This is what passes for a joke in Austria

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Austrian man strikes a blow for atheism:

Austrian driving licence

An Austrian atheist has won the right to be shown on his driving-licence photo wearing a pasta strainer as “religious headgear”.

Niko Alm first applied for the licence three years ago after reading that headgear was allowed in official pictures only for confessional reasons.

Mr Alm said the sieve was a requirement of his religion, pastafarianism.

Hi-larious. This sort of thing is why I dislike the “new atheism”.

3 Comments

  • Reinder Dijkhuis

    July 15, 2011 at 12:39 am

    What, not the endemic sexism, entitlement, internet-libertarian-style smugness and Richard Dawkins oh-so-deniable, I’m-just-sayin’, tee-hee-hee advocacy of genocidal warfare in Africa ?

  • Martin Wisse

    July 15, 2011 at 5:51 am

    Yes, that doesn’t help either.

  • Reinder Dijkhuis

    July 15, 2011 at 5:04 pm

    I should add that I actually still support most of the political and cultural agenda of the New atheists: visibility and acceptance of atheists in the international public sphere, not having religion be the default assumption. I also support the obnoxiousness, because in America, that’s how we remind people we’re right here, standing right next to you. So as a political movement and a pressure group, I’m still with them.

    As an intellectual movement, however, GNU Atheism, is pretty much useless, and getting worse. Only PZ Myers is still worth paying attention to.