My primary reason for traveling to Atlanta was to read a paper at the 2012 Eastern Division Annual Meeting of the American Philosophical Association (APA). I was invited by my colleague John Shook, head of the Society of Humanist Philosophers. I was joined on my panel by Melvin L. Rogers, Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Emory University, and Brad Elliot Stone, Associate Professor of Philosophy and African American Studies at Loyola Marymount University. Rogers, a John Dewey scholar, read a paper titled “Toward a Democratic Ethos: Engaging Du Bois’ Souls of Black Folk.” Stone, Chairman of the African American Studies Department, and the Director of the University Honors Program, read a paper titled “Prophetic Pragmatism and Black Secular Humanism.”My primary reason for traveling to Atlanta was to read a paper at the 2012 Eastern Division Annual Meeting of the American Philosophical Association (APA). I was invited by my colleague John Shook, head of the Society of Humanist Philosophers. I was joined on my panel by Melvin L. Rogers, Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Emory University, and Brad Elliot Stone, Associate Professor of Philosophy and African American Studies at Loyola Marymount University. Rogers, a John Dewey scholar, read a paper titled “Toward a Democratic Ethos: Engaging Du Bois’ Souls of Black Folk.” Stone, Chairman of the African American Studies Department, and the Director of the University Honors Program, read a paper titled “Prophetic Pragmatism and Black Secular Humanism.”

In late December I traveled to Atlanta to speak at the 2012 Eastern Division Annual meeting of the American Philosophical Association (APA). While there, I met with members of the Black Nonbelievers of Atlanta, and with author and documentary filmmaker Jeremiah Camara.

The American Family Association (AFA) has issued a warning that, by 2060, Christians could be oppressed in much the same way that African Americans were before the coming of the civil rights movement. It further warned that the nuclear family could go the way of the dinosaur, and that the U.S. could have a Muslim president.

Authorities in India have charged five men with kidnapping, gang-raping and murdering a woman in Delhi on December 16th. (The woman died later.) Thousands of women in the nation have marched to protest against the rape in particular, and against sexism in general. Sheila Dikshit, the Chief Minister of Delhi, joined the protesters and demanded strong laws against rape. Shahsi Tharoor, Junior Education Minister of India, advocates naming a new anti-rape law after the victim. Some politicians are demanding the death penalty and chemical castration for rapists.