Looking at bad arguments is a hobby of mine. So when I discovered Milo Yiannopoulos (@Nero) had been suspended from Twitter last night, I had a look at what people were saying about it. Long story short, it was a combination of “Nero was suspended for no reason” and “Ooh, now you’ve messed with the wrong person”. (Irony much?)
Also, five attempts to teach gamergaters some vocabulary lessons. Continue reading “Five Things #Gamergate Needs to Know About Twitter”
A while back, I offered people one of those pain-for-funds incentives to donate to Skepticon. Apparently, however, Slyme Pit poetry is too painful for most or all of you.
That’s fair, but it still leaves Skepticon in need. As of right now, with less than two weeks to go before the conference, Skepticon still needs to raise $7,000 to cover their costs for this year. That’s a lot.
People reading this blog probably aren’t going to be able to donate all that money. (If you can, great! Go for it!) Still, whatever you can do would mean a lot to me, as you might be able to tell from my willingness to trawl slime for “poetry”. I’ve made my own donation and added Skepticon to my list of regular monthly donations, but we need a lot more than me.
Why should you donate to Skepticon? Several reasons. Continue reading “Tell Me What You Want”
I’m pro-voting. If you’ve read this blog for a while (a day or two even), you may have noticed.
This afternoon, I tweeted a couple of thoughts to encourage others in the U.S. to vote tomorrow.
“All politicians are alike” is a lie that benefits the worst politicians. Voting makes a difference.
— Stephanie Zvan (@szvan) November 3, 2014
Voting makes a difference even if your candidate doesn’t win. But if enough people vote in “hopeless” races, they may stop being hopeless. — Stephanie Zvan (@szvan) November 3, 2014
This second tweet received some argument. The person responding agreed with me that people should still vote, but called voting in states that swing solidly red or blue a “purely symbolic gesture”. Except in the sense that communication is symbolic, I strongly disagree that there’s anything symbolic about voting even when your candidates have no chance of winning. I disagree even when you have no candidates on the ballot who represent your views.
Here are several ways that votes for a candidate who doesn’t win still make a difference. Continue reading “Why "Losing Votes" Still Matter”
When someone said, “I yelled at the screen through that whole movie”, we knew we were on the right track. When we saw Jason Statham, Ron Perlman, and Ray Liotta together…in a sword and sorcery flick…from the director of the Blood Rayne movies….with Matthew Lillard and Burt Reynolds…well, there might have been cackling.
This one is available on Netflix. Continue reading “Mock the Movie: Wizard Liotta Edition”
The election is Tuesday. As usual, I put my reasoning for my votes online for people who don’t have the resources or time to do their own, though I’m skipping those races with only one choice. If my reasoning doesn’t match yours, at least you have some background. If you want to provide additional background in the comments, feel free. If you want information on local races I haven’t touched on, or just another opinion, I recommend Naomi Kritzer’s coverage of the candidates.
You can find your polling place here. Continue reading “Minneapolis 2014 Sample Ballot”
Mick Nugent has responded to my post about providing haven for rapists. As he titles his post, “Why Stephanie Zvan’s defence of PZ Myers’ ‘haven for rapists’ smear is not reasonable based on the evidence“, allow me a moment to clarify a couple of things.
If I thought that PZ’s comments particularly needed defense, I’d have done it before now. I think the tweets in question, which can be found here, stand on their own for anyone who is familiar with Nugent’s recent behavior in email and on his blog. My post responded to demands from Aneris, a slimepitter, that I respond to a skewed version of PZ’s statement in which Nugent’s behavior was attributed to the pit. I ignored that problem and responded because it gave me an opportunity, a hook on which to hang some writing I wanted to do anyway.
I wrote my post because I wanted to say, in my own words, that Mick Nugent has provided a haven for rapists. I’ll still say it. Mick Nugent has provided a haven for rapists by his actions with respect to Michael Shermer. I don’t have to consult with PZ in order to say it. I don’t have to be defending PZ in order to say it. I said it. I believe it. I said why I believe it. I’ll stand by it on my own, thank you very much.
However, rant aside, that’s not what I want to draw people’s attention to. I want to draw attention to the fact that Nugent says PZ claimed Nugent’s commenters were rapists. In particular, I want to draw attention to Nugent’s use of an email from PZ in this regard. Continue reading “Michael Nugent and the Email”