skepticon

A Skepticon Retrospective: From Crasher to Speaker

Eli Heina, 5 Comments

I attended my first Skepticon in 2012. Jen McCreight happened to be in the same carpool as me. The night before, she told us that she had a workshop that she wasn’t quite into the idea of facilitating. I joked about taking it from her and she suggested that we could co-facilitate it. That workshop ended up going swimmingly and Jenn went from my hero to my hero and my friend.

Funnily enough, I crashed another workshop at last year’s Skepticon. Faisal Saeed Al Mutar did one on Islam and modernity. Due to technical issues, the original ex-Muslim woman he wanted to bring in for another perspective could not be Skyped in as planned, so he invited me to sit in with him for his Q&A. Towards the end of the weekend, I told Lauren Lane (one of the many tireless people who make Skepticon happen) that I ought to have my own workshop. That Monday, I emailed her with the subject line “First!” asking for one.

What I got was far, far more than that.

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A Skepticon Retrospective: From Crasher to Speaker
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Skepticon Is Nigh: A Tale Told in Reaction Images

Eli Heina, 2 Comments

If you follow me on social media, you’ll know how beyond stoked I am for this weekend. In but a few short hours, I will be boarding the flight that will be the first leg of my journey out to Springfield, MO, where I will be not only presenting my first workshop after two years of crashing others’ but also speaking at the Skepticon.

a cat with the caption (heavy breathing)

Inorite?

My workshop is on Becoming & Being One of the Cool Kids Online. It will cover the weirdness that is being a skepto-atheist-secular-SJW-type who uses the interwebs.

Attention online is a mixed bag, as we will discuss.

Because getting attention online is complicated, we’ll be talking history and theory but also brainstorming strategies and plans of action.

My talk is called Simple Pleasures: It’s Complicated.

I will also be decked out to the nines for the benefit of all beholding, but especially my dance partners (you could be one!), at SkeptiProm / Dino Prom.

the singer from Future Islands doing a kind of awkward yet kind of hot jig-dance

The aforementioned decking-out will take place at my hotel room, where I will be allowing in people (within reason) to borrow make-up and jewelry, as well as get help with the application of the former.

Elsa striding in her cool (see what I did there?) new outfit, captioned

It is so on.

For once, I am taking my laptop with me to con, and I’m committed to posting at least one update during all the excitement. I do tend to post things on social media, as well, so you can peek there for livetweeting and other updates.

Skepticon Is Nigh: A Tale Told in Reaction Images