Greetings one and all. How about some queer skeptic news?
Burger King has unveiled (unfortunately in one location) the Proud Whopper. Its signature burger is wrapped in rainbow paper. While patrons weren’t told what was in it, it turns out that it’s no different from the regular Whopper, which I think is kind of a cool idea from a marketing perspective. I wish Pride-oriented stuff wasn’t always limited release, but good for Burger King for making a statement.
You know the difference between conservative activists and liberal activists? When a liberal activist suggests that conservative victories will result in overreach, they’re generally correct. For example, remember the day of the Hobby Lobby decision when liberals were saying that companies would use it to discriminate against LGBT individuals and we were told we were overreacting? Not even a day later, companies are trying to use it to discriminate against LGBT individuals.
I think I like Libby Anne’s commentary on the above best, mostly because it points out that when Warren et. al. talk about protecting the queer community, they neglect to mention that the people that the queer community needs protection from is them. What she doesn’t cover and I only saw mentioned once was the part of the letter that says, “…we agree that banning discrimination is a good thing,” before they go right into explaining how they can’t practice their faith if the president bans discrimination.
Finally, it’s a bit old, but I have to agree with the Rude Pundit that taking the high road won’t benefit us, and if people are going to harass women outside of clinics, then we should give them the exact same treatment outside of their churches. I disagree that we should go as far as harassing them at home or posting personal information around town, but I think a visible presence outside of activist pro-life churches where we can explain to them, “counsel” them you might say, how wrong they are and try to convince them that their activities are immoral is entirely warranted. This goes for all of the recent SCOTUS rulings against secularism. If the Court finds that sectarianism is the way of things, we gain nothing by not being sectarian. That also means that when atheists give invocations at city hall events, they can’t be ecumenical, they ought to start with something along the lines of “Since there is no god, we must rely on ourselves and our sense of reason to guide us” or something similar. As skeptics, especially those of us in the US, we often point out that if another faith or lack of faith did the same things that right wing Christians defend so strongly, those same people would be up in arms. Let’s prove it. I suspect we wouldn’t have to for long before there were changes in law.
