A Valuable Lesson Learned

Well, folks, I just spent the better part of this day working on tonight's Barmy Bible Study - hours of work
- and somehow, some way, the post has disappeared.  I was just finishing it up - moving a photo from one spot to another and clicked "remove" to remove the duplicate photo and    !    the entire post vanished!

Let that be a lesson to me:  I must learn to compose posts offline and transfer over somehow.  This is something I really hate to have to do because the post never migrates over properly, and in the end you have to fuss with it exactly as I just did now - which means I could still lose it.  Except, possibly I would have a back-up copy, I guess.

Just posting to complain because this seriously stinks.

Then and Now - Woman Hanged for Being A Slut

Catherine Mandeville Snow, last slut to be hanged in Newfoundland

One month ago, on Thursday, March 29 in St. John's NL, a mock re-trial of the infamous 1834 case of Catherine Snow was held.  Mrs. Snow was the last woman to be executed in Newfoundland.  She was tried and convicted of the murder of her husband. Two men who worked for the husband were also tried and convicted of the murder. One of them was Catherine Snow's cousin and alleged lover, the other an indentured servant.  The husband, John Snow, had disappeared in August 1833 and no trace of him was ever found. Catherine Snow protested her innocence of the crime right up until the moment of her execution.

After the recent mock retrial, several journalists reported with satisfaction that the modern "jury" of some 400+ citizens (both male and female in our "enlightened" age) had voted to overturn the conviction of Catherine Snow, and all hands appeared to be pleased that justice had finally been served. I am afraid I am of a far less agreeable temperament, however. I am too inconveniently inclined to look not just at the general outcome of a vote, but at the details and what they might say about how people think. Which is why I have written about this today.

The case was notorious because Catherine Snow was widely believed to have been innocent of the murder of her husband, yet was convicted of the crime by an all-male jury reacting mainly to the accusation that she was an adulteress. There was no physical evidence at all connecting Catherine Snow to the crime.  Even for that time, such a deficiency of evidence would have ordinarily caused sufficient doubt about a person's guilt to prevent a murder conviction - and perhaps even prevent a wrongful arrest in the first place - especially when there were two people already convicted who had confessed to the crime.

But Catherine Snow's case was special, you see.  She was a woman, and a wife. As a wife, she was the property of her husband, John Snow, in accordance with English common law in the 1830's. Because she was little more than a piece of chattel, a woman's human rights were almost non-existent. Unlike a male prisoner, Catherine Snow was not considered a person of equal worth to a man,  so the care that might normally have been given to ensure that justice was served in a capital crime trial appears to have been considered unnecessary.

Gossip soon branded Catherine Snow
an adulteress, crippling her defense.

Moreover, as a woman who may have been unfaithful to her owner/husband, she was a "wretched woman" and a "sinner" of a most particular kind, who deserved to be punished.  Gossip and rumor from John Snow's home-townspeople was enough to tarnish Catherine's Snow's reputation which, in turn, was enough to prejudice a judge and jury to convict her without evidence - and apparently without hesitation - even when the penalty for the conviction was death.

Likewise, the indentured servant, Arthur Spring, was John Snow's property. In those harsh times, it was difficult to survive indentured servitude - what with beatings, overwork and the habitual refusal of owners to honor the terms of 'contracts', only about 40% of indentured servants survived to avail of their eventual emancipation - but should a servant dare to challenge a master's authority, the full weight of the law and the citizenry would come down to crush him or her.  Just like runaway slaves in the USA during that era, indentured servants were hunted down if they ran away from an abusive master, and the law would punish anyone who tried to help them:

"Deserted, from the service of the Subscriber, on Monday last, JOSEPH DELANEY, an indented apprentice, about 5 feet 3 inches in height; had on a Moleskin Jacket and Blue Trousers. Whoever harbours or employs the said apprentice, after this public notice, shall be prosecuted with the utmost rigor of the law. JOHN BERRIGAN, Tailor, St. John's, June 6, 1833." (item in local newspaper)

According to testimony, John Snow was a moody, difficult, possibly violent man.  He is believed to have beaten his wife and mistreated his servants. None of this was considered relevant in the murder trial, perhaps rightly so, but it begs the question of why other irrelevant testimony was allowed by the judge and taken into consideration by the jury. For example, there was no evidence connecting Catherine Snow to the crime of the alleged murder and disappearance of her husband, but the court heard repeated references to her alleged infidelity and to the reports that Catherine was believed to have fought back against John Snow's beatings by throwing things at him.

Most of the 1834 jury - male citizens all - would also have been the owners of wives and indentured servants.  Just the idea that a wife and a servant might have had the audacity to plot with the wife's alleged lover to murder their owner no doubt chilled the blood in the jurors' veins.  A woman trying to take her fate into her own hands - defying her husband, fighting back against his "discipline", taking a lover - seems to have been so upsetting to these men that they convicted Catherine Snow of the murder of her husband out of fear that she might embolden other women (like their wives) and as a punishment for her rebellion against her lot in life.  In spite of confessions from the actual killers - including outright testimony from one of the killers that Catherine Snow had known nothing of the plot (even though he had nothing to gain by exonerating her) - and in spite of the fact that there was absolutely no evidence to support the charges, the jury, knowing very well that she would be sentenced to death, took less than half an hour to convict her.

They convicted her, basically, because they saw her as a rebellious slut. They convicted her because they wanted to make an example of her.  The male citizens of the colony wanted to send a clear message to women: never forget that a woman whose reputation had been ruined - whether by her own actions or by the malicious gossip of others does not matter - would be stripped of any defense for any crime,  She would be judged on her perceived character, not on whether or not there was any evidence that she is guilty of a crime. Shorter version: sluts would be shown no mercy.

At the retrial last month, it was established that the facts of the case are clear. There was a total absence of incriminating evidence against Catherine Snow in 1834 and this fact remains undisputed today. No new evidence which might have pointed unambiguously to her guilt was ever brought forward. The woman was wrongfully executed and the modern "trial" was meant to demonstrate how modern social mores - and stricter legal protections that "guarantee" that convictions will be based upon evidence - are superior to those of a bygone era.

And then they held the vote.

A majority (approximately 250) of the modern "jurors" voted to acquit Catherine Snow, which led to the jubilant reports about the exoneration for Catherine Snow, the wonders of modern justice and the superiority of modern egalitarian sensibilities. Not widely reported, however, was that nearly 200 of the assembled "jurors" withheld their "aye" for acquittal, declaring that there was not enough evidence to acquit.

You've read that correctly: nearly half of a crowd of modern men and women, living in a society which claims to go by the principles of innocent until proven guilty and convictions based upon evidence, would not acquit a defendant of a crime for which there was no evidence against her and, furthermore, made the astonishing assertion that in order to acquit, they would require evidence of innocence.  Apparently, unless Catherine Snow could prove that she did not murder her husband (your honor, here is a gun without my fingerprints on it - and here is another gun without my fingerprints on it - and another...) - obviously a nearly impossible task since there was no physical evidence in the case - these jurors refused to acquit, leaving the ghost of Catherine Snow still languishing in jail, I guess. They were not going to acquit her because there was no evidence not connecting her to the crime. WTF?

Also, four modern "jurors" voted "guilty". Apparently, they had just arrived from 1834 via some sort of time machine.

The self-congratulatory reporting on CBC and in the local newspaper, TheTelegram, focused only on the majority opinion. The full vote was glossed over and even the verdict - acquittal - was incorrectly reported with misleading headlines like "Retrial Finds Last Hanged Woman Not Guilty". The story was spun as an example of modern fairness and equal treatment of both genders before the law. Aren't we just the best society now?

CNNs Mary Snow, a descendent of
Catherine Snow is working on a
book about her infamous ancestor.

I guess I am just curmudgeonly. Being far less inclined to uncritically accept the rosiest interpretation of this event, I insist on focusing on the large minority who did not vote for acquittal - and the fraction who, incredibly, still voted "guilty". What does it say about modern society when a case this clearcut can still only produce a split decision, rather than the unanimous acquittal that the facts of the case demand (after failing to result in the resounding dismissal it ought to have received instead of ever having gone to trial at all).  Spectators remarks - and particularly some misogynistic comments below the news articles - reveal that slut-blaming and slut-punishing are alive and well.

We talk of how things have gotten so much better for women.  In some ways, things have gotten better. Since about midway through the 20th century, in some western countries at least, women have finally ceased to be the legal property of men for the first time in history. Stories like this, however, reveal just how deeply cultural misogyny is ingrained. If Catherine Snow was really on trial today, I am uncomfortable with her odds. We've still got a long way to go.

Vatican Reprimands Women Religious

The LCWR march to support preservation of the Louisiana wetlands

[This is the first post on this story. A very cool follow-up post can be found here.]

When the stories about Catholic women religious and clergy coming under fire from the Vatican for upholding true Christian values*  made the rounds of the news cycle last week, a lot of people were surprised to learn that any Catholic organizations might actually be working for social justice. But there are orders of women religious (aka nuns or sisters) who have been quietly providing real help for the poor and the marginalized in our society (and around the world) - no religious conversion or test required - and they have been doing so for years. Catholic orders of women religious have been working tirelessly for decades with the most disadvantaged people in society, and often in direct - if quiet - defiance of the official stance of the Church hierarchy

Public antipathy toward the Catholic Church as an institution has grown and is understandable given the heinous crimes and even more heinous denials and cover up that have rocked the church over the past few decades. Catholic politicians like Rick Santorum - whose Catholic fundamentalism is terrifying in its coldly relentless misogyny - has further entrenched the public perception of the Catholic Church as an authoritarian, ultra-conservative, misogynistic organization that seems to be completely forgetting its frequently stated mission to promote social justice.

Sadly, this characterization is undeniably true.  It is a reality that is obvious to objective observers, but which has gone largely unnoticed by parishioners who continue to participate in their traditional communities happily (willfully?) oblivious to the church's recently renewed rightward tilt. One of the things every Catholic knows is that one can visit a Catholic Church almost anywhere in the world and feel at home. The liturgy, the music, the incense - care has always been taken to ensure conformity around the world so that a Catholic community can transcend national borders and national loyalties. It is this conformity and continuity which has lulled many Catholics into a false sense that the Church that they grew up with in the 60's 70's and even the 80's - an emerging progressive and ecumenically-minded Church focused on social justice - has continued to progress. The soothing sameness of Catholic rituals and celebrations served to smooth over and conceal the rightward lurch of the church hierarchy from its rank and file members. People were fooled by the same old-same (wonderful) old appearance of the Church they grew up loving and admiring, while behind that mask, the progressive and socially conscious movement that had at long last been launched by Vatican ll was being dismantled and discarded.

I almost feel like thanking Rick Santorum for bringing the hard-right swerve of the church to the public's attention - and particularly to the attention of sleeping progressive Catholics. While still not quite mainstream Catholicism, this fundamentalist strain of Catholicism has been resurging under the radar for over four decades (the most conservative elements began pushing back even before the Vatican ll council was adjourned), until it has come to dominate the church in a way which is bewildering to many liberal Catholics, and frightening to secular Catholics and non-Catholics. Clearly, though, Catholics are waking up to this reality now and even more clearly, many of them are not happy about it.

On the heels of the contraception debacle, some Catholic clergy are now in hot water for defying the hierarchy and refusing to lobby their parishioners to oppose gay marriage. Polls showed that a whopping 90+% of Catholics use forms of birth control other than the approved "natural family planning" (aka the "rhythm method") and that the vast majority of Catholics support the coverage of contraception by employer insurance, defying the official church position against contraceptive coverage. Perhaps encouraged by the solidly progressive views of a majority of ordinary practicing Catholics, a few priests have begun to refuse to obey their archbishops on other issues where they cannot, in good conscience, agree with the Church.

In Seattle, WA, at least two Catholic priests have refused to gather signatures for a petition for a referendum to ban gay marriage, defying the explicit urging of their Archbishop, Peter Sartain. Among the dissenters were Rev. Michael Ryan of St James Cathedral and Rev. John Whitney, SJ.(Jesuit) of St. Joseph's.

Rev. Michael Ryan

"I have decided that we will not participate in the collecting of signatures in our parish. Doing so would, I believe, prove hurtful and seriously divisive in our community." Rev. Michael Ryan, St. James Cathedral, Seattle.

"The leadership of the church sometimes confronts the world as an enemy of the Spirit. The church needs greater humility and openness." Rev. John Whitney, SJ. St. Joseph Catholic Church, Seattle.

"I am particularly concerned about our youth who may be questioning their own sexual identity and need our support at this time in their lives." Pastoral life coordinator, St. Mary's Church, Seattle.

Rev. Ryan, in particular seems to have risked serious censure by defying the archbishop because he is the pastor at the archbishop's home parish, the archdiocese Cathedral of St. James. But Rev. Whitney, as a Jesuit, has also taken a bold and courageous step:  Jesuits take a specific vow of obedience to the Pope, over and above the usual clerical vows taken by other orders. So far, though, there has not been a reaction from the church like, for example, public censure of the priests.

Interestingly, however, there has been a seemingly out- of-nowhere attack by the Church hierarchy on women in the Church. During the same week that this open act of defiance from priests was occurring in Washington State, news broke that the the Vatican had issued a stunning reprimand of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (story from NPR) for their stance on social issues.  It may be a coincidence that the Vatican has assigned Archbishop Peter Sartain - yes, Archbishop Sartain of Seattle - to investigate and oversee an overhaul of the nun's association. In keeping with the Bible-based and historically deep-seated misogyny of the Catholic Church, it would appear that the Vatican's outrage over acts of defiance from within the clergy could only be adequately assuaged by chastising and humbling female servants of God. Quelle surprise!

What stance suddenly and so deeply enraged the Vatican, you might ask?  Why, that would be the sisters' long-standing (and publicly expressed) view that social justice should never become a political kickball.  It would be their stance that, as women religious, they have a duty and a right to follow their conscience when serving people in need. It would be their stand that when the requirements for social justice conflict with Catholic doctrine, that perhaps it is the doctrine which should be evaluated and not justice that should be sacrificed.  On the website for their social justice lobby, these sisters regularly expressed views which have only now landed them in a great deal of trouble with the men of cloth.

Check out these radical feminists!

The sisters' work and their opinions are not actually news to people who work with them, but as so often has been the case over the centuries, the Vatican largely ignored the women religious. Though these women have taken on the lion's share of the Church's work giving aid and comfort to the poor and suffering, they are rarely acknowledged and even more rarely praised by the male hierarchy for their efforts. Yet, in a time of social upheaval, when issues surrounding women's rights have come to the fore, the Vatican is suddenly focusing on the women they have branded "radical feminists" and punishing them for the sins of moral independence and following their social conscience led by their understanding of the teachings of Christ. They have been given notice that they will be taken in hand by Archbishop Sartain, and their entire cooperative of women religious may be completely overhauled to conform to new, stricter Vatican boundaries including - naturally - a male overseer.

The sisters are not taking this harsh censure with complete submission.  These are women who love God and love the Church, but they also believe in social justice and - though their spokeswoman stops just short of saying the Vatican is dead wrong - they have steadfastly defended their position, in spite of the painful sense of rejection and humiliation:

Sr. Simone Campbell

"And it's not about the giving up but it's about the fidelity to the call to be faithful to the Gospel and have that so unseen and to have this edict never mention the Gospel, never mention the responsibility to be God's arms and hands with people who are poor and suffering, the people at the fringes, people who suffer injustice, to have that not at all seen is extremely painful." Sr. Simone Campbell, executive director of  Network.

Allowing that the edict was like "a sock in the stomach," Sr. Simone nevertheless was generous enough to offer an apologia for the Vatican's unexpected slap down:

"When you don't work every day with people who live on the margins of our society, it's much easier to make easy statements about who's right and who's wrong." Sister Simone Campbell.

Sr. Campbell is more generous - and more submissive to unearned male authority and privilege -  than the Vatican or the Pope deserve.  It should not be surprising that the pervasive misogyny in the Catholic Church which would happily see women everywhere subjugated as inferior, less than human beings, extends even to its servants inside the Church, but somehow it still is. The Church has shown its moral bankruptcy in so many ways throughout its history, but has generally had clever enough leadership to hold on to its position of "moral authority" in society, in spite of behavior which has shown it to be the complete opposite in every way.  The one thin beacon of light in the entire decrepit organization has been the outreach work of people like the women religious, and the Vatican seems determined to snuff it out.

Women helping women.
Retired nuns volunteer to tutor
women for GED

I am a little late getting this post off the writing desk. Started this post last week before, you know - crime - but I still wanted to write about it. There was a time in my life when I was determined to join one of the orders now under the umbrella of the LCWR - when I was fired up with enthusiasm to pursue the kind of "mission" that would be unrecognizable to anyone unfortunate enough to be the target of what opportunistic, proselytizing evangelical churches call "missions" today.  "Sisters" were models of strong womanhood; performing important, meaningful work, giving up comforts and conveniences to minister to the poor and sometimes risking their lives to bring nursing, education and other humanitarian aid to people in war-torn places. In an era when strong female role models (not to mention prospects for a life of adventure) were exceedingly rare for girls, these women exemplified one of the few pathways that a girl could embark upon to make a difference in the world outside of domesticity. 

The people who made the news last week for displeasing their Church masters represent the kind of Catholicism that almost was. The courageous work of Catholic women religious, and the recent willingness of some Catholic clergy in Washington to challenge the Church hierarchy represent the kind of loving and inclusive Christian stance that I once believed permeated the Catholic Church.  While I have rightly abandoned any romantic delusions of that kind over the past several years, it is a relief to know that my youthful belief that there were sincere people who devoted their lives to the social mission of the Church was not entirely without foundation.

*Not to be confused with the brutally hypocritical True Christian Values™ of the religious right.

More in touch with the rest of humanity than most religious people, sisters at Villa Maria by the Sea  host an annual surfing contest.

Crime Scene! Temporarily Out of Service

Well, that was an interesting morning.  And by "interesting", I mean surprising, unsettling and scary.

Our house was broken into last night.  We were all at home asleep and did not hear a thing. A burglar came into our house, into the kitchen, stole whatever gadgets s/he could carry (laptop, briefcases, phones on kitchen counter) and left, presumably, when s/he could not carry anything more.

The first we knew of it was when I came into the kitchen early this morning and discovered the back door wide open. My first thought was "oh no!  more mice and who knows what other critters in the house!" and I marched off to ask everyone WTF?  Who left the door open all night?

But no one had left the door open.  It was a slider with a sketchy lock mechanism which we usually reinforce with a cut off hockey stick in the track.  Because of the actual hockey game on TV last night, Mr. Nifty and I were later than normal going to bed and neither one of us noticed that the hockey stick wasn't in the track.  The thief or thieves only had to push up hard on that door handle to slip it off the catch.

They must have crept in, grabbed what they could in the kitchen and made a hasty getaway, leaving the door wide open.  The thought of a stranger - a thief no less - in the house while we slept is pretty unnerving.

Almost as soon as it dawned on us that we'd been robbed (the thief did not mess the kitchen up or apparently even leave that room, so the tidiness did not at first scream BREAK IN!), the phone rang. It was our neighbor who had found the briefcases along the creek bed during his morning walk.  Obviously, no computers or other equipment was left inside, but our neighbor had managed to gather up papers strewn about.

Anyway, interesting series of thoughts on this:

1.  Lingering astonishment that I did not hear someone in our kitchen in the middle of the night.

2.  Relief that what I have always told the kids has been proven true in this case:  I have always told them that most thieves are lazy criminals who just want an easy mark.  They are not looking to confront people in their houses, determined to rob them anyway. They are hoping for a quick, easy robbery - preferably with nobody at home - and then to get away without getting caught.

3.  Renewed conviction that owning or wielding a gun in this situation could only have made a bad situation worse. We were asleep but unharmed and a petty thief took some stuff.  Yes it is infuriating and yes it feels like a violation of our "castle", but it was just stuff and no one was hurt.  Even if the thieves had made off with every thing of value in the house, none of our crap is worth a human life.

Having said all of that, though, I am spitting mad and taking steps to prevent this from ever happening again.  A locksmith just left (I know that slider had no locks on it, but one of the briefcases had keys in it so locks changed - $433. Grrr),  and a security firm is coming by this afternoon to quote us on an alarm system.  We should have done this before, but frankly it is deucedly expensive and we were not sure it would be worth it to us (because a system was installed in a previous house we had bought and -  oops! - we never engaged the alarm system so it was wasted).  Guess it is time to accept reality.

That's it for now.  Posting will be light today.  I don't feel much like writing, what with police and locksmiths and everything.  Back to work tomorrow, though!

Is This Art?

The photo above has been making the rounds today and people are talking about it. Apparently there is controversy! Apparently, reasonable fair-minded people must weigh up these obviously equivalent* viewpoints:

It is art!   

vs.   

It is a ghastly racist, misogynistic exploitation of the horrific experiences of women of color in societies which practice FGM for the benefit of a callously opportunistic "artist".

As you can see from all the laughter and smiling faces in the photo, the "art" cake was well-recieved in Sweden, at least amongst the delighted throng of white people who attended the event at the Moderna Museet in Stockholm.

According to this story, the "performance art" was part of an installation purporting to be highlighting the issue of female genital mutilation.  I don't doubt that the museum was trying to highlight the issue of FGM, but I think it would be mistake to assume that the museum's - or the artist's - motivation for highlighting this "issue" was to support the women whose lives are impacted by the practice. An alternative motivation, given the repugnant and culturally tone-deaf centerpiece of the opening party, could be that "highlighting the issue of FGM" has been identified as a hot topic likely to generate a great deal of interest and revenue for the artist and/or the museum.

The "art" consisted of a grotesquely caricatured, naked "African" woman's torso with the "head" being that of the artist who was sitting under the display table with his head poking out through a hole in the table placed above the neck of the cake sculpture.  The artist had painted his face in a ghastly "black face" mask, with a wide-mouthed exaggerated grimace complete with cartoonish wide-spaced teeth.

The "performance" element consisted of the "head" of the "woman" screaming in feigned agony as the Swedish Culture Minister - by previously arranged request - picked up a knife and cut the "genitals" on the cake, mimicking ritual female genital mutilation.  Riotous laughter apparently ensued. The Minister enthusiastically ate her piece of cake and even fed the artist a bit of cake, to the delighted amusement of all parties.

What could possibly be wrong with that?

Melissa McEwan had a few suggestions, as did Feministe and these news outlets:  BBC ,  New Statesman, MSNBC.  (Here is the Sarah Baartman story, which some of these articles reference).

Were these people sincerely trying to "highlight" the issue of female genital mutilation in support of the women whose lives are impacted by this horrible practice?  Perhaps they were.  But, if financial and promotional gain were not the real goals behind this mind-bogglingly offensive display, it is hard to think of a worse way to have "failed".

I'm no expert, but it seems to me that instead of a jovial celebration - complete with cannibalistic cake and re-enactments of terrible mutilations - why not simply take a more direct approach?  I don't know, maybe something like this:

* By "obviously equivalent", I mean: not. remotely. equivalent. Obviously.

Is Blasphemy a Victimless Crime?

Just the other day, I read an amusing blog post by Mano Singham about an Indian skeptic, Sanal Edamaruku, who challenged a religious guru - who claimed to be able to kill people using only his religious rituals - to do so on TV.  The resulting show was, as Mano said, hilariously "must-see" TV.

Edamaruku followed that debunking of superstition up with another application of healthy skepticism to a false religious claim, when he was invited by a TV station to investigate a Catholic church's claim that it had a miraculous "weeping cross" in front of its premises. Edamaruku simply applied his knowledge of the physical sciences and discovered the rational explanation for the phenomenon:

"Sanal Edamaruku identified the source of the water (a drainage near a washing room) and the mechanism how it reached Jesus feet (capillary action). The local church leaders, present during his investigation, appeared to be displeased."

It seems that due to the church's "displeasure", this story has taken a dark turn.  The Friendly Atheist reports this morning that a warrant has been put out for Mr. Edamaruku's arrest on charges of blasphemy:

"Yesterday (10th April,2012) Sanal received a phone call from a Police official of Juhu Police Station in Mumbai directing him to come to the said police station to face the charges and get arrested. He also said that FIRs have also been filed in Andheri and some other police stations u/s 295 of Indian Penal Code on the allegations of hurting the religious sentiments of a particular community. Mumbai police has announced that they were out to arrest him. It is apprehended that he can be arrested any moment."

Let's think about this. A church was claiming a miraculous phenomenon on its property. A skeptical thinker doubted the truth of the claim and then proved that the claim was false, showing how the phenomenon was actually caused. Outraged by the revelation that their "miracle" was false, the religious leaders appealed to the law to punish the skeptic for telling the truth.

Asia "Bibi" Noreen

It is hard to believe that this is actually happening anywhere in the world today. Yet, it is happening. Not just in one country, but in dozens of countries dominated by several different religions all around the globe. In first, second and third-world countries - post-modern and pre-modern - blasphemy laws act as a muzzle on free speech when it comes to the free expression of ideas which are not approved by religion.

The threat to Sanal Edamaruku's physical freedom for the crime of laughing when religious superstition was proven false is a chilling example of the oppressive abuse of privilege that religions employ against those who do not share their delusions and who refuse to bow down to their theological authority. Whenever governments (and people) give them the power to do so, religions use blasphemy laws to silence and oppress non-conformists. In many parts of the world, a charge of blasphemy - for actions which religionists claim the discretion to decide - leads to violence and sometimes even death to those accused of the "crime".

Some people say that "blasphemy is a victimless crime".  Of course, they mean that when a person speaks critically about or even disrespects religion, no one is actually harmed by the speech. While this is true in the strictest physical sense, religionists would argue that it is not true of psychological harm.  Blasphemy pains religionists because it challenges their cherished beliefs, which can cause psychological discomfort. Further, blasphemy disturbs a religionist's sense of the proper social order.  Religionists see their religion as the pinnacle of social authority, so a blasphemer outrages them by challenging that authority.

That sort of psychological harm is common in human social interactions, as anyone who was the brunt of a "nyah nyah!" taunt on the playground can attest. In nearly every area of human life, people must cope with their hurt feelings and their sense of injured pride when other people make fun of them - no matter how unjust the ridicule may or may not be.  Only religion is awarded the special status in most cultures which allows them to use the government and the courts to slap lawsuits - or worse - against those with whom they do not agree.

Tellingly, in some countries which have tried to provide legal protection against the very worst kind of ridicule perpetrated on the victims of relentless physical and psychological bullying, the one notable exception to prosecution under the proposed laws is: "sincerely held" religious belief.

The dangerous and undeserved privilege which religion continues to enjoy all over the world is something  against which people who value human dignity and individual freedom must protest, loudly and constantly. Blasphemy may or may not be "victimless", but blasphemy laws enable the kind of religious persecution - and provide legal protection to religiously-motivated violence - which I think is a crime against humanity.

Religion justifies fighting words with wars

Is There A Christian Word For Fatwa?

Last week, a Texas judge ruled that publicly praying for harm to be done to another person is perfectly okay.  In the time-honored tradition of giving religion a free pass for behavior - inciting violence - which could be prosecutable as a felony in any other context - especially, say, if people use their freedom of speech to demand justice when a brown person is murdered in cold blood - District Court Judge Martin Hoffman  made a summary judgement against Mikey Weinstein in favor of the former navy chaplain who had publicly posted an imprecatory prayer - Psalm 109, to be precise - for Weinstein's annihilation.

Non-Christians poised to gobble up Christians! Wait...

In its crowing report about the lawsuit, the religious website WNDfaith defined "imprecatory prayer" thusly:

 "An imprecatory prayer is a prayer asking God to protect the weak and faithful from the strong and wicked."

It is hard to believe that any Christians in the USA could possibly not know that they comprise nearly 80% of the population, while other religious groups account for another 5-6%.  People who do not subscribe to any official religion but still believe in a god make up a further few percentage points. So, the claim that the "faithful" in the military - who are even more numerous relative to the non-religious than those in the general population of the USA - are "weak" is incredibly disingenuous.

Gordon Klingenshmitt was one of nearly 2000 evangelical Christian chaplains who aggressively proselytize to American soldiers using public funds and with virtually no oversight. These chaplains, with the backing of COs, charge soldiers with a mission to proselytize everywhere they are deployed. Weinstein started the MRFF (Military Religious Freedom Foundation) several years ago in an effort to represent the small constituency of soldiers who suffered personal and even professional discrimination - some might even call it officially- sanctioned persecution - as a result of this unconstitutional establishment of the Christian religion within the United States military.

The judge ruled in favor of Klingenschmitt who claimed in his widely published prayer that he was "surrounded by wicked men" who were the "enemies of religious liberty".  In a military overwhelmingly staffed with Christians, where non-Christians are estimated to be outnumbered by nearly 90 to 1, it is difficult to imagine how this former navy chaplain concluded that he was "surrounded" by people who did not share his beliefs, much less how he could believe that he and his fellow Christians were the "weak" victims of the "strong and wicked" MRFF - the group whose raison d'être is to advocate for freedom from religious coercion, don't forget - and whom the Christians greatly outnumbered. It was like Goliath whining that David was looking at him during forced religious worship of Goliath's god.

Though they vastly outnumber their critics, and although they have used pressure and suppression, both through official channels and off the radar, to punish soldiers who protest the suffocating Christian crusading in the American military, people like Klingenschmitt claim to be persecuted for their beliefs. Klingenschmitt denied any ulterior motive, but by invoking Psalm 109 - notorious verses in the Old Testament inciting violence against "enemies" - he sent a message to the fringe elements among his co-religionists that the MRFF, and Weinstein and his family in particular, were legitimate targets for Christian vengeance. Then, he pretended to be the injured party, innocent of any wrongdoing.

What? This is just an

innocent coffee mug!

How do Christians justify such shockingly blatant lies?

As outrageous as it is that the courts have failed to protect a private citizen from the brazen call for his destruction by a powerful religious leader, this is not the first nor even the most shocking example of how religious privilege in the USA allows the elite leadership of the powerful Christian majority to threaten its enemies with impunity. A recent, and chilling, example of this type of perniciously subversive incitement of violence came to light shortly after the 2008 election of President Barack Obama.

Psalm 109 has been passed around the internet and referenced on bumper stickers, hats and t-shirts ever since shortly after the election of Barack Obama in November 2008.  Christians who sported the hats, t-shirts and bumper stickers disingenuously claimed no harm, no foul. Some columnists - once again in the time-honored tradition of giving religion a free pass on egregiously bad behavior - speculated that the people behind the imprecatory prayer (including pastors and devout bible-studying Christians) may not have been familiar with the full text of the psalm. Considering the emphasis on Bible study in fundamentalist Christianity, this assertion beggars belief.

Pretending that they are not using coded language or political dog whistles is yet another example of the stealth conservative strategy of the religious right, backed by powerful corporate interests in the unholy alliance formed during the Reagan era. Creating social tension to win political power has been the stock in trade of the Christian Coalition for two decades. Establishing plausible deniability in the event of an outbreak of the very violence incited by the coded language is the purpose of using secrecy and coded language. In the words of Ralph Reed, Christian Coalition leader:

What? This is just an

innocent teddy bear!

"But that's just good strategy. It's like guerrilla warfare. If you reveal your location, all it does is allow your opponent to improve his artillery bearings. It's better to move quietly, with stealth, under cover of night." Continuing, "I want to be invisible. I do guerrilla warfare. I paint my face and travel at night. You don't know it's over until you're in a body bag. You don't know until election night." Ralph Reed, 1992

Feigning innocence of having any wish that actual, physical harm might come to progressives, including the President - and under the protection of the privilege which religion enjoys in this culture - right-wing conservative elites were able to send a message - put out a de facto contract - to the most radical members of its much-vaunted "base". Psalm 109  was a coded reminder of all the Sunday morning exhortations that good Christians were under attack by a wicked, powerful enemy and that if anything should happen to these "enemies", it would be a righteous judgement from God.

Bible-believing Christians are proudly familiar with their Bible verses.  There is little doubt that most Evangelicals were "in on the joke" even as they were protesting that it was just a bit of post-election "fun". Just to be clear, however, here is a fuller passage from Psalm 109 from the Book of David, in the Bible:

What? This is just an
innocent prayer for our president!

8 Let his days be few; and let another take his office. 
9 Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow. 
10 Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg: let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places. 
11 Let the extortioner catch all that he hath; and let the strangers spoil his labour. 
12 Let there be none to extend mercy unto him: neither let there be any to favour his fatherless children. 
13 Let his posterity be cut off; and in the generation following let their name be blotted out. 

Having sent up the alarm, brazenly and in plain sight, while professing innocence of any subtextual motive, the right-wing conservative powerhouses and their political arm - the Republican party - continued to spout patriotic platitudes while they worked tirelessly to undermine the foundations of the Republic for their own political and financial gain. If the strategy is successful, they will need only to sit back and let paranoia and delusions of Christian persecution - well-stoked for over two decades in the nation's megachurches and home-schooling movement - take their natural course as the fabric of society unravels in the face of the constant onslaught of religious and social strife.

What? This is just an

 innocent cell phone case!

The deployment of a Bible verse to commit or incite retaliatory action against one's perceived enemies is the one way that a person in a Christian- dominated culture might be able to get away - sometimes literally - with murder.  That a federal judge threw out the Mikey Weinstein case - and punished him for seeking a legal remedy by making him pay court costs and damages - is an indication that this situation may get worse before it gets better.

One small, significant irony in the situation should not be missed, however.
In declaring that there was no real harm - or potential for harm - suffered by Weinstein as a direct result of the imprecatory prayer for his destruction, the judge was ruling that Klingenschmitt's god does not exist.  If the court believed that the god actually existed - the Biblical god capable of smiting Weinstein - then the prayer would have been as dangerous as a mob contract, and Klingenschmitt would be facing trial for a felony offense.

By ruling that the prayer was irrelevant and caused no harm, the judge threw the weight of a U.S. federal court behind a ruling that God does not exist. Classic.

Digital Cuttlefish at FreeThoughtBlogs wrote an excellent poem summing this up far better, and far more succinctly, than I have done here:

Suppose you ask a hired gun
To wipe somebody out—
Could you be held responsible?
Of that there’s little doubt.

Protect yourself from legal woes

What? This is just an innocent t-shirt!

Behind this false façade—
When issuing a mortal threat,
Pretend you’re asking God!

So long as God is impotent
And cannot have His way—
You want your God to smite my ass?
Then go ahead and pray.

If someone overhears you, and
Decides to be God’s sword—

You’re innocent, cos you were only
Talking to the Lord.

Your prayer was posted publicly,
Where anyone could see—
The claim is still “It’s just a talk
Between the Lord and me.”

It’s funny… if there was a God
You’d ask, your soul to spare—
And if you tried out this defense…
You wouldn’t have a prayer.

What? These are just innocent bumper stickers!

Update:  Chris Rodda at This Week in Christian Nationalism blogged about the kind of ridiculously offensive mail that Mikey Weinstein regularly receives.  For a sickening glimpse into the mind of the true believer,  check out Chris's birthday post for Mikey Weinstein here.  And a belated Happy Birthday to you, Mikey Weinstein.

First Evolution, Next Global Climate Change!

Recap of the February conference of American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Clips of Republican Rick Santorum highlighting the scary anti-science, anti-earth ideology of Republican party hardliners.

Short, excellent interview with Chris Mooney, science journalist, who places the blame on religion and libertarian economic ideology (which often go hand in hand due to the unholy alliance between business and the religious right dating back to the Reagan era).

Chilling.

Tennessee Insanity

Oh, Tennessee!  

Today, Tennessee's governor, Bill Haslam (R - of course) had a choice:  he could sign or veto the recently passed bill HB368/SB893 - which would encourage teachers to teach creationism in Tennessee classrooms and to teach children the outright lie that there is scientific controversy over established scientific theories such as evolutionary theory or climate change theory. 

Governor Haslam had done his homework.  His remarks indicate that he clearly understands that the suggestion that there is any scientific debate is false, and that the only "controversy" is religious and political.  Like cowards before him, the Governor chose to allow the law to pass without his signature. In short, he has hedged his bets: he cannot be accused of having signed a bill which will surely cut the promising future of Tennesse's growing reputation as a leader in STEM subjects off at the knees,  but he cannot be accused either of not having kowtowed to the religious right because he has allowed the bill to pass by standing aside and refusing to veto the odious piece of legislation.

Tennessee has the dubious distinction of being the state where the Scopes "Monkey" trial was held back in 1925.  At that time, teacher John Scopes was prosecuted for teaching evolution in a Tennessee school in defiance of a law banning scientific teaching which conflicted with Biblical creationism.  Scopes was found guilty and convicted, but the Tennessee Supreme Court later overturned the conviction.

Gradually, the overwhelming evidence for evolutionary theory convinced a majority of Americans that to prevent schoolchildren from learning this science was tantamount to returning them to the dark ages, and soon educational guidelines routinely included evolutionary theory in science curricula. Ever since that time,  religious proponents of creationism - sworn enemies of the scientific method and especially of evolutionary biology - have been scheming to undermine science and to bring religion roaring back into American public schools.

Tennessee is not the first state to introduce legislation since the 2010 elections which will allow religiously motivated "teaching" of the lie that there is scientific controversy over subjects like global climate change or evolutionary theory.  There is no scientific controversy on these subjects:  the science is solid and there is broad consensus among scientists all around the world that both are well-established, solidly proven scientific theories.  The "controversy" is strictly between religious/political opportunism and the truth.  Religious/political ideologues refuse to accept proven science, not because it is untrue, but because it threatens their own foundational belief systems.

How has Tennessee and states like it come to this sorry pass?  The easy answer is that the rise of the religious right has brought with it incredible pressure on the separation of church and state. But the deeper answer is that moderately religious Americans have enabled the far right to gain this much power.  Religious moderates, hiding behind their "no true Christian" justifications - linking hands with extremists to protect their own religious privilege - have enabled religious extremism to make these frightening inroads into education.

Tennessee had been slowly building a justifiably strong reputation for leadership in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM disciplines) at secondary and post-secondary schools across the state.  University of Tennessee was ranked highly in STEM disciplines in recent years, thanks to the tireless efforts of science and mathematics teachers and professors.  With this law, the state legislature will undermine all of that hard work, and within a very few years, Tennessee will slide back into the educational backwater where its religiously-backed leadership clearly wants the state - and more importantly, its people - to be.

For the second time today, I want to link to Tombstone da Deadman.  This time, here is his wonderful rap from last summer: "Anti-Science".

Also:

Equal Pay, Schmequal Pay

I am up to my neck in company and cooking this weekend -  yes, that's it!  That is a great excuse for not posting! - but I had to just slip this one in here.  Daniel Finke at Camels With Hammers on FTB posted about the latest shot across the bow of the ship of equal rights. That leaky old vessel is looking worse for wear lately.

This time, it is the Wisconsin legislature, headed by the deservedly embattled Scott Walker, which has rolled back the calendar on yet another milestone in the history of women's rights.  The Wisconsin house, voting along (Republican) party lines, voted to repeal the 2009 law which tried to address unfair, unequal pay practices in the state.  Huffpost article here.

Looks like, with a possible recall looming over his head, Walker is determined to do as much damage as he possibly can to the state of Wisconsin before June.  Naturally, he also seems keen to polish his credentials with the GOP - perhaps he is planning on a federal run if the people of Wisconsin throw him out of the Governor's office - by firing off as many destructive missiles at women as he possibly can, too.

The Republican War on Women:  coming soon to a state near you.