The meetup on 4.25.10

One of the first matters of discussion at this TAM was about a recent incident involving Comedy Central and censorship, or more accurately, self-censorship. Part of the script for an episode related to the "prophet" Muhammed was not aired on South Park. The speech had to do with "fear and intimidation."

A radical Muslim group called Revolution Muslim dropped a strong hint that the two producers for the TV program could meet the same fate as murdered Dutch filmmaker Theo Van Gogh. This led Comedy Central to alter (self-censor) their programming.

Disturbed by this chain of events, a cartoonist from Seattle, Molly Norris, declared May 20 to be "Everybody Draw Muhammed Day." What will the frethought community in this area do? Will we cower in silence? Or we will not let our freedom of expression be intimidated? More on this later.

Hilary noted that FFRF has an online petition which you can sign by going to: http://ffrf.org/legal/national-day-of-prayer-victory/stop-the-national-day-of-prayer-petition/

A movie, The Book of Eli, was mentioned as one which freethinkers would enjoy.

Bill mentioned and recommended that we read an article in Tulsa World titled "Let's Move Learning Online." bill said public education is on the way out. Learning online is effective, cheaper, you go at your own pace, and there are no transportation issues involved.

William Poire announced that the blood drive which we were going to participation had been canceled due to the requirement that we come up with a large amount of money to stage the event.

Hilary said that on the TU campus there is building a move to establish a chapter of the Secular Student Alliance. The chapter would have as its goals: education, service, activism, and community.

Someone mentioned that there is a YouTube video (a spoof?) about an atheist going door to door trying to convert people to atheism.

Bill raised the question about whether AA receives any federal funding, but no one knew the answer.

Bill raised the question about who has the authority to perform marriages. He would like to see someone from TAM be in the position of performing ceremonies at major rites of passage in our lives.

I would urge you to click on "Post a comment" below and help by adding to what you recall from this meeting. I have just touched on some of the highlights that I recall.