2013
Carolinas
Secular
Conference

About the Conference

The Carolinas Secular Conference is an annual event of the secular movement primarily geared toward the interests and needs of leaders, activists, and enthusiasts living in the Carolinas.

The conference allows involved individuals to meet and discuss issues related to increasing the public's awareness of the movement and fostering its growth. Attendees are provided with opportunities to learn skills and share practical experiences as well as to suggest and set annual goals for secular action.

Additionally, the conference exists to celebrate the growing secular movement and culture, recognize individual excellence in advancing it, inspire an increasing engagement, and build a supportive community for nontheists across the region.

Featured Speakers/Presenters Include ...

Margaret Downey

Margaret Downey is a renowned leader and activist in the Freethought and feminist movements, as well as a speaker, business woman, writer, editor and Secular Humanist celebrant. She founded the Freethought Society, the Anti-Discrimination Support Network and the Thomas Paine Memorial Committee.

Margaret is a past board member of the American Humanist Association and the Thomas Paine National Historical Association, the Freedom From Religion Foundation, The Atheist Alliance, The Humanist Institute, and the Godless Americans Political Action Committee. She is currently serving on the Advisory Board of the Robert Green Ingersoll Museum and Scouting For All.

Margaret has been a guest speaker on National Public Radio’s Talk of the Nation, Nightline, 20/20 and Marty Moss-Cowan’s Philadelphia NPR show Radio Times. She has also been featured on radio programs in Texas, South Carolina, California, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, Florida, New York, and Georgia, and most recently Jamaica and China.

She is regularly featured at Atheist/Humanist conferences as a speaker and is well known for her fun-filled presentations, which always include visuals, door prizes, props, and well-prepared complimentary literature.

Katherine Stewart

Katherine Stewart is author of The Good News Club: The Christian Right's Stealth Assault on America's Children. The book is a chilling exposé of the well-funded, highly coordinated effort by Christian Nationalists to use public schools to advance a fundamentalist agenda.

Born in Boston, she started her career in journalism working for investigative reporter Wayne Barrett at The Village Voice and freelanced for Newsweek International, Rolling Stone, Marie Claire and others. She co-wrote the book about the musical Rent and, after moving to Santa Barbara in 2005, published two novels about 21st century parenting. Most recently she has written for The New York Times, The Guardian, the Daily Beast, Bloomberg View, and Religion Dispatches. She lives with her family in New York City.

Amanda Knief

Amanda Knief is author of The Citizen Lobbyist (2013), a how-to for getting a voice in government. She is also the managing director and in-house counsel for American Atheists. Amanda is a constitutional law and public policy expert who worked as legal counsel for the Iowa Legislature and as a lobbyist for the Secular Coalition for America. She has a BS in journalism and science communication from Iowa State and a JD from Drake University Law School. Amanda is an avid geocacher, rock climber, and bibliophile. She often travels with her Yorkie, Sagan.

Beth Presswood

Beth Presswood is the host of the Godless Bitches podcast, which is affiliated with the Atheist Community of Austin. She has also appeared on The Non-prophets podcast and The Atheist Experience TV show. She grew up in a hardcore Southern Baptist household and became a closeted atheist around age 15. She began her atheist activism with founding the Atheist and Freethought Club of East Tennessee State University. She is married to atheist activist Matt Dillahunty and resides in Austin, TX.

Harry Shaughnessy

As president of Triangle Freethought Society in Raleigh, NC, Harry Shaughnessy has shown his creativity and enthusiasm for doing whatever is necessary to garner that next donation, has been able to bring in nationally known speakers, hold successful parties and events, rally for important causes and build a net reserve of funds that makes planning future events much easier. His local Foundation Beyond Belief fundraising team for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society reached their goal of top local team and a $5,000 award. Harry is also president of Relevant CRM, a software consulting firm that he founded in 1993.

More speakers/presenters to be announced soon!