With the help of advanced telescopic technology, astronomers are now able to see into the past more deeply than ever before. What they’re finding, according to the capsule reports in the newspaper, is a universe that is larger and more crowded with Earth-like objects than previously understood. If you believe in old-fashioned notions like mathematics,...
When Julia Gillard became Australia’s first female prime minister last week she quickly earned international headlines (and a congratulatory call from President Obama). Being a woman was the easy part. Gillard overcame an obstacle far more troublesome than her gender: She doesn’t believe in God. “No, I don’t,” she told an interviewer at Australia’s national...
Joe is a human being. Joe is unsure if he is homoseuxal or heterosexual. But like most human beings, he has urges that involve activities other than procreation. Rather than figure out who he is or what he likes, Joe decides to sublimate his confusing desires, announcing to the world that he is no longer...
Once, long ago, in an arid place where life was hard, harder than in the yet undiscovered precincts of what we now call the Americas, a crazy Jew started a cult. Despite the objections of the local authorities, who, like most authorities, preferred the populace to be docile and compliant, the crazy Jew spoke passionately...
Not long ago I attended a concert at the Celebrity Center, on the campus of Scientology headquarters, in the heart of Hollywood. Independent producers like to rent out the theater there because in addition to a good sound and light system, the Celebrity Center offers below-market rental rates in exchange for subjecting the audience to...
Despite what proponents of the so-called “prosperity gospel” preach; despite the tithing that power-hungry pastors collect from their entranced flock; despite the malicious claims allegedly found in the Bible that gays, Hindus, and connoisseurs of erotica are destined for eternal purgatory — despite all the hateful crap that religion teaches us — we believe there’s still...
An Open Letter to Councilmember Hugo Soto-MartinezDear Councilmember Soto-Martinez,
The man you replaced, Mitch O’Farrell, was perceived by many as a cynical politician who placed the desires of wealthy real-estate developers over the concerns of the people he was supposed to represent. Sensitive to any perception of impropriety, you’ve made it a point to not accept…
For more than forty years one of our favorite writers, Detroit-based Peter Werbe, has been publishing provocative essays about capitalism, technology, religion, politics, and popular culture in the anarchist journal The Fifth Estate, where he’s long been an indispensable member of the editorial collective. Some of his best work is now organized in a compulsively readable...
