Author Archive for AlwaysQuestionAuthorityPage 2 of 35

Aphorism: On Spontaneous Human Combustion

Published
by
AlwaysQuestionAuthority
on May 11, 2012
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By Madison S. Hughes (05.09.2012)

I cannot say that spontaneous human combustion is my forte; however, judging from the bits and pieces of information concerning such that have entered my realm of thought, I must say that I am not convinced by any evidence that proponents have put forth to support such claims.

Certainly, a “loving” God would not allow such, but somehow I doubt One that engages in world genocide would take issue with a burning here and there. As a matter of fact, His followers have historically proven rather fond to burnings. I wonder if those that spontaneously combust are also of the more intellectual among us.


Greta Christina: Why Atheists Have Become a Kick-Ass Movement You Want on Your Side

Published
by
AlwaysQuestionAuthority
on May 11, 2012
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Atheists are becoming a force to be reckoned with. They are a powerful ally when inspired to take action — and a powerful opponent when they’re treated like dirt.

Why would any organization or social change movement want to ally itself with a community that’s energetic, excited about activism, highly motivated, increasingly visible, good at fundraising, good at getting into the news, increasingly populated by young people, and with a proven track record of mobilizing online in massive numbers on a moment’s notice?

If you need to ask that — maybe you shouldn’t be in political activism.

And if you don’t need to ask that — if reading that paragraph is making you clutch your chest and drool like a baby — maybe you should be paying attention to the atheist movement.

Continue reading . . .


Pema Chödrön: “This Lousy World”

Published
by
AlwaysQuestionAuthority
on May 11, 2012
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Pema Chödrön discussing a verse from eighth-century Indian Buddhist scholar Shantideva’s ”The Way of the Bodhisattva,” where he uses a wonderful leather shoe analogy to show how one might go about first recognizing, then dealing with both inner and external induced suffering.


Of Bedrooms and Boardrooms

Published
by
AlwaysQuestionAuthority
on May 10, 2012
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The 2012 election should be about what’s going on in America’s boardrooms, but Republicans would rather it be about America’s bedrooms.

[...]

. . . Republicans have introduced over four hundred bills in state legislatures aimed at limiting women’s reproductive rights — banning abortions, requiring women seeking abortions to have invasive ultra-sound tests beforehand, and limiting the use of contraceptives.

[...]

Our crisis has nothing to do with private morality. It’s a crisis of public morality — of abuses of public trust that undermine the integrity of our economy and democracy and have led millions of Americans to conclude the game is rigged.

What’s truly immoral is not what adults choose to do with other consenting adults. It’s what those with great power have chosen to do to the rest of us.

[...]

Regressive Republicans have no problem intruding on the most personal and most intimate decisions any of us makes while railing against government intrusions on big business.

Read more . . .


“We Are Star Dust” – Symphony of Science

Published
by
AlwaysQuestionAuthority
on May 10, 2012
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[Fifteen] Major Differences Between Occupy Wall Street And The Tea Party Protests

Published
by
AlwaysQuestionAuthority
on May 10, 2012
.

Article by 

I read an article recently, which compared the origins of the Occupy Wall Street movement to the origins of the Tea Party movement. As someone who has paid attention to both movements,  I believe nothing could be further from the truth. Below are just 15 differences between the Occupy Wall Street protests, and the Tea Party movement.

1. Occupy Wall Street is a grassroots movement, funded by people around the world, without corporate sponsorship.
The Tea Party is an AstroTurf  movement, receiving most of its funding from corporate sponsorship, and Fox News and its supporters.

2. Occupy Wall Street wants less corporate influence over our Government.
The Tea Party wants less Governmental influence over corporations.

3. Occupy Wall Street didn’t receive mainstream media coverage until several weeks after it began.
The Tea Party held rallies across the country sponsored by Fox News, and even small rallies with minimal turnout received attention from other media outlets.

4. Occupy Wall Street protesters are unarmed.
The Tea Party protesters openly carried a large variety of guns, including assault rifles.

5. Over 1,000 Occupy Wall Street Protesters have been arrested.
Zero Tea Party Protesters have been arrested.

Continue reading . . .


President Barack Obama Affirms Support for Same-Sex Marriage!

Published
by
AlwaysQuestionAuthority
on May 10, 2012
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The Corporate Media’s Attempt to Kill the Occupy Movement

Published
by
AlwaysQuestionAuthority
on May 10, 2012
.

[...]

. . . Since September, the mainstream press in the US has systematically ignored and demonized the Occupy movement. The nakedness of the class bias in this case, however, was especially jarring: the size and significance of the protests were downplayed, reports of police brutality were largely ignored, and the movement was portrayed as violent and dangerous. Many of the most prominent US news outlets, such as The New York Times, practically ignored the protests altogether. These shameful distortions by the corporate press display the function of the media as an organ of the rule of “the 1 percent,” and reveal how threatened elites are by organized, direct action and democratic participation.

[...]

The Tea Party, a movement which serves rather than threatens corporate interests, has received front-page coverage in virtually all of the nation’s national newspapers for events that were smaller and less significant than this week’s May Day protests. Yet, a truly substantial social movement with genuine emancipatory potential and a broad base of support among Americans is largely considered un-newsworthy by the corporate press. When the demonstrations were covered, crude caricatures masquerading as objective news ruled the day.

Read more . . .


Howard Dean: Republicans ‘Don’t Like Latinos,’ Serve Only Their ‘Corporate Masters’ (VIDEOS)

Published
by
AlwaysQuestionAuthority
on May 9, 2012
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Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean (D) lit into the GOP Tuesday night, attacking what he described as the party’s willingness to abandon Latino voters and instead express concern only for corporate interests.

“[Republicans] don’t care what anybody says except for themselves and their corporate masters, like the Koch brothers. They have one master, and that’s money,” Dean told MSNBC’s Ed Schultz. “They don’t care about the average working American, all they care about is the corporations who are giving them all that money to put them into office. … So who are they going to serve?”

Continue reading and watch videos . . .


FFRF’s ‘Quit the Catholic Church’ ad in today’s Washington Post

Published
by
AlwaysQuestionAuthority
on May 8, 2012
.

Click on image to enlarge.

The Freedom From Religion Foundation’s full-page ad, “It’s Time to Quit the Catholic Church,” runs in today’s Washington Post (A-5 Main), urging liberal and nominal Roman Catholics to “quit” their church over its war against contraception.

The provocative ad asks: “Will it be reproductive freedom, or back to the Dark Ages? Do you choose women and their rights, or Bishops and their wrongs?”

The ad is similar to the full-page ad that appeared in The New York Times in March, which is still creating shockwaves among conservative religionists. The Washington Post, unlike the Times, accepted FFRF’s punchy headline, “It’s Time to Quit the Catholic Church.”

Additionally, FFRF has placed the full-page ad with a splash of color on the back of the Washington Express, handed out for free to Metro riders and D.C. residents. Express distributors will be wearing the ad on their vests.

“It’s a disgrace that U.S. health care reform is being held hostage to your church’s irrational opposition to medically prescribed contraception,” the ad states. “No political candidate should have to genuflect before the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.”

Continue Reading . . .


Cops Don’t Need Oversight!

Published
by
AlwaysQuestionAuthority
on May 8, 2012
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“Our society has created a profession where you have near unlimited authority, and next to no responsibility for what you do with it. Of course that is going to attract people who are sociopathic, depraved, sadistic fucks!”


Five Things The GOP Doesn’t Want You To Know About Birth Control

Published
by
AlwaysQuestionAuthority
on May 8, 2012
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Source: MoveOn.org


National Day of Reason / National Day Of Prayer

Published
by
AlwaysQuestionAuthority
on May 7, 2012
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Sean Faircloth on National Day of Reason

Christopher Hitchens on National Day Of Prayer Being Unconstitutional (04.16.2010)


Conversion on Mount Improbable: How Evolution Challenges Christian Dogma

Published
by
AlwaysQuestionAuthority
on May 7, 2012
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During most of my years as a liberal Protestant minister, I never saw a contradiction between my Christian faith and the fact of evolution. Like many progressive Christians, I did not understand evolution as a challenge to the doctrine of divine creation ex nihilo; evolution was merely the mechanism that God used for creating life on our planet.

[...]

My indifference towards evolution changed dramatically when I ran across Richard Dawkins’ analogy of natural selection as “climbing Mount Improbable.” In that memorable and vivid metaphor, Dawkins illustrates the truly incremental and gradual nature of the evolutionary process. Opponents of evolution have contended that, while change within species can occur, the leap from one species to a new species is just too improbably great to have happened by purely natural processes. Outside assistance must have been involved. Dawkins addresses that claim by acknowledging that, yes, the leap from one species to the next seems improbably difficult—like scaling the cliff of a mountain to reach the peak. However, if one approaches the peak not from the formidable cliff but instead moves slowly along the slope on the other side of the mountain, reaching the peak of “Mount Improbable” becomes quite possible, although it might take a very long time.

[...]

Which core doctrines of Christianity does evolution challenge? Well, basically all of them. The doctrine of original sin is a prime example. If my rudimentary grasp of the science is accurate, then Darwin’s theory tells us that because new species only emerge extremely gradually, there really is no “first” prototype or model of any species at all—no “first” dog or “first” giraffe and certainly no “first” homo sapiens created instantaneously. The transition from predecessor hominid species was almost imperceptible. So, if there was no “first” human, there was clearly no original couple through whom the contagion of “sin” could be transmitted to the entire human race. The history of our species does not contain a “fall” into sin from a mythical, pristine sinless paradise that never existed.

Read more . . .


Socialist Hollande Ousts Sarkozy as French Leader

Published
by
AlwaysQuestionAuthority
on May 6, 2012
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(Reuters) – Socialist Francois Hollande swept to victory in France’s presidential election on Sunday in a swing to the left at the heart of Europe that could start a pushback against German-led austerity.

[...]

In Bastille square, flashpoint of the 1789 French Revolution and the left’s traditional rallying point for protests and celebration, activists began partying two hours before the polls closed and a swelling crowd cheered as giant TV screens relayed the results.

Read more . . .


Aphorism: On American Militarized Police Forces Killing OWS Protesters

Published
by
AlwaysQuestionAuthority
on May 6, 2012
.

By Madison S. Hughes (05.05.2012)

It will happen!

The military and police forces attract a great number of Hawks. Many are actually Chickenhawks, but more on that presently. They come stock with an aggressive and militant mindset. They are predominately white-wing reactionaries who are very traditional and theistic. They see the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) protesters as left-wing radicals who are very unconventional and secular. They believe the unemployed are so because they are lazy, and the have no work ethic. The OWS protesters see the downtrodden as victims of the system that, ironically, the Militarized Police Force are supporting against their own economic best interest. The contrast could not be greater.

Thus far the Militarized Police Force has demonstrated that they are, in fact, Chickenhawks. Their continual use of disproportional force against nonviolent, unarmed, passive protesters shows that they are just itching like a yeast infection to put a notch in their lipstick case.

It’s only a matter of time.