My friend Dan Birtcher, who organized a protest of the so-called National Day of Prayer, reports that the protest went well and no one was arrested. Read a note he sent out about the event and I included a link to some photos.
Tag: secular humanism
On March 29th it was reported that the Borders bookstore chain had decided not to stock the April/May issue of the “Free Inquiry” magazine. The chain claimed it was concerned about the safety of their customers because the issue of the magazine would include a selection of cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad that had been published in a Danish newspaper back in September However Secular Left has learned that Borders looked the other way when a conservative magazine, “The Weekly Standard” published an article about the cartoons AND included a full color photo of the Danish newspaper with the cartoons.
The Associated Press reported today (03/29/06) that the company that operates Borders and Waldenbooks stores will not stock the April-May issue of Free Inquiry magazine because it contains cartoons of Islam’s Prophet Muhammad that provoked deadly protests among Muslims in several countries a couple months ago. But I get it. They can pander to those customers who might not have appreciated the cartoons in context and it doesn’t hurt them in the balance sheet. However, censoring the magazine is going to create more of a scene than just letting it sit silently on the shelf collecting dust before being shipped back to the distributor. The move also brings fresh free publicity for CSH. Now if they decided not to stock Dr. Phil’s latest fake psychology book then all hell would break loose – or better what if they ban the Holy Bible – with its tales of incest, sex, violence, and tribulation.
France and many countries in Europe have issues with immigrants. Most are from current or former colonies. The new citizens have learned the language and made efforts to be part of their adopted countries, but due to old colonial classism, the hosts really don’t want them and this causes them to be segregated. These new people are not treated as equal. They may have the same rights by law, but like we saw in the US South for 100 years after the slaves were freed, they aren’t treated as equal.
This morning an essay Penn Jillette wrote appeared on the NPR website that sums up how we non-believers find a purpose in life especially when this life is all we have.
Atheists may not be victims in the sense that Christians can be victims in countries like China but Atheists (and most non-believers) do suffer from the negative attitude as illustrated in the article by Leo that I started this posting with.
Obviously Leo was complaining about people complaining and he included Atheists in that lot as if our concerns are trivial.
There aren’t too many groups these days that one would hear or tolerate such negative attitudes expressed so publicly without any backlash. Imagine if a popular TV host said on the air she wouldn’t vote for any one who was a Muslim or Christian with the inference that viewers follow her advice.