A commenter on YouTube, dummychaos, puts it this way, “Bill O’Reilly brings out the worst from people. He’s pretty good at that.”

Here’s the original video from The O’Reilly Factor:

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Because I was constantly being told that I’m rejecting God, and I knew that wasn’t true, I decided to research rejection, which made me aware of its effects. My studies took me in a completely unexpected direction. The epiphany (pun intended) was rather shocking. The evidence indicates that the personal god is a manifestation of the ego, which explains a plethora of theistic tendencies, including their typical dislike of atheists, who theists subconsciously perceive to be rejecting a part of themselves. God is Tyler Durden; and the first rule of Jesus Club is you have to talk about Jesus Club. The second rule of Jesus Club is you have to talk about Jesus Club.

By DarkMatter2525

Live from the Doughnut and Bacon party, No God Band performs John Lennon’s Imagine. It’s really the sound that sucks. Yet, the silver lining is that it is very short.

I will say this: the singer was amazing, though you may not be able to tell from this video. I took it with my phone (G2). Doesn’t look too bad for a camera phone. But it does sound bad. :P

Here’s  photo of the band playing a song or two earlier:

Read my non-review.

Mr Deity’s latest episode touches upon the Elevatorgate stupidity.

Via Heathen Hub

I really want to move on from this but I keep reading the exact same perspective from big bloggers, completely ignoring Stef McGraw or stclairose. Is this on purpose to make a point? I feel like rational dissenter’s voices are being quelled for not going along with some form of groupthink.

Stef’s first post on the subject begins:

It’s possible the man actually just wanted to talk and do nothing more, but I’ll even give that point to her; I obviously wasn’t there, and don’t know what sort of vibes he was giving off. Fair enough. My concern is that she takes issue with a man showing interest in her. What’s wrong with that? How on earth does that justify him as creepy? Are we not sexual beings? Let’s review, it’s not as if he touched her or made an unsolicited sexual comment; he merely asked if she’d like to come back to his room. She easily could have said (and I’m assuming did say), “No thanks, I’m tired and would like to go to my room to sleep.”

Watson is upset that this man is sexualizing her just after she gave a talk relating to feminism, but my question is this: Since when are respecting women as equals and showing sexual interest mutually exclusive? Is it not possible to view to take interest in a woman AND see her as an intelligent person? [Read More]

Then Watson calls her out in a way that upsets many. She puts her in the same category as the assholes saying they wish she’d be raped. She calls her a misogynist apologist for having a differing opinion. Not to mention that this was in a setting where Watson had the stage and McGraw was just an audience member.

Her response post:

Leadership Conference this past weekend during Rebecca Watson’s talk, and I would like to take this time to formally address what I think of her actions. Watson’s point of view can be seen on her blog, Skepchick.org.

Let me start by saying there are two different issues at hand, and that one’s thoughts toward one do not necessarily have to correlate with one’s opinion on the other. The first issue is whether or not Watson’s criticism of the man in the elevator (who asked if she would like to get coffee in his room at 4:00 am) is justified. The second is whether or not her decision to call out a student during her keynote speech was appropriate. Reading many comments on both sides has made me realize that it’s necessary to make this distinction early on, as many people seem to be yelling over each other arguing completely different matters.

Exactly. Some people are not even on the same page of the book, while some are reading a magazine. And maybe some are drawing pictures. I don’t know how to end this extended metaphor. But it’s in there somewhere.

I happen to be quite annoyed and offended at the dismissing of these women’s views. Why are they’re feelings not worthy? No one has said (that I’ve seen) Rebecca is not right to feel creeped out. That’s not the issue. It’s that she is trying to silence other people (including many women) for disagreeing or seeing a point differently. Not her nor anyone in her camp will even debate these points; they just call us names and/or delete our comments. It’s not rational discourse.

She goes on:

There was no time at the conference where I, as a student attendee, could appropriately make any sort of public statement addressing what Watson claimed about my argument and me. She has said over Twitter that “An attendee has every right to counter during Q&A or by publicly blogging again later,” but there are issues with both of these approaches. First, the Q&A was not an option in my mind, as I wasn’t going to get up after her great talk and argue with her about something unrelated; I have more respect for a speaker than that. And second, yes, I currently am blogging about the issue, but this won’t reach everyone who went to the conference; I write for a successful student blog, not one like Skepchick that a large percentage of the secular community reads. [Read More]

If Watson’s feelings are to be respected; why not Stef’s, stclairose’s, or mine (or the many other women and men)? Why are Watson’s feelings more important than anyone else’s? Talking about feelings in a skeptical community is odd enough, but if we’re going to consider them, we must consider them all.

Just in case you missed it, here is is stclairose’s video that made her a “gender traitor” as well:

There you have it.

I believe in equality. I do not want special treatment or special rules for being a woman. Call me a traitor all you like, but it only makes you look childish.

I also agree that the way the Palestinians are treated is mostly wrong. The Jews in Israel should know better. In my opinion, we should learn from the past, not repeat it. We should not treat others the way we have been treated. Christians were treated poorly at one point, then essentially went on a rampage to treat people worse. It makes no sense.

Helen Thomas was recently on Joy Behar but the video code doesn’t seem to working. Watch it here.

There are also some points on the Iraq War.