Barney Frank and former Minnesota Vikings punter Chris Kluwe are teaming up in campaign to help end discrimination against the non-religious. Hey, that's me!

Courtesy of HuffPo:  

Former Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) and former Minnesota Vikings punter Chris Kluwe have signed on to a new campaign to end discrimination against atheists, agnostics and the nonreligious. 

Openly Secular, a coalition of more than two dozen secular organizations, seeks to debunk misconceptions about secular people by encouraging nontheists to come forward and raise awareness for the 29 percent of Americans who identify as nonreligious. 

In an Openly Secular campaign video posted Friday, Kluwe, who described himself as "cheerfully agnostic and openly secular," urged nonbelievers to advocate for their rights. 

"It's important for secularists to be vocal about who they are ... in a truly functional society, in a stable society, everyone is afforded the same freedom to be who they are no matter what that is as long as it doesn't infringe upon the rights of other people to be who they are," Kluwe said. "If you want to enjoy your own beliefs, then you have to fight for everyone else's beliefs just as hard, because if you don't, someday you might be on the other side of that line and you're not going to be very happy when that day comes."

Is it weird that I want to say amen to that?

Personally I am in favor of anything that will de-stigmatize Atheists and allow people to understand that we are not attacking their religious beliefs. We simply do not want them shoved down our throats.

Former Minnesota Vikings player Chris Kluwe takes on the Religious Right.

Courtesy of Americans Against the Tea Party:  

Kluwe made the comments during an interview with atheist activist David Viviano. When asked if religion was behind Vikings special teams coach Mike Priefer’s anti-gay comments, Kluwe said that a special brand of extreme Christianity was most likely the source. 

“I think that might have been a factor in it because I know that especially with Christianity there is very much, you know, a lot of stuff in the Old Testament about, you know, stone the gays, don’t allow it, homosexuality is a sin, stuff like that,” Kluwe replied. “And it is really unfortunate because there is a lot of very nice people who are Christians who don’t believe that, but there are also a lot of very not nice people who are Christians who do believe that, and they give the other Christians a very bad name.” 

“They’re very vocal, they’re very active, and they’re treating people really badly,” Kluwe went on to say. 

He pointed out that if the “tables where flipped,” fundamentalist Christians would be the first ones to complain about being “persecuted.” 

“Fundamentalism is never a good thing in history,” he continued. “Fundamentalism leads to really terrible things, and so my position has always been, I don’t have any problem whatsoever with religion, I have no problem whatsoever with whatever your beliefs are, all I care about are your actions. What do your actions say about you as a person? Because that is the only way any of us can ever judge each other.” 

Hard to argue with that.

I know that a lot of my Christian visitors get a little testy with me always going after religion, but much like Chris Kluwe my main problem is with those who wish to impose their religion on others.

If there were no Christians trying to insert Creationism into public classrooms, or telling women what to do with their bodies, or imposing their Biblical morality on our LGBT friends and relatives, I would never say a peep.

But as we know that is NOT what is going on in America these days. But hopefully by speaking out, educating others about the origin of religion, and standing up for our rights, there may soon come a time when people of a religious persuasion can live in harmony with the non-religious, and feel no sense of discomfort or need to inflict their point of view on their neighbors.

Minnesota Vikings punter Chris Kluwe lays the smack down on yet ANOTHER homophobic asshole.

So this attorney from Minnesota, Riley Balling, took it upon himself to write an article for the Star Tribune which stated the following: Many times it is stated:

"What I choose to do in my marriage doesn't affect your marriage." However, same-sex marriage affects all of our marriages.

Then Mr. Balling went on to demonstrate his ignorance by making a number of false equivalencies and false statements to support his point of view.

This did not sit well with Kluwe. who responded thusly: