AHA Conference Hightlights

by Bill Creasy

In June, 2008, WASH assisted the American Humanist Association with the AHA/IHEU Annual Conference in Washington, D.C. A summary of some of the events at the conference follows.

Thursday, June 5

At 2: WASH members gave a panel discussion on local groups, with Bill Creasy, Stuart Jordan, Steve Lowe, and Jenny Kalmanson, introduced by RJ DeSmedt. Bill talked about history, organization, and major projects of WASH. Stuart talked about trying to start student groups. Steve talked about advertising and attracting new members. Jenny talked about WASHine, the web site, and being a secular celebrant. About half the time was spent on audience comments and questions, and the discussion was very productive. One man was thinking about starting chapters for his group in Houston. A woman started a humanist group at her retirement community. There was discussion of meetup.com, and a man got a 40% response of paying members from meetup contacts. There were 20 people in the audience, with a lot of participation.

At 3:30, Greg Paul gave a talk, "The Remarkable Success of Western Secularism." He spoke about his new hypothesis that the strength of religious belief is strongly correlated to economic uncertainty, including lack of health insurance and job insecurity. The correlation can be plotted for European countries and regions of the U.S. This idea explains the success of so-called "prosperity" evangelical churches that promise members that God will make them rich. His discussion provoked some audience reaction about the difference between correlation and causation. But then, the fire alarm went off and he was interrupted. Also, he was late getting started because the projector didn't work, and his talk wasn't introduced. So he left without finishing his talk.

At 8, Paul Kurtz spoke about "World Humanism Past, Present, and Future: The History of IHEU." He described dialogs with humanists in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union in the 1970's. He is an engaging speaker with good stories. He said Greg Paul's article in the "History of Unbelief" is the best article, according to Tom Flynn. He talked about secularization of European countries, and how the U.S. is following them. IHEU needs dialog with Muslims.

Friday, June 6

The 4:30 session was "A Humanist Approach to Social Problems," chaired by Ellery Schempp. It was about the poorest of the poor and assstance to them. Babu Gogineni spoke on Indian Dalits (untouchable class) and their poverty and social problems. He said Dalit chidren could be subjected to human sacrifice when a new school is built. These people are excluded from technological and economic progress, and they are discriminated against, even though they are 200 million people. He proposed adopting a Dalit village for $4000 for 3 years. The next speaker was Sebastian Valez, grad student, on problems in the Dominican Republic and Haiti. There is a lot of xenophobia of Dominicans for Haitians. Religion provides political cover for NGO aid organizations, but aid is often diverted to rich. He is organizing comunities to renovate schools and buiding, so aid actually helps the poor.

Saturday, June 7

In the afternoon, the AHA Awards Ceremony session started at 1:15: First award was introduced by Fred Edwords for the Humanist Pioneer Award. Matthew LaClair is a high school student who tape recorded his teacher evangelizing to students, then criticized textbooks. He was disappointed that he didn't get a high school citizenship award, but instead it went to someone who called him a liar. He's been interviewed on right-wing radio shows. He recommended being nice and talking calmly to people who get angry. He actually got one interviewer to change his mind during the interview. Very good speaker.

Second award, the Humanist Religious Liberty Award, was presented by Matthew Chapman, who covered the Kitzmiller/Dover trial on intelligent design in schools, to Judge John E. Jones III. He is Republican federal judge, named by Time magazine as influential American. He wrote a ruling on the trial that was a comprehensive rebuttal of Intelligent Design as science, calling it religion. He said federal judges should speak to the public about what they do. He has been criticized by right-wing commentators. According to them, he "stuck a knife in the back" of evangelicals who supported Bush. He said most Americans don't understand how judiciary works in this country. Judiciary is not done by majority rule, but to control excesses of majority rule. He said presidential candidates should debate science, as in Chapman's "Science Debate 2008." Judges don't control budget or military, but have only good judgement. He thinks that receiving the award indicates his judgement was good in the Dover case. Chapman is an entertaining speaker, and Jones is restrained and thoughtful.

The third award was introduced by Patricia Willis, "Humanist Heroine Award," to Eleanor Smeal. She is also attacked by religious right. She works with the National Organization of Women for legalizing the "morning after" pill, and for cancer research. Research on cancer cells with progesterone receptors is delayed for political reasons because of opposition to birth control. Issues are reduced to sound bites. She just came from Hillary Clinton's speech endorsing Obama. She said coverage of Clinton has been misogynistic. Media dwells on "smallest, most idiotic, most irrelevant" piece of news. She was very strident in criticizing media coverage. The media called Clinton "witchy," said she "cackled," men who supported her were "eunichs," and she was "pimping" Chelsea. Press is not reporting news, but shaping it. Smeal said, "This is scary. Why is there no outrage?" NOW and Planned Parenthood always have strong support in polls, but that is not reflected in press coverage. American policy on family planning is "stupid," and needs to be criticized by more than women's groups.

All the award winners got enthusiastic standing ovations.

At 4:30, Austin Dacey, CFI rep. to UN, spoke on his book "Secular Conscience." He was introduced by Roy Speckhart, who said he is one of the leading philosophers of the 21st century. He asked whether the audience agreed with the following statements: religion ought to be a private matter (not coerced or controlled); morality ought to be a private matter; morality is based on enlightened self interest; there is a science of good and evil; and there is no good or evil but thinking makes it so (ethics is relative or depends on context). But religion and morality should be discussed in public. Otherwise it can't be discussed or criticized. It should be held to the same public standards as any other public statement. Secularists have imposed a "gag order" to try to stop religious people from imposing religion, but gagged themselves from discussing values as a civic matter. We must refrain from coersion, but still try to convince others in an open way. Evolutionary explanations of morality can explain social behavior, but doesn't mean the social feelings aren't real and objective, or that they are relative. Morality that depends on circumstances can be principled and adaptable, not relative in a fuzzy way. There were 30-40 people with a lot of audience participation.

This article was originally published in the July 2008 issue of WASHline, the newsletter of the Washington Area Secular Humanists.