Category: Interviews

10 Questions with Cindy Chaney

by Administrator, posted in Geek Stuff, Interviews

1. First, how do you define nerd and how is a nerd different from a geek?

That was the big question at Orc Con! I am always surprised when I tell someone about the site and they complain that they are a geek rather than a nerd. Let’s settle the debate once and for all, I think the average person uses the terms interchangeably and only nerds and geeks worry about the nuances between the two. (That’s right, I just called you a nerd. Or a geek.) In media, the term ‘nerd’ seems to be attached to people who are very academic and education-focused, while ‘geek’ is attached to those who are into technology and gadgets.

In my opinion, both groups tend to be interested in things that the mainstream population thinks is un-cool. For example, both geeks and nerds play D&D. However, nerds will take that to the extreme by memorizing the rule book. Geeks may love Zelda, but nerds will get a tattoo of Link on her foot (check out nerdgirl zelda’s profile for proof).

I know you guys are Big Bang Theory fans, so let’s use Sheldon as an example. Sheldon is definitely a nerd, whereas Leonard is a geek. Leonard has the same interests as Sheldon but he does not take them to the same extreme. Plus, he cares about other things like women and being social, and Sheldon has no use for either. I think people often feel nerds have poor social skills. This may be true, but not because they can’t be social. They are just too busy saving the universe to make time for it.

2. Tell my readers about your website My Nerd Girl.

Mynerdgirl.com is a social networking site for nerds. We also have featured nerd girls that we do photo shoots with in hopes to break down the stereotypes a bit and say “Smart is Sexy”. We think nerds can be social and wanted to create a place where they can meet people with similar interest. And membership is free!

As a user you can create your own profile, add friends, watch videos, blog, view and comment on pictures, chat in the forum, view upcoming events, read articles, and send questions to Dr. Ando our sexologist. We’re working night and day in the lab on some new features due out soon.

3. What made you decide to start a website?

Like most great ideas throughout human evolution, it came to about on a trip to Vegas.

4. What has been the hardest part of starting your own website?

I have my MBA, I used to analyze small businesses for a living, and I teach college-level business courses. None of it prepared me for starting my own website.

The hardest part for me was dealing with web companies. The first one did not deliver what they promised, the second flaked out, and the third went bankrupt. Now one of the Nerdgirls has finally signed on to help me fix some of the bugs left by company number three and do some upgrades. Looking back, if I would have learned all the code myself, the site would have launched a year earlier.

5. What advice would you give to other people considering starting their own social networking website?

Don’t give anyone any money up front.

Also, the internet does not have a 9-5 work day.

6. Do you feel there are stereotypes or misconceptions about women who are fans of more traditionally “guy geek” stuff, such as comics, roleplaying and computer games?

Yes, I think that there are many, and that’s why I wanted to start MyNerdGirl. Most of all, I think that people assume that nerdy girls are unattractive, and that is why I do the photo shoots. Nerdy girls are the most attractive women on the planet because they are the whole package. I try to bring out each woman’s individual personality in the photos because that is what makes us beautiful. We also don’t photoshop the pictures because I want young girls that come to our site to see that beauty comes in all shapes and sizes.

7. Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Firefly, or Dr. Horrible?

I think my favorite is Firefly, but we have fans of all three on the site.

8. We’re doing this interview before the much nerd anticipated movie “Watchmen” releases, but we will be publishing the interview after the film’s release. Care to make any predictions?

I predict it will give me a Nerdgasm, which will be just as hot as it sounds.

9. I only have 8 friends on My Nerd Girl, can you help me amass friends there?

People who blog tend to pick up more friends, as do people who go in the forum. However, the best way to find friends is to scroll through the new users tab and just ask people. We are working on adding a search tool soon, that will allow you to filter users based on their interests.

10. Parting shot! Ask us here at The Magical Buffet any one question.

What do you like about MyNerdgirl.com?

I liked the idea of place to get to meet other women with interests similar to my own. Outside of the internet it’s hard to find other women who want to swap recipes, AND talk comic books, on MyNerdgirl.com those are the only women I find.

About Cindy Chaney:
Cindy Chaney is a self-proclaimed nerd and creator of MyNerdGirl.com (an interactive and informative social network for nerds). Cindy’s goal is to provide a positive environment for nerds to celebrate what makes them unique. She believes that smart is sexy! Cindy wears many hats in the quest for global dominance including writer, editor, producer, event coordinator…well, you get the idea.

When Cindy isn’t busy talking to fellow nerds on MyNerdGirl.com she is playing games (video games, board games, RPG’s, and the occasional LARP) or reading (books, comics, and manga). Cindy is also a talented scrapbooker and has a gray belt in martial arts.

As with all Nerds, she has a long list of academic achievements including a Master in Business Administration from Cameron University and Bachelors in Organizational Leadership and Communications from Chapman University. Cindy is also an instructor at Westwood College where she is currently Teacher of the Year.

Catching Up With Steve

by Administrator, posted in Events, Geek Stuff, Guest Authors, Interviews

It’s been several months since Steve Kenson was kind enough to talk about gaming with The Magical Buffet. Since then so much has happened that Steve sent us a little note to share with everyone to let us know what he’s been up to and what’s coming next.

Hey Everybody,

It’s been a busy time since I last talked with the Magical Buffet! I’ve made the transition at Green Ronin Publishing from developer to full-time designer, which means rather than overseeing and guiding various projects, I’m primarily writing and designing, which I think are my personal strengths. I’m working with our new Mutants & Masterminds developer, Jon Leitheusser, on a project called “The Supervillain’s Handbook” for a summer release this year. It’s a big book of supervillainy, including hidden lairs, evil schemes, and villain archetypes.

In other exciting news, our “A Song of Ice and Fire Roleplaying” game is back from the printer and shipping to stores! I’m very pleased with how it came out and I’m working with our production department on the forthcoming releases for it, including a Narrator’s Screen (bundled with the adventure “Wedding Knight” written by me) and the big adventure saga “Peril at King’s Landing” as well as a comprehensive guidebook to Westeros. The cover to the Campaign Guide is a great painting of how the Kingslayer got that name.

Also, for any folks who are interested, I’ll be a guest at the Northeast Wars convention in Burlington, VT April 3-5, running M&M and talking about RPGs. It’s a fun convention, so come by if you’re in the area!

About Steve Kenson:
Steve Kenson began freelancing in the RPG industry in 1993. By 1995, he was working full-time as a freelance author and designer on RPGs such as Shadowrun and Earthdawn. He has written for a wide variety of game-lines and published ten novels: seven for the Shadowrun line, two for Crimson Skies, and one for MechWarrior. In 2002, Steve designed the Mutants & Masterminds Superhero RPG for Green Ronin Publishing under the Open Game License. Two years later, he became a line developer with Green Ronin, overseeing the development of the Second Edition of M&M, along with games such as Blue Rose, True20 Adventure Roleplaying, and A Song of Ice and Fire Roleplaying. He’s now a designer with Green Ronin Publishing.

Steve maintains a website at www.stevekenson.com and a LiveJournal at xomec.livejournal.com. He lives in southern New Hampshire with New Age and pagan author Christopher Penczak and psychic reader and counselor and part-time tooth fairy Adam Sartwell.

Getting There First

by Administrator, posted in Interviews, Wiccan/Pagan

I love it when I get clued into something cool before other people do. Who doesn’t? I’m just one person, stumbling around in the wilds of the world wide web, occasionally bumping into something cool, often times getting nudged into it by one of The Magical Buffet’s many friends.

Thanks to my friend Marissa at Llewellyn I was able to interview Raven Digitalis, who’s first book “Goth Craft” had just released. Five months later MTV featured him. Yep, beating MTV, that was pretty darn cool.

As many of you may recall I took great pride in having beat Perez Hilton on discussing Movember by almost a month! That’s thanks to our artist extraordinaire Will Hobbs. Small, meaningless “victory” but one I claimed nonetheless.

Which brings me to Thuri Calafia. Again, Marissa at Llewellyn tipped me off that I wanted to talk to this new author. She was right. Thuri, author of “Dedicant: A Witch’s Circle of Fire” was thoughtful, knowledgeable, and most importantly asked me an amusing question for our interview. This is why I was pleased as punch to stumble across this nice profile of her and Carmella Cook, owner of Essential Elements Apothecary, on OregonLive.com. Click here to read the nice write up. OregonLive is no Perez Hilton, but I’m still going to proudly proclaim that I went there first! Go me!

I’m also excited to tell you that both Raven Digitalis and Thuri Calafia have contributed to The Wiccan Rede Project. You can look forward to hearing their thoughts on the Rede in the months to come!

Who or what will I get to claim firsties on next? I can’t wait to find out.

10 Questions with Gary Lachman

by Administrator, posted in Books, Interviews, Magic/Occult

1. As I made note of in my review of your latest book “Politics and the Occult: The Left, the Right, and the Radically Unseen” you belonged to the band Blondie and were a fixture of the New York music scene, how did Gary Valentine the rocker become Gary Lachman the writer?
I had always wanted to ‘be a writer’ and wrote poetry before I became a musician. It was through the poetry that I became a songwriter. While in Blondie, my own and other groups, I always read philosophy, psychology, literature and so on.

2. What drew you to studying occult movements and philosophies?
I became seriously interested in the study of the occult through reading Colin Wilson’s excellent book The Occult, which takes a more philosophical approach to the subject than most other similar books do.

3. One thing that stands out in “Politics and the Occult” is the colorful cast of characters that fuelled these movements. Who are you particularly fond of and why?
In general I was attracted to the character of Freemasonry in the late 18th century, when it was motivated by what seems a real sense of universal brotherhood without class, religious or racial distinctions, and where men and often women of like mind could meet and discuss ideas about the nature of society.

4. Help me out here, is Aleister Crowley really as big of a deal as my friend’s college roommate told me he is?
Crowley is probably how most people today discover the occult. A colorful if often annoying character.

5. What was one of your most surprising or entertaining discoveries made while researching “Politics and the Occult”?
I was disturbed by the amount of far right and anti-semitic thought that informs much of western esotericism but encouraged by the many forms of progressive occult thinking.

6. Since one of these women is deceased, this is a purely hypothetical question. In a fist fight who would win, Victoria Woodhull (the first woman to run for President) or Hillary Clinton?
Victoria, I think. Women were tougher in her day.

7. Who gets more groupies, rockers or authors? Or is it about quality? Do authors get a better quality of groupie verses rockers?
I don’t get many groupies these days so its hard to tell.

8. What is your next project?
I’m currently working on a book about C.G. Jung.

9. Are you amazed we got through this whole interview without me asking you one question about Debbie Harry?
Relieved, actually.

10. Parting shot! Ask us here at The Magical Buffet any one question.
Are you open on Sundays?

Thanks to the glory of the internet The Magical Buffet is here 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, barring server issues.

About Gary Lachman
Gary Lachman is author of “A Secret History of Consciousness”, “A Dark Muse”, “Rudolf Steiner”, and other books. A founding member of the rock group Blondie, in 2006 he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.





10 Questions with Thuri Calafia

by Administrator, posted in Interviews, Wiccan/Pagan

1. First, what is the Circles system and how does it differ from other Wiccan traditions?
Well, I wouldn’t really call Circles a “tradition” per se, though others have. Circles is simply a system of organizing study, but it’s very eclectic. Each book is/will be a complete course of study for that level.
The first way Circles is different is that each level, each course, from dedicant through adept level, follows a Wheel of the Year program that is ongoing; it can be started at any time – there is no waiting period for the “next class” to start. In the Dedicant book (and in all the books), and in Circles School, the first unit for any level is the Orientation and Basics lesson. Once that is completed, the student simply “jumps on the Wheel” in the current month, joining the rest of the class in a smooth and seamless transition. It’s very exciting this way; there are new students coming in (and graduating!) all the time, yet there is enough time for folks to bond with each other, and of course with me, too. No one has to wait, and students can delve as deeply or move along as quickly as they like.
The other fundamental way in which the Circles system differs is that study is connected to the Wheel of the Year; subjects are discussed in the time they’re exalted (a term I picked up from astrology, meaning, in my opinion – where it’s magnified, most powerful, in its most natural “home”). For example, we learn about dreamwork when we’re on the threshold of, and about divination when we’ve passed into the Dark Time; we learn about candle magic and colors just before Imbolc; about human sexuality and sex magic during April, when Beltane is on its way and the air is buzzing with raw passion and the urge to couple.
Finally, when I have all class levels going at the same time (Dedicant, Initiate, and Adept), which I will soon, there is the monthly lesson for each class once per month, but all the classes meet together for Pathworkings, the “hands on” part of the classes, and each student then is able to do the work for their current level. For example, if we’re doing ritual, the Dedicants would probably purify and charge the circle, maybe call quarters, the Initiates would cast and call deity, and the Adepts would probably deliver the ritual’s message and guide the meditation/trancework and fire the cone of power. With Pathworkings such as divination practice, the higher level students can help the newer students by providing feedback and suggestions for improvement. This teaches the Dedicants the ropes while teaching the Initiates and Adepts how to teach and to lead. Everybody learns.

2. Tell my readers about your first book “Dedicant: A Witches Circle of Fire”.
Dedicant is the foundation book for the series, and gives a good, solid Witchy education up to and including initiation. There are some surprises – I like to poke holes in the pretty red balloons of tradition, so when I discover an answer to a Mystery or find a way to shed light on a practice or belief which could profoundly alter the way folks look at things, I convey this information through my teaching and my writing.
I’m a fiction writer at heart – the first major piece I wrote is an epic lesbian novel (called Visions), and I feel this love of good prose shines through in my work. Every monthly lesson chapter in Dedicant (and most likely in all the books in the series) starts with a guided meditation starring the student as the main character, and there are other guided meditations (elemental ones, for example) which are all rather poetic and colorful, which hopefully inspires the student to connect with the energies of the season, and the beauty around them throughout the turning of the Wheel. My hope is to also inspire in the student a sense of their own power and intuition, a strong connection to the earth and moon tides.
I stress good scholarship, and so there’s required reading of other authors – the cream of the crop of what I’ve read – throughout the course. There are ethics exercises designed to make the student think, so when they start using energy to create change in the world, they’ll be in the habit of examining all possible consequences of their actions before taking such actions.
I kind of went to the “hit and miss” school of Wicca, being self-taught, so I’ve tried to put together a system of learning which helps the motivated student avoid that trap by providing guidance throughout the path to initiation, and, with the other books in the series of course, beyond initiation as well. It’s great for teachers, too – rather than teaching Wicca in a linear fashion and having to make each group of excited, eager students wait (and wait and wait) for the next round of classes, teachers can use Dedicant as a foundation for their own classes, and teach around the Wheel of the Year, too, adding their own required reading and special touches.

3. How many more books will there be in the series, and can you tell us a little bit about them and what to expect?
There will be three more books, possibly a fourth. The one I’m working on now is Initiate: A Witch’s Circle of Water. Initiate will likely be quite a bit longer and lot more intense, as I feel the program will help prepare the student for the intensity of being a priest or priestess of the Old Gods in an active community service role. In Initiate, the student will learn much about energy work, which is the training I feel is most often missed on the solitary path. This gives the student a solid foundation for renewing and re-filling his spiritual vessel by connecting with his patron gods and matron goddesses at a deep level. This helps ensure he doesn’t get burned out when he begins to serve his gods at Adept level. There will also be considerable exploration into various spiritual callings, or gifts, which will help prepare and train the student, so that he can feel confident and strong when he starts giving back to his gods through community service work.
The next one will be Adept: A Witch’s Circle of Earth. Adept will be all about community service, writing and performing public ritual, writing and facilitating private, specialized rituals such as Dark Workings and other specialized healings, Life Passage rituals and Wiccan Rites of Passage, house clearings when spirits are more than happy to hang around mischief for the residents, etc. We’ll explore some of the deeper Mysteries, too, such as qabalah.
I also plan to do a sort of prequel to the series, called Seeker: A Witch’s Circle of Air, which will explore all kinds of different earth-based religions. This book will be a sort of overview for those who are drawn to an earth-based path but are not sure if Wicca, the Native American path, Asatru or other earth-centered spirituality is for them. This would also be a good text for those who have already finished a course of study in one tradition or spiritual belief system, and who want to learn more of other paths. This could give them new possibilities, new avenues to explore.
There may or may not be a Master: A Witch’s Circle of Spirit. If so, this would focus mostly on Right Livelihood and what the student feels the Pagan community needs and why it’s their job to provide it.

4. What drew you to the Wiccan faith?
Oh, my. What didn’t? I’ve always been deeply connected to nature, and feel most at home outdoors, especially in the wild places. I can remember, from a very early age, feeling a special resonance with the ancient Greek gods – Artemis in particular – and doing what, looking back, I can only call devotional rituals to Her in the field across from my house. She’s been my matron goddess since that time, although I did go through a born-again-Christian phase for about five minutes in my late teens. When I was in my early twenties, I started reading. Bonewits’ Real Magic was one of the first books I read, and it really struck a chord within me – I grew up with the same sort of dry humor, so it felt really familiar. In addition, I loved his logic, so I read the book over and over, and still do. The next thing was Spiral Dance, and it felt like coming home. Starhawk has a way of expressing both the light and dark sides of the divine in a way that really resonates with me. Then I read Drawing Down the Moon, and I must admit I cried through most of it – the sense of family, of belonging, of community was something I’d never had in my family of origin, and so had always longed for. Suddenly, here was the possibility that I might someday find that family, that tribe. That’s powerful stuff. From there, I was hooked; the religion I’d always felt in my heart finally had a name.

5. After teaching for so many years, what made you decide now is the time to put that knowledge into books for the masses?
Well, deep at my core, I’m a writer – it’s all I’ve ever wanted to do. Even as a kid, I had a group of other kids that would sit and listen to me tell stories, and of course they always had a “moral,” a lesson in them, and I believe I wrote my first stories around age nine or ten. So I guess I’ve always been a teacher, too. Then, in my mid-twenties, I had an astrologer tell me I was destined to be a spiritual teacher, and students just sort of… started appearing. So I guess you could say I kinda fell into the spiritual teacher thing, with a few IRL students, but mostly, it started with a sort of online 101, back in the late 1990s.
As my packets of information got thicker and thicker, and my attempts at selling my novel became more and more frustrating, I thought, “Hmmm… maybe I could get my foot in the door with nonfiction – this is almost a book already,” and then I just fell in love with the work. In many ways, fiction is still where my heart is (I’m a sucker for a good story), but this work has captured my heart, too, and I credit the many wonderful and amazing students I’ve had over the years with that energy – they’ve truly opened my heart. Now, I have plans for all kinds of writing projects, from this series, to a book on healing women’s sexuality, to a Witchy cookbook. And of course, there are always the stories in my head. I just love to write.

6. What challenges do you see facing the Wiccan community? How can the community resolve those issues?
The biggest challenge I see the Wiccan community facing is the one I get on my soapbox about at every turn: we must stop the infighting, the Witchier-than-thou BS, and unite as a people! If we are constantly looking down our collective noses, squeezing out the new priests and priestesses in our communities so that only the “Old Guard” gets to present public rituals and other good works, if we cannot see past our tiny differences to the vast common ground we all stand on, we will fall apart. This “us and them” attitude comes from our domestication in western culture’s fear of anything different. As a religion, we claim to honor diversity, but then we snipe at each other, snub newbies, and talk trash behind each other’s backs when someone’s spiritual practices are a hair’s breadth different from ours. This kind of negativity will never allow us to truly grow and build as a valid and viable religious community.
How to resolve it? I think it can really only be truly resolved on an individual level. I believe that each and every one of us must try to allow for the possibility that the person smiling at us from across the circle is just as vulnerable as we are, just as hopeful that real connections can be made with another Pagan, is just as smart and savvy as we are, and that they have no intention to harm our standing or our place in our communities. They just want to be heard, too. Why try to compete when we can connect and network and build? So you know some stuff. Bet they know some stuff, too. We must expand our minds, open our hearts. And then we need to get off our high horses and step up to the responsibility of reaching out to that new person and quit assuming its everyone else’s job. We must embrace each other! We must walk our talk! We need to make others feel welcome and important. We’re all important, damnit. Every one of us.

7. Zatanna, Samantha Stephens, or Circe?
Hmmm, not sure what you’re asking me here. Don’t know much about Zatanna. I watched Bewitched as a kid, and loved it. Loved the movie, too. Circe? Well, that’s one goddess I wouldn’t want to cross. But I’m not too much like any of those women.

8. Can you tell my readers about the College of Wicca and Old Lore?
It was started by Morning Glory Dragonfly, in 2000. At the time, Morning Glory owned the shop Herbs and Arts in Denver. She got together a team of four other teachers, including yours truly, and we started the school. This was just after I first wrote and submitted the proposal for Dedicant to Llewellyn. We set up the school to follow a Wheel of the Year program, though it was much different than the WOY program I had in mind, so we butted heads on a few things.
Unfortunately, some of the teachers butted heads on a great number of things, but Morning Glory was truly wonderful to work with, very knowledgeable, and such an open heart and spirit! Though there were difficult times, she did her best keeping it all together and for the time I was there, the school seemed very successful. I left later that year to pursue my own teaching dreams and to work on the book. I will never forget her, though; she taught me many things about spiritual leadership, and I try to live up to her example in many ways.

9. I understand that you host Witches’ Afternoon Teas. I’m partial to English Breakfast Tea, what kind of tea is served at your gathering?
Well, Carmella Cook, the owner of Essential Elements Herbal Apothecary, the venue we hold the Teas at, is in charge of the tea part. She usually makes a couple of pots of her special blends for the events, but she’ll make a cup of whatever folks want, and she has a lot of them! She also usually provides a fruit tray or cheese and crackers, or other munchies. I provide the “cakes”, which have been everything from fancy and decorated (I used to be a professional cake decorator), or basic and homemade, or store-bought pound cake and fruit when I was pressed for time. There are always refreshments, though, and usually a good variety. We also have free readings and each Tea has a different theme, from seasonal to silly. They’re a lot of fun.

10. Parting shot! Ask us here at The Magical Buffet any one question.
Well, I was going to ask you how the Magical Buffet got started, but then decided that question was too lame and ordinary and anyway, you probably answered that already in your FAQs or your About Us section, so I went there and found it. So now my question is: What is the first thing you’ll do as Supreme Ruler of the World?
I would immediately request more episodes of the television shows Firefly, Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, and The Boondocks

About the Author
Thuri Calafia is a Wiccan High Priestess of many years standing, and the creator of the Circles System and School. She is the author of DEDICANT: A Witch’s Circle of Fire; A Course of Study in the Old Religion. Calafia is active in the Portland Pagan community, offering various workshops and priestess services, presenting regular Open Full Moon rituals and Witches’ Afternoon Teas, and teaching Circles Dedicant level classes. She is working on the second in the four-book series, INITIATE: A Witch’s Circle of Water. She lives with her beloved Labrador, Miss Alyssa Ramone.

10 Questions with a First Amendment Lawyer

by Administrator, posted in First Amendment, Interviews, Politics

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving (in the United States), a time where traditionally I gush about how thankful I am for the support and enthusiasm of Magical Buffet readers. Which I truly am, but today I’d like to say this, “I am thankful to be an American.”

It’s true. I love this country. No other country gives its citizens the freedoms that America does. Just look through my website, it’s littered with posts about people in other countries suffering because they don’t have the freedoms we have here in America. In my opinion, our Founding Fathers were freakin’ geniuses for our Constitution and Bill of Rights. And as a proud American, I get concerned when I learn that the government is trying to infringe on those freedoms or worse succeeding at it.

This leads to something else I’m thankful for, that there are people willing to help myself and my readers learn more. Take the time to read my interview with Lawrence G. Walters, First Amendment Lawyer extraordinaire.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving everyone! I’ll talk to you after the weekend!

1. What made you decide to specialize in First Amendment law?
Originally, my practice was involved typical, mainstream, commercial litigation work representing banks, insurance firms and construction companies. After about four years of that nonsense, something happened that would set me on my current course. The State Attorney in my home county started prosecuting “Mom and Pop” video stores for renting films he did not like. He had Sheriff’s Deputies hand deliver letters demanding that certain movies be taken off the shelves, or the stores would face criminal prosecution. Although I had no experience in First Amendment law, that didn’t sound right to me, and I offered to help these small business owners, on a pro bono basis, to fight this apparent abuse of prosecutorial power. Fortunately, we won all of the cases, and forced the State Attorney to back down. After that small taste of defending Free Speech rights, I was hooked.

2. Do you feel there are any common misconceptions about the First Amendment?
Definitely. First, the First Amendment only applies to governmental censorship, not the activities of private corporations or individuals. We constantly get questions from people wanting to sue websites like Yahoo! or Google because they have been banned from participating in certain online groups based on their online communications. Private companies can censor all they want, without violating the First Amendment. The same goes for private employers. However, when the government tries to impose some sort of penalty or prior permission on speech-related activities; that is a problem.

Another misconception results from people trying to also blame the First Amendment for keeping the “prayer out of schools.” Students are free to pray all they want in school without violating the First Amendment. It is only when a Public School forces children to participate in prayer-related activities, or punishes them in some way for failing to do so, that the “Establishment Clause” to the First Amendment is implicated.

3. How is something determined to be slander or libel, as opposed to the exercising of freedom of speech?
The concept of libel/slander, both of which are referred to as “defamation,” can be somewhat complex. But in general, all speech is presumed to be protected by the First Amendment with very narrowly-drawn exceptions. One of those exceptions involves defamation, which is defined as publication of a false statement of fact that causes damage to an individual’s reputation. Importantly, the false statement must relate to an issue of fact, and not one’s opinion. Thus I can say, “Ford Sucks” without any legal repercussion, because that is my opinion. But if I say: “The wheels come off of Ford vehicles if the car exceed 40 mile per hour” I can be sued for defamation, unless I have the facts to back up my statement. Truth is always a defense to defamation, so you can make damaging statements of fact about individuals or companies so long as you have the ability to prove the truth of those matters in court.

4. What are the free expression rights of students in public schools under the First Amendment?
Students do not surrender their Free Speech rights when they enter the classroom. But schools are allowed to impose some restrictions on student speech that would not be constitutional if applied to adults outside the classroom setting. Students’ rights under the First Amendment were the strongest in the late 1960’s, when the Supreme Court, under Chief Justice Warren, decided the case of Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District. Under that case’s holding, students had the ability to express themselves – even through their choice of clothing, so long as that expression did not materially disrupt the educational environment. Although that is still technically the law, later decisions from more conservative incarnations of the Supreme Court have dramatically reduced the scope of student free speech rights, allowing schools to censor student speech even to preserve decency or morality.

5. Is a public school student’s choice of dress Constitutionally protected? Including hair color, piercings, etc.
Today, the schools can probably get away with restricting or mandating student dress code so long as the school policy is not “content based.” In other words, the school cannot forbid Democratic political messages on t-shirts while allowing Republican political t-shirts. If everybody is required to wear a white t-shirt as part of a school uniform, that is not a content-based decision. Things like piercings, hair color, tattoos, etc., have been held not to be protected by the First Amendment, and therefore the schools can most likely regulate those items.

6. Has the nature of the First Amendment changed during the past eight years?
Unfortunately, yes. Constitutional rights in general have been eviscerated during the George W. Bush Administration. As a result of repugnant laws like the Patriot Act, as well as the appointment of numerous conservative federal judges throughout the country, it is becoming more and more difficult to prevail on First Amendment–based legal challenges to government censorship activities. Often, these conservative courts will evaluate the ‘value’ of the specific message at issue in a given case, instead of treating all speech equally, as is required under the First Amendment. So, for example, political speech is given more protection than erotic speech, or sarcastic humor. Hopefully we can begin repairing some of this damage during the next presidential administration.

7. Are there restrictions to how people can assemble and petition the government?
The First Amendment protects the right of people to peaceably assemble and petition the government for redress of grievances. These two aspects of the First Amendment have not been fleshed out by the courts, and there is not much law interpreting these rights. One restriction on assembly rights is the requirement that such assemblies be peaceful, and not advocate any form of violence. Recently, there have been efforts at the state and federal levels designed to force protestors to conduct their assembly in designated “free speech zones.” This is clearly an effort by the government to separate the speakers from the intended recipients of the message. Any restrictions on the time, place, or manner of an assembly must be “reasonable” and must provide for alternative means of conducting the communicative activity.

8. Can employers place restrictions with regard to their employee’s ability to practice their religion, such as attire, garb, prayer needs, or time off for religious observances?
Private employers have more latitude with respect to restrictions on religious activities than governmental employers. However, neither private, nor public employers may discriminate against individuals based on their religion or “creed.” These are protected civil rights under federal law. Unfortunately, employers will often find alternative, non-discriminatory reasons for any adverse employment action, so proving a violation of the First Amendment in such cases can be difficult. But technically, employers are required to make reasonable accommodations for the exercise of one’s religion, so long as it does not interfere with the normal functioning of the employee’s duties.

9. What actions can an individual take if they feel they are being deprived of their First Amendment rights?
The first thing is to stand your ground. So many free citizens capitulate to governmental oppression these days, and that is unfortunate. We only have as much freedom as we demand in this country. Government, by its very nature, will always seek to stifle individual freedoms, and try to grab control. It is essential that citizens of this great country stand up, speak up, and be heard. We have the right NOT to remain silent in America. If the government is doing something illegal, there are hundreds of First Amendment lawyers throughout this nation who are willing to take these cases and fight hard for their clients. The First Amendment Lawyers Association, www.FirstAmendmentLawyers.org, is a good place to start looking for a First Amendment attorney if one is needed.

10. Parting shot! Ask us here at The Magical Buffet any one question.
If you could be guaranteed, for the rest of your life, that you would not be the victim of any crime, harassment, or misfortune, would you be willing to give up your constitutional rights to the government?

That is a very difficult question, and one that I don’t think anyone could honestly answer without being in the actual situation. I’d like to think that when push came to shove I would do the right thing….not give up my constitutional rights. I don’t imagine myself to be particularly brave or heroic, but I’d like to think that I would be willing to die to insure those rights for everyone.

Bio:

Lawrence G. Walters is a partner in the national law firm of Weston, Garrou, Walters & Mooney, which maintains offices in Orlando, Los Angeles, San Diego and Salt Lake City. Mr. Walters has developed an outstanding reputation for representing the interests of the online entertainment community. He has practiced law for almost two decades, concentrating in the areas of constitutional, media and Internet law. He is recognized as a national expert on legal issues pertaining to Free Speech and the Internet, and frequently contributes to television news programs on networks such as NBC, ABC, Fox News Channel, MSNBC, CNBC, and CNN. His high profile cases are regularly followed by the print media, and he’s been quoted in such periodicals as the Chicago Tribune, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, San Francisco Chronicle, Wired Magazine, Business 2.0, Playboy, ABA Journal, St. Petersburg Times, Orlando Sentinel, etc.

He began practicing law in Central Florida in 1988, after graduating from Florida State University, College of Law, with Honors. While in law school, he studied English Common Law at Oxford University and interned with a federal judge in the Northern District of Florida. During his career, Mr. Walters has served as a professor at the University of Central Florida, and acted as a Director for the local Bar Association and the local Chamber of Commerce. Among his many civic and community activities, he has served as Chair of the Legal Panel of the ACLU, Central Chapter, and currently participates on the advisory panels for the University of Central Florida’s Law Studies Program, and the Heifer.org charitable group. He has established and directed numerous non-profit associations and trade groups, including the Internet Freedom Association, the Jacksonville Property Rights Association and the Association of Coastal Property Owners. His efforts in helping fight online child pornography earned him the Annual Service Recognition Award from the Association of Sites Advocating Child Protection, www.asacp.org in January, 2005. Recently, Mr. Walters was recognized as one of the Top 100 News Makers by the media industry group, Xbiz, and was included in the top 10% in the ‘Best of the Bar’ competition, conducted by the Orlando Business Journal.

Mr. Walters’ First Amendment law practice dates back to the late ’80s when he defended numerous video stores in Florida against obscenity charges. In 1997, he formed the Florida Bar’s First Amendment Law Committee, which he currently chairs. He represents hundreds of webmasters across the globe in connection with the regulation and protection of online content. Mr. Walters regularly deals with issues relating to online advertising, Internet gaming, domain name protection and other cutting edge practice areas. His law firm has been established for over 45 years, and handles cases involving constitutional and commercial issues such as civil rights litigation, licensing and zoning suits, intellectual property claims, appeals and complex criminal defense. Larry often represents clients in the fields of online gambling, adult entertainment, online dating and Internet pharmaceuticals. He has initiated over 100 federal law suits, and defended over 30 criminal obscenity cases during his career, many of which involved racketeering charges.

Mr. Walters is a frequent lecturer on Free Speech issues, and has presented seminars across the Country on Internet law, Gaming law and the First Amendment. One of his speeches dealing with the First Amendment and Terrorism, was published in the Representative American Speeches of 2003, along with those of President George W. Bush, Dr. Condoleezza Rice, and Sen. Hillary Clinton. He regularly publishes articles of interest to Webmasters on countless websites and magazines, including legal updates directed at specific industries. His website, www.FirstAmendment.com, receives over 1.5 million hits per month, and is recognized as a global resource on Internet law issues. He operates several other websites including www.GameCensorship.com dealing with legal and legislative attempts to censor video games. Over the years, Mr. Walters has published several law review articles on gambling advertising and obscenity regulation, along with a book chapter on the First Amendment protections of commercial speech. His accolades in the legal field have earned him recognition as an honored member in the Who’s Who Registry of Outstanding Professionals, 2006-07 Edition.

In 2005, Mr. Walters was appointed to the Board of Officers of the First Amendment Lawyers Association, a prominent group of First Amendment practitioners, for which he regularly presents lectures on Free Speech and the Internet. He has earned a “BV” (very high) rating from Martindale Hubbell, the national rating service for lawyers. Mr. Walters is admitted to practice in all state and federal courts in Florida, as well as the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta, Georgia, and the U.S. Claims Court in Washington, D.C. In addition he has been admitted pro hac vice to courts across the country.

10 Questions with Peggy Levitt

by Administrator, posted in Books, Interviews, Religion

1. Can you tell my readers a little bit about your book “God Needs No Passport”?
God Needs No Passport is the story of how new immigrants are changing the American religious landscape and making it just as global as our economy and politics. It’s based on conversations with people from Brazil, Ireland, India, and Pakistan who live in the Boston area and with their friends and family members back home.

Our debates about immigration in this country are out-of-sync with how people actually live their everyday lives in three ways. First, when we think about immigration, most Americans expect people to trade in their membership cards in the countries that they come from for a membership card in the United States. The reality is that more and more people continue to invest, build homes, and vote in their homelands at the same time that they start businesses, establish religious congregations, and join the P.T.A. right here. This is a good thing for our country because they are the bridge builders, translators, and religious diplomats we so desperately need.

Second, when we think about religion, most people assume we mean Judeo-Christianity. The type of religious beliefs and practices that many newcomers import do not fall neatly into the model of “bibles, buildings, and boys” or the assumption that religious life takes place in a formal building, where there is a book we all believe in, that a male leader teaches us about. For many of the people I spoke with, there was a great deal of overlap between religion and culture. Faith spilled over into their living rooms, the schoolyard, and the workplace. What they do outside the walls of official religious buildings is much more important than what they do inside them. If we are concerned about deepening and strengthening religious pluralism in this country, we need to learn to think outside the Christian box.

Finally, just as we learn to think outside the Christian box, so we need to think outside the nation-state box. Grasping that people earn their livings, participate in elections campaigns, or raise children across borders is challenging because many of us take for granted that the world has been and always will be organized into sovereign nation-states. But such a view is short on history. Capitalism, imperial and colonial regimes, anti-slavery and workers’ rights campaigns, illegal pirating networks, and, of course, religions have always crossed borders.

Assuming that social life automatically takes place within a national container blinds us to the way the world actually works. Assuming that political outcomes are decided nationally doesn’t give enough credit to political and social movements involving activists around the world. Taking literally the label, “Made in the U.S.A.” ignores the fact that some piece of that garment was probably made in Latin America or Asia. Eberhard Sandschneider, the Research Director at the German Council on Foreign Relations in Berlin got it right when he told the 2005 Davos delegates that what we are increasingly seeing is a multidimensional system in which states work with businesses and civil society through a dense web of international and interdisciplinary networks. Bush administration officials, who told the members of the 9-11 Independent Commission that what happened was completely beyond their imagination because they could not envision a terrorist operation organized across borders, nor did they have the capacity to respond to one, got it dangerously wrong. So many of the problems we face are transnational problems that need transnational solutions.

2. Why did you decide to research the connections between immigration and religion?
I have been studying immigration for close to 20 years. My first book, The Transnational Villagers, was about people from a small village in the Dominican Republic who settled in one particular neighborhood in Boston. I was fascinated by how the people who moved and the people who stayed behind continued to occupy the same social space, and save money, raise children, and worship together, even though they were separated by physical distance. The Catholic church played a big role in helping them do that. Much research on immigration has left out religion and I thought it was time to change that.

3. How do discuss with a stranger sensitive topics such as religion and patriotism?
I felt incredibly fortunate to share people’s “religious biographies.” Most people I spoke to were extremely generous and open. They want people to understand what they believe in and thought I might help them get their stories out.

4. In your opinion, is religion a threat to America? Is religion dangerous?
Despite predictions of secularization, religion is clearly here to stay. Are there people out there who hold extreme values and want to convince the rest of us of their truth? Of course. But that is religion at the margins. The vast majority of people fall in the religious middle. They care about family and community. They care about good jobs, housing, and the environment. They fall along all sides of the political spectrum and, therefore, represent potential partners on all kinds of issues. The religious right has controlled the political use of religion for too long and its time for the left to reclaim religion and use it to promote progressive causes.

5. What was one of the most surprising things you discovered in your research?
One big surprise was how much people’s transnational connections change over the generations. Let’s take the case of Irish immigrants. The new Irish leave behind the “Celtic Tiger” — a country that is richer and more powerful than ever before. The parents of second and third generation Irish Americans left behind a country that was desperately poor. While these Irish Americans still think of Ireland as the place of leprechauns, green beer, and thatched roof cottages, their contemporary counterparts think of computers and condos. When these newcomers and old-timers meet, an interesting generational clash results.

6. Can you tell my readers about the Transnational Studies Initiative?
TSI is an attempt to get people who are concerned about all kinds of economic, social, and political cross border processes to talk to one another. I work on transnational migration and religion. My co-founder researches transnational social movements and politics. We knew there were many researchers and practitioners doing this work around the world but they did not see themselves as part of the same conversation. Nor had they really rethought things like citizenship, belonging, or identity in response to this shared conversation. TSI organizes these encounters. We’ve also published The Transnational Studies Reader to share our perspective with students and practitioners and to specify how it differs from other ways of thinking about global processes.

7. How can the global community benefit from all of this?
I’ve been amazed at the level of nationalism driving much of the 2008 presidential campaign. A case in point is all the “America First” signs that we saw at the Republican convention. Many Americans are fearful of people who hold multiple loyalties. They say that dual citizenship is like polygamy – it’s impossible to be loyal to two countries at the same time. But this is in our future. And it is entirely possible to be an active, contributing member of two places simultaneously. Immigrants are miles ahead of the rest of us because they have let go of false dichotomies like either/or, in or out and show the rest of us how to live in a global world. We should celebrate and emulate their example rather than thwart it.

8. What’s next for you and your work?
I’m turning to arts and culture. I’m interested in how national artistic and cultural institutions, which were created, in part, to create national publics, change when national life no longer obeys national boundaries. I’m curious about how much these institutions recognize these demographic changes and how they respond to them. I’d like to explore this by looking at museums, media outlets, and American universities that are setting up campuses abroad.

9. With your experiences traveling for your research, what’s the best advice you can offer the international traveler?
Be humble and respectful. Listen much more than you speak because there is so much to learn.

10. Parting shot! Ask us here at The Magical Buffet any one question.
I’d like to know more about who your readers are.
Thanks for this opportunity to share my work with you.

I cannot accurately answer that excellent question. Thanks to the wondrous anonymity of the Internet, I’m not sure who reads The Magical Buffet. I would like to think cool people like Stephen Colbert and Joss Whedon check my website daily for information and entertainment, but despite my best rum fueled fantasies; I doubt that’s the case. What I do know is that anyone who reads my site regularly and enjoys it is someone who would probably like me. The Magical Buffet now more than ever, thanks to the relaunch we did in July, is a pretty accurate reflection of who I am, despite that fact, we keep gaining more readers. It’s nice to feel liked.


Bio
Peggy Levitt is Associate Professor of Sociology at Wellesley College and a Research Fellow at The Weatherhead Center for International Affairs and The Hauser Center for Nonprofit Organizations at Harvard University where she co-directs The Transnational Studies Initiative. Her book, God Needs No Passport: Immigrants and the Changing American Religious Landscape was published by The New Press in July 2007. The Transnational Studies Reader was also published by Routledge Press in 2007. Her first book, The Transnational Villagers, was published by the University of California Press in 2001.

Peggy Levitt is:

Associate Professor, Department of Sociology Wellesley College (http://www.peggylevitt.org)

Author of God Needs No Passport:Immigrants and the Changing American
Religious Landscape

Co-Director of the Transnational Studies Initiative and Associate at The Weatherhead Center for International Affairs and The Hauser Center for Nonprofit Organizations, Harvard University

10 Questions with Steve Kenson

by Administrator, posted in Geek Stuff, Interviews

1. In case some of my readers aren’t sure of what we’re talking about, when we say RPG, or role-playing games, what are we talking about? What is a role-playing game?
Well, when I say it, a roleplaying game is something where you and some friends get together, create characters in an imaginary world, and play out their adventures using dice (or some other randomizers) and a set of game rules to determine the outcomes, building the story (and, to a degree, the characters) as you go along. I’ve run into a lot of folks to whom “RPG” now means online games, so I guess that makes me an “old school” gamer, since to me it means tabletop, face-to-face games.

2. How old were you when you played your first role-playing game and what game was it?
I was 12 and it was the first edition of Gamma World from TSR. My school friends and I quickly moved on to the D&D Basic Set and other games as well.

3. What do you feel are some of the benefits of having role-playing games as a hobby?
I think there are many benefits, not the least of which are stimulating the imagination, teaching English, math, and research skills, social time with friends, and providing a fun creative outlet.

4. What would you like to say to parents who may be concerned about their child’s interest in role-playing games?
Try actually playing an RPG with your child to get an understanding of what it’s like from the inside. Talk to your kids about their RPG experiences and why they’re interested in them, rather than relying on outsiders with an agenda (including me!). Get informed and form you own opinions.

5. When did you realize that perhaps you could go from a player of, to a creator of role-playing games?
Probably when I was helping play test the second edition of Shadowrun. I submitted a number of ideas for new spells, powers, and so forth, and the developer liked almost all of them, leading me to realize, “Hey, I’m pretty good at this!”

6. You have a huge list of RPG credits these days. Am I the first person to say, “Kudos on doing some work for ‘Hong Kong Action Theater’?”
Wow. The first one I can recall. That’s definitely one of my more obscure projects… Back in my full-time freelance days, you took work where you could get it.

7. Now, I don’t want to ask Dad to pick a favorite, so what are a few of your role-playing publishing achievements you are most proud of?
Well, Mutants & Masterminds because it’s the most robust and long-lasting game line that I’ve had the most direct hand in, as both designer and developer. In particular, Freedom City is my baby and I’ve loved watching the setting grow and develop as other creators get to play there.

I’m proud of my contributions to Shadowrun and I have a deep fondness for the game and its world. I’m also quite pleased to have contributed to Earthdawn, which is probably my favorite fantasy RPG.

8. All right, you have this question to expound on the virtues of the “Mutants and Masterminds” role-playing game.
Well, the goal with M&M was to create an RPG that plays like a comic book, and I think mechanics like the Toughness saving throw for damage and the acquisition and spending of hero points help to make it so. There’s a give-and-take to the action, and players are rewarded for doing things in a superheroic fashion.

Plus, M&M benefits from having top-notch production values and artwork, which is a credit to our Art Director, Hal Mangold, who does an awesome job making the books look good, and to Sean Glenn, who did the initial graphic design for the “look” of M&M.

9. Okay, huge swaths of my readers adore your partner Christopher Penczak, so please take a moment to share something amusing about him. I’m all for public embarrassment, but if you prefer, it can be something nice and not humiliating.
It’s funny how, in a different world, Christopher might well have been a big-time gamer: he had some experience with D&D as a kid, but the group he played with wasn’t very good, so he didn’t have much fun and gave up on the idea of RPGs. I think, if he’d played with a better group, there’s a good possibility he would have ended up as an RPG author or designer, he’s certainly got all the right talents for it!

10. Parting shot! Ask us here at The Magical Buffet any one question.
Something I’ve considered recently: how does (or did) your experience as a gamer inform your spiritual life, and vice versa? Is it true what the hysterics of the 1980s claimed: did D&D (or RPGs in general) “lead you into the occult”? What’s the overlap between the gaming hobby and the neo-pagan spiritual path, and what (if anything) does it mean?

That is an interesting question. I didn’t actually start gaming until late high school, which makes me a late bloomer compared to most gamers I know. By that point, I already had a fascination with other faiths and magical practices. Perhaps because I was the only Jewish student in my school, perhaps just because?

I feel gaming and various spiritualities can overlap. Anyone who has cracked open an old school GURPS source book on Greece or Egypt has been given a crash course in mythology. Dungeons and Dragons, back when there were alignments and clerics to deities, forced players to consider issues of faith and the inner struggle of good versus evil. Personally, my first game ever was Vampire Second Edition from White Wolf. Our game master never let us forget the price you pay for immortality. At its finest, gaming gives you a safe environment to explore and challenge different ideas and societal conceptions. This does serve as an entry point to consider the idea of other faiths and modes of spirituality.

Obviously, this isn’t universally true. I have met gamers who to put it kindly, are narrow-minded. And of course, being of a faith outside of the norm of your community doesn’t automatically mean you’ll enjoy the hobby of gaming. Gaming, like any hobby is something that some will enjoy and some will find boring, lame, and/or a waste of time.

Extra Bonus Geek Question!
I polled several of my gaming buddies, and this question I feel best asserts my posse’s geek cred.

11. In the “Song of Ice and Fire” RPG, will players be able to recreate fights like the one between Gregor Clegane and Prince Oberyn without using dumb tactics for either one or requiring ridiculously implausible rolls?
We certainly hope so! SIFRP (as we call it for short) has a lot of optional detail for systems like combat, but one of my favorite aspects of it is how the player chooses the consequences of damage suffered by the character; all “damage” in combat builds towards “defeat,” at which point the victor gets to decide what happens to the loser: death, unconsciousness, severe embarrassment, or what have you. The defender, however, can choose to mitigate such losses by accepting injuries and wounds (long-term setbacks) to stave off defeat, or even to yield (offering up their own terms of defeat) rather than letting their opponent dictate the terms. There are a lot of options in there for making a good story out of a fight.

About Steve Kenson:
Steve Kenson began freelancing in the RPG industry in 1993. By 1995, he was working full-time as a freelance author and designer on RPGs such as Shadowrun and Earthdawn. He has written for a wide variety of game-lines and published ten novels: seven for the Shadowrun line, two for Crimson Skies, and one for MechWarrior.

In 2002, Steve designed the Mutants & Masterminds Superhero RPG for Green Ronin Publishing under the Open Game License. Two years later, he became a line developer with Green Ronin, overseeing the development of the Second Edition of M&M, along with games such as Blue Rose, True20 Adventure Roleplaying, and A Song of Ice and Fire Roleplaying. He remains an avid gamer with his weekly game group.

Steve maintains a website at www.stevekenson.com and a LiveJournal at xomec.livejournal.com. He lives in southern New Hampshire with New Age and pagan author Christopher Penczak and residential counselor and part-time tooth fairy Adam Sartwell.

10 Questions with a Humanist

by Administrator, posted in Interviews

Rebecca interviews Fred Edwords

1. The American Humanist Association’s basic definition of Humanism reads: “Humanism is a progressive philosophy of life that, without theism and other supernatural beliefs, affirms our ability and responsibility to lead ethical lives of personal fulfillment that aspire to the greater good of humanity.” Is this how you personally define Humanism as well?
Since I helped write that, yes. But I could add another definition that I also had a hand in: “Humanists—motivated by compassion, inspired by imagination, guided by reason, and informed by experience—strive toward a world of mutual care and concern.” In sum, we’re people committed to being good without God.

2. How does Humanism differ from Atheism or Agnosticism?
Well, once people arrive at a conclusion that ideas such as God, gods, or the supernatural are false, don’t make sense, or aren’t productive of growth and understanding, they sometimes ask themselves, “Now what?” And that’s where Humanism comes in. Humanism takes people to the next level. It allows them to move beyond mere negation to a positive affirmation of life.

As the late Corliss Lamont, author of The Philosophy of Humanism, put it; Humanism says “Yes” to life. That means Humanism offers a set of worldly, human-based values that allow one to endure adversity, find personal meaning, reach out to others, and discover the excitement of exploring what’s really out there.

And what do Humanists say really is out there? The natural world, humanity, relationships, the arts, and so much else. For example, the universe as discoverable by science is so fascinating in all its variety and complexity that there’s more than enough to keep whole populations entranced for generations upon generations. No need to expend time on the supernatural or paranormal when the natural offers mysteries aplenty! You can add to this the study of people, including the ways they think and feel, the vast collection of things they have made (which includes even religions and mythologies), and the wide range of human stories that we find in history, biography, and fiction. I could go on. We’ll never run out of things to learn and do, think about and feel, care about and act upon. Hence we’re content to explore “one world at a time.”

3. Do Humanists interact with, or ever work with, religious communities?
Yes. This happens in two ways: individually and collectively.

Individual Humanists, like billionaire Ted Turner, are working with religious institutions that have effective programs in place to bring aid to the suffering (without making religious preaching a centerpiece of such humanitarian help). Other Humanists, like scientist Edward O. Wilson, are working with Evangelical Christians to help raise environmental awareness, stop global warming, protect endangered species, and save the Earth.

Humanist organizations, such as the American Humanist Association, regularly work with religious organizations for common cause in promoting civil liberties, separation of church and state, abortion rights, gay rights, peace, social justice, and so on. We respect the fact that, while Humanists have a lot of innovative ideas and progressive moral sympathies, traditional religions tend to have the people power—at least here in the United States and many other countries.

4. What are some of the goals of the Humanist community?
Our primary mission is to share Humanist ideas with the world, apply Humanism to the critical issues of our time, and defend the liberties of Humanists. We see our philosophy as offering a clearer way to understand the world, a more effective approach to solving the world’s problems, and an attitude that promotes peace and a widening circle of inclusiveness. But because there has been a longstanding prejudice against our nonreligious, skeptical, rational, and empirical approach to knowledge, some Humanists have suffered discrimination and unfair treatment. So we speak up for our own and even offer legal help when necessary.

5. What is the biggest misconception, if any, about Humanism?
There is an assumption that rationality, which plays a central role in Humanism, makes one cold, unfeeling, and unimaginative. But rationality actually liberates people from a number of harmful ideas that can block the free expression of their personalities and the blossoming of their moral potential. The late Humanist psychologist Albert Ellis demonstrated this so effectively in his various books—including such classics as Sex Without Guilt and A Guide to Rational Living—which continue to enjoy a wide readership after decades. (He subsequently wrote updated versions which can be found on the Web site of the Albert Ellis Institute at www.albertellisinstitute.org .)

6. Who are some of your favorite Humanists, and why?
There are so many because they have been active in such a wide range of fields. When it comes to taking courageous stands for liberation, I think of suffragist Elizabeth Cady Stanton, family planning pioneer Margaret Sanger, civil rights leader A. Philip Randolph, and Russian dissident Andrei Sakharov. When it comes to scientific innovation I think of Julian Huxley, Linus Pauling, Stephen Jay Gould, Steven Pinker, and Carolyn Porco. I’m energized by the astuteness of social critics like Barbara Ehrenreich and Wendy Kaminer. And I’m amazed by the imagination of an inventor like Buckminster Fuller or a fantasy novelist like Philip Pullman. All of these people are or were part of the organized Humanist community in some way. But stepping beyond such individuals there are those who have proclaimed their Humanism independent of the movement, such as Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, whose hands-on humanitarian work has been an inspiration.

7. Asimov, Vonnegut, and Farmer?
I knew all three. Isaac Asimov was just fun to talk to. He had a great sense of humor and was an incomparable storehouse of knowledge. More than just a science fiction writer, he was rightly called “the great explainer of our age” by Bill Moyers. Kurt Vonnegut was funny in his own self-deprecating but plain-speaking way. He liked to hang out with ordinary people and say just what he thought, doing so with a Mark Twain style of wit that is rarely seen. James Farmer, who I met only once but also corresponded with, was a vigorous and untiring activist for civil rights. Yet he wasn’t the type to make people feel under attack when answering their questions. His approach was understanding because he could see the perspective of white people who were struggling to “get it.” And he wanted to help them succeed. Yet in other situations he could put his life on the line for the rights of African Americans. All of this was why, without an advanced university degree, he was able to teach at universities.

8. That leads me to ask, as a sci-fi geek myself, why do you think science fiction writers are so drawn to Humanism?
Because Humanism celebrates thinking outside the box. Just by the fact that Humanists are willing to step outside of traditional religion, and even go against the grain to the point where they arrive at the idea of a godless, natural universe, shows that they are people who are willing to question the status quo, rethink the culture, and then imagine a different future. Lots of science fiction and fantasy writers are or have been Humanists or the equivalent: Mary Shelley, H.G. Wells, H.P. Lovecraft, Robert A. Heinlein, Gene Roddenberry, Arthur C. Clarke, and Ursula Le Guin, just to name a few more.

9. How would you suggest someone learn more about Humanism?
The American Humanist Association website at www.americanhumanist.org was deliberately made rich in information so that people everywhere could not only find other Humanists or find what Humanists are doing but could explore the philosophy deeply. On that Web site we have blog posts, news reports, articles, philosophical essays, and entire books free for downloading or reading online. And nobody has to sign in, sign on, or pay for anything to access this material. Also, there are no annoying ads or pop-ups. It’s simply a free and open resource. Yes, you can also sign onto statements, purchase books, register for conferences, or join the organization. But that’s up to you. There’s no pressure.

10. Parting shot! Ask us here at The Magical Buffet any one question.
What would have to happen, or what evidence would you need to see, to make you change your mind about something you now dearly believe to be true?

I can see several ways that could happen. Generally, personal experience is what changes my mind. I hear something is true, and then I experience it first hand and decide for myself. Of course, despite what some people may think, rational, logical arguments do in fact change my mind. Ever see the show “Penn & Teller’s Bullshit”? I sometimes I think all it takes is for Penn Jillette to tell me something.


About Fred Edwords:A leading voice for Humanism in the United States and abroad, Fred Edwords is recognized as an outstanding lecturer, debater, and inspirational speaker on human rights, Humanist philosophical issues, and Humanist lifestyle concerns. He has appeared on national and local television in the United States and Canada, has been interviewed on radio and for newspapers around the world, and has lectured in North America, Europe, and India. He has also written for several publications in the United States and elsewhere.

Fred Edwords began his Humanist activism in 1977 as vice president of the Humanist Association of San Diego. He became president the next year, expanded his reach as American Humanist Association West Coast regional coordinator in 1979, and became national administrator for the organization in 1980. He then served for fifteen years as AHA executive director (1984-1999) and twelve years as editor of the Humanist magazine (1994-2006). Edwords now focuses his attention on bringing Humanism to a wider public in his capacity as AHA director of communications.

Fred Edwords is also seen as a leader in the broader community of reason. He was the first president (2002-2005) of Camp Quest, Inc., a summer camp for freethinking children, and served in various leadership roles on the staff of the Ohio camp from 1998 to 2008. He has also served on the boards of the International Humanist and Ethical Union and the National Center for Science Education, served as vice president of the North American Committee for Humanism, and been a member of the adjunct faculty of the Humanist Institute. In 1980 he was the founding editor of the Creation/Evolution journal-the only publication dedicated to answering the pseudoscientific, philosophical, educational, and legal arguments of creationists-serving as its editor for eleven years. For such work Edwords was recognized in the mid-1980s as Rationalist of the Year by the American Rationalist Federation and as a Humanist Pioneer by the American Humanist Association. He continues as an advisor for the Secular Student Alliance and a Humanist Celebrant in the Humanist Society.

He is also the director of planned giving for the American Humanist Association.

Rebecca Speaks Again!

by Administrator, posted in Events, Interviews

That’s right folks, my voice is again going to be heard on the internet. This time it’s going to be on the Paravision radio show on the Para-X Radio network. I’m really excited because Para-X Radio has lots of good shows and a great chat room.

I will be a guest on September 19, 2008 (this Friday). The show runs from 8-9pm eastern. To tune in just go to the Para-X Radio website, then click on “Live Chat” in the thin red bar at the top of the page. This allows you instant access to the chat room and the live feed of the show. If you get there early, you may have to refresh your computer at 8pm to pick up the show when it starts.

Enjoy!

For those of you who missed my last appearance on ISIS Paranormal Radio, you can check it out here.