I think overly sensitive Christians need to re-examine their definition of hate speech. Political hopeful William J. Kelly is attempting to make a mountain out of a molehill, claiming a sign erected by the Freedom from Religion Foundation in the Illinois Capital Building is hate speech:

At the time of the winter solstice, let reason prevail. There are no gods, no devils, no angels, no heaven or hell. There is only our natural world. Religion is just a myth and superstition that hardens hearts and enslaves minds.

Kelly finds this disparaging toward Christianity and other religions in general, and is suing Jesse White, Secretary of State for Illinois (who is responsible for enforcing the state’s property laws). It’s becoming quite clear, however, this is a politically motivated action rather than an honest concern about “hate speech”. He’s hoping to rally Christians around him, and I’m sure he’ll have plenty of success; after all, the recent confidence that previously silent atheists are displaying scares the hell out of them, and some people are looking for any excuse to fight the progress we’ve been making.

So what we can gather from this lawsuit is anytime you suggest religion is merely a superstition, you are effectively committing a hate crime. Is Kelly unaware of the concept of freedom of speech or is he merely afraid of it? Why do religions fear dissension so much? Do they correctly see that once people are exposed to the fact religions are merely the product of superstition and ignorance that they might abandon them? If they get to remove the sign from the Capitol Building, does that mean we get to expunge “In God We Trust” from their money too?

Australia, be warned! It seems as though the latest efforts of your country’s atheists have attracted the attention of theologically minded hackers. The Global Atheist Convention’s website has been flooded, and the Atheist Foundation of Australia’s site was attacked also.

It’s not known who is doing this exactly, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it was some religious nutbag hoping to prevent people from attending this year’s atheist convention. It’s the type of typical, “it’s not wrong if I do it for Jesus” tactic that fundamentalists seem so fond of employing.

As usual this kind of thing only galvanizes people even more, so I imagine this probably won’t stop people from going; if anything, I’m willing to bet the event will be an even bigger success. In your face, religion!

When you blog about atheism, the occasional death threat or hateful message is inevitable. I’ve been fortunate enough to have avoided such unpleasantries, though I credit my low profile more than anything overly friendly about me. New to the list of victims is Mark from Proud Atheist. He put up a post a few days ago celebrating his 1st year anniversary (my how time flies, no?), and this was one of the comments he received:

Yes, happy first and LAST anniversary.

Your sins are too mighty to repent for, our Father will send you all to hell when you die! I will hack into this website and destroy it; and find your personal information too, so I can blow up your house—but your destiny is so fucked up that I don’t know why I would bother! I may, however, hunt down your friends and family and slaughter them—that would cause you great pain, would it not? I have gotten signs from God that approve of doing this to all fucking atheists! Someday you may find a gun at your head, or cyanide in your drink, or a grenade in your home—but I will kill you, make no mistake! The sooner you go to your eternal punishment, the better!

This guy is an obvious lunatic, and here’s hoping Gabriel Tanejo is just another hateful coward.

(Note: The site no longer exists)

A fan of the site sent me this video, and I had to educate myself a little bit to find out exactly who Harlan Ellison is. Because he hates the Internet and still does all his writing on an old Olympia typewriter (the supposed Mercedes Benz of typewriters!), most of you are probably like me and have to admit almost complete ignorance about his life and works. Of course, after listening to his speech, I will be picking up a bunch of his short stories and novels to see what he’s all about.

As some of you may already know, The Good Atheist isn’t the only blog I work on. I’m also pretty deep into the MMA scene, and Ryan and I have a reputation as being the “bad boys” of the mixed Martial Arts world through our site, Fightlinker.com (we also record 2 podcasts a week for that site as well, so if you love the sport, go check out the other podcast). I’m not sure what that means exactly, but we’re the guys who make fun of people for entertainment purposes. Apparently that’s still cutting edge.

One fighter who I’ve always given a hard time is Frank Mir. Frank is one of the cockiest fighters in the UFC, and after watching him on the reality show “The Ultimate Fighter”, I couldn’t help but root for his opponent the whole time (he came off looking like a huge dick the whole show).

Over the past year though, it’s been getting a lot harder to hate the guy, especially after he came out of the atheist closet and admitted to being a huge fan of Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens. This makes Frank the first openly atheist fighter in a major fight organization. Say what you will about his attitude; it takes fucking guts to say that shit. I hate to say it, but if he keeps doing this kind of thing, I’ll have no choice but call myself a fan. I feel weird saying that…

With atheist bus ads popping up all over the US, there’s bound to be some conflict a-brewin’ (they are kind of intended for that purpose, anyway). The latest controversy comes from Des Moines, Iowa, where bus driver Angela Shiel was suspended after she refused to drive a bus with an atheist banner on the side. She might get fired over this, since the Des Moines Area Regional Transport (or DART) has a policy that drivers are not allowed to choose which buses they drive.

Now before you decide on whether or not she should be allowed to refuse such a simple thing, how would atheists have responded to a non-believer refusing to drive a bus with a Christian ad on it? I don’t know about you, but I would have told that person to suck it up and do their job. We all have to do things we aren’t always comfortable with, but them’s the breaks. At the end of the day, it’s just a stupid ad, and letting people speak their minds isn’t a crime.

This is a tough situation for DART, since firing Angela would only anger theists, and capitulating to her demands would mean that other drivers could follow suit. Their priority is on providing a reliable service, and not having to deal with people’s religious convictions. I think the solution is letting her wear a t-shirt emblazoned with I believe in God while driving the bus if she’s feeling conflicted about the whole thing. Problem solved!

Here’s a bit of weird news: an Italian atheist is suing a parish priest for repeatedly claiming Jesus Christ was a historical figure. Luigi Cascioli is a 72 year old lifelong non-believer who has grown tired of Italians blindly accepting the notion of the literal existence of God, and has decided to involve the courts.

It’s a fairly amusing tactic, but since the burden of proof is on Cascioli to disprove the existence of Jesus, it’s likely he won’t win (just try disproving the existence of fairies why don’t you?). Rev. Enrico Righi has already pulled out the “Josephus and Tacitus” card, claiming these two historians, who lived decades after the supposed death of Jesus, wrote vaguely about a ‘Christus’ figure, therefore somehow proving his existence. As to the supposed God like powers of the guy, there’s no mention of it.

I’ve always argued that although someone may have existed by such a name, it’s unlikely the person identified in the New Testament ever existed at all. The fact none of his supposed miracles are ever mentioned outside the Bible should tell you it’s about as accurate as Homer’s The Odyssey. Is it surprising that people who exaggerate or confabulate stories in order to make it more thrilling? Have you never watched a movie “based on a true story” before? They usually don’t stick very much to the source material, if you know what I mean.

At the same time, I don’t like the idea of courts getting involved here. I admire Luigi’s tenacity and sheer gumption, but I don’t feel it is necessary for a court of law to decide whether or not priests are allowed to make historical claims about their deities. It smacks me as very totalitarian to force conformity through the mechanism of law. It’s best that people come to their own conclusion that all religions are bullshit.