Warning: this textbook contains science, and may not be suitable for cognitively immature audiences

Textbook disclaimer stickers from the biology department at Swarthmore College:

More at the College website.

Uppity lesbian high school student gets what’s coming to her

In Wayland High School, Michigan, two 14-year old girls viciously beat a third girl because, as they told police, the girl was an advocate for gay rights and “was trying to in their words ‘impose her views on them.'” A third girl captured the assault on film (and the video was subsequently posted to several Internet sites), suggesting, as police suspect, that the attack was pre-meditated. Because of the age of the perpetrators, the FBI has stated that it will not be investigating potential hate crime violations; and the state of Michigan does not have any hate crimes based on sexual orientation.

Melissa Pope, a spokesperson for local GLBT advocacy group Triangle Foundation, argues that the attack underlines the urgency for the Michigan legislature to pass “Matt’s Law,” an anti-bullying and hate crimes bill:

Matt’s Safe Schools Law [is] a law that would require every school district in Michigan to have a bullying policy in place to protect all children. The bill has been passed by the House and sits in the Senate Education Committee awaiting a hearing.

The chair of the Committee, Republican Wayne Kuipers, opposes the bill in its current form.

The notion that in a healthy, functioning liberal democracy (and whether the US meets the criteria is another matter) you ought to be able to attend an educational institution without being physically assaulted by those who disagree with your views or sexual preferences, should be a no-brainer. But “refcoach,” a commenter at The Grand Rapids Press, disagrees. In his view, the bitch had it coming:

Well its obvious that if your a loud mouth little girl and your always in somebody else’s face all the time its going to come back to haunt you.
Yes you have the right to free speech, but you also have the right to having consequences for your actions. If this girl treated others with a bit more respect she would have not had this happen.
Hat to say, but she got what she deserved.

For refcoach, then, liberal democracy is a boot stamping on the faces of those with whom you disagree, forever. And I doubt very much that he “hats” to say it.

According to the Chicago Tribune, the perpetrators are facing expulsion. As for “Karol,” the victim:

she says she’s not angry about the fight.”Sure my bumps and bruises will go away, but they’re going to get expelled… they’re in trouble with the courts… whose the real loser.”, said Karol.

(Via Dispatches From the Culture Wars)

Things they’d have difficulty believing in Salt Lake City XVIII

The week in fundie:

1. In Tanzania, albinos used to be the object of simple persecution, for much the same mindless and irrational reasons that such people would be ostracised anywhere in the world: because of their physical appearance. Now, because of a belief across Africa that albinos have magical powers, and because witchdoctors are promoting the belief that potions containing albino skin, bones and hair can make people wealthy, albinos are being hunted for their body parts. The New York Times reports one such case:
   

   The young are often the targets. In early May, Vumilia Makoye, 17, was eating dinner with her family in their hut in western Tanzania when two men showed up with long knives.Vumilia was like many other Africans with albinism. She had dropped out of school because of severe near-sightedness, a common problem for albinos, whose eyes develop abnormally and who often have to hold things like books or cellphones two inches away to see them. She could not find a job because no one would hire her. She sold peanuts in the market, making $2 a week while her delicate skin was seared by the sun.

   When Vumilia’s mother, Jeme, saw the men with knives, she tried to barricade the door of their hut. But the men overpowered her and burst in.

   “They cut my daughter quickly,” she said, making hacking motions with her hands.

   The men sawed off Vumilia’s legs above the knee and ran away with the stumps. Vumilia died.

   The article also refers to the murder in Kenya of an albino woman, whose eyes, tongues and breasts were gouged out. This is where magical thinking can lead, people. It can lead to superstitious thugs breaking down the door of your house and hacking your children to death. (HT: Dogma Free America. See also The Standard.)

If it’s Sunday, it must be Bowie

Assorted David Bowie clips, in chronological order.

1968: “When I’m Five” (from the short film Love You Til Tuesday)

1969: “Space Oddity” (David Bowie)

Triskaidekatheism

Reed Braden has nominated me for Nullifidian’s Atheist Thirteen meme, and since it’s been a long while since I’ve participated in one, how can I refuse? If you want to play too, just copy the questions below, and nominate three bloggers who you would like to participate.

An open letter to Perth Atheists

I appreciate that Perth Atheists Meetup (a wonderful development, by the way) hasn’t been around for very long, and that your organisation’s website is but an adjunct. But as an atheist from Perth, though not a Perth Atheist, and currently resident in Japan, I must say I’m a little disappointed in the lack of Perth-related atheist and religion-related news content.

WA is the state in which, a few short years ago, the Opposition party ran for election on a platform of increasing the age of consent for homosexual sex from 16 to 18; it is also the state in which, only last year, two of the state’s highest-profile religious leaders came out in support of ID being taught in schools. There is no shortage of religious nuttery there. Even PerthNow has beaten us both to the punch with a story on the positive correlation between atheism and intelligence. And come on, guys: I’m half way around the world, and I can’t be the only one (aside from ex-members, of course) blogging on the Bethel Covenant Community scandal, can I?

Please, pretty please, with sugar on top: it would be great to open up your link and find, in place of a Google News aggregator, some good local material.

More Stumbleupon joy . . .

1. Drag a series of dots, lines and other shapes of assorted sizes and colours into the circle on the left, and watch them appear in the kaleidoscope on the right. A great way to kill two minutes.
2. In this optical illusion, you stare at the dot at the centre of the image for 30 seconds, then move your cursor over the image. The image will appear to be in full colour until you move your eyes. And I’d really appreciate knowing why.
3. If you enjoy reading the classics on your boss’s time, but don’t want him or her to know about it, why not try Read At Work?
4. Wikipedia’s List of Unusual Deaths is yet another reason why the aformentioned is the greatest site on the Interwebs.
5. How to beat PacMan. You never know when this sort of information will come in handy.
6. Nothing says “geek” like a coffee-table-sized NES controller.
7. Dei Ex Machina.
8. Yo Suck At Photoshop: a Photoshop tutorial with class. In Episode 7, Donny walks us through Patch Tool and Levels by attempting to transform a sad, recently-divorced woman into a MILF: “Mom I’d Love to Facebook.”
9. Hell of Sand. Plant things. Grow things. Blow shit up.
10. Devil’s Pool is a natural rock pool at the top of Victoria Falls in Zambia where, between September and December, idiots can swim just a few feet away from a 100-metre sheer drop.
11. I might have posted this one previously: Students for an Orwellian Society.

Silvio Berlusconi: theocrat

AGI reports:

“I thank the Pope for his appreciation of the new atmosphere which has broken out in Italy with the arrival of our political grouping in power. We model ourselves on the European Popular Party, and for the Vatican this is something to appreciate. We are on the Church’s side: we believe in the Christian tradition, in the undeniable value of life, on the role and the value of the family, on the defence of human rights, on solidarity, justice, tolerance. We respect the weaker members of society: the ill, children, the elderly, the marginalised. We are on the same wavelength as that on which the Church is active” affirmed Italy’s Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, just before his meeting with the Pope, scheduled for 11 am today. Berlusconi added: “We hold that all kinds of dialogue are possible between Church and State. The Church and its organisations are free to express their thoughts on anything, the lay state has every right to follow its own lights in the government’s deeds. My Government cannot fail to meet with the approval of the Pope and of the Church”.

Berlusconi is Italy’s richest man, and his commercial empire includes three private television stations and the country’s leading daily newspaper. Two of the three state-run TV stations are operated by his supporters, and you are as likely to hear a critical word uttered about him in the Italian media as you are likely to hear criticism of Vladimir Putin in the Russian media. If this guy believes in justice and in the best interests of the weaker members of society, I have a Trevi Fountain to sell you.

The Inverse Godwin’s Law

I can’t claim credit for the idea (that honour goes to Slacktivist), nor for the name. Ninglun’s thoughtful post on some of the embarrassingly Talibanesque elements in the Old Testament provoked the following typically thoughtless response from Kevin:

Very impressive! You have blamed the taliban on the jooooooos! Kudos to you for that impressive slight of hand. Weird that Jews don’t kill people for their God, and muslims do (most people think the taliban is a muslim group)… often, but still, what does that matter? It’s the fault of the jooos! They’re so pesky, huh?

A complete strawman if you (unlike Kevin) bother to read Ninglun’s post, but I’ll pass over that, Ninglun having promptly pointed out Kevin’s dishonesty (or at least his profound inability to read for comprehension) to him later in the comments. Godwin’s Law addresses the derailing of discussions by means of the introduction of inappropriate or hyperbolic comparisons of x to Hitler/the Nazis. (“Hitler/the Nazis” can of course be replaced by any sufficiently diabolical entity in this formulation.) An “Inverse Godwin’s Law” would apply to arguments which claim that the critique of x is invalid because x is not as bad as [insert sufficiently diabolical entity here]. “Jews don’t kill people for their God, and muslims do,” claims Kevin, and therefore you’re not allowed to say anything critical about the Old Testament.

Slacktivist calls this “the NABA defense:”

John McCain: theocrat

Republican presidential candidate John McCain shows his true colours on the separation of church and state:

[McCAIN:]I would probably have to say yes, that the Constitution established the United States of America as a Christian nation.

I think the number one issue that is in the selection, that which people should make a selection of the President of the United States is, “Will this person carry on in the Judeo-Christian principled tradition that has made this nation the greatest experiment in the history of mankind”?

I just have to say in all candor that since this nation was founded primarily on Christian principles that, I, that, that’s a decision that the American people would make, but personally, that’s, that’s just, I prefer someone who I know with a solid grounding in my faith.

I just feel that, that, my faith is probably a better spiritual guidance, a better spiritual guidance. I just would, I just feel that that’s an important part of our qualifications to lead.

We welcome the poor, the tired, the huddled masses, and, but they, when they come here, they shouldn’t, they know that they are in a nation founded on Christian principles.

Our Founding Fathers were concerned about church being part of the state such as had been in England and the imposition of a certain type of Christianity imposed on people. So, they didn’t mean, in my view, separation of church and state, that there is no place for God or a Superior Being, a Creator. They also continued to emphasize the Christian principle, “In God We Trust”, “created equal.” Every statement that they made had to do with the belief in a Divine Creator.

We are a nation which is uniquely designated in many respects. But I think it was Man implementing the teachings of Christ. [Emphasis added. Transcript from a commenter at Atheist Media Blog]

So not only does he believe (or, given the likelihood that he’s pandering to fundamentalists, purporting to believe) that the US Constitution founded America as a “Christian Nation,” he also believes that there should be a religious test for public office. Via Pharyngula.