Uproar over Critical Race Theory is a modern ‘Red Scare’
Reading Time: 6 minutes The quote below is apropos today for Kristi Noem, the governor of my state, South Dakota, and a visceral “critical race theory” opponent: “Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last?” This famous and consequential retort was leveled against rabid anti-communist U.S. Sen.
Metaxas beats a very live horse in ‘Is Atheism Dead?’
Reading Time: 5 minutes Conservative Christian writer Eric Metaxas’ self-serving exercise in apologetics—Is Atheism Dead? (2021)—begins with this florid flourish of biblical triumphalism in his introduction: “We are living in unprecedentedly exciting times. But most of us don’t know it yet. That’s e
Is universal suffrage really such a great thing?
Reading Time: 6 minutes As I write this, exactly one year after the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrectionist attack on the U.S. Capitol to subvert the counting of Electoral College votes, I’m more convinced than ever that many, many, many Americans lack enough intellectual integrity and common sense to be trus
The ethical problem with denying diabetics no-prick glucose monitors
Reading Time: 5 minutes In the past few years, science has produced a few truly wonderful devices capable of monitoring diabetics’ blood-sugar levels 24/7 in real-time, with the power to help the afflicted self-manage very protective eating strategies. Unfortunately, even though I’m diabetic, I simp
School prayer is already legal. So why are evangelicals still pushing it?
Reading Time: 4 minutes Although as a nontheist Democrat I’m somewhat of a religious and political outlier in my adopted ruby-red state, South Dakota, I’m proud of how reasonable some of its religiously conservative, Trumpian leaders can sometimes be. Like when it comes to school prayer. My latest r
Did too-blind justice free Kyle Rittenhouse?
Reading Time: 4 minutes FYI to my readers: My OnlySky essays are always informed by secularism, nontheism and humanism but do not always focus on patently irreligious themes. My essential aim is to investigate our world from the perspective that gods are nonexistent. Blind justice, it turns out, can
Why the U.S. desperately needs a domestic anti-disinformation agency
Reading Time: 6 minutes A new anti-disinformation agency in Sweden is simultaneously encouraging and discouraging in the realm of public free speech and truth. On Jan. 1, the government of this progressive, Scandinavian nation established the Swedish Psychological Defense Agency (SPDA). Its fundamen
An unequal tale of two liars: Smollett and Trump
Reading Time: 4 minutes Actor Jussie Smollett was convicted on December 9 of five counts of “disturbing the peace,” technically speaking, in a bizarre case in which the gay Black actor falsely claimed two Donald Trump-supporting men attacked him on a Chicago street while yelling homophobic and racia
What did Jews ever do to deserve such epic contempt?
Reading Time: 6 minutes Why do so many people around the world seem to hate Jews? This perplexed me as a kid when I first learned about the rise of Nazi Germany and the Holocaust in school and watched horrendous black-and-white films of Nazi bulldozers shoving huge piles of dead, emaciated Jewish pr
Atheism is inherently reasonable. That’s why believers don’t ‘get’ it
Reading Time: 4 minutes I’m a nonevangelical nontheist. That’s because I totally accept the fact it’s virtually impossible to convince adult true believers that the divinities they worship, for all intents and purposes, simply can’t be confirmed to exist. With that view, it seems silly trying to con
Crystal clutchers and Bible thumpers: Birds of a feather
Reading Time: 4 minutes An unsettling CBS News article I read recently—“How conspiracy theories ‘infiltrated’ the wellness community”—reminded me of the inherent kinship between such seemingly divergent believers as, say, crystal clutchers and Bible thumpers. Profound truths and transformative power
If the dead visit our dreams, what does it mean?
Reading Time: 4 minutes Of several hypotheses of the genesis of supernatural religion in humankind, ancient interpretation of dreams is a top contender.