Today the American Humanist Association was at the National Press Club in Washington DC to launch our latest campaign: godless advertisements on local Metro buses that state, “Why believe in a god? Just be good for goodness’ sake.”

The advertisement directs people to the website www.whybelieveinagod.com. Our press release was issued this morning:

Already appearing today in the New York Times and Washington Post, the message will soon be blazoned on the sides, taillights, and interiors of over 200 Washington DC Metro buses.

It’s the first ad campaign of its kind in the United States, and the American Humanist Association predicts it will raise public awareness of humanism as well as controversy over humanist ideas.

“Humanists have always understood that you don’t need a god to be good,” said Roy Speckhardt, executive director of the American Humanist Association. “So that’s the point we’re making with this advertising campaign. Morality doesn’t come from religion. It’s a set of values embraced by individuals and society based on empathy, fairness, and experience.”

At a press conference today launching the campaign, large displays were featured showing the ads in today’s New York Times and Washington Post, the bus posters, and how the posters will look mounted on the side of a bus and inside, behind the driver’s seat. The exterior posters will appear on buses in Northwest Washington starting Tuesday, November 18. The interior posters will begin December 1 in Northwest and Southeast.

“We expect these bus signs to generate a lot of public interest,” said Fred Edwords, director of communications for the American Humanist Association. “Some folks may be offended but that isn’t our purpose. We just want to reach those open to this message but unaware how widespread their views are.

The “goodness’ sake” ads and posters direct people to a special Web site at www.whybelieveinagod.org that helps people find others of like mind in the Washington, D.C., metro area and nationally. The site also informs the public about humanism and answers common objections to the slogan as well as to the appropriateness of running the campaign during the holidays.

Such high-profile promotion isn’t new to the American Humanist Association. Throughout 2008, humanist advertising has become more visible across the nation. In particular, highway billboards have been erected just outside of New York City, Philadelphia, and other major cities. They read: “Don’t believe in God? You are not alone.”

“Those billboards,” Fred Edwords added, “started raising the profile of our movement and generated an avalanche of responses, both from people who realized that they, too, were humanists as well as from those who disagreed with us. But everyone heard our message loud and clear. And this is what it takes for us to reach our audience.”

What do you think of the ad? Let us know in the comments section!

Ahhh. What a relief. After eight years of an administration that ruled by its version of “God’s law,” I knew that whatever the results of Tuesday’s election, many things would change for the better. For example, regardless of the outcome, the National Institutes of Health would again be permitted to use the most promising materials in its research – new lines of embryonic stem cells.

The specific results: the election of President-elect Barack Obama, Elizabeth Dole’s loss of her Senate seat, Rep. Pete Stark’s reelection win by an even larger margin (76 percent) than his last election – lead me to the following conclusions regarding the future of nontheists’ rights and separation of church and state in the United States.

Following the rhetoric during the presidential campaign, we now know that even those who support our Constitutional secular government, are willing to parade Christianity as a prerequisite for earning votes. Both Obama and Senator-elect Hagan (Dole’s opponent) felt obliged to prove that they are Christians. Both neglected to add Colin Powell’s commentary: so what if candidate isn’t Christian (though his comment had to do with “allegations” that Obama is Muslim, the same could be said of “allegations” that Hagan doesn’t believe in a god.)

Such rhetoric pushes back many advances that nontheists (and non-Christians in general) have made in terms of visibility, respectability, and acceptance in our society. The invocation offered at the huge public party in Grant Park in Chicago prior to Obama’s acceptance speech was offered in Jesus’s name, and I wondered if Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Wiccans, and other non-Christians in the audience felt as excluded by that as the nontheists in attendance. Those non-theists have told me that their excitement at being there was dampened by the fact that our President-elect would invite a minister who wasn’t even interested in including all the theists with a more inclusive prayer to God (the kind of prayers nontheists usually endure.)

President-elect Obama has promised to expand faith-based initiatives and even indicated that some of the government grants may continue to flow directly into church coffers. The Secular Coalition for America is working with over 40 other organizations to convince the new president to eliminate the privileging of religion over effective secular social service grantees, and to deal with the other abuses seen in the current faith-based scheme. On the plus side, Obama has stated that he will require that grantees stop discriminating in hiring based on religion when using such funds.

I do expect to see a renewed respect for science. Thus in addition to stem cell research, sex education funds and international family planning aid might again flow without limitations regarding theologically-based abstinence-only requirements. Creationism may now be placed where it belongs in public schools – comparative religion and world literature curriculum; it is definitely NOT a scientific theory. And when a creation story is taught in religion or literature curriculum in public schools, those curriculum must place it beside the many other creation stories of the world, and must not present one story as the truth over any others.

There will be many more changes to come. As we wish good-riddance to eight years of faith-based rule, I end on the most positive note. When Representative Pete Stark allowed the Secular Coalition for America to announce his nontheism, many individuals told me that they assumed he did so because he planned to retire. I assured them he planned to run for reelection, and having interacted with Rep. Stark, I can assure everyone that he is more vibrant and “young” than his chronological years should allow. His formidable reelection win should embolden other nontheistic members of Congress (at least those from parts of the country considered “safe” to do so) to refrain from hiding their lifestance. Perhaps before the next election cycle there will be more than one out non-theist in Congress. Until then the caucus of nontheists in Congress will consist of – in Stephen Colbert’s words, “Stark, his self and him.”

Anti-choice groups in the United States have increasingly turned to the ballot initiative process to attempt to restrict reproductive freedom on a state-by-state basis. This year, however, they failed in three states.

The most extreme measure was in Colorado:

“Colorado voters on Tuesday rejected Amendment 48, which would have defined a ‘person’ from the point of egg fertilization. If the measure had passed, Colorado would have become the first state to grant full constitutional rights to a fertilized egg.”

The Colorado amendment ended up being rejected nearly three to one. It was so far-reaching that National Right to Life and several prominent Republican candidates in Colorado declined to support it. Colorado Springs-based Focus on the Family did lend its support. But in the end Coloradans rejected the attempt to make their state one of the most extreme anti-choice states in the nation. Not only would the measure have made abortion illegal in all cases, even if the life of the mother was at risk, but it also could have led to some forms of birth control being banned. A strong No on 48 campaign, led by the medical community of Colorado and supported by leading civil liberties, reproductive rights, and legal groups, pushed back and successfully defended a woman’s right to choose in the state.

South Dakota wasn’t reaching quite that far, but Measure 11, which received a “no” vote of 56 percent, was still extreme. A revised version of the last attempt to ban abortion there, which was rejected by voters by a 10 percentage point margin in 2006, proponents hoped to pass Measure 11 by providing for exceptions in the case of rape or if the life of the mother was in danger. However, these provisions were still incredibly strict:

“Opponents argued the exceptions were still too narrow — abortions were only permissible if the woman identified her assailant and proved paternity through DNA testing, or if a doctor found the mother faced possible organ failure if the pregnancy came to term.”

In other words, a rape victim would have to endure the additional trauma of quickly proving a case against her assailant and receiving permission from the state to terminate the pregnancy. It is not at all clear that a state as anti-choice as South Dakota would let that happen anyway. And the health exception could only be applied in the most extreme cases and would effectively tie a doctor’s hands with a narrow legal definition of “health risk.” In the end, South Dakotans said no to the law that very well could have ended up in front of the US Supreme Court.

Finally, as part of the nation-wide effort of anti-choice groups to chip away, incrementally, at access to abortion, Proposition 4 in California proposed to require that doctors notify parents 48 hours in advance of performing an abortion on a minor. In the case that the minor did not want to inform her own parents of the abortion, she could have another adult family member informed, but a child abuse investigation would subsequently have to be opened against her parents. Or perhaps the minor could persuade a judge to grant her a non-notification abortion.

But what are all of those requirements, really? They are obstacles. The goal of Proposition 4 was to restrict reproductive choice as much as possible without stepping over the line and violating the constitutionally protected right to privacy, as defined in Roe v. Wade. Proponents were trying to dress the proposition in the idea of protecting minors from sexual abuse, but doctors are already mandated reporters of abuse and rape. So if a minor seeks an abortion in the state of California today, and the doctor suspects that the pregnancy was the result of sexual abuse or rape, the doctor is already required by law to report this to the police.

Thankfully, Californians saw through Proposition 4. It failed.

This isn’t the last time we’ll hear from the anti-choice forces in the United States. But by defeating these three measures, the voters are making their support for a woman’s right to reproductive choice increasingly clear. Combine that with the fact that we can expect better appointments to the US Supreme Court in the coming years, and we can see that reproductive freedom will overall be better protected in the years to come. But it will take years of hard work to undo the damage already done in so many states by similar measures. And I doubt that the anti-choice organizations are going to go quietly.

Well, now I think I’ve seen everything, and you can see it too.  OK, it’s just the straw that broke the camel’s back, but really, the biggest loser of this election was not a party or a person, it was the wall of separation between religion and government.

This campaign showed us Mike Huckabee and his “it’s not really a cross” ad, as well as his desire to change the constitution to “God’s standard.” We also witnessed some eager candidates proclaiming their non-belief in evolution and Mitt Romney’s Faith in America speech. We had various cries that now President-elect Barack Obama was a Muslim and now lame-duck U.S. Senator Elizabeth Dole’s two attack ads, both railing against the supposed connections to “godlessness” of her opponent Kay Hagan. More concretely, three states passed ballots that banned gay marriage.

Now I’m sure I’m overreacting, but then lets look at the campaign that was.  Even the president of the Catholic League, Bill Donahue–a pretty religious guy–found Huckabee’s ad to be over the top.

“The whole idea is to give the appearance of a cross,” Donahue said, “and this is just injecting religion into politics even too far for guys like me.” I think proposing changing the constitution to God’s standard speaks for itself.

The question about belief in evolution seems like it might be a science question, but I think that’s disingenuous. The question is really to see who is willing to say “God created the Earth.”  There really isn’t a science controversy here. We don’t need to teach the controversy to educate voters.  It’s just a ploy to get religion into the campaign, just like Intelligent Design is a ploy to get psuedoscience in the classroom.

Next we have Mitt Romney’s “Faith in America” speech.  Even the fact he had to make this speech speaks to a problem separating religion and government. This speech was intended to be a John F. Kennedy-like statement separating Romney from the Mormon church, and showing Romney would represent everyone. It ended up sounding more like he would represent only god-believers. But the real issue is that he shouldn’t have needed to make the speech to defend his religion anyhow.  We’re supposed to have no religious litmus tests in this country for public office.

Again the whole “Obama is a Muslim,” smear is pretty self-evident. The idea that accusing someone of a religious affiliation, or even no religious affiliation, as a smear is by itself repugnant.  Yet smear it apparently is.  And I’ll be more explicit, Article 6, section 3 of the U. S. Constitution says:

The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.

Of course, this specifically applies to the government-imposed religious tests, however, as far as the American public is concerned, it not only shouldn’t matter whether Obama or any other candidate is a Muslim, Mormon or atheist, but it shouldn’t even be a topic of conversation. When you hire someone for any job, you can’t ask them about their religion. Why can we ask presidential candidates?  Aren’t they applying for the job of president?  We wouldn’t tolerate it anywhere else.

And then we have the “Godless Ads.”  Kay Hagan, is a godless heathen. A godless heathen who is an elder in her Church.  Hmm…we godless heathen types are trickier than I thought.  Years of church attendance and all that so we can secretly take over the world through the churches!!!  And as to the “godless fundraiser” Hagan attended, at the house of Woody Kaplan, apparently if you have an atheist in attendance, or as one of over forty sponsors,  it’s an atheist event.  I never knew what power we had!!!  You know I keep looking to see if this is a Landover Baptist moment, but you know, Toto, I don’t think we’re even in Landover anymore.

And last, but the most heartbreaking were the Arizona, California and Florida anti-gay-marriage decisions.  Marriage has always been on the peripheral of issues surrounding the separation of religion and government. Is a marriage an issue left to God and the churches, synagogues and mosques? Or is it a matter of civil law, of ensuring that all Americans have equal–not special–rights and protections under the law?

The argument that it is a state issue, in the sense of protecting families and children, is specious or there would be an outcry against straight marriages that have no intention of producing children.  Civil law guarantees rights and protections for couples in a union, period.  Civil unions and religious marriages need to be separated from each other in order to ensure that everyone’s civil rights are protected. A civil law same-sex marriage does nothing to harm religiously recognized marriages. The measures that were not passed would have proved this separation between religion and government, and were very much necessary.

Want to know why we should separate religion and government? This campaign cycle was definitely a poster child for what can go wrong when you let the two interfere with each other too much. Let’s hope we all as Americans can learn something from this election cycle, and see that it doesn’t happen again.

Despite a lot of cause for celebration for progressives this election cycle–the election of our nation’s first biracial president and the defeat of a senator who manipulated anti-atheist prejudice as a campaign tactic–the movement for LGBT equality took a big hit on Tuesday.  California, Florida and Arizona all passed gay marriage bans and Arkansas voted to bar all unmarried people, LGBT or straight, from adopting children or serving as foster parents.

This turn of events is particularly upsetting in California, where voters directly voted to reverse the right to marriage that same-sex couples had won. Already, three lawsuits have been launched and protesters have taken to the streets in Los Angeles, San Francisco and Sacramento. No one is quite sure yet what will happen to the 18,000 or so same-sex couples that have already married; those unions remain in legal limbo.

How was it that California’s Proposition 8 was able to pass? The campaign had a great deal of money behind it (click here for a list of major donors–many of them businesses) and spread a lot of misinformation about the California supreme court ruling that legalized gay marriage, for example that same-sex marriage would be taught in schools and that houses of worship that refused to marry same-sex couples would lose their tax-exempt status.

The California supreme court has already said that marriage is a fundamental right, so I’m hopeful that one of the lawsuits will be successful in setting aside Proposition 8. In the meantime, it’s important to actively educate the masses about why marriage equality is important–perhaps starting with the list of donors supplied above.

A study recently authored by Temple University researchers examined the link between faith, church attendance, and depression. The results:

Lead researcher Joanna Maselko found that people who report being in a close relationship with a higher power are 1.5 times more likely to struggle with depression. She believes depressed people may use religion as a coping mechanism, and as a result, “they’re more closely relating to God and praying more.”

It is important to note, as the researcher did, that faith is not causing depression, but rather depression may impel many people towards faith. Isolation and depression are often intricately tied together, and perhaps some people that suffer from depression feel less isolated (or at least hope to) if they can feel a connection to a god.

However, the study also found that those who may or may not report a deep faith but who do attend religious services regularly are 30 percent less likely to be depressed. The relationships that develop from regular social interaction in a church setting help hold off depression.

I share this information because I think it raises an important point, not so much about faith but rather about the benefits of social interaction that people receive from church attendance. Millions of people in the United States and around the world live a large portion of their social life through the setting of churches, synagogues, mosques, and other religious institutions. These institutions bring people together on a regular basis and unite them around common purposes. Obviously, these common purposes can often be at odds with what is actually good for society; the campaign of hate against gays and lesbians that the Mormon Church and many Christian churches just supported in California is a good example of this (and there are thousands of other examples of how this organizing power has been used for bad purposes). But it appears that the fundamental need for humans to interact with each other and see each other socially is a powerful force impelling church attendance today.

Humanist Manifesto III states, “Humans are social by nature and find meaning in relationships.” This is an important tenet of humanism: that humans, being social, want and need relationships with other people, and that, indeed, these relationships are important for both the health of people and the health of society.

Understanding this will, I believe, help those of us who do not belong to an organized religion understand just a little bit better how it all works and why many people do belong. And it will help us look to the future: if churches lose their social influence, we humanists will have to redouble our efforts to provide the social interaction, through the many organizations that we already have around the United States and the world, that people seem to fundamentally crave.

Today’s finally the day for that annual rite of civic duty!

Any interesting election day stories?

The Mormon Church (Church of Latter Day Saints) has had a bad history of discrimination. In the mid-1800s, prominent Mormon leader Brigham Young said things like:

“Shall I tell you the law of God in regard to the African Race? If the White man who belongs to the chosen seed mixes his blood with the seed of Cain, the penalty, under the law of God, is death on the spot. This will always be so.”

Those with any African ancestors were prohibited from becoming priests or attaining a full marriage. In 1954, Apostle Mark E. Petersen told Brigham Young University students: “If that Negro is faithful all his days, he can and will enter the celestial kingdom. He will go there as a servant, but he will get a celestial resurrection.”

Suddenly, in 1978, God decided to clarify things. The Church received new revelation to stop discriminating against African-Americans! I’m not sure why he waited so long. I wish I were wise enough to understand God’s brilliance, because everything He does is for a reason, right? Excuse me for a moment, I need a paper towel to wipe up all the sarcasm dripping from my voice.

So when can we expect the next “revelation” about discrimination? The Wall Street Journal reported that the Mormon Church is fueling an advertising blitz in support of Proposition 8 in California – the attempt to take marriage rights away from gay and lesbian couples. “Between 30% and 40% of the $25.5 million in donations raised as of last week by the ‘Yes’ campaign has come from the Utah-based Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, supporters of the measure say.”  Brigham Young University even urged its students to support the measure.

Mormons from Utah are fighting to define marriage as between one man and one woman. Insert your own “Traditional Marriage” joke here.

Proponents of California’s Proposition 8 have made preserving “traditional marriage” their rallying cry.  But what is traditional marriage, exactly?  The excellent blog Sociological Images makes this point:

In early American history, when families largely lived on farms and worked for sustenance, people didn’t marry because they loved each other. And they certainly didn’t split up because they did not. Marriage choices were highly influenced by their families and, once married, husbands and wives formed a working partnership aimed at production. They teamed up to support themselves and make children who would take care of them when they were old and help them in the meantime.

The piece goes on to point out that mutual love and happiness only became a major component of American marriages in the 20th century. And throughout history, indeed, we can see plenty of examples of major social customs around marriage and the family shifting as economic and social realities changed. From the number of children that a couple has to the age difference in spouses, from a formal engagement process deeply involving the families to living together prior to marriage with no family input, we can see clear changes over time in how marriage and “couple-hood” in general are carried out. After all, it wasn’t even all that long ago that a woman was considered to be the property of her husband, with no rights of her own.

My point is, marriage and the family are constantly changing over time. And as Sociological Images points out, “when someone speaks of ‘traditional’ marriage, they actually just mean ‘the kind of marriage that I like that I am pretending existed throughout all time before this current threat right now.’” There is no single standard of “traditional marriage” that we can safely use to define marriage in our society today.

But if opponents of marriage equality can’t stand on tradition, then what can they stand on? Biblical scripture. Indeed, commonly cited by the proponents of changing California’s constitution (and, for that matter, the measures in Florida and Arizona this year that are also seeking to outlaw marriage equality) is marriage as outlined in the Bible. I’m not going to debate scripture here. For that matter, I do not care what the Bible has to say about marriage, because when we are discussing civil law, then we must recognize the separation of church and state: the Bible has nothing to say on the matter!

We have religious freedom in the United States, and included with that is that each church may define for itself how it wants to handle marriage. And each Sunday school may teach what it wants to teach. There are churches out there today that preach that divorce is wrong, but we do not want it to be outlawed, now, do we? Why should churches get to define marriage for everybody?