No. 1 | Free Inquiry (original) (raw)
Women in Secularism
Introduction Melody Hensley
To organize an event with a focus on issues affecting a particular group, be it religion, race, gender, or sexual orientation, is to endure accusations of tokenism—the idea that inequality and tensions can be papered-over by the superficial inclusion or promotion of a particular group for the sake of appearances. Such insincerity and posturing can …
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Women in Secularism
Nontheism and Feminism: Why the Disconnect? Ophelia Benson
You would think that nontheism and feminism should be a natural combination. Women have the most to gain from escaping religion, after all: monotheism gives men higher status, starting with their allegedly being made in the image of God. But atheism hasn’t always been very welcoming to women. Maybe there’s an idea that men created …
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Women in Secularism
Sexism: It’s Not Mission Drift! Jennifer McCreight
Recently within the atheist community, sexism has become a hot-button issue–or more accurately, a molten-lava/center-of-the-sun issue. Whether it’s the religious Right’s push to restrict women’s reproductive rights or internal debates about sexual harassment policies at atheist/skeptical conferences, sexism has become the topic. And this has left a lot of atheists scratching their heads. “Why are …
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Women in Secularism
The Intersection of Nontheism and Feminism Rebecca Watson
It hadn’t occurred to me, seven or so years ago when I started the website Skepchick.org, that misogyny might exist independently of religion. Most of the antiwoman rhetoric that I read or experienced came by way of holy books—“wives, submit to your own husband as you do to the Lord” and so on. I assumed …
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Women in Secularism
How to Attract More Secular Women Activists Susan Jacoby
At the pioneering program “Women in Secularism” sponsored in May 2012 by the Center for Inquiry–Washington D.C., I discussed some of the reasons—from the greater religiosity of women to actual denigration of female intellect by some male secular activists (which you wouldn’t think would exist among male creatures who pride themselves on their rationality)—for the …
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Women in Secularism
Jezebel Sikivu Hutchinson
My first memory of attending a political protest was with my father, after a woman named Eulia Love was murdered by two Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) officers in 1979 in South Central Los Angeles. Love was gunned down after allegedly threatening the officers with a butcher knife. The killing elicited a firestorm in the …
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Women in Secularism
Islam Is Woman’s Enemy Wafa Sultan
I can scarcely tell you how pleased I am to be speaking at such a highly-needed conference: one devoted solely to women’s issues. Coming to Washington, D. C., for this conference is a double pleasure to me. Not only is it my first time to speak at such an event, but because sharing with you …
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Women in Secularism
Poems Jennifer Michael Hecht
Please Answer All Three of the Following Essay Questions I What would it take to make you what you truly want to be and why will no one cooperate with you on these visions you have of yourself, when it would be so easy for them to finally acknowledge that you are the demon …
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I’ve always been a bit ambivalent about Christmas. There were presents, of course. Not too many–just enough to wake you before your parents. Saving the best for last, my brother and I went first for smallish parcels from dista nt relatives while still working the kinks from our corneas, the phlegm from dry winter windpipes. …
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Before The Beginning Dennis E. Erickson
Somewhere out there in a singularity before the big bang or the poof-and-it’s-there—depending upon one’s persuasion–a “typical” family gathers for dinner and has an unusual discussion. Dad: Do you think it is about time to share the good life with a new species? We have been by ourselves for what seems like an eternity. Please …
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Cut It Out: Circumcision Revisited Edan Tasca
Kramer: A bris? You mean circumcision. . . . I would advise against that. Elaine: Kramer, it’s a tradition. Kramer: Yeah, well, so was sacrificing virgins to appease the gods, but we don’t do that anymore. Jerry: Well, maybe we should. —“The Bris,” Seinfeld, season 5, episode 5 The February/March 2012 issue of Free …
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Editorial
Free Expression and Women’s Rights Ronald A. Lindsay
This issue of Free Inquiry highlights two very important concerns: namely, the need to ensure that people throughout the world can freely express their views about religion and the need to promote women’s rights and end sexism, both outside of and within the secular movement. Some might think these concerns are unconnected. They would be …
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Free Expression in Crisis, Op-Ed
It’s Time to Stand Up for Free Expression Tom Flynn
The entire Muslim world . . . is agitating for the United Nations to pass an anti blasphemy law. The rest of the civilized world must oppose this at every turn. —Mahfooz Kanwar, Calgary Herald It seemed the whole world was marking International Blasphemy Rights Day (September 30). Debates about free speech and criticism of …
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Free Expression in Crisis, Op-Ed
The First Amendment Provides Full Protection to Innocence of Muslims Edward Tabash
Questions have arisen over whether the Internet film Innocence of Muslims (or its fourteen-minute trailer) should be considered protected by the First Amendment.1 The very core of free speech would be nullified if the film were denied constitutional protection. Some may assert that this film meets the standard of “a clear and present danger” in …
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Free Expression in Crisis, Op-Ed
The Trouble with Religious Hatred Austin Dacey
In the discourse of human rights, impiety is no longer understood as an affront to a sacred entity but to a human entity. Blasphemy is personal. Under existing human rights treaties, the prevailing legal model of personal blasphemy is “religious hatred.” Roughly speaking, laws against religious hatred or religious hate speech tend to draw from …
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Free Expression in Crisis, Op-Ed
Freedom of Speech and Muslim Rage Shadia B. Drury
Shadia Drury’s two-part column “The Decay of American Democracy,” Part I of which appeared in the October/November issue, will be concluded in a future issue – Eds. The display of Muslim rage in over twenty countries that was triggered by an American-made video insulting the prophet Muhammad has once again turned the conflict between religion …
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Free Expression in Crisis, Op-Ed
Skepticism v. the Indian Blasphemy Law: Free Speech, Free Inquiry and Religious Tolerance Ryan Shaffer
Sanal Edamaruku has been campaigning for critical thinking in India for more than three decades. As head of the Indian Rationalist Association, he travels throughout India showing how gurus or “godmen” perform supposedly science-defying miracles by means of simple stage magic. In a country where superstition is backed by poverty and illiteracy, rural Indians often …
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Obituary
Paul Kurtz (1925-2012)
Paul Kurtz, founder and longtime chair of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, the Council for Secular Humanism, and the Center for Inquiry, died on October 20, 2012, at the age of eighty-six. He was one of the most influential figures in the humanist and skeptical movements from the late 1960s through the first decade of …
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On Gore Vidal When I read that the editors of FI, in their introduction to S. T. Joshi’s obituary of Gore Vidal (FI, October/November 2012), quoted International Academy of Humanism Secretary Stephen Law that Vidal was “principled, honest, and courageous” I was perplexed and frightened. I could not help but wonder what Joshi had …
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Op-Ed
Altruism Isn’t Generosity Tibor R. Machan
A big error has haunted humanity for centuries: it’s the equivocation between generosity and altruism. Generosity is a virtue any decent human being will practice: it asks that one reach out to deserving others in times of dire need. Altruism is a policy of devoting oneself to benefiting others above all. The former is admirable; …
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Op-Ed
Homosexuality Is Not a Choice, But It Should Be Katrina Voss
In 1996, a particularly devastating nail was driven into the coffin of “homosexuality is a choice” rhetoric. A team of researchers found that the more older brothers a boy has, the greater the likelihood that he will grow up to be gay. Since the research was first published in the American Journal of Psychiatry, many …
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Op-Ed
Ffity Years of American Atheists Tom Flynn
Free Inquiry congratulates American Atheists as it nears its fiftieth anniversary year. The organization was founded by the activist Madalyn Murray O’Hair in 1963, soon after O’Hair’s victory in one of two consolidated U.S. Supreme Court cases that ended mandatory prayer in public schools. During most of its early years, American Atheists was the movement’s …
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Op-Ed
More Evidence of Fading Faith James A. Haught
Some American cities are suffering a new problem: abandoned churches. The Philadelphia Inquirer recently reported that officials in the City of Brotherly Love can’t cope with once-stately temples that “decay into neighborhood eyesores.” “There are now so many shuttered houses of worship – at least 300 estimated across the Philadelphia region – that anxiety over …
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Obituary
Obituaries – Vol 33, No 1
Sergei Kapitza, 1928 – 2012 In early 2012, Sergei Kapitza won the first gold medal awarded by the Russian Academy of Sciences for his “outstanding achievements in the dissemination of scientific knowledge.” This was appropriate, because Kapitza was one of the few people–one of the important few–who could be described as a “science popularizer.” …
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Church-State Update
Hansel, Gretel and Today’s Abortion Wars Edd Doerr
Thanks to the Brothers Grimm, we are all familiar with the tale of Hansel and Gretel, the young brother and sister who were abandoned by their father and stepmother in the woods of medieval Germany. While the tale is fiction, it is actually a metaphor for a practice that was rather common during long stretches …
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God on Trial
How Christians Can Test Their Own Prayers Objectively John W. Loftus
For the moment, let’s set aside the problem of why God doesn’t do what is right regardless of whether people pray. And let’s set aside the problem of what god, if any, is answering prayers. Finally, let’s also set aside the problem of why God doesn’t answer important prayers—like those to alleviate world hunger, those …
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Humanism and the Arts
A Tribute to Harry Harrison Guy Lancaster
Most obituaries written shortly after the August 15, 2012, death of best-selling science-fiction writer Harry Harrison remembered him as the author of Make Room! Make Room!, the novel upon which the Charlton Heston movie Soylent Green was loosely based. But Harrison’s significance to the genre of science fiction, and to secular humanism, transcends this distasteful …
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Humanism at Large
Our Christian Language Peg Tittle
Several years ago, I held a position at Nipissing University in Canada that involved working with students to improve their writing skills. At the time, all students admitted to the publicly funded university had to take a writing competency test, and I typically used the student’s test as a starting point for our work together. …
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Reviews
A Philosophy for the Past, Present, and Future John Shook
Meaning and Value in a Secular Age: Why Eupraxsophy Matters—The Writings of Paul Kurtz, edited by Nathan Bupp (Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 2012, ISBN 13: 9781616143215) 265 pp. Paper, $19.00. It may be difficult to recall nowadays, but there was a time when the greatest atheists were philosophical giants. They matched their metaphysical, theological, and …
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Reviews
Rediscovering a Lost Treasure James A. Haught
The Swerve: How the World Became Modern, by Stephen Greenblatt (New York: W.W. Norton, 2011, ISBN 978-0-393- 06447-6) 356 pp. Hardcover, $26.95. Distinguished Harvard University professor Stephen Greenblatt contends that rediscovery of the lost Lucretius poem, De Rerum Natura (On the Nature of Things), helped trigger the Renaissance, the Age of Reason, the Enlightenment, and …
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Reviews
Hitchens Memento Mori Becca Challman
Mortality, by Christopher Hitchens (New York: Twelve Books, 2012, ISBN ) 104 pp. Paperback, $22.99. A constant reflection on demise is a good thing. — Christopher Hitchens To devotees of Christopher Hitchens, of which I am unabashedly one, his final tome is a heartbreaking journey’s end; not because of pathos or sentimentality, which he avoids …
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Reviews
What They Really Said Rob Boston
That’s Not What They Meant!: Reclaiming the Founding Fathers from America’s Right Wing, by Michael Austin (Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 2012, ISBN 978-1-61614-670-2) 285 pp. Paperback, $19.00. The Founding Fathers these days are a bit like Silly Putty – they can be stretched into just about any position. Political commentators on the Right and the …
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Reviews
A Suspect Sales Pitch William Harwood
The Jewish Gospels: The Story of the Jewish Christ, by Daniel Boyarin (New York: New Press, 2012, ISBN 978-1-59558-4687) 223 pp. Hardcover, $21.95. Author Daniel Boyarin’s approach in The Jewish Gospels: The Story of the Jewish Christ seems akin to one that believers in Mother Goose and Santa Claus might take. Instead of focusing on …
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Poem
Poems – Vol 33, No 1 Brooke Horvath
Still Life with Lamp and Dogs Brooke Horvath Pillows covered in vines & flowers rest upon the armchair They must have lain there awhile they are so overgrown Two grey pillows on the couch like rocks on rocks Two dogs, one per pillow, one dog dreaming, one awake… As for the lamp– who knows? …
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