he knew he had done nothing wrong. Most students would have just kept everything to themselves.

On a side note, Isaiah’s activism isn’t limited to school. When he heard that the Westboro Baptist Church was planning to fly to South Africa to protest at Nelson Mandela‘s funeral, he called up the South African Embassy and alerted them to the hate group’s plans. That may have played a role in thwarting the church’s attempts to enter the country.

I wish Isaiah the best of luck in the future. He’s done such a tremendous service exposing religious violations at his high school already; I hope his activism streak doesn’t stop there.

Secular Invocation Delivered at Wilkes-Barre City Council Meeting

On Thursday night, Justin Vacula delivered a secular invocation during the “public comments” potion of a meeting of the Wilkes-Barre City Council. (The council always has a religious invocation at the beginning of meetings… I’m not sure if that’s legal.)

It’s a little tough to hear, but a transcript is below:

My name is Justin Vacula. I am a co-organizer and spokesperson for the NEPA Freethought Society — a social, educational, activist, and philosophical coalition of atheists, agnostics, humanists, secularists, and skeptics predicated on community which upholds the separation of church and state and promotes critical thinking.

I asked to provide a secular invocation at the start of council meetings to provide an alternative to the government-led Judeo-Christian prayer offered by Councilwoman Maureen Lavelle which begins each meeting.

Council refused my request to offer an invocation at the beginning of the meeting, but allowed me to offer a secular invocation during the public comment section. I lament council’s decision to continue exclusionary prayer led by government officials at these public meetings. Further, I am dissatisfied with council barring members of the public from offering opening invocations in place of the government-led prayer.

Today, I will provide a modified secular invocation from the organization Americans United for Separation of Church and State — an inclusive message which council can use as a guideline for future meetings so that meeting invocations are more inclusive.

We come here to do the business of local government. Government officials have pledged to improve the quality of this community and are entrusted with doing so.

As we gather, we are reminded that although we have differences we are linked by our common humanity. When we work together to move our community forward in a spirit of mutual respect and common decency, we showcase what is best about our community, our state, and our nation.

We embrace many traditions and represent many demographics. We are Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, humanists, atheists, agnostics, Wiccans, Pagans, unaffiliated, uncertain, and so many other things. We are young and old and everything in between. We represent many races and nationalities. We identify as libertarian, liberal, progressive, and conservative.

To be sure, we do not agree about everything and we often feel fiercely protective of what we do believe. But there is one thing on which we all agree. We share the goal of making our community the best place it can be. We unite here today with that noble aim and common purpose.

Citizens and government officials ought to enter meetings with a healthy dose of humility and doubt — being receptive to the ideas of others and having the willingness to change any and all of their beliefs given good reason, argument, and evidence. We ought to seek and welcome challenges to our beliefs. We should be concerned about whether our beliefs are justified and true.

Let us not have intellectual arrogance — outright dismissing the ideas of our detractors and declaring that our beliefs are non-negotiable, not up for debate or revision. Let us remember that our beliefs inform our actions and, because of this, often translate into real-world impact — having the potential to help or harm others. Let informed reason, evidence, and argument inform discourse not only at city council meetings, but also in all aspects of our lives. Demand good reasons, arguments, and evidence when people present claims. Thoroughly consider perspectives of those with whom you disagree.

For if we happen to discard our cherished beliefs, we make intellectual progress. While it may be difficult to admit being wrong or break away from tradition, changing our beliefs so that we perceive the world more accurately is a huge benefit — a sign of growth and maturity.

Let us remember horrid traditions in this community and nation which were justified mostly on the basis of “it was always done this way” including coal mining which offered workers — boys and men who would work in extremely dangerous conditions — little to no protection. As we progress as a community and species, we make moral progress and break from tradition. Tradition alone is no justification for belief.

It is people, although they often disagree on matters they view as important, who come together to make change in our communities. It is through action, at local and even larger levels, by which we progress. It is through passionate debate, although it may seem uncomfortable, by which we challenge our own perspectives and learn from others — sometimes changing our own beliefs when there is good reason to do so.

It is my hope that at this council meeting and others — and even encounters in everyday life — that we work together to make change in our communities. It is my hope that we challenge ourselves and others to improve our quality of life. It is my hope that respect, when deserved, is extended to others. It is my hope that good argument, evidence, and reason guides the decisions of all within and outside of this room. Thank you.

Oh man, that was more than three minutes. I don’t know if some council members in other cities could handle it…

Keep these invocations coming!

When Jews Become Atheists: A Compilation of Religious Humor

A lot of people raised in the Jewish tradition are now vocal atheists. Here’s an entertaining compilation of several notable Jews (or secular Jews or former Jews or whatever they prefer to call themselves) talking about faith:

(via Atheism-is-Unstoppable)

I Think She’s Saying God Won’t Answer All Our Prayers…

I’m pretty sure today’s Family Circus offers the least helpful theological advice ever:

In other words, God’s advice is as helpful as that of a mute psychic. You have to wonder why anyone would even bother praying when the response is that useless…

(Thanks to Larry for the link)