OK, here's my report.
First of all, it was great to meet people from this board-- I regret that I didn't get to hang out much with kittynh, rebecca, evelyn, scott, suzoled, or girl6 (and others), but it was awesome to meet everyone. I'm really glad that I did get to talk to bpesta, scarlet, wowbagger, and Eos a fair bit (and in case anyone doesn't know this yet, Eos is super-awesome, even if she did cast aspirations on my personal hygiene
). I have yet to meet anyone from the JREF board who hasn't hit the "kindred spirit" bell for me.
I missed the humanist activist training on Friday, as well as the Rushdie talk, but I heard it was good. I had a beer with bpesta's myspace friends on Friday evening, which was fun.
Saturday started off with some kind of benediction in both English and Hebrew-- I did not pay much attention (I don't stand and recite things in unison any more). Then there was a video of Dr. Sen talking about economics and humanism, which was interesting, but the video was low-contrast and the sound quality was poor. Then there was a talk about Confucianism, which was interesting in parts, but there were also lots of vague, general statements about "expanding circles of consciousness" and other fuzzies. The gist of the talk was: "Confucianism is a type of humanism" and "China should look to India for cultural and political reform." I appreciate that they were trying to have a non-Western viewpoint on humanism at the conference, but your first talk of the conference sets the tone, and it would have been better to have someone more charismatic speak, or at least a real person! (i.e., not a video).
The panels were, overall, interesting and inspiring. The first was on "Abrahamic" humanism, and had Salman Rushdie, Sherwin Wine (a secular Jew), and Bill Murray (a UU minister). Even though I'm an atheist, I did appreciate their points about the contributions to humanism from Abrahamic religions. Rabbi Wine was the best speaker, and his points about how secularized people who still think fondly of religion for cultural or personal reasons do not want to rub elbows with the "wounded," as he put it. I feel like I got a lot to think about from that panel discussion. I wished they had opened it to questions.
However., there was not time, because Salman Rushdie was interrupted in mid-statement by Greg for a completely random video conference with a conference on global warming in Birmingham, AL (where E.O. Wilson was speaking). It was incredibly rude to Rushdie, and I did not see the point. First Miss Rhode Island and then Greg made some kind of statement about "working with Baptists on global warming...." WTF? In retrospect, I think that Greg was just showing off. Hey, look all you Baptists-- Harvard has a humanist chaplain, and look at all of these people who have gathered here to talk about Humanism (oddly, the camera on our end was pointed at the audience, whereas in Birmingham it was pointed at the stage). There was no dialog, and right after the exchange, Rabbi Wine gave the floor back to Salman Rushdie. I kind of resented having words put in my mouth (I never agreed to "work with Baptists" on global warming, and the video exchange was not mentioned in the program). Frankly, I thought it was an embarrassing moment for Greg.
The "formal humanism" panel was also great-- Lori Lipman Brown continues to be my hero. It was well moderated and there was time for questions. Good points were raised about the necessity for humanists to show their stripes "through their works" and also there was a good discussion about diversity in humanism.
The "future of humanism" panel with bpesta and Rebecca was slightly less well-run, but still, lots of good points were made, and I appreciated hearing the perspectives of the students on the panel. Rebecca and Brian easily held their own again the Harvard and SSA guys.
I skipped the over-priced dinner and went back home for a walk, a nap and a shower, but I snuck back in to hear Dar Williams at 9:30. Again, I thought was horribly embarrassing for Greg and August that Dar didn't get to the stage until almost 11. Yes, Dar is cool, but only one person should get the honor of introducing her, not three! It was an abuse of the captive audience for the Harvard guys to go on and on about how important the Harvard humanist chaplaincy is and how they need a new building (not a broom closet!). Eventually Dar got to go on, said some interesting things, sang four or five songs and then got pushed off. What a disappointment.
As I wrote before, the morning round-table had some good moments, but it was lots of presidents and executive directors from lots of different humanist organizations who all wanted to pimp their programs. There was some discussion about the risk of humanism being considered "just another religion," which led to some clarification between the importance of both secular and religious humanists working together for common goals. Discussion of branding and media-handling skills was also considered.
Still... it was definitely a conference worth attending-- a "consciousness-raising experience." I had never even thought about how obvious it is that colleges, prisons, and hospitals should have humanist chaplains. U. Minnesota is installing foot-washing sinks for the 500 Muslim students on campus... what about providing services for the thousands of non-theist students on campus? I'm motived to get the student humanist organization at Yale back into an active status, and I'm going to write a letter to the president (of Yale) with my thoughts about the conference and just how important this issue is to non-theist students and faculty. I also met many interesting people (including the new CFI exec. director in NY-- CFI totally rocks!), and I heard about some other upcoming conferences that I might try to attend.
And it was a beautiful, sunny weekend in Boston!
-- Michael
