What Has Happened
A Brief History, Starting at the Beginning
Lots of folks have no sprites or ghosts or deities in their thinking about reality; no life after death hopes for themselves or loved ones, and no supernaturalism at all in their worldviews. Why are they marginalized at the sidelines when they should be as central as anyone to political decision making? This movement began with a desire to address the sorts of societal factors that keep so many out action (or feigning beliefs they do not have, or evading associations that they do).
The motivation was to do something to facilitate more people who have a naturalistic outlook saying as much and stepping into the civic mainstream. We thought to try to unify large numbers of diverse people with a civic umbrella term so that more people might begin to express themselves within their spheres of activity in an affirmative way.
- Co-founder Paul Geisert settled on bright (n.) as that term (October 2002), and later Co-founder Mynga generated its definition: "A bright is an individual who has a naturalistic worldview, free of supernatural and mystical elements." (November 2002)
- We bounced the overall idea off of others (January through April, 2003), and after getting feedback, soon set up an online website and then established a formal legal organization (June 2003; August 2003).
- Other people joined in, and a Brights Forum developed (December 2003), to be run by dedicated Brights from different nations. The Forum operates round-the-clock with discussants from across the globe.
- Brights Central (BC) started cranking out Brights' Bulletins monthly, polling Brights and responding to constituents and queries, adding information to the "home-brew" website, and sending out occasional "BrightenOps" (opportunities to take an action). Later came occasional regional announcements (e.g., emailing to Brights within 50 km of Geneva).
Paul actually meets two Forum Facilitators in person while in Edinburgh, Scotland (Summer, 2006)
Notice: Paragraphs below close with italicized comments related to ongoing or recent activity. The link will let you zero in on such activities. You can follow a link someplace else to take a closer look. But, be sure to come back! You can use your back arrow to return. If you get totally lost return to your email and restart.
- Brights Meetup gatherings came onto the scene (and sometimes departed). The largest is in London, England
- Other "Brights sites" - created wholly by volunteers - sprang up in several languages.
- Clusters of Brights began communicating. The current listing includes over 50 groups. Will became the Brights Community Clusters (BCCs) Coordinator
- With polling and creative input, an icon was selected and a logo developed. With the help of a volunteer Web architect Theo, the main site became more attractive, accessible, and functional (Spring, 2005). This symbolism page illustrates aspects of the more professional look and feel.
- Brights activists put up focused websites and started stirring interest on the part of youth. Brights now have a presence in Facebook and at MySpace.
- Some individual offshoot Web efforts took place. The latest formed is at Atheist Nexus.
- Finally, after many requests, arrangements were made to have Brights merchandise. Now the logo appears on items from totebags to buttons to Tshirts to posters available in The Brights Shop.
- Lapel pins were added next. These can be obtained from the Merchandise section of the main website.
- Soon there was a move to have annual calendars, the first of which (2007) was produced by a collaboration of Brights' Forum participants. The 2009 version of this product is available for about $15 at a print-on-demand vendor: Lulu.com
- All along, the movement has received sporadic mention in varied publications and web resources. While some articles about the Brights movement get it right, many have called for a response, such as this article Shedding Light on Brights by the Co-founders.
- Although perhaps viewed as a somewhat "nonconforming" part of the landscape, The Brights' Net is now recognized by most organizations in the American freethought community as "belonging" (somehow). BeliefNet has acknowledged this movement, naming the Co-directors in its "Who's Who" of freethought today but, focused on "beliefs" as it is, falling into the fallacious conceptual trap of equating a broad naturalistic outlook with “being an atheist..”
- Interviews with Co-Founders, mentions by Enthusiastic Brights, and voluntary actions of activist Brights have helped "The Brights" come quite a long way in just a few years.
You can see from the accomplishments so far that Brights all over the world must be doing something right -- and that makes it worthwhile. We are far from reaching the original dream, but we definitely have momentum. Keeping it is, in part, up to you.
