Predators Beyond Belief

By Sikivu Hutchinson

Oh to be middle-aged, male, skeptic and white — master of the rational universe.  The ad nauseum propagandistic bullshit that atheist/secularis/freethought circles are magically exempt from institutional racism, sexism and heterosexism continues to be blown to bits by allegations of pervasive sexual harassment, assault and workplace discrimination from women in the field.  The most recent allegations by Dr. Karen Stollznow against Skeptical Inquirer editor Ben Radford underscore how deep and intractable male entitlement, privilege, and predation are in an industry that thrives on in your face elitism, balls-to-the-breeze racial politics and intellectual exclusivity.  Stollznow’s claim that she was assaulted and harassed by Radford–while organization heads at the JREF and CFI apparently did next to nothing to censure or purge the predator from their ranks–is further testimony to the complicity of atheist leadership with a culture of sexist policing, control and slut-shaming.  Time and again, in industry after industry, sexual harassers and predators are protected, promoted, propped up and rewarded for their criminal behavior and power politics. Indeed, many harassers are rewarded with promotions and other perks that keep the good times and career/retirement dividends rolling for the predator long after the victim(s) has either resigned due to stress, been marginalized and frozen out of promotional opportunities for being an “uppity bitch” or completely kicked to the curb.  CFI’s silence on Radford (and others, PZ Myers’ blog has an in depth take from former JREF employee Carrie Poppy) is further indication of its lack of institutional credibility on equity, “diversity” or any other issue that threatens the supremacy of ensconced white male professionals.

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Predators Beyond Belief
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33 thoughts on “Predators Beyond Belief

    1. 1.1

      Thanks for the feedback Satan. And as to your other response — an actual change in leadership would be too much like a dangerous “redistribution of wealth” to this regime

  1. 2

    Also, this might be the first post on the subject to make the root of the problem the central theme. If I was on the board of an organization that was facing a PR apocalypse due to the ineptitude of entrenched highly privileged leaders like myself, I’d consider the cause in the solution.

    I would find an organization like Secular Women or Black Skeptics and propose a merger, with mixed leadership in the resultant group, and someone new in the top spot. That way, all the work I spent building my organization wouldn’t go to waste, and a more powerful, diverse, and useful entity could come out the other side of our ruin.

    But hey, I’m an unemployed security guard with a $40,000 student loan and $270 a week in my dwindling unemployment money. What do I know?

  2. 3

    […] shit with a ton of biases and a petunia’s ability to think rationally. It’s another thing entirely to be a sexual stalker, harasser or opportunist. Especially if you have some kind of elevated […]

  3. 4

    DJ Grothe’s response that Carrie Poppy released in particular leaves me white hot with rage. As a thirty something straight white male, I’m pretty disgusted with most of the current atheist organizations. I wish it wasn’t the case, but it seems any time you get a bunch of oldish white dudes together (and no one else) and give them power some kind of terrible abuse comes out of it. A couple years ago I would have argued that it was culture or religion that was responsible, but it’s pretty clear that the current old guard atheist orgs are just as bad.

    Makes me wonder if it’s the willingness to step on the backs of others that is the biggest predictor of success in an organization?

    1. 4.1

      “Makes me wonder if it’s the willingness to step on the backs of others that is the biggest predictor of success in an organization?”

      Thorstein Veblen suggested something along these lines, though I don’t think he thought it was every organization necessarily.

  4. 5

    There’s so much I want to say about all this, I don’t even know where to begin or how to structure my thoughts.

    I’m angry. I feel betrayed. This time by the so-called leaders of the Atheist movement. Isn’t there anyone on this planet who understands that with leadership comes, above all, responsibility? And is it too much to ask to be treated humanely, if you’re in some way different from the norm? Are women, members of ethnic minorities, immigrants, gay people, transgender and transsexual people, sex workers, housewives, working class people without academic degrees, not living, breathing, sentient beings? Well, we are, whichever of these groups we belong to. So what’s the rational justification for thinking it’s not such a big deal if we suffer? People who do that are not skeptics, they’re not rational. Whatever part of their body they think with, it’s not the left brain hemisphere.

    I feel angry. But more than that, I feel lost, as silly as that sounds. I really do want to belong to something. On a local level, we’ve solved this by walking out on the old Freethought group and forming a new one just for immigrants. But I’d also like to be part of something bigger than my town, a community where the sun never sets. And I want that to be an Atheist community, because there’s no single thing I identify with more strongly. It’s the thing that woke me up and allowed me to escape from the life that my ethnic community had all planned out for me. Some people I really care about actually left all other communities behind when they renounced religion. So yeah, the current state of the Atheist movement really bothers me.

    Am I the only person who doesn’t know where she stands in the global movement? The whole thing seems divided into two camps, neither of which I can identify with. One is like the Republican Party of Atheism, and I want no part of that. The other one cares about roughly the same topics as I do, but in a way that seems all twisted and wrong to me.

    I wonder, is there any kind of network, any kind of hub for Atheists who want diversity and equality in the real world? Where opinions that are independent of any camps are welcome? An internet forum for all I care, where people can exchange ideas for things like community work, empowering women and girls, integrating ethnic minorities, and all that, without being ridiculed? As in real world ideas, rather than holy wars against the word “but”. I know, it’s always easier to debate semantics than to discuss working strategies for things like equal pay and helping women and girls escape from abusive religious families. Perhaps what I’m looking for, is a place where people go who don’t do things the easy way. I don’t know right now. But what’s there and easy to find, just isn’t good enough, and that’s frustrating.

    *sigh*

    1. 5.1

      Web forums are geared towards debate, so I don’t think that is going to work. All you’ll ever get is another set of debates and sides. I think real community is built the way you’re building your local group, face to face with people you trust, or at least tentatively trust. I have heard that there is a good deal of research now that shows that humans react to video chat in similar ways that they react to meatspace face to face conversations, so if there is ever going to be any sort of real global community around anything, then video chat is probably going to play an important role in that.

      A lot of the same people who get caught up in shouting matches on web forums and blog comment threads seem to be able to be thoughtful and productive face to face, so I definitely think that the medium matters.

      I could be completely wrong, but I don’t think there has ever been a global movement of any kind where a lot of people that are lower middle class, working class or below (aka ‘ordinary folks’) have taken part in international discourse on a large scale, or even in nationwide discourse in the US.

      Based on the quality of a lot of the leaders in the anglophone Atheist/Skeptic movements I suspect it’s probably best to keep the movement as a whole as decentralized as possible until there’s a way to weed out people who want to be leaders but who are unsuitable…

      1. These are good points, and I’ll have to think about them.

        It’s not debates and differences of opinion per se that bother me. It’s more the kind of debate where binary views of issues are imposed, with each side claiming infallibility. Like whenever you try to present a third option, the faction that promotes A will find the most absurd reasons for claiming that your position is actually just B in disguise (and vice versa).

        The current sexism debate is a parade example. I see misogyny as an urgent problem that must be dealt with, but I completely disagree with the analysis and proposed solutions that white middle-class feminists have to offer. In real life debates with white Americans and Europeans, that’s gotten me accused of being a militant anarcha-feminist and a person who lacks a feminist awareness in the same sentence.

        I’ve seen this kind of thing mostly in people who focus exclusively on theoretical matters. People who are used to doing practical community work seem to be much more open to the idea that not every issue has a single, absolute answer. Because working in the real world has taught them that many things can be seen from more than one perspective.

        1. Yeah, that’s exactly what I suspect is happening on a lot of forums.

          The format of web forums is so good at facilitating debate that you tend to get a lot for debate for debate’s sake, debates where there is no future action that depends on what the participants learn during the debate. In those debates the outcome is usually that people who agreed previously agree more and that people who disagreed previously disagree more. Sometimes one side manages to present some irrefutable evidence that proves the other side i plain wrong, but that seems to be pretty rare.

          I know of examples where forums have been used to reach agreements on things that will influence some real life action, and then the discussions tend to be much more constructive. I have had moderator privileges at a forum like that for a number of years and I have never had to delete or edit a single post except for spam bots. So if you have a group that’s doing any sort of stuff besides debating then a forum can be a useful tool, but I think the community has to be created before you can create the forum.

          I’d love for the people at the Atheism+ forum to prove me wrong, but I doubt they will, not because they are bad people or because they have bad intentions, but because they are fighting an uphill battle against a forum that doesn’t facilitate what they want to do. If they had gone off and started local Atheism+ groups in their towns and cities first things would probably be different.

          1. I agree that it’s much easier to have a productive debate on concrete things than on abstract philosophy (although I’ve learned that there are philosophical issues that should be discussed, as long as they don’t take up too much time).

            I have to say, A+ is not the community I’m looking for. Not because they concern themselves with the wrong general topics. But because their approaches to solving problems would be ineffective outside of their white middle-class world (e.g. their ideas for advancing women’s rights presuppose that you’re surrounded by a critical mass of males who are willing to part with their privilege voluntarily, and that you have access to a social network you can draw on). In fact, I suspect they’re not exactly effective even in their world, because if they were, we wouldn’t be talking about sexual assaults at Atheist conferences.

          2. “(e.g. their ideas for advancing women’s rights presuppose that you’re surrounded by a critical mass of males who are willing to part with their privilege voluntarily,”

            So, if that’s a key issue, I suggest looking at what the Second Wave feminists did. They faced a lack of that, and there’s endless writing about their tactics.

            The reason there’s a critical mass of anti-sexist males in the “white middle-class world” now is entirely due to the work of Second Wave feminists inthe 1970s — a couple of generations later, the children and grandchildren of those Second Wave feminists are anti-sexist males, so there’s a critical mass. The critical mass is extremely useful, and worth using if you’ve got it.

            “, and that you have access to a social network you can draw on).”
            I think you have to have that in order to do any sort of social change. If you haven’t got that, you’re stuck where Abigail Adams was, begging her husband not to forget the ladies (he ignored her). Surely you have something.

            If what you’re starting with is sexist men and sexist women, the most useful tactic historically seems to have been “consciousness raising” in women-only spaces about specific concrete sexism issues which bug lots of you. FWIW.

            Of course, FTB is the first and only atheist “organization” I’ve gotten involved with in any way mostly because it’s got such damn good writers. A lot of the organizations which are now being revealed to be populated with predators… never appealed to me. I never thought too hard about why, they just gave off a bad vibe. I’ve had their magazines recommended to me by other people and didn’t like ’em.

        2. Thanks as always double-m for your comments as I share your frustration. The echo chamber of racist/sexist/heterosexist deflection from the navel gazing conference dominance obsessed atheist regime is personally nauseating to me and makes me even more vigilant about anchoring any “outreach” I do in those spheres in my real time humanist social justice work with youth and communities of color (where most folk of color actually live, go to school, work, and coalition-build). It is precisely this kind of imperial arrogance and New Jim Crow segregationism (vis-a-vis conference bubbles and exclusionary hiring/promotions policies, hierarchical leadership, white overexposure, cronyistic narrow “first world” agendas, etc.) that makes organized atheism untenable for questioning, agnostic or non-believer people of color in the U.S. If you are not already familiar with it, the Black Freethinkers weekly podcast on blogtalk radio highlights these intersections from an anti-racist feminist of color perspective.

          1. Wow, thanks! There’s a lot of interesting stuff there, and I’m really looking forward to listening to it. The latest episode just caught my attention, because male youth being funneled into the prison system is a major issue for Roma people as well. I completely agree with pretty much everything you say. Oh and, in case you haven’t had your daily facepalm moment, here’s the hilarious “outreach to white feminists” experience I had on Monday:

            For the first time in my life, I was going to attend a feminist conference this coming November. It was about getting girls interested in science, with a specific focus on immigrant families (I’ve attended public lectures on the subject before, but never a real conference). The ticket price was almost prohibitive, but this was something my friend and I had really wanted to do, because it was relevant for our volunteer work.

            So we went to the university that was going to host the event, and the woman who handled the registrations already looked at us like we were just a little out of place. At first, she thought my friend was a child. When she explained to her that she was a Mbuti who had been raised by Swiss adoptive parents, the woman just snorted. After that, she addressed me exclusively and ignored my friend completely. In other words, to the organizer of a feminist conference on immigrant(!) topics, an African woman who was shorter than the average European wasn’t worthy of her attention.

            Next thing she said to me was “you’re not from around here either” (How astute of you to notice, Ma’am. You’re surprised that immigrants would attend a conference on immigrant topics? Well… never mind). When I mentioned my ethnic background, the response was the classic “but you’re not a prostitute or something, right?” line. I don’t know what annoys me more about this every time I hear it, the racial stereotype or the fact that people use the sex worker label as an insult. But I just wanted to get it over with, so I gave her a forced smile. And then, after all those pleasantries, we were finally getting to the point where she’d sell us the damn tickets.

            Except we discovered we couldn’t attend after all.

            They didn’t provide any kind of day care. We asked her if she’d put us in touch with the other attendees, so maybe we could have made some arrangement where we’d take turns in looking after each other’s children during the conference. She called the lead organizer, who explained to us it wasn’t an issue for the other attendees and she couldn’t help us (she didn’t bother to address my friend either).

            Erm, HELLO?! No child care?! At a FEMINIST conference?! I guess if you’re a white feminist academic, you have an immigrant nanny for your kids, so balancing work and motherhood isn’t a problem for you. At that point we decided we weren’t going to learn anything at a conference run by those jerks, and left.

            I’m not saying all white people are like that, I’ve met a few who were genuine allies (okay, most of them were either L, G, B, T, or Q, or married to a person of color, or Jewish, or non-mainstream in some other way). But in the majority of cases, attempts to cooperate with white people on anything hands on, has led to some variation of the experience I’ve described here.

        3. No child care at a “feminist” conference. Unfortunately that’s so fucking typical of the white “first world” mentality. Due to feminist of color organizing around child care/provision of food etc. this has become a staple at virtually all culturally responsive community, school and parent meetings in South L.A. I know that some more “well-heeled” organizations in predominantly white areas here include child care and charge an extra fee. Another issue is easy access to public transportation and/or the provision of bus tokens and van-pooling. In my immediate community there are so many churches and faith-based institutions with vans and para-transit that facilitate attendance and participation among transit-dependent disabled, elderly, working parents, and youth.

  5. 6

    Hi Sikivu, I watched the HuffPo video last night and very much appreciated what you had to say. I’m glad I wandered on over to your blog- It’s great!

  6. 7

    The list of ‘men behaving badly’ is getting ever longer and longer, and the sad thing is that I am not particularly surprised at the names of the men appearing on this list.

  7. 8

    To CFI and JREF, I have two words for you: Joe Paterno.

    If you don’t want your own reputation to be indelibly smeared by being tied with predators, stop protecting and enabling predators.

  8. 10

    Yes it is, Gareth.

    I kid, but honestly, if you feel personally pigeon-holed or derided, yeah, this is probably meant for you. I’m a 37 year old blue-eyed white guy, and when I looked at the evidence, I realized this gave me a huge amount of advantage that was invisible to me. That’s called privilege. Now I’m willing to defer to the judgement of people who know a subject better than I do from personal experience.

    I can understand where you’re starting from, but if you aren’t bothering to go anywhere from there, you’re part of the problem.

  9. 11

    Gareth, I’m a 61 year old white male and I don’t in the least feel slighted or derided. Then again I don’t try to dismiss the sexism and racism inherent in our community nor do I to defend rape culture. If you don’t do any of these things then the very valid criticism isn’t aimed at you so stop being so sensitive. Though I am ashamed by many of the white middle aged men in our ‘community’, especially those at the top who you would think would now better. Unless of course their only real intent is to protect their privileged positions at any cost.

  10. 12

    John Phillips/AmericanSatan you should not feel ashamed at the actions of others. You don’t own the sins of your racial, gender or cultural group in any way. You are only responsible for your own actions. You didn’t make the world – you just live in it.

    I am not a particularly sensitive guy (to the criticisms of others) – so do not be concerned that I am being over-sensitive. I am actually more concerned about you and people like you – the harm you do to yourself and the progress of the human condition. I can feel your care and concern, but your efforts are misdirected. To feel guilt or shame for the actions of others reminds a little bit of the original sin concept. It harms you – and blurs your judgement on remedial actions. I can never see that stereotyping and pigeon-holing a socio-cultural-racial group is an appropriate remedy to the same treatment being inflicted on another group.

    Satan, where I am going with this? Well, not down the path of shame – that’s for sure. By the way, comments like “…if you feel personally pigeon-holed or derided, yeah, this is probably meant for you.” are NOT helpful. I think I’d call that insinuation. Too much of it going on.

  11. 13

    To the blogger…

    “The ad nauseum propagandistic bullshit that atheist/secularist/freethought circles are magically exempt from institutional racism, sexism and heterosexism…”

    Who actually says this? These are new institutions in the main. As institutions they have no explicit racism, sexism or heterosexism. Perhaps you mean that some members bring psychological baggage with them from older institions, that really are institutionally racist, sexist, heterosexist etc. That is not institutional. It means you have a problem with racist, sexist and heteronormative behaviour from individuals within this community. That is a critically different thing.

  12. 14

    @Gareth Bridges at 12

    Except for when their leaders, openly, call women “scolds” and try to shame them as prudish when they suggest that consent is a good place to start if you plan on having sex.

    But you might mean something completely different with the word “explicit” (disregarding the fact that something can be implicit and still rampant – the two terms are not mutually exclusive) than the rest of us. I mean, you do feel you have the interpretation prerogative after all, right?

    Behold, privilege in its natural habitat.

  13. 15

    Bozjemoj. I think I would feel the same way if someone were to tell me that consent was a good place to start if I planned to have sex. I would think that too bloody obvious to mention. Not being a rapist I would think it offensive to me because it would imply that I was. I might suspect the scolding as being borne of prudishness – as I have seen anti-sex sentiment masquerading as concern for social justice in my own locale. And anyay, if I were a rapist do you think being scolded would make a difference? What if I were tell you now not to murder or steal because it’s wrong? You’d think I was an idiot!

    I don’t understand the rest of your post. Yes, of course something can be implicit and rampant. So? I am not sure what you mean by me feeling I have the “interpretaion preropgative”.

    And I don’t understand your last statement “Behold, privilege in its natural habitat.”. THe internet? The blogosphere? Do you mean, “look at this guy, born in the first world with the privilege of owning a computer and expressing his opinions on a blog”?

  14. 16

    John Phillips/AmericanSatan you should not feel ashamed at the actions of others. You don’t own the sins of your racial, gender or cultural group in any way. You are only responsible for your own actions. You didn’t make the world – you just live in it.

    And because I live in it, I benefit from systemic inequity in almost every fucking thing I do, including walking down the street. If I want the world to become a fairer place than the one I was born into, I have to go out of my way to make that happen, because I am empowered to do so.

    I am not a particularly sensitive guy (to the criticisms of others) – so do not be concerned that I am being over-sensitive. I am actually more concerned about you and people like you

    I don’t need your concern. As for people like me, I think I know what you mean by that.

    comments like “…if you feel personally pigeon-holed or derided, yeah, this is probably meant for you.” are NOT helpful. I think I’d call that insinuation. Too much of it going on.

    It wasn’t an insinuation, unlike my last comment. It was an assertion. This post is, probably, meant for you. By which I mean…

    “The ad nauseum propagandistic bullshit that atheist/secularist/freethought circles are magically exempt from institutional racism, sexism and heterosexism…”
    Who actually says this? These are new institutions in the main. As institutions they have no explicit racism, sexism or heterosexism. Perhaps you mean that some members bring psychological baggage with them from older institions, that really are institutionally racist, sexist, heterosexist etc. That is not institutional. It means you have a problem with racist, sexist and heteronormative behaviour from individuals within this community. That is a critically different thing.

    You are the beneficiary of institutional racism and sexism everywhere in western culture that has institutions. As to who said that? I SAID IT, before I became aware that a great many atheists are ignorant fucking jerks.

    I just assumed (Ass, U, Me) that not believing in shit like the bible and having faith in the liberal line was sufficient to innoculate me from being an oppressive jerk. I have said as much in the past. But most systemic oppression isn’t written into the rules. The rules are written in ways that allow or encourage it to happen.

    if I were a rapist do you think being scolded would make a difference? What if I were tell you now not to murder or steal because it’s wrong? You’d think I was an idiot!

    Most rapes are acquaintance rapes. Many of the rapists probably don’t think of themselves as rapists because they haven’t been properly educated about what the fuck rape is, or what societal bullshit they’ve been soaked in that allowed them to be blind to that in the first place. So saying “Don’t rape, fellas,” -especially when followed with specific education- IS a very good idea.

    And I don’t understand your last statement “Behold, privilege in its natural habitat.”

    Its natural habitat is the words of a self-righteous “white, male, 52 year old.” I have privilege, you have privilege, Sikivu actually has a little bit of privilege as an educated American, but not much here. The point is that you and I are the natural habitat of privilege, which is why we need to educate ourselves about that and change.

  15. 17

    Wow Satan, so it’s OK to call me a jerk? You want a fair and kinder society but you abuse someone who disagrees with you. Is that because I’m a privileged white male? I have no emotional response of course. I am simply a cold-blooded “predator beyond belief”. I don’t think I had ever seen so many “jerks” and “douche-bags” and the like thrown around until I came to these boards. And they are thrown with such zeal and confidence. You don’t see any irony in simultaneously wanting a fairer world and hurling vile insults toward someone whi has done you no harm.

    I agree with you that there are systemic problems in society – honestly, I do. But I see people who behave like you as part of the problem, and people who behave as I do as part of the solution. I don’t see that feeling guilt for things I am not responsible for as a solution. I put apologizing for crimes I have not committed in the same category (useless!). I don’t see any value in humiliating public displays of faux self-flagellation. I wonder who actually does more to achieve a fairer society – a self-righteous, meretricious social justice warrior such as you, or me. I am sure I can work productively for a better world without crass ostentation.

    I think bullying comes in a variety of forms – and humanity has a deep problem with it. I don’t think that bullying is divided along such clear gender and racial lines as you believe. I work for an organisation that has layers and layers of nasty, stupid bureacrats driving it. I don’t see any racial or gender distinction amongst the bullies I deal with daily.

  16. 18

    I don’t get into these exchanges very often, in part because I’m very busy and it takes me a long time to respond to stuff like I did in the last post. I’m just not the kind of writer that can fire these things off. The other reason is that it’s emotionally taxing. Plus I already said about everything I had to say. Any more clarification of my position you can derive from googling “Social Justice 101.”

    Did you see me flagellate myself, faux-ly or otherwise, or is that just what you imagine people like me doing? I don’t hate myself for being white. That’s a silly right wing stereotype. As for calling SJ warriors bullies for calling out injustice, that’s like calling progressives intolerant for calling out intolerance. I’m not saying you’re stupid, but you are saying a stupid thing.

    Meretricious can imply dishonest, and I assure you that I am not. But another meaning can be that I make a case with surface appeal that is rotten within. I can see how a right wing douche would say that about any progressive position motivated by compassion. I’m not saying you’re a right wing douche, but you’re saying the kind of things they say.

    As for insults and rudeness, that – I think – was the worst thing a person could say about Sikivu’s delivery above. It was a bit rude. But ya know what? She has a right to be pissed.

    The last thing I will say before I stick the flounce is that Sikivu didn’t say you are a “Predator Beyond Belief” – unless you’re Ben Radford or Michael Shermer or DJ Grothe or an as-yet-unnamed authority figure in the skeptic or atheist movements that either A) Actively victimizes people or B) Protects those who do. Your “too much insinuation” comment leads me to guess that you are defending Michael Shermer, in which case,

    There’s a locked thread with 4,112 comments on this network that may be educational to you. have a nice day.

  17. 19

    Thanks for the reply, but it contains insinuation after insinuation I am afraid. You struggle to comprehend that someone can be left wing, believe in social justice, yet find your MO vile. It must hurt. It would be easier for you if i was a right wing mysoginist racist doing a bit of trolling – but alas, no. I am a person who cares for justtice deeply – and HENCE do not agree with the ideology being agressively plied on this site. Understand – HENCE.

    Now, by meretricious i did mean dishonest – I did not mean meritorious. It means phony. It doesn’t mean that you are deliberately dishonest – but the message is still dishonest and false.

    As for rudeness, I wasn’t just referring to the blogger – i was referring to you and all the members here who throw around insults like candy. Plenty of people have the right to be pissed – no one has the right to randomly insult people who don’t align with their ideology.

    And as for the “real” predators you mention…are they? Are you happy to mark Shermer that way based on anonymous, unsubstantiated rumour? Is it that he is a white privileged male that you can do so so carelessly?

  18. 20

    Really Garrett? White cis male is going to try to tone police people of color and women for being pissed off at douches like you? Yeah I said douche, something irritating, possibly harmful and not needed. You’re so failing to realize the privileged space you’re speaking from that you’re whining about insults when you’re attempting to infantalize people trying to have a discussion about social justice issues.

    I’m glad that someone here is trying to educate you maybe you should listen finally, go educate yourself on your privilege and figure your shit out before you come into a space like this and spew your bullshit all over the place.

    Here I’ll even give you a place to start:
    http://www.amptoons.com/blog/files/mcintosh.html

  19. 21

    You struggle to comprehend that someone can be left wing, believe in social justice, yet find your MO vile.

    Oh no, Gareth Bridges, I have totally no problem understanding people like you.
    I’ve been born and raised by them. People so convinced in their own righteousness that they are oh so very hurt should somebody suggest that they still urinate piss instead the milk of human kindness.
    Yeah, I’ve seen it way too often.

    Are you happy to mark Shermer that way based on anonymous, unsubstantiated rumour?

    Really, can’t you even get the basic facts right?
    An unnamed source* is not “anonymous”, a first hand testimony is not “unsubstantiated rumour”.
    But I’ll take a leaf out of Stephanie’s book and ask you straight away:
    If everything is exactly the way multiple source tell us about Shermer, what kind of evidence could the victims now produce that would satisfy you?

    Is it that he is a white privileged male that you can do so so carelessly?

    Is it physically possible for your brain to entertain a different thought? Like “could it be that him being a cis white straight educated middle class guy has shielded him for years in a way no black man would have been shielded?” Or “could it be that I’m automatically defending him, trusting his account over that of the woman because he’s so much like me?”

    *But personally know to the named author who is, in turn, putting his reputation and future on the line

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