Skepticism

Fox news is nothing if not persistent

Ellen Johnson, president of American Atheists, discussed The Golden Compass this morning on “Fox & Friends” (Fox News Channel).

Here’s a blurb from the No God Blog:

Ms. Johnson will be discussing the censoring of “anti-religious” segments of film “The Golden Compass” based on the book of the same title by Atheist writer Philip Pullman. The movie version, in production, has been attacked by the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, which claims that the film has a “stealth Atheist agenda.”

Ellen also discusses the topic in a short video.

Pullman and the studio must be thrilled with all this free press for the movie!

How’s the reading done? Will we all be finished with the book before the film comes out so we can compare the two versions of the story?

Writerdd

Donna Druchunas is a freelance technical writer and editor and a knitwear designer. When she's not working, she blogs, studies Lithuanian, reads science and sci-fi books, mouths off on atheist forums, and checks her email every three minutes. (She does that when she's working, too.) Although she loves to chat, she can't keep an IM program open or she'd never get anything else done.

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7 Comments

  1. I would suggest that readers try to get through all three books before seeing the movie. The first book is a fun adventure, but the story doesn't settle down to the meat-and-potatoes until about half-way through the second book. Like Fellowship of the Rings, The Golden Compass ends with the beginning of our hero's journey.

    Selfishly, I want someone else to talk to about the entire series.

  2. Those darned "Stealth Atheists" with their "Christian Radar" defeating technology.

    Brand them all!

    …on the butts of course. I want to see their butts. "Hey you, pull down your britches. I think you're a Stealth Atheist!"

  3. I'd read The Golden Compass a few years back. I just hope that its still fairly fresh in my mind for when the movie is released. Although by now, I've learned to view the movie adaptations of books for what they are: A different medium for a different audience.

  4. I've read all three. Frankly, I didn't think they were the masterpieces that some folks have said they were, but I did enjoy them quite a bit.

    The first book has very little in the way of anti-religious themes, so I'll be interested to see what they thought was worth "censoring". It's more likely that the movie content had to be cut to service time and SFX constraints. The film has had more problems going for it than just censorship. It's had problems with directors working on it, along with budget issues…

    But yes, plenty of free press to promote a worthwhile read.

  5. I dunno, this bad press is free press stuff only seems to work for things that are profoundly stupid. Given that I have a feeling that drudge will be trumpeting every fail and foible of the "atheist" movie as well as assuring us that it's a box office flop (regardless of whether it is or not) in contrast to, say, Passion of the Christ or Narnia, I would guess that this movie is facing a huge huge uphill climb for success even if it didn't have the "atheist" strike against it to begin with, let alone production problems.

  6. I have the books at home now, but I probably won't have any time to start reading them until mid December :/

    Of course, I'll bet the movie probably won't come out here until next year, so that's not really an issue …

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