SAIU is On the Move
Posted at 12:05 am May 1st, 2013 by SAIUWe’re in the process of moving our website, so please pardon our mess.
Bow to your new leaders!
Posted at 11:04 am April 14th, 2013 by SAIUThe ’13-’14 leadership for SAIU has been selected! After the President, Secretary, and Treasurer were elected by popular vote on April 7th, they selected three individuals to carry out a semester term as small group leaders. All new officers will be sworn in at the end of year potluck on Sunday, April 21st. If you would like to read more about what each of these people will be responsible for, you can read information here. Additionally, there are four appointed positions which SAIU’s current president, Jessika Griffin, selected with recommendations from SAIU at large.
President
Orion Day studies both the natural and social sciences, and he will be leading the SAIU in further outreach and advocacy for secular issues.
Secretary
JT Stewart studies psychology and sociology at IU, he enjoys music, art, and analyzing everything.
Treasurer
Katie Russell studies human development and family studies at IU, she is very interested in sexual health and reproductive rights.
Director: Reflection and discussion small group
Allen Quaderer studies geology at IU and will lead this small group during the summer of 2013.
Director: Social and community small group
Rachel Van Nostrand studies human biology at IU, she is excited to help build a community to provide support to secular students at IU.
Director: Activism small group
Brooke Lange studies communications and culture and journalism at IU, she is happy to have a hobby aside from sneaking out to fight crime every night.
Quidditch Captain
Brienne Strohl studies philosophy and is very interested in rationality activism.
Mascot
Plastic Jesus has been with SAIU for about a year. Previous SAIU president, Carly Casper, found Jesus during her summer travels and donated him to the SAIU. Plastic Jesus will be the face of SAIU for the ’13-’14 academic year.
Worldview: who the hell knows
First Lady
Scott Setchfield has been selected, appropriately, as the SAIU First Lady. Scott will support Orion along the way and be a pretty face for us to admire. There are rumors that his arms are almost at First Lady Michelle Obama standards.
Overseas Correspondent
Aubree Allen will be spending the summer of 2013 abroad in Croatia, and visit many other countries along the way. Aubree was SAIU’s service director for two years and is an enthusiastic vegan. If she doesn’t die of starvation in countries that mainly eat seafood and do not have appropriate soil to grow vegetables, then when she returns she will share her experiences with us all!
A year in review
Posted at 12:04 pm April 12th, 2013 by JessikaMy final official day as SAIU President is April 21st, at which time we will swear in all the new officers at our end of year potluck. I wanted to go over all the wonderful things SAIU has accomplished this year and thank all of you for a wonderful year!
May ’12 – July ’12
We kept the group alive throughout the summer with regular discussions and movie viewings. Check our events calendar in mid-May for updates on the summer activities for 2013. Summer activities draw a smaller group of people, and are great for those of you who don’t have much time to participate during the school year.
In June, myself and Orion, Outreach Director, travelled to the Center for Inquiry Student Leadership Conference in Amherst, NY. We picked up Alishba Zarmeen on the way, founder and President of Earlham Humanists. SAIU was also awarded Best Online Outreach for 2011. Read more »
Is “Islamophobia” Real?
Posted at 6:04 pm April 8th, 2013 by Robby BensingerThis post is a member’s response to a current event. The opinions expressed in this piece are not necessarily those of the SAIU.
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My previous post on the Sam Harris / Glenn Greenwald clusterfuffle was mostly procedural. I restricted myself to assessing the authenticity of Murtaza Hussain’s citations, barely touching on the deeper issues of substance he and Greenwald raised. But now that we’re on the topic, this is a great opportunity to pierce through the rhetoric and try to get a bit more lucid and careful about what’s actually being disputed.
My biggest concern with the criticisms of Harris is that they freely shift between a number of different accusations, often as though they were equivalent. At the moment, the most salient seem to be:
A. He’s a racist, and has a racially motivated hatred of Muslims.
B. He has an intensely irrational fear and hatred of Muslims.
C. He has an intensely irrational fear and hatred of Islam.
D. His concerns about Islam are exaggerated.
E. He doesn’t appreciate just how harmful and dangerous the United States is.
F. He advocates militarism and condones violence in general.
I’d like to start disentangling these claims, in the hopes of encouraging actual discussions — and not just shouting matches — about them. Although I’ll use Harris and his recent detractors as a revealing test case, the conclusions here will have immediate relevance to any discussion in which people strongly disagree about the nature and geopolitical significance of Islamic extremism.
