One of the most painful lessons I’ve learned over the past several months is that there are no heroes. There is always — always — some measure, small or large, of disappointment hiding behind all the awesome things that drew you to idolize one person or another.
Of course, while I always thought of Dawkins as a science popularizer and atheist first, and a humanist dead last, I figured this latest Great Sorting of the skeptical and atheist communities into those that are down with social justice causes and those that would rather entrench themselves in privilege would pretty much end exactly this way. The hyper-privileged folks nearest the top of our movement have pretty uniformly fallen on one side of this divide — the side that would rather not skeptically examine ideas like social conventions, consent, harassment policies and protecting the underprivileged.
So it’s absolutely no surprise to me that Dawkins has, again, sided against Skepchick — this time, instead of writing a “Dear Muslima” comment at Rebecca Watson (telling her that the sexism she encounters isn’t nearly as bad as female genital mutilation, so she should grow up or get a thicker skin), he’s stabbing at Skepchick the organization for a) being on board with the idea of harassment policies, and b) for having written a post last year offering free vaccinations with hugs as your reward.
[blackbirdpie id=”223116208835272705″]
(How heartwarming is this Skepchick open invitation to “HUG ME at TAM”! http://tinyurl.com/6za5gxa . Spontaneous! Carefree! Rule-free! Delightful!)
He was asked to clarify by probably dozens of people — and dozens of people heaped derision at his “timely” reply to the issue in order to smear Skepchick’s credibility as hypocrites, even if it would damage the vaccination campaign in the process. He “clarified”:
[blackbirdpie id=”223125658870611968″]
(I VERY strongly support the vaccine campaign. And I support spontaneous hugs governed by ordinary unwritten rules of politeness. Problem?)
The funny thing is, it doesn’t take a particularly sharp mind to be able to square that circle — first, put aside your predisposition that suddenly Skepchick is all about sex-negativity, or about requiring consent via consent forms written in triplicate, or any other antifeminist trope you’ve heard about them. Skepchick is very much a sex-positive organization. They are also very pro-consent. It is not difficult to be both — if you foster one, you pretty much must foster the other, because if you don’t, people will be almost invariably hurt.
He walked some of this back, because people got the wrong impression of what he was saying. Some people thought he does not support the efforts to increase herd immunity. So he said the following:
[blackbirdpie id=”223144235589828608″]
(Please support http://hugmeimvaccinated.org . Epidemics are nonlinearly favoured if vax nos fall below a threshold. Spread the meme not the disease )
This was a good, strong message, and in isolation, absolutely correct. It’s just a shame that he decided to — now, suddenly, shortly before TAM 10, and using what he thinks is a gotcha moment from a blog post in 2011 — take this stab at Skepchick.
It is an emotive argument about the morality of expecting consent before actions are taken involving other people, and one predicated on paper-thin evidence. It is so far beneath Dawkins that it serves only to undercut his image as a rationalist in my eyes — not that I was any longer under any delusion that he is a pure rationalist. It is similar in scope and in vector to his last stab at a Skepchick, in suggesting that these unwritten rules are all it takes to prevent people from doing nasty things, and that anything that DOES happen must be dealt with via the panacea of a “thicker skin”.
Offering free, spontaneous hugs to people is perfectly fine. There was a very strong harassment policy at CONvergence, and a sur-policy for the FtB and Skepchick party rooms at the convention, and I got more hugs there than anywhere else at the entire convention. Every one of them was enthusiastically consented-to as far as I can tell, and if anyone was being significantly put-upon, they would have had every right and every recourse to ameliorate that situation.
Offering hugs as a reward for vaccination is a nice idea, but at the same time, it’s well within the rights of the person who gets a vaccine to forgo the hug. And in fact, some people are even bothered by the very offer of a hug, so those people must needs make that apparent before they partake in the free vaccination services offered, because the whole event is predicated on something that might be to them a trigger, if not a simple preference.
And setting the expectation that hugs are pre-consented (and in a limited fashion — the post he linked to says one hug per vaccination!) is absolutely not an undercutting of the idea that one needs to obtain consent before performing an action. The thing about consent is that it is often negotiated by the neurotypical without verbalizing or formalizing. One can offer a hug by opening one’s arms, and letting the other person approach if they choose. Neuro-atypical folks can explicitly request verbal consent if they are unskilled at those practices, as well. Even asking or motioning, though, crosses some people’s comfort barriers, so setting the expectation — verbally, via that blog post and via the title of the campaign — that hugs are on the table explicitly, and in advance, actually does people like that a huge service.
To be clear, and frank, I am seriously disheartened that Richard Dawkins feels the need to take swipes at Skepchick over concerns that completely buy into the least charitable framings of the issues at hand. I honestly thought that Dawkins would be more intellectually curious and rigorous than to conflate a demand for consent in the form of harassment policies, with sex-negativity in the form of deriding “spontaneity” and lionizing “unwritten rules”, the way he has in this instance. It’s terribly unskeptical, and it exposes a very large blind spot in an otherwise intelligent and rational actor.
I know there are no heroes. I just wish some of the people that I want to look up to, could stop proudly displaying the unheroic bits like so many peacock feathers.
Jason, I want to again note your first:
“One of the most painful lessons I’ve learned over the past several months is that there are no heroes.”
and last sentences:
“I know there are no heroes. I just wish some of the people that I want to look up to, could stop proudly displaying the unheroic bits like so many peacock feathers.”
I believe that to be the theme of your post and that you used the Dawkins controversy as an illustration.
The vast majority of comments were in reaction to your illustration and not to the theme that you began and ended with.
I think the quantity and feelings displayed in these reactions illustrate the importance of your theme.
A ‘painful lesson’? perhaps but in my view an extremely important one, and one not easy to fully own. And I am not speaking as one who claims to have successfully tanken it on board.
Thanks for bringing this up.
Please, stop playing evo-psych-armchair-scientist.
How about the fact that our world is ripe with heroes? From the first fairy-tale to the latest movie.
Giliell,
Yes, the world is ‘rife’ as you put it with gods, heroes, fairytales etc.
But some people are into it much more than others.
What do you think is the source of differences? I will probably not want to censor your opinion if made in good faith, but only wish to consider it.
I was planning on attending the FFRF conference this year because Dawkins is scheduled I am now rethinking this.
Unbelievable! First Dawkins thinks that because he’s only dealing with some woman (not an important man like PZ who he has dealt with directly on many occasions, just someone to be ignored), someone who is barely known compared to his fame that he can just drop in a condescending swipe while PRETENDING to complement her, after he fucked things up by waltzing in to a discussion he didn’t understand WITHOUT taking the time to do the reading and understand what people are saying and just be a sarcastic mansplaining shipdit.
Now we get a bunch of privileged dudes in here going “Come on! He was nice as well isn’t that enough for you?” or WORSE “It’s not even an insult, just calm down [you silly girl – implied], there’s nothing to make a fuss about.
Seriously FUCK OFF.
No he’s go a good point. Stop trying to pry way into this. He’s not a deity and never tried to be. There are many possible meanings to a tweet like this and it really doesn’t look for a second like he said anything less than cool.
Sarah,
Let us set the emotional outbursts, harsh language and cries for exclusion of differing views aside, and instead take a look at the consequences of seeing Dawkins’ very clear support as an attack: Consider the close to a million-and-a-half people who are now aware of the campaign.
What did they get out of this twitter-exchange? That Skepchicks think praising their efforts is really bashing them, and that Skepchicks cannot offer a simple apology, if they make a mistake.
Almost one and a half million people could have been reached with a positive message, but are instead met with an avalanche of misunderstood outrage. I have rarely seen such a miserable example of a botched opportunity.
What a dumbshit article. Stop trying to manufacture drama where there is none. Your interpretation is a crazy ass one that no person in a more sensible state of mind would adopt of these tweets.
No. Dawkins’ “very clear support” came two hours after a sidelong swipe at Skepchick that came out of the blue, and people (including myself) still do not understand the motivation for the attack.
Beyond that, Claus, after that show of support (which came two hours after the attack, note the timestamps!), Elyse, Women Thinking Inc., and Skepchick all thanked him for it.
Ike @79:
TAM’s “policy” doesn’t appear to have been anything more than a paragraph in the program and on a blog post on the website. If they’d had anything even resembling the common and open-source policies that other organizations have been adapting and adopting, he would have had something more than “look at my survey!” to wave around as evidence.
So, having a policy is a good start, but if it’s not properly implemented, it’s not much more than words on paper. It is, however, more than some conventions have or have had, and so that’s a starting point.
Jason,
How did Dawkins *attack* Skepchick? He brought the campaign to the attention of his close to his half a million Twitter-followers, and made it clear that he strongly endorsed it, when asked for clarification.
Claus: you are aware that I spent a thousand words in the post above the comments line examining exactly what he said that people are up in arms over, right? Asking a question that’s answered in the original post is tiresome at absolute best.
I’ll just put this here.
Jason,
Fair enough. I really don’t think your interpretation (and others) is the correct one, so let us agree to disagree.
What about Derren Brown?
Sorry, I should have specified that 114 was in response to Tom @ 111. The intervening posts were not there when I started.
To add to the discussion at hand, I want to point out that a more recent Skepchick post than the year-old one Dawkins tweeted specifically talks about the TAM 2012 vaccine clinic, without emphasizing the “Hug Me” message quite as much. It’s clear to me that Dawkins chose his link very deliberately.
Yes, how dare the man be snarky towards someone who tried to blacklist him?
Skip it, kid. I heard it all before. I read her own writing on the subject. She called for boycotting his books, etc. In the same way that the current imbeciles here wanted D.J. Grothe fired. Same way you lot blacklisted Abbie Smith and tried to stir up trouble with her employer.
What a mean little group of thugs this is.
Saying that you’re not going to buy any books by a person on the topic of feminism is like my threatening you with boycotting your breakfast cereal line. (Assuming you don’t actually make a breakfast cereal line.)
Also, please define “blacklist”. Because I suspect your understanding of the word is lacking.
Sarah,
Your post is full of quite a bit of baseless assumption:
“Unbelievable! First Dawkins thinks that because he’s only dealing with some woman (not an important man like PZ who he has dealt with directly on many occasions, just someone to be ignored),”
Massive, motive conjuring on your part here. And certainly not true. Dawkins has argued, and passionately about the empowerment of women. He clearly values women everywhere and in all movements. If anyone looks silly in the atheist gender wars, it isn’t Dawkins. He hasn’t moved to excommunicate members, or boycott them for holding different opinions than his. RDF still posts links to blogs like Greta Christina, Maryam Namazie, PZ and others.
“someone who is barely known compared to his fame that he can just drop in a condescending swipe while PRETENDING to complement her, after he fucked things up by waltzing in to a discussion he didn’t understand WITHOUT taking the time to do the reading and understand what people are saying and just be a sarcastic mansplaining shipdit.”
Dawkins didn’t “mansplain” he disagreed with Watson, and PZ and gave decent reasons for his disagreement. For this, Watson, and others heaped opprobrium on him, said he was the past etc. THere was the unfortunate hypocritical use of gendered slurs against Dawkins too. You will remember the high minded “Dear Dick” campaign? (Oh but that is just short for Richard, snicker, snicker) Also Dawkins didn’t pretend to compliment Watson. He said he supported their vaccination campaign, and sensible hugs.
“Now we get a bunch of privileged dudes in here going “Come on! He was nice as well isn’t that enough for you?” or WORSE “It’s not even an insult, just calm down [you silly girl – implied], there’s nothing to make a fuss about.”
Quite simply, no “silly girl” is implied. Not even a little bit. If you think there is something about which to complain do so. Dawkins was having a swipe at the hugs policy at AA, and maybe/probably having a little go at Skepchick. Again, given the tendency of Skepchick and its like minded legions to attribute the worst possible character traits to almost anyone who disagrees/opposes them the fact that Dawkins might have a critical word or two seems entirely predictable. In fact he has been much kinder about all this character assassination than, in my opinion, he should be.
“Seriously FUCK OFF.”
No. Why don’t you engage in a meaningful way? Stop demonizing people with whom you disagree. Stop dismissing opposing points of view with terms like mansplainin’ and mysoginist when they clearly don’t apply.
Claus: considering that I said that the supportive tweet (two hours after the attack tweet) was in isolation absolutely correct and laudable, why would I attack Derren Brown for retweeting it? Again, this question would have been answered by my original post.
Max,
Let me save you a lot of pain around here:
That’s pretty standard. One of the first rules of the FTB lot is to assume the worst possible motive of anyone they disagree with. This has, as the Hitch put it, a way of turning any noisy moron into a major commentator.
That’s not the way things are done in these parts. Haven’t you heard? Skepticism isn’t about evidence, but revealed dogma. It’s about the truth handed down, and no evidence is ever required, nor rational thought, just mindless following of the anointed few.
Look, if you want rational discussion, stick with Namazie and Taslima. You won’t find it here.
You will notice something interesting here. That, unlike watson or myers, Dawkins did not even bother to respond to this stuff. Why? Because he is secure in his own contribution. It is precisely because you are dealing with people who contribute nothing and never will that you get this stuff.
…, you do recognize how ironic it is that you’re making nothing but emotive arguments and conflating commenters with an entire community here, right? And that you’re disregarding all of the actual argumentation that went into the original post and many other comments to focus, laser-like, on one commenter who’s angry?
Clearly, a blacklist of the darkest order!
(For my own part, I wouldn’t recommend Dawkins’ books anyway, because I’ve found other writers more engaging on the topic of atheism, and his evolutionary theory is dully mired in arguments of half a century ago. But that’s just me.)
Jason,
I’ve hung around this site for a long time, so I know what this poor sod Max is going to go through. At the start you think, “Hey, great – a site devoted to thinking rationally and discussing things!”. Then he’ll find out that he doesn’t agree 100% with everything and try to discuss it. He’ll then start asking, helplessly, to be engaged rationally about points – that’s the stage he’s at right now. Finally, he’ll learn, as I did, that you might as well be on WorldNetDaily, arguing that Hawaii is not in Kenya, for all the reason you’ll get.
I’ve gone through all that, so I’m just trying to save the kid some trouble.
Blake, yes her antics are pathetic considering the stature of the person she’s trying to go up against. When it came to Abbie Smith, on the other hand, things were a lot nastier, because Miss Smith was more vulnerable. I don’t confuse impotence with virtue.
Jason,
Not quite, since it did not include any reference to Derren. But thank you for your clarification.
I love the “stature” argument, which we also saw with DJ. “How dare you call out someone who’s done so much etc.” Because arguments from authority are so much more valid when skeptics use them.
It’s almost as rich as the willful ignorance of context and subtext, which fuels the whole “friends won’t be able to hug/what about married couples” slippery-sloping as well as the “I don’t see what’s objectionable about Dawkins’ tweets at all!” If there’s one thing I’m skeptical about, it’s that anyone calling themselves “skeptics” could be so obtuse without effort.
@kaboobie: Enlightening and depressing. Good to see that the effort was barely a token, and that Kimbo Jones & Stephanie Zvan’s suspicions (roundly dismissed–“what makes you think they wouldn’t have one this year?”) were well-founded.
Jason,
You wrote “Saying that you’re not going to buy any books by a person on the topic of feminism is like my threatening you with boycotting your breakfast cereal line. (Assuming you don’t actually make a breakfast cereal line.)”
But Rebecca did not merely state that she would not buy Dawkins’ books and attend his lectures. She also encouraged others to do the same.
That’s calling for a general boycott of Dawkins, is it not?
Claus: fair point, while I still think I recall reading something expressly boycotting his books on feminism, I can’t find that now and the blockquote is pretty clear — Rebecca Watson personally will no longer add her weight to any of his activities (talks, books, etc).
I note that she did not ask that others follow suit, though. Unless you believe skeptics are vulnerable to cults of personality (and there’s a lot of evidence in this very thread that that’s the case!), one cannot extrapolate from that a “call to boycott”.
Christ. Anyone ever asks why I hate Dawkins can take a peak at his defenders.
Claus @ 130:
A lot of people retweeted Dawkins’ supportive tweet. One RT I personally saw was from Tim Minchin. Do you expect Jason to chronicle every single retweet?
I’m very glad this little incident ultimately resulted in exponentially greater exposure for hugmeimvaccinated.org. As Jason pointed out, Elyse replied to Dawkins on Twitter to thank him for his support, simply and unequivocally.
Claus: I don’t think Rebecca called for a boycott. I can see how you’d get confused, though, what with strangely ambiguous statements like this:
The rampant ellipsis is having a gay old time conflating behavior that one does themselves and behavior that one has done to them.
Jason,
I am afraid you are mistaken – she did in fact ask that others follow suit.
Here is the actual quote:
“So many of you voiced what I had already been thinking: that this person who I always admired for his intelligence and compassion does not care about my experiences as an atheist woman and therefore will no longer be rewarded with my money, my praise, or my attention. I will no longer recommend his books to others, buy them as presents, or buy them for my own library. I will not attend his lectures or recommend that others do the same. There are so many great scientists and thinkers out there that I don’t think my reading list will suffer.”
http://skepchick.org/2011/07/the-privilege-delusion/
(emphasis mine)
That’s calling for a general boycott of Dawkins, is it not?
Tom,
See my post above.
I’m personally not going to recommend that you go see a Minnesota Twins game. But since I don’t really care about baseball, that lack of recommendation does not indicate that I’m recommending that you not see a Minnesota Twins game.
Do you get the distinction yet, Claus? Because you’re hair-splitting, especially given the PS modifier that Tom Foss pointed out that you’re expressly denying exists by telling Tom Foss to read your blockquote — which came before that modifier.
Crybaby Bigot Trolls:
Translation: I HAVE NO FRIENDS, SO I TROLL FTB. BUT MY MOM SAYS I’M COOL!
Translation: Have I injected my pointless stupid lies into this thread yet. Y’all know you can’t live without me wasting everyone’s time with bullshit.
Translation: be nice to me why I treat you like shit.
So we’ve gone from being “nobodies” to having the power to blacklist Dawkins. My how the mighty have risen!
Translation: I’m a shameless liar!
++
Now for the actually worthwhile people on the thread:
LOL. Too right. It’s almost like they’re so sensitive and irrational that you just can’t talk to them. Funny how, talking about not liking creepy ass dudes treatingyou like their own personal petting zoo is the same as wanting to castrate all men and outlaw sex, but threatening rape and violence for MORE THAN A YEAR because one women said “don’t do that” in an effort to help the clueless stop being creepy ass dudes unintentionally, is totally rational and correct.
LOL. They’re complete morons and I’m glad they have their own little angry bigot movement. Weed out the losers so I can meet someone cool at cons.
And I agree with Fionnabhair – no gods, no masters and all that.
That is just a million pounds of win. Stealing!
I think there’s a difference between “I will not recommend that others attend his lectures” and “I will recommend that others not attend his lectures”. Kind of like atheists often distinguish between “I do not believe that there is a God” and “I believe that there is no God.”.
What you see as “pathetic”, I see as a measured, justifiable, proportionate response.
Yes, that was a nasty business. The nastiness came from the person who injected lofty speech like “Rebeccunt Twatson” into the discourse.
Where do I even start?
You think that the “Dear Muslima” was a reasnable disagreement?
In what universe
And after that, his reasoning was that “elevators aren’t dangerous, they have buttons and doors!”, thereby showing his ignorance of the fact that assaults in elevators happen more often than one could wish for and that doors and buttons are fuck use to you if the agressor is standing in front of them.
You are mistaken, I am not splitting any hairs.
According to Webster’s, a boycott is:
“to engage in a concerted refusal to have dealings with (as a person, store, or organization) usually to express disapproval or to force acceptance of certain conditions”
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/boycott
A lengthier explanation can be found at Oxford Dictionaries:
http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/boycott?q=boycott
If that is not what Rebecca called for, what did she call for, then?
Bear in mind that English is not my first language. I tend to pester those who have English as their first language to educate me on the subtleties. That is, after all, how you truly learn a language (besides the old joke about it being in bed, but…).
nah. Dawkins deserves disrespect because he’s a one-trick pony who Dunnings his Kruger too much in public. And is too much of a complete coward to own up to his ignorance.
That his mindless minions are also whiny bigots who Dunning their Krugers too much in public and troll every blog they can find that isn’t a member of the He-man Woman Haters Club isn’t his fault. That he attracts such people to worship him is. but he’s not sending them to be crybaby bigots peeing themselves all over FTB.
. .. . or is he?
Claus: I have never recommended that anyone attend a Zamfir concert, or purchase a Maserati. Am I engaged in a boycott of those things?
I love(*) that Rebecca Watson gets admonished for “naming and shaming” a person of lesser prominence in atheist/skeptic circles than herself (for the henious crime of quoting what that person wrote publicly under their own name), and is called “pathetic” for criticizing a person of greater “stature”. What a strange game: the only winning move must be not to play.
(*) Footnote: this is sarcastic.
Claus Larson
At the moment I’m not recommending a hell lot of things, for example buying a Toyota. Do you think I just started a boycott?
Claus: A little longer, you’re getting hung up on the difference between personally refusing to do something and calling for others to do the same. I suppose you could call what Rebecca said a “personal boycott,” but the term “boycott”–like “protest”–has connotations of something more organized, intentional, and group-oriented. Rebecca may be personally boycotting Dawkins, in a strict dictionary-definition sense of the word. She explicitly did not organize a boycott or encourage others to join in.
@Blake Stacey: +1
Tom Foss,
You said “I have never recommended that anyone attend a Zamfir concert, or purchase a Maserati. Am I engaged in a boycott of those things?”
That’s a good point (which is the same as Giliell’s). The difference is that, while you have never recommended that anyone attend a Zamfir concert, or purchase a Maserati, have you recommended that people do not attend a Zamfir concert, or purchase a Maserati?
If you have done the former, but not the latter, then you have not encouraged a boycott of either. But, if you did the latter, then you will have encouraged a boycott of either. Just as Rebecca recommended that others did not buy Dawkins’ books, or attended his lectures.
Is this not correct?
You also said “A little longer, you’re getting hung up on the difference between personally refusing to do something and calling for others to do the same. I suppose you could call what Rebecca said a “personal boycott,” but the term “boycott”–like “protest”–has connotations of something more organized, intentional, and group-oriented. Rebecca may be personally boycotting Dawkins, in a strict dictionary-definition sense of the word. She explicitly did not organize a boycott or encourage others to join in.”
I am sorry, but what do you make of her statement “or recommend that others do the same”?
How is that not encouraging others to join in on her personal boycott?
PS. My post 144 was for Jason. Mea Culpa.
Claus: I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt since you state that you are not a native English speaker. So let’s examine this sentence in its totality:
Let’s rearrange it slightly — let’s take “attend his lectures” and use it to replace “do the same” (deleting the superfluous “or”):
Since this scans exactly like the former case we’re all using, and not the latter (e.g. “I will recommend that others not attend his lectures”), your argument is in fact hair-splitting and mistaking lack of recommendation for recommendation against.