Illinois allows civil unions, Diocese ends adoption programs in response

Today, Illinois becomes the 7th state to recognize civil unions for homosexual couples. It’s a great day for equality, though it didn’t quite go far enough in my opinion (which would be full-fledged marriages). Unfortunately it’s not a such a great day for orphaned children in Illinois because as reported by the Chicago Sun-Times, “Meanwhile, an opponent of the law, the Catholic diocese in Rockford, announced last week it will end its state-funded adoption and foster-care program rather than comply with the law, which would require it to place children with gay or unmarried couples.” I hope anyone and everyone can see the issue here. Rather than embrace two people’s love regardless of their sexual orientation, the Catholic church prefers to close down their state-funded adoption and foster-care program. They’d rather not help children find home because now they have to adopt children to gays. Those dirty, blasphemous gays. They’d rather let children be homeless than let them be around gay people.

Do I need to keep repeating this? Or has it sunk in already? Where is the love and tolerance Christians preach about? Does that go out the window just because two people who want to get married are the same gender? I guess the answer to that is yes when it comes to the Catholic Church in Rockford, IL

61 percent of Americans think Bin Laden is in hell

So says a new CNN poll.

Not surprisingly, who is more likely to think Osama is burning works as a window into the landscape of religious and political belief in the United States:

Who feels the strongest that bin Laden is in Hell? Men more than women, people who earn less than $50,000 a year more than more affluent respondents, people without college educations more than those who have them, conservatives more than liberals, and people from the South and Northeast more than people from the West and Midwest.

Only 5 percent of respondents replied that they do not believe in hell. The dynamics of believing in supernatural justice in this way is an interesting one; in cases like this, it could clearly be quite comforting. On the other hand, I wonder how many of that 61 percent see hell as a place only unambiguously bad guys go to - it’s Osama, Hitler, Stalin and Timothy McVeigh down there rather than say, your Jewish neighbor or your agnostic cousin. One hopes, at least, that the number of people who have this rather proscribed, convenient concept of hell is rather large.

The broader impact of atheism

Greta Christina, who we interview in our upcoming podcast, has a great post up called “A Crisis of Faithlessness.” Basically, she talks about occasionally wondering whether the atheist movement is the cause she should be investing most of her energy in, considering how much else is profoundly messed up about the world.

But, she argues, the impact of atheism is not strictly limited to questions of religious beliefs - it has wider societal implications, with tentacles in many directions.

Without religion, homophobia would be a lot less rampant. Without religion, sexism would be a lot less rampant. Without religion, the U.S. wouldn’t be freaking out over government funding of birth control.

I concur entirely - and I relate to the occasional bout of wondering, could my energy be better allocated? But, as I explain in the comments over at her blog, it seems to me that atheism is in fact deeply connected to everything I most care about.

Take economic inequality, for instance - particularly the growing gap between the rich and the poor in the United States. At first glance, this is not a religious issue. But look deeper, and irrational belief rears its ugly head - even when people are not particularly (or at all; think Ayn Rand disciples) religious. Indeed, part of this country (Calvinist New England) was originally founded on the whole idea that the rich were rich because they were on a list; as for everyone else, well, they were suspect.

Today, I see so often how this assumption persists despite Calvinism being long dead and largely replaced by a fuzzy, all-loving God. People still assume - consciously or not - that there is a certain amount of justice in “free market capitalism,” and the virtuous and hard-working really can and should rise above everyone else who, apparently, qualify as unvirtuous/immoral. But from an atheist perspective, there is nothing out there keeping score; God/the invisible hand does not necessarily reward good or virtuous people with riches. That depends on us, entirely. And I think once you rid yourself of this knee-jerk assumption that there is some sort of large score keeper in the sky, you start to really see how fucked up things are and think, holy hell, there is no good reason for any of this to be like this.

Again, religion is not entirely responsible for this, far from it. But I think it is a sizable chunk of what is going on. And if I can encourage people to start to take responsibility for the society they see around themselves, I think that goes a long way, beyond simply not believing in God.

Framing and critical thinking

Republicans in Tennessee and Oklahoma are currently trying to pass bills which, the language claims, would encourage “critical thinking” skills in the science classroom by protecting all teachers who would “discuss” the “controversies” surrounding “certain” scientific theories. (All scare quotes mine.)

My tone is sarcastic for good reason. As is obvious, and as the ACLU notes in opposing the bill in Tennessee, the real purpose of these bills is to give cover for teachers who want to slip creationism into the classroom. And as none of our readers need explained to them, the whole idea that evolution is “controversial” – among scientists, that is — is a preposterous claim to make.

But most Americans do not know this, and that is why the conservative framing of this issue – often referred to as the “teach the controversy” argument – is brilliant. Especially interesting here is how conservatives have co-opted the phrase “critical thinking” to describe baseless skepticism concerning evolution, which rests upon mountains of incontrovertible evidence. They have listened to how progressives talk about what is wrong with the mindset of fundamentalists, and decided to turn this on its head. Thus the common conservative voter who feels looked down on by scientific or academic elites can argue right back that it is they, not himself, who abandon critical thinking by refusing to allow the “debate” about creationism to be heard in the classroom.

Continue reading…

Texas Public Schools Receive “D” Rating from Conservative Think Tank

Recall our discussion back on Episode 7 of the podcast discussing the Texas Board of Education’s move to inject both religion and conservative politics into the public education system’s social studies programs. We called it a bad move, and, according to a recent report, even a conservative think tank agrees; from the Thomas B. Fordham Institute’s report:

The conservative majority on the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) has openly sought to use the state curriculum to promote its political priorities, molding the telling of the past to justify its current views and aims … Indeed, the SBOE majority displayed overt hostility and contempt for historians and scholars, whom they derided as insidious activists for a liberal academic establishment.

Texas Freedom Network President Kathy Miller:

This analysis adds to a growing chorus of criticism aimed at state board members who deliberately and arrogantly substituted their own political biases for facts and scholarship throughout the standards.

Texas State Board of Education Chair Gail Lowe has defended the Board’s moves, calling the report, “misinformation.”

Petition to remove tax breaks for religion

The following is an overview of the petition:

Conservative atheists

The atheist community almost acts at times as though conservative atheists cannot exist — excluding the farce that is S.E. Cupp, that is. The NYTimes highlights this underrepresented segment (conservatives) of an already small fraction of society (atheists).

They are part of a small faction on the right: conservatives with no use for religion. Since 2008, they have been contributors to the blog Secular Right, where they argue that conservative values like small government, self-reliance and liberty can be defended without recourse to invisible deities or the religions that exalt them.

Read More at NYTimes.