Prosecutors are investigating the death of a newborn boy who died in September after contracting herpes through a controversial practice of ritual circumcision, reviving a debate in New York over safety and religious freedom. [...] The cause of death of the 2-week-old boy, who died at Maimonides Hospital in Brooklyn on Sept. 28, was Type 1 herpes, caused by “ritual circumcision with oral suction,” according to the medical examiner’s office. The ritual of oral suction — or in Hebrew, metzitzah b’peh — is practiced almost exclusively in ultra-Orthodox communities and, to a lesser degree, in Orthodox Jewish communities, despite efforts by the city to curtail it and educate communities about its health risks. The procedure occurs during the circumcision ritual of the bris, as the practitioner, or mohel, removes the foreskin of the penis and then sucks the blood from the wound to clean it.

Following up on OVO blog posts commenting on mainstream media in the past [2/05] [8/05] [11/05] [9/07] [12/07], another report of grown men sucking the blood from a baby boy’s freshly wounded penis in front of an appreciative audience.  Only religion gets a free pass on such atrocities.  Only religion allows you to mutilate a child’s genitals, suck blood from the wound, do so in public and get away with it.  Somehow this one more dead baby on a pile of who knows how many more dead babies isn’t really a dead baby.  It’s a debate, a controversy.  There’s two sides to it.  Two sides, a debate.  We’re having a conversation about it, it’s a controversy.  Just put that dead baby over there while we have a debate about this controversy.   On one side, there’s not practicing amateur cosmetic surgery on newborns, wrapping quivering bearded lips around the delicate member and drawing out blood through the sucking motion of a diseased tongue.  And on the other side, there’s religion.

I’d like to live in a world where there isn’t a debate about this ritual of oral suction, and it isn’t controversial.  A world where everyone recognizes this as wrong in every circumstance and without exception.  I’d like to live in a world where the parents who allow this to happen have their surviving children taken away, and the men who do it are put in prison for life.  There’s no subtlety necessary, no need to be concerned about the feelings and traditions and communities involved.  May metzitzah b’peh end and never again be practiced.  If the practitioners are not willing to give it up, the full force of the law should be used against them.  Let the charges of antisemitism fly.  My defense is I advocate the criminalization of all sucking of cradle cock, not just the hemopedophilia carried out by these monsters.

Everyone simply can’t go “back to 1911″ – there wouldn’t be enough energy there to support our wasteful habits. The last viable population density must’ve occurred, in fact, around 1911. After that – the crowd. The utopian reversionism I’m proposing, I guess, is only possible for a self-chosen elite.

Petroleum was a rare commodity in 1911 – like whale oil today. Stoves burned wood – a renewable resource. Plant an acorn, reap a cord of fixed sunlight. I’m not saying everyone should to it now. I’m saying that we – carefree luddites – will burned wood in our ornate victorian stoves, while everyone else poisons themselves with petrol & electricity.

The alchemists tell us that not all forms of heat are simply the same calories delivered by different tech. The heat of a brooding hen, heat of a manure pile, heat of a woodstove – & the heat of a nuclear reactor disaster – are qualitatively different, not just quantitatively.

Woodfire has been used since the cave people discovered fire. It comes from heaven (as lightning) – it warms the Zoroastrian temple in Persia, the Vedic sacrifice in India, the Celtic bonfire on May Day, the outdoor barbecue invented by buccaneers on Hispaniola. Woodfire is basic everyday magic. It transforms food alchemically. It alchemizes the domestic hearth. It engenders visions. It is the body of the djinn.

Frankly we no longer care very deeply about the end of the world. It’s too late for “everyone” to go on gulping down oil & shitting out pollution. The only solution to the energy crisis is voluntary poverty, as Ivan Illich used to say – so the secret is to learn to enjoy it.

Frenchfry oil, wind power, solar panels, nuclear power plants – none of them will allow the whole world to go on sucking up oil & other forms of dead energy like us Americans in 2011 – like it’s “going out of style” (which it is) – so let’s just do without it, & revert to 1911, comrades. Abandon the suckers to their doomsday scenarios (Rapture, Global Warming, Peak Oil, band, whimper), & stoke up your ACME woodstove with aromatic pine, & sit around it all winter with the complete works of Balzac, Scott, Dumas, Stevenson, Proust. Roast some apples. Simmer your poppy-head tea. Dream on.

I know that you don’t like to think this, but we are much like humans. We are subject to the human frailties. We forget. We get slip-shod. We fall short of our disciplines. You have selected me to be the family coordinator and I agreed to be, at least until someone better comes along. So that’s why I’m now reminding you of some of our basic principles for handling slaves.

Our slaves can get bored easily. When bored, they get restless. They start thinking, and questioning order. Therefore it is necessary for us to direct their thinking into areas which keep them dependent on our leadership. We must make them feel dependent on society for all their needs. Make them feel important to the Great Whole to which they belong. Keep them too deep in debt to have any spare time to experiment with principles of self-sufficiency, or even just getting out of hole.

A few of the slaves who refuse to conform are squatting in various places and planting their apple seeds, plum pits, grape seeds, avocado pits, orange seeds, nuts of all kinds and vegetables. They are not using our hybrid seeds. They found organic natural seeds more productive. They are creating Gardens of Eden, with free food, no rent and and acceptance of the Golden Rule instead of Government. So far, only a few of the smarter nonconformists are doing this. This gets them off our case; however, we must not give them any publicity, as it might encourage more our workers to not conform.

The family came up with a great innovation when they first decided to “allow” the peons to “own” land. Ownership gives them roots ties them down and makes it a easier to find them. It also gives us a classification of slave known as landlords. They serve us by forcing people to pay them rent in order to have a space to sleep on this planet. Thus they all work for us for the rest of their lives. We must always make them think that this is normal and that everyone has always had to pay rent and that they always will.

If the slaves deviate from present thought patterns, they might think it strange that they “agree” to work for us for 30 years to buy a place to sleep. They might wonder why some “primitive” people are able to build their homes from the material at hand in a couple of weeks and have no mortgage to pay. They might even find it simpler, more enjoyable and even more adventuresome to walk to where they wish to go instead of working for us to earn money to make perpetual car payments to us, so that they can get to a job to make the money to make their car payments. To say nothing of the car maintenance costs and depreciation. We must constantly entice them to buy. They make much better workers if are always in debt.

If we allow them space to think, they may question the vehicle with which they are killing themselves: 50,800 persons dead and 1,900,000 disabled in 1981 in the United States alone.They may see how machines and their present manufacturing processes are destroying their life-support system. They may see that all the processed junk food we’re selling them is making them sick and costing them more; see that their boring, unsatisfying jobs are driving many of them crazy. They might even discover the simplest unprocessed foods which are cheap and healthful.

As it is recorded in our family archives, one of our forefathers, Galus Julius Caesaer once sald: “Give them breed and circuses, to keep them from rebelling.” It is a simple matter to give them food, but it takes a little more imagination to give them circuses. I guess this is the creative part of being slave masters – to create diversions to keep their gullible little minds busy.

Our Watergate Scandal was a fine circus. It kept them thinking and talking along safe lines for years. We are still getting some mileage out of the Kennedy Assassination and they still aren’t sure whether we shot the real Kennedy, his double or a dummy. We have fine show going on Central America and in the Middle East, some still lingering in Germany, others in Vietnam, the USSR and China.

We may use the recent invasion to start another World War. It will be a challenge to attempt to involve our sheep in another big war, so soon after the last one. However, we may be able to pull it off, to get them angry enough to fight. We wouldn’t need to use the older nuclear bombs, as they could be dangerous to our families’ health. We might use a few of our cleaner H-Bombs. It will be a creative, fun time for us. Wars are truly the sport of kings. They are more fun to stage and run than chess games, or are hum-drum activities of production or politics.

Creating straw men for slaves to knock down is one of our best numbers. We set it up and let them tear it down. It diverts much of their creative energy. We create another excellent diversion by resisting their efforts to tear it down.

We learned long ago that people can think only one thought line at a time. We feed them thoughts and they either fight them or go along with them.

Music has always been an effective tool for setting their moods, their pace and leading their thoughts. While dancing they learn to step to the beat of our drummer and keep the pace we set. This teaches them to obey orders. The drum has always been useful for this. We let them touch each other during the dance. They seem to enjoy touching and they feel successful when they keep in step, so this training process becomes self-perpetuating. It also serves as an excellent distraction.

They must occupy their minds with keeping in step to the beat and with how they are going to entice their partners to deb. If they are constantly bombarded with distractions they will have no time to do any real thinking. They will only be aware of that which we make them aware.

Our closest guarded secret is the fact that slavery still exists in every country on this planet.

Laborers, farmers, traders, professionals, managers, directors and presidents – all take pay, so they must obey our orders. They are not aware of their bondage. Some are vaguely aware of the idea that “big money” runs everything. But they are unable to relate to the idea that they are part of that “everything.”

They think that they are free people, making all their own decisions We allow them to make the unimportant ones. The important ones we cover in their laws, and in their customs and religious and moral codes. We have even trained them to punish their own kind when they do not conform.

We have been masters for a long, long, time. We teach kids how to work, to be submissive and to obey orders. These kids grow up to he good slaves, like their parents. Most of the parents even go so far as to break their own kid’s spirits. So by the time they are of work age, them are docile, gullible and easy to manipulate.

Through all our media, including books, we give them a substitute for living. For example, we encourage them to live vicariously through the exciting adventures of fiction. This puts their fantasy life through an exciting energy drain which seems to satisfy some of their emotional hunger.

This substitute fills one of those spaces in time which they might have used to go out and experience life first-hand. Distractions keep them from discovering the bondage they are in. We must continue to titillate them to want to watch television and movies, to read newspapers, magazines and books to listen to radio and music.

We use the mass media not only for a distraction but also to help create their basic beliefs and expectations. Of course, the schools and churches serve this purpose too, as do popular songs and music. We use the media to create the desire to buy. In this way we motivate them to work for us.

They continue to administer to our needs as they did to Caeser’s and as they did for the priests in the time of the great pyamids. Our ancestors really knew how to handle people! As slaves get more education it takes a little more finesse to keep on top of them; however, it’s basically the same even today. Keep them fearful; fearful of death, fearful of pain, fearful of each other. Always encourage competition: it’s like fighting, separates people and keeps them fearful of losing.

We have made them afraid of death by telling them that they have spirits which live on after their death. If they obey our rules, which we tell them were inspired by God, their spirits will be assured entrance into Heaven or reincarnated into a better existence, depending on which of our religions they have chosen. This makes them afraid to die, because they know they haven’t obeyed all the rules (which we deliberately made too difficult to always be obeyed). If they can be kept afraid they are more easy to manage. Then they look to us for guidance and protection.

Promoting fear of pain is another distraction we have always used. We must not give them time to discover that pain is their body’s method of alerting them to the fact that they are doing something wrong to it. So before they can check out the reason for the pain, we channel them to a doctor who will attempt to numb the pain. The doctor will take up time and money doing so. It creates a great diversion, and debt. Some people talk about their pain constantly. The patients’ pain will usually return (sometimes to a different part of their body) after their cure. Doctors usually don’t remove the cause of pains. This would put them out of business.

We hire some of the slaves to act as police and soldiers so that we can threaten to inflict pain and imprisonment on the others. They literally enforce their own slavery when they take jobs in law enforcement and the military. We keep them too busy and too broke to realize this.

Sports and gambling have always been good spectacle. Sex may rate second place, drugs third. We have achieved a sort mass hypnosis by using movies, TV and music, with which we have been able to implant suggestions and beliefs without their being aware of it.

We may need to give our ecology program front page coverage again soon. It can take up the Slack to hold their attention in case it is untimely to start a war now.

Remember, the Warbucks family has ruled on this planet for six thousand years, so it is our right and destiny to continue doing so. Keep up the good work and if you have any problems, contract Alexandria or Ernest, as I’m taking a little vacation.

- Cleopatra Warbucks

from OVO 11 CONTROL (September 1991)

See also:
OVO 2 (1987)

It is annoying to attend religious services and annoying not to. One who has had deep feelings for some organized religion finally gives up on its extant and visible self, usually after bouts of non-involvement, aggrieved attendance, and conquering indifference.

“It is the evil of the age,” explains the voice of tradition. “It is the self-judgment of an illusion,” comes the modern explanation. Have we really no slicker attitudes to cop than these: a sour sense of personal purity or an embittered belief in our rational integrity?

The real culprit is the whole idea of organized religion, which ought to be stacked next to military intelligence, public education & jumbo shrimp in a museum of dizziness.

How could we have believed that we could walk into any mosque / church / temple – the spiritual equivalent of a waiting room – and find our undiscovered and secret desires? Shame shame shame on us for having tried to share our spirit with less care and precaution than we would ordinarily exercise in sharing our sperm.

The people with whom one can do religion are as rare as those with whom one can make love – and not always the same persons!

Better to make religion a beautiful personal solace, like masturbation, than to rely on paid priests / rabbis / imams, licensed by the state to practice unsafe spirituality and spread mental diseases, especially those which undermine the mind’s natural defenses and immunities against silliness.

Anyone will tell you that religion is a private thing – but I teach you that religion must be a secret thing! Fools, guard your dreams! The wise have none so beautiful as yours!

Therefore, Moorish Orthodoxy. Because the title is less cumbersome than Anarchopaganzen – Hebreaochrislam.

Moorish Science Monitor. Volume 2 Number 6. Winter 1987.

Multiple name identities are co-incarnations, individuals who exist in more than one body at the same time.

A few multiple name identities can be found in academia. Nicholas Bourbaki has written several influential papers on mathematics since 1935.  A number of men were Nicholas Bourbaki.  The theologian Franz Bibfeldt was also a number of men.

Most multiple name identities are found in the arts. No one knows who is the author of the 1930 book The Little Engine That Could.  The story is attributed to Watty Piper, which was the house name of publisher Platt & Munk.  Many men and women wrote under the name Watty Piper.  

Kenneth Robeson was the creator and author of the Doc Savage character, who first appeared in 1933.  Lester Dent and a number of men wrote the stories, all of which were published under the Street & Smith house name Kenneth Robeson.

Three German men were Stefan Brockhoff, author of mystery novels from the 1930s to the 1950s.  

Kilgore Trout is a science fiction author who first appears in the 1965 book God Bless You Mr. Rosewater by science fiction author Kurt Vonnegut.  Trout is modeled after the science fiction author Theodore Sturgeon, who in turn was born with the name Edward Hamilton Waldo.  Philip J. Farmer wrote the 1974 science fiction novel Venus on the Half-Shell and attributed it to Trout.

Since 1968, films which the director wishes to distance themselves from are attributed to Alan Smithee. The Internet Movie Database lists more than seventy titles attributed to Alan Smithee.

David Agnew is a name used by the BBC as a shared scriptwriting credit since the 1970s.

Bruce Lee died during the production of the 1978 film Game of Death.  Two other actors took on the role of playing Bruce Lee playing the character Billy Lo and the film was released.

V. C. Andrews’ 1979 book Flowers in the Attic was so successful that authors have published dozens of books under her name since her death in 1986.

Between 1988 and 1994, the Dutch composer Van den Budenmayer wrote the score for Zbigniew Prisner’s films.  den Budenmayer was several men working under one name.

Nicholas Palmer wrote the 1990 book Fuck Yes! under the pseudonym Rev. Wing Fu Fing.  On a lark, author Tom Robbins signed a copy of Fuck Yes! when a Robbins fan handed it to him.  This started the rumor that Robbins was the secret author of Fuck Yes!, a rumor which helped Palmer sell 50,000 copies of the self-published book over the next four years.  Fuck Yes! tells the story of a man who says ‘yes’ to every circumstance that life presents him.  In 1996 Palmer sued Robbins, who agreed to never sign another copy of the book again.  Palmer said: “It’s not just Robbins, the book is good. It has allowed him to take advantage of my anonymity.”  In 2008 Jim Carry starred in the film Yes Man, which tells the story of a man who says ‘yes’ to every circumstance that life presents him.  Yes Man is based on the 2005 book of the same title by Danny Wallace.

Actor Heath Ledger died during the production of the 2009 film The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus.  Three other actors took on the role of playing Heath Ledger playing the character Tony Shepard and the film was released.

The author Wu Ming is several Italian men who have published books since 2000.

There is a species of human behavior that is not quite art, not quite politics, and not quite as presumptuous as all that sounds. I prefer the term pranks. I first learned of multiple name identities from pranksters. Rrose Sélavy was an an artist and model in the 1920s, associated with a number of dadaists.

In 1960 the young Kerry Wendell Thornley worked as a desk clerk for the United States Marines.  As a prank, he entered a false name in the training lecture roster: Omar Kayyam Ravenhurst.  Over time Thornley and other Marines completed more paperwork for the non-existent Marine, giving him an IQ of 157 and fluency in 17 languages.  Ravenhurst then got the blame when Thornley or one of his friends made a mistake on base, making Private Ravenhurst a multiple name identity.

A free music festival was held near Stonehenge in 1974.  The audience decided to squat the location at the site after the performance.  Eviction laws required naming each of the squatters, and so the squatters all adopted the same name to make the job of the police more difficult.  Thus several dozen people became Wally.  One of the Wallies, Wally Hope, was sent to a psychiatric institution for possession of LSD in May 1975.  He was unable to detox from the forced drugging of the institution and died in September 1975.  His free-spirited life and oppressive death was a central inspiration for Penny Rimbaud to form CRASS.  Unrelated is the Stonehenge built by Wally Wallington.

David Zack has written about Monte Cantsin, who appeared in 1975:

Maris [Kundzins] and I were in Portland [Oregon]. We’d been working with a Xerox 3107 that makes big copies and reductions. We were making giant folios; monster folios and dinosaur folios we called them. And one night Maris started fooling around with the tape recorder, singing songs in Latuvian about toilets and traffic. Well, we decided to make a pop star out of Maris. But it had to be an open pop star, that is, anyone who wanted could assume the personality of the pop star. This open pop star would be the most talented in history, better than Elvis Presley, Frank Sinatra, Sal Mineo and even Ry Cooder all rolled together in one. Pop stars have always been special to me, growing up the son of a symphony conductor the way I did. To me they stand for rebellion and acceptance, revolution and success and a whole lot of other things at the same time. We were mouthing Maris Kundzins’ name, and it came out Monty Cantsins. Then we got to saying can’t sin and can’t sing and quite a few other things to give the impression that this pop star could be a thief as well as a saint.

One thing I definitely did invent is “Monty Cantsin,” the open pop star. I did not do this alone, I did it in Portland, Oregon with the very first Monty Cantsin, an artist named Maris Kundzins. Maris and I sent a card to Kantor in Montreal, you are Monty Cantsin, the open pop star. Well Graf I have to assert what Kantor did with this simple postcard belongs in any history of art and also any history of the world. The idea that people can share their art power is a very good one I think. My own understanding of Neoism is that it is about sharing, about bash: cooperation between people, putting egos and tempers aside. Though not always seeming to. [1][2]

Stewart Home has written about Karen Elliot, who appeared in 1985:

Karen Eliot is a name that refers to an individual human being who can be anyone. The name is fixed, the people using it aren’t. Smile is a name that refers to an international magazine with multiple origins. The name is fixed, the types of magazines using it aren’t. The purpose of many different magazines and people using the same name is to create a situation for which no one in particular is responsible and to practically examine western philosophical notions of identity, individuality, originality, value and truth.

Anyone can become Karen Eliot simply by adopting the name, but they are only Karen Eliot for the period in which the name is used. Karen Eliot was materialised, rather than born, as an open context in the summer of ’85. When one becomes Karen Eliot one’s previous existence consists of the acts other people have undertaken using the name. When one becomes Karen Eliot one has no family, no parents, no birth. Karen Eliot was not born, s/he was materialised from social forces, constructed as a means of entering the shifting terrain that circumscribes the ‘individual’ and society.

The name Karen Eliot can be strategically adopted for a series of actions, interventions, exhibitions, texts, etc. When replying to letters generated by an action / text in which the context has been used then it makes sense to continue using the context, ie by replying as Karen Eliot. However in personal relationships, where one has a personal history other than the acts undertaken by a series of people using the name Karen Eliot, it does not make sense to use the context. If one uses the context in personal life there is a danger that the name Karen Eliot will become over-identified with individual beings. [3]

I published work by Karen Elliot in OVO 3 (1987)

Stewart Home, in turn, has seen publications under his own name that he did not write.  These include the books Stone Circle, Harry Potter and the Quantum Time Bomb, and essays including “Anarchism is Stupid: How Luther Blissett Hoaxed Bakunin’s Idiot Children,” “Communism or Masochism? An Appeal to All Revolutionaries Concerning the Rubber Slave Larry O’Hara,” and “An Open Letter to My Avant-Garde Chums by Stewart Home.”  Someone anonymously suggested the (then) anonymous blogger Belle de Jour was Stewart Home.  Not necessarily with his cooperation or consent, Stewart Home has become several people.

Luther Blissett (born 1958) is a professional footballer, manager and coach.  His name was adopted by the Luther Blissett Project as an open reputation in the 1990s.  Blissett the footballer is aware of the other Blissetts and has taken his open reputation in stride.

I enjoyed several people being me in the early 2000s.  A number of my friends in Portland were on a site called irreality.  They encouraged me to join, but I had enough internet time in my day and didn’t want to.  Some time back I’d heard that David Bowie had hired actors to play his press agents, and Bowie confirmed whatever exaggerated claim they made about him.  Inspired by this story I encouraged 2-3 of my friends to set up an irreality account for me and post to it as if they were me, promising I’d confirm anything they posted as my own.  For a year or two these friends would mix some of my own writing (from ovo127.com) with original writing of their own and post it at irreality.  When I’d meet up with those who thought I’d posted what they read at irreality attributed to me I’d confirm it.  Some of the friends I made on irreality are friends to this day, perhaps only now learning I wasn’t necessarily who they thought I was at the time.  Irreality closed shop in 2008.

The second-most influential multiple name identity is Anonymous.  Although Anonymous began as an internet meme around 2006, Anonymous is also the name of many individuals who have appeared in public.  Inspired by a scene in Allan Moore’s V for Vendetta, Anonymous appears in numbers wearing the mask of Guy Fawkes.  As of December 2010, Anonymous is conducting successful attacks on major credit card and communication companies around the world in retaliation for slights against wikileaks.

The most influential multiple name identity is St. Nicholas / Father Christmas / Kris Kringle /  Santa Claus.  Every December for over a century, Santa has appeared around the world, wearing the same clothes, carrying out the same actions, exhibiting the same demeanor, claiming the same home-base and promising to return at the same time next year.  A significant part of the world economy is shifted when Santa Claus comes to town.  In the late 1980s the Orange Alternative of Poland held a parade of seventy-seven Santas as part of their absurdist protests against Communism.  The SantaCon / Santarchy tactic appeared again in 1994, carried out by Suicide Club of San Francisco.

“You should never run out of people to be.” – Genesis P-Orridge.

Amnesty International has made its name as a champion of free speech, campaigning on behalf of prisoners who have spoken out against oppressive regimes around the world. But when it comes to speaking up about the organisation itself … well, that seems to be a different story.

Last week [February 2010] Gita Sahgal, a highly respected lifelong human rights activist and head of Amnesty’s gender unit, told The Sunday Times of her concerns about Amnesty’s relationship with Cageprisoners, an organisation headed by Moazzam Begg, a former Guantanamo internee.

Since his release in 2005, Begg has spoken alongside Amnesty at a number of events and accompanied the organisation to a meeting at Downing Street last month. Sahgal felt the closeness of the relationship between Amnesty and Cageprisoners — which appears to give succour to those who believe in global jihad — was a threat to Amnesty’s integrity. “To be appearing on platforms with Britain’s most famous supporter of the Taliban, whom we treat as a human rights defender, is a gross error of judgment,” she wrote to Amnesty’s leaders following the Downing Street visit.

Feeling her concerns were not being addressed, she decided to go public. Hours after our story appeared she was suspended. Sahgal’s phone started ringing off the hook with news organisations seeking interviews. The story also lit up the blogosphere, partly because of Amnesty’s importance — it has some 2.8m members and a raft of glamorous supporters — but also because what Sahgal was talking about touched that raw nerve, the naivety of white middle-class liberals in dealing with Islamic radicals.

To say the past week has been a difficult one for Sahgal would be an understatement. She fears for her own and her family’s safety. She has — temporarily at least — lost her job and found it almost impossible to find anyone to represent her in any potential employment case. She rang round the human rights lawyers she knows, all of whom have declined to help citing a conflict of interest. “Although it is said that we must defend everybody no matter what they’ve done, it appears that if you’re a secular, atheist, Asian British woman, you don’t deserve a defence from our civil right firms,” she says wryly.

So no one in the human rights world wants to cross swords with Amnesty: that’s no surprise and least of all to Sahgal. “I know the nature of what I’m up against,” she says. “I didn’t do what I did lightly.” [...]

If the men incarcerated in Guantanamo were white fascists, she says, “I hope we would defend them. We would have to defend them — but we wouldn’t necessarily put them on 50 or 100 platforms after that”.

Article continues.

I place small value in knowing a person by the company they keep. Using myself as an example, what could you learn about me by way of my facebook friends? There you will find many men and women who have only myself in common. Were they ever to meet, they would surely wonder about the wretched company I keep. They are Christians and atheists, occultists and skeptics, anarchists and fascists, regular folks and weird artists, feminists and anti-feminists, gainfully-employed and work-free, family-types and libertines, and perhaps even yourself. I will gladly call all of them friend and count myself fortunate for being able to do so. It is also the case that (with luck and effort) people grow and change, old beliefs and identities no longer apply, and (with luck and effort) we can be forgiven for past mistakes. I certainly appreciate when I have been forgiven for my past mistakes, of which there are a few. When Ms. Sahgal questions Amnesty International for the company they keep, I can see some merit in the question but not much. I hope that Mr. Begg has turned the corner and abandoned the more loathsome aspects of Islam, and am willing to give him a chance to demonstrate this is true.

When Ms. Sahgal hopes that Amnesty International would defend white fascists as well as Muslims, she expresses a hope that was closed off years ago. Since February 2006, Amnesty International has adopted the policy that ‘freedom of speech carries responsibility for all.’ In September 2005 the newspaper Jyllands-Posten published twelve cartoons depicting Muhammad in rejection of the self-censorship the editors saw among publishers afraid of Muslims. Muslims around the world protested in exactly the way they did not protest against 9/11. As quiet as the Muslim world was after 9/11 in which thousands were murdered, they rioted after the publication of twelve cartoons. Hundreds died and great economic damage through arson was done. Rather than commit itself to freedom of speech and the separation of state and superstition, Amnesty International gave the rioting Muslims what they wanted: submission.

Events of recent weeks have highlighted the difficult question of what should be the legitimate scope of freedom of expression in culturally diverse societies. [...] Newspaper editors have justified the publication of cartoons that many Muslims have regarded as insulting, arguing that freedom of artistic expression and critique of opinions and beliefs are essential in a pluralist and democratic society. On the other hand, Muslims in numerous countries have found the cartoons to be deeply offensive to their religious beliefs and an abuse of freedom of speech. In a number of cases, protests against the cartoons have degenerated into acts of physical violence, while public statements by some protestors and community leaders have been seen as fanning the flames of hostility and violence. [...]

The right to freedom of expression is not absolute — neither for the creators of material nor their critics. It carries responsibilities and it may, therefore, be subject to restrictions in the name of safeguarding the rights of others. In particular, any advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence cannot be considered legitimate exercise of freedom of expression. Under international standards, such “hate speech” should be prohibited by law.

There’s the universal human right of free speech, and then there’s the publication of twelve cartoons in a newspaper. Don’t confuse the two.

Hate speech laws are a funny thing when it comes to religion. The United Kingdom’s Racial and Religious Hatred Act 2006 is an example. According to this Act, an offence has occurred if “a person who uses threatening words or behaviour, or displays any written material which is threatening if he intends thereby to stir up religious hatred.” But if the “hate speech” is interpreted in the light of the Human Rights Act 1998, which guarantees freedom of religion and expression, then no offence has occurred. Consider the Criminal Code of Canada. It prohibits ‘any writing, sign or visible representation that advocates or promotes genocide [against] any section of the public distinguished by colour, race, religion, ethnic origin or sexual orientation.’ But if the “hate speech” is made ‘to establish by an argument an opinion on a religious subject or an opinion based on a belief in a religious text’ then the “hate speech” is exempt.

That’s right: religion is exempt from laws protecting religion, and “hate speech” done in the name of religion is allowed while “hate speech” critical of or outside religion is forbidden. This exemption is necessary to preserve and protect the “hate speech” found in the Bible and the Quran. This exemption suggests “hate speech” laws exist to protect religion from criticism, not combat genocide or uphold the universal human right to Not Have Your Feelings Hurt.

I was a member of Amnesty International for many years. I paid annual dues and held fund-raising events. I supported AI because I support freedom of speech. I support the immediate and unconditional release of all prisoners of conscious. AI began as a support system for prisoners of conscious, and some measure of that mission remains in place. But over time, AI has abandoned the success found in doing one simple thing very well in favor of doing a number of exciting things poorly. A few years ago the board of AI was populated by a group that supported adding “economic, social and cultural rights” to the mission of the organization. I will not argue the merits or demerits of these claims here, nor the merits or demerits of AI having a ‘gender unit’ (of which Ms. Saghal was a leader). I will say that advocacy of economic, social and cultural rights are adequately addressed by other organizations and by many millions of individuals. I wrote AI saying that these new goals were at odds with being able to offer support to some prisoners of conscious. I was told that I could get my donated money back but that the decision had been made by a vote to adopt these goals. I replied that the same vote that brought about these changes might bring other changes later on – but apparently not, as I got no reply, AI continues to list left, and with the support of “hate speech” laws AI has abandoned its original mission of supporting prisoners of conscious.

I’m not a believer in natural rights, but I do support laws respecting freedom of speech. Freedom of speech includes the freedom to be mistaken, the freedom to offend, the freedom to criticize, the freedom to inquire. Let Mr. Begg speak, and just as much let Jyllands-Posten publish. I do not claim Ms. Sahgal has been censored, as Amnesty International is not a government organization and did not use the force of law to enforce its way.

All that having been said, Amnesty International has erred by dismissing Ms. Sahgal. Any effort to defend freedom of speech must include a sound criticism of Islam and a record of its crimes. Ms. Sahgal touched the raw nerve, the naivety of white middle-class liberals in dealing with Islamic radicals. For that, she was dismissed from Amnesty International. I still get requests for money from AI. I consider bleeding them of the postage and printing it takes for them to send me these requests to be a small protest against what AI has become.

Including notations for articles relating to accupuncture, alchemy, alternative energy sources, the Amazing Randi, ancient astronauts, artificial intelligence, astral projection, astrology, the Bermuda Triangle, Bigfoot, cargo cults, cattle mutilation, communication with non-humans, creationism, cryptozoology, Dianetics, dinosaurs, dowsing, earthquakes, firewalking, Uri Geller, gravity research, hidden planets, hoaxes, hypnosis, killer clowns, kirilian photography, lake monsters, life on Mars, mind control, mystery boats, Muzak, near death experiences, Nostrodomus, parapsychology, perpetual motion, planetary alignment disasters, psychic phenomenon, pyramid power, reincarnation, the Rosicrucians, SETI, the Shroud of Turin, spontaneous human combustion, teleportation, TM, test-tube babies, the Tunguska explosion, UFOs, vampires, volcanos, voodoo, weather control, Velikovski, weird science, yellow rain and zombies.

V1#1 10/78
p 12 / letter [UFO] Melinda Moore
p 14 / letter [dowsing] Ted Kaufman
p 14 / letter [astral projection] Martha Fotinos
p 28 / The Sciene Conflict [UFO] James Oberg
p 44 / Life In Vents [czoo] ?
p 46 / Kirilian Photography [k.p.] ?
p 48 / Electricity & Weather [ e. & w.] ?
p 49 / quote ["The universe is... queerer than we can suppose."] J.B.S. Haldine
p 49 / Magnetic Sense of Sharks [czoo] Kenneth Rose
p 50 / Birds [czoo] Jeff Cox
p 63 / Listening for Life [in outer space] Alton Blakeslee
p 92 / The Turin Shroud [t.s.] Barbara Culliton
p 149 / advertisement [Project Blue Book] Blue Book Coordinator

V1#2 11/78
p 24 / Moonglows [mg] Patrick Moore
p 31 / Betty Hill [UFO] James Oberg
p 41 / Talking Bird [czoo] Barbara Ford
p 105 / Communicating with Dolphins [czoo] John Lilly
p 113 / Lifetides [para] Lyall Watson

V1#3 12/78
p 10 / letter [UFO] Barry Goldwater
p 12 / letter [UFO] Sam Piazza
p 12 / letter [UFO] Charles Labbe
p 12 / letter [UFO] Al Porterfield
p 12 / letter [UFO] R. Brown
p 12 / letter [UFO] James Irwin
p 20 / Star of the Magi [s.o.t.m.] Mark Chartrand
p 32 / Queen of the UFOs [UFO] James Oberg
p 40 / Einstein’s Brain [where is it?] ?
p 108 / PSI Burn: A Study of Psysiological Deterioration in Parapsychological Experimentation [satire] David Searles
p 146 / Man Will Never Fly [m.w.n.f. society] Lawrence Maddry

V1#4 1/79
p 8 / article [UFO] Frank Kendig
p 12 / letter [UFO] Terry Hansen
p 12 / letter [UFO] Robert Barrow
p 32 / The Coyne Incident [UFO] James Oberg
p 71 / intv: I. J. Good [weather control, UFO, more] Christopher Evans
p 117 / advertisement [Dianetics] Church of Scientology
p 125 / advertisement [Project Blue Book] Blue Book Coordinator
p 130 / letter [Velikovsky] Garry Tillery

V1#5 2/79
p 6 / article [text-tube baby hoax?] Frank Kendig
p 10 / letter [Einstein's Brain] Gerard der Leun
p 12 / letter [czoo] William Bond
p 32 / Astronomy and the Flying Saucer [UFO] James Oberg
p 39 / Flippant Earth [magnetic pole switching] ?
p 42 / More Ancient Astronauts [A.A.] ?
p 103 / Nutrition Fads and Fallacies [N.F.a.F.] Daniel Greenberg
p 110 / advertisement [Love of the Two-Armed Form] Dawn Horse Press
p 137 / letter [Betty Hill map] Charles Atterberg

V1#6 3/79
p 10 / letter [PSI Burn comments] Alan Vaughan
p 32 / UFO’s at the U.N. [UFO] James Oberg
p 117 / advertisement [Other magazine; a little of everything] Other
p 127 / advertisement [The Discovery of the Wingstars; fossils found in meteorites] Wingstar Research Society
p 137 / letter [g.r.] Peter Singelakis
p 137 / letter [w.s.] David Hargrave
p 137 / letter [all mathematics prooven wrong, mathematically] H. Murker
p 140 / next issue [static gravity hoax] ?
p 140 / next issue [loch ness] ?

V1#7 4/79
p 6 / article [parapsychologists accused of sloppiness] Frank Kendig
p 12 / letter [UFO] Ben Price
p 16 / Turning the Crank [crank science] Mark Chartrand
p 27 / New Scandal in Psychic Research? [para] Scot Morris
p 52 / First Encounter [UFO] E. Speigle
p 77 / Static Gravity [w.s. April-Fool] Christopher Priest
p 115 / advertisement [Undreamed-of Possibilities] Self-Realization Fellowship
p 121 / advertisement [Dianetics] Church of Scientology

V1#8 5/79
p 10 / letter [religious birds] Eugene Marquis
p 12 / letter [anti-gravity, incl J. R. R. Searl] Allan Grise
p 32 / * Global Disclosures [UFO] Harry Lebelson
p 92 / Return to Loch Ness [czoo] J. Chesternan and M. Marten
p 117 / advertisement [Dianetics] Church of Scientology
p 125 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians
p 128 / letter [UFO] David Travis
p 128 / letter [UFO] David Schroth
p 128 / letter [czoo: Loch Ness M.] B. Goldman
p 130 / letter [PSI Burns commentary] Charles Honorton
p 146 / The Gulibility Factor [UFO] Thomas Monteleone

V1#9 6/79
p 12 / letter [UFO] Jeff Henry
p 22 / A Hidden Earth [new planets in our solar system] Patcick Moore
p 32 / Saucer-Eyed Spies [UFO] Art Gratti
p 36 / Clarke’s 1st Law ["When a distinguished scientist says something is impossible... he is very probably wrong."] Arthur Clarke
p 40 / Ignored Prediction [earthquake] Tony Fusco
p 41 / Magic Stone [bezoar protects against arsenic poisoning] Don Fabun
p 42 / Medical Milestones [2nd heart discovered, more] K. S.
p 96 / Flight of the Dragon [czoo] Peter Dickinson
p 134 / letter [czoo] David Edelshick
p 134 / letter [cargo cults] Tully Scott
p 136 / letter [stacic gravity hoax commentary] Anthony Blokzyl
p 146 / Vampires Revamped [V as a form of rabies] Bruce Wallace

V1#10 7/79
p 10 / letter [static gravity hoax commentary] Robin Carpenter
p 10 / letter [static gravity hoax commentary] Norman Mclead
p 10 / letter [para] Gerry Erberich
p 14 / letter [U. Geller] Arthur Clarke
p 14 / letter [UFO] Harry Lebelson
p 14 / letter [para] G. Dew and L. Hillshafer
p 18 / A Bit of Lunacy [moon in language and legend] Mark Chartrand
p 32 / Trance Figures [UFO] Allan Hendry
p 37 / Loch Ness Dolphins [czoo] O.D.
p 41 / Year of the Atom [nuclear hijinx] Douglass Colligan
p 41 / quote ["The most beautiful experience... is the mysterious..."] Albert Einstein
p 42 / The Earthquake Boom [e.b.] Dan Ross
p 126 / letter [UFO] John Harding
p 127 / letter [para] Vickie Lloyd
p 127 / letter [turning the crank commentary] A. Abajian
p 127 / letter [UFO] Paul Krause
p 129 / next issue [ancient astronauts evaluated] ?
p 133 / advertisement [Dianetics] Church of Scientology

V1#11 8/79
p 10 / letter [UFO] Jon Stone
p 12 / letter [para] Brenda Thomas
p 30 / UFO Over Iran [UFO] James Oberg
p 40 / UFO Tips [UFO] Terrence Dickinson
p 44 / White Dwarfs and Green Men [a. a.] Carl Sagan
p 128 / letter [a. a.] John Tran
p 128 / letter [UFO] Janice Tonietto
p 135 / letter [UFO] Philip Klass
p 135 / letter [UFO] Jeffrey Benner

V1#12 9/79
p 12 / letter [Flight of the Dragon commentary; czoo] Eugene Marquis
p 32 / True UFOs [UFO] James Oberg
p 37 / Quake Lights [earthquake lights] Tom Kovach
p 41 / Animal Trivia [weird animal facts] S. D.
p 42 / Viruses from Outer Space [v. as "messages" from o.s.] O. D.
p 112 / advertisement [What is Scientology?] Church of Scientology
p 113 / advertisement [Undreamed-of Possibilities] Self-Realization Fellowship
p 129 / advertisement [The Cycles of Heaven] Avon paperback
p 135 / advertisement [Dianetics] Church of Scientology
p 142 / letter [czoo] Jason MacCallum
p 142 / letter [cargo cults] Alan Vaughan

V2#1 10/79
p 18 / letter [vampires] Count Dracula
p 44 / Tunguska [Tunguska event] James Oberg
p 57 / Yogis [y. exhibit amazing body control] D. S.
p 58 / quote ["We think so because other people all think so... "] Henry Sidgwick
p 108 / Unseen Yeti [czoo] John Hunt
p 140 / advertisement [I am magazine] I am
p 163 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians
p 165 / advertisement [Metascience Quarterly] Metascience
p 165 / advertisement [Nebulon Gazette] Nebulon Gazette

V2#11 11/79
p 10 / letter [astrology debunked] Philip Ianan
p 12 / letter [Sagan anc. astro. article commentary] Stan Stephenson
p 12 / letter [Sagan anc. astro. article commentary] Don Peterson
p 30 / Alien Metals [UFO] Harry Lebelson
p 36 / Pregnant Men [p.m.] Dava Sobel
p 38 / Gay Vaccine [gay men used in hepatitis vaccine trial (AIDS
conspiracy?)] Joel Davis
p 44 / Antimatter Revealed [ws] Robert Forward
p 80 / interview: Carl Sargent [para] Christopher Evans
p 84 / Illegal Aliens [extraterrestrials and the law] Robert Freitas
p 128 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosecrucians
p 142 / advertisement [The UFO Handbook] Doubleday
p 142 / letter [para] James Bobula

V2#3 12/79
p 10 / letter [czoo: yeti] John Hunt
p 10 / letter [UFO] Giles Guthrie
p 16 / letter [UFO] John Warren
p 16 / letter [UFO] David Hofer
p 18 / letter [anc. astro] Gena Davies
p 28 / Syncronicity [s.] Bernard Dixon
p 40 / Alternatives [UFO] Robert Wilson
p 45 / quote ["Discovery consists of seeing what everybody has seen and thinking what nobody has thought."] Albert von Szent-Gyorgyi
p 46 / Fossil Footprints [f.f.] Alton Blakeslee
p 49 / quote ["Scientists, especially when they leave the particular field in which they have specialized, are just as ordinary, pig-headed, and unreasonable as anybody else."] H. J. Eysenck
p 50 / quote ["Science has become adult; I am not sure whether scientists have."] Victor Weiskopf
p 108 / Prizes [Klass anti-UFO prize] Scot Morris
p 130 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosecrucians
p 134 / advertisement [UFO: The Documented Evidence] Methuen Publications

V2#4 1/80
p 12 / letter [Viruses from Outer Space debunked] Deborah Katz
p 28 / Death on the Range [cattle mut.] Harry Lebelson
p 40 / Urban Legends [u.l.] D. C.
p 42 / quote ["Everyone is ignorant, only on different subjects"] Will Rogers
p 62 / interview: Jacques Vallee [UFO] Christopher Evans
p 88 / Talk to the Animals [signing apes] Eugene Linden
p 116 / advertisement [Mystery Stalks the Prairie; c. mut] Niagra Sales Company
p 117 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians
p 122 / erratum [Yogi, 10/79] editor of OMNI
p 126 / letter [Dracula debunking] Andras Rozsa

V2#5 2/80
p 10 / letter [czoo: yeti] Bill Tabit
p 32 / Alone Again [UFO] James Oberg
p 41 / Wildlife Trivia [weird animal facts] S. D.
p 41 / quote ["Due to unforseen circumstances, we must postpone the Psychic Fair...] Tamara Rand Institute
p 42 / Psychic Cops [para] D. C.
p 109 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians
p 120 / letter [Illegal Aliens commentary] Jane Morgenstern
p 120 / letter [Illegal Aliens commentary] Gabrielle Davis

V2#6 3/80
p 14 / letter [synchronicity] Sebastian Foti
p 36 / Phantom Moonlight [UFO] James Oberg
p 45 / Invisibility Lessons [TM debunking] James Randi
p 48 / Eyeball Flora [plants grow in eyeballs] S. D.
p 49 / Psychic Scoreboard [para] Joel Davis
p 128 / letter [Randi, Dixon commentary] Steven Yates
p 129 / letter [Unseen Yeti commentary] James Justus
p 132 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians
p 141 / letter [Talk to the Animals commentary] Eugene Linden
p 146 / Thinking out Loud [para] Martin Pitt

V2#7 4/80
p 10 / letter [Talk to the Animals commentary] Edd Doerr
p 12 / advertisement [czoo: tube worms discovered with RCA camera] RCA
p 14 / letter [Talk to the Animals commentary] Jim Stone
p 14 / letter [Death on the Range commentary] Alan Bingham
p 32 / Close Encounter [UFO] Harry Lebelson
p 39 / Space Oddities [weird things spotted by Brittish satellites] Douglas Colligan
p 76 / interview [James Randi] Scot Morris
p 120 / advertisement [Haiti ("Voodoo, you can feel it in the air...")] Haiti Gov’t Tourist Bureau
p 128 / advertisement [Undreamed-of Possibilities] Self-Realization Fellowship
p 130 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians
p 131 / advertisement [two Genesis-as-science books by R. Jastrow] Warner Books
p 138 / letter [Jaques Vallee commentary] D. Anderson

V2#8 5/80
p 10 / letter [UFO] Arlan Andrews
p 20 / Galactic Germs [germs from space] Bernard Dixon
p 32 / Honest Illusions [UFO] James Oberg
p 40 / quote ["Heaven and Earth were created... Oct. 23, 4004 BC..."] John Lightfoot
p 41 / Nature Trivia [czoo] S.D.
p 41 / quote ["Rail travel... is not possible..."] Dionysys Lardner
p 137 / advertisement [Crystal Pyramid Pendant] Cosmic Connections
p 137 / advetisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians
p 138 / letter [cattle mutilation] Rod Faust

V2#9 6/80
p 10 / letter [telepathy, interspecies communication] David Palter
p 12 / letter [TM, levitation] Roane Dantzler
p 20 / Jupiter’s Noneffect [planetary allignment disasters] John Gribbin
p 32 / The French Connection [UFO] Charles Berlitz
p 39 / Life on Mars [l.o.m.] L. D.
p 42 / quote ["Science is the topography of ignorance"] Oliver Holmes
p 122 / letter [TM, levitation] Gregory Trulen
p 124 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians
p 130 / Save the Toad! [giant flying vampire toad hoax] Norman Spinrad

V2#10 7/80
p 10 / letter [Shroud of Turin] Sandy Shakocius
p 12 / letter [Amazing Randi, Sagan] Richard Currey
p 12 / letter [Amazing Randi] M. Stone
p 12 / letter [Amazing Randi] Immanuel Chin
p 12 / letter [Amazing Randi] Peter Schwartz
p 12 / letter [reply to above] James Randi
p 14 / letter [UFO] Ronald Berends
p 14 / letter [cattle mutilations] Michael Albers
p 24 / Ghost Story [para experiments] Morton Schatzman
p 30 / The Russian Connection [UFO] James Oberg
p 35 / Mutilation Madness [cattle mutilation] James Randi
p 125 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V2#11 8/80
p 16 / letter [planetary alignment disasters] Mary Boland
p 32 / Repeaters [UFO] James Oberg
p 36 / Blow to Creation Myth [scientific creationism] Joel Davis
p 38 / Nastiness by Degree [weather and social unrest] Peter Evans
p 39 / Narwhal Mystery [why the tooth?] Barbara Ford
p 40 / Scientists and Monsters [czoo] D. C.
p 41 / quote ["If the scientist doesn't start with a sense of mystery, he doesn't start."] Rene Dubos
p 111 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V2#12 9/80
p 10 / letter [electronic mind control] Laura Collins
p 10 / letter [giant flying vampire toads] Athens Friends of the Toads
p 10 / letter [giant flying vampire toads] Ray Hermann
p 10 / letter [giant flying vampire toads] Steve Conklin
p 10 / letter [giant flying vampire toads] Suzanne Helder
p 10 / letter [reply: giant flying vampire toad article was a hoax] editor
p 14 / letter [TM] Edd Doerr
p 14 / letter [TM] Marvin Minsky
p 18 / Sea Serpent Survey [czoo] Bernard Dixon
p 32 / Jung Ideas [UFO] Harry Lebelson
p 36 / quote ["No quackery is ever rejected by the American public until a more scientific-sounding but inherently less plausible quackery is ready to take its place."] H. Mencken
p 39 / quote ["Sciene is nothing but trained and organized common sense."] Thomas Huxley
p 41 / quote ["For the people liable to be killed by earthquakes, quake prediction is certainly significant."] Gordon Taylor
p 42 / Animal Vibrations [animals and earthquakes] S.D.
p 113 / letter [Amazing Randi] C. Anderson
p 113 / reply [to above] James Randi
p 113 / letter [UFO] Mike Bucker
p 113 / letter [UFO] Peter Adams
p 113 / letter [UFO] Richard Bridges
p 120 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V3#1 10/80
p 10 / letter [Which is hotter, heaven or hell?] M. Eckard
p 10 / letter [Shroud of Turin] John Wagner
p 12 / letter [electronic mind control] Bill Katz
p 30 / Minnesota Attack [UFO] James Oberg
p 35 / The Creationist’ “Equal Time” [scientific creationism] Ben Bova
p 37 / ESP and the CIA [psychic spies] Judith Hooper
p 38 / quote ["Sciene is not a sacred cow. Science is a horse. Don't worship it. Feed it."] Aubery Eben
p 40 / Wildlife Tales [weird animal stories] S. D.
p 42 / quote ["Like a mutation, an idea may be recorded in the wrong time, to lie latent like a recessive gene and spring once more to life in an auspicious era."] Loren Eiseley
p 155 / UFO Unemployment Insurance [UFO] D. T.
p 155 / Astrology Defense [a. in the courts] D. T.
p 156 / Face From Space [face on Mars] Harry Lebelson
p 156 / Psychic Healer [psy healing] Allan Maurer
p 158 / Sumerian Astronauts [a. a.] ???
p 158 / quote [exerpt from "backscrewing theory of gravity"] George Gillette
p 158 / quote ["Apart from the known and the unknown, what is there?"] Harold Pinter
p 163 / letter [cattle mutilations] C. Harper
p 163 / letter [planetary alignment disasters] Terry Fischer
p 182 / Calendar [UFO, dowsing, man will never fly society meetings announced] Geoffrey Golson
p 188 / advertisement [Autobiography of a Yogi] Self-Realization Fellowship
p 188 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V3#2 11/80
p 10 / letter [creationism] Michael May
p 32 / More Soviet Encounters [UFO] E. Speigel
p 36 / Death on Mars [simulated life on m.] Nick Engler
p 39 / Hoku Point [ice on hands cures headaches] Allan Maurer
p 40 / Mokele-Mbembe [czoo: contemporary african dinosaurs] Douglas Colligan
p 42 / Maligned Squid [czoo: giant s. sightings] S. D.
p 121 / letter [planetary allignment disasters] Terry Fischer
p 123 / advertisement [The Necronomicon] Necronomicon
p 126 / article [volcanic prediction by Janet Cullen-Tanaka] Dick Teresi
p 134 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V3#3 12/80
p 36 / Target: Denmark [UFO] Harry Lebelson
p 41 / Kudzu [weird k. facts] Stuart Diamond
p 41 / quote ["The effort to reconcile science and religion is almost always made, not by theologians, but by scientists unable to shake off altogether the piety absorbed with their mother's milk."] H. Mencken
p 42 / Life From the Clouds [l. originated in c.] Alton Blakeslee
p 44 / quote ["Science is built of facts the way a house is built of bricks, but an accumulation of facts is no more science than a pile of bricks is a house."] Henri Poincare
p 136 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V3#4 1/81 : missing, but contains perpetual motion article by James Randi

V3#5 2/81
p 12 / letter [god in science fiction] David Bowring
p 14 / letter [electronic mind control] Sidney Weinstein
p 24 / Hypnotic Witness [h. memory recovery] R. McColm
p 32 / Space Encounters [UFO] James Oberg
p 36 / Horned Wonder [czoo: mystery fossil skull] Douglas Colligan
p 37 / Chorus Girl Hypothesis [thought-transferance among birds disproven] Barbara Ford
p 42 / Killer Wave [k.w. responsible for bernumda triangle?] Tom Summer
p 45 / In Through the Out Door [subliminal mind control] Eric Lander
p 120 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V3#6 3/81
p 35 / Useless Animal Slaughter [vivisection] Brandon Kuker-Reines
p 40 / quote ["Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened."] Winston Churchill
p 42 / quote ["The future is beyond knowing, but the present is beyond belief"] William Thompson
p 95 / Interview: Donald Symons [scientific proof: women exist to serve men!] Claire Warga
p 100 / Postmarks [stamps of the world, incl. Grenada UFO stamp] Marc Kaplan
p 140 / Washington Debate [UFO] E. Speigel and K. Ehrlich
p 144 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V3#7 4/81
p 12 / letter [Amazing Randi, perpetual motion] William Watkins
p 12 / letter [god in science fiction] Susan Saltiel
p 26 / The New Biofeedback [biofeedback] Bob Kall
p 35 / The Stealth Affair [stealth planes hype, debunking] Paul Nahin
p 40 / Animal Trivia [weird animal facts] Stuart Diamond
p 40 / Death Blow from Space [asteroid killed dinosaurs] Joel Davis
p 41 / quote ["Nothing is rich but the inexhaustable wealth of nature. She shows us only surfaces, but she is a million fathoms deep."] Ralph Emerson
p 42 / quote ["The religion that is afraid of science dishonors God and commits suicide."] Ralph Emerson
p 76 / Psychic Search [psy] Stephan Schwartz
p 118 / People [Uri Geller section] Dick Teresi
p 135 / advertisement [booklet on "space aliens"] American Raelian Movement
p 140 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians
p 141 / advertisement [The Necronomicon] Necronomicon

V3#8 5/81
p 10 / letter [subliminal mind control] Craig Waller
p 12 / letter ["right to life"] Sandra Seipke
p 36 / Mainland Mysteries [UFO] Paul Dong
p 45 / quote ["Kids get ideas about UFOs where I learned about sex: the tabloids and the sleazy press."] J. Hynek
p 45 / Whistling Air Crashes [80% pilots whistle before crash] Allan Maurer
p 50 / Psychic Fools [psy debunk experiment] Kendrick Frazier
p 93 / advertisement [books incl. Stonehenge and Mystery of the Pyramids] Natural Science Book Club
p 120 / People [incl. Tut curse debunk] Dick Teresi
p 128 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians
p 131 / letter [hypnotic memory retreival] The Amazing Kreskin
p 131 / letter [Amazing Randi, perpetual motion] Edward Cheesbrough
p 138 / Last Word [psy] James Randi

V3#9 6/81
p 16 / letter [Sumerian Astronauts] Zecharia Sitchin
p 44 / Gossamer Wings [UFO] Daniel Cohen
p 48 / Soul Gun [kirilian search for soul] Minael Jeffries
p 50 / Mammary Madness [photos of women in stuffed bras judged "less intelligent" in study] Ellen Bilgore
p 53 / Brain? Who Needs It? [hydrocephalus students with literally no brain and 120 IQ] Judith Hooper
p 54 / quote ["There is more religion in men's science than there is science in their religion."] Henry Thoreau
p 129 / advertisement [Three Mile Island Creamy Mushroom Dressing] The Catalyst Company
p 134 / People [psychic tattoo consultant Jamie Summers] Dick Teresi
p 147 / Gravity Watch [g. is not a constant?] David Lynch
p 148 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V3#10 7/81
p 12 / letter [perpetual motion, Amazing Randi] Dave Martell
p 12 / letter [perpetual motion, Amazing Randi] Paul Nahin
p 27 / Music [Muzak] Scott Cohen
p 32 / Hoax [UFO] James Oberg
p 35 / Feminism and the Brain [men's brains are superior] Judith Hooper
p 37 / Animal Revenge [a. getting r.] Stuart Diamond
p 39 / Pet Neuroses [animal psychiatry] Douglas Colligan
p 41 / quote ["In the final analysis, randomness, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder"] R. Hamming
p 42 / quote ["Religions die when they are proved to be true. Science is the record of dead religions."] Oscar Wilde
p 69 / interview [Albert Hofmann] David Monagan
p 109 / advertisement [catalog incl. alternate energy, biofeedback] Edmund Scientific
p 110 / Competition ["rumors" of the choking doberman / conspiracy sort] Scot Morris
p 119 / letter [Stealth questions] John Price
p 123 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V3#11 8/81
p 10 / letter [psy. archeology] Ed Starkins
p 14 / letter [mystery spots] James Swan
p 41 / Hunger Cues [looking at food can make you fat] Stuart Diamond
p 41 / Reasonable Chimp [animal intelligence] Alton Blakeslee
p 69 / Project Tesla [Tesla research continued] ?
p 101 / letter [octopus intelligence] Linda Palter
p 108 / advertisement [UFOlarm UFO detecter] Tucker Scientific
p 108 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians
p 116 / letter [mystery spots] Ray Hyman

V3#12 9/81
p 12 / letter [big breasts and intelligence] Paula Siddens
p 12 / letter [new religion: Random Factor Faith] Eugene Shelby
p 14 / letter [early mystery airships] Carl Baumann
p 34 / The Pine Bush Adventure [UFO] Harry Lebelson
p 45 / Half a Brain [is all we need] Douglas Colligan
p 45 / Human Tidal Waves [human rhythms & behavior linked to moon] Norbert Lempert
p 48 / quote ["A great truth is a truth whose opposite is also a great truth."] Thomas Mann
p 48 / Shock Treatment [is useless and traumatic] David Cohen
p 50 / Surprise Sight [woman born blind, corrective surgery, knew colors anyway] David Colligan
p 50 / quote ["I think and think for months and years. Ninety-nine times, and the conclusion is false. The hundreth time I am right."] Albert Einstein
p 71 / advertisement [books incl. mysteries of pyramids, stonehenge] Natural Science Book Club
p 81 / The Healing Bran [think yourself healthy] Douglas Garr
p 127 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians
p 133 / letter [animal IQ] Cameron Stante
p 133 / letter [creationism] N. Spencer
p 146 / Last Word [amazing collection of science quotes... they ain't so smart] Bernard Dixon

V4#1 10/81
p 12 / letter [acupuncture, Amazing Randi] K. Chan
p 12 / letter [NY White sewer pot rumor expounded] S. Wishevsky
p 14 / letter [psy slurs] Ray Hyman
p 14 / letter [psy defence] Stephan Sscwartz
p 20 / Shape Shapes Shape ["morphogenic fields" effect form & behavior] Bernard Dixon
p 26 / Man Bites Man [human bite attacks] Patrick Huyghe
p 46 / Binge Disorder [bulemia study] Douglas Colligan
p 47 / Sleep-Wake Biofeedback [b. to stay awake, go to sleep] Robert Kall
p 70 / Ghosts and Goblins [waiting for hard para evidence] ?
p 73 / Intelligent Machines [coming soon] ?
p 133 / Mobius Psi-Q Test [para test] S. Sschwartz and R. Mattei
p 169 / UFO Update [UFO] Stella Iner
p 170 / Unicorn [goat w-horn by Glory and G'zell] Harry Lebelson
p 170 / quote [about "heresy"] Isaac Asimov
p 170 / Stalking Anomalies [Center for Scientific Anomalies Research in MI] Douglas Colligan
p 170 / quote ["There is no ox so dumb as the orthodox"] George Gillette
p 170 / Mystery Ship [1976 mystery boat photo] Harry Lebelson
p 171 / Soviet Psychics [s. p.] Allan Maurer
p 171 / quote ["Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen."] Albert Einstein
p 172 / Emotional Alarm Clock [hypnosic monitor] Robert Kall
p 172 / Coincidence [maybe not so rare or odd] Kendrick Frazier
p 172 / Fang Count [vampire census] Allan Maurer
p 183 / advertisement [catalog incl. biofeedback and alt. energy] Edmund Scientific
p 184 / Burroughs at the Bunker [WSB on women as "genetic mistake"] Regina Weinreich
p 192 / letter [UFO] Dean Kurath
p 196 / calendar announcement [International Fortean Organization meeting Oct. 17-18] Geoffrey Golson
p 196 / calendar announcement [International Conference on Alternative Energies Dec. 14-16] Geofrey Golson
p 205 / advertisement [The Necronomicon] Necronomicon
p 208 / Cosmic Dangers [asteroid strikes] Patrick Moore
p 212 / advertisement [Autobiography of a Yogi] Self-Realization Fellowship
p 212 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V4#2 11/81
p 12 / letter [Tesla] Edson Johnson
p 16 / letter [n.d.e.] Debra Shotwell
p 39 / Parent of the Apes [human/ape genetic cross] Barbara Ford
p 44 / Gay Disease [mysterious "decreased resistance"] Judith Hooper
p 80 / Witches [w.] Erica Jong
p 111 / Anti-matter [UFO] Allan Hendry
p 112 / Transsexual Reincarnation [r. as cause of t.] Allan Maurer
p 112 / Global Cryptozoology [International Society of C. established] Douglas Colligan
p 113 / Feminist Hex [witches hex trailside killer] Allan Maurer
p 114 / Magnetic People? [magnetic sense?] Carol Johmann
p 114 / Psychic Better Business Bureau [The Association of P. Practitioners established] Allan Maurer
p 114 / Placebo Horoscopes [prepared and placebo h. equally accurate] Kendrick Frazier
p 124 / advertisement [catalog incl. alt. energy, biofeedback] Edmund Scientific
p 147 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V4#3 12/81
p 10 / letter [lunar madness] Richard Ornberg
p 45 / Noisy Vegetables [plants makes noises when in need of water] Judith Hooper
p 131 / Anti-Matter [UFO] Jeff Hecht
p 132 / French Flying Saucer [built by Jean-Claude Ladrat] Philip Black
p 133 / ESP Believers [parapsychologists are] Kendrick Frazier
p 133 / Human Combustion [Jack Angel, SHC survivor] Harry Lebelson
p 133 / quote [meat and snake showers in Scientific American, 1877] ?
p 133 / UFO Ports [UFO] Margaret Sachs
p 134 / Russian Sleeptalk [Gene Sutherland speaks r. in s., hounded by parapsychologists] Mark Teich
p 161 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians
p 161 / advertisement [catalog incl. biofeedback] Edmund Scientific

V4#4 1/82
p 10 / letter [mystery ship of 10/81 issue SOLVED #1] Mark Epling
p 10 / letter [mystery ship of 10/81 issue SOLVED #2] Anthony Romain
p 10 / letter [second sighting of mystery ship?] W. Krohn
p 12 / letter [phantom-limb sensations] Donald Eisner
p 12 / letter [goat-unicorn of 10/81 issue explained] Draper Kauffman
p 33 / Near Death [n. d. e.] Judith Hooper
p 35 / Whistling Ears [ears that make noise] Judith Hooper
p 37 / SETI Axed [SETI funding cut] Michael Michaud
p 39 / OM Swat Team [TM team's mere presence stops violent crime] Judith Hooper
p 40 / quote ["Thoughts, like fleas, jump from man to man. But they don't bite everybody] Stanislaw Lem
p 67 / interview [Martin Gardner] Scot Morris
p 89 / UFO Update [UFO] Lee Speigel
p 90 / Mermen and Mermaids [explained] Douglas Colligan
p 90 / quote ["That which is incapable of proof itself is no proof of anything else."] Percy Shelley
p 90 / Voodoo Traffic [Brittish motorists use v. dolls to curse cops] Allan Maurer
p 90 / quote ["We are waiting for the UFOs. We know they exist."] Grahm Parker
p 90 / Dogu Space Suits [a.a.] Madeline Lebwohl
p 91 / Sole on Fire [firewalking] Harry Lebelson
p 91 / Uri Geller, Where Are You? [Uri-bating by Randi and OMNI] ???
p 92 / Nostradamus Interpreted [by Jean de Fontbrune] Mark Teich
p 92 / quote ["An abnormal number of all reported paranormal phenomena appear to have happened to holy idiots, fools or crooks."] C. Snow
p 92 / Remembering Birth ["the fact is we do."] Marc McCutcheon
p 119 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V4#5 2/81
p 10 / letter [Tesla] Michael Milanovich
p 10 / letter [UFO] Allan Hendry
p 12 / letter [creationism] Les Brown
p 12 / letter [creationism] James Milton
p 12 / letter [creationism] Keith Croes
p 24 / Cheap Talk [modern myths, ala "Paul is dead"] Gary Fine
p 35 / First Earth Battalion [Army goes new age] Michelle Bekey
p 37 / quote ["The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious... "] Albert Einstein
p 38 / Ancient Recordings [in pottery] Allan Maurer
p 58 / Recollections of Death [n.d.e.] Michael Sabom
p 62 / interview [Candace Pert: sex relations hardwired in brain?] Judith Hooper
p 93 / UFO Update [UFO] Jack Thornton & Pamela Weintraub
p 94 / Raging Skeptics [pick on each other] Irving Lieberman
p 94 / King Tut’s Shroud [just like J.C.'s only we have the body too] Sandra Dorr
p 95 / Nutrition for Psychics [psy] Robert Sheaffer
p 95 / Discojet [UFO-like jet by Paul Moller] Margaret Sachs
p 95 / Killer Clowns [k. c.] Pamela Weintraub
p 96 / Modern-Day Voodoo [belief makes it work] Eric Mishara
p 96 / Time Tripping [by Association for Past-Life Research and Therapy] Margaret Sachs
p 96 / China’s Armpit Savants [psychic readings or frauds?] James Randi
p 96 / quote ["Skeptical scrutiny is the means, in both science and religion, by which deep insights can be winnowed form deep nonsense."] Carl Sagan
p 121 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V4#6 3/81
p 10 / letter [satirizing anti-choice legislation] Audrey Glickman
p 10 / letter [n.d.e.] D. Amaral
p 14 / Yellow Rain [y.r.] Douglas Starr
p 22 / Gay Origins [g. o.] Judith Hooper
p 36 / quote ["There was never an idea started that woke men out of their stupid indifference but its originator was spoken of as a crank."] Oliver Holmes
p 36 / Cruelty to Monkeys [in the name of science] Sandra Dorr
p 37 / quote ["In a way, science might be described as paranoid thinking applied to nature: we are looking for natural conspiracies, for connections among apparently disparate data."] Carl Sagan
p 38 / Loch Ness Monsterlings [czoo] Michael Jeffries
p 40 / quote ["Science has proof without and certainty. Creationists have certainty without any proof."] Ashley Montague
p 41 / Grass Intelligence [pot studies] Judith Hooper
p 45 / Cool Immortality [life extention] Roy Walford
p 75 / interview [Francis Crick: life on earth was planted by intelligence from beyond] David Rorvik
p 91 / UFO Update [UFO] Jeff Wells
p 92 / Haitian Zombies [zombies] Pablo Fenjues
p 92 / Phantom Animals [animal teleportation] Pamela Weintraub
p 93 / Haunted Personalities [some p. more condusive to h.] Dave McNary
p 94 / Dracula Revisited [tour of Ducharest] Margaret Sachs
p 94 / Demons of Brookfield [inspire multiple murderer Arne Johnson] Peter Rondinone
p 123 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V4#7 4/82
p 10 / letter [sound in pottery] Robert Mest
p 10 / letter [UFO] Janina Leeds
p 12 / letter [Nostradomus] Everett Bleiler
p 12 / letter [n.d.e.] Walter Isenhour
p 12 / letter [UFO] Steven Soter
p 36 / Music [DEVO] Michael Shore
p 51 / quote ["Ignorance is the womb of monsters."] Henry Beecher
p 52 / quote ["The wallpaper with which men of science has covered the world of reality is falling to tatters."] Henry Miller
p 101 / UFO Update [UFO] Peter Rondinone
p 102 / Voices from Beyond [on tape] Allan Maurer
p 102 / Joan of Arc: Genetic Male [j.o.a.:g.m?] Eric Mishara
p 103 / Deadly Dreams [monsters become real] Peter Rondinone
p 103 / Huge UFO [UFO] Katherine Jason
p 103 / quote [UFO] Woody Allen
p 104 / Nuclear Premonitions [n.p.] Peter Rondinone
p 104 / Champlain Monster Meeting [czoo] J. Greenwell
p 104 / ELF-Wave Antidote [extreme low frequency mind control] Eric Mishara
p 115 / advertisement [Autobiography of a Yogi] Self-Realization Fellowship
p 130 / letter [sound in pottery, Seth] Dona MacVicar
p 137 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V4#8 5/91
p 10 / letter [animal experimentation] Richard Snedeker
p 10 / letter [shroud] Ann Smith
p 12 / letter [n.d.e.] Mary Flood
p 12 / response [n.d.e.] Michael Sabom
p 12 / letter [n.d.e.] Jerry Stockton
p 12 / letter [n.d.e.] William Reynolds
p 12 / letter [n.d.e.] Ira Marvin
p 12 / letter [n.d.e.] Bill Horne
p 12 / letter [n.d.e.] Michael Jackson
p 12 / letter [n.d.e.] John Kogut
p 12 / letter [n.d.e.] Anthony Klotz
p 40 / Barley Cure [tribal remedies ahead of science] Sy Montgomery
p 43 / Hypnosis on Trial [h. maybe not reliable] Yvonne Baskin
p 45 / Tunguska and Ozone [t. explosion] Joel Davis
p 111 / UFO Update [UFO] Al Furst
p 112 / Past-Life Skiing [p.l.s.] Margaret Sachs
p 112 / Mummy’s Curse [Tut] Robert Sheaffer
p 112 / Examining Bent Metal [burned by Uri] D. Rogo
p 112 / quote ["Logic is neither an art nor a science but a dodge."] Stendhal
p 113 / The Jerusalem Cover-up [The City of David was really Edinburgh, Scotland] Pamela Weintraub
p 114 / quote ["Men are most apt to believe what they least understand."] Montaigne
p 114 / UFO World Record [UFO] Peter Rondinone
p 114 / Satellite Seances [se. by way of sa.] Rachel Basch
p 137 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians
p 154 / Last Word [psy., para., Uri, Dowsing,] James Randi

V4#9 6/91
p 12 / letter [UFO] Travis Walton
p 12 / letter [humans were planted] Mark Baisley
p 12 / letter [humans were planted] Z. Sitchin
p 12 / letter [increase in gay men caued by favorable female wiring] Robert Hyre
p 14 / letter [gay origins] Nathan Daniels
p 14 / letter [self-contempt is the root of homosexuality] Pamela Goren
p 14 / letter [earthquake prediction] Steven Montgomery
p 14 / letter [firewalking] James Randi
p 36 / Deadly Intercourse [sperm allergy in women] Eric Mishara
p 39 / Biten by Love [psychosomatic arthritis in abused women] Charles Craig
p 41 / quote ["If triangles had a god, he would have three sides."] Clarles de Secondat
p 100 / Creationist Comics [c.ism] Bill Lee
p 109 / UFO Update [UFO] Carol Johmann
p 110 / Jesus Insurance [estate willed to Jesus] Peter Rondinone
p 110 / quote [psy.] Trevor Hall
p 110 / Time Foils ESP [psy.] Dava Sobel
p 110 / quote ["It is curious what unlikelihoods people - particularly scientists - will accept in order to 'save appearances...'"] Martyn Skinner
p 111 / Integraton [alien-inspired technology] Margaret Sachs
p 111 / Loc Ness Worms [czoo] Ivor Smullen
p 111 / quote [para] Trevor Hall
p 112 / Monster on Ice [Frank Hanson's "Big Foot Creature" exposed] Kendrick Frazier
p 112 / quote ["Miracles are not contrary to nature, but only contrary to what we know about nature."] St. Augustine
p 137 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V4#10 7/82
p 12 / letter [creation of gays] Ned Flaherty
p 14 / letter [yogis] Melvin Carter
p 14 / letter [yogis] Selene MacKenzie
p 14 / letter [yellow rain] Robert Levi
p 14 / letter [yellow rain] Timothy David
p 14 / letter [yellow rain] Fred Greene
p 35 / Good News for Lab Animals [vivisection] Douglas Starr
p 37 / Keeping Quiet about Earthquakes [predicting e.] Eric Mishara
p 39 / quote ["There are no facts, only interpretations"] Friedrich Nietzche
p 41 / Mystery Lake [unfrozen water near S. Pole] Madeleine Lebwohl
p 41 / Whole-Mind Predictions [use both halves for success] Judith Hooper
p 46 / Butterflies in the Dark [psy] Les Ericson
p 91 / UFO Update [UFO] Pamela Weintraub
p 92 / Bubbling Blood [St. Januarius miracle] Kathrine Jason
p 93 / Ghost Hunt [g. poll -- seen one?] Allan Maurer
p 93 / UFO Counseling [UFO Contact Center] Joel Davis
p 94 / Pyramid Wine [w. made in a p.] Peter Rondinone
p 94 / Hieroglyphic Hoax? [about Jewish exodus] Carol Johnmann
p 123 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V4#11 8/82
p 10 / letter [psi, czoo, UFO] Tom Pyzdek
p 12 / letter [astrology] Land Fleming
p 20 / Sudden Death [from fright or imagination] Patrick Huyghe
p 36 / Fetus on the Couch [personalities formed in utero] Eric Mishara
p 37 / Talking Computer for Dolphins [t.c.f.d.] Owne Davies
p 39 / Fateful Names [n. determine your future] Dava Sobel
p 91 / UFO Update [UFO] James Oberg
p 92 / Psychic Sleuths [p.s.] Marcello Truzzi
p 92 / American Triangle [Bermuda T. shifts west] Robert Sheaffer
p 93 / UFO Auto Accidents [UFO] Bethany Campbell
p 93 / Aroma Therapy [a. t.] Eric Mishara
p 94 / Suburban Pyramid [James Onan built one] Mark Teich
p 94 / quote ["The unknown always passes for the marvelous."] Tacitus
p 94 / Out-Of-Body Survey [University of Kansas findings] Tom Kovach
p 121 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V4#12 9/82
p 10 / letter [Jerusalem Cover-Up commentary] Robert Stephanos
p 10 / letter [Jerusalem Cover-Up commentary] Ken Turnbull
p 10 / letter [Randi mistake noted] Marcello Truzzi
p 22 / Foresight Saga [precog] David Loye
p 46 / quote ["When you collect the ten wisest men of the world and ask them to find the most stupid thing in existence, they will not be able to find anything stupider than astrology."] David Gilbert
p 47 / quote ["If a minister believes and teaches evolution, he is a stinking skunk."] Billy Sunday
p 53 / OOPArts [out-of-place artifacts] Robert Patton
p 99 / UFO Update [UFO] Bethany Campbell
p 100 / Big Foot Fraud [by Rant Mullens] Douglas Starr
p 100 / Pet Telepathy [psi] Owne Davies
p 101 / Living Neanderthals [crypto-anthropology?] J. Greenwell
p 102 / Messages for the Dead [carried by terminal patients] Eric Mishara
p 102 / Vampire Hall of Fame [v. museum in NY] Herny Packer
p 127 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians

V5#1 10/82
p 12 / letter [Loch Ness Worms commentary] Robert Huffman
p 14 / letter [Creationist Comics commentary] Sharon Lunsford
p 14 / letter [Creationist Comics commentary] Bill Melancon
p 14 / letter [Creationist Comics commentary] Roger Thrasher
p 49 / quote ["Never argue with a man who buys ink by the barrel."]
Bill Greener
p 52 / Subliminal Diet [s. tapes] Allan Maurer
p 72 / Mind Tripping [altered states lead to health] Judith Hooper
p 108 / advertisement [Battlefield Earth by L. Ron Hubbard] St. Martin’s Press
p 112 / Fetal Thought [does it exist?] ???
p 129 / interview [Karl Pribram] Judith Hooper
p 135 / advertisement [The Mastery of Life] The Rosicrucians
p 136 / Psi-Q Test 2 [psi] S. Schwartz and R. Mattei
p 151 / UFO Update [UFO] Alvin Lawson
p 152 / Bigfoot at Walla Walla [czoo] Owen Davies
p 152 / … And on Film [bigfoot, that is] Owen Davies
p 153 / The Alchemist’s Curse [a. really works] Moria Anderson
p 154 / Blond Mummy of Sinkiang [caucasian mummy from 2000 BC China] Douglass Starr
p 154 / Phantom Hitchhiker [para] Mark Teich
p 167 / advertisement [Autobiography of a Yogi] Self-Realization Fellowship
p 190 / Sun Shakes [may disprove Einstein's theory of relativity] Allan Hendry

The above does not reflect the intention of OVO, and in fact stands opposite to it. The above is provided to feed the presuppositions of those who will not actually read this issue of OVO. Any review of this issue that quotes the words above is likely to have been written by someone who never read beyond them to learn what OVO actually states. This issue of OVO has a purpose, but the likelihood that it will be misrepresented is great enough that a clear statement of what the purpose is not is in order.

OVO does not advocate the criminalization of Christianity. Existing criminal law suffices to address what is harmful, and law is among the least appropriate means of addressing what is merely mistaken. Christians deserve equal sanction by the law, and voluntary and informed activities among consenting adults (including religion) should not be outlawed.
OVO does not advocate the murder of Christians except in self-defense. Because of the potential for legal error, capital punishment is immoral in all cases. War and murder are immoral in all cases except in self-defense. Except in self-defense, it is always immoral to kill (including killing Christians).

OVO does not advocate the replacement of the Christian God with another God, a Goddess, a pantheon of deities, nature worship, or similar substitution. OVO does not advocate worship, be it of the Christian God or any other. To any reader who uses OVO to build up their own superstition: your faith is equally contemptible.

OVO does not criticize Christianity because it does not understand it. Many years research went into this issue, and along the way misunderstandings about Christianity (whether in its favor or against it) were abandoned. OVO criticizes Christianity not because it does not understand it, but because it is worthy of criticism.

OVO does not criticize Christianity because the editor had a traumatic experience with Christianity. The editor had a generally positive experience with Christianity while growing up and has Christian friends today. It is a silent admission of defeat that Christians use this psychological, secular explanation for why someone might criticize their superstition. The editor came to reject Christianity the old fashioned way: by reading the Bible.

OVO is not critical of Christianity because the editor is possessed by Satan, demons or evil spirits. Such ghosts have never existed.

OVO does not criticize Christianity because it is a socialist publication. OVO is not a socialist publication.

OVO does not criticize Christianity because Christianity is false. Christianity is false, but that is not in itself sufficient reason to advocate that it wither away. There are many non-fiction books, films, plays, poems and recordings that are also false but serve to inspire humanity. But these false stories do not claim to be true, are not taught to impressionable children as true, and are not used to support legislation that meddles in the affairs of non-Christians. No one is arguing that the epics of Homer be taught as history; no one is legislating that Aesop’s fables be posted in courtrooms. These stories, though false, serve to inspire those who seek them out and are rightly preserved. It is the secular power of Christianity that is the problem, not merely its falsehood. Christianity does not attempt to identify and lessen its falsehoods: it revels in them as ‘tests of faith.’ Christianity is holding back science and art, culture and philosophy, tools that actually can and actually have improved humanity’s lot in an indifferent Universe.

OVO does not criticize Christianity because it is a good religion perverted to bad ends. It is much more the case that a few good people (Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, perhaps) have perverted the bad religion of Christianity to good ends. All the good done in the name of Christianity could and does occur through entirely secular means. What remains distinctly Christian if such duplication of labor is removed? Threats of eternal damnation, denial of the pleasures and wonders of this short life, confusion and deception. When Christianity has supported individual rights it has done so only after a ‘revelation’ that (a) goes against its own history and (b) miraculously is in harmony with contemporary public opinion. For example, many Christians opposed slavery in the United States; but many more supported slavery and did so for much longer. Even today the Bible contains many passages supporting slavery and not one passage condemning it. Christianity is a slave religion, a misogynist religion, a queer-killing religion, a nonsense religion, but good people keep twisting their bad faith to good ends. Wouldn’t it be better to just do good deeds without wasted efforts to placate an invisible monster that lives in the sky?

OVO does not criticize Christianity to criticize individual Christians. It is often the case that an attack on a person’s unconsidered beliefs is perceived as an attack on their person. If a person’s beliefs are profoundly unconsidered, to merely state that one holds differing beliefs is perceived as an attack. For example, Christians who see other superstitions get equal time in the eyes of the law sometimes complain that their freedom of religion is under attack. Those who hold considered beliefs are secure when challenged and (hopefully) willing to admit error. Those who hold unconsidered beliefs, who repeat what they have been told without deliberation, are more likely to confuse who they are with what they believe. Christianity, like all religions, encourages strong belief but also encourages a lack of consideration. Posturing, bullying and stubbornness are substitutes for consideration of belief among most Christians.

OVO does not criticize Christianity because its claims contradict the evidence of our senses, science, history, archeology, astronomy, mathematics, common sense and the like. It is true that Christianity is incompatible with all of these, but science progresses by way of challenges to all our claims. If Christianity challenges the evidence of our senses, all the better: let the challenges be considered and considered again. If the Bible contradicts science, science can be tested to see if the Bible has a better explanation for reality. Where the Bible holds true, the Bible holds true. Where the Bible is found to be false, it should either be re-written or re-classified as folk tales. Resolving contradictions between the Bible and the evidence of our senses can be of value to us all, and so the contradictions between the Bible and the evidence of our senses are not in themselves why the Bible should be criticized. Internal contradictions in the Bible, and holding on to falsehood when falsehood has been identified, are worthy of the greatest of criticisms.

OVO does not criticize Christianity as an argument for atheism. The editor is preparing an argument for atheism that is distinct from this argument against Christianity.

OVO does not criticize Christianity because Jesus Christ was a good person whose followers have gone astray, or because we do not have the secret teachings of Jesus, or because Jesus was a complex person with both good and bad qualities. Jesus never existed.

In 1991, the editor published A Call to Heresy on a BBS in Knoxville, Tennessee USA. The document found its way onto BBS’ around the world as well as other formats, including an Internet domain in Hong Kong and a CD-ROM of public domain texts published by Palm Computers. Various editions of the text can be found on the Internet today. Some of the research done for that text has found a new home here in OVO 16 AntiChrist.

OVO criticizes the Bible. Some Christians say that it is an error to overly attend to what the Bible says, and one should rely on the Bible as inspiration rather than fact. But the Bible itself makes claims of perfection, and so taking it at its word in claims of perfection are as justified as any other perspective; perhaps more justified than some ‘inspired’ interpretations. If any interpretation of the Bible is as good as any other, then Christians in no way can distance themselves from the worst among them. Having failed to amend the contradictions, atrocities and absurdities in the Bible with over two thousand years to do so, it is reasonable to conclude that the Bible is considered factual among Christians. Some Christians (called Dominionists or Fundamentalists or Conservatives or the Christian Right) are explicit in their claim that the Bible is factual, while the rest hold it to be factual but requiring ‘interpretation’ (often by way of asking the reader to simply ignore parts of the Bible).

But this issue of OVO does not limit itself to criticisms of the Bible. The Roman Catholic Church claims a history pre-dating the Bible. Martin Luther, founder of Protestant Christianity, wrote inspired texts. The Church of Jesus Christ Latter-Day Saints and the Watchtower Society claim to have Christian revelations in modern times. All of these Christians are well deserving of criticism and contempt.

There are a set number of responses offered by Christians when confronted with their own beliefs. The first and most common is to be told that these Bible verses have been taken out of context. It is claimed that the verses surrounding these quotes give them a meaning other than their apparent meaning. If this is the case it will be easy to demonstrate; full citations for each quote are given throughout. The reader is encouraged to read the Bible. There is no more sure path to rejecting Christianity than understanding it. Some claim that the contexts of the times change how we should understand the Bible. But does the Bible say it is relevant only until the time of Job (the last time God speaks directly to humanity), or does it claim to be relevant to all times? Some claim that one translation of the Bible offers a more accurate account than another, but existing fragmentary early Christian texts contain their own contradictions, atrocities and absurdities.

The second common reply made by Christians when confronted with their own beliefs is that the Bible, God, Jesus and the rest are not to be understood by reason in the way math or science is. Christianity is to be understood by faith, by the heart, by the spirit, by the soul. Therefore any apparent contradictions, atrocities or absurdities should be ignored because those are all ‘reason’ and not ‘faith.’ But there is no ‘alternative to reason’ as faith is said to be. One can hope, one can wish, one can pretend and ignore, one can scream or run away or kill one’s critics, but none of these are alternatives to reason. Even if there were an alternative to reason, how is the ‘feeling’ that Christianity is true (and all other religions false) different from the ‘feeling’ that Islam is true (and all other religions are false)? Why is it that Christian ‘feelings’ are so regional – does God not inspire such ‘feelings’ everywhere equally? Why don’t children have that ‘feeling’ until an adult tells them to say they do, and why do adults spend so much effort making sure that ‘feeling’ is planted in children?

All religions claim to be the only true religion. Even the ecumenical religions claim to be the only true religion, by claiming that the non-ecumenical religions are false. But since all religions contradict each other at most only one can be the only true religion. Since all religions by definition put themselves outside what can be demonstrated as true, it would be unjust to establish any religion as secular law because the likelihood of error would be too great. Suppose Mithrism became the law of the United States when actually it was Ah Pook that was the real living God? Those countries that have a legal assumption of atheism serve freedom the most. At times this has been the case in the United States, where OVO originates. Christianity threatens the legal presupposition of atheism in the USA, necessitating this issue of OVO. Christianity is the superstition behind the US support of Israel, the war in Iraq, lack of access to Plan B and a vaccine for two strains of cancer-causing HPV, the removal of science from public education, the ongoing imprisonment of the West Memphis Three (among others), blue laws, laws forbidding atheists from holding elected office and more. Reform from within should occur in Christianity. Civil discourse should occur between Christians and non-Christians. But should Christianity elect to ignore the opportunities of positive reinforcement, let it learn the sting of negative reinforcement. OVO is not reforming Christianity from within, nor is it a civil discourse. It is an attack – using only Christianity’s own beliefs as weapons. When Mithrism or the faithful of Ah Pook establish their superstition as law in the USA, they will be equally worthy of criticism. Readers in countries where Islam or Judaism are the majority superstition are encouraged to make similar efforts.

This issue of OVO advocates the withering away of Christianity through reason and scorn. Reason alone withers Christianity to a hostile party guest that has long overstayed his welcome; scorn provide us with laughter and satisfaction as we show him to the door. Perhaps reason alone, or reason and compassion, might be a more noble endeavor. But any belief that cannot withstand a little mockery is perhaps not worth holding in the first place.

Subject religious organizations to the same requirements as secular non-profit organizations: demonstrate they perform a quantifiable public good to receive tax-exempt status. Do not donate any funds, labor or resources to Christian organizations: there are secular equivalents to any Christian organization for those who seek to aid others. Do not vote for politicians who make their Christianity a part of their platform. Oppose ‘faith based’ funding and theocratic laws. Learn more about Christianity than the Christians themselves. Confront Christians with their own claims and history.

OVO is fortunate to originate in the United States, where Christianity and other superstitions may be legally practiced and criticized. The United Kingdom, Holland, Sweden, Italy, Turkey, Norway, Canada and other countries forbid criticism of religion as a form of ‘hate crime,’ while China, North Korea and other countries forbid religion as a form of ‘thought crime.’ In the United States religion may be both practiced and criticized – for now. If Christianity continues to become the state religion of the United States, this may not be the case much longer.

OVO is a tool kit to disabuse the reader of Christianity.

(from OVO 16 ANTICHRIST January 2006)

Tax exemption for religious organizations in Oregon brings about three problems for Oregonians. First, there is no definition of religion to differentiate ‘real’ religious organizations from ‘fake’ ones, thus making any decision for or against tax exemption on the part of the government arbitrary. Second, religious organizations are not compelled to make contributions to their community that are comparable to the amount they are awarded in taxes breaks, nor is there any effort or means to hold them accountable for aiding the community. Third, the revenue needs of Oregon could be met by taxing religious organizations at only a fraction of the rate other organizations are taxed.

It is helpful to delineate what is under discussion in any argument. In this case, the topics under discussion are Oregon, taxes exemption and religion. Oregon is the state to the North of California and Nevada, to the South of Washington, to the West of Idaho and with a Western boundary of the Pacific Ocean. Tax exemption means that the agencies in question are not compelled to pay taxes. The definitions for Oregon and tax exemption are easy to find, confirm, and understand. But the search for a definition of religion is doomed to failure.

There is no legal definition of what a religion is, be it on the international level, the national level or the state level. Although many nations define religion as something deserving of political protection, there is no legal definition of what a religion is in international law [1].

There is also no legal definition of what a religion is in United States law. The First Amendment of the Constitution states that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” The Civil Rights Act of 1964 states that the religion of a US citizen cannot be used to deny them public accommodation, equal protection under the law, segregation in public education or college education, the right to vote, or employment [2]. While the Constitution and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 ensure protection of religion, neither define what it is they are protecting. The United States has never offered a definition what a religion is, although it has offered a definition of what a religion is not. In Thomas vs. Review Board of the Indiana Employment Security Division, the Supreme Court determined that “religious beliefs need not be acceptable, logical, consistent, or comprehensible to others in order to merit First Amendment protection [3].” In the eyes of the law, a religion is anything that declares itself a religion.

There is no legal definition of what a religion is in Oregon law. ORS 128.620 (4) states a “religious organization means any organized church or group organized for the purpose of divine worship, religious teaching, or other directly ancillary purposes [4].” ORS 307.140 states property owned or being purchased by religious organizations is exempt from taxation [5]. ORS 65.001 (39) states that a religious group “is designated a religious corporation by a statute or is organized primarily or exclusively for religious purposes.” The Department of Revenues states that exemption from property tax is available for any religious group that has a constitution, bylaws, or charter which states its mission and purpose [6]. Religious organizations in Oregon are clearly given exemption from property tax, and are clearly expected to ‘be religious.’ But there is no legal definition of what a religion is or how to ‘be religious’ in Oregon law.

Whether it be international law, United States law or Oregon law, there is no legal definition of what a religion is. What if legal sanctions and prohibitions for other issues were left similarly vague? For better and for worse, there are legal definitions to who is and is not a Native American; what is and is not an endangered species; which chemicals are and are not legal to ingest. If there were no definition of who is a Native American, anyone could collect federal benefits reserved for Native Americans. If there were no definition of what an endangered species is, any species could be declared no longer endangered and hunted to extinction. If there were no definition of who is authorized to sell morphine, anyone who would like to make some fast money would do so. The reason legal definitions exist is so that laws may be fairly applied to all, and so that exemptions from the law may be justified. But a religious group is a religious group merely because it claims to be a religious group. Religions exempt themselves from definition, aside from the definition of ‘that which is tax exempt.’

Because there is no legal definition for religion in Oregon, there is no way to determine if religious tax exemptions are being fairly applied. Some religious organizations may be tax exempt but not deservedly so, while other religious organizations may not be tax exempt and deserve tax exemption. There is no way to determine if religious tax exemptions are being fairly granted to all applicants because there is no way to determine which applicant is ‘being religious’ and which is not. Whatever ‘being religious’ means, religious organizations are exempt from paying taxes. This includes taxes related to their property, businesses, income, and donations.

The justification offered for religious tax exemption is similar to that of secular groups that qualify for non-profit status (501c3). Secular non-profit organizations earn their tax exempt status by providing services that might otherwise be provided by the state, such as housing or medical care. Since the state does not have to pay for these services, no taxes are gathered from organizations that offer such services. Since the perceived need for taxes is thereby reduced, secular non-profit organizations can justify their tax-exempt status.

But there is an important difference between the tax-exempt status of secular organizations and the tax-exempt status of religious organizations. Secular non-profit organizations are held accountable for their work. They must demonstrate that the service they provide is necessary, that they have provided that service, that the service they provided was taken advantage of, and that the cost of lost taxes is less than the benefit of the services provided. If a secular non-profit organization cannot demonstrate each of these characteristics, they do not retain their tax-exempt status.

The standards that secular non-profit organizations are held to makes them very different from religious tax-exempt organizations. Religious tax-exempt organizations are not held to these standards or to any other standard. A religious organization may deliver food to the hungry, offer shelter to the homeless and counseling to the troubled – or they may do none of these things, or it may do these things to a standard far outside accepted norms (such as offering “prayer” as a substitute for medical care or counseling). Religious groups are exempt from taxes whether or not they serve their community and lessen the tax burden. There is no legal obligation on a religious group’s part to demonstrate they have delivered food, shelter or other tangible services; there is no legal obligation on a religious group’s part to do anything to retain their tax-exempt status other than filing or re-filing the proper forms. It is not possible to measure measures how much religion Oregonians need, how much religion religious organizations provide, how many people take advantage of religion, whether one form of religion is more beneficial than any other, or whether or not religion is cost effective. While is it possible to state how many people claim religious affiliation, it is not possible to state what that means. It is not possible to determine if a two-year-old just as religious as an adult. It is not possible to legislate how often or in what way a group must be religious to qualify for tax exempt status. Because there is no oversight to determine how much a religious group serves its community, there is no justification for tax exempt status for religious organizations in Oregon.

Oregon law does not state what religion is. Oregon law is also not consistent in when individuals are exempt from legal punishment due to religion. Sometimes activities are forbidden by law irregardless of religion, other times they are allowed if religion is said to be involved. In the case of Employment Division Department of Human Resources of Oregon vs. Smith it was determined that the state of Oregon is not compelled to allow the use of peyote [7]. Although peyote has been a part of Native American religions for centuries, and although the plaintiffs were themselves Native Americans and were using peyote for what they claimed were religious reasons, the state Supreme Court determined they were not entitled to unemployment compensation after being fired due to using peyote. The legal injunction against peyote use trumped their religious claims. This is an example of an activity being illegal whether or not it was ‘religious.’

Conversely, Oregon law provides immunity to many charges if the crime occurred as religion. These crimes have included homicide by abuse or neglect, first and second degree manslaughter, criminal mistreatment, requirements for children to wear a bicycle helmet, and nonsupport of children. Until recently, all of these crimes could be excused if the defendant claims they were committed as religion [8].

All newborns in Oregon are given a drop of vitamin K by law, but parents can prevent their children from receiving protection against spontaneous hemorrhaging for religious reasons.

The Followers of Christ Church in Clackamas County took advantage of religious exemption for murder by allowing nearly eighty children to die since the 1950s from treatable medical conditions. In over half of these deaths, the state did not attempt to establish the cause of death, the record was lost or their deaths were listed as due to ‘natural causes.’ Even when an Oregon medical examiner brought these deaths to the attention of the District Attorney’s office, the prosecutor declined to file charges. In the words of Rita Swan, “a parent may be beating or torturing a child, but if he or she can show that the child was prayed for, criminal charges must be dismissed [9].” Oregon House Bill 2494 revised criminal exemptions for parents who treat children only with prayer in 1999, after hearing opposing testimony by Oregon churches [10]. While child sacrifice in Oregon now carries some consequences, other criminal exemptions such as not requiring a religious child to wear a bicycle helmet remain [11]. These are examples of an otherwise illegal activity made legal by calling it ‘religious.’

One of the larger religious organization in Oregon is the Archdiocese of Portland. The Archdiocese of Portland is under the direct orders of the Roman Catholic Church, led by the Pope of Rome. In 1962, Pope John XXIII gave his approval to a document outlining the policy of the Roman Catholic Church in the event of child abuse by clergy. The policy was to keep child abuse by clergy secret and to transfer abusive priests to new parishes. The policy itself was to be kept secret but was revealed in 2003. The policy has never been retracted [12]; in fact, the current Pope stated in 2001 that the policy was still in effect [13]. More than one hundred and sixty nine victims of clerical child abuse have sued the Archdiocese of Portland for child abuse, and more than $53,000,000.00 has been assigned to settlements so far. While the Archdiocese of Portland filed for and received permission to delay paying its victims, it did have the funds to make building upgrades costing $1.6 million dollars [14]. The Archdiocese of Portland is estimated to own between $300,000,000 and $500,000,000 in property, none of which is taxed. It also owns special-purpose funds, investment funds, and loan funds, none of which are taxed. In 2003 its revenue was no less than and perhaps greater than $8.2 million, none of which was taxed [15]. The Archdiocese of Portland is only one out of 6,862 religious organizations claiming ORS 307.140 tax exemption in the state [16]. To quote the Oregonian, “The Catholic Church operates not by secular law, but by church law [17].”

Religious organizations in Oregon are not compelled to follow the same standards of education and employment as any other educator or employer in the state. Fundamental facts of nature which are part of the basic curriculum for any other school in the state may be omitted or deliberately misrepresented in religious schools. Any secular employer who hires and fires based on gender, ethnicity, sexuality, marital status or beliefs is subject to legal sanctions, but if the employer is religious they may hire and fire at will are protected by law in doing so.

Non-profit organizations (both secular and religious) are forbidden from endorsing political candidates. But some religious tax-exempt groups want to have their cake and eat it too. The Sonrise Church of Hillsboro lost its tax exempt status after partisan campaigning on its property [18]. The Christian Coalition has published the same sort of voting guides that cost the Sonrise Church its tax exempt status [19]. The New Hope Community Church of Clackamas has held partisan campaign meetings on its property [20]. The campaign to elect George W. Bush solicited the support of hundreds of religious organizations [21]. To further blur the line between state and superstition, the House of Representatives has initiated a bill that will merely fine religious organization that engage in partisan politics rather than revoke their tax exempt status [22]. Religious organizations can now avail themselves to federal funds through George W. Bush’s ‘faith based initiatives’ law – but apparently this money is made available mainly to Christian organizations, as few other religious organizations that have applied have received such funds. Under faith based funding, tax dollars can go to agencies that refuse to hire or serve minorities, women, homosexuals or anyone else for any reason.

In 1998 the Audits Division of the State of Oregon Department of Revenue conducted an audit of property tax exemptions. It determined that among religious organizations claiming tax exempt status under ORS 307.140, the sum of $2,010,492,000.00 was lost in tax year 1995-1996 [23]. This figure represents only revenues lost from property taxes, and does not include other lost forms of revenues connected to employment, businesses, museums and other sources of income for religious organizations. The audit states that 41 of the 154 organizations audited that were granted tax exempt status did not even meet the minimal state standards for tax exempt status (whatever those might be). The audit does not specifically state how many of these organizations were tax exempt under ORS 307.140. But the fact that one third of the organizations that claimed (and were granted) exemption totaling seventeen percent of $170.9 billion dollars in property taxes [24] were not qualified to do so suggests that Oregon religious tax exemption law is in dire need of supervision and revision [25]. Among other recommendations, the audit suggested that Oregon needs a clear definition of what a religion is to be able to fairly evaluate applications for ORS 307.140 tax exempt status [26]. This recommendation was not mentioned in the Department of Revenue’s reply [27] nor in a 1999 report on their progress in implementing 1998 audit [28]. Religion continues to go undefined, but religious tax exemption continues to be granted.

At what cost does Oregon grant tax exempt status to religious organizations? The state deficit for fiscal year 2004 was between $950,000.00 and $1,267,000.00 [29]. If religious organizations were taxed only for their property and only at half the rate of any other organization, the state budget would be all-but balanced within a single year.

Being religious, the defining trait that has no definition, is in the main an excuse to do as one pleases without consequence in Oregon. The majority of religious organizations in Oregon do not abuse and sacrifice children. Instead, they do nothing. Doing nothing and ruining childrens’ lives should not be rewarded with tax exemption.

Notes:
[1] Gunn , T. Jeremy: The Complexity of Religion and the Definition of “Religion” in International Law. Harvard Human Rights Journal Volume 16 Spring 2003. http://www.law.harvard.edu/students/orgs/hrj/iss16/gunn.shtml
[2] Civil Rights Act of 1964. Document Number: PL 88-352. http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/laws/majorlaw/civilr19.htm
[3] Thomas vs. Review Board of the Indiana Employment Security Division. 450 U.S. 707. http://laws.findlaw.com/us/450/707.html
[4] ORS Chapter 128 http://www.leg.state.or.us/ors/128.html
[5] ORS Chapter 307 http://www.leg.state.or.us/ors/307.html
[6] Property Tax Exemptions for Special Organizations. http://www.dor.state.or.us/InfoC/310-664.html
[7] Employment Division Department of Human Resources of Oregon vs. Smith http://laws.findlaw.com/us/494/872.html
[8] Children’s Health Care. http://www.childrenshealthcare.org/
[9] Swan, Rita. Letting Children Die for the Faith. Free Inquiry, Volume 19, Number 1. http://www.secularhumanism.org/library/fi/swan_19_1.htm
[10] Larabee, Mark. Shield-law bills face easy win in House. Oregonian, March 5, 1999 http://www.rickross.com/reference/foc/foc9.html
[11] Children’s Health Care. http://www.childrenshealthcare.org/
[12] BBC News. Excerpts: Vatican document. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/3157859.stm
[13] Pope ‘Obstructed’ Sex Abuse Inquiry. http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,1469055,00.html
[14] Funds are Released to Florence Parish http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/news/111813879118220.xml&coll=7
[15] Sunday Oregonian, May 23, 2004, Page A-14.
[16] State of Oregon Department of Revenue Property Tax Exemptions. March 24, 1998. Page 51. http://www.sos.state.or.us/audits/audreports/1998_year.html
[17] Sunday Oregonian, May 23, 2004, Page A-14.
[18] Americans United Reports Eight Churches to IRS for Distributing Christian Coalition Voter Guides During November Elections. December 10 1998. http://www.au.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=6112&abbr=pr&JServSessionIdr012=i6cieg36h2.app1b&news_iv_ctrl=1502
[19] Christian Coalition of Oregon http://www.coalition.org/
[20] Dobson speaks to NW pastors about same-sex debate. KATU April 5 2004. http://www.katu.com/news/story.asp?ID=66042
[21] Bush Campaign [...] To Forge Church-Based Political Machine. Americans United, June 2 2004. http://www.au.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=6692&abbr=pr&security=1002&news_iv_ctrl=1241
[22] House steps into church-politics debate. USA Today, June 8 2004. http://www.usatoday.com/news/politicselections/nation/2004-06-08-church-politics_x.htm
[23] State of Oregon Department of Revenue Property Tax Exemptions. March 24, 1998. Page 51. http://www.sos.state.or.us/audits/audreports/1998_year.html
[24] ibid. March 24, 1998. Page 56. http://www.sos.state.or.us/audits/audreports/1998_year.html
[25] ibid. March 24, 1998. Page iii. http://www.sos.state.or.us/audits/audreports/1998_year.html
[26] ibid. March 24, 1998. Page 44. http://www.sos.state.or.us/audits/audreports/1998_year.html
[27] ibid. March 24, 1998. Page 55. http://www.sos.state.or.us/audits/audreports/1998_year.html
[28] State of Oregon Department of Revenue Status of 1998 Audit Recommendations as Reported by State Agencies. November 17, 1999. http://www.sos.state.or.us/audits/audreports/1999_year.html
[29] State Budget Shortfall Map http://www.pbs.org/now/politics/budgetmap.html

(from OVO 16 ANTICHRIST January 2006)

(from OVO 14 Suffering March 1992)