Atheism Plus/Free Thought Blogs (FTB)

[Recovering Agnostic]

And that's what I wonder most about A+: whether they realize that in their strident pursuit of Social Justice™, they are actually turning off decent people who would otherwise be interested in social justice (lowercase), and making them throw their hands up and say "If that's what social justice is, then I want no part of it."

This is my greatest concern. Rather than creating a big tent for people who have an interest in various forms of social justice, it's become a ghetto which is marginalising that discussion and even breeding resentment against the cause among the very people who ought to have been natural allies.

 

[s_pepys]

This is my greatest concern. Rather than creating a big tent for people who have an interest in various forms of social justice, it's become a ghetto which is marginalising that discussion and even breeding resentment against the cause among the very people who ought to have been natural allies.

steve novella replies back to pz. jeez, this is boiling up a bit.

http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/pz-replies/

lxxx

 

[s_pepys]

steve novella replies back to pz. jeez, this is boiling up a bit.

http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/pz-replies/

lxxx

and finally, i think? for now, pz replies again.

http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2013/02/01/atheists-are-skeptics/

my thoughts on this little disagreement are that novella seems quite reasonable and holding out an olive branch. pz is ranting, swearing and misrepresenting novellas points in a terribly ugly way. just my opinion.

lxxx

 

[s_pepys]

and finally, i think? for now, pz replies again.

http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2013/02/01/atheists-are-skeptics/

my thoughts on this little disagreement are that novella seems quite reasonable and holding out an olive branch. pz is ranting, swearing and misrepresenting novellas points in a terribly ugly way. just my opinion.

lxxx

just for fun and cos this atheism plus thread. here is their take on the discussions.

http://atheismplus.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=3830

lxxx

 

[Mr. Scott]

[
This is a direct link to the most relevant section below

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=W014KhaRtik#t=656s

This is cool because RW only mentions sexual trolling from theists here. After Elevatorgate, her sexual trolls morph into atheists. Is it possible some of her sexual trolls cold be theists claiming the be atheists? I can imagine why they would do that, but I'd be a conspiracy theorist until evidence of that comes up, but maybe it's at least in part the real false flag I keep sensing.

 

[Verklagekasper]

steve novella replies back to pz. jeez, this is boiling up a bit.

http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/pz-replies/

lxxx

So PZ complains that atheism wasn't regarded and theism isn't shunned enough by skeptics.
Well, Richard Dawkins has always been a popular and valued speaker at skeptic events. Martin Gardner, a believer in a god, became a skeptic icon. Skeptics have no reason to shun either of them. Because, even though their views on religion couldn't be more oppsite, skeptics profit/profited from both of them. The latter can't be said about PZ. He's just not in the same league. And it is unlikely that his attempts to turn secular movements into soap operas about himself and some selected feminists will ever bring him the desired fame.

 

[Stout]

This is my greatest concern. Rather than creating a big tent for people who have an interest in various forms of social justice, it's become a ghetto which is marginalising that discussion and even breeding resentment against the cause among the very people who ought to have been natural allies.

That's been my experience with SJWs as well. It becomes all about who is more correct, who is better at "calling out" instances of isms be they real or perceived. A classic trick it to start with the assumption that everyone, read society, thinks a certain way and apply that supposed thought pattern to people who aren't quite as "committed" to the cause.

See the demands that Aplussers put on their allies for their pet causes. they want nothing more than lapdogs.

So.....

Now the shooting of "trolls" is done. All dissenting opinion purged save a couple of contrarians who A+ will keep aroud for entertainment. No more audience, no lurkers to write to save us critics.

It's ging to be back to the comments section in the blogosphere.

 

[Rrose Selavy]

Double Plus Atheism?

We are at war with rich old white men. We have always been at war with rich old white men.

Unless they are called PZed.

The story seems otherwise very familiar.
If I had slightly more coding chops than I do — which is to say “any at all” — I’d put together a web-based quiz game in which you’d be presented with an odious bit of misogynistic abuse, and you’d have to guess the source: Fundamentalist Muslim Ideologue or Western Male Netizen.
It would be a really difficult game.

Yep. The Western Male Netizen is now no better than the "Fundamentalist Religious Ideologue" You heard it here on PZee's blog (feb 4th) .
The commenters then gleefully dance around that well known misogynist white male Netizen Richard Dawkin's "Dear Muslima" remark.

 

[qwints]

I liked a lot of what Novella had to say in his post. I disagree with Novella's caution in applying skepticism to the empirical claims inherent in political and religious worldviews:

Regarding politics – I acknowledge that science can address empirical claims within political discussion. It is extremely difficult, however, to tease apart value judgments from politics, and the value judgments themselves are not objectively resolvable.

I'm biased because I live in Texas, but I find it really easy to distinguish the empirical claims about scientific and historical facts made by the Texas Board of Education from their value judgments. I also think that groups like the Texas Freedom Network are able to challenge both the claims and the values effectively.

 

[zooterkin]

I liked a lot of what Novella had to say in his post. I disagree with Novella's caution in applying skepticism to the empirical claims inherent in political and religious worldviews:

The part you quoted doesn't say anything about caution when applying skepticism to empirical claims.

 

[Rrose Selavy]

I bet it smelled refreshingly sweet, compared to the Atheism+ movement.

Trigger warning:

I'd give it a bit , mate. I've just been in there and it needs another flush...

 

[qwints]

zooterkin, see this section from the blog post itself. Novella feels it is important to "tread carefully" in political areas for a few reasons - strategic, personal style and (from the other quote) the difficulty of disentangling value judgments from empirical claims.

All of these issues incorporate empirical claims at some level. Can a woman’s body “shut down” pregnancy from rape? No. What does the evidence have to say about the relationship between specific gun control policies and gun violence? What are the risks posed by GM crops? What is the cost-benefit of recycling paper? Should we outlaw the hunting and shooting of Bigfoot? (Sorry, couldn’t resist.)

However, I do personally feel that it is important to tread carefully on such issues – at least for me, because I choose to cultivate a politically neutral skeptical approach. Others choose to do the same. This is partly strategic (maximizing outreach) and partly just personal style. Still others choose to promote skepticism alongside liberalism or libertarianism – good for them. That’s their choice.

 

[qwints]

See the demands that Aplussers put on their allies for their pet causes. they want nothing more than lapdogs.

I'm not sure what this statement is referring to. Are you talking about the argument that those personally affected by an issue should have the most say in how to resolve it?

But that was back when I foolishly thought social justice simply meant providing equal opportunities for everyone.

How would you define equal opportunities? For example, does this study mean that society is not providing equal opportunities for everyone?

It was in those naive, carefree days before I realized that social justice also apparently entails unwavering devotion to, and violent defense of, über-left political dogma;

I can't speak to people favoring social justice in general, but there's a wide spectrum of political positions on atheismplus. I'm also not familiar with any members committing violent acts in defense of über-left political dogma. Are there events I should know about?

ridiculous policing of thoughts and words to expunge anything that could ever be remotely construed, no matter how irrationally or at however great a stretch, to be the tiniest bit offensive to even the most demonstrably unbalanced person (provided that person is a member of some marginalized minority);

How offensive does something have to be before it's okay to care about its impact? The cumulative impact of a lot of slightly offensive things can create a hostile environment.

adoption of an entire new vocabulary full of made-up pronouns and catch phrases to demonstrate how deep in the in-group one is;

How do you feel about previous efforts to make English more gender neutral - firefighter instead of fireman for example?

and most importantly, a large dose of self-loathing for my gender, ethnicity, age, socioeconomic class, sexual preference, physical capabilities, level of comfort with my own physiology,

Recognizing the privileges those attributes gave you isn't self loathing. As a simple example, consider the widely seen double standard between promiscuous men and promiscuous women. Is observing the different treatment hating men?

And that's what I wonder most about A+: whether they realize that in their strident pursuit of Social Justice™, they are actually turning off decent people who would otherwise be interested in social justice (lowercase), and making them throw their hands up and say "If that's what social justice is, then I want no part of it."

The "you're turning off the moderates" argument has a long and sordid history. Changing systemic discrimination isn't supposed to be easy.

 

[Donna Noble]

Because of its name I naively thought Atheism+ might be a good forum to write on, so I joined up with little previous knowledge of it. My first comment didn't get past the moderator and earned an instant ban. My crime? A two sentence comment. This is it: 'Richard Dawkins is entitled to his opinion. There is this thing called freedom of speech.' It was a response to a nasty thread that was STILL raving on about Rebecca Watperson and the 'coffee invitation=rape' elevator incident. When I tried to go back on, there was an enraged response from the moderator telling me I 'didn't know what the hell I was talking about,' along with a threat of 'punishment' via my ISP address. WTF??! I was certainly barking up the wrong tree. I discovered afterwards that the forum was set up to be an ANTI Richard Dawkins site. It's run by radical feminists (hence the enraged response to my naive comment). I had wondered why there didn't seem to be any debate when I initially looked it over. Everyone appeared to be of a like mind, and there was intense moderator scrutiny that put me in mind of '1984' and its 'Ministry of Truth'. Apparently no comment is allowed that disagrees with the agenda of the site. I consider myself to be 'feminist' (just rational and reasonable really), but I would never associate with those extremists. They need to change the name of the forum to, 'Feminist radicals against Richard Dawkins' (Feminazis actually).

 

[theprestige]

I would expect Atheism++ to be more object-oriented.

So objectifying RW would be considered a feature, not a bug?

 

[Antiquehunter]

So objectifying RW would be considered a feature, not a bug?

Oh, the pith!

 

[Donna Noble]

I was just wondering what the comment prior to yours meant.

 

[Hokulele]

I was just wondering what the comment prior to yours meant.

They are making jokes in reference to Object Oriented Programming (OOP) languages, one of the most well-known ones being C++. An OOP language treats what are normally intangible concepts as if they were objects with properties. For example, to allow someone using your software to tell the computer, "I am happy with all of the options shown here, please print now." you can create a dialog box with buttons for those people to click. Although a "button" looks and acts like a "thing" in a software program, there really isn't anything physical there, the programmer is just treatnig like an object.

In other words, the programmer is "objectifying" concepts, which, if you equivocate a bit, is exactly what Rebecca objects to.

 

[dasmiller]

So objectifying RW would be considered a feature, not a bug?

Unless she's better in abstract.

 

[RandFan]

SAnd that's what I wonder most about A+: whether they realize that in their strident pursuit of Social Justice™, they are actually turning off decent people who would otherwise be interested in social justice (lowercase), and making them throw their hands up and say "If that's what social justice is, then I want no part of it."

This is my greatest concern. Rather than creating a big tent for people who have an interest in various forms of social justice, it's become a ghetto which is marginalising that discussion and even breeding resentment against the cause among the very people who ought to have been natural allies.

This ^^^^

My way or the highway is not helpful. RW and her ilk have been poisonous to there own cause. I have a daughter. I do not want her to ever be harassed. I don't want any woman to feel harassed at any event in any venue. But I strongly disagree with the absolutism emanating from that sub group.