4 new atheists so far

I just got an email from a girl who deconverted. She's been struggling with why god hates her so much for loving another woman, and wanting to let go of god for awhile. Then she saw my video on Sunday School and what I said about children being taught they are flawed, evil, sinful and wrong was exactly what she needed to hear.

"That was why I couldn't get away from god. Because deep down I was still that child in Sunday School being told again and again that I was sinful. And just like that, sitting here in my room and listening to your video, all my fear about hell and god went away. What's left is a woman free to live her life without fear."

Epic just isn't a powerful enough word. Stellar maybe? A YouTube video did the trick for me; it's why I do videos myself. Still, there's a world of difference between believing you're doing some good and knowing it.

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Thoughts on Sunday School

I've started half a dozen posts but I haven't had the hours of dedicated solitude I need for real writing. Thankfully tomorrow I can go register Little Man at the new school & soon he'll be outta my hair.

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ATAT Housekeeping

Hello, readers. I've been doing a bit of housekeeping on the blog. Since Little Man is back in school, I've discontinued (for now) the Sunday Schools posts of recommended readings and cool blogs. Instead I'm sharing things on my Facebook, via Twitter (@antitheistangie), and through my Google Reader (streamed below in the box titled "Recommended Reading".)

I've added a new petition for HR 911. Feel free to share the link: http://tinyurl.com/senate911 and ask others to sign.

I've also added a Donate button. Yeah, it's not very classy but since the unemployment office has decided to be ten freaking weeks late with my deposit (and my landlord's not too happy with me, and my phone's gonna get shut off in three days...) I figured it was time to swallow my pride and go the Christian missionary route, and start begging for cash. (Sorry.)

I've also added new links in the side bar of ATAT Favorites, including the site for the International Cultic Studies Association (ICSA) and the humorous photo blog People of Wal-Mart.

There is a survey off to the side, but I'm having trouble logging in (read: remembering *either* of my passwords) so I'm disabling it until I can get in to view the results.

That's all for now. I'll try to post something entertaining later on today.

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Sunday School 4

Sorry for the late post today. I'm unreasonably tired. So today let's tackle two completely unrelated topics that start with the same letter of the alphabet: Faith Healing and Food Art. (See, I told you they were unrelated.)

Faith Healing

Here's a great article by Dr. Stephen Barrett on Quackwatch"Some Thoughts About Faith Healing". Here's a few paragraphs about James Randi (faith buster extraordinaire).

Randi's most noteworthy experience was the unmasking of Peter Popoff, an evangelist who would call out the names of people in the audience and describe their ailments. Popoff said he received this information from God, but it was actually obtained by confederates who mingled with the audience before each performance. Pertinent data would be given to Popoff's wife, who would broadcast it from backstage to a tiny receiver in Popoff's ear. After recording one of Mrs. Popoff's radio transmissions, Randi exposed the deception on the Johnny Carson Show. First he played a videotape showing Popoff interacting with someone in the audience. Then he replayed the tape with Mrs. Popoff's voice audible to illustrate how Popoff used the information.

Randi also exposed the techniques used by evangelist W.V. Grant, who calls out people in the audience by name and describes their ailments. Grant obtains this information from letters people send him and by mingling with the audience before his show. To help his memory, he uses crib sheets and gets hand signals from associates who also use crib sheets. After one performance, Randi was able to retrieve a complete set from the trash Grant left behind! Following another performance, Randi found that some members of the audience had given false information about themselves, their ailments, and their medical care. For example, after "Dr. Jesus" had "put a new heart" into a man supposedly awaiting open-heart surgery, Randi found that the details (including the doctor and hospital named by Grant) could not be corroborated.

Grant's subjects typically are "slain in the spirit" and fall backward into the arms of his assistants. In 1986 I observed from a few feet away what happened when he encountered an elderly woman who did not wish to fall backward when he touched her forehead. Grant pushed his fingers into her neck so hard that she could not remain standing. I also watched him "lengthen" the leg of a man who limped up to the stage, supposedly because one of his legs was shorter than the other. The audience may have been impressed with this feat, but I was not. Before the show began, I noted that the man was one of Grant's assistants and walked normally.

For a visual, I offer WV Grant's contemporary and peer: Benny Hinn



Enough of the lulz. On the serious side of things, Dr. Seth Asser's article on Religious Child Abuse makes some excellent points, such as:

The Supreme Court has consistently ruled that while freedom of belief is protected, there is no right to freedom to act on those beliefs in a way that hurts others. Despite this and at the urging of Christian Science lobbyists, in 1974, the federal government mandated that states that receive child abuse prevention grants have laws that would exempt parents from the duty to provide medical care to ill children if they instead relied on "spiritual treatment."

Dr. Asser and Rita Swan together founded Children's Healthcare is a Legal Duty, Inc (CHILD). They're asking people to contact their senators regarding HR 911, which passed the House but is languishing in the Senate. HR 911 is the Stop Child Abuse in Residential Programs for Teens Act.

It sets limits on the use of physical and mechanical restraints and seclusion. It requires all staff to be familiar with the signs of and appropriate responses to heatstroke, dehydration, and hypothermia. It requires the program to have policies for the provision of emergency medical care. It requires that youths be allowed to make and receive phone calls with “as much privacy as possible” and be allowed to call the state hotline to report abuses. HR911 does not exempt church-run facilities from its requirements.

I'm going to make another petition (like the one in the side column - over there to your right. Yes, please go sign that one, too) and hopefully have it up later this week. And now, as promised, the completely unrelated - but awesome - food art.

I have a couple things to say about this picture.



1) It's a photograph, not a painting.
2) That's cabbage.

Here's another by the same artist, Carl Warner. You can buy his stuff here, if you have a couple hundred pounds (or more hundreds dollars.)




I've also got links from Kevin Van Aelst, who uses everyday objects to convey complicated concepts.

Like this picture of ABC gum made into the human digestive system.



Or this extremely cool apple globe.



He calls this one "Right Middle Finger" and that's really what it says to the server who's gotta clean that up, isn't it?



Or how about these chromosomes? So sour!



Definitely check out his site. (I couldn't fit the cellular mitosis Krispy Kreme photo series on here, but it's worth a peek.)

I'll have a more normal "yay atheist blog community" Sunday School next week. This week is all about preparing for Back to School, so I fully intend to slack-ass.

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Sunday School 4

It's time for another round of this week's latest and greatest sites I happened to stumble upon. Feel free to direct me to good stuff, too. If I missed the most awesome video/article/blog please let me know. (Half the purpose of this blog is a resource for myself of cool stuff I've found. My bookmarks tab gets full too quickly.)

Jerry's Blog posted this awesome video on continental drift. Little Man and I watched it a couple times already. I think even creationists accept continental drift, but I could be wrong about the YECs.


650 Million Years in 1 Min. and 20 Sec. - Watch more Funny Videos

Pretty, no?

Trust me on this one, and go to Bay of Fundie's blog for Like a Virgin

Forever in Hell takes on the Christian Anti-Defamation League in "If God's So Great, Why Do You Keep Losing?" That's what I was planning on linking you to at least. Then I read this response to cries of "the government can't get anything right" and so now I think you should go there too/instead.

Actually, I'm going to quote part of it here because it's just so brilliant.

This morning I was awoken by my alarm clock powered by electricity generated by the public power monopoly regulated by the US Department of Energy. I then took a shower in the clean water provided by the municipal water utility. After that, I turned on the TV to one of the FCC regulated channels to see what the national weather service of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration determined the weather was going to be like using satellites designed, built, and launched by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. I watched this while eating my breakfast of US Department of Agriculture inspected food and taking the drugs which have been determined as safe by the Food and Drug Administration.

It goes on from there with more fabulousness.

Over on Proud Atheists you can watch Brad Pitt's appearance on Bill Maher. He talks (jokes?) about running for governor of Louisiana. His platform would be no religion, legalization and taxation of marijuana, and legalization of same-sex marriage. Heck, I don't live in Louisiana but I'd vote for him. Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have been incredibly involved in New Orleans post-Katrina recovery through their Make It Right foundation. On a side note, I admire the heck outta Angelina. Her transformation gave me hope I too could outgrow my slutty, rebellious teen years. Now we're both moms and one of us is classy. (Hint: I am not classy.)

I really liked Cyber Lizard's science anecdote "The 'Real' Creation Story".

On the non-atheist My Older Brothers I about wet myself reading "Top Ten Things My Brother Learned Recently". Example: #3. If you notice a bunch of people pointing their camera phones at you, stop whatever you're doing and just walk away.

And.... Healthcare. Yes, I'm sorry to say there are people out there who still think healthcare reform and providing insurance for all Americans is a secret plot to kill old people. Or veterans. Or children with special needs. This one particularly offends because 1) Sarah Palin doesn't believe a word of what she's saying, and 2) I am the mother of a special needs child. This is just the most offensive form of fear-baiting I've come across; this whole healthcare debacle is all about turning Americans against each other. Haven't the right-wingers done that enough with all their values voters, their moral majority, and their wedge issues like abortion and same-sex marriage? Do we really need this to be getting in the way of my healthcare?

The White House has put together this "Reality Check".

Obama himself wrote this NY Times Op-Ed "Why We Need Health Care Reform".

This nice LA Times piece explains what's in the House bill.

The Atheist Jew takes it home with "Town Hall Nut Jobs Embarass the United States"

Forever in Hell reminds us that "Sarah Palin Was for Death Panels" before she was against them. Kind of like the Bridge to Nowhere.

Jerry's Blog explains the Republican Rent-a-Protester Machine and encourages people to become organ donors.

And since living wills/advanced directives have been in the news so much lately (often by idiots and charlatans) here's a place where you can put together your own living will. This document can help guide your family and physicians in making the choices for you that YOU want, like what measures you want them to take to save your life through interventions like a ventilator and resuscitation. It's about giving you the choice in your own health, not your doctor or your government or your family. You. As you can see this service isn't free. The Medicare end-of-life counseling provision mentioned in the House Bill (and villified by the likes of Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich) would pay for elderly Medicare recipients getting their legal wills.

Finally, dear readers, in health care as in all things - if it sounds too crazy to be true, look it up on FactCheck.org.

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Sunday School 3

Now gather round, my children, for today we'll learn many new and exciting things. Or at least you'll have cookies and juice with a coloring page while I read Bible verses out of a teacher's book. Oh wait... we're not having that kind of Sunday School you say?

Okay then, we'll just have to go the Anti-Theist route instead. My son was coloring on the walls in Sharpie this morning (having already used every tube of lipstick I own to go all Trading Spaces on the place *yesterday*) so I tossed the Sharpie (how'd that ever survive the past *year* in this apartment?) and pulled out a coloring book from my mom. It's... a Sunday School coloring book! And you know, there are a lot of pictures of just animals, like one of a donkey in a meadow under stars. And then, right next to it is a picture of an angel (flying) next to a woman and gabbing to her. Suddenly I realized that there are adults - parents - who seriously believe that a physical flipping angel - with wings! - talked to Mary.

My kid knows the word "cranium" but not the word "angel". He tries to say "graduated cylinder". He hides a map in his cowboy hat, and uses a plastic instrument piece as binoculars, points to the myriad stains on the carpet and declares, "Look, tracks!" And then her runs off, and when he gets "lost" in the living room, he pulls out his map and uses it to find his way back home to his bed. And he has no idea what an angel is. I am kind of awesome, you know. I'm huge in Japan.

Vjack at Atheist Religion brings us news on the C Street cult and its present threat to the democratic process. I have to admit I tend to unquestioningly presume a high level of patriotism for politicians, public school teachers, firefighters, and police. But these guys are theocrats all the way - and we elected them to public office.

I don't know if you guys are aware, but in college I was a Middle East studies major. The Israeli/Palestinian conflict especially got my interest and it's amazing how little the average American (including me before this class) really knows about the conflict. This news story on HuffPo sheds light on the side most Americans aren't aware of.

Just Bill runs Ask the Scientologist, an excellent Xenu info blog. This week he tells What It Means to be a Scientologist.

Ron Britton over at Bay of Fundie brings us Teabagging for Jesus, an excellent image post of the insane (misspelled) posters of teabagger protestors. (The people who don't wanna pay taxes, but still want to drive on roads, use the post office, take Medicare, etc.)

Heaving Dead Cats is at it again, this week bringing us the new US currency suggested by an atheist graphic designer. Here's what the new 20 would look like under this arrangement.



On the "face" of each bill, along with the Pres. or founding father is a quote from the Bill of Rights. Very rad ideas here. (Yes, I did just say rad. I watched Saved by the Bell as a kid. So sue me.)

And finally, dear Sunday students, I'd be remiss if I left you without a funny religiously themed video of the week. Here's two for good measure!






Seriously, I want a job where I get millions of dollars to shove people! He might be an evil charlatan but damnit he gets paid to do something we learned not to do on the playground. It's kind of like the guy who made a couple million bucks off of painting eyes on rocks.

And then there's the lovely River Tam.



That's all for today kids. Therefore, go ye and sin some more!

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Sunday School 2

Come in class. Sit, sit, sit. Today we're going to learn about Mother Theresa.



Here's a recent post from the Allied Atheist Alliance on the world's most famous nun. But don't worry, folks - that's not all we have to talk about today. We've also got this fantastic find by Neece over at Heaving Dead Cats. The Duelity project is two videos - one a scientific sounding explanation of creationism, and the other a poetic "yea thou" type telling of evolution. You can watch them separately or concurrently. (Of course, I watched each one, and then the combined version.) It's funny and well done and definitely worth a click.

Here's a touching story (I know, I know) about a 5 year old girl who decided to recycle cans to raise money for the homeless. She raised enough to feed over 18,000. (Better than some magic loaves and fishes any day, right?) The article ends with practical suggestions for small ways every one can help. Two hands in service do more good than two in prayer.

Billyist of Good Reasons News thoroughly quashes an anti-atheist OpEd hit piece in the Journal-Sentinel.

And, oh-my-scientitic-method! You need to watch this video (originally posted by MoJoey on Deep Thoughts and totally ganked by me). You will be laughing till you nearly pee, so have a good excuse if your boss wonders why you're snorting and squealing and sitting in pee.



Finally, as I'm sure many of you are aware, PZ Meyers, the Secular Student Alliance, and other atheists are taking a field trip to the Creation Museum. But the Creation Museum has sent back a warning to PZ that those atheists better act right! BlagHag has the funniest comic *ever* on the subject.

Finally, I'll leave you with the hilarious and perfect country music video, "What Would Jesus Do?" Seriously, click. I wouldn't steer you wrong. This is even *funnier* than "Storm". I've already re-watched it three times this morning.

Click play! Because Jesus looks like Bam Margera.



That's all for this week. See ya real soon!

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Sunday School

I've decided to add a new weekly feature here on ATAT offering Recommended Reading. Here are the best blog posts of the week, as stumbled upon by your local friendly anti-theist.

Keeping Track of Republican Sex Offenders - This post on Deep Thoughts details all the current Republican illicit sex scandals.

Idiot of the Week: Birthers - This regular feature on Atheist Revolution focuses on those conspiracy theorists who claim Obama's not a "real" American.

God Changes You - The Sunny Skeptic takes a hard look at SC Gov. Mark Sanford's recent OpEd on why he should stay in office, because *now* God will make him a good man.

Failure to Grasp the Point - The lovely and charming Heather of Why Don't You Blog? looks at crappy creationist explanations for human infant behavior.

Drink When Thirsty - Skeptical blogger Heaving Dead Cats (who wins my award for having the most punk rock garage band sounding name) looks at the science behind the recommendation to drink 64 oz. of water each day.

Post hoc ergo propter hoc - Cubik's Rube (another awesomely named blog) explores the logical fallacy "If A, then B".

Why Jimmy Carter left the Baptists - This post on Jerry's Blog explains why Jimmy Carter is a stand up feminist.

Wailing over the Veil - The HuffingtonPost takes on the issue of the hijab and burqa.

Say What? - I adore Cake Wrecks, a completely untheistic blog about when cake decorating goes horribly, hilariously wrong. I also recommended the Hello Kitty post for the excellent Zombie Hello Kitty.

That's all for this week's Sunday School. If there's another great blog (atheist or other) you think merits a feature in next week's Sunday School, comment below or email me with the perma link.

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