Atheist Revolution Religious belief is a destructive force that causes far more harm than good. Atheist Revolution is a blog dedicated to breaking free from irrational belief and opposing Christian extremism in America. Statistics Unique Visitors: Total Unique Visitors: Outgoing: Total Outgoing: 0 0 48 8836

Articles from Atheist Revolution

Changes in Religious Activity Affect Men and Women Differently 2008-01-12 06:51:00 According to Temple University, a new study conducted at Harvard by a researcher now at Temple and one at Brown reveals that religion may affect women and men differently when it comes to mental health.Among persons for whom religious activity changes between childhood and adulthood, effects on mental health may differ by gender.According to Temple University's Joanna Maselko, Sc.D., women who had stopped being religiously active were more than three times more likely to have suffered generalized anxiety and alcohol abuse/dependence than women who reported always having been active.On the other hand, men seem to experience a very different pattern.Conversely, men who stopped being religiously active were less likely to suffer major depression when compared to men who had always been religiously active.Joanna Maselko, Assistant Professor of Public Health and co-author of the study published in Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology, offers the following possible explanation:Wom ...

Ending Door-to-Door Proselytizing 2008-01-11 06:54:00 You just returned from church and are spending a quiet Sunday afternoon with your family before you return to church that evening (it is revival, after all). Your doorbell rings, and you open the door to reveal a well-dressed young man who says, "Good afternoon! I was hoping that I could take a few minutes of your time to tell you about the church of Satan." In stunned silence, you realize your mouth is hanging open and your 6 year-old daughter is now standing beside you at the door. He continues, "You see, we believe that Christianity is a perversion of basic human truths and..." You manage to shut the door.If you are a "bible-believing Christian," I am guessing that you would be upset if this scenario actually happened on your front porch. Please try to understand that I feel every bit as upset when this happens on my porch but the intruder is an evangelical Christian. And I'm fairly confident that I'm not alone in feeling this way. Here are some specific thoughts that often flash ...

Atheism Does NOT Require Faith 2008-01-10 05:38:00 Next to the claim that atheists are evil because some god is required for morality, insisting that atheism requires faith seems to be a second favorite among many Christians. I will provide a recent example of this claim and then show why it is false.Joey Depew, a member of the Board of Contributors to the Chillicothe Gazette (OH), writes:The thing I find most interesting about atheism is the amount of faith it requires to believe. Christians have the Creation story and atheists have the Big Bang. So you have God, or some higher being, creating the world and some beginning of life, or you have nothing. If I remember correctly, the Big Bang began with some molecule of matter being struck by some molecule of anti-matter and then - BANG! - the universe expanded beyond measure in a fraction of time.If that doesn't take faith to believe then I don't know what does. Where did that initial matter come from? If there was nothing but a huge void, how could matter just suddenly appear, let alo ...

Nice When the Media Gets Atheism Right 2008-01-09 20:14:00 The Tri-City Herald (WA) ran a nice article on atheism featuring foxhole atheist, Fernando Aguilar, as part of their "what we believe" series. It is nice to see some accurate information about atheism being disseminated in the media for a change.Aguilar says no two atheists hold exactly the same views because atheism isn't a belief system. It's simply a way of describing someone who doesn't believe there's a God.It is also refreshing to see atheism included in the series to remind readers that there are viable alternatives to religion.Tags: atheism, atheist, media ...

Creationism Undermines Fundamentals Of Science Education 2008-01-09 05:52:00 A coalition of 17 science organizations, including the prestigious National Academy of Sciences, issued a report in the January 2008 Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB) Journal calling on scientists to get more involved in promoting science education. Specifically, the coalition is concerned that creationism and its pseudo-scientific cousin, intelligent design, are undermining science education.The article reports the results of a national survey of 1,000 likely American voters. Among the findings were that respondents favored teaching evolution over creationist alternatives. In addition, the survey found a relationship between one's understanding of science and one's support for teaching evolution, indicating that those who know more about science are more likely to support evolution as a part of science education."The bottom line is that the world is round, humans evolved from an extinct species, and Elvis is dead," Weissmann added. "This survey is a w ...

Maximizing Reciprocity in the Atheist Blogosphere 2008-01-08 05:44:00 One of the great things about the way the World Wide Web works is that those of us who link to one another are interconnected. This means that what benefits one of us is likely to benefit all of us. Think about it - if a blog links to you, then helping that blog attract more visitors means that more people are likely to find you as well. This should give all of us a powerful incentive to promote other blogs. I'm going to give you some easy ways to do this, some of which might not have occurred to you.If you have your own blog and want to support others while simultaneously boosting your own traffic, there are many helpful strategies to consider. Here are just a few:On the off chance that you do not already have a blogroll containing links to the blogs you read regularly, add one first. Mine is on my right column and is labeled "Recommended Blogs."Add the StumbleUpon toolbar to your web browser. Now open each of the blogs listed in your blogroll and click the thumbs up ("I like it!") b ...

H. Res. 888 Rewrites American History To Support Christian Nation Myth 2008-01-07 05:37:00 House Resolution 888, sponsored by Rep. Randy Forbes (R-VA-4th District), seeks to rewrite American history to include a number of falsehoods perpetuated by Christian extremists. This should be of grave concern to every American atheist as well as anyone who values historical accuracy.For many specific examples of the misinformation contained in H. Res. 888, see Chris Rodda's excellent post at Talk To Action. It is long, but it really is a must read. Rodda has done an impressive job of debunking many of the claims contained in the resolution. Plain and simple, this is revisionist history intended to promote the "Christian nation" myth through deception.For more information about the implications of H. Res. 888, talking points you can use when discussing what is wrong with it, and even a sample letter you can send to your Representative in Congress, see Bruce Wilson's helpful post at Talk To Action. Contacting your Representative is especially important if he or she happens to be on t ... History

Know Them By Their Deeds: Atheist Tree of Knowledge Repeatedly Vandalized 2008-01-06 15:19:00 I keep forgetting to post this one, but better late than never.The "Tree of Knowledge" erected in front of the West Chester county courthouse by the Freethought Society of Greater Philadelphia was vandalized at least four times during the month of December. The tree also drew many complaints. It seems that many Christians do not think atheists should be allowed to have any sort of holiday display.Tags: Philadelphia, atheist, Freethought Society of Greater Philadelphia, vandalism ...

Media Coverage of Romney's Speech Reveals Attitudes Toward Atheists 2008-01-06 10:55:00 As we enter the primaries, analysis of Mitt Romney's Mormon beliefs and whether they are relevant in evaluating his suitability for the American Presidency continue. One noteworthy point which has not been made often enough is what the media's coverage of Romney's faith speech says about public attitudes toward atheists.The following is from an editorial in the VC Reporter (California): "Freedom requires religion just as religion requires freedom," Romney said in his speech. "Freedom and religion endure together, or perish alone."Those words, Romney’s continued excoriation of secularism, and the media’s collective failure to question this position are a slap in the face to the millions of Americans who look deep within their souls and find no belief in a higher power, those Americans who find all their answers to life’s mysteries in science and those Americans who choose that their faith, their spirituality is so personal that it is theirs and theirs alone and not the provenan ...

Humanist Symposium and Carnival of the Godless 2008-01-06 10:50:00 Two atheist blog carnivals in one day! I guess I know how I'm spending the morning. Carnival of the Godless is up at Axis of Jared, and The Humanist Symposium is up at Faith in Honest Doubt. Check them out.Tags: atheism, blog carnival, Carnival of the Godless, The Humanist Symposium, atheist ...

Action Needed On H. Res. 888 2008-01-05 11:26:00 If you've been reading any atheist blogs lately, you'd undoubtedly heard about House Resolution 888 by now. If not, you can learn about it here. Now is the time to contact your Representative in Congress to ask him or her to oppose H. Res. 888.I found a decent letter template to adapt for my purposes here. Here is the letter I sent in its entirety:Dear Rep. Taylor:I am writing to ask you to please oppose H. Res. 888. This resolution attempts to rewrite American history with many demonstrably false assertions, documentation of which can be found at http://tinyurl.com/2b3kvx.At first glance, this resolution may appear noncontroversial, but please do not be misled. It is a historically inaccurate attempt by the religious right to rewrite American history to promote their agenda.Unfortunately, I am convinced that there are many people in the country and even some in Congress who would like to turn our great nation into a Christian theocracy. Aside from being filled with inaccuracies abou ...

Media Won't Discuss Huckabee's Christian Extremism 2008-01-04 13:01:00 He won Iowa, and he's here to "take this nation back for Christ." He's Mike Huckabee, and he could end up winning the Republican nomination for 2008 even though he remains an embarrassment to many Republicans. He appears to be a genuine Christian extremist, and there seems to be little place in Huckabee's America for nonbelievers, homosexuals, a woman's right to choose, and even science. It is not quite time to panic, but it is also no time for apathy.This story from the Associated Press caught my eye because it reports that Huckabee stands by this statement he made 10 years ago: "I hope we answer the alarm clock and take this nation back for Christ."He gave the speech the same year he endorsed the Baptist convention's statement of beliefs on marriage that "a wife is to submit graciously to the servant leadership of her husband even as the church willingly submits to the headship of Christ." Huckabee and his wife, Janet, signed a full-page ad in USA Today in support of the stateme ...

Atheist Pride 2008-01-04 07:46:00 I guess I've never been a fan of the phrase "atheist pride" because it reminds me at some level of white pride. I've preferred to talk of an "atheist movement" or "atheist revival." And yet, these phrases do not quite capture the self-affirming, pro-atheist sense of "atheist pride." At first glance, it may appear silly to feel pride in what is simply a lack of theistic belief, but as I look ahead to 2008, I think this is exactly what we need.In defining atheism as a lack of theistic belief (i.e., the claim that some sort of god or gods exist), it may seem that one has little in which to take pride. However, I think that one's ability to either escape from religion should be a source of pride in itself. Those of you living in America know full well how pervasive a force Christianity can be, and to have de-converted or never to have accepted it in the first place is notable. We face tremendous pressure to go along with the Christian majority and are regularly demonized for our refusal ...

Huckabee: Defined By Faith, Willfully Neglectful Of Science 2008-01-03 05:57:00 It is important to me that American children receive a quality secular education. Science education is a vital part of this, necessary to promote the future scientific prowess of our nation so that we can compete in a global economy. Because I value science and support reality-based education, I could not in good conscience vote for a candidate who denies evolution. Moreover, I could not cast my vote for a candidate who chooses to ignore the body of scientific evidence which indicates that homosexuality is not a choice and instead demonizes homosexuals on religious grounds.I've already expressed my opposition to Huckabee, but the more I learn about him, the worse he sounds. Now I learn that he insists that homosexuality is a choice, ignoring the body of scientific evidence which shows otherwise. He does not care about the science because his biases are religiously motivated. He's willing to turn his back on reality when it conflicts with his bigotry.In addition to his willful denial ...

Review of the Rational Response Squad 2008-01-02 15:30:00 When I asked what you thought of the Rational Response Squad, I did so because I wanted to hear your thoughts without my influence. That is, I wanted to know what you thought about them and not simply whether you agreed or disagreed with my views. Now it is time to share my opinion.The most common category of criticism I have seen directed at the Rational Response Squad (RRS) involves the question of whether their tactics produce more harm than good for atheists. This is by no means the only criticism, but it is common common enough that it provides a natural starting point.RRS Tactics: More Harm or More Good?Let me cut to the chase and say that I come down on the "more good" side of this debate. That is, I think their presence and even their aggressive tactics benefit us more than they cost us. But this is an indirect benefit, and understanding it requires us to realize what the RRS is and what it is not.The RRS has been fairly clear that they have no interest in representing atheism ...