Dawkins sounds off. Lots of atheists upset.

Kooli

Mark Hamill wrote: »

Has this person ever explained why she didn't call the guards or security for the physical threats? Has she ever explained the context/s under which the insults occurred? Has she ever explained why she went back more than once to any conference?

What would the relevance of her answer to those questions be?

Newaglish

Mark Hamill wrote: »

Has this person ever explained why she didn't call the guards or security for the physical threats? Has she ever explained the context/s under which the insults occurred? Has she ever explained why she went back more than once to any conference?

Kooli wrote: »

What would the relevance of her answer to those questions be?

I assume the poster thinks the claims might be fabricated or exaggerated as it could be difficult to explain why some threats were not reported at the time but then used to support and defend a subsequent argument.

Chazz Michael Michaels

Dawkins was the first atheist intellectual I found as a younger man. I thought he was great. Then I found Hitchens, and suddenly Dawkins looked like a fool to me, by comparison. This has changed nothing for me.

Kooli

Newaglish wrote: »

I assume the poster thinks the claims might be fabricated or exaggerated as it could be difficult to explain why some threats were not reported at the time but then used to support and defend a subsequent argument.

Yeah I thought so.

Now I haven't read this whole thread, but I have followed this whole incident on other sites and blogs.

My understanding is that that main issue is not that harrassment occasionally happens to women at atheist events. It's that women who talk about it are questioned, silenced, dismissed and not taken seriously. That is what I understand to be the main issue, so if that's the case, it makes a lot of sense that these things don't tend to be reported. If the community's response is 'This stuff doesn't happen' (rather than 'We believe this happens, and will take it damn seriously when it does'), that makes it much more difficult to report.

A lot of sexual harassment is kind of low-level stuff anyway. A single incident may not feel 'reportable', but it can contribute to a sense of a lack of safety when each incident is piled up on top of each other. So a culture shift of sexual harassment - big or small - being not OK (rather than not a big deal) may be seen by some as more important and more effective than leaving it up to individual women to take on the system, or to finger-point individual men (some of whom are probably very influential within that system)

decimatio

Chazz Michael Michaels wrote: »

Dawkins was the first atheist intellectual I found as a younger man. I thought he was great. Then I found Hitchens, and suddenly Dawkins looked like a fool to me, by comparison. This has changed nothing for me.

The main issue I've found with many members of the skeptic/atheist/rationalist community is that for many, their skepticism is dependent on the issue in question.

For example, I've lost any respect I had for PZ Myers because he continually uses his position within the skeptic community to promote views on mostly unrelated issues, such as politics, and he doesn't apply skeptical reasoning when he does this. And he's not the only one.

My first experience of this intellectual dishonesty was in an article he wrote in 2007 claiming Christopher Hitchens advocated genocide against Muslims. If this wasn't bad enough, others such as Russell Glassner on the Atheist Experience continued to parrot this article as "proof" that Hitchens had advocated genocide.

Edit: Forgot to include relevant link. http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2007/10/14/ffrf-recap/

About halfway down the article he writes;

PZ Myers wrote:

"Basically, what Hitchens was proposing is genocide. Or, at least, wholesale execution of the population of the Moslem world until they are sufficiently cowed and frightened and depleted that they are unable to resist us in any way, ever again."

And just for absolute clarification, what Hitchens actually said was; (You can see the relevant videos here (3:30); (http://youtu.be/RwDk8LOD5Go)) The question being, "How exactly does bombing and killing Muslims lessen their number or limit their fervor ?" To which Hitchens made a reply concerning the bombing of terrorists. He went on to talk about killing Jihadists and specifically stated how the Jihadists were killing Muslims.

Now agree or disagree with Hitchens politics, and I'm pretty sure the vast majority disagree, all you like but anyone even half familiar with Hitchens' work would raise an eyebrow at such an assertion and they'd be right to do so. Hitchens no more advocated genocide against muslims than he advocated joining the church of latter day saints. PZ and others made this claim based solely on a dislike for his politics. I don't mean to generalise but it seems to me that many Americans are quite fundamentalist in their political affiliations which doesn't seem to occur to anywhere near the same level in most other countries.

My point is that this whole mess from the elevatorgate incident to Dawkins extremely ignorant response to the latest nonsense with Watson and DJ and the thunderf00t fiasco is anything but reasonable and skeptical. These people are skeptical when it comes to certain issues and have thrown that skepticism away with other issues. If Watson, Dawkins, PZ, DJ, Thunderf00t, etc applied the same skeptical and reasonable thinking to this issue and all issues in their lives that they applied to the supernatural than none of us would even have heard of elevatorgate. Watson would have made her reasonable comment to the elevator guy and the skeptic community would have reasonably looked at it and then we would have had a reasonable discussion regarding the treatment of minorities at conferences and that would have been that.

Now its an emotional, fundamentalist-like ****storm that belongs nowhere near a community that claims to be rational.

oldrnwisr

Zombrex wrote: »

Well actually one thing that came out of the Skepchick cluster f**k thread was a site called secularcensus.

An interesting statistic (and take it with a grain of salt as I'm not sure how statistically sound that survey was), was that in terms of unwanted advances women were nearly as likely to encounter this from organisers themselves than from conference goers. (15% to 23%)

I'm not quite sure what this means and how to address it but to me it called into question how effective things like harassment polices and things like that can be, given that those tasked with enforcing such policies can be part of the issue as well. Certainly in any event I've been involved in organising (which I point out have never been a secular/sceptic event) the organisers tend to have a notion that they are above the rules that apply to everyone else.

It is not like I have a solution though, just something to keep in mind.

Thanks for the info Zombrex.

I see your point about the event organisers. Perhaps a possible, and I stress possible, solution to the problem would be an extension of what I said previously about better interaction with the hotel/convention centre staff. If the organisers formulated the anti-harassment policy and then tapped the hotel where the conference is being held to supply security staff, the policies could be enforced in a completely apopulist way.

condra wrote: »

Is this whole brouhaha about harrassment online or IRW?

In general this is about online harassment and I agree that this is something which should be tackled. There does seem to be some claims being made, however, that this has spilled over into harassment at conferences which I don't see any evidence for.

Mark Hamill wrote: »

Has this person ever explained why she didn't call the guards or security for the physical threats? Has she ever explained the context/s under which the insults occurred? Has she ever explained why she went back more than once to any conference?

I honestly don't know. If I had to guess, I would say that Rebecca didn't feel that these incidents were a huge problem until DJ Grothe started blaming women talking about harassment for the drop in attendances at TAM. Then she said, well actually, she had been harrassed. I'm not entirely sure what she was trying to accomplish but the effect of it has been that there is now a perception that Rebecca's experiences are somehow representative of women's experiences in general which isn't supported by any substantive evidence.

Newaglish wrote: »

I assume the poster thinks the claims might be fabricated or exaggerated as it could be difficult to explain why some threats were not reported at the time but then used to support and defend a subsequent argument.

I don't know if you're referring to me here, but no, I don't think that Rebecca's account of her experiences are fabricated or exaggerated. I just don't see any evidence to suggest that they are representative of women's experiences in general.

Kooli wrote: »

My understanding is that that main issue is not that harrassment occasionally happens to women at atheist events. It's that women who talk about it are questioned, silenced, dismissed and not taken seriously. That is what I understand to be the main issue, so if that's the case, it makes a lot of sense that these things don't tend to be reported. If the community's response is 'This stuff doesn't happen' (rather than 'We believe this happens, and will take it damn seriously when it does'), that makes it much more difficult to report.

A lot of sexual harassment is kind of low-level stuff anyway. A single incident may not feel 'reportable', but it can contribute to a sense of a lack of safety when each incident is piled up on top of each other. So a culture shift of sexual harassment - big or small - being not OK (rather than not a big deal) may be seen by some as more important and more effective than leaving it up to individual women to take on the system, or to finger-point individual men (some of whom are probably very influential within that system)

What appears to have happened is this:

1. The number of women attending TAM compared to the previous year dropped from 40% to 18%.

2. DJ Grothe of JREF made a comment which referred to a quote made by Rebecca Watson in an interview with USA today in which he suggested that the reason less women were attending TAM is because a small group of women were talking about harrassment which lead to the perception that there was a widespread problem with harrassment of women at atheist/skeptic conferences even though there was no real problem.

3. Rebecca Watson responded by saying that her quote wasn't talking about TAM but that she had experienced all sorts of unwanted advances at atheist conferences.

4. From there the relatively minor spat seems to have escalated and become ambiguous resulting in different perceptions of what was actually being claimed.

The thing is though that while DJ Grothe cocked up by strawmanning Rebecca Watson, the data in the meantime such as the secularcensus posted by Zombrex does suggest that real-life harassment is not a widespread (I'm bolding this because the distinction is important) problem.

Mark Hamill

Kooli wrote: »

Yeah I thought so.

Now I haven't read this whole thread, but I have followed this whole incident on other sites and blogs.

My understanding is that that main issue is not that harrassment occasionally happens to women at atheist events. It's that women who talk about it are questioned, silenced, dismissed and not taken seriously. That is what I understand to be the main issue, so if that's the case, it makes a lot of sense that these things don't tend to be reported. If the community's response is 'This stuff doesn't happen' (rather than 'We believe this happens, and will take it damn seriously when it does'), that makes it much more difficult to report.

A lot of sexual harassment is kind of low-level stuff anyway. A single incident may not feel 'reportable', but it can contribute to a sense of a lack of safety when each incident is piled up on top of each other. So a culture shift of sexual harassment - big or small - being not OK (rather than not a big deal) may be seen by some as more important and more effective than leaving it up to individual women to take on the system, or to finger-point individual men (some of whom are probably very influential within that system)

That doesn't answer my questions though (or at least, explain the lack of answers from the woman). What she claimed to happen to her is not low-level - constant physical threats and physical molestation from the atheists and skeptics who attend these conference should either have made her call the police (assuming none of the conference management, the security or the location management were any help because they were in on it) or leave after the first 10 minutes and never return. Why would anyone ever go back to these things if they knew they where just going to get physical and sexual abuse and never be helped in any way?

Mark Hamill

oldrnwisr wrote: »

I honestly don't know. If I had to guess, I would say that Rebecca didn't feel that these incidents were a huge problem until DJ Grothe started blaming women talking about harassment for the drop in attendances at TAM. Then she said, well actually, she had been harrassed. I'm not entirely sure what she was trying to accomplish but the effect of it has been that there is now a perception that Rebecca's experiences are somehow representative of women's experiences in general which isn't supported by any substantive evidence.

Look at what she says:
"Over the past several years, I’ve been groped, grabbed, touched in other nonconsensual ways, told I can expect to be raped, told I’m a whore, a slut, a bitch, a prude, a dyke, a ****, a twat, told I should watch my back at conferences, told I’m too ugly to be raped, told I don’t have a say in my own treatment because I’ve posed for sexy photos, told I should get a better headshot because that one doesn’t convey how sexy I am in person, told I deserve to be raped – by skeptics and atheists. All by skeptics and atheists. Constantly."

How is the stuff in bold, being constant, not serious? How would a single incidence of any of the bold not be serious? Hell, how is constant insults at skeptic conferences from skeptics (ie the people who make up the majority of those attending, not just a minority of trolls or deniers) not serious?
These are all incredibly serious. If my sisters called me from some event and said any of the bold was constantly happening, I'd tell them to get out and call the security, organisers, guards whoever would help them. Hell, if I was somewhere and any of the bold happened to me constantly, I'd get out and call the guards.
Frankly, for a person, a supposed victim, to try and defend a lack of action against any of these on the basis that they aren't serious (but still claim they are serious and so something needs to be done), screams to me that they made them up or pieced them together from anecdotes they heard from other people. Why would they go back to such environments otherwise? Why would they protect the people doing it to them?

oldrnwisr

Mark Hamill wrote: »

Look at what she says:
"Over the past several years, I’ve been groped, grabbed, touched in other nonconsensual ways, told I can expect to be raped, told I’m a whore, a slut, a bitch, a prude, a dyke, a ****, a twat, told I should watch my back at conferences, told I’m too ugly to be raped, told I don’t have a say in my own treatment because I’ve posed for sexy photos, told I should get a better headshot because that one doesn’t convey how sexy I am in person, told I deserve to be raped – by skeptics and atheists. All by skeptics and atheists. Constantly."

How is the stuff in bold, being constant, not serious? How would a single incidence of any of the bold not be serious? Hell, how is constant insults at skeptic conferences from skeptics (ie the people who make up the majority of those attending, not just a minority of trolls or deniers) not serious?
These are all incredibly serious. If my sisters called me from some event and said any of the bold was constantly happening, I'd tell them to get out and call the security, organisers, guards whoever would help them. Hell, if I was somewhere and any of the bold happened to me constantly, I'd get out and call the guards.
Frankly, for a person, a supposed victim, to try and defend a lack of action against any of these on the basis that they aren't serious (but still claim they are serious and so something needs to be done), screams to me that they made them up or pieced them together from anecdotes they heard from other people. Why would they go back to such environments otherwise? Why would they protect the people doing it to them?

OK, hold on a sec. Let's back this pony up for a minute.

First of all, you're quoting a portion of my post other than where I responded to yours. Was that a mistake or intentional?

Secondly, I made no comment about whether or not the incidents were serious and I don't see how you think I did. What I said was that these incidents seem to have happened and yet Rebecca didn't seem to make a big deal out of them until DJ Grothe made his comments about TAM. As I said in opening my response to you, I don't know what the answers to your previous questions are. That would be a matter for Rebecca Watson.

Finally, to restate my position again, I am not downplaying the seriousness of incidents that may have happened to Rebecca Watson or others. I am just concerned that claims are being made about the general safety of women at atheist and skeptic meetings without any substantive evidence to support such claims. If these claims, whether made deliberately or by being misinterpreted continue then there really will be a major problem in the attendance of women at such meetings.

Newaglish

oldrnwisr wrote: »

I don't know if you're referring to me here, but no, I don't think that Rebecca's account of her experiences are fabricated or exaggerated. I just don't see any evidence to suggest that they are representative of women's experiences in general.

I meant Mark Hamill - sorry. I should use names in future.

Also I wasn't actually suggesting that I personally think her stories are exaggerated. Just interpreting the post.

That being said, it seems sort of convenient that after being called over-sensitive and reactionary after the coffee/elevator incident, suddenly there is a huge history of frankly unbelievable behaviour that was never mentioned before.

Working in a professional environment myself, I've never come across people acting this way at all. I've never met a female professional before who claimed she was constantly on the receiving end of gropes and comments about rape.

(I don't know the full facts of this story so I could be wrong in my interpretation)

Mark Hamill

oldrnwisr wrote: »

OK, hold on a sec. Let's back this pony up for a minute.

First of all, you're quoting a portion of my post other than where I responded to yours. Was that a mistake or intentional?

Absolute mistake, sorry about that, I changed my post fix it.

oldrnwisr wrote: »

Secondly, I made no comment about whether or not the incidents were serious and I don't see how you think I did. What I said was that these incidents seem to have happened and yet Rebecca didn't seem to make a big deal out of them until DJ Grothe made his comments about TAM. As I said in opening my response to you, I don't know what the answers to your previous questions are. That would be a matter for Rebecca Watson.

I know you didn't say they were serious, I was responding to your suggestion that maybe Rebecca didn't see them as a huge problem. My post is basically "how could anyone not see these incidents as a huge problem, even if they just happened to one person in one event?".

oldrnwisr wrote: »

Finally, to restate my position again, I am not downplaying the seriousness of incidents that may have happened to Rebecca Watson or others. I am just concerned that claims are being made about the general safety of women at atheist and skeptic meetings without any substantive evidence to support such claims. If these claims, whether made deliberately or by being misinterpreted continue then there really will be a major problem in the attendance of women at such meetings.

For the record, neither am I. Even if what Watson said in her quote was a fabrication, that still wouldn't mean abuse doesn't happen at these conferences and that something shouldn't be done about it. I am simply posting in response to that one specific quote because it doesn't make sense to me.

Nodin

...it doesn't make sense to anyone that cares to give it thought. If a failed geeky come-on is video worthy then whats listed in that paragraph should have provoked a shit storm at the time of their occurence. While I've no problem believing that some form of sexism occurs at events where two genders are represented, I'm unconvinced of Ms Watsons testimonial.

Duggys Housemate

I havent read this thread, just the last 3 pages, but - back to the main topic - Atheism is not Left wing. A good proportion of atheists were historically leftwing, by definition pro-homosexuality etc. Nowadays, a good percentage of 20 somethings are atheists but those atheists are, otherwise, across the opinion spectrum. American politics and political opinion are massively divided, the right is extremely hostile to the left, and vice versa. Myers is a left wing extremist. Calling Hitchens pro-genocide, and his attacks on Sam Harris being cases in point.

This kind of extreme leftism is looking for heretics, and criticism of Islam gets you in that camp.

Neither are atheists feminists. Not sure how this thread has moved on, but the original hoo-haw about a simple request in an elevator, where the guy, when turned down for "coffee", said "Sure, right enough" is a joke. People have to meet somehow.

No doubt this is a huge issue to America's identity politics academics, but to the centrist Atheist not a big deal.

No reason, by the way, that atheist conferences should have to cater for radical leftists.

Zombrex

The latest sceptical s**t storm that just erupted is that blogger Thunderf00t (who produces that quite brilliant YouTube videos) has released comments by Freethoughtblogs (FtB) bloggers that were made on a private behind the scenes mailing list he seems to have had unauthorised access to after he was fired from FtB.

Needless to say FtB has gone ape crap crazy, probably with a lot of justification consider this seems to be completely unethical and unjustifiable action on Thunderf00t's part.

Thunderf00t seems to have felt he was justified in doing this because the FtB bloggers had been discussing how they were going to target other bloggers they disagreed with, including himself. But he really doesn't have a leg to stand on, these were private emails.

Once again the term "disappointing" is the only way to describe this whole messy stupid affair. I love Thunderf00t's videos. I continue to use the present tense there because just because he did this doesn't me I retroactively now hate them, as some bloggers have been stating. But there is no way this behaviour can be excused and you really wonder what the hell he was thinking.

You really wonder where all this will end. This scene keeps popping into my head

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Emdzsz_XvfA

UDP

Wow there seems to be a lot of egotistic douchebags in the skeptic community. Maybe that's just what happens to many people when they get an audience.

Rev Hellfire

Zombrex wrote: »

Needless to say FtB has gone ape crap crazy, probably with a lot of justification consider this seems to be completely unethical and unjustifiable action on Thunderf00t's part.

I don't think they've any justification. This is a group who have been exposed using a backchannel to organise the harassment and censure of individuals who disagree with their stance.

He should be commended for bringing such dubious activites to light and exposing these bullies for what they are.

King Mob

Rev Hellfire wrote: »

I don't think they've any justification. This is a group who have been exposed using a backchannel to organise the harassment and censure of individuals who disagree with their stance.

He should be commended for bringing such dubious activites to light and exposing these bullies for what they are.

Such a position might have been more tenable if he hadn't spent a lot of time campaigning against people abusing youtube to invade people's privacy.

They are as bad as each other and I've subscribed from both the FTB/Skpechick's stuff as well as from Thunderfoot's channel.

robindch

Rev Hellfire wrote: »

This is a group who have been exposed using a backchannel to organise the harassment and censure of individuals who disagree with their stance.

Linky?

Rev Hellfire

robindch wrote: »

Linky?

http://thunderf00tdotorg.wordpress.com/2012/08/10/ftb-want-thunderf00t-drummed-out-of-the-community-and-forever-a-pariah/

Zombrex

Rev Hellfire wrote: »

I don't think they've any justification. This is a group who have been exposed using a backchannel to organise the harassment and censure of individuals who disagree with their stance.

He should be commended for bringing such dubious activites to light and exposing these bullies for what they are.

Why? They are private citizens, if they want to privately be bullies or hypocrites or liars they can.

If I want to spend every waking minute ringing up UPC trying to get the guy who brought my new cable box fired because I didn't like the way he looked at my dog, I can. It is up to UPC to handle that. No one has the right to open my mail and publish it because they think I'm being a dick.

If I want to post a blog about how I think Robin is awesome (cause he is ) and then privately I'm emailing Boards.ie asking to get him banned, that is a douche move but it is still perfectly within my rights as private citizen and it doesn't in anyway justify breaking my right to privacy. It is up to Boards.ie to ignore this, it is not up to anyone to break into my email to prove I'm doing it.

People seem to be confusing bloggers with people who the public genuinely have a right to know about (ie public officials and companies). There is no right to know here.

UDP

robindch wrote: »

Rev Hellfire wrote: »

This is a group who have been exposed using a backchannel to organise the harassment and censure of individuals who disagree with their stance.

Linky?

http://thunderf00tdotorg.wordpress.com/
Apparently they were scheming to harass him out of the community.

I'm skeptical of anyone's story in this. They are all being emotional and irrational resulting in an out of control **** storm. One thing for sure is I have lost respect for nearly all of them thus cannot take them seriously anymore. Could never imagine myself going to a conference that these children would be speaking at.

Rev Hellfire

@King Mob & UDP
Ohh agreed none of them are saints in any of this.

Rev Hellfire

@Zombrex
I'm not sure I'd equate an organisations mailing list with a private mail between one or two other individuals.

We'll agree to disagree.

BluntGuy

I want to do whatever it takes to make sure that he is essentially drummed out of this movement

What "movement"?

pH

oldrnwisr wrote: »

What appears to have happened is this:

It's almost correct - but framed in such an anti-JREF manner that I feel the need just to set the record straight.

1. The number of women attending TAM compared to the previous year dropped from 40% to 18%.

Yes DJ was genuinely worried and upset at the drop of women registering for TAM2012.

2. DJ Grothe of JREF made a comment which referred to a quote made by Rebecca Watson in an interview with USA today in which he suggested that the reason less women were attending TAM is because a small group of women were talking about harrassment which lead to the perception that there was a widespread problem with harrassment of women at atheist/skeptic conferences even though there was no real problem.

So background

Following the Women in Secular conference in early May 2012 there was a bit of public chatter on twitter/FB and blogs like this and this

A reasonable reading of all this was that a back channel existed where women were warning other women about some men in particular and these types of events in general. Anecdotal reports also existed on JREF forums of posters who self-identified as female who posted they were attending TAM would get warning PMs from other members regarding sexual harassment.

There must have been 20+ major blog posts on this topic(+ thousands of tweets/comments/facebook )
Have a look here for a (FtB) view of the timeline of events
http://freethoughtblogs.com/lousycanuck/2012/06/15/harassment-policies-campaign-timeline-of-major-events/

However when pushed the major "harassment" and one of the important things that needed to be done was to ban speakers having consensual sex with attendees. Why because, well why?

"Michael Shermer is sexist and treats conferences as a chance to have sex with young women"

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2012/05/23/its-almost-time-to-start-naming-names/
(in the comments section a name from "The List" that's been hinted at for so long is finally revealed)

OK onwards to DJ Grothe ...

Sophie Hirschfeld posted this on FB

Sophie Hirschfeld 25th May wrote:

Hm, I should have thought to propose a panel on sexual harassment and boundaries for TAM. It is probably too late for that, isn't it?

DJ responded 2 days later with this

DJ Grothe 27th May wrote:

Barb: I think I see where Sophie is coming from with all of this, and as a gay man I feel I'm sensitive to issues of sexism and homosexism.

It is true that harassment issues are much discussed in some quarters of the skeptics and atheist and other allied movements (all generally for the better, to the extent the emotionally charged issues are tempered with evidence) but to my knowledge there has never been a report filed of sexual harassment at TAM and there have been zero reports of harassment at the TAMs we've put on while I've been at JREF.

Of course that doesn't mean such didn't happen, but of 800+ responses to our attendee survey last year, only three people said they were made to feel unwelcome by someone at the event: one, a man who didn't like all the magic; two, a woman who was ridiculed for her veganism; and three, a conservative who didn't feel welcome because of what he saw as an undue emphasis by speakers and attendees on progressive and leftist ideals. (One woman at the event did, however, complain to staff that she felt she may be harassed by someone in the future, and felt uncomfortable about the man, and while we are concerned about such concerns, she didn't complain of any actual activity that had happened that the hotel or security or law enforcement or others could take action on.)

I believe I understand the impulse to protect people from harm (this is a strong motivation for skeptics, after all) but telling newbies that they need to be on guard against so-called sexual predators at our events, or that the movement or movements are "unsafe for women," may be a sure-fire way of making some women feel unwelcome who otherwise would feel and be safe and welcomed. As for policies, I think Ben is on the right track. We are all against harassment or bullying of any kind, sexual or otherwise. Any incident of harassment or assault should immediately be reported to security and law enforcement, and JREF staff and the hotel staff stand ready to assist should any regrettable incident ever occur, God forbid. But again, no such incident has ever occurred at TAM to my knowledge, and I believe that bears mentioning in current discussions about how prevalent are the unnamed "sexual predators" at various atheist and skeptical events.

Last year we had 40% women attendees, something I'm really happy about. But this year only about 18% of TAM registrants so far are women, a significant and alarming decrease, and judging from dozens of emails we have received from women on our lists, this may be due to the messaging that some women receive from various quarters that going to TAM or other similar conferences means they will be accosted or harassed. (This is misinformation. Again, there've been on reports of such harassment the last two TAMs while I've been at the JREF, nor any reports filed with authorities at any other TAMs of which I'm aware.) We have gotten emails over the last few months from women vowing never to attend TAM because they heard that JREF is purported to condone child-sex-trafficking, and emails in response to various blog posts about JREF or me that seem to suggest I or others at the JREF promote the objectification of women, or that we condone violence or threats of violence against women, or that they believe that women would be unsafe because we feature this or that man on the program. I think this misinformation results from irresponsible messaging coming from a small number of prominent and well-meaning women skeptics who, in trying to help correct real problems of sexism in skepticism, actually and rather clumsily themselves help create a climate where women — who otherwise wouldn't — end up feeling unwelcome and unsafe, and I find that unfortunate.

http://www.facebook.com/SophieHirschfeld/posts/3831844709949?comment_id=4505844&offset=76&total_comments=116

As you can see Rebecca isn't mentioned

From Rebecca's own version of events:
http://skepchick.org/2012/06/why-i-wont-be-at-tam-this-year/

Rebecca's post on the comments section

Rebecca Watson wrote:

I still don’t see who these “prominent and well-meaning women skeptics” are who “create a climate where women — who otherwise wouldn’t — end up feeling unwelcome and unsafe.”

Who are they? What have they said that makes women feel unsafe? Please be specific.

And DJ's reply (again a comment on someone else's blog)

Rebecca: Off the top of my head, your quote in USA Today might suggest that the freethought or skeptics movements are unsafe for women. This is from the article:

“I thought it was a safe space,” Watson said of the freethought community. “The biggest lesson I have learned over the years is that it is not a safe space. . . ”

(http://www.usatoday.com/news/religion/story/2011-09-15/atheist-sexism-women/50416454/1)

If we tell people that our events or our movements are not safe for women, some women are bound to believe that. If I as a gay man had never attended a freethought or skeptic event and read in a national newspaper that that community wasn’t a safe space for gay people, I would certainly be reluctant to get involved.

Additionally, many well-meaning if off-base posts about purported rampant sexual harassment at skeptic and freethought events may give the impression that such actually occurs, and a lot. Here are some recent posts with some quick quotes. I’d be pretty surprised if you haven’t already read them:

http://www.skepticalabyss.com/ “at a skeptics event like TAM we have all the classic ingredients to make it an ideal place for sexual harassers to victimize women” etc

http://freethoughtblogs.com/almostdiamonds/2012/05/20/zero-intolerance/ — “you’ve probably seen the public behavior of some of these guys already. . . . Not only are these speakers still allowed to show up, but they’re still in demand. Conferences need to sell tickets and fill seats. When organizers stop inviting some of the people on this [sexist] list, unless sexism is a primary concern for donors, unless experiences are allowed to be made public, organizers get overruled.” [This is the audacious and unsupported claim that there are known sexual harassers on programs but that that is ignored because of a financial interest.]

http://freethoughtblogs.com/almostdiamonds/2012/05/23/real-progress/ — “I’ve also seen ideas about conferences sharing or consolidating data to make it easier to identify problem speakers” [This suggests something like the creation of a blacklist of "sexist" speakers?]

http://freethoughtblogs.com/blaghag/2012/05/dealing-with-badly-behaving-speakers/ — “I remarked that when I was about to attend my first major atheist/skeptical conference, multiple people independently sent me unsolicited advice about what male speakers to avoid at the con. The same speakers were mentioned by different individuals, with warnings that they often make unwanted and aggressive sexual advances toward young pretty women and that I should not be alone with them.” [Are these rumors about which men will rape or harass or accost someone? Are these rumors unfounded?]

And at the same post — “Speakers and conference organizers should not be looking to get laid at conferences because they are there in a professional setting, even if attendees are there for more entertainment reasons.” [Are we seriously telling speakers and attendees at atheists and skeptics at conferences that they shouldn't be engaged in sexual activity? This usurps others' adult responsibilities and rights and is counter to my personal values.]

http://freethoughtblogs.com/almostdiamonds/2012/05/22/making-it-safer-in-the-meantime/ — “some of the male speakers at our conferences use their conference appearances as an opportunity to abuse women”

So this is a very quick survey of some of the messaging that may be telling women that they are unsafe at or should be wary of atheist and skeptics events. I submit that this sort of messaging, and the talk about so called rampant sexual predators at atheist and skeptics conferences, may have the opposite of the intended effects to make the events more welcoming for women; these messages may instead encourage women to be less involved than they normally would.

I refer you to the data in points #9 and #10 in my comment above. That information should be relevant in these discussions about how prevalent such “abuse of women,” how rampant “sexual harassers . . . victimizing women.”

It is important to be sensitive to these sorts of real and legitimate concerns surrounding issues of sexual harassment at events. But again, such concern should be based on evidence and not rumor or gossip.

3. Rebecca Watson responded by saying that her quote wasn't talking about TAM but that she had experienced all sorts of unwanted advances at atheist conferences.

But how seriously can we take that?

4. From there the relatively minor spat seems to have escalated and become ambiguous resulting in different perceptions of what was actually being claimed.

The thing is though that while DJ Grothe cocked up by strawmanning Rebecca Watson, the data in the meantime such as the secularcensus posted by Zombrex does suggest that real-life harassment is not a widespread (I'm bolding this because the distinction is important) problem.

I've no idea how you can accuse DJ of Strawmanning Watson - she asked him a question he responded "Off the top of my head, your quote in USA Today might suggest that the freethought or skeptics movements are unsafe for women."

Zombrex

BluntGuy wrote: »

What "movement"?

"We're here, we're query, we don't want any more bears!"

You know, the pro-moustache movement.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCppe11LpCM

mathepac

Eggsellent

Nodin

mathepac wrote: »

Eggsellent

What a profound observation.


And witty too.

Galvasean

UDP wrote: »

Could never imagine myself going to a conference that these children would be speaking at.

I'm the same. What little interest I ever had in attending such a conference has been well and truly buried.

So, when's the next A&A forum beers?

tdawg

Have to say I have no idea who any of these people are, it's strange to try and understand where all this self-importance is coming from. It actually reminds me of reality TV celebrities and their silly little tiffs.

I guess sites like skepchic are made for preaching to a choir, and I guess thats what builds up the egos of people in charge.

mathepac

Nodin wrote: »

What a profound observation.


And witty too.

Glad you appreciate it. The Simpsons seem to feature in here a lot, which is good, just not on their own, which is bad.

Northclare

mathepac wrote: »

Nodin wrote: »

What a profound observation.


And witty too.

Glad you appreciate it. The Simpsons seem to feature in here a lot, which is good, just not on their own, which is bad.

I love Cartoon time on these threads,or when people put up funny pictures to get their message across lol there was a few directed at me now and again but I saw the humor in it

The only time I'm skeptical is when I'm buying meat in the supermarket or I make sure I observe road signs, getting my car serviced on time,just being sensible from day to day,
I like to use my common sense and keep my life manageable.

But in fairness I checked out out that skeptchick one and I'm not impressed, it's almost as bad as a hardcore religious fanatic telling us well all burn in hell...

If she was a pop star she would be very popular with the tabloids,as she loves controversy.

decimatio

Northclare wrote: »

But in fairness I checked out out that skeptchick one and I'm not impressed, it's almost as bad as a hardcore religious fanatic telling us well all burn in hell...

I don't know everything about the skepchick issue because I've avoided it as much as possible. I do however have unfortunately become too familiar with many of the FTB bloggers.

PZ Myers is a liberal left-wing fanatic politically. I think people outside the US only hear about or pay attention to the right wing crazies because politically most of Europe is quite close to the Left's position but the left wing nutjobs are just as bad.

I wrote about Myers in particular on my (new) blog here if anyones interested.

Jellicoe

Zombrex wrote: »

Why? They are private citizens, if they want to privately be bullies or hypocrites or liars they can.

If I want to spend every waking minute ringing up UPC trying to get the guy who brought my new cable box fired because I didn't like the way he looked at my dog, I can. It is up to UPC to handle that. No one has the right to open my mail and publish it because they think I'm being a dick.

If I want to post a blog about how I think Robin is awesome (cause he is ) and then privately I'm emailing Boards.ie asking to get him banned, that is a douche move but it is still perfectly within my rights as private citizen and it doesn't in anyway justify breaking my right to privacy.

That's all true, as long as you realize that like it or not, inevitably there will be repercussions and reactions to your behavior that you do not like either.

Particularly when you're dealing with people who fundamentally do not believe in the 'jebus' style concept of turning the other cheek. If you step out of line with their group think, then expect the negative consequences.

oldrnwisr

pH wrote: »

I've no idea how you can accuse DJ of Strawmanning Watson - she asked him a question he responded "Off the top of my head, your quote in USA Today might suggest that the freethought or skeptics movements are unsafe for women."

Thank you for providing such a comprehensive reply pH. I haven't had a chance to read through all of your links in their entirety yet but it certainly does seem as if I was dead wrong with my previous comment about DJ Grothe. This entire controversy is really giving me a bad taste in my mouth with the amount of crap being thrown around by people I previously had some respect for (Rebecca Watson, PZ Myers, Thunderf00t etc.) It'll be a cold day in Gre'thor before I consider going to another conference where these muppets are speaking.

bipedalhumanoid

Zombrex wrote: »

But there is no way this behaviour can be excused and you really wonder what the hell he was thinking.

You really wonder where all this will end. This scene keeps popping into my head

I couldn't agree less.

Firstly, we don't know what TF did to gain access to those emails. If you're willing to take FTBs version of events as gospel I have a nice bridge in Sydney that might interest you.

If the information TF has unearthed is accurate, then some FTB blogges are guilty of conspiring to get a guy fired from his job for the crime of sending a dissenting tweet! That is far more sinister than TFs whistle blowing.

FTB appear to have set up a smokescreen of blog posts focusing entirely on accusations against TF to divert your attention from the uncomforatble email content that TF has unearthed. You seem to have fallen for their spin.

equivariant

I've spent part of the last week reading up on some of the blog posts and commentary on the whole skepchick/FTB/Thuderf00t/slimepit squabble and I must say that I find it all quite depressing. Are these people the best that the atheist/rationalist community can come up with as representatives? PZ Myers starts a blog post with "F**k off ...." - this guy is a supposedly a professor at a respected university? Is that how he speaks to people? Thunderf00t claims that there is nothing wrong with disseminating info from a private mailing list - this guy is supposedly a respected academic and scientist. Is that his idea of honesty? Grow up people - you are all acting like a bunch of 12 year olds.

And spare me the whole "this is serious, people are being threatened" rubbish. If any participant of this squabble feels threatened online, they should just sell their computer and stay off line - its not like any of them are contributing anything worthwhile to the world. If even one of them had anyting interesting to say about anything then it might be worthwhile talking about threats, but right now they do not. Both Myers and Mason are a disgrace to the academic profession that gave them a platform in the first place.

Northclare

Great post,you made a good point.

condra

Elevator Guy Comes Out
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9DWGcFEw2s

legit?

Krishna I hope so. Bit long after the fact to take particularly seriously though.

bipedalhumanoid

Deleted User wrote: »

Krishna I hope so. Bit long after the fact to take particularly seriously though.

There are three things we know about Elevator guy from RWs account.

1) He was not shy, he was very confident
2) He was not american
3) He appeared to her to be in his 50s

So what do you think?

Galvasean

Is this the part where we all stand up one by one proclaiming, "I'm elevator guy!"

Nodin

condra wrote: »

Elevator Guy Comes Out
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9DWGcFEw2s

legit?

He doesn't look like a "......coffee?" guy tbh.

Galvasean

Maybe if he had of asked hr up to his room for some smack she'd have been more interested?

condra

I’m elevator guy.

MagicMarker

I'm more partial to escalators myself.

robindch

I was the guy who offered her coffee when the lift doors opened upstairs -- ye didn't hear her complaining about me, now, did ye

oldrnwisr

Galvasean wrote: »

Is this the part where we all stand up one by one proclaiming, "I'm elevator guy!"

Galvasean

MagicMarker wrote: »

I'm more partial to escalators myself.

"An escalator can never truly break, only become a stairs.

Sorry for the convenience."

- Mitch Hedberg.

bipedalhumanoid

condra wrote: »

I’m elevator guy.

Yes, Condra is elevator guy.