June 2010
78 posts
“Just because secular society has dragged the religion that you prefer [Christianity] kicking and screaming towards sanity and morality doesn’t mean that you get to pretend that your religion is without its problems and point your fingers at some other ones.
Yes, Islam is a messed up basket of crap. It’s also younger than yours and it’s been the enforced religion of a number of states. It hasn’t had the opportunity to be dragged kicking and screaming towards sanity the way your religion has.
But you don’t get off the hook. You don’t get to pretend that the stuff that’s in your bible is not in your bible.” —Matt Dillahunty (The Atheist Experience) in response to someone claiming that religion is a force for “love and understanding” in the world, except for a “few bad apples” like Islam, while secular society results in fear, hatred, death, wars, disease, and famine.
Yes, Islam is a messed up basket of crap. It’s also younger than yours and it’s been the enforced religion of a number of states. It hasn’t had the opportunity to be dragged kicking and screaming towards sanity the way your religion has.
But you don’t get off the hook. You don’t get to pretend that the stuff that’s in your bible is not in your bible.” —Matt Dillahunty (The Atheist Experience) in response to someone claiming that religion is a force for “love and understanding” in the world, except for a “few bad apples” like Islam, while secular society results in fear, hatred, death, wars, disease, and famine.
May 2010
184 posts
A constructive suggestion for retribution against BP →
scienceblogs.com
Emphasis mine. We should be doing this YESTERDAY.
Everyone is fixated on that one burning mess in the Gulf, which is probably exactly what the oil companies want — they are probably sweating pungent carcinogenic petrochemicals at the thought that someone might look around and notice all of those other rigs, which almost certainly have a paper trail of shortcuts and risks and shoddy management. While BP is struggling to catch up with its responsibilities and close off the well and clean up the poisons, I think a great thing for the Obama administration to do would be to descend on each of those other wells with a force of elite regulatory accountants, documenting all the potential and extant problems, and telling each company to fix them. Now. Without cheating, without getting any special dispensations. If they can’t fix them, shut them down or hit them with massive penalties.
“
Eventually I realized I had covered the wrong story. The important point wasn’t that Exxon couldn’t clean up its oil spill. The point was, no one could clean it up.
By telling the story of the company’s incompetence, we had perpetuated the myth that real cleanup of a major oil spill is possible. We had left the industry free to say that next time, with proper preparation and equipment, they would be able to recover any spilled oil.
The truth is that when large amounts of oil go into the ocean, it’s a huge success to recover as much as 10 percent. More than that is rarely possible. Oil spreads too rapidly and reacts too quickly with the environment; and the ocean is a challenging place to work, especially considering the logistics of speedily gathering up a blob the size of a small state.
” —From A Spill’s Dirty Secret on SEED Magazine (via uzairm) (via abagond)
THIS.
(via ilykadamen)
(via so-treu)
(via thingsimreading)
(via pcquotes)
(via thecurvature)
From My 15 Year Old Mind...
I’ve been looking through files on my computer and came across a paper I wrote on mythology from my sophomore year of high school. My favorite parts are when I write about mythology not having a place in society today because we can find explanations through science rather than stories and describing religion as an authoritarian system that believes it is “absolutely correct, no room for questioning.”
Ha! Luckily I grew up in an area where no one batted an eye at these sentiments.
“[In England] The party that lost is working with the party that won. They’re not accusing them of being bolshevik zulus out to destroy Magna Carta. Because the English are grown-ups, including their conservatives, who enjoy a wonderful luxury conservatives on the side of the pond do not. They’re allowed to be sane. They don’t have to cater to creationists and anti-intellectuals. Only in this dumb country do liberals and conservatives argue over things like evolution and climate change and whether sick people should be left to die in the street.”
—Bill Maher (via goodreasonnews) (via stfuconservatives)
This movie was okay. Written well, but I despised Stiller’s character, Roger. I think we’re supposed to be annoyed with him but come to understand or sympathize with him. I never got there. Maybe I just really don’t like Ben Stiller. Greta Gerwig was great— her character felt interesting and real.
No, really, the word “no” isn’t that confusing →
pandagon.net
I can’t say that I pay much attention to celebrities like Kendra Wilkinson so I had no idea these were the circumstances of her sex tape. So horrible.
WWII Love Letter
May 28, 2010
President Barack H. Obama
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest
Washington, DC 20500
Dear Mr. President,
For the past month, we have sent you personal letters from those harmed by “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” With the votes in the House and the Senate Armed Services Committee, we are bringing our series to a close. The final letter we are sharing with you was written by a World War II soldier to another service member. It is a love letter penned on the occasion of their anniversary.
The letter, which follows below, was published in September 1961 by ONE Magazine – an early gay magazine based out of Los Angeles. In 2000, Bob Connelly, an adjunct professor of LGBT studies at American University, found a copy of the letter in the Library of Congress. He brought the letter to the attention of Servicemembers Legal Defense Network last month.
We sincerely thank Mr. Connelly for his research and the ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives for granting permission for the letter to be republished.
Please accept this letter on the behalf of all lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender service members on active-duty, in the reserve and in the National Guard; those who have been discharged; and those who didn’t enlist because of the discriminatory law now being dismantled.
With great respect,
Former Specialist 4th Class Aubrey Sarvis
United States Army
*****
THE LETTER AS PUBLISHED BY ONE Magazine:
Dear Dave,
This is in memory of an anniversary – the anniversary of October 27th, 1943, when I first heard you singing in North Africa. That song brings memories of the happiest times I’ve ever known. Memories of a GI show troop – curtains made from barrage balloons – spotlights made from cocoa cans – rehearsals that ran late into the evenings – and a handsome boy with a wonderful tenor voice. Opening night at a theatre in Canastel – perhaps a bit too much muscatel, and someone who understood. Exciting days playing in the beautiful and stately Municipal Opera House in Oran – a misunderstanding – an understanding in the wings just before opening chorus.
Drinks at “Coq d’or” – dinner at the “Auberge” – a ring and promise given. The show 1st Armoured – muscatel, scotch, wine – someone who had to be carried from the truck and put to bed in his tent. A night of pouring rain and two very soaked GIs beneath a solitary tree on an African plain. A borrowed French convertible – a warm sulphur spring, the cool Mediterranean, and a picnic of “rations” and hot cokes. Two lieutenants who were smart enough to know the score, but not smart enough to realize that we wanted to be alone. A screwball piano player – competition – miserable days and lonely nights. The cold, windy night we crawled through the window of a GI theatre and fell asleep on a cot backstage, locked in each other’s arms – the shock when we awoke and realized that miraculously we hadn’t been discovered. A fast drive to a cliff above the sea – pictures taken, and a stop amid the purple grapes and cool leaves of a vineyard.
The happiness when told we were going home – and the misery when we learned that we would not be going together. Fond goodbyes on a secluded beach beneath the star-studded velvet of an African night, and the tears that would not be stopped as I stood atop the sea-wall and watched your convoy disappear over the horizon.
We vowed we’d be together again “back home,” but fate knew better – you never got there. And so, Dave, I hope that where ever you are these memories are as precious to you as they are to me.
Goodnight, sleep well my love.
Brian Keith
