Richard Dawkins (and the Creepy Elevator Guy) should watch MadTV

I'd somehow missed the whole "Creepy Elevator Guy" story, but my son called yesterday to bring me up to date. For those of you who don't know, women are badly underrepresented in atheist groups, and the few who do attend meetings sometimes get unwanted sexual attention, which occasionally turns into harassment. In this instance, Rebecca Watson got on the elevator headed for her hotel room at 4 AM and was propositioned by one of the male attendees. Hemant Mehta has an excellent summary of the details so I won't repeat it here.

I don't have a lot to add to what's already been said. Blag Hag had a good blog about it. PZ Myers blogged about it and got a rather disturbing letter from Richard Dawkins, and Hemant Mehta wrote a second blog that was very thoughtful (he has links).

A while ago I wrote a blog that's very relevant: Mormons and Animals: Denying our Deepest Instincts. Men can be total jerks and worse. But atheists have a huge advantage over religious people

Miss USA 2011: Evolution Answers a Disgrace to Women

The Miss USA competition claims to judge women based on more than just how they look in swimsuits. But the video below is a rather shocking illustration that the competitors are scientifically illiterate. I'll issue the same challenge as my fellow blogger Hemant over at Friendly Atheist: Can you watch the whole thing, or will you turn it off in disgust before it's done?

The young women were asked, "Should evolution be taught in schools?"

I did a quick count. Something like thirty six contestants said or implied "Teach both sides." About a half dozen said that evolution shouldn't be taught at all. Only three (Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Mexico) said "yes" without waffling. But even those three gave weak answers.

But not one gave the right answer. The right answer to this question is, "Yes, evolution should be taught because it's solid, proven science and is the foundation of all biological sciences. If we don't teach evolution, our students will be second-class citizens in the modern scientific world."

This leaves us with two choices. It could be that the Miss USA contest has

Women Pay Huge Price for Iraqi War

The Iraqis are paying a huge price in lost lives for the war, but there's a hidden cost that has largely been unnoticed. Its the price young Iraqi women are paying: there are no men to marry.

If this happened in America, it would be sad, but women could find fulfilling lives. Women in America aren't judged just by who they can marry or even whether they marry. Women in America can choose to marry or not. Either way, they have opportunities. They can become artists, work in the trades, become corporate executives, work in the service industry and many more. They lead productive, meaningful, happy lives, married or not.

Not Iraqi women. If a woman isn't married by her early twenties, she's considered a poor choice.

How to Enslave a Modern Woman

My brother-in-law posted a beautiful, inspirational video called The Invisible Woman by Nicole Johnson. It really is a very moving story ... and I despise it. It illustrates perfectly how religion is used to subjugate women.



Karl Marx got many things wrong, but he famously wrote, "Religion is the opiate of the people." The message is simple:

You work your ass off, and nobody cares. But God cares, and He sees you even if you are everyone else's invisible servant. So be a good girl, accept your fate, and get back to work.

But no woman should take this crap from anyone, much less her own husband and children. It is wrong to be treated like dirt, yet this "God cares" message is nothing more than an opiate, designed to get women to shut up and get back to their tasks.

What horrifies me about these messages is how insideous and alluring they are. A woman works sixteen hours a day, her children, husband and friends are disrespectful and uninterested, and she begins to feel worthless. But wait! There's a man, not just any man, but a kindly, loving, fatherly man, who loves her with all his heart. This man is everything her husband and children are not – appreciative, admiring, concerned, thankful, and probably handsome too. Who wouldn't want to believe this, true or not? So she goes back to her chores, happy that at least one person cares about her.

But step back for a moment, and think what might happen if women around the world rejected this opiate. Instead of feeling that inner contentment, knowing that God cares, some would surely become more depressed than ever. But maybe some would actually do something about their mistreatment.

Maybe instead of being invisible, they'd demand the respect that they deserve. And maybe they'd actually get it. Wouldn't that be novel?