Author Archive for Steve
What the UK needs isn't just disestablishment but a genuine separation of church and state. Faiths are, by their very nature, exclusionary and discriminatory and they have no place in government business.
If what the Scientologists claim is true, we would all migrate naturally to their way of thinking. Any philosophy or science that relies on legal threats, intimidation, coercion, violence and forcible indoctrination to assure belief and allegiance among its members is inherently suspect.
A London tribunal has found that a local government officer, a Christian, was guilty of discrimination when she refused to conduct gay marriages.
Spirituality is religion’s last-ditch defence, the final redoute of superstition.
This festive season is traditionally a time when Christians get their knickers in a twist about the 'meaning' of Christmas. Of course, it has nothing to do with Christ.
Watford Area Humanists are attempting to have Darwin Day - 12th February - made a Bank Holiday in the UK. Add your voice to the petition.
A Christian group has failed in its attempt to impose its narrow beliefs on society - beliefs that could have prolonged suffering for untold thousands of people.
The freeing of Doctor Humayra Abedin is a sign of hope - that the medieval practices of some religions are at last losing their grip.
Just how much are fundamentalist and bigoted religious views driving Sarah Palin’s bid for the VP slot?
And given that Palin has now been found, by an enquiry, to have acted unethically, can she be trusted in such a powerful position?
The National Union of Journalists has released an important new film about police harrassment of photojournalists. It's required viewing for anyone who cares about freedom of the press or civil liberties in general.
A number of organisations have come together to create Accord - a campaigning coalition dedicated to making school a place of learning and discovery, not an excuse for religious indoctrination.
Faith schools have been criticised for hiring only those teachers who practice that faith. But the real issue is the existence of those schools.
The case of the British muslim who forced his children to flog themselves has rightly caused outrage - including among many in the muslim community. But are we in danger of missing a more important point?
The Ashura ceremony, part of the month-long period of ‘mourning’ known as Muharram, is an important part of the Shia [...]
A poll suggests that an increasing number of religious people in the US think politics shouldn’t be preached from the pulpit. Well, it’s about time…
According to the poll by the Pew Forum, some 50 per cent of conservative church-goers believe that “houses of worship should not express views on day-to-day political matters”. That’s up from [...]
The ACLU in the US is celebrating a decision in Fredericksburg that it says is a victory for freedom of religion. Well maybe. But it’s a defeat for freedom from religion.
The issue, as reported on the ACLU website, revolved around the saying of prayers to open Fredericksburg City Council meetings. The decision of a three-judge [...]
The UK Government has passed a law which means that fortune-tellers, mediums, spiritualists and other peddlers of the supernatural must label their services as ‘entertainment only’. I can think of a few other organisations that should do that.
In ‘Fighting fraud in the spiritual realm‘, I said how I felt this law should be extended to [...]
The four votes on aspects of the Embryology Bill in the UK presented an opportunity for the religiously blinkered to put narrow-minded dogma before compassion and scientific progress. They were soundly and properly trounced.
It’s always good to see reason prevail. The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill represents the most important development in fertility law in [...]
There are many assertions that the religious make - either in defence of their faith or as an attack against atheism - that have been so thoroughly discredited that they amount to bald-faced lies. This random and sporadic series of posts will look at some of the most popular.
One of the problems with those infected [...]
Bill’s at it again…
And then his ‘apology’…
A comment by Virgin Media’s new boss that net neutrality is “bollocks” could have repercussions for the company. Let’s hope so.
Virgin’s CEO Neil Berkett is far from unusual, aside from the stupidity he displayed in being so blunt about his attitude to the Net. Businessmen do not view the Internet as a public good: to [...]
Speaking on his US tour, the Pope has recalled some of the horrors of his own past. But only some.
While in New York, the Pope addressed a Seminary in Yonkers and said:
“My own years as a teenager were marred by a sinister regime that thought it had all the answers.”
It turns out he was talking [...]
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