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Show 246: The Court and the Cross w/Frederick Lane

The Court and the Cross

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From the publisher:

While President George W. Bush has appointed two Supreme Court justices during his terms in office, the next president may be in a position to appoint up to three new justices, replacing one third of the Court. This relatively high number could drastically alter future Supreme Court rulings. Now is the perfect time to consider the role of politics in Supreme Court nominations and in the new appointees’ ensuing decisions.

In The Court and the Cross, legal journalist Frederick Lane reveals how one political movement, the Religious Right, has dedicated much of the last thirty years to molding the federal judiciary, always with an eye toward getting their choices onto the Supreme Court. This political work has involved grassroots campaigns, aggressive lobbying, and a well-tended career path for conservative law students and attorneys, and it has been incredibly effective in influencing major Court decisions on a range of important social issues. Recent decisions by the Right’s favored judges have chipped away at laws banning prayer in school, bolstered restrictions on women’s access to abortion and birth control, and given legal approval to President Bush’s use of federal funds for religious organizations.

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Show 245: Humanism and the Psychology of Communication

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On two recent programs, ETFF co-host Arnell Dowret examined how we communicate with each other and what humanistic naturalism can offer by way of our better understanding each other in public discourse. Focusing on nebulous terms bandied about in popular American culture – by religionists and secularists alike – Arnell suggested we loose polarizing and pain-inducing terms like sin, shame, guilt, vice and bad and instead offer the more precise language of social science.Human beings behave according to both their biology and environment, and in our judgmental, often punitive, uber-competitive and commoditized society, we have developed a language – promoted by religionists and secularists alike – which has led to a culture of punishment and reward, praise and blame, guilt, shame, anger and fear.

Dr. Marshall Rosenberg, a religious humanist, would suggest these terms are part of a ‘violence-based communication.’ In response he founded The Center for Nonviolent Communication. Carrying on his work in the New York City area is Dr. Dian Killian, co-author of Connecting across Differences: A Guide to Compassionate, Nonviolent Communication (NVC). Dr. Killian was on ETFF to discuss her work for Brooklyn NVC. We offered several special gifts for those who become members or renew their membership that you are still able to obtain by clicking here or here!

As co-host Michael O’Neil likes to say, we put the human back in humanism as we investigate a way of thinking and communicating in both our personal relationships and in the political arena… Imagine all the People, Living Life in Peace…

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Show 244: The Language of Public Discourse; Can Naturalism Change the way we Think!

Call-In Show

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Language usage in America over the last 40 years has polarized society – all or nothing, judgmental terms like good and evil, sinful and righteous, pride and guilt – while nuanced, knowledgeable and meaningful language has been vilified as “political correctness.” Can naturalists and humanists offer a unique perspective and be of any real value in the public square today? What sort of contribution can we make to public discourse which is consistent with humanist values and evidence based thinking?

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Show 242: Chris Hedges

Chris Hedges Doesn’t Believe in Atheists!

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From the Publisher:

From the New York Times bestselling author of American Fascists and the NBCC finalist for War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning comes this timely and compelling work about the “new atheists”, those who attack religion to advance the worst of global capitalism, intolerance and imperial projects.

Chris Hedges, who graduated from seminary at Harvard Divinity School, has long been a courageous voice in a world where there are too few. He observes that there are two radical, polarized and dangerous sides to the debate on faith and religion in America: the fundamentalists who see religious faith as their prerogative, and the “new atheists” who brand all religious belief as irrational and dangerous. Both sides use faith to promote a radical agenda, while the religious majority, those with a commitment to tolerance and compassion as well as to their faith, are caught in the middle.

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Show 241: Susan Jacoby, author of The Age of American Unreason

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With reading on the decline, scientific and historical illiteracy on the rise, and a mass media dedicated to the dumbing-down of our minds, it is crucial now more than ever to understand just how we got to this point and what we can do about it. This Sunday, Susan Jacoby will discuss her new book “The Age of American Unreason” to enlighten us on the aforementioned trends. Jacoby dissects a new cultural phenomenon at odds with our Enlightenment traditions that has at its core a disdain for logic and evidence, a triumphalist religious fundamentalism, a mediocre public education system (at best), and the triumph of infotainment. Jacoby’s analysis describes and points out this anti-intellectualism and anti-rationalism for what it is and what it has cost us as a society.

The Age of American Unreason is Susan Jacoby’s eighth book. Jacoby’s “Freethinkers: A History of American Secularism” (2004), was hailed in The New York Times as an “ardent and insightful work” that “seeks to rescue a proud tradition from the indifference of posterity.” Among her other books are “Wild Justice: The Evolution of Revenge,” a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 1984, and “Half-Jew: A Daughter’s Search for Her Family’s Buried Past.”

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Show 240: Austin Dacey on the Secular Conscience

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In “The Secular Conscience,” Austin Dacey argues that we who are non-religious should be every bit as engaged in public discussions as are our religious counterparts… discussions which involve reflecting upon individual behaviors and/or public policies, as being problematic or as supporting our society moving in a direction we want.

Austin feels that the public discussion of behavior and policies are presently dominated by religion, and that if secularists do not find a way to participate in that discussion it will be at our peril. This of course makes total sense, but what exactly can we bring to such a discussion that would constitute a unique and much needed contribution?

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Show 239: Alisha Price of the One Taste NYC Center

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Michael O’Neil continues his series on “Ecstatic Humanism” in a conversation with Alisha Price of One Taste NYC. Since opening their first San Francisco center in 2004, the OneTaste movement has explored radical ideas of relationships, intimacy, pleasure and community. Now operating on both coasts, OneTaste offers a “post-New Age” vision of “Connected Living” that relies less on mysticism and more on psychology than some of their shamanism-chic contemporaries.

But what can humanists learn from these practices? Have we rejected superstitious institutions only to blindly continue aping their rigid mores and perpetuate a society of “sensual scarcity,” when healthier arrangements are possible?

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Show 238: 1-Hour Easter Day Special: From Sacred to Secular Cruelty & Vengeance

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The story of the events of Easter Day in combination with the events leading up to it is a narrative so loaded with dysfunctional, anti-humanistic, and delusional content, it has served as a virtually inexhaustible wellspring of toxicity for two thousand years, providing support for most of the very worst ideas in our society which are still with us today.Belief in universal sin, belief that universal sin could somehow be relieved through someone’s torture, and belief in an immortal soul that rises up after we die, are just some of the problematic lessons of Christ’s Passion.

A major example of an inhumane institution which derives legitimacy from beliefs which can be traced back to the Easter narrative can be found in our American system of criminal justice. Joining us to facilitate our examination of our modern prison system will be author of “American Furies,” Sasha Abramsky, and Dr. Philip Zimbardo, author of “The Lucifer Effect,” and Chief Researcher and designer of the famous “Stanford Prison Experiment.”

And we’ll also be replaying the now classic confrontation between Jesus and the Easter Bunny, first played on this program, in which we’re given the best argument to date for why we should jettison all the suffering, blood and gore and instead celebrate the Spring for the natural “miracle” it is.

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Show 237: Kathryn Joyce

Sunsara Taylor talks to Kathryn Joyce, author of the upcoming book, Quiverfull: Inside the Christian Patriarchy Movement.

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Joyce discusses the relationship between the Right-Wing Christian Fundamentalist movement both in the US – and it’s affect in Europe – and Xenophobia, racism, patriarchy, the Pro-Life movement and the white anti-immigration madness of the 21st Century.

Kathryn Joyce is a freelance writer whose work has appeared in The Nation, Mother Jones and other publications. Quiverfull: Inside the Christian Patriarchy Movement, is due out from Beacon Press in early 2009.