Frivology

I don’t get much of a chance to blog at work, but I do get opportunities to catch up on my RSS feeds.  Which means, I got to watch the world react to Obama’s Inauguration even though I wasn’t able to really participate init.  Planet Atheism was a pretty big aid to doing that, as I got to read all of the reactions to the part that made me ‘woohoo’ out loud - Obama recognizing non-believers.  I also just kind of got to see how people would react. 

Unfortunately, one of my favorite bloggers - PZ Myers - disappointed me the most with, really, the least to say: 

I’m not wildly enthusiastic about our new president, but he is so much better than the amoral sleazebuckets he is replacing in office that I have to see it all as a largely positive change. I also just read the speech … not bad. I’ll give him a few years to prove himself.

I also caught the brief acknowledgment of the existence of non-believers. It’s a small thing, but appreciated. Everyone seems to be a bit unsatisfied with his specific choice of word, and I agree a bit. The better choice, the word that would have been more inclusive and positive, is “freethinkers”. Someone let his speechwriters know.

via: Catching up with the event of the day

Well, first, as I understand it Obama wrote his own speech for this one, but that’s me being nit-picky.  Secondly, I really don’t like the term ‘freethinkers’, it doesn’t really hit with the right punch what it really means.  Non-believers works very well, thank-you-very-much.  I feel like PZ, and then later when I read him, Hemant, are really … I don’t want to say cynical as that sends the wrong impression, so does bitter, but maybe … jaded?  

(continue reading…)

So, the Bush Administration is being forced to turn over records describing which Christian leaders have visited…

The nine fundamentalist Christian leaders allegedly identified in the Secret Service visitor logs are Focus on the Family’s James Dobson, Gary L. Bauer, of American Values, Wendy Wright, of Concerned Women for America, Louis P. Sheldon and Andrea Lafferty of the Traditional Values Coalition, Paul Weyrich, co-founder of the Heritage and the Free Congress Foundation, Tony Perkins, of the Family Research Council, Donald Wildmon, of the American Family Association, and Jerry Falwell.

When I read things like this, it really makes me wonder just why, if god is so great and god is so good and god is so helpful to our country, people feel the need to hide god’s influence on them. It makes it seem a little less like doing the work of the creator and a little more like hiding the existence of prostitutes.