(updated April 27, 2012)
Maggie Ardiente is director of development and communications for the American Humanist Association. She also serves as editor of the AHA’s weekly e-zine, Humanist Network News. She has been quoted in the Washington Post, Voices of America, Alternet, and other print and radio media. Maggie graduated from James Madison University and served as vice president of the JMU Freethinkers, a student group for atheists, agnostics, and humanists. She is a former member of the Board of Directors of the Secular Student Alliance and graduate of Class 15 of the Humanist Institute. (mardiente@americanhumanist.org)
John M. Barry is a New York Times best-selling author whose books have won more than twenty awards. His most recent book is Roger Williams and the Creation of the American Soul: Church, State, and the Birth of Liberty. In 1998 the Society of American Historians named Rising Tide: The Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 and How It Changed America the year’s best book of American history. In 2005 the National Academy of Sciences named The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History the year’s best book on science or medicine.
Rob Boston is senior policy analyst and assistant director of communications for Americans United for Separation of Church and State. He also serves as assistant editor of AU’s monthly magazine Church & State. He is the author of three books on church-state relations and serves on the Board of Directors of the American Humanist Association. Rob writes a regular column on church-state relations for The Humanist. (rboston@americanhumanist.org)
Marshall Brain is best known as the founder of HowStuffWorks.com, purchased for $250 million by Discovery Communications in 2007. As a well-known public speaker, Marshall frequently appears on radio and TV programs nationwide. He has appeared on everything from The Oprah Winfrey Show to CNN. He is the host of National Geographic’s Factory Floor With Marshall Brain. Marshall has written more than a dozen books and a number of widely known web publications including How to Make a Million Dollars, Robotic Nation, and Manna. Marshall resides in Cary, North Carolina, with his wife and family.
Jes Constantine is the web content manager for the American Humanist Association and co-host of The Humanist Hour podcast. Constantine is responsible for keeping all of AHA’s web-based programs running. She also co-hosts the AHA’s monthly podcast, the Humanist Hour, with Todd Stiefel. The THH podcast is a one-hour Internet radio talk show that features interviews, essays, listener comments and music. Before starting at the AHA, Jes worked for the several YWCA associations worldwide. Her activist orientated work involved helping the victims of domestic violence, racism and homelessness. Jes graduated from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in 2003 with a B.S. in Information Technology/Science and Technology Studies.
Brian Dixon is vice president for media and government relations at Population Connection. He is a leader of a large coalition or organizations that support American involvement in international family planning programs. He has worked closely with members of congress to draft bills and amendments, and to develop legislative strategy and messages around key international issues like the Global Gag Rule and support for the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA). He has appeared on numerous radio and television programs to discuss the population growth and its impact on the quality of life in the United States and around the world.
Margaret Downey is a freelance journalist and public speaker who pursues stories of discrimination, choice in dying, humanitarian lifestyles, living as a secularist, atheism and family planning. Her articles concentrate on activist issues, political and religious satire, separation of church and state, and the advancement of freethought. She founded the Freethought Society and the Anti-Discrimination Support Network in 1993. Margaret is a past board member of the American Humanist Association and a current board member of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, Scouting For All, the Godless Americans Political Action Committee, and Atheist Alliance International.
Fred Edwords is the national director of the United Coalition of Reason, founded in 2009, working to foster cooperation among local groups in the community of reason, launching billboard and bus ad campaigns to raise their public profile. He is on the faculty of the Humanist Institute, national director of the International Darwin Day Foundation, and past president of Camp Quest. He was American Humanist Association executive director for 15 years and Humanist magazine editor for 12 years. He has served on the International Humanist and Ethical Union board and on the founding board of the National Center for Science Education. (fredwords@unitedcor.org)
Sean Faircloth writes about his “Ten Point Vision of a Secular America” in his new book Attack of the Theocrats: How the Religious Right Harms Us All and What to Do About It. He is director of strategy and policy for the Richard Dawkins Foundation for Science and Reason, and conceived the Secular Decade plan, a specific strategic vision for re-secularizing American government. Faircloth graduated from the University of Notre Dame and from University of California Hastings College of the Law and served five terms in the Maine legislature, spearheading over thirty laws. (sean.faircloth@richarddawkins.net)
Barbara Forrest is professor of philosophy at Southeastern Louisiana University. She is co-author with Paul R. Gross of Creationism’s Trojan Horse: The Wedge of Intelligent Design (Oxford University Press). She serves on the Board of Directors of the National Center for Science Education and the Board of Trustees of Americans United for Separation of Church and State. She served as an expert witness for the plaintiffs in Kitzmiller et al. v. Dover Area School District (2005). She is co-founder of the Louisiana Coalition for Science.
Jason Frye has been an LGBT activist since 1996, a humanist activist since 2003, a humanist celebrant since 2006, and has held various positions in freethought organizations at both the local and national level. Jason helped establish the LGBT Humanist Council and his speeches tend to be thought-provoking, inspiring, chocked full of good information, and they never fail to entertain.
Author-artist Zelda Gatuskin is editor-in-chief of Amador Publishers, LLC, an independent humanist press (founded 1986), and proprietor of Studio Z, multi-media arts. She holds a bachelor’s degree in visual communications from Emerson College. Zelda resides in Albuquerque, NM and is currently serving as president of the Humanist Society of NM. Her poetry collection, But Who’s Counting?, is a 2010 New Mexico Book Awards winner. Her published works also include two mixed-genre collections, Ancestral Notes and Time and Temperature, and two fantasy novels. Her latest book is a young adult novel, Where the Sky Used to Be.
Janet Heimlich is the author of Breaking Their Will: Shedding Light on Religious Child Maltreatment, the first book to fully examine child abuse and neglect enabled by religious belief in the United States. As a freelance reporter for National Public Radio, Ms. Heimlich won nine journalism awards, including the regional Katie, the Houston Press Club’s Radio Journalist of the Year, and the Texas Bar Association’s Gavel Award. In addition, she has written non-fiction articles for such publications as Texas Monthly, the Texas Observer, Texas Parks & Wildlife, and the Austin American-Statesman.
Sikivu Hutchinson is a senior intergroup specialist for the Los Angeles County Human Relations Commission. She received a Ph.D. from New York University and has taught women’s studies, cultural studies, urban studies, and education at UCLA, the California Institute of the Arts, and Western Washington University. She is the author of Imagining Transit: Race, Gender, and Transportation Politics in Los Angeles, Moral Combat: Black Atheists, Gender Politics, and the Values Wars and the forthcoming Godless Americana: Race and Religious Rebels. She is also the founder of Black Skeptics Los Angeles and a senior fellow for the Institute for Humanist Studies.
Arthur M. Jackson was born in Oregon and currently resides in San Jose, California. He holds a B.S. degree from Oregon State University and a Master of Education from the University of Oregon. He has been active in the American Humanist Association for over 40 years and has been serving in various administrative capacities ever since.
Howard Katz is a board member of the American Humanist Association, president of The Humanist Society, and advisory board member of Humanist Charities. He has been a Humanist Celebrant for over seven years. He was awarded the ACLU of Illinois’ Volunteer of the Year Award and is a former officer of Illinois National Organization for Women. He’s held multiple public offices and is currently parliamentarian of his County Democrat organization. He’s been a member of the AHA for over 30 years. (hkatz@americanhumanist.org)
Charlotte Klasson is the state coordinator for the Louisiana National Organization for Women and is the board secretary for the New Orleans Secular Humanist Association. She’s a volunteer scuba diver at the Audubon Aquarium and enjoys photography and tennis. She is a a graduate of the University of Arkansas and has worked professionally in scholarly book publishing and as a newspaper and magazine editor and writer. In March, Klasson was voted onto the national NOW board as a representative for the Mid-South region which is comprised of Arkansas, Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi and Tennessee. She will begin her two-year term this summer.
Marty Klein is a licensed psychotherapist, certified sex therapist, and international lecturer in sexuality and public policy. He has been an expert witness or invited plaintiff in many important state and federal obscenity and anti-censorship cases. His landmark book America’s War On Sex, with a foreword by the ACLU’s Nadine Strossen, was honored as Book of the Year by AASECT, and has just been released in an updated second edition. (www.martyklein.com)
Richard MacDonald, M.D., a 1952 graduate of University of Alberta, was in general practice for fifty years in Canada and California. Two decades of involvement with the Dying With Dignity movement includes over ten years as medical director of The Hemlock Society, president of the World Federation of Right to Die Societies and, currently, senior medical advisor of Final Exit Network. MacDonald states that those patients who choose to avoid prolongation of dying should not be abandoned by medical caregivers. At times, he believes it is the duty of a doctor to support a rational request made by a patient seeking as peaceful a dying process as possible. He has provided an experienced, compassionate presence for close to two hundred who made that choice.
Raúl Martínez is a proud Mexican humanist and part-time comedian from Las Vegas who pays the bills by working in IT project management. He is also the author of literally hundreds and hundreds of e-mails that he writes, sometimes twice a day! Raúl is known by some as the Joe the Plumber of the Humanist movement although he would prefer to be known as Bob the Builder. He says, “I may not have a Ph.D. but I do have some letters at the end of my name: NEZ.” (rmartinez@americanhumanist.org)
Sharon Moss graduated from Ohio State University in 2005 with a BA in Comparative Religion. She is a former president of Students for Freethought at The Ohio State University and current president of the Humanist Community of Central Ohio. Sharon serves as the Alumni Advisor to Students for Freethought and is the atheist representative to the University Interfaith Association at Ohio State. Sharon is also a certified Humanist Celebrant with the Humanist Society and is authorized by the state of Ohio to solemnize marriages. She considers this the closest thing to a super power she’ll ever have.
Eric Nguyen is the grassroots coordinator for the American Humanist Association. He is also the program coordinator for the Humanist Society and the program manager for the LGBT Humanist Council. (enguyen@americanhumanist.org)
David Niose has been president of the American Humanist Association since 2009. He first joined the board in 2005. His forthcoming book is Nonbeliever Nation: The Rise of Secular Americans. Niose also developed and implemented a legal strategy that utilizes the concept of equal rights rather than the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause to protect religious minorities from governmental endorsement of majoritarian religious views. Niose has also worked closely with the Secular Coalition for America, sitting on the group’s advisory panel for several years before selected as vice president in 2011. Niose also writes a blog, “Our Humanity, Naturally,” for Psychology Today and has appeared on Fox News, BBC, The Thom Hartmann Show, and The Alan Colmes Show. (dniose@americanhumanist.org)
Anthony Pinn completed his graduate work at Harvard University. He is currently the Agnes Cullen Arnold Professor of Humanities and Professor of Religious Studies at Rice University. In addition, Pinn is the director of research for the Institute for Humanist Studies. Pinn is the author/editor of twenty-six books, including African American Humanist Principles (2004) and The End of God-Talk (2012).
Terry Plank is a search marketing professional and Humanist Celebrant, having performed more than 2,000 wedding ceremonies. As a search marketer, he has assisted over 100 clients and businesses. As dean of SEMPO Institute he managed 40+ search marketing professionals to develop five online courses for the Institute and was founder of an online training company, Academy of Web Specialists. Terry earned a Master of Science in Counseling from San Francisco State University and a Master of Divinity from Fuller Theological Seminary. (terry@semconsultation.com)
Herb Silverman received his Ph.D. in mathematics from Syracuse University and is Distinguished Professor Emeritus in Mathematics at the College of Charleston. He founded the Secular Humanists of the Lowcountry and is founder of the College of Charleston student Atheist/Humanist Alliance. He is founder and president of the Secular Coalition for America and an advisory board member of the Secular Student Alliance. He is an “On Faith” panelist for the Washington Post online and writes for the Huffington Post. Herb’s book, Candidate Without a Prayer: An Autobiography of a Jewish Atheist in the Bible Belt, is available.
Lyle Simpson authored Why Was I Born? (Humanist Press 2011) to answer questions of life from a humanist perspective. He served for five years as president and chairman of the board for the American Humanist Association, been its general counsel since 1974 and has been president of the Humanist Foundation since its inception in 1980. His educational background is in psychology and philosophy. He is an attorney in the Midwest with a humanistic practice helping people make the greatest statement that they can for their lives.
Roy Speckhardt is executive director of the American Humanist Association. He’s appeared on Good Morning America, CNN Headline News, Fox News, numerous national radio shows, and has spoken to dozens of local humanist groups across the country. Roy is also a columnist for The Huffington Post and Patheos. He also serves as a board member of the Humanist Institute and the United Coalition of Reason and as an advisory board member of the Secular Student Alliance. He holds an M.B.A. from George Mason University and a B.A. in sociology from Mary Washington College. (rspeckhardt@americanhumanist.org)
Katherine Stewart’s work has appeared in The New York Times, Reuters, The Daily Beast, and Religion Dispatches. Her book The Good News Club: The Christian Right’s Stealth Assault on America’s Children was published in January 2012. Her website is www.thegoodnewsclub.com and she tweets @kathsstewart.
Todd Stiefel is the founder and president of the Stiefel Freethought Foundation, and serves as an advisor to many of the national organizations in the freethought movement, including the American Humanist Association. He is the co-host of the Humanist Hour podcast and the rhythm guitarist for the rationalist rock band Words Such As Burn. Todd graduated cum laude from Duke University and worked 12 years for Stiefel Laboratories, finishing as the Chief Strategy Officer. Todd’s mission is to gain respect for freethinkers and ensure the complete separation of church and state.
Debra Sweet is the director of World Can’t Wait, leading its continuing efforts to stop the crimes of our government, including unjust military occupations, covert drone wars, and torture and detention codes, as well as reversing the fascist direction of U.S. society. She has worked with abortion providers for twenty-five years, organizing community support and helping them withstand anti-abortion violence. Since the age of 19, when she confronted Richard Nixon during a face-to-face meeting and told him to stop the war in Vietnam, she has been a leader in the opposition to U.S. wars and invasions.
Kristin Wintermute is executive director of The Humanist Institute and board member of the American Humanist Association. She is a lifelong humanist who attended the First Unitarian Society, led by Khoren Arisian, through her childhood and teen years. She spent many years pursuing a career as a family therapist before she was hired by the North American Committee for Humanism (NACH) to be their executive director in 1998. A year later, NACH and its subsidiary, The Humanist Institute, became one organization.