Ben Goldacre, fearless exposer of the scientifically illiterate, had a meeting with some of the people the BBC employ to keep an eye on their loose cannons (how many do they need to keep track of Charlie Brooker, I wonder?). He asked them how much swearing was allowed, as you would, and was given an official BBC list of swear words, based on viewer research and sorted in order of offensiveness. They refused to let him leave the room with it, because it's a secret. He figured they were worried he'd scan it and put it on his website. Then he got a copy through another route, so of course he scanned it and put it on his website.

In places, it reads almost like dialog. "Shag whore twat!" "Piss off, spastic slag!" I briefly considered lifting the whole thing and dropping it into my next post wholesale. The thing that did shock me was that terms of racial abuse were scored as less offensive than 'cunt' or 'motherfucker'. I expect people identified them as 'not swearing' because they thought they were a different kind of offensive, not because they thought they weren't offensive at all. For instance, 'Jew' in everyday speech isn't a swear word, but if you heard someone saying 'stop being such a mean, selfish Jew' you'd take more offense than you would at any mere profanity.

That doesn't account for people who think such terms are mild swearing, though. Some people must have thought that 'Paki' or 'nigger' were soft swear words, about as bad as calling someone an arse. I suppose they may have been confused by the whole recuperation thing, where black or Asian people use those terms themselves to draw their sting.

Other responses just leave you baffled. As always with surveys, I find. A low but positive number of people thought that 'cunt' was "not swearing" at all. Meanwhile, 10% thought that 'arse' was "very severe". I suppose it might stand out in a nunnery, but not otherwise, surely. I wonder if any respondents thought both those things? You can just imagine someone hearing a bottom-based profanity in the street, turning on the culprit and screaming "stop saying arse, you cunt!" at their bemused face before flouncing off in a huff.

Thanks to Jeff for the link. I hope you're having a good holiday. If you're reading this sat in an Internet cafe in Ayia Napa, you got on the wrong bus at the airport. Unless your Dad decided what you all really needed was a few nights clubbing.

I'm sure you've all enjoyed my indepth coverage of the New Atheists. The media capitalise us, you know. We're kind of like the New Romantics without the eyeshadow, except when we wear eyeshadow.

It's kind of thematic for me, of course. Discover my themes here, if you dare.

And now we've got a lovely new campaign for you. It's the OUT Campaign. Yes, atheists are coming out of the closet, and calling out around the world. Are you ready for a brand new beat?

Now obviously in Britain closeting isn't such a problem, but we should all show solidarity with our secular siblings over the seas. Richard Dawkins has written us a rallying cry, and there's T-shirts and everything.

We've even got our own logo. Ironically for some of us, it's a big capital A.

I've added it to my profile, on that picture of me in the top right hand corner. Yes it is. I just happen to be the spitting image of Wittgenstein. You should check out Derek Jarman's film of his life, I did all the stunt scenes.

There's also a conference. It's in Washington DC, and it's already booked out, but I'm sure there'll be video coverage online. Like there was for the scientists' conference here.

Seriously, there is a political point to all this. Firstly, I know it's a joke in the UK, but in some countries atheists are under pressure to keep their views secret. In Muslim countries, people who abandon their religion can be and have been executed for it. In the US, whilst nothing quite like that happens, some states have laws banning atheists from elected office, and many people have lost child custody cases because their partner has promised to give the child a religious education, and they're an atheist. There's a handy summary of related issues here, on another excellent Science Blog.

What we need in the UK is a decent campaign to get our teeth into. Here are some ideas.

We should demand that every time they get some bishop on TV or radio to comment on an issue, instead of just adding a rabbi or an imam for balance, they add an atheist as well. Either a well-known face like Richard Dawkins, or someone from a humanist society or the like. If they argue that such figures don't represent all secularists, we can argue back that bishops, rabbis and imams don't represent every one they claim to either. We're 64% of the population, and we demand our say.

Never let people talk about Christian, Muslim or Jewish children. Or any other religion. You wouldn't talk about an atheist child just because their parents were atheists. Always refer to them as a child of Christian, Muslim or Jewish parents, and complain when other people don't.

Disestablishment. Why should the Church of England be officially our church? It's insulting to Catholics, Jews, Muslims, whatever. And, most importantly, to us. We're the majority, we are.

Faith schools. I think not. And they can damn well stop making the kids pray. Bastards. How many hours of my life did they steal?

I might have added a demand that they make religious education vaguer and less scriptural, but they already have.

I'm feeling much more enthusiastic about politics now it's got computers in it. Do you rmember the bad old days when you couldn't be political wthout getting dressed and leaving the house?