ريتشارد دوكنز's Blog, page 135

Alabama company refuses to print university’s LGBTQ-inclusive magazine

By Gwen Aviles Due South, a student publication at the University of South Alabama, has been printed by local business Interstate Printing since 2012. However, when the magazine’s editor-in-chief, Sara Boone, sent over the latest issue for printing, she received an unexpected response. “After reviewing the subject matter of the 2019 Fall edition of Due …

Americans Have Positive Views About Religion’s Role in Society, but Want It Out of Politics

By the Pew Research Center A large majority of Americans feel that religion is losing influence in public life, according to a 2019 Pew Research Center survey. While some say this is a good thing, many more view it as a negative development, reflecting the broad tendency of Americans to see religion as a positive …

A Black Hole Threw a Star Out of the Milky Way Galaxy

By Dennis Overbye There are fastballs, and then there are cosmic fastballs. Now it seems that the strongest arm in our galaxy might belong to a supermassive black hole that lives smack in the middle of the Milky Way. Astronomers recently discovered a star whizzing out of the center of our galaxy at the seriously …

Earthquake Conspiracy Theorists Are Wreaking Havoc During Emergencies

By Anna Merlan On an early Friday morning in November 2018, the ground gave way in Anchorage, Alaska. At 8:29 a.m., a magnitude 7.1 earthquake hit just north of the city. Street lights blinked off, highways began to buckle, and buildings shook as enormous cracks opened in the walls and floors, coughing plumes of dust …

Principal who banned gay books charged with child pornography

By Gwen Aviles A former Kentucky school principal has been indicted on child pornography charges, a decade after he first made headlines for banning books with LGBTQ storylines. Phillip Todd Wilson, the former principal of the Clark County Area Technology Center in Winchester, Kentucky, was charged with 17 child pornography and distribution charges in August, …

Ohio House passes bill allowing student answers to be scientifically wrong due to religion

By WKRC Staff COLUMBUS, Ohio (WKRC) – Ohio lawmakers are weighing in on how public schools can teach things like evolution. The Ohio House on Wednesday passed the “Student Religious Liberties Act.” Under the law, students can’t be penalized if their work is scientifically wrong as long as the reasoning is because of their religious …

Meet Arrokoth, the Most Distant Object Ever Explored

By Mike Wall Hopefully you weren’t too attached to “2014 MU69,” because the most distant object ever explored has a new name. The 21-mile-wide (34 kilometers) body visited by NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft on Jan. 1 is now officially known as Arrokoth, a term that means “sky” in the Powhatan/Algonquian language, mission team members announced today (Nov. …

Hundreds of Students Protested Their Christian High School for Threatening a Gay Classmate

By Wren Sanders On November 8th, roughly 200 students at Bishop Amat Memorial High School, the largest Catholic school in the Los Angeles area, walked out of their afternoon classes to stand in solidarity with a classmate who had reportedly been subjected to disciplinary action because of her sexuality. The Friday demonstration followed a Buzzfeed report published …

They were accused of sexually abusing children, now they’re the priest next door

By Lindsay Schnell and Sam Ruland John Dagwell said he’s earned the right to live in peace as he tries to put his past behind him. The former Roman Catholic brother, 75, pleaded guilty in a New Jersey criminal case in 1988 to molesting a student when he taught at a parochial school. His religious …

The U.S. Drops to 32nd in Global Ranking of Nations Promoting Freedom of Thought

By Hemant Mehta For the eighth straight year, Humanists International has released its annual “Freedom of Thought Report” describing serious cases of discrimination and persecution against atheists around the world. You can download the report right here by clicking on the “Download the 2019 Key Countries edition (PDF)” link. There’s some good news overall. Since 2015, eight countries (or …