You know, each week we scour the internet looking for proof of God's or
anything supernatural, and we haven't found anything yet that would convince us. But
we have found a lot of really cool stuff and we want to show you
what it is. So buckle up because the show's starting right now. Hello,
and welcome to another episode of the Nonprofits. This is the show where
we discuss news and topics of the day from a skeptical humanist perspective. My
name, of course is Kelly Latin and today's topics are a step in the
right, step in the right a step step step, step in the right
direction, and stepping with mom obviously no Cynthia McDonald stepping with me today.
All the way. On the far end is the heavenly Helen Green. Hi,
Helen, how are you? Hello? Everyone? Happy pride mind.
I'm your choking gay queer unicorn. Hello. And next to Helen we have
the Jaunty Jason Friedman. I don't know how that name is. Jaunty I
went I went to school, but I don't even know what that means,
so I'll have to look that up after this. But thanks, I'm happy
to be here. And the jus Jonathan RODDA Bush. Hey guys, thank
you killing Yep, it's uh, it's great to be on Nonprofits. This
is an amazing show with amazing people, especially since this makes us an all
ACD cast. I was going to mention that we are all a CD personality,
so if you want to talk to any of us, you can always
find us on the ACD. So and I do want us point out that
this show is a product of the Atheist Community of Boston, a five O
one C three nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting promoting atheism, critical thinking, secular
humanism, and the separation of religion and government. And today we are going
to talk about humanists spreading the good news of the secular word. The pros
came, but these parents conquered a Tennessee laws struck struck down by a federal
judge and a Utah scholar school district bands the Bible. As with all of
our shows, links to today's topics and the news we discuss are available in
the description below just down there. And a reminder, if you want to
come into the show prepared, you can check out the Nonprofits Facebook fan page
and get all the links. On Friday nights, So you can come in
here ahead of time, know what stories we're going to be talking about.
And we are going to be stepping out to Minnesota first. And Jason,
I think you're gonna take us there. You're gonna be our hiking guide.
So what do you got for us? Well, you know, I'll tell
you it's it's interesting being part of a nonprofits that actually has a positive feel.
So I'll tell you I'm excited about that. So this is from www
Dot Star Tribune dot com. The name of the article is a Minnesota Humanists
take out billboards to spread the secular word. It goes to say the state's
largest group of nonbelievers aims to fight what they see as a push to impose
Christian beliefs in government. The billboard that they're fighting, or that they posted
says, reject Christian nationalism, keep religion out of government. Now, you
know, seeing that as John's first time here, I'm gonna go ahead and
pop his cherry and pass it to him. John, how do you feel
about this article and this billboard in general? Well, I think that they
had a genius or a great idea. I've thought of this as well as
one of the things I was thinking about how we might be able to do
this nationwide. It takes an awful lot of money. I think it took
them like five K or seven K for the billboard, and I don't know
if that's for a month or if that's for how long that is, but
it's a It is a real step in the right direction. Something like eighty
nine percent of people who are driving actually do read billboards, So if this
spurs them to start thinking humanist time, oh gee, that would be pretty
cool. And also when this was posted, to read it it got over
fifty k up checks, So that's you know, that's amazing, you know,
So yes, And I thought another point. The article quoted from the
Minnesota Humanist president said, so many people have not heard of it. Humanism
that is, and her name is Hayland and of humanism. But as soon
as you describe it, most people I know say, oh, that's me.
I didn't know there was that name for it. So and since my
father was a dedicated humanist, I'm kind of like, I am surprised that
more people don't know that the humanist movement has been around for a very very
long time. So I'm I'm really happy that this is happening and that they're
getting some good press over it. And I think we could do more of
this if we just organize a little bit and see if we can't raise some
money. Helen, Um that I called you out on that, sorry,
but um and uh. They've they've also humanists also to do this have established
relationships, which is what we can do also with the unitarians and the human
humanistic Jewish congregations UM over over a secular Now they're actually organizing over a secular
counter to the National Day of Prayer, which I think is also a good
idea if the if the nation's going to have a Day of prayer, we
need to either have our own day or take that and co opt it so
that we can use it. Um. And So these are some of the
points I was thinking about with this, and you know, there are a
lot of other things we can do. It would be great to get some
of these humanists from Minnesota, since they've already made national news onto some really
good talk shows like The Talk or The View or you know, something like
that, there's going to reach a lot more people. Hopefully they're planning that
too. And so once we start getting the word out that there are people
in this country who don't buy into the bs these Christian nationalists are selling or
that, you know, then maybe they'll get the idea that real patriots of
this country don't believe that church should have anything to do with politics. So
if you don't believe that out there, then you're not really a patriot.
So just think about it. And so the alliances are very important, and
we need to pay attention to what other people are doing. And if we
find out about any actions or rallies that they're doing that we can attend.
We should probably give them that kind of moral support by showing up and you
know, supporting their actions. And if even if it is a religious group,
even if it is the reform Jewish synagogue in the area, we should
show up. Even if it's the mosque, the local mosque, which we
have several in Florida, believe it or not here right in Tampa. And
they're really good people. They've come to my old church, the Unitarian Church,
and given talks and that on things. So it's it's like we have
allies out there. We may not agree with them, but we have Alan
Okay and Helen. I think I'm gonna pass this over to you. So
I am very very happy that the humanists are coming out of the proverbial closet.
It is pride months, so come out of the closet, Yali.
That's the way I kind of look at this. I'm so happy that this
billboard got up and people are paying attention. And one of the wonderful things
that I found out about the seculary government clause that the Humanism Minnisota, pushed
by the state legislators, said form last October. The caucus aims to counter
what is members say is a growing push to impost Christian beliefs in government.
Includes legislators who are outspoken non believers, as well as lawmakers who are religious
and support the separation of church and state. Coachair Representative Mike Freiberg of Golden
Valley recently invite a Humanists of Minnesota program direct coordinator Audrey Kingstrom to the House.
Legislative lessions usually begin with the player, but Freiberg asked Kingstrom to give
a secular invocation. Now, I want to live in that world. I
would absolutely love that all the way from state governments to the national that it
was very inclusionary, that there was no no hierarchy as far as religion or
secularists or whatever it is. Is that we're here to do our jobs and
we believe in the Constitution and what it stands for. I would love that.
And I know me and John live in the San Francis bus hole,
so you know, we I think for the two of us to really want
this to happen, maybe we could, you know, have a you know,
as John suggested, you know in our little noty notes, that we
could have a secular tea party, but all not only use secularity guardy,
but we convite people of color, all the queers, you know, everyone,
you know, people from different religious groups that understand the separation chertain state.
That would be I want that. I want that so much. So
thank you Minnesota for recognizing that we do have a separation or church to stay
in this country. And I am very excited this happened. So, Kelly,
what did you think of all this? Well, first off, it
was like you guys said almost everything I had in my note, So I'm
gonna think they have to think of new stuff right now. I did check
out Minnesota Humanists though, and they seem like a really cool group of people
and it's just like every large organization like that, there seems to be like
a core group of twenty thirty people. And John, I think it was
three months. They rented the build two billboards for three months for seven thousand
dollars And that's a pretty good chunk of money. That's not easy to come
by. So um, but it goes to show you how just a small
group of people, say twenty or thirty, you can share some volunteer work
together and get something like this done. And I think it's awesome that.
You know, it's a really good example how you can make a difference in
your community by not doing a whole lot of work. I'm sure there was
a lot of work pert and putting fundraisers together. Yeah, but like I
said, when you share it between twenty thirty people, it's not that hard,
it's not really that good to do it. So I think this is
a really good lesson in being able to do that and make a difference in
your community. And I think Minnesota Humanists, if you live in Minnesota,
you might want to check them out. They seem like a pretty cool group
of people to hang out with. So Jason, you want to take it
back again, Yeah, yeah, for sure. You know, it's funny.
It's you can look at this and be like, oh, you know,
it's just a billboard. But you know, I spent a lot of
time on the road in Houston, in the greater surrounding area pretty much from
New Bronfels to Beaumont, and it's a home of Lakewood Church, right,
you know, Joel Ostein and his cohorts. And what's really interesting is that
in the past is give or take about three years years, they've launched a
billboard campaign across Houston. And I know this because I drive. I mean,
my truck is my office. So it's really interesting because a lot of
the areas that I work in are low SCS because you can put a lot
of you can mix industrial and housing kind of in the same area in low
SCS areas kind of go hand in hand. But that's, you know,
besides the point. What's interesting is those billboards are primarily in those areas,
and it really it really made me think about about that. I'm like,
oh my god, that guy has that crap all over the place, and
it's him and his wife with these big, terrifying smiles and they say come
home to hope and if that isn't like the glaring antithesis of what the secular
humanists are doing, because if anybody knows anything about Lakewood Church, that place
is a cesspool for just that capitalistic Christian nationalistic money and Jesus fucking intertwined just
filthiness. I mean, along with those billboards in Houston, we have tons
of anti abortion billboards, you know, pro pro life billboards. We have
those one eight hundred Call for Truth billboards or whatever all over the place,
and these like tons of these that say save yourself from Hell, and they're
ever I mean, they're across taxes in general. Yeah, I've lived here
way too long, so I would I would really hope that and maybe,
you know, maybe this is something that I should be doing here in Houston,
especially being part of you know, the punk rock scene and everything.
You know, we have a bunch of activists. This just really highlights the
effectiveness of it. Like the stats that John brought up. I mean,
it's what we don't realize is that we're repetitive creatures. So we're doing the
same shit over and over and over and over and over and over and over,
and that thing just becomes part of your fucking daily mental landscape. That
just gets like just the original. Yeah, yeah, it becomes part of
your rituals. So I see those billboards and I'm indoctunated by the billboards if
I like it or not, or I'm thinking about them at least, right,
you know, So if we can get that that that questioning and that
critical reasoning, like here's all your bullshit critical thinking, and then there's the
rest of your day, you know, then then maybe we could Uh I
don't know, I don't know. Maybe and if whatso, if it's seven
thousand dollars over three months, you know, the thirty five hundred dollars a
month for thirty people, you know that that's not so bad. And in
Houston, I'm sure there's some areas we get it for pretty cheap, right,
And uh, I don't know, might even be worth it. I
think it's I think any type especially you know Hellen brought up in a happy
Pride month. Obviously you know I'm celebrating it right now. Um. Visibility
and you know visibility is key, right, I mean, yeah, John,
looking to my what side of you on? There you go? And
uh, I turned around. I don't know what's happening, and uh,
you know with Kelly, who is our token straight friend, you know we
had we Yeah, we love you, bro, It's okay, it's okay,
I love you. Your your lifestyle is okay. We accept you,
We accept you for who you are, and you just remember that you are
in the midst of all the gays boors around you, and you might floating
around. I was I'm gonna end up cutting the gay watch out, watch
out, I'm fast, but I digress. It's it's I think with visibility.
So it's like like John and I have talked before in the past about
like me being apprehensive about coming out for things and being apprehensive about coming Helen
and I've talked about it, and it's and even Kelly and I've talked about
it before too. And I think with the atheist thing that that that and
humanism and all that stuff, there needs to be visibility, right And and
if you set something up as a beacon you know, what was that movie
with the guy and the ghosts that played baseball, If you build something to
show up that whole thing, Yeah, yeah, So I mean that's it's
more or less I think that's what we should be doing. You know that
was that was one of the things say that, And that was one of
the things I found when I started a nonprofit organization and we knew we needed
more people to help, but we didn't know how to find those people.
And we just put an ad in the paper saying that we were having a
meeting at our local library, and they showed up. All the people we
needed to help. They all just showed up because they saw that the meeting
announcement and they were interested too. They were waiting for somebody else just to
put that announcement in the pain. Yeah, well that's ACA did that.
I just I just finished my internship with the ACA. Yeah, you know,
graduation, but uh that I had to do a little report on ACA.
And they did that. They started putting out advertisements, they started to
meet up, a little meetups and this on the other and then now here
we are years and years and years later, and it just thousands of people's
lives have been affected by it and continually be affected by in real time.
And you see how it affects people, and it's really neat. So yeah,
something like that. It's just those those little and think about it.
We have the internet now, I mean come on, that's that's amazing.
So yeah, yeah, it's it's amazing information and travel. But but I
digress, Kelly. I'll pass it on back to your conductor, sir.
Well, I was going to let John take it next. Go oh yeah,
oh yeah yeah. The only thing I have to add is there's,
you know, the only limitation on how you can create events and things like
that as your own imagination and uh, you know, and sometimes you might
want to go for the shock value, but usually it's better just to demonstrate
your humanity in public. So you know, though, I would love to
see a sit in on the governor's lawn of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence or
the party on their lawn. So I'm sitting there going just spit ball in
here. But if we can talk them into it, yeah, you know,
we want to get national news that would do it, you know,
but you want to really, you just want to show the common guy on
the street that you're not an evil, terrible person, that you're an actual
human being. And then they start thinking, well, yeah, you're a
human being. But you know, I find myself as a as a triple
threat. You know, I'm I'm a liberal I'm an atheist, I'm gay.
Yeah, watch out you are scary. Well, I mean I agree
with you, man. I think it's uh, we're normal, Like that's
everybody's just a normal person. We're just that that term normal. Yeah,
this is a normal life experience, you know. Yeah, Helen, I
mean that's I said, we all the people. And uh, I think
your point is that not being normal is normal. Not being normal is normal.
It's normal. It's normal to just be to be an individual. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, it's really cool your authentic self. Yeah. And
the more visibility that's allowed, the more way and the more you pay that
way, you know, it's I need you know, my daughter recently came
out of school as both being atheist and gay, you know, and you
know, at the end of fifth grade, and she lost half her friends
and people told her she was going to hell and she was going to get
jumped and all this stuff, and and she's just all fuck it. So
she started like wearing her she like, I know, she loves metal and
this black metal and his band called Cradle of Filth and shit like that,
and has hoodies with pentagrams. It's just what she's into, you know.
And uh, she just started wearing her ship school. She's a fucking I
don't care anymore, Like, okay, all right, yeah, you know
she's like people who don't like we don't like me. Okay, cool.
I know Helen has something she one day. So what do you got for
is Helen? I was gonna say, like, so as like, this
is just another example of people organizing and getting shit done. And as we're
going through the article tonight, this is really what this is nice about about
organizing and getting shit done, because we tend to forget that in this country
that we get a lot of him in hall, Like I get very frustrated
listening to the news, but then I'm reminded that there are people out there
that genuinely care about these things, you know, whether the religious or not,
you know, and we have to kind of remember that if we want
to do the change, we have to do the work, and this is
an example of that. So that was the only thing I wanted to say,
because I'm actually very excited for this episode tonight. I'm in a much
better mood than I've been in the past few weeks, so you know,
like you know, like if you're not happy, you know, burnsham shit
down, not literally, but like, you know, do the activism,
you know, because we can't we can we can't endorse burning. Yeah,
don't do anything anything that's gonna like cause burning, because that's bad. Ourson
is bad. We had the ACA to not promote ourson. Yeah. Please,
I'm so glad you said that. Cut I said it. I made
the disclaser if you do it, but don't, but don't, definitely don't.
God No, that doesn't solve anything, creates much many more problems in
the souls and smells real bad too. So damn you don't want to add
some more pollution of the planet, you know what I mean? I don't
know. I've got enough forest fire smoke up here right now, right like
jne m Kelly Moore sinus issues before now, before we move on, I
did kind of want to plug Minnesota Humanists again. They seem pretty cool.
They have book views, they have lectures, they have monthly meetings, and
they seem like a really cool group and if you do Minnesota, live in
Minnesota, you might want to check them out. So at this point I
would like to thank all of our viewers, the old ones, the new
ones, all of them for getting us over twelve K subscribers. And I
was thinking just yesterday that why can't we get fifteen k by the end of
the year. That should be that should be attainable. So if you're watching
us now and you haven't subscribed yet, get on that. Help us get
the fifteen k. And then once you've subscribed, you can like and ring
that bell so you always know when there's another Nonprofits episode premiering. But it
is every Sunday at three pm. You knew that, right Central, three
pm Central. And then you can share the link to the channel with your
friends and your family member, the people you work with, all your neighbors,
the guy walking down the street right now, go out there and run
out there and give them the link. You might make a lifelong friend.
So let's get the word out there and we could start helping with the fundraisers.
And were you aware that the eighth Community of Austin's programming is actually available
in a podcast form. If you weren't aware of that, you really should
have been. So you can check out the Atheist Experience Network where you can
find all of the ACA shows and podcast form. The flagship show that on
Profits is obviously the best one, but you can find him by subscribing a
tiny dot cc slash a n podcasts, and you can listen to all of
his other shows too, Truth Wanted, Tokkeithen, I think there's one called
The Atheist Experience and all the other ACA shows. Don't miss a single episode.
You have my permission to go over there and binge listen to them all.
So go over there and have a lot of fun. And with that,
I want to take us on a little walk over to out to California,
my home state where I was actually born at And this is a story
that was published by The Daily Beast. It happened in Redlands, California.
The story was written by Victor Swezzy. I hope I didn't just totally butcher
a class name. It's the story about a woman named Amber Easley who decided
to attend her first school board meeting and she stood up talked about what she
believed in, and some proud boys followed her home and kind of started a
whole campaign against her, even putting out posters with a Hitler mustache, which
I find really ironic. I'm going to talk about leader, but yeah,
she her bunch of other mothers got back together and they stood up to the
Proud Boys and they won. So Helen, let's something wrong with you?
What do you have to say? Okay, So before I make a comment
on this article, I want to point out that last week the leader of
the Proud Boys, and Ricky Taro and four fellow members were convicted of third
degree conspiracy and plan to prevent members of Congress and law enforcement from discharging their
duties on January six, and they're facing up to twenty years in prison.
So give me all plodlaw plod yay. So position such, yeah, one
step below treason, but I'll take it. I will take it. So
I want to remind I'm sure no prod always is watching this show or anyfficiuness,
but if you happen to be watching this show, I would like to
remind you that we live in a free country and when you try to do
things like take over the government, there are consequences. So maybe you shouldn't
be a butthead. That's all I'm gonna say about that. But moving on
to this article, I thought it was fantastic. Um. What really got
to me was the fact that this mother and then she was basically going to
school boar bit meetings and hearing you know, people from the alt right show
up and start saying all these horrible things, and she realized that if she
didn't put some water on this fire, it was going to burn through the
entire district. And I thought it was amazing that she was just like,
well, no, I'm not going to do this, and she gathered like
a bunch of other parents and concerned citizens and was basically it was like,
no, you are not going to come into the school board meetings and try
to put your terrible ideologies into our school system. So again, and as
a mom, I get it, you know, because there can be a
lot of bad ideas, and like, I've been kind of lucky because it
wasn't so bad when my kids were in school. But now a lot of
parents are like, well no, and there and they're now starting to get
the fire and they do have the power to make a change in their school
system. That's why there's a parent teacher association, that is why parents had
to get involved in their schools. So for me, hearing the story,
I was like, yeah, like damofos, like stand out for your rights.
So I thought this was really really really admirable. So, Jonathan,
what did you think of it? I think they were There was actually a
little bit to unpack around this story. But of course the links are in
the in the chat so or you know, in the comments section or show
notes. Sorry, gets me a little while to get my brain gear.
You know, the hamster running around in there has to get things where she
Uh. You know, this is amazing to me. This woman has no
fear and I I always respect that anybody no fear at all, you know,
and these people are violent, you know, they have done violent things.
They have committed all sorts of violent across the country. And she just
said get off my law basically. And I love that. I just love
it to death. Um. And and from she held her ground and then
that's a bad thing to say from Florida. But anyway, the uh she
did she and she was a mama bear out to protect all her communities cups.
And this is a window into how we should I don't say should be,
but we could be. Um. I know some of us are that
way um and have confronted people when they were being jerked. But you know,
it's just it's just amazing to me that I think there are a lot
more people out there like her, and all they need is an excuse to
get together. She networked like a lot. She got the labor unions involved,
the Teamsters union, local union was involved, the teachers Union was involved.
I mean, she got a lot of some heavy hitters, you know,
to join her organization and to work with it. So, you know,
and like all cowards, the little idy gets scurried away and went back
under the rock. So I'm kind of like, good for you. You
know, stand up to the bullies, push them down the stairs, whatever
you gotta do. Of course, no physical violence, but you know,
just make sure that you are doing all you can to get rid of these
clowns. So it's it's you don't really need to do any physical violence.
You just have to expose them for who they are for the reason that's right.
Just confront them, say that's bs and you're talking an awful lot like
a guy in the nineteen twenties and thirties that normally, well some of them
would love that, but so I would above that. But I'm just going
to say that from there that I have an excerpt from the article, and
this is about a representation of things we're up against a network of altright hate
groups, right wing Christians, and conspiracy theorists have launched a crusade to reshape
public schools in their own emmet. So they've contested school board seats, called
for book bands, which we will talk about, denied the existence that LGBTQ
plus children, and use scripture as a justification. So again, the stand
up for these people whenever you can, go to your school board meetings if
you can, and just confront these people every time chance you get, and
they will eventually just crawl back under their rocks. I agree. That's all.
I'm going to pass it to Jason. Well, you know, man,
this is really interesting to talk about these proud boys because it's funny because
they wear they wear a brand called Fred Perry. So so I grew up
and I'm still involved in the hardcore punk scene, and Fred Perry is a
brand tends to be worn primarily by a group called Skinheads. Now not all
skinheads or Nazis, primarily they're not. But you have different colors. A
lot of times. It's a kind of traditional or not traditional, but it's
kind of an old way of doing things where you'd have guys wearing red Fred
Perry's and they'd be Nazis or whatever. That's neither here nor there. But
you know what, the Proud Boys or whole thing is a golden blue.
It's interesting to me because I grew up around a bunch of boneheads. I
grew up around a bunch of Nazis. We had in Texas we had the
Confederate hammer Skins, or we had just a bunch of boneheads running around Houston,
and these guys would show up to shows and pacts and this is just
how would be. I remember this one gig. You had a bunch of
guys and we were just running around and having fun in the circle pit,
and these guys just started running around Sea Island and this circle pit. I
mean, I'm not endorsing this, but it did not end well for them.
And the thing is with our our scene and with what we do musically
and the things that we do, we we don't allow that shit to They're
just an extension of that movement. That's that's that's something that we've seen grow
in the American punk rock scene. The band I played a band called Verbal
Abuse, and we we have a big kind of skinhead punk following as well.
And it's like traditional And we have a bunch of sharps, which are
skinheads against racial prejudice, a bunch of my skinhead buddies. They they were
at the BLM protests and acted as a human shield between the cops and the
protest. So that's that's kind of what our group and our people do.
Singer in my band, one of my bands does that, you know.
So, so I understand this arena very well. And what John said,
hit the nail on the head. These are pathetic, weak, scared,
spineless cowardice sadly proclaiming straight men, and and they run around in groups,
and they put colors on them and they they have to co for themselves and
logos, and they have to hide in the pack while pretending to be alpha's
and and it's just it's just atrocious and pathetic and weak and disgusting, and
all it is is a media friendly KKK. Now if we remember we are
I think John mentioned, you know, or the twenties and the thirties,
right, I forget who mentioned that, but that's who it was okay to
be part of those organizations at those times. That's all it is now it's
it's it's disgusting, and and the fact that it gets any type of gravitas
or media attention, UM, it just astounds me. Kelly, how do
you feel about this? You're you're a muted kill. I did it again.
I was coughing because I've been dealing with that smoke. Oh sorry,
it's so sorry. Um you guys. I agree with everything that you guys
have said so far, and you know, I really do not like these
people. And I thought I mentioned earlier on one to say something about the
irony of them putting the Hitler mustache on this poor woman. These guys are
neo fascists. We all know it. Some of these guys even have Nazi
tattoos. We all know it. I've seen them. There's no denying it.
And it's like they use Hitler as a way to get people to turn
against their opponents. It's like they know that people don't like the very person
that they are actually looking up to. And that's what I find ironic,
because we all know who they really worship, we all know it, So
to use a tactic like that just goes to show you that they know they're
wrong. They know people don't like them, and that I found that really
really ironic. I have mentioned before a little bit about the Proud Boys and
how they've been focusing on winning seats in like school districts and city councils,
county boards, or at the very least showing up to meetings at health department
public meetings and library board meetings in an attempt to inject their toxic ideas in
the local government. Because they want to try to make it normal. This
is their attempt to normal so they can spring board on to larger and more
important offices. So when you see these women here doing this, this is
awesome. Right two years ago, this strategy was working. It still is
in some areas, but there's people like these women right here that did this
that are making it fail there too. Unfortunately, in my home area up
here and way up in Michigan, it is working still. We've had a
Proud Board candidate that got elected to our school board recently. I'm kind of
bummed about that. But a lot of things have changed in the last two
years, and the biggest one probably is the public becoming more aware of this
going on and not letting it happen, right because they're seeing who these people
are they want to stop it from happening, and they're actually going out and
doing it, and it's awesome to see it. How then you want to
add something to it? Yeah, And what I found really like you mentioned
the irony of like putting a Hitler mustache and on this woman, which fine,
Like it just shows the deputy and irony you know, of these people,
because they are the worst of the worst. Um And the way I
kind of look at it is that there these people are losing. That's the
reality of it. I know that there's a lot of upcry about them,
and they are infiltrating, you know, certain places of government, and we
have to fight against it because the only way to make that um this is
going We're going to defeat them. But they're in the death rows and because
and when you're in the death rows, you will do anything you can to
hold onto a tiny little bit of bit imaginary power that you have, you
know, And we're now starting to realize that if we let them bowl over
what we consider democracy and things that are fair and equal for all people like
you have every right to be an asshole, but you can't force other people
into your asshole ideology. And everybody else has not to that. Everybody else
has the right to stand up about you being an asshole dude exactly. And
I'm sorry to cut off, but that's right. I agree with you.
So they're in this death rows and unless we do the work to make that
not happen, they will bowl over. And the fact that this mama was
like, h I'm not having that and gathered all these groups and was like,
we're going to push them out because we do not want this in our
school district, that's what does it. So, UM, kudos to her
and all the amazing work her and all the organizations did, so I give
snaps, thank you. It was great. Okay, I don't know who
wants to take it. Who wants to take it? Two little comments real
quick and yeah. And one of the things is that, um, that
these people really quickly got experts in media coordinate, social media coordination and recruitment,
the SRS or Save Writing Schools Network, starting a database of the people
who are on the bad side of things, the neo Nazis and the proud
boys and that so that they can recognize them when they're running for office.
They successfully defeated an Altright candidate for school board by supporting the incumbent school board
member with lots of you know, just campaigning and making sure everybody understood who
they were fighting. And so this was really illuminating for me because I used
to work in campaigns back in college and that it was part of my degree
political science. And I can tell you that sometimes that stuff can get very
elitist. But this kind of grass work, grass roots work almost always works,
you know, and people don't pay attention to it enough. Bernie Sanders
paid some attention to it, and he managed to do a lot of fundraising
and outperform a lot of people with it. So it does work. There
are examples of it, not just him, but other people who've done that
and so, and even in areas that they are not the majority, there
are still people in the Red States that will support this sort of So,
hey, there's no reason to give up, you know, just just find
the people you can find, do what you can do, and every little
bit helps. So five minutes a week, ten minutes a week, like
Kelly usually says, this is all you need to start stemming the touch.
That's all we'll I usually say, a half hour or an hour a little
bit more than five or ten minutes, but no me ten minutes. My
attention goes, did you want to take this out? I'd love to,
UM, just to kind of pin a little a little bow on what John
was saying. UM. Giving time is I think crucial to sum up kind
of these these last two discussions that we've been we've been going over and I
know all four of us here give time. I know that for a fact,
we all, all four of us give volunteer time to humanism UM on
a on a weekly and sometimes daily basis, with a lot of hours.
If it's you know, from I mean, I can't even go through the
amount of things that Helen does, you know, or or John does on
a CD or Kelly does on a CD and ACA or the amount of shit.
I mean, seriously, all of us do a lot of shit and
and all of this or also have lives and families and businesses and significant others
and shit like that. So it can be done, you know, and
where you know, if you don't have that time, that's where money helps,
you know. So I know from knowing the people who run the ACA
that this is worth putting time and money into. You know, this is
worth putting effort into because people get affected, you know. So if you
find something, I just encourage anybody listening to find somewhere, especially here here.
But if not here, find somewhere to put your time and or money
into that will affect your life, maybe now or in the future, because
I'm looking at my eleven year old daughter who stands up to people at our
school and We've had to get vacation Bible School flyers removed out of the school
multiple times after the call, after calling the tea and threatening them blah blah
blah, they finally got my point. You know, you can. You
can change things, you just you just have to be loud about that shit
sometimes. So yeah, that's all I got. Kelly thrown it back to
you man. Well all right, Hunter, I'll throw it in there too.
Oh no, no, yeah, yeah, she loves she loves it,
all right. Well, thanks for grabbing that up for us there,
Jason. And you know, do you know how to make arrangements because if
you do, you can arrange to be in Austin on Sunday, June twenty
fifth, consider joining us in the studio at the for the live audience at
the ACA. Free Thought Library for live broadcasts of Talking Then and the Atheist
Experience. Doors open at noon on Sunday. Parking is wherever you can find
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You need to get there early or you're gonna need to stay there late.
The letter we can let you out, and if you can't make it there
this month, we will continue to broadcast live from the library the last Sunday
of every month, so you can plan next month and throw the kids in
the back of the suv and all come on down. If you want to
find out more about the live broadcast, you can keep watching this show,
or you can check out the website at Atheist hyphen Community dot org for news
and information as we expand the in studio offerings in the future. And have
you ever said to yourself self, I really love I mean, I really
really love the content the ACA creates, but I wish there was a way
that I could get it all the time. Well, you know what,
self, I got you covered. Because you can check out the twenty four
seven AXP TV live stream. You can tune in any time of day to
experience a constant stream of shows, clips, specials from the twenty five or
twenty six twenty six seasons of the Atheist Experience. All you have to do
is tune into tiny dot cc slash a xp TV live stream. I'm sorry
a xp TV to forget the live stream. It's easier than that, and
you can discover some of your or see some of your favorite hosts, and
discover some of those hosts that you don't even know about. There's a lot
of good ones from the past. I miss a lot of them, so
yeah, go ahead and check that out. There's also a really good community
of people that hang out in the chat room there. I hang out there
quite a bit myself. It's a lot of fun. Go check it out.
And our hiking guide for our next step down to Tennessee is gonna be
Jonathan, So John, take it away. John, you are muted.
I'm sorry. I'm gonna Kelly believe, I can't tell y'all a part anymore.
All he's younger than me. Okay. But the down to Tennessee,
they passed a ban on drag shows and it was a pretty extensive piece of
crap. The Tennessee d Drag Band was struck down by US District Judge Thomas
Parker. Yeah, as unconstitutionally vague and substantially over brought. Simply put,
no majority of the Supreme Court has held that sexually explicit but not obscene speech
receives less protection than political, artistic, or scientifics. And since it also
has drags an art form and has been since the Bard, you know Shakespeare,
where all women weren't allowed to be actors. So all the female parts
in you know this early sixteen hundreds and late fifteen hundreds were men, and
so drag is a part of our ancient culture as well. So it's just
one of those things that that they said, Okay, this is art,
you can't do this. And this judge was appointed by Clinton, so it's
no surprise at this happened. However, his legal reasoning behind it is actually
sound, of course, but he's actually a judge, not a shill.
But I'm sorry, I shouldn't make opinions like that. Well it's just,
you know, I'm just dealing with facts there. But the but I agree
with the judge that this would not pass the smell test even with Scotus,
even with Dream Court. So I think a lot of the other draconian laws
like school prayer, attend commandments in schools. Other such draconian bs will meet
similar faiths as they work their way through the court. And so I'm I'm
thinking these extremists will soon find out there are limits to how far the both
the American public and the judicial system will permit them to push the stuff.
So I'm I'm very very happy that this happened. Now it's still under threat
by the Attorney General to Tennessee to take to appeal it up the chain of
federal courts. But I think that if he thinks about it seriously, he'll
find that not a lawyer, folks, but I think he'll find that the
courts aren't real friendly to people who are trying to oppress people by passing laws.
So by ignoring the bill right and designating certain people as an emotional thing,
they gave no real evidence that what they were claiming happens was happening.
So and they can't because it's not it. So it's like boom, they
said, you can't restrict an artist from doing his artist. So oh and
so anyway, I'm going to pass this off to Hellam and see where she
said. Yeah, So yummy, yummy, yummy, Yemmy AMMI, So
I kind of love that. Judge Thomas Parker basically said, Okay, you
want to band drag, but you don't have any like to stand on because
a lot of it, these bills are being passed into a lot of legislators.
They're intentionally vague and they're too broad, so there's no actual thing they
can actually point to to shows that is showing showing any real harm to the
citizens within the states or districts. And that's the point, because then people
on the that don't like, you know, queer people or people of color
or someone you know, whatever, it hops into their brains and they can
go like, think of the children, Think of the children, and everybody's
like, yeah, well we are thinking of the children. And having people
like dress and play dress up and read a book to kids isn't causing harm
to them, you know, and like, and adults are smart. They're
not going to bring their kids to a gay to a gay club, to
a draft show when you can't even get in if you're twenty one plus or
even or you have to be eighteen, you can't drink, So that's not
happening. So I'm really really glad this Judge sought it for what it was,
because it is just a nothing burger. They're just they're basically like,
I don't like I don't like people that are gay, and I don't like
dragt and I don't like anyone that isn't falling to this his sis normative.
I want to make babies culture, and they were and they're terrified because,
oh my goodness, like, what if someone dresses up in drag and I
want to have sex with them? You know what does that mean? So
I'm like, I'm sorry, you can. I'm like, we've had drag
since Shakespeare because drag means dressing representing a girl, which was wrote in the
margins of shakespeare plays. So get over it. Drag exists, It's been
around for a very very long time, and they're going to exist, and
they are wonderful. So I am so glad this just cut down, especially
while all the crap that's going on in Tennessee. So thank you, thank
you, very very very much. So I'm very happy. So anyway,
Kelly, I know you probably have an opinion on this. I know you're
probably a little bit happy. I do. I have all kinds of things
to say I'm this one. Please tell me things. I want to hear
things. Believe it or not. Well, I love the reason it was
it was upheld by the or not upel by it, but reversed by the
judge because it was unconstitutionally vague and substantially over broad. And I honestly didn't
find that surprising at all. And when you talk to people, yeah,
I think we've all seen people being interviewed at far right rallies on the inner
tubes, and a lot of them will like, did everybody see the guy
that was really against CRT He hated it, but you know, he didn't
want to get into the details of it. But and then it turned out
that he didn't know anything about it at all. He was sure he hated
it. He couldn't define it, right, He couldn't define it. And
that's what's going on here. They can't define this because if they did,
it would be big a treat YEP. And that's the rub. And that's
why all of these bills are probably gonna end up failing because there because the
language is overbroad, it is unsubstantial, and they're not going to be able
to figure out the language in a neutral way. Without being bigoted, and
that's just going to kill the bill from the beginning by doing that. Jason,
you have something you want to you want to add to that. Yeah,
I'm gonna at two points. M one. I like what you said
about the vagueness of the language, and I think with all four of us
being active with ACD, we are very familiar with vagaries. I feel like
we interact with them on a pretty consistent basis, and if people were to
truly define and really admit what they're talking about, it would come out to
be bigotry and is ms and hatred and ethnocentric, misogynistic, just trash.
So that leads into the second point that I have is that in making these
assessments now we're we're setting precedent right, so hopefully, like like we were
saying, Kelly, this will be a trickle down thing that starts happening now
or or whatever direction it fucking trickles, you know, I mean, so
it becomes more like, yeah, like a happy explosion of non shittiness,
you know. So, I don't know, I'm really impressed with with I
say this. I'm impressed with the judge doing what was correct. I mean,
I laugh at myself. That's like good job being a job. Yeah,
It's like, yeah, that's like celebrating a parent for feeding their child,
right fucking so yeah, yeah, so yeah. I mean it's there's
really not much to say on this. Again. I'm surprised that we're talking
about positive things on the nonprofits. I don't really know how to like say
too many things without ranching about shit that pisses me off and makes me want
to throw my chair. Um, it's kind of hard for me, and
I feel unsettled right now. So I'm just gonna go ahead and uh pass
it back to John and get some more of his feelings about the situation because
I don't know how to how to not be mad about things. I'm having
a hard time with it. Honestly, I've already I've already picked all my
nails off and ground down two teeth. So yeah, Well, I just
wanted to mention a few of the details here that I didn't go over.
The Memphis based theater group Friends of George, which is a drag performing group
and gave friendly and sort has a lot of LGBTQ type characters and performances,
and their statement that for proving that this causes harm, says it encols the
lives of drag performing and seeks to oppress queer culture statewide. And that speaks
volume about how this lawsuit progressed because it was nailing it on the head.
You're trying to repress it, you're oppressing it, and I think when the
judge had to consider that, he had to also consider that there's no reason
for them, and so it became a big nothing burger. There's no there
there, and it's difficult for the state prove that the government has an interest
in banning a group's artistic expression. And actually in another article that was actually
said by one of the people from the theater or was it the judge.
But then the opposition to this district attorney, they, you know, the
guys who were named personally in the suit, had a lot of They managed
to negotiate that the governor himself and the attorney general would be dropped from the
suit, and they pursued the local attorney general doing dum. But all in
all, it's a great victor for us. So it really is. And
it's as as you said, Jason, it's sets President Kelly absolutely on point.
Sets President and it was so transparently simply bigoted. Good for us.
So yell that back to you, Kelly, I think, okay, we
can come right back to me. I don't have a problem with that.
Um. I did check out the judge a little bit. Tommy Parker.
It sounds like a good old boy named Tommy Parker. But he was appointed
by Trump, which I thought was interesting. And I've met quite a few
people where I lived. I made a mistake, Mike, my County.
My county voted seventy eight for Trump. So I've met quite a few Trump
supporters here. And these pure blooded Trump supporters will believe anything that guy says.
Whatever he says, it's the truth to them. So I'm wondering if
people know about Trump appointing this judge, because he's obviously a good judge.
If Trump said so and then he makes this decision that they're so far against,
are the ers throughout the state of Tennessee going to be filled up with
people who are no longer able to function mentally because they're suffering from such bad
cognitive dissonance, Because that's what it would seem like to me, you know,
I just thought it was just crazy that if you try to put all
of this together, it doesn't make any sense to me. But the way
that the right thinks some of the right people who have made who I have
met in my area anyway, because some of them are really really far right,
Helen, you want to add something to it, yeah, And I
also want to make a comment about what you said about, like, you
know, Judge appointing Truma playing this judge and there's a little part of me
that was like, well, this guy's a dumb dumb and let me see
if I can finnacle show him that I'm a bootlocker. And then they put
it's like okay, I'm gonna point you to the state gorge, and it's
like, okay, I'm like, I'm gonna do my job exactly as I'm
supposed to do my job. So you know, like it could be some
of that going on, you know, I mean, like people do all
kinds of things to get the jobs that they want. So you know,
I'm not I'm not I'm not gonna poo poo on that at all, you
know, So I'm kind of like, Okay, maybe that happened. And
I also want to point out to what this article really remind me of that.
The law is the law. It does not matter what side of the
line you're on that if there is a law that you know, and this
is the job of a judge to look at the evidence presented, compare it
to what is actually going on, and go, you know what the argument
versus the evidence. Sorry, I said that wrong, And then they can
go, this is nothing because this is too I'm constitutionally vague and I cannot
give a proper ruling on it. So I'm so and that gives me hope.
That's why we have a separation in this country. And unless you can
show precedent or actually any new evidence that's causing harm, you can't pass something
like this because drag doesn't hurt anybody. So there's been no cause of her.
There's been no incident of drag causing harm except for biggest attacking drag queens.
You're kidding. I know. That is so shocking. I know.
So I'm just saying that, you know, I know it is. It
is to a straight person like me, I know. I'm sorry. Well
listen, I'm like, you're you're, you're you've caught the game. Now
you're Yeah, there's dragon glitter and RuPaul's drag Drag Race and askless chefs just
going forward. Just just embrace it. Embrace it anyway, Jason, my
fellow queer, we've got do you get an opinion on how wonderful this is?
I'm I'm in such good this is. We've got this real good spot
out here called Tony's Corner Pocket that has a drag show night and it's a
lot of fun. Generally they'll couple it with like amateur strip night and it's
a lot of fun there. Man. They've got a real great outside like
a bar. Uh it's nice, like a cedar bar. We're real pretty
out there, well, I mean outside inside just a party. Um.
I just I'm I'm I'm cautiously optimistic, right you know. Um, I
want to think that the law is there to work for people. I have
a hard time believing that a lot of cases. But this, this is
a little beacon of hope. I do like the idea of that guy,
uh faking it till he made it and then doing whatever the fuck he wanted
to do. I like that. That's a nice little, uh little myth
that I could add to this story. That's okay, j Christian Christians do
it all the time, you know, Christian Christians do it all the time.
I'm good with it, you know what I mean. But but the
thing that I think that really stood out to me is that there there was
the admission that it was targeted, you know, and that it was obviously
focused on a specific group, and it was focused on a marginalized group.
And I think this guy was smart enough to realize that once we got out
of this fucking stupor maybe that we're in right now allowing this bullshit, because
I mean, think about it since the beginning, and I was, God,
this is I just did a report, one of my last reports I
turned in, I guess and may uh for for school. At that point,
I think it was like four hundred some odd proposed anti LGBTQ plus bills
have been proposed the United States. It's I feel like I'm walking around with
a target on my back. This shit's ridiculous and and and it's I feel
like my daughter's walking around with a target on her back, and my friends
are walking around with targets on their backs, and it's it's just wild.
But I also feel like that again I'm not I'm never optimistic, but I
feel like this is almost like the death. I'm gonna scream until I die,
you know, And I'm hoping that that's the case. And maybe maybe
this judge had some foresight and knowing that like this isn't going to look good
in a couple of years. Maybe they saw the trend and they saw how
the tide was turning. And I mean, because if we continue pushing the
way that we're pushing and we have visibility the way that we have with I
mean, we need just more. We need it to be more normalized.
We need media to be much We need RuPaul's drag race, like you mentioned
like kind of kiddingly. We need that to be mundane. We need that
to be boring. That needs to be just like whatever. Yeah like oh
mom, dad, I'm gay. Oh okay, cool, Yeah that's great.
You know, like people need to like just not care anymore. Like
the world that I'm looking forward to is that I can like hit on somebody
and no matter what gender or lack thereof, they're not offended. They're's like,
all, thanks, I appreciate it. I'm just not into you,
or you know, I don't like tall guys or something. I mean,
I don't know, you know, or I'm not really into tattoos or something,
you know, or I don't know, you know. I mean,
it's it's at least I get like an honest answer to smell. I'll stay
away from, you know. I mean, I don't know, you know,
it's just weird. So maybe that guy had some foresight, or maybe
the dude actually cares about the law, you know, and he saw how
disgusting it really is. And uh, I know, living here in Texas,
it's it's and working with oil and gas and working with the people I
work with, and how openly homophobic they are with their language and other phobic
they are with their language, and you hear in bombs dropped on a daily
basis and other things like that. Um, the need for things like this
happening in places like Tennessee and Florida and shit like that, it's that needs
to happen because again, that's empowering. And we've been talking about visibility throughout
throughout the segment or throughout the show, not just a segment, but throughout
the show, and this is just another way to be like see see motherfucker,
See it's okay. You're You're just stupid, and somebody cared about what
you said when they really shouldn't have cared. So John, my, you
know, my, my, my fellow partner and crime of being queer somehow?
What do you what do you think about this? Man? You want
to go and wrap this up? John, You're muted. My manager did
it again. I'm trying to turn into Kelly, you know him. You're
just morphing into you know, I have to start growing my balding's paid down
to that. But yeah, I just wanted to say that, you know,
when judges actually look at the law and how it applies and that it's
supposed to apply equally equal treatment under the law, they find that a lot
of these things are just indicated or directed at a oppressing or suppressing a group
of people, and that that is starkly and totally against the Constitution. So
uh, and you know, they always point to the you know, the
First Amendment when it suits them, or or the you know, or the
Second Amendment when it suits Uh. They don't even read things like the fourteenth
And I'm kind of like, I used to carry a copy of the Constitution,
the Amendments in my breast pocket, you know, just because people would
be so ignorant of it that they just shocks me. But this judge knew
exactly what he was doing. He knew what he's about, and there's there's
no there there. Like I said, So it's no surprise the judge appointed
by anyone would throw out the law. It's just not a surprise because under
the law in the United States, they'd have to change the Constitution before they
can get something like this to stand. The same thing about the church invading
schools and things like that. It will all sort out. And the more
it sorts out, the more these kinds of things will start to fade away
because once they know they can't win with that, Yep, it's gonna fade
out. So that's how I'm gonna leave it. That's good, all right,
Thanks John. Before we leave, though, I run a quick note
of federal judge in Florida appointed by Bill Clinton. So it is an old
dog to learn a new trick. Just put a stay on gender for the
gender affirming care band for miners. Unfortunately it was only for three miners,
but he did say that they would suffer irrreparable harm if not given the treatment,
So hopefully that'll expand to more goods and I will take it. And
I also, before you go, Kelly, just one, I think there
are organizations like American Atheists that are keeping track of these bills and pushing against
them. So keep that in mind when you're feeling a little bit frustrated about
these things. So there are people behind the scenes that you're not thinking about
that are keeping track of things. I'm sorry, I just want to get
that Amy. That's fine, that's fine, thank you. Yeah, And
now I want to mention that for the low, low low price of just
ninety nine cents, that's right, just ninety nine cents a month, you
can click click at the joint button below the video that'll give you access to
special chat emojis and it'll make your name go from a boring black in the
chat to a really cool Kelly Green. And you know, I was walking
down the street yesterday and this guy ran across to me and he said,
hey, hey, haven't I seen you on the nonprofits before? And I
got all proud of myself and I was like, yeah, well, yes
you haven't. He goes, yeah, I thought I saw you on one
episode. I didn't like that episode, but I was wondering do you guys
Someone emerged and I was like, oh darn, do we sell merch.
We have got a ton of merch and if you go to tiny dot cc
slash merch ACA you can find all kinds of cool items like T shirts,
hoodies, coffee mugs, beanies, phonecases, toad bags which apparently they don't
have in some parts of Great Britain. And all the ACA shows feature a
special limit edition item every month, so be sure to check out our store
for NP merchandise and merch from all the other Great ACA shows. Yes,
folks buy our shit. It's really good their quality shirts. Check them out.
And this month's special shirt is a half star book review of of all
things the Bible, with a really good reason why the Bible only gets a
half a star. So check it out, fans, it's really really good.
And that is going to lead us into our last segment and we are
gonna be stepping with Helen Green. Take it away, Helen. Yes.
So this article comes from LBTQ Nation by John Russell. This was published on
June second, and a school juristic bands the Bible after indiscent materials point.
So there was a parent in Utah that was going through, you know,
kind of want to respond to the book bands, and they thought that,
you know, maybe we should report on the Bible and got a removed from
elementary and junior high school. So I definitely have more to say about this,
but I want to go since I want choosing a person. We're going
to go to Kelly. Kelly, how do you feel about this article because
you didn't tell me where I was supposed to go. Yes, that was
my bed that I was working at it. But um, you know this
is this is our second case of making the language too overbroad, isn't it?
The sensitive materials and schools act bands pornographic or in decent quote unquote material
and the Bible certainly fits that description. So you know, one thing I
noticed about this when when I look at the list of these books that are
being challenged and trying to people want that these people want banned, it seems
like the only kind of sex day have a problem with our same sex relationships,
And I thought that was kind of telling. I mean, they'be even
banned same sex penguins for crying out lot. They weren't having any sex,
they weren't doing anything, they were just raising a baby. Right. Oh,
but I did check, I wouldn't look, and there is absolutely no
gay sex in the Bible. So apparently that's what makes that book okay,
right? I do you think there's an agenda there? Maybe? John,
What do you think? Oh? My yes, this is kind of This
is kind of a mixed a mixed feeling bag for me, and the reason
is that I am an advocate for no book banning at all. I did
find some information on it. There's a follow up article that I was made
aware of just prior to the show that does have a comment from the FRF
that they don't agree with book banning of any kind, but they wanted to
illustrate how stupid book banning was by banning their favorite book. The oppositions,
trust me, they are anyway. So the sequence of events is pretty telling
as well. A plant was filed with the Review Committee, pointed by Davis
School Distriview committee decided that the Bible does not contain sensitive material under Utah's HB
three seventy four, which is the law against allows them to ban books without
even having had the person wanting to ban them read the book or actually even
look at that. They don't have to have ever seen the book. So
literally, they can just judge a book by its cover, but they don't
even have to see the cover. They just have to figure out that they
don't like personally whatever reason, which is almost overwhelmingly are books that are contain
LGBTQU issues or black issues or other racial issues. So the the next thing
was the committee decides that the book would be removed from elementary and junior high
school and kept in high school. The fr fr F is now challenging that,
saying that that is, you know, they shouldn't have that even for
high school students because various they gave eight pages of Bible quotes to them.
Though you don't need any quotes from a book to get it banned by other
people, but they gave like eight ages of this, and so they you
know, and the law was And that's just to illustrate that the laws of
bad faith effort to get the LGBTQ books and black authored books off school library
show by not requiring the complainant to have seen the book, much less read
it to point out what they object So, yeah, this is just it
was a blatant attempt at just at censorship. And though the eight page list
of biolensis is the parent involved that were unacceptable under the law. The parent
involved could probably find but a scoche of overkill involved in that, though maybe
they should. Utah Parents United, a conservative group that advocate for parental rights
quotes in education, has led the effort to ban the books in schools everywhere.
So we have a knowledge of them. Just some slight statistics. Now
I'm going to pass this off. There were David school districts had complaints about
fifty two books out of a total of two hundred and eighty for the state,
so mostly about black and LGBTQ issues. So you can see that this
is like this particular school district has had a lot of compared to the wrest
of And I won't go in too. I was going to, but I'm
not going to go into the fallacies and rhetorical devices involved in their bottleness.
But because it's just so blatant obvious to any of us, if you really
want to look it up, there's some websites for you can fallacies, rhetorical
techniques, all of the ones that this latent tries propaganda. So, and
I'm going to pass this off to Jason. I'm probably going to be the
unpopular one of the groups today. I think this is a shame honestly,
I mean, what are they going to do. They're just they're going to
ban kids wearing crosses around their neck rosaries with a depiction of Jesus being crucified.
I mean, the thing is a normalized, culturally acceptable belief, like
to to remove Christianity out of out of I just I can't to me,
the idea of banning a book to me playing the same game, the same
dirty fucking game that these people are playing. I just feel like it where
you're lowering yourself. I can't. I cannot get behind this one bit.
It actually makes me mad. I think it's uh. I think it's just
it's like it's like a typical movie situation to where the you, you know,
you have the hero fighting the villain. You're like, I have these
like morals I'm not gonna cross, and then it's like, actually I'm going
to cross them now. But then he eventually becomes a ship bag too,
right, So I don't. To me, it doesn't it's yeah, of
course, like the good job, stupid Christians, blah blah blah. But
like, honestly, it's it's it's terrible that any book ever gets banned,
especially books about African American folks, about black folks, about about gay folks,
about queer folks, about anything. It's terrible. It's disgusting. Um
any religious book, it's all disgusting. And and of course they're just following
the law and it's just the thing. But to me, the laws fucked
and it's disgusting and it should be abolished and it should be thrown out.
Any type of book banning is atrocious to me. Uh, if you continue
to infantalize children, and especially middle schoolers, I mean, these kids are
fourteen, fifteen years old, I mean, these these these kids are like
I know, I know, I know children who are like doing DJ work
on and like writing music on computers. My daughter's eleven and she's smarter than
I. I mean, we're going to continue and fanalize them, and we're
gonna use some type of thing and fight fire with fire. I don't know.
I could ramble on and on about it. I just I cannot get
behind it. And I'm actually kind of mad at FRF for doing this,
and I cannot get behind this one bit. So Kelly, how do you
do about this? I you know, I agree with you. I don't
think any books should be banned. However, they made the rules. If
the rules are going to be there, and they are and they're gonna ban
books, I want this to be fair. That's the only that's it,
that's all I want. I don't want any books banned. But if these
people are going to make these rules to have these books banned, let's point
out how bad this rule is by banning their books too, the same books
that they think should be on the shelf that still fit the description of what
they want to ban. And I think that's important, is that we're staying
within the rules that they may we're pointing out the absurdity that they've put upon
this topic. It's crazy, it's silly, it's stupid. And this is
exactly why we stand up for a separation of religion in government. We need
to stand up when biased laws based on someone's religious beliefs get in the way
of personal freedom. I know it often looks like we're losing, but the
courts have been mostly on our side. When you look at it, they
were kind of see they have been just we're in Florida and I know this
isn't a court, it's just a review, a school school board review.
But if the review is on bias, the Bible has to go, just
like the other books. I just want to want them to be treated fairly
by this obviously fascist law. Helen, you want to take it like this
is a this is a situay of a pomming cattle like, And that's the
way I kind of look at it. Because they came in and they're like,
Okay, we're going to ban all this book with sexually explicit material or
you know, material that people uncomfortable, which is a point of some material,
especially if you're coming from a privileged place, to get an idea of
what is Because the idea of a book, especially one that gives you the
experience and understandings of somebody else, it's supposed to develop empathy. It's supposed
to develop a social better conscious awareness of where who you are and what your
role is within society. And these parents were like, well, you're taking
away things that have to do with my kids queer identity. You're taking away
things that have to do with people of color, my child of colors identity.
Now, if we're gonna play if we're gonna play ball. The parents
were like, okay, you want this book, and this book has incests
reality violent, you know, mass murder, genocide, all these different things
in that book, and everybody was saying, like, we don't want to
infestive material. So under their description of what should be banned, they are
like, I'm going to present it to school board and say these are my
complaints. So they're not. And I don't agree with Bible. I don't
agree. I'm one hundred percent with you, Jason. I don't think any
book should be banned. I think that any literature should be able to be
read and dissected and looked at for what it is. And this is kind
of what's happening here. And unfortunately, I wish it didn't came to playing
by these assholes rules, but the school district said, well, we're going
to play by these rules. And I find that very frustrating, but I
also understand that it's like, well, if you're going to do this,
we have to do this. And it's this holier than ass than thou ask
like freedom for me, not for thee. And according to the article,
last year, UTABH lawmakers pass HV three seven four, which requires public kay
through twelve schools to remove books containing pornographic or in decent material. Craig say,
the law has been used to remove books by mostly LGBQ plus and black
others from shelves, which we already discuss and they're December twenty two Bible Challenge,
a parent whose name and adress were doctor suggested that the HP three setting
form makes the bad faith process. So and I do agree, this is
in bad faith, absolutely, and they're using this against They're using this the
show that you're doing. You're using the show that you are. If you're
going to play by these rules, then everybody gets played by these rules.
So that's kind of where I am right now. It's frustrating. I agree,
but I think that we all have to be perfectly aware that if,
if, people are going to change things in certain school directs, so we
have to move forward. So, um, Kelly, do you want to
wrap this up before we close out? Oh? I know Jason had something
you wanted to say real quick. Sorry, no, it's okay. I
could ran for hours about this. You got a couple of minutes, go
ahead. I could have about thirty seconds for the thing I want to say
you got two minutes, go for it. I think I really wanted to
comment on the identity thing. Identity is purely a concept thing. Right when
we look at ourselves, we have our conceptual identity. We talk about our
gender identity, our racial identity, our ethic identity, these are these are
concepts. Of course we can tie them into real world experiences and things like
that, but the way we view ourselves identity is conceptual. So I would
argue that somebody's religious beliefs are part of their identity, that's how they view
themselves. So when whenever, and I am a staunch antitheist, just so
everybody understands, anybody listening, I think it's all fucking trash, all right,
I will gladly, I will gladly say that there is no God,
just whatever. It's crap that said there, that said there. This is
this people's identity, this is there, This is like I said, this
is a culturally this is a culturally relative like accepted belief that goes deeper than
religion. So even those stories that are I guess pornographic or whatever, that
they don't even see those things anymore. It's it's I know, I was
raised the evangelic cause fucking saturated with it, and and it's it's like you're
you're reading that, but like what you're reading is more metaphysical and more it's
it's not what it really is. So I don't know if that argument stands.
And I understand. I just that's what I'm saying. It's just tragic.
The whole thing is tragic that we would infantalize our children to this extent,
that that the book that they probably have ten copies of in their own
house. And I understand the absurdity of it. I understand all of it.
Maybe we highlight the absurdity, but I just think it's low. That's
all I really wanted to say. I think it's low. I think what
we're doing is stooping down to something and all Christians, and it seems like
most monotheists, because I know a lot of cool polytheists. Monotheists, what
they want is to be a martyr, and I think that's what we're providing
as martyrs. Cool. Thanks Jason, that was awesome. You know,
quick quick two quick updates. I saw in the news today, well not
the day we're broadcasting this, but the day we filmed it. Which was
last Wednesday, there was a protest at the Capitol in Salt Lake City with
over one hundred people protesting the Bible band, including several Republican lawmakers. They're
going to have to redefine what books they want banned, and I think where
do we go from there? We go back to biggoted language again. And
another quick note to end the segment, another complaint was recently filed against the
Book of Mormon as well in the same district, So we're probably going to
see that book possibly banned too in the future. Again, if you agree
with it, disagree with it, it's now happening terrible. And I really
enjoyed having this conversation tonight. I had a blast. And if you would
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okay, and I'm going to give everybody one word. Cynthias gave us one
word last week to sum up our thoughts on the subject. On this episode,
Helen, what do you got solution? Jason Confused? Jonathan, I'd
have to second confused, but also optimistic. Okay, And I'm gonna you
know what I said hopeful last week, and I'm going to use the same
word again. I'm hopeful that we're going to see more stuff in the future
that's coming out positive in our direction. And I want to thank everybody for
watching and listening to the show, and we will see you next time.
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