The Morning Heresy is your daily digest of news and links relevant to the secular and skeptic communities.
McDonald’s—yes, McDonald’s—declares it has committed to what they call a science-based plan to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by one third by 2030, and this includes its suppliers. They say that they are the first restaurant company to do something like this.
Meanwhile, the cities of Oakland and San Francisco are suing the five big oil companies for damages for their role in screwing up the planet. These giant corporations have been unable to get the case dismissed. FiveThirtyEight‘s Anna Maria Barry-Jester reports from the courtroom.
“Egregiously sloppy.” “Religious overtones.” “Fabricated.” “[A] pattern of ethically and morally questionable behavior.” “Scientific misconduct and an extreme religious agenda.” These are words and phrases attributed to the new head of the CDC, Robert Redfield. I think I’m coming down with something.
The voters of Alabama will decide this November whether the Ten Commandments can be displayed on state property. Will there be an option on the ballot for “What, are you f***ing kidding me?”
Earlier this month, the director of CFI’s west coast empire operation, Jim Underdown, attended a conference for California’s interfaith community hosted by Assemblymember Eloise Gomez Reyes. He was kind enough to supply the text of his remarks, which include:
I guess what I’m here to say is, we’re not your enemies. I have devoutly religious friends and family that I love and would do anything for—and they for me. We’re your neighbors and friends and co-workers and family members. The vast majority of us of us obey the law, pay our taxes, and care about our fellow human beings as much as any religious person does. We care about our communities and our country, and we want to participate in the work that will make our neighborhoods, our states, and our country good places to live. But we can’t work together until all of us are included.
Andreea Nica at Religion Dispatches speaks to people who made the difficult transition out of fundamentalist religion, the subset of the “nones” a new study is referring to as “exiters.”
Have you seen the pictures of that tiny “alien skeleton”? It’s not an alien (surprise, surprise), but a human child who lived with an unfortunate combination of genetic mutations.
Do you know who Kim Wilde is? You’d probably have to be my age or a little older to remember the song “Kids in America.” Anyway, she’s apparently having some sort of comeback after she got a lot of YouTube views for a video of her drunkenly singing that song on a subway, wearing antlers, with a guy playing guitar. Why the hell am I talking about this? Because her new album is called Here Come the Aliens, inspired by what Wilde says was a real alien spacecraft she saw. “Maybe they’ll save us from the apocalypse,” she says. THAT’S IT. Go about your business.
Quote of the Day
This headline from The Guardian, all by itself:
Bulgarians rush to save a phalanx of distressed, frozen storks
Bulgarians? Phalanx? Distressed, frozen storks??? I am going to be repeating this to myself all day. Might have to make a song out of it.
Oh, and, you know, good job, Bulgarians.
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