It’s Secularists That Are Poisoning Discourse, USD Professor Says (tags)
According to University of San Diego professor Steven D. Smith, the coarsening of our public discourse shouldn't be blamed on religious people arguing issues on the basis of moral values. Instead, it's secular people who consider themselves "rational" and "scientific" who have intimidated religious people from expressing their views openly and forced them to "smuggle" in their perspectives in ostensibly secular terms.
Lê’s “Gangster” Not Just Another Immigration Memoir (tags)
Lê Thi Diem Thúy was brought to this country from Viet Nam by her father in 1978, when she was six, but her book “The Gangster We Are All Looking For,” honored this year by the San Diego Public Library and PBS as the 2011 “One Book, One San Diego,” isn’t your ordinary immigrant’s memoir. Presented as a novel — which allows Lê to tap her childhood for material without having to be bound by literal truth — “Gangster” is written in an almost poetic prose style, rich in nature imagery, characteristic of many Asian writers who learned English as a second language. Introducing, reading from and commenting on the book at the Public Library downtown on February 2, Lê gave a presentation touching on a lot of the issues raised in her book, including culture clashes, the role of the imagination and language as a force that can tear people apart as much as it can bring them together.
JUSTICE FOR FILIPINO AMERICAN VETERANS (JFAV) MEET W/ Congressman Bob Filner Share (tags)
A group of Justice for Filipino American Veterans (JFAV) met with Congressman Bob Filner, ( D-51st District) ,head of the House Committee on Veterans Affairs in a legislative visit in his Chula Vista office today at 9:00 AM, July 09, 2010. The San Diego and Los Angeles group headed by JFAV National Coordinator Arturo P. Garcia and San Diego JFAV representation met with Congressman Filner and his Filipino deputy Manny Doria for fifteen minutes. The JFAV organization updated Rep. Filner on the present situation of 16,000 Filipino veterans who were denied of their lump sum claims by the Department of Veterans Affair (DVA). Rep. Filner acknowledged that they did not expect that more than 41,000 Filipino World War II veterans will apply for claims. They ( US Congress) only provided for 18,000 Filipino veterans.
There Is No God — and He Can Prove It (tags)
There is no God, says 85-year-old author and ex-Roman Catholic Horacio Hanson — and he can prove it. That’s the claim he makes in his self-published book There Is No Creator: Religion Is a Fraud: What Now? — a title he readily admits is a deliberate in-your-face challenge to believers — and repeated when he spoke about it to the San Diego Humanist Association at the San Diego Public Library downtown on March 13. After noting that the worst insult in the Arabic language is, “May God deprive you of your religion,” Hanson launched into an hour-long presentation that made it clear that depriving his listeners — and the rest of humanity — of religion is precisely his intention.
Humanists Memorialize Giordano Bruno (tags)
The San Diego Humanist Fellowship commemorated the 410th anniversary of the execution of Giordano Bruno at their February 14 meeting. Bruno, a 16th century philosopher, monk and scientific scholar, was killed by the Holy Inquisition for denying the Trinity, the divinity of Jesus, the virginity of Mary and the dogma that the earth was the center of the universe.
Humanists Memorialize Giordano Bruno (tags)
The San Diego Humanist Fellowship held a program on February 14 to commemorate the life and death of Giordano Bruno, the 16th century Italian philosopher and scientific theorist who was burned at the stake by the Holy Inquisition in 1600 for (among other things) arguing that the earth orbited the sun and there was an infinite universe.
“Voices of Honor” Tour Challenges “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” (tags)
O.K., so maybe you're a hard-core peacenik who wouldn't dream of joining the military or of supporting anyone who would. You should still care about the continued exclusion of open Queer people from the U.S. military under the so-called “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. Not only is the policy unjust and discriminatory on its face, it's also disproportionately enforced against women and people of color — so in practice it's racist and sexist as well as homophobic. “Voices of Honor” was a national tour which wrapped up in San Diego September 30 that featured five military veterans talking about the personal strains of living under “don’t ask, don’t tell.”
“Future Without War” Author Discusses Women Nobel Laureates (tags)
Of the 789 people who have won the Nobel Prize, just 35 of them have been women. But among them are individuals with truly remarkable stories, Dr. Judith Hand told the Humanist Fellowship of San Diego at a program September 20 at the San Diego Public Library. They range from pioneering scientists Marie Curie and Barbara McClintock to writers Pearl S. Buck, Nadine Gordimer, Toni Morrison and Doris Lessing and peace activists Betty Williams, Mairead Corrigan, Aung San Suu Kyi, Rigoberta Menchú, Jody Williams, Shirin Ebadi and Wangari Matthai. Dr. Hand shared some of these women's stories in the context of her own belief that more involvement of women in the public affairs of the world can lead to a future without war.
Fernando Suárez del Solár Speaks at “Senseless Death” Screening (tags)
In 2003 Jesús Suárez del Solár became one of the first U.S. victims of the current war in Iraq -- and his father, Fernando, expressed his anger and sadness at the loss of his son by joining the San Diego anti-war movement and becoming one of its most powerful activists. On July 8 the San Diego Public Library showed “A Senseless Death,” a 2006 documentary by a French-Canadian filmmaker that told the story of Jesús and other so-called “green-card soldiers,” immigrants (both documented and undocumented) lured into the U.S. military and promised citizenship in return for becoming cannon fodder for U.S. imperalism.
PBS Documentary on “Don't Ask, Don't Tell” Airs June 16 (tags)
The PBS documentary “Ask Not,” dealing with the human cost of the “don't ask, don't tell” policy that excludes open Queers from the U.S. military, will be shown nationwide on June 16 and in San Diego June 21 as part of the “Independent Lens” series. The show depicts individuals thrown out of the military under “don't ask, don't tell” and the Queer community's fight-back against the discriminatory policy. In a May 3 preview screening at the San Diego Public Library, activists working against “don't ask, don't tell” discussed why even progressive people who generally oppose America’s wars should be concerned about this issue.
Audience Packs Library for Medical Marijuana Film (tags)
For many of the 300 people who packed the San Diego Public Library screening of "Waiting to Inhale," Jed Riffe's film on the medical marijuana issue, it's not just a movie but something they're living. The film begins with a raid on a medical marijuana growers' collective, and at least two members of the audience talked about having gone through similar raids from San Diego County law enforcement just days earlier. The audience was highly partisan but the film itself was surprisingly fair-minded and even-handed in its approach to the issue.
Former Prof Speaks on Religion/Science/Democracy Conflicts (tags)
Former UCSD professor Lew Perry spoke to the Humanist Fellowship of San Diego November 16 on the conflicts between religion, science and democracy. He said that conflicts are inevitable because when religion makes statements about the physical world -- like the Bible's claim that the earth is fixed in space -- scientists can and must challenge the religious understanding of physical reality.
San Diego Indy Media Blocked by Public Library (tags)
Just noted today, that computer software for blocking certain sites in the San Diego Public Library system (via the 15 minute computers, at least) have blocked out at least two well-known Leftist websites.