More Atheist Leaders Who Aren’t Dawkins or Harris: Jim G. Helton

In June, I wrote a piece for AlterNet, titled 8 Awesome Atheist Leaders Who Aren’t Richard Dawkins or Sam Harris. The gist: When a media outlet decides that atheism is important, they all too often turn to Richard Dawkins or Sam Harris. Then, when Dawkins or Harris puts their foot in their mouth about race or gender — again — the reporter cries out, “Atheism needs better leadership! Why doesn’t atheism have better leaders?” Atheism does have better leaders — so I profiled eight of them, to bring just a small fragment of the range and variety of atheist leadership to more people’s attention.

At the end of that piece, I wrote, “And these eight are the tip of the iceberg… I could write a new profile of a different atheist leader every week, and still be at it ten years from now.”

So I decided: Why not do that?

I don’t know if I’ll do it for ten years. But for at least a while, once a week I’ll be profiling and interviewing a different leader in organized atheism.

This week’s profile: Jim G. Helton.

GC: Tell me briefly what your organization does and what you do for them. (If you’re in a leadership position with more than one atheist organization, feel free to tell me about more than one.)

Jim G Helton
JH: I’m Founder & President of the Tri-State Freethinkers, Regional Director in Kentucky for American Atheists, and consultant for the Secular Student Alliance. I also oversee legislation for Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, Wyoming, & Washington for Hemant Mehta, in which he gave me my favorite title, Overlord.

The group that I spend most of my time with is the Tri-State Freethinkers. We are a local group that has members from Ohio, Kentucky, and Indiana. Our group can most easily be summarized through the acronym A.C.E.S., which stands for Activism, Community, Education, and Social. We provide a community for people and have been repeatedly praised for our well-rounded activities.

Tell me about a specific project or projects your organization is working on.

Equal Rights and separation of church and state are the two biggest issues we tend to tackle. They seem to go hand in hand. We have also partnered with several other organizations who are helping people in the community, including Planned Parenthood. We have taken a stance on several social issues, such as the humane treatment of animals and trying to stop the death penalty in Ohio.

Abstinence Only Sex Ed: Eliminating abstinence only sex education in public schools. We have had success with my son’s school. We are working on some of the districts now with the goal to be to take this to the state level next year.

Gideons Bibles: We have successfully challenged bible distributions in several public schools in Kentucky by passing out humanist and atheist books. As long as the press covers the event the Gideons cannot show up, according to their own by-laws.

CEDAW: The Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women. We helped get this resolution passed this spring and are hoping to have the ordinance passed this fall with funding. A couple key points from CEDAW are equal pay for women, access to healthcare, domestic violence support, and stopping human trafficking.

Baptists Park: The Mayor of Cincinnati has proposed to build a park on church property. We have sent a letter and contacted the FFRF.

Feeding the homeless: We have been working on a farm, growing fresh produce for those in need. Next month we are going to feed around 150 people. This includes buying all the food, preparing it, and distributing it.

Where would you like to see organized atheism go in the next 10 to 20 years?

I would like to see it organized enough to not only take on atheist issues, but also tackle social issues and have the power to effect elections. We are starting to see some of the national and local organizations work together on projects such as the Reason Rally. I would like this type of cooperation to happen on a regular basis.

What do you think are the main challenges facing organized atheism now?

Tri State Freethinkers at Pride Parade
The main challenge I see for local groups is that it’s usually one person leading the charge, and if something happens to that one person or that person burns out, the organization falls apart. A true leader has the ability to inspire others and get a lot more people involved. We need to prepare future leaders so the movement doesn’t skip a beat.

Do you consider yourself a “new atheist”? Why or why not?

Yes, because I have only been an atheist for less than three years. I think the difference with “new atheism” is that we are no longer staying silent — we are much more organized. Many more people are coming out of the closet every day.

Any questions you wish I’d asked, or anything else you’d like to add?

Advice I can give other leaders of organizations: There are a lot of good leaders out there doing amazing things. What separates the great leaders from the good leaders is the ability to inspire others. There are too many grassroots groups where the leader of the organization does everything. The reason the Tri-State Freethinkers have been so successful is we have built a team. I wanted to change the world and I thought the best place to start was in my own backyard.

Comforting Thoughts book cover oblong 100 JPG
Coming Out Atheist
Bending
why are you atheists so angry
Greta Christina is author of four books: Comforting Thoughts About Death That Have Nothing to Do with God, Coming Out Atheist: How to Do It, How to Help Each Other, and Why, Why Are You Atheists So Angry? 99 Things That Piss Off the Godless, and Bending: Dirty Kinky Stories About Pain, Power, Religion, Unicorns, & More.

More Atheist Leaders Who Aren’t Dawkins or Harris: Jim G. Helton
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The Patheos Atheist Channel is Not the Enemy

In the wake of Ed Brayton leaving Freethought Blogs for the Patheos Atheist channel, some people are apparently targeting the entire channel as terrible. This is both unnecessary and inaccurate. Yes, there are some jerks at Patheos Atheist. There are also excellent atheist bloggers there. Many of them are serious social justice advocates. Excellent bloggers at Patheos Atheist include (please note that this is not ane exhaustive list):

Sincere Kirabo, Notes from an Apostate
Alix Jules, The Graffiti Wall
Adam Lee, Daylight Atheism
James Croft, Temple of the Future
Libby Anne, Love Joy Feminism
Kylie Sturgess, Token Skeptic

And of course, Ed Brayton, Dispatches from the Culture Wars.

This isn’t war, people. It’s not even a football rivalry or Coke vs. Pepsi. There is plenty of room in the atheist blogosphere for more than one blog network.

Here’s a link to the Patheos Atheist channel. Ignore the jerks, and check it out.

Comforting Thoughts book cover oblong 100 JPG
Coming Out Atheist
Bending
why are you atheists so angry
Greta Christina is author of four books: Comforting Thoughts About Death That Have Nothing to Do with God, Coming Out Atheist: How to Do It, How to Help Each Other, and Why, Why Are You Atheists So Angry? 99 Things That Piss Off the Godless, and Bending: Dirty Kinky Stories About Pain, Power, Religion, Unicorns, & More.

The Patheos Atheist Channel is Not the Enemy

Sad News: Ed Brayton is Leaving Freethought Blogs

Sad news: Ed Brayton, blogger at Dispatches from the Culture Wars and the creator of Freethought Blogs, is leaving the network. He’ll now be blogging at the Patheos Atheism channel. He’s turned over control of the Freethought Blogs network to the FTB executive committee.

So why am I leaving? Also omnipresent since the start of FTB, as I’m sure you well know, has been controversy. The bloggers here have often gone on crusades and launched battles, most of them necessary and justified. But along with that has come a great deal of drama and stress. I’ve endured several threats of lawsuits against me as the owner of the network over the words and actions of others. I’ve had continual demands that I do something about this or that blogger, that I throw them off the network or censor them. I’ve been caught in the crossfire of a great many fights, continually taking shrapnel in battles that I wasn’t even involved in.

I believe it has to some degree impeded my ability to engage in important activist projects by making some people reluctant to work with me because of all that controversy. That frequent stress has also begun to affect my health. I have two autoimmune disorders that are triggered by stress and I have come to the conclusion that it would be better for my health, both physical and mental, to get out of the crucible and be responsible only for myself and my own words and actions.

Here is his full announcement, explaining his decision in more detail.

I will miss him hugely, but I 100% support his decision to take care of his health and well-being, and wish him all the best. As many people have heard me say, sometimes holding up a four-foot-long banner with the words in big block letters: Self-care is not selfish. I’ll be following him at his Patheos blog, and hope to have many years of happy and fruitful work with him in other arenas.

Comforting Thoughts book cover oblong 100 JPG
Coming Out Atheist
Bending
why are you atheists so angry
Greta Christina is author of four books: Comforting Thoughts About Death That Have Nothing to Do with God, Coming Out Atheist: How to Do It, How to Help Each Other, and Why, Why Are You Atheists So Angry? 99 Things That Piss Off the Godless, and Bending: Dirty Kinky Stories About Pain, Power, Religion, Unicorns, & More.

Sad News: Ed Brayton is Leaving Freethought Blogs

Godless Perverts Social Club is Finally in Oakland! Thursday, August 20!

Greetings-from-Oakland-postcard-700x400

Godless Perverts Social Club is expanding to Oakland!

Godless Perverts are very excited to announce the expansion of our empire, which is now stretching its tendrils into the East Bay! We’re having our very first Oakland Godless Perverts Social Club on Thursday, August 20, 7-9 pm, at Telegraph Beer Garden. Telegraph is located at 2318 Telegraph Ave., between 23rd St & 24th Streets: it’s about a ten-minute walk from the 19th Street Oakland BART station, and is close to several bus lines.

We’ll be meeting in the back room behind the bar, so we’ll have a separate, somewhat private-ish space to talk about sex and blasphemy and whatnot. Telegraph has lots of food options, mostly in the sandwich/ sausage/ burger family, and including many vegetarian and vegan options. They have a wide selection of beers, and they also have soft drinks for those who don’t drink alcohol. (It is a bar, which means you need to be at least 21 to attend.) Admission is free, but we ask that you buy food and/or drink if you can.

All orientations, genders, and kinks (or lack thereof) are welcome. Community is one of the reasons we started Godless Perverts. There are few enough places to land when you decide that you’re an atheist; far fewer if you’re also LGBT, queer, kinky, poly, trans, or are just interested in sexuality. And the sex-positive/ alt-sex/ whatever- you- want- to- call- it community isn’t always the most welcoming place for non-believers. So please join us! We’ll meet on the third Thursday of every month in Oakland: we’ll also still meet in San Francisco at Wicked Grounds, on the first Tuesday of every month.

Godless Perverts presents and promotes a positive view of sexuality without religion, by and for sex-positive atheists, agnostics, humanists, and other non-believers, through performance events, panel discussions, social gatherings, media productions, and other appropriate outlets. Our events and media productions present depictions, explorations, and celebrations of godless sexualities — including positive, traumatic, and complex experiences — focusing on the intersections of sexuality with atheism, materialism, skepticism, and science, as well as critical, questioning, mocking, or blasphemous views of sex and religion.

Godless Perverts is committed to feminism, diversity, inclusivity, and social justice. We seek to create safe and welcoming environments for all non-believers and believing allies who are respectful of the mission, and are committed to taking positive action to achieve this. Please let the moderators or other people in charge of any event know if you encounter harassment, racism, misogyny, transphobia, or other problems at our events.

If you want to be notified about all our Godless Perverts events, sign up for our email mailing list, or follow us on Twitter at @GodlessPerverts. You can also sign up for the Bay Area Atheists/ Agnostics/ Humanists/ Freethinkers/ Skeptics Meetup page, and be notified of all sorts of godless Bay Area events — including the Godless Perverts. And of course, you can always visit our Website to find out what we’re up to, godlessperverts.com. Hope to see you soon!

Comforting Thoughts book cover oblong 100 JPG
Coming Out Atheist
Bending
why are you atheists so angry
Greta Christina is author of four books: Comforting Thoughts About Death That Have Nothing to Do with God, Coming Out Atheist: How to Do It, How to Help Each Other, and Why, Why Are You Atheists So Angry? 99 Things That Piss Off the Godless, and Bending: Dirty Kinky Stories About Pain, Power, Religion, Unicorns, & More.

Godless Perverts Social Club is Finally in Oakland! Thursday, August 20!

#mencallmethings: “mentally compromised,” “should be removed from society,” “it”

Content note: misogyny, ableism

Jerk on my blog, in response to my year-old post on The Amazing Atheist:

Screen Shot 2015-08-03 at 10.52.01 PM

The author of this article is an uneducated and mentally compromised, it should be removed from society and made into an example of how not to live.

#mencallmethings

I see. So in an effort to persuade people that The Amazing Atheist isn’t really sexist or misogynist and we should give him a chance to explain himself, this person goes onto a feminist’s blog and tells her that she’s mentally compromised and should be removed from society. Also, he (the online handle doesn’t give clues about gender, but the email address did, so I’m assuming the commenter is male) literally dehumanizes me, referring to me as “it.”

I’m reminded once again of Lewis’s Law: “Comments on any article about feminism justify feminism.”

And I’d like to point out: That post came out over a year ago. I’m reminded of the sexist atheistbros who are still — STILL — dredging up wildly distorted versions of Elevatorgate and arguing with them. It’s funny — almost — in the light of how often feminists get accused of hanging on to old injuries and dredging up old muck.

Continue reading “#mencallmethings: “mentally compromised,” “should be removed from society,” “it””

#mencallmethings: “mentally compromised,” “should be removed from society,” “it”

Godless Perverts Social Club Meets Tuesday, August 4!

godless perverts social club august 4

The next Godless Perverts Social Club is Tuesday, August 4!

Community is one of the reasons we started Godless Perverts. There are few enough places to land when you decide that you’re an atheist; far fewer if you’re also LGBT, queer, kinky, poly, trans, or are just interested in sexuality. And the sex-positive/ alt-sex/ whatever- you- want- to- call- it community isn’t always the most welcoming place for non-believers. All orientations, genders, and kinks (or lack thereof) are welcome.

So please join us at Wicked Grounds, the kink cafe and boutique at 289 8th Street at Folsom in San Francisco (near Civic Center BART). We meet on the first Tuesday and the third Thursday of every month. 7-9 pm. Admission is free, but we ask that you buy food and/or drink at the cafe if you can: they have beverages, light snacks, full meals, and milkshakes made of literal awesome sauce. Continue reading “Godless Perverts Social Club Meets Tuesday, August 4!”

Godless Perverts Social Club Meets Tuesday, August 4!

More Atheist Leaders Who Aren’t Dawkins or Harris: Monette Richards

In June, I wrote a piece for AlterNet, titled 8 Awesome Atheist Leaders Who Aren’t Richard Dawkins or Sam Harris. The gist: When a media outlet decides that atheism is important, they all too often turn to Richard Dawkins or Sam Harris. Then, when Dawkins or Harris puts their foot in their mouth about race or gender — again — the reporter cries out, “Atheism needs better leadership! Why doesn’t atheism have better leaders?” Atheism does have better leaders — so I profiled eight of them, to bring just a small fragment of the range and variety of atheist leadership to more people’s attention.

At the end of that piece, I wrote, “And these eight are the tip of the iceberg… I could write a new profile of a different atheist leader every week, and still be at it ten years from now.”

So I decided: Why not do that?

I don’t know if I’ll do it for ten years. But for at least a while, once a week I’ll be profiling and interviewing a different leader in organized atheism.

This week’s profile: Monette Richards.

GC: Tell me briefly what your organization does and what you do for them. (If you’re in a leadership position with more than one atheist organization, feel free to tell me about more than one.)

Monette Richards photo by Amy Davis Roth
MR: I currently hold dual citizenship in the secular movement. My first home is on the Board of Secular Woman. Our goal is to amplify the voices of secular women and, basically, find ways to make the secular movement more friendly and welcoming to them. I do all the backend IT work and whatever else I can do to help: tabling and speaking at conferences, membership fulfilment, whatever we need at the moment.

I am also the President of our local chapter, Center For Inquiry – Northeast Ohio. While wearing this particular hat, I am working hard to build a community that is welcoming, accepting and able to support its members. Everyone needs a community that has their back whether they find themselves facing a violation of their First Amendment rights or without reliable day care.

Tell me about a specific project or projects your organization is working on.

Secular Woman, along with C.A.S.H. and Minnesota Atheists, are sponsoring Secular Women Work, an activist conference. Our secular movement is widespread, loosely connected and is made up, as movements are, primarily of volunteers. Many of us spend so much of our volunteered time learning how to navigate the particular activist corners we occupy. This is a perpetual reinvention of the wheel. We will be bringing as many of those skills together as we can, so we can all learn from each other and become a much more effective movement. Then nothing, nothing will be able to stop us from taking over the world!

CFI – NEOhio, on the other hand, is working with Senator Skindell on Ohio SB50, a Secular Celebrant bill. In Ohio, only individuals ordained through a church, along with a few elected officials, can solemnize marriages. This puts our community at a disadvantage when it comes to being able to have the ceremonies we want to have, where we want to have them. The bill is currently stuck in committee, If you live in Ohio, call the head of the committee, Senator Bill Coley (614-466-8072) and tell him to get this bill moving! Then call your Senator and tell them to support the bill. Then come to our next Lobby Day and tell them both in person!

Where would you like to see organized atheism go in the next 10 to 20 years?

I would absolutely love it if organized atheism was completely unnecessary within the next decade or so. Failing that, I fantasize that it has grown up and grown big enough to include so much more than First Amendment battles, that it has taken on the anti-choice movement head on and forced them back, that it has fully embraced BLM [Black Lives Matter], that it has grown so diverse that Secular Woman becomes completely irrelevant and redundant! Go Team!

What do you think are the main challenges facing organized atheism now?

Monette Richards at Ohio State House
A narrow focus on the establishment clause has left our movement myopic and ill prepared to engage with many of the other issues facing us. This year alone, states have enacted 51 restrictions on reproductive health and our movement is still arguing over whether atheism means more than disbelief in gods. It is time to accept that our movement is about more than prayers before football games, more than Ten Commandment displays in courthouses, more than Bibles in classrooms. We need diversity, not just in our membership but in our goals as well.

Do you consider yourself a “new atheist”? Why or why not?

I honestly don’t know. I’m not familiar enough with the term. I googled. I read. I am undecided that it matters. I am an anti-theist in that I do think religion, eventually, should be made irrelevant. But, that doesn’t mean I’m forging a hardcore schedule of stopping grandma from thanking Jesus as the nice man who made her dinner possible or calling CPS on families who teach their children about hell.

Any questions you wish I’d asked, or anything else you’d like to add?

Something I feel necessary to say whenever I talk about me and my place in the movement. I have no college education. I am not especially smart. I have no wicked talents. I am not ambitious. I am nothing special. This is important to recognize because it can be anyone of us (but more correctly, all of us) working to make the secular movement a success. It doesn’t take a degree to be effective, but it does take getting involved.

(Black and white photo by Amy Davis Roth.)

Comforting Thoughts book cover oblong 100 JPG
Coming Out Atheist
Bending
why are you atheists so angry
Greta Christina is author of four books: Comforting Thoughts About Death That Have Nothing to Do with God, Coming Out Atheist: How to Do It, How to Help Each Other, and Why, Why Are You Atheists So Angry? 99 Things That Piss Off the Godless, and Bending: Dirty Kinky Stories About Pain, Power, Religion, Unicorns, & More.

More Atheist Leaders Who Aren’t Dawkins or Harris: Monette Richards