Saturday 26 December 2009

Humanist Life

Time to come out from my seasonal hibernation to see if it is safe for Humanists to venture out without fear of being bombarded by carol-singing proselytisers of the Jesus Nativity cult.

There is a new website apparently launched by the BHA but in some way independent of them. It is called trendily HumanistLife without a break between the words. Unfortunately the first three articles are all dictated by the religious agenda, since they are about Humanists' attitudes to Christ-mas.

The statement in the top right corner reads: "Humanists make sense of the world using reason, experience and shared human values. We take responsibility and inspiration not from the supernatural and divine, but from what is real and from each other." But why is it necessary to mention "the supernatural and divine" at all, as if they have any real existence? We don't think much of astrology or magic or postmodernism either, so why mention them!

In the left=hand column I noticed that Stephen Law is writing a book on History of Humanism. A work of this nature is needed, as existing works that I have seen are poor. I hope it will be comprehensive and cover such related developments as Freethought, Secularism, Positivism and so on. I've posted a comment to that effect.

This could develop into a good resource for Humanists. It is asking for people to submit content, but I couldn't see any indication about who is editing the content. Presumably BHA staff who may already be overloaded.

1 comment:

  1. You may have missed this - it's from Today's Telegraph ( which I don't normally read ) and is not online - I may have abbreviated a bit.

    Give Atheists a Little Peace - Bosses told.

    Offices should set aside "quiet rooms" that can be used by atheists as well as religious people who want to pray, an employers gropy says.

    A new guide from Employers Forum On Belief says it is important that the rooms can be used by workers of all religions and none.

    However, it's advice sheet is almost totally devoted to accommodating Muslims, telling employers to provide screens for single-sex prayer: sinks for ritual washing: and racks for worshipers to take off their shoes.

    The forum is made up of employers ranging from the Department of Businesses, Innovation and Skills, to Barclays, Sainsburys and West Midlands police.

    In November it produced a guide to Christmas that told bosses that non-Christians may see shutting the office over the festive period as discriminatory.

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