Dawkins sounds off. Lots of atheists upset.

Kooli wrote: »

Just read this piece by Michael (different from the one linked above I think):
http://skepchick.org/2012/08/speaking-out-against-hate-directed-at-women-michael-nugent/

I think it's a fabulous piece. I know you look in here, Michael. So just wanted to show my support.

Have to say I think it's terrible - RW gets a polite invitation for coffee in a safe social setting - attacks Paula Kirby and other female activists from podiums where she's been asked to speak on unrelated topics - because they think she's overreacting and now Nugent feels the need to lecture us on how sending a psychopathic rapist round to your ex is wrong? Really - some nasty human being looking for revenge on his ex in Wyoming is somehow context and background to all this?

The atheist/skeptic community can do nothing about the current levels of hate speech on the net - much of it facilitated by America's 1st amendment rights.

And this is where I think Michael is so misguided it's almost funny - and I have a question for him - what % of the hate speech/threats/harassment comes from active card-carrying members of atheist Ireland/ISS etc. conference attendees? My "guess" is it's vanishingly small (if not actually zero).

Honestly How many members of AI (or attendees of conferences like last year in Dublin) will read Nugent's piece and say "Oh - he's right - I'd never thought about it that way before - sending prominent female atheists rape threats is wrong I'd better stop" ?

Threatening anyone (MALE or FEMALE) using the net is wrong - harassing them is wrong - however as the recent twitter cases in the UK have shown this behaviour seems to be wide-spread and nothing to do with atheism/skepticism.

By far the best advice in this situation seems to be "Don't feed the trolls" - but by making a mountain out of every nasty trollish tweet/comment on the net the trolls by now must be full to bursting.

No one is saying any of the stuff Nugent is talking about is tolerable (to be fair some extreme "freedom of speechers" might be but they're a minority) - but people have been saying "ignore it" - it's a worldwide internet problem and giving them the reaction they've got is exactly why they're doing it.

This has caused another massive overreaction on the FtB side (see the thunderf00t fiasco) as they deliberately misinterpreted "Don't feed the trolls" as "You're only women - we're men shut up and take it".

- - -

I'm very very disappointed in Nugent here - instead of recycling irrelevant (but disgusting and obviously reprehensible) stories of males being nasty to women how about focussing on the actual recent harassment issues in the skeptic/atheist community?

Ophelia Benson's "threatening email"
http://freethoughtblogs.com/butterfliesandwheels/2012/06/closing-the-file/
Which looks much more like an hysterical overreaction from a sycophantic fan than a threat.

Harriet Hall's harassing t-shirt
http://freethoughtblogs.com/butterfliesandwheels/2012/07/in-your-face/

Oh no Michael - now we're on much shakier ground aren't we - you don't mention the actualharassment, instead we get stories about craiglist rapists and assholes on reddit (I have no idea how Nugent feels he's going to clean up the conversation on US sites like reddit - but when him and Amy have sorted reddit out they can quickly move on to 4chan)

Instead of pandering to the FtB groupthink how about dealing with the problem:

1) If the threat is credible or sinister report it to the authorities.
2) If the harassment/sexism is from an identifiable individual - warn them.ban them - on moderated forums / comments this issue mostly goes away.
3) Ignore Trolls - anonymous comments on email go into the bin.

Michael Nugent wrote: »

pH, this particular article was specifically about online harassment and threats of violence, including rape, against women. I will address other issues in other articles, including the ones that you highlighted.

But I linked to 2 recent incidents - one an clearly a case of online threat - the other clearly a case of female harassment by atheists which have been thrown around recently by those you're currently appeasing - you mention neither of these but instead feel that a man in Wyoming who set his ex wife up to be raped using craiglist is more relevant?

Please judge this article based on how it addresses the issue that it is about, not other issues.

I was

Also, I did not merely give some stories.

I sourced and cited analysis and examples based on academic research from a professor at the University of Maryland school of law, a book on the topic published by Harvard University Press, evidence given to a UK parliamentary enquiry, and mainstream newspaper features.

I linked to those sources.

The analysis and examples demonstrated not only the nature and pattern of the threats, but the real-life affect that they have had on real-life victims.

I cited a suggestion that countered the idea that ‘don’t feed the trolls’ is the best advice, and instead proposed that cyber gender harassment be reframed as a civil rights violation.

Please try reading the article again, without filtering it through your differences of opinion with other people on other issues.

Which is all fair enough .... but ....

Whilst atheist/skeptic groups use the internet we're going to be affected by the rest of the net - noble as your aspirations may be that after you've fixed the internet (say early 2013) no harassing/threatening comment will appear on the net directed towards a woman - I personally think they're in cloud cuckoo land - and its a massive waste of effort and resources to even be considering it as a goal.

So to summarise
1) Harassment of public figures on the internet is a problem - things are being done about it UK but a) It's not about gender and sex it's harassment and b) the only thing that can be done is really at the nastier end of the spectrum.
2) Why frame this as either an atheist/skeptic issue or a gender/sexism issue?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-17399027
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-gloucestershire-18391970
3) DON'T FEED THE TROLLS

"And we should work together on this so that, ultimately, we never again
have a fifteen year old atheist girl excitedly posting online about her
Christmas present of a Carl Sagan book, then reading crude comments about
adult men wanting to have sex with her"

You make a huge error - it's something people on this forum get pulled up for all the time of conflating all atheists - what people in /r/atheism say on reddit is nothing to do with me and while I do not agree in any way with what happened on the Sagan book thread - I didn't write any of it - they don't speak for me - I have no real interest in spending time and effort to change reddit - I am not going to judge the success/failure of atheist/skeptic communities I'm involved in by the postings potentially that anyone in the world could make on a US forum (1st amendment and all that) - sorry Michael it's just unrealistic.

I'll judge us, our sexism by how women are treated as members of Atheist Ireland - as posters on the atheist.ie/forums - to some extent how posters are treated here on boards.ie - how women are treated at AI meetings/conferences, skeptics in the pub meetings and ISS meetings. I honestly see little (or no) problem here - or at TAM or on JREF forums etc. I honestly don't think our Irish setup is hugely different for other skeptic/atheist groupings in other western countries - I'm not hearing stories like "OMG I went to conference X - they treat women terribly there" from people I know who attend international events.

"But we must not deny that it[sexism] exists, or reinforce it with prejudice and
discrimination. Instead we should actively work to create inclusive, safe
and supportive communities, in which we can live together as equals,
regardless of our race, gender, sexuality or ability levels."

Just to be clear on this - I might be reading it wrong - you're admitting that sexism exists in Atheist Ireland (and presumably on the forums/net/mailing lists/conferences etc) you run - are you saying you haven't been bothered to deal with it up to now and now you're going to do something?

If it's such a hugely important issue in our community, and leaders have ignored it for so long and haven't addressed it (possibly for their own sexist agenda?) surely we can't expect these people to deal with it effectively - Those that presided over this bastion of misogyny, hatred and harassment of women must do the decent thing and fall on their swords for the good of the movement?

I don't see how you can have it both ways - if the misogyny, hatred and harassment is as big an issue as you claim - and you ignored it before Skepchick brought it to your attention - the decent thing to do would be resign. If, on second thought, all this is just attention-seeking behaviour by a small group of entitled idiots attempting to hijack the skeptic/atheist movement then you've just made a big fool of yourself.

How about a more "reasonable" statement - "We in the atheist/skeptic movement try hard to make everyone feel comfortable and welcome, and we kind of pride ourselves that we do a pretty good job at this. Minor aberrations, or the actions/words of a tiny number of individuals in no way reflects the overall spirit/ethos or our movement which at its heart is inclusive."

Wicknight thought he could have a reasoned discussion about this on the comments on skepchick - and within 3 or 4 posts we have:

You’re just cluelessly belittling the sexist abuse in exactly the way Nugent’s post is objecting to.

and

God you’re a dishonest shit.

From Ophelia Benson no less!

Parts of that sentiment could well form part of a reasonable statement, but as it is it sounds like it is more concerned with protecting the reputation of the community than addressing the problems, regardless of the number of people who may be causing the problems.

Well your lack of concern for the reputation of Irish Atheists was obvious when you decided to set it ablaze on the fires of accusations of rampant sexism, misogyny, harassment and craiglist rape. I'm not sure why anyone would want to be part of such a misogynistic organisation that couldn't even see the rampant sexism in its own midst until skepchick opened your eyes.

Anyway Michael - enjoy your new friends, I suggest reading the comment section at the bottom of where they posted your article - but don't worry they won't treat you that badly as long as you stick rigidly to their groupthink and self-flagellate regularly with appeasing "We're all horrible sinners sexists" posts.

Michael it's great watching you try to rationalize so many fcuk off's, horsesiht's, trolls etc... directed against a person calling for "rational discussion" in that thread by arguing that some posters on a website so unswervingly rational & skeptical are so controlled by their emotions that they can't separate their feelings from their critical faculties when reading apparently critical posts on a website whose main purpose is criticism.

With that said I don't think you're in any position whatsoever to dictate to others where their empathy should begin, let alone that it should be passed on through the keyboard whether it exists in the person or not, or whether they should even have empathy whatsoever, let alone argue that because a person didn't act the way you want them to that it's understandable for tons of people to purposely try to alienate the leper...

Also, a small correction, she didn't actually call him a vile little weirdo, even though she did, though she didn't, even though she did, though she didn't... Just a heads up, you may, if consistency has anything to do with anything, be called a dishonest little siht soon enough.

I'd post it on there but fcuuuuuuuuuuukkkkkkkkk.................

Witch of the Week

I nominate Wick for witch of the week!

Nodin wrote: »

His paragraph long request for reason and evidence being rejected with "fuck off troll", I'd imagine hes already been allocated a title.

As a form of punishment, I read the whole discussion.
If that is the level of response, and completely missing the point then its no surprise this mess is still going.