FTBConscience: The Online Freethought Blogs Conference, July 19-21!

ftb conscience

So Freethought Blogs is having a conference! An online/ virtual conference. It’s taking place on July 19-21, 2013 and will focus on social justice, technology, and the future of the freethought movement. Without travel, registration, or hotel costs, FtBCon will be accessible to freethinkers around the world. Here’s the website with more details, and here’s the schedule: still being updated, but here’s what’s on the schedule and when for now. (Please note that all times on the schedule are in Central Standard Time.) Conference sessions will be held through Google+ hangouts. And yes, this will be an interactive conference: attendees will have the opportunity to interact with each other in chat rooms and to submit questions to moderators.

Speakers and panelists include Freethought Bloggers PZ Myers, Ed Brayton, Crommunist, Jason Thibeault, Ashley F. Miller, Kate Donovan, Miri M., Greta Christina, Ophelia Benson, Russell Glasser, Richard Carrier, Avicenna, Brianne Bilyeu, Zinnia Jones, Chris Clarke, Stephanie Zvan, Yemisi Ilesanmi, and Aron Ra… plus guests Jamila Bey, Rebecca Watson, David Silverman, Debbie Goddard, Shelley Segal, Beth Presswood, Heina Dadabhoy, Ania Bula, James Croft, Desiree Schell, JT Eberhard, Amy Roth, Hemant Mehta, Kim Rippere, Dan Fincke, Rebecca Hensler, Anti-Intellect, Emily Finke, Hank Fox, Lauren Lane, Sarah Moglia, Vyckie D. Garrison, and many more! Topics include: sex and skepticism, mission creep, climate change, atheism and art, relationships in a godless world, reproductive rights, atheist music, environmental activism, myths and facts about trans people, atheism and grief, the Asian faces of freethought, immigrant’s rights, and much, much more.

My own bad self: I’m going to be on the Sex & Skepticism panel, with Ginny Brown, Franklin Veaux, Benny, Sophie Hirschfeld, and Miri M., Friday July 19th from 6:00 to 8:00 pm CST — and on the Atheism and Grief panel, with Rebecca Hensler, Nicome Taylor, and Hank Fox, Sunday July 21, from 4:00 pm to 5:00 pm CST.

Again, this will be an interactive conference: attendees will have the opportunity to interact with each other in chat rooms and to submit questions to moderators. The chat room is moderated: we want this to be a fun and interesting experience for everyone, which means we’ve got no time for trolls, and anyone that the mods decide is being abusive or rude will be banned from the chat. When submitting questions to session moderators, make sure it’s clear which session your question pertains to, since we’ll occasionally have two sessions going at the same time. (We probably won’t be able to ask every question that gets submitted to us, but we’ll do our best.) And yes, we have a harassment policy: go to the Website and check it out.

If you think you’re going to attend, please like our page on Facebook and RSVP attending to our Facebook event! And all the presentations and panels will be moderated — so if you can’t attend the conference live, or if you can attend some of it but not all, you’ll be able to check out the stuff you find interesting later on YouTube.

Hope to see you there! This is the first time we’ve done this, and we’re really looking forward to it. Should be loads of fun!

{advertisement}
FTBConscience: The Online Freethought Blogs Conference, July 19-21!
{advertisement}

3 thoughts on “FTBConscience: The Online Freethought Blogs Conference, July 19-21!

  1. 1

    Oh, hey. First I was excited because– virtual convention! Then I was bummed, because: Oh, G+ and FB. I don’t use services which are hostile to pseudonymity. Then, I was confused because it was mentioned over on FTBcon that sessions would also appear on YouTube. But not streaming on YouTube? So is there a way to watch this in real time without having a G+ account?

  2. 2

    @siderea, you can create a throwaway gmail account… Use a proxy to create, lie viciously about your age and other characteristics, no way any personal information can be of any use to them then!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *