The Friendly Atheist
Hemant Mehta, the Friendly Atheist, is under attack by a right wing Christian hate group. The Illinois Family Institute, led by Laurie Higgins, is harassing celebrity atheist Mehta.
According to Mehta, a high school math teacher, Higgins emailed his boss, his high school’s entire administrative staff, and every school board member to inform them about Mehta's private life as an atheist blogger. The attempt was to smear Mehta, claiming Mehta was unprofessional and unsuitable to be teaching because of his affiliation with atheism.
This episode is but one shameful event is an organization that is ugly through and through. The Illinois Family Institute is a vile sewer of hate and ignorance. The group is engaged in a campaign of gay bashing homophobia. The organization seems dedicated to denigrating anyone who does not goose step to their Christian fundamentalism. Obviously, any organization that claims the gay community is just as dangerous as Nazis is out of touch with reality and hard to take seriously.
Higgins is on record as favoring the bullying and harassment of gay children by Christian children. She is engaged in an effort to prevent any legislation which prohibits or penalizes discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identification. She believes it is a Christian's God given right to abuse and harass gay adults as well as gay youth.
The attack on atheists and homosexuals is predictable for a group consisting of the most ignorant and bigoted among us. Yet their shame is every Christian's shame. Where are the good Christians, and why do they allow such hatred and bigotry to be spread in their name?
Florida administrators stand trial for prayer in school
Brad Pitt: Soldier in America's culture war
Eagles sign Vick; PETA cries foul
Comments
While Christians apparently believe in the same core doctrine, they seem to have an endless capacity to ignore some parts, celebrate others, and note the entire work as the word of God all in one breath.
Intellectual compartmentalization is a trick we humans can use to protect ourselves. It is an instinct to help subdue fear, so that we can accomplish that which is terrifying or seemingly impossible. It's one of those things that has enabled our species to achieve our current state of existence.
The application of this skill for the purpose of believing in twaddle is... a waste. When this waste moves us toward the subjugation and hatred of each other... it's unforgivable.
All anybody need know is the Southern Poverty Law Center has officially designated IFC a hate group. Their campaigns and actions have no basis in fact and no other purpose but but to vilify and destroy those they dislike.
To Buffy: The Illinois Family Institiute is no longer listed as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.
To Micha J. Stone: Why no link to what Higgins actually wrote? Google "Unprofessionalism in District 204" (posting links here is disabled) where you can see that she does NOT declare Mehta as "unprofessional and unsuitable to be teaching because of his affiliation with atheism." Instead, she took offense to the unprofessionalism of declaring in a public forum that "The only thing that could make this kiss-in even better is if it took place just outside Higgins' house." She writes that her "hope was that someone in the administration would have a conversation with Mr. Mehta regarding his influential role in students' lives and his inappropriate comment." Reasonable.
Higgins favors bullying and harrassment of gays? Wrong: espousing traditional marriage and saying so does not equal bullying. See her explanation by googling "Malicious Lies of Box Turtle Bulletin."
It's ironic that you have a video ad from the church of $cientology on the same page as this article ;)
Mehta is the buddhist term for selfless compassion. Adds nice emphasis to the article to think about that.
I am a Christian and have been keeping in touch with Hemant since his book was published and I read it. This is disgusting what the IFI is trying to do. Myself and two of my Christians friends have written letters to Higgins vehemently denouncing her actions. So don't say the Christians aren't doing anything at all...
So, how, exactly, is this NOT harassment and a hate crime? Time for a civil lawsuit, I think.
This post jumped the shark when Nazis were invoked.
The author of this article has libelously claimed that I believe "it is a Christian's God given right to abuse and harass gay adults as well as gay youth." That is an execrable lie utterly devoid of any evidence from my writing to support it.
If you have any integrity, you will either provide evidence from my writing for this pernicious claim or retract it.
I did not say Mehta was unsuitable for teaching because of his atheism. I have said that some parents may find him an unsuitable role model because of the ideas he expresses and endorses on his public blog. Parents are entitled to be informed consumers. And his speech rights do not supersede or abrogate parental choice and rights.
I notified his superiors about his suggestion that the homosexual kiss-in would be even better if it took place in front of my home. That is an irresponsible and unprofessional public statement for a teacher--and role model for students--to make.
Laurie Higgins suggesting someone libeled her... uh, that is ironic in its purest form. What a sad, pathetic person she repeatedly shows herself to be.
Laurie, free tip for ya: We aren't going away. Pray all you want, attempt to shame us, attempt to defame us by telling half-truths to people about our nonexistent motives* ... but note this: atheists, agnostics, secularists, non-believers (call us want you want -- heck, compare us to Nazis, that seems to be your thing) are only growing in numbers... while your side is not. And this makes us all LOL.
*We do have one motive: to be free from the tyranny of fundamentalist Christians who always act in ways that Jesus would despise. Odd, isn't it? That Jesus would most certainly shame you/your actions, while embracing us. You truly are a failure at your very core.
You know what's really "unprofessional" Ms. Higgins? To send a letter to someone's employer and co-workers and failing to send it to the person with whom you have a problem.
When you 'submarine' someone this way, you're being petty and small-minded. You're hoping to catch Mehta by surprise with his superiors. This is a tactic used by vindictive people.
Tell me, would Jesus have used your tactics?
Laurie Higgins - brain-washed and brain-dead. Get off your self-righteous soapbox and join the world of tolerance.
Quite the irony - The loving christian bashing others. By your own measure, you are a sinner. Repent or go to hell. Sinners make baby geezus cry. :(
Seriously, that last sentence says it all. Where are all the good Christians and why to they turn a blind eye to these hate-mongers? The Christian fundamentalists are why I am atheist. Although, the crazier those intolerant nut jobs get, the more atheists will come out. So maybe it is a good thing... any thoughts?
To Actually... : Last sentence of Laurie Higgins' " Malicious Lies of Box Turtle Bulletin." says " If you care about children's temporal and eternal lives, PLEASE OPPOSE ANY ANTI-BULLYING EFFORTS in public schools that imply that homosexual behavior is worthy of affirmation. " (my emphasis) .How is that not favoring bullying of homosexual kids in order the achieve her fundamental christian agenda in PUBLIC schools ?
Well said and spot on, Micah.
And we should stop them from using a christiany as a shield...how?
the good christians are the ones that aren't actually christian, the ones who's beliefs differ from the organized beliefs
So how do I stop it? They hate me (for trying to be an inclusive and loving Christian - which I always thought was a redundant statement) more than they hate Mehta.
This is evil, and I'm sorry.
Wasn't the IFI that same organization that spewed forth that Dare To Stand vomit? That video was so full of lies that many people thought it was merely satire.
What they did was low but also probably pointless. Mehta isn't exactly in the closet about his atheism. Between his book and his blog I doubt many didn't already know.
It says something when christians don't stand up to other, more outspoken, christians.
I am a true Born-again Christian, and follow in Jesus Christ's footsteps, which means I show no hate, but love everyone as Christ did. It is people like this that give Christians a bad name, but for someone like me who reads the Bible consistently, I knew this would happen because it is fortold in the Bible. Jesus said The world would hate us, because it hated Him first. That being said, false christians spring up everywhere, it is in the Bible, and is one more step in the progression of things to come.........the best chance we have as Christians to battle something like this is to show that we are different. To show love, not hate, tolerance, and not to judge, because a true Christian follows what Jesus did when He walked the earth; He showed compassion, love, caring, mercy, kindness, and forgiveness, even to those who persecuted Him, and nailed Him to the cross. Our jobs as Christians are not to get into a verbal confrontation with people like this, it is to spread the Truth.
"The Illinois Family Institute is a vile sewer of hate and ignorance."
How wrong you are. The Bible clearly says that there are those who will "call evil good, and good evil." It's happening all around us. Vile sewer of hate? Just the opposite is true. Family values, faith in Christ, belief in freedom and our nation's founding fathers...these are the things the Illinois Family Institute stands for and these are the ideas and beliefs that are under attack in our world today. Tell the truth, and you'll be hated for it. Jesus said that. Just watch, I'll be hated for writing this. Sad.
Not hated peter, just corrected.
Indeed, you could interpret your bible as reccommending gestures of kindness - and all this right after god slaughtered the entire of humanity for not Doing What it Was Told (including, assumedly, young infant babies who were yet to figure out what their hands are for, let alone being guilty of crimes punisible by the horrific death of drowning), as well as other sundry massacres on similar grounds.
You might also consider as kindness, the promises in the bible of "saving" the "chosen", presumably leaving the unchosen to whatever "unsaved" means (depending on your particular cult sect) - either way, god saves some, and leaves others to rot - in a magnificent display of religious bigotry, selectiveness and intolerance (yet he loves us all, except if we don't get on bended knee, because apparently, an omnipotent god needs mortals to worship him, or he gets "jealous").
But yes, okay, YOUR interpretation is that your god is kind, and therefore so is JC... but that's YOUR interpretation. NOT the same as those who choose to stone their children for disobedience - as the bible teaches you.
The founding fathers did not include anything about America being a christian nation. it was founded as a country with freedom of religion for ALL including atheists. Family values are not exclusive of christian households. Morals are not exclusive of christian believers. But these are things that few grasp and even fewer are willing to admit.
Got something to say?
Examiner.com is looking for writers, photographers, and videographers to join the fastest growing group of local insiders. If you are interested in growing your online rep apply to be an Examiner today!