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By Day: Fortune 100 Data Analyst serving a Fortune 100 customer; By night - Human Rights, Latin America, Religious Left, Legislative Advocacy
In the Guardian, Terry Eagleton reviews Alain de Botton's Religion for Atheists: A Non-Believer's Guide to the Uses of Religion:
Diderot, a doyen of the French Enlightenment, wrote that the Christian gospel might have been a less gloomy affair if Jesus had fondled the breasts of the bridesmaids at Cana and caressed the buttocks of St John. Yet he, too, believed that religion was essential for social unity. Matthew Arnold feared the spread of godlessness among the Victorian working class. It could be countered, he thought, with a poeticised form of a Christianity in which he himself had long ceased to believe. The 19th-century French philosopher Auguste Comte, an out-and-out materialist, designed an ideal society complete with secular versions of God, priests, sacraments, prayer and feast days.
There is something deeply disingenuous about this whole tradition. "I don't believe myself, but it is politically prudent that you should" is the slogan of thinkers supposedly devoted to the integrity of the intellect. If the Almighty goes out of the window, how are social order and moral self-discipline to be maintained? It took the barefaced audacity of Friedrich Nietzsche to point out that if God was dead, then so was Man – or at least the conception of humanity favoured by the guardians of social order. The problem was not so much that God had inconveniently expired; it was that men and women were cravenly pretending that he was still alive, and thus refusing to revolutionise their idea of themselves.
God may be dead, but Alain de Botton's Religion for Atheists is a sign that the tradition from Voltaire to Arnold lives on. The book assumes that religious beliefs are a lot of nonsense, but that they remain indispensible to civilised existence. One wonders how this impeccably liberal author would react to being told that free speech and civil rights were all bunkum, but that they had their social uses and so shouldn't be knocked. Perhaps he might have the faintest sense of being patronised. De Botton claims that one can be an atheist while still finding religion "sporadically useful, interesting and consoling", which makes it sound rather like knocking up a bookcase when you are feeling a bit low. Since Christianity requires one, if need be, to lay down one's life for a stranger, he must have a strange idea of consolation. Like many an atheist, his theology is rather conservative and old-fashioned.
De Botton does not want people literally to believe, but he remains a latter-day Matthew Arnold, as his high Victorian language makes plain.
The Daughter of the Disappeared
When Victoria Donda learned that her supposed father was accused of being a notorious torturer in Argentina and that her true parents were political prisoners, she soon unraveled a web of family secrets and lies.
By Mei-Ling Hopgood
victoria donda
Hernan Zenteno
On a cold, gray August day in 2003, Victoria Donda, a 26-year-old law student, got a call from her friend Isaac. "We need to meet. It's urgent," he said. The petite Argentine was having a hellish week. Her father had tried to kill himself and now lay comatose with a self-inflicted gunshot wound. She had barely left his side since, even to shower or eat. Now, her head spinning from lack of sleep, her dark eyes swollen and red from crying, Victoria raced from the hospital to a nearby café to meet Isaac.
Earlier that week, the Argentine government had publicized allegations that her father, along with other ex-military officers, had taken part in Argentina's military dictatorship in the 1970s. He was accused of interrogating and torturing prisoners; he'd tried to commit suicide the night the news broke. Entering the café and sliding into a seat by the window, Victoria desperately hoped that Isaac, a friend from her volunteer work, would tell her the charges had been a huge mistake. Instead, he just looked at her, his eyes welling up behind his thick glasses.
"Negrita," he said, using a term of endearment for the black-haired Victoria, "you are the daughter of a couple murdered during the dictatorship. The people who raised you aren't your parents," he continued. She'd been kidnapped, and her identity had been changed at birth.
GiveWell, by far the best charity evaluator working today, has a new top ranked charity, the Against Malaria Foundation. Why is VillageReach, their best ranked charity for several years, no longer at the top? First, GiveWell is ranking more charities and charities are now more willing to provide GiveWell the kind of detailed information on outcomes that GiveWell demands. Thus, more charities are vying for the top spot. Even more important is this:
VillageReach was our top-rated organization for 2009, 2010 and much of 2011 and it has now received over $2 million due to GiveWell’s recommendation. We do not believe that VillageReach has short-term funding needs…
When was the last time that a charity or evaluator told you that due to successful fund-raising there are now more urgent needs elsewhere? Impressive. As I have for several years, I will be following GiveWell’s advice and donating to the Against Malaria Foundation and several of GiveWell’s other top charities.
With the sensibility of an iconoclastic elf eyeing a parade of indiscriminate merrymaking unfurling all around him, Christopher Hitchens holds forth on the absurdities of the Christmas season in one of the first of his posthumously published essays.
The piece takes its lead from a famous song titled “A Christmas Carol,” written and first performed in the late 1950s by satirical singer-songwriter Tom Lehrer, viewable below. —ARK
Christopher Hitchens at The Wall Street Journal:
[T]he thing about the annual culture war that would probably most surprise those who want to “keep the Christ in Christmas” is this: The original Puritan Protestants regarded the whole enterprise as blasphemous. Under the rule of Oliver Cromwell in England, Christmas festivities were banned outright. The same was true in some of the early Pilgrim settlements in North America.
Last year I read a recent interview with the priest of one of the oldest Roman Catholic churches in New York, located downtown and near Wall Street. Taking a stand in favor of Imam Rauf’s “Ground Zero” project, he pointed to some parish records showing hostile picketing of his church in the 18th century. The pious protestors had been voicing their suspicion that a profane and Popish ceremonial of “Christ Mass” was being conducted within.
Now, that was a time when Americans took their religion seriously. But we know enough about Puritans to suspect that what they really disliked was the idea of a holiday where people would imbibe strong drink and generally make merry. (Scottish Presbyterians did not relax their hostility to Yuletide celebrations until well into the 20th century.) And the word “Yule” must be significant here as well, since pagans of all sorts have been roistering at the winter solstice ever since records were kept, and Christians have been faced with the choice of either trying to beat them or join them.
A previously unpublished, oddly timely, 'contrarian' piece by the late Christopher Hitchens in the WSJ Online (I'm still celebrating by the way):
[T]he thing about the annual culture war that would probably most surprise those who want to "keep the Christ in Christmas" is this: The original Puritan Protestants regarded the whole enterprise as blasphemous. Under the rule of Oliver Cromwell in England, Christmas festivities were banned outright. The same was true in some of the early Pilgrim settlements in North America.
Last year I read a recent interview with the priest of one of the oldest Roman Catholic churches in New York, located downtown and near Wall Street. Taking a stand in favor of Imam Rauf's "Ground Zero" project, he pointed to some parish records showing hostile picketing of his church in the 18th century. The pious protestors had been voicing their suspicion that a profane and Popish ceremonial of "Christ Mass" was being conducted within.
Now, that was a time when Americans took their religion seriously. But we know enough about Puritans to suspect that what they really disliked was the idea of a holiday where people would imbibe strong drink and generally make merry. (Scottish Presbyterians did not relax their hostility to Yuletide celebrations until well into the 20th century.) And the word "Yule" must be significant here as well, since pagans of all sorts have been roistering at the winter solstice ever since records were kept, and Christians have been faced with the choice of either trying to beat them or join them.
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Most of us still have some holiday shopping to do and here are a few suggestions that can keep you out of the lines at the malls and big-box stores and warm the heart of any good trade unionist or progressive on your list.
David Prosten reminds us that Union Communication Services (UCS), the labor movement’s all-union, 100 percent labor books bookstore, is a good place to find the gift of solidarity. They have a sleigh full of great stocking-stuffers for the labor activist in your life, union hall or workplace.
Click here to see a special selection of books and other goodies from the UCS catalog. Some of the best of the best are featured here, including two brand-new, just-added titles—Working Words, a collection of prose and poetry from Bob Dylan to Eminem to Amiri Baraka, and Rebel Voices, the IWW anthology.
Also at UCS, check out the recently published children’s book Which Side Are You On? The Story of a Song. It tells the story of the song, written in 1931, that has become an anthem for people fighting for their rights all over the world, through the eyes of song author’s Florence Reece’s 11-year-old daughter. The song was written as the Reece family huddled under the bed as bullets from coal company thugs tore through their Kentucky home.
Your holiday gifts can fight human trafficking and modern-day slavery when you shop at the Not for Sale Store. The group Not for Sale (NFS) is a leading voice in the fight against global exploitation.
The store showcases products made by NFS and its partners, who employ survivors of human trafficking and those vulnerable to exploitation. Through the marketing and sale of ethically made products, the Not For Sale Store serves a dual purpose: The store provides sustainable opportunities for survivors to have dignified work while demonstrating the viability of alternative supply chains that value people over profit.
It has an amazing selection of men’s and women’s apparel and accessories, gift cards and more, including apparel from the ultra-hip AllSaints line that earlier this year entered a partnership with NFS.
Don’t forget with the AFL-CIO Online Store—Union MadeTM where you’ll find union/worker-themed T-shirts (including my favorite above), sweatshirts, caps, buttons, bumper stickers and more.
You can find union-made products at AFL-CIO’s Union Label and Service Trades Department (UL&STD). Just click on the yellow “Search for Union Products” box on the right side of the UL&STD home page here.
You also can click on the unions below to visit their online gift shops:
AFSCME, AFT, Postal Workers (APWU), Railroad Signalmen (BRS), Farm Labor Organizing Committee (FLOC), Glass, Molders, Pottery, Plastics and Allied Workers (GMP), Ironworkers, Fire Fighters (IAFF), Machinists (IAM), Electrical Workers (IBEW), Marine Engineers’ Beneficial Association (MEBA), Letter Carriers (NALC), National Nurses United (NNU), Plasterers and Cement Masons (OPCMIA), Professional Aviation Safety Specialists (PASS), Seafarers (SIU), Transport Workers (TWU), TCU/IAM, UNITEHERE!, Mine Workers (UMWA), United Steelworkers (USW), United Transportation Union (UTU), Utility Workers (UWUA).
Visit the Labor Heritage Foundation’s online gift shop here and Union Boot Pro here. Other shopping links include: Union Made Goods, Justice Clothing and Union-Made Clothing Discounts from Union Plus.
Click here to check out American-made products recently featured on manufacturethis, the blog from the Alliance for American Manufacturing (AAM).
During what is often referred to as the holiday season, a variety of cultures and religions honor an equally diverse number of both religious and secular traditions. Christmas, Hanukkah, and Bodhi Day are just some of the religious holidays that are celebrated this time of year. And for many who don’t subscribe to a particular faith tradition, the season is still seen as an occasion to gather with friends and family.
No matter why you are celebrating this holiday season, we can all celebrate living in a country where religious freedom is a fundamental value. The First Amendment's Free Exercise and Establishment Clauses not only protect the right to believe (or not to believe), but also the right to express and to manifest religious beliefs.
In honor of our country’s proud history of promoting religious freedom, and the ACLU’s commitment to protecting the rights of all religious believers to practice their faith, this holiday season we are highlighting 12 cases we have brought on behalf of a variety of faiths defending religious liberty and the right to religious expression.
Fourth Day: ACLU Defends Right of Students to Wear Anti-Abortion T-Shirts
The ACLU works to defend your right to religious expression even when that message may be considered inflammatory by others. For example, the ACLU of Iowa defended the rights of two teenage girls who, for religious reasons, sought to wear anti-abortion t-shirts to school after school officials threatened to punish them.
High school students Tamera and Brittany Chandler, wore T-shirts displaying a picture of a fetus and the words, "Abortion Kills Kids." School officials told them to cover up the shirts or face punishment. The ACLU of Iowa, which staunchly defends the reproductive rights of women, also has a long track record of defending the rights of anti-abortion and conservative Christian groups. Read more…
For more instances of the ACLU rigorously defending the rights of all religious believers to practice their faiths, please visit our website.
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