Patton Oswalt Brilliantly Trolls for Twitter Outrage, Chez Pazienza, The Daily Banter, May 7, 2014

If it weren’t so hilarious it would be depressing. A little earlier this afternoon Patton Oswalt began trolling Twitter and the rest of the internet, trying to drum up outrage over nothing. Literally, nothing.

What he did was simple: He started posting tweets that referenced and apologized for tweets he says he deleted because they were offensive, but of course the “deleted tweets” weren’t real. They never were.

Chris McDougall: I Never Meant To Start A Barefoot-Running Fad, Jon Gugala, Fittish, May 7, 2014

In 2009, Chris McDougall published Born to Run, an account of his adventures in the remote canyons of Mexico. From his travelogue was birthed an industry-shifting movement that re-examined everything once accepted as gospel truth about running shoes.

One of the uglier fruits of that movement: the Vibram FiveFingers shoe, a foot condom that enjoyed a brief, inexplicable vogue thanks to the minimalist-shoe fad. On Tuesday, Vibramagreed to settle a class-action lawsuit alleging that the company had made false and unsubstantiated claims about the shoe’s health benefits. Now seemed like as good a time as any to chat with the man whose book sparked a movement.

Guess Who Got into a Facebook Face-off over Atheism? Neal Jones, The Humanist, May 6, 2014

While the idea of a face-off on social media might suggest stepping into the middle of a frivolous fracas, a serious issue was raised in a recent Facebook post by South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley in which she accused State Sen. Katrina Shealy of “spreading the lie” that the director of the Department of Social Services, Lillian Koller, is an atheist. Shealy responded on her own Facebook page that she was angry over the governor’s accusation, asserting that she had asked Haley’s staff months ago to confirm or deny rumor about Koller’s alleged atheism. The staff clarified that Koller is Jewish, which came as a relief to Shealy. “I don’t give a flying flip what the Director is,” came her retort. “Well that is not true either, I would worry if she were an atheist.”

Really? And why is that? If Koller were an atheist (again, she apparently isn’t), how would that negatively affect her job performance? Why would anyone’s religious beliefs or lack of beliefs be an issue at all?

Of course, we all know why. The issue is prejudice. Atheists are one of the most maligned groups in the United States, especially in the Bible Belt where the first question someone asks upon meeting you is, “So where do you go to church?” According to polls, being atheist is less acceptable in America than being gay, Muslim or Jewish. Heck, even Haley and Shealy can accept a Jewish director of Social Services, but apparently not an atheist one.

Photo credit: Gage Skidmore [CC-BY-SA-3.0], via Wikimedia Commons.