h/t: Planet Atheism
h/t: unreasonable faith
REPUBLICAN FEAR: “Why Republicans Fear Same-Sex Marriage”
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Tag Archives: Politics
REPUBLICAN XENOPHOBIA: “Chris Matthews Calls Out GOP Chairman Reince Priebus on Xenobhobia”
IN REMEMBRANCE: Anthony Arnove / “Howard Zinn Turns 90: The Great Legacy of the People’s Historian”
Howard Zinn would have turned 90 this Friday if his seemingly boundless energy and youthfulness had not been cut short in January 2010.
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It’s worth remembering that A People’s History of the United States first came out in 1980 as a tide of reaction was seeking to bury the social movements that inspired Howard’s book and which he saw as the hope for the future.
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Howard challenged these ideas in a terrific speech he gave in 1970: “If you don’t think, if you just listen to TV and read scholarly things, you actually begin to think that things are not so bad, or that just little things are wrong. But you have to get a little detached, and then come back and look at the world, and you are horrified. So we have to start from that supposition—that things are really topsy-turvy.”
Howard had that rare ability to step back and help us understand our topsy-turvy world primarily because he approached politics and history from the standpoint of someone who thought it was possible to turn our world right side up — to put people before profit, the environment before the interests of mining companies.
¡Howard Zinn presente!
Related articles
- Lies the Debunkers Told Me: How Bad History Books Win Us Over (theatlantic.com)
REASON: Bill Maher / “My New Rule for Todd Akin and the Republican Party”
. . . Here’s the only thing you need to know about Todd Akin and human anatomy: he’s an asshole. What I want to talk about is how it’s not a coincidence that the party of fundamentalism is also the party of fantasy. When I say religion is a mental illness, this is what I mean: it corrodes your mental faculties to the point where you can believe in tiny ninja warriors who hide in vaginas and lie in wait for bad people’s sperm.
Evangelicals might like to pretend that the magical thinking that they indulge in at home doesn’t affect what they do at the office, but it absolutely does. The brain that believes in angels and miracles and Jesus riding a dinosaur is trained to see the world not as it is, but as you want it to be.
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. . . [B]ecause we’re already such a religious country, our minds are primed for magical, fantasy thinking. The gullibility comes factory-installed. They’ve learned that you appeal not to an American’s head, but to his gut — it’s a much bigger target. But here’s the problem: life is complicated. I mean, I know we know some things for sure, like why Jesus put us here on Earth: to watchHere Comes Honey Boo Boo on a 50-inch TV screen. But what about the Chinese slaves who made the TV? What about carbon from the coal that generated the electricity? What about the Walmart where we bought it, where the workers don’t have health insurance? What about racism, or the oceans turning into nail polish remover? The grown-up answer is: identify problems scientifically, prioritize and solve. The Republican answer is: there isn’t a problem. And anyone who tells you different is a liar who hates America. We don’t have to make hard choices. We just have to ignore the science and the math — that’s why God gave us values.
SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE: FFRF / “God Fixation Won’t Fix This Nation”
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“This is an equal-opportunity message to both political parties and all public officials. Essentially, we secularists, who comprise nearly a fifth of the U.S. population, are telling government officials that it’s time to get off your knees and get to work!” said FFRF Co-President Dan Barker.
“God fixation won’t fix our nation, or any nation. A preoccupation with religion in government and a political fear of offending religious lobbies is holding back our nation scientifically, intellectually and morally,” added Annie Laurie Gaylor, who co-directs FFRF.
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Related articles
- FFRF Puts ‘God Fixation Won’t Fix This Nation’ Billboards at Sites of DNC and RNC Conventions (patheos.com)
- Nearly One in Five Americans Have No Religious Affiliation (patheos.com)
- “Nones” climb to 19% (secularnewsdaily.com)
- Nearly One in Five Americans Have No Religious Affiliation (patheos.com)
- “Nones” climb to 19% (secularnewsdaily.com)
POLITICAL SATIRE: “The “Mourning After” Pill”
h/t: Planet Atheism
h/t: PZ Myers
AUTHORITARIANISM: Atheist Experience #477 / “Understanding Right Wing Authoritarianism”
CRITICAL THINKING: George Carlin / “Teach Your Children to Question Everything”
ACTIVISM: Tom Morello / “Paul Ryan Is the Embodiment of the Machine Our Music Rages Against”
Photo credit: Tim Mosenfelder/Getty Images; Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call
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Ryan claims that he likes Rage’s sound, but not the lyrics. Well, I don’t care for Paul Ryan’s sound or his lyrics. He can like whatever bands he wants, but his guiding vision of shifting revenue more radically to the one percent is antithetical to the message of Rage.
I wonder what Ryan’s favorite Rage song is? Is it the one where we condemn the genocide of Native Americans? The one lambasting American imperialism? Our cover of “Fuck the Police”? Or is it the one where we call on the people to seize the means of production? So many excellent choices to jam out to at Young Republican meetings!
Don’t mistake me, I clearly see that Ryan has a whole lotta “rage” in him: A rage against women, a rage against immigrants, a rage against workers, a rage against gays, a rage against the poor, a rage against the environment. Basically the only thing he’s not raging against is the privileged elite he’s groveling in front of for campaign contributions.
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EDUCATION: PZ Myers / “Woe is U.S. Academics”
Have you been following Doonesbury for the past few weeks? It’s been all about the progressive destruction of the American university, as the old model is replaced by the for-profit university, a hideous scheme in which state and federal support for higher education gets siphoned off to support lousy schools that grind through massive numbers of students, offering low tuition, flexible hours, and a fast-track to a degree…and with abysmal retention rates, low success, marginally qualified ‘faculty’, and an education that is worth less than you paid for it. These are the colleges you see advertised on cheesy commercials on television, in which some guy proudly testifies about getting his fancy diploma working only a few hours a week at night over two years, and never having to step away from his computer to do it.
Always Question Authority 