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In the News: Venice, Florida, city council rejects “In God We Trust;” Doug Marshall’s Reason Station goes up in Warren, Michigan, city hall; creationist teacher disciplined in Arroyo Grande, California, public high school. After celebrating the birthdays of Peter Tchaikovsky and Pete Seeger, we talk with Princeton history professor Kevin M. Kruse about his eye-opening book, One Nation Under God: How Corporate America Invented Christian America.
In the News: The dumbing down of America with Tennessee House voting the bible as the state book, global warming talk barred from Wisconsin state agencies, and prayer before university football games. After celebrating the birthday of feminist pioneer Mary Wollstonecraft and hearing Roy Zimmerman’s “Creation Science 101,” we talk with Len Eisenberg, founder and CEO of Evogeneao, promoting evolution education.
AUDIOBOOK DRAWING. There is still time to enter the drawing for a free download of the audiobook of Dan Barker’s new book, Life Driven Purpose. Send an email by April 29 to ‘[email protected]’ with the Subject “Free Audiobook” and include your name, physical mailing address, and how you listen to Freethought Radio. Five winners will be announced on next week’s show.
Find out why the pious Attorney General of Oklahoma is on the warpath against FFRF, why vouchers – ouch – hurt our public schools, plus other recent FFRF activism, then meet Amanda Metskas, executive director of Camp Quest, which provides secular summer camps around the nation, and is celebrating its 20th anniversary. We honor the birth of Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev, an atheist, by playing some of his enchanting music, and, with a camping theme, play Dan Barker and Steve Benson’s parody of the Boy Scout Hiking Song, “Why BSA?” from FFRF’s CD, “Beware of Dogma.”
FFRF continues to fight Vouchers and RFRA. When FOX News goes after you, you must be doing something right. Listen to a former DOJ employee attack FFRF and defend Christians’ so-called right to discriminate. After celebrating the birthdays of freethinkers Charlie Chaplin and Thomas Jefferson with music, we talk with FFRF’s Legal Publicist Maddie Ziegler about her work to defend Jefferson’s wall of separation between church and state.
In The News: The Madison, Wisconsin, City Council passed the resolution to add atheism as a protected class to city ordinances; FFRF takes out TV and New York Times print ads opposing religious school vouchers and the state and federal Religious Freedom Restoration Acts. After celebrating the birthdays of freethinking songwriters Tom Lehrer and Yip Harburg, we announce the winners of the drawing for a signed copy of Dan Barker’s new book, Life Driven Purpose. Our guest this week is Wendy Thomas Russell, author of the new book, Relax, It’s Just God: How and why to talk to your kids about religion when you’re not religious.
In the News: FFRF reports on its successful commercial by Ron Reagan on CNN, salutes Robert Kastenmeier, a former member of Congress who died last week, and its March Madness complaints over basketball chaplains at state universities. After celebrating the birthday of Eric Idle (by playing two of his irreverent Monty Python songs), Annie Laurie interviews Harry Shaughnessy, president of the Triangle Freethought Society (an FFRF chapter), whose family was featured this month in a CNN online story about “The Atheists Next Door.”
After reporting on the success of FFRF’s national ad featuring Ron Reagan on CNN, we announce FFRF victories stopping prayer and bible reading in public schools in Texas and Maryland. We celebrate the birthdays of nonbelievers Elton John, Stephen Sondheim, Keira Knightly, Richard Dawkins, and freethinking feminists Matilda Joslyn Gage and Gloria Steinem. Then we talk with journalist and author David Seidman about his new book, What If I’m an Atheist: A teen’s guide to exploring a life without religion.
Good news: FFRF reports many state/church victories around the country; federal Appeals Court won’t allow Milwaukee Catholic diocese to shield cemetery trust from bankruptcy to pay for victims of molesting priests. Bad news: Supreme Court temporarily sides with Catholic university to deny birth-control coverage; Wisconsin moves to expand school vouchers for mainly religious schools. After hearing the song “None of the Above,” Annie Laurie interviews Dan Barker about his new book, Life Driven Purpose: How an Atheist Finds Meaning.
FFRF’s TV ad featuring Ron Reagan was censored by the major news networks. After celebrating the birthday of freethinking botanist Luther Burbank and hearing “Bread & Roses” in honor of International Women’s Day, we talk with Kimberly Veal, an organizer with Chicago Black Skeptics.
