One Utah

PZ Myers was righteously and correctly offended at a nonsense nonissue kerfuffle over a student “stealing” and “holding hostage” a communion wafer. The story goes something like this: the student went to Catholic communion service, didn’t eat the wafer immediately, was physically assaulted by someone trying to force him to eat the wafer [...]

Jesse Helms died at the age of 86. He served 30 years in the US Senate. He was a shrewd manipulator of Senate rules and a fearless champion of racism in its most honest form. Helms was also a rare breed - a truly honest bigot. He didn’t dress up his [...]

Last night, KUED re-aired the locally produced documentary Outside, about the lives and experiences of four homeless youth in Salt Lake City.
I know there are homeless people in Salt Lake City. I know there are homeless teens and young adults in Salt Lake City. I’ve advocated for better services for the homeless. [...]

shit like this happens:
In September of 2007, the principal at Hollis F. Price Middle College High told teachers she wanted the names of all student couples, “hetero and homo,” because she wanted to monitor them personally to prevent students from engaging in public displays of affection.
The principal heard about them through another student, then wrote [...]

Some basics:  Some individual parents, a Chrisitian indoctrination center school and the Association of Christian Schools International (ACSI) filed a lawsuit alleging that the University of California was discriminating against them; UC has said that some of the courses these groups teach do not meet their requirements.  Among those courses are courses on creationism pretending [...]

I’ve added some text to expand on some ideas.  I’ve noted them.
The brouhaha in American Fork holds a morbid fascination for me. The American Fork PTSA invited a group to address their meeting and talk about the dangers of pornography. What they discovered they were going to get was a denunciation of glbt persons dressed [...]

I’m having an extremely difficult time posting today. I just can’t seem to think clearly. I don’t know what’s up with that.
I’m avoiding the gym tonight. I know it’s lame excuse but it’s always so crowded on Mondays it’s almost not worth going. I know it’s a lame excuse.
Anyway, [...]

I thought it was odd that Ken B posted a comment about global warming in response to my post about the systemic dishonesty of creationists. I wonder if maybe there are connections between the dishonest means and methods of creationists and those who deny global warming. I haven’t really looked much at the methods used [...]

I hate the way the so-called War On Terror has been twisted to make morally repugnant acts like torture acceptable.
Rather than argue that torture is a moral good, supporters of torture have argued it is a regrettable moral necessity.
The argument goes like this:
Terrorists do bad things. Doing bad things proves they are bad men. [...]

I’m going to be laughing about this for decades. In fact, I may be amused about this the rest of my life and if I’m reincarnated, I may be born amused about it in my next life.
The story from PZ Myers (h/t Feministe).
I went to attend a screening of the creationist propaganda movie, Expelled, [...]

I am the first to admit, I have finally lost my marbles over the idiocy of the male gender of (my gender) our species. To wit, Bush and the few millions of U.S educated - supposedly - Americans.
Sign the damn petition if only to show these criminally stupid people that WE are many more [...]

I’ve been trying to write an appropriately sarcastic and ironic response to our state legislators opposition to the IB program. It’s almost impossible to satire someone who does not know the difference between “socialization” and “socialism.” It’s equally difficult deploying sarcasm in response to someone who thinks the any positive mention of the [...]